Spilled Wine

Erotic short. After observing a magical ritual, a mage more closely observes the priest.

More Cicero Penllwynog with a priest of Dionysus — some post-ritual magical sex! Explicit M/M erotica between two cis men, 2k.

Cicero first appeared in Au Naturale.

Content warnings: age difference (between a nineteen-year-old and a man in his thirties), references to past consensual sex when one party was underage (between the same men) and implied abuse of power, messy sex, drunkenness

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The air in the temple was uncomfortably cool, but it smelt hot — it smelt like ozone, and as Cicero walked from the back of the room, his boots making quiet taps against the polished stone floors, he could feel the heavy weight of it. The air was thick with concentrated power, so much so that when he snapped his fingers he saw a bolt of electricity jump between his thumb and middle finger tips as they broke apart, and the sensation made his skin tingle.

Shaking out his hand, he laughed to himself, and Stravo, who was running a cloth through the wine spilt over the altar, squeezing it over the jug to send the thick, purple liquid falling back into it, grinned at him.

“Don’t tell me we find in the young lordling a new devotee,” said Stravo, and Cicero breathed in, feeling the cool air weigh heavily on his skin even as he tensed and untensed his muscles. The magic in the room was intoxicating, and he knew without looking at himself that his hair had been utterly ruined by the static thrum, no doubt sticking up in all directions.

“If only I could,” said Cicero, “but even power like this won’t bring me to worship. It brings me terribly close, though.”

It was August, and a few hours ago, when Cicero had come into the temple of Dionysus, he’d almost wished he hadn’t made the trip — the air had been hot and humid and sticky then, even before he’d gone into a great stone hall filled to the brim with people. This was a yearly tradition, a scrying of sorts to tell of the year ahead of them, and Cicero had grown more and more bored as the prayer and devotion had gone on and on —

And then, the bit that he and his fellow students had gathered to observe had begun: the magical rites were read, committing the priest — Stravo — and the priestesses gathered to the ritual itself.

It had been awe-inspiring, the way that the whole of the world had seemed to crackle into pieces, magic filling the room so much so that it pushed out everything else, wine-tasting rain falling down from the ceiling in a heavy shower as dead women danced on the walls, and shouted, and whispered, and sang.

It had been wholly uncanny, overwhelming in the best of ways, and Cicero had sat for quite some time on a bench at the back of the room as he’d watched people filter out, many of them with starry-eyed, drunken looks on their faces, his fellow students among them.

Cicero’s Rite and Ritual course was made up of a mix of priests and alchemists, for the most part, but it was of course the Hellenists who were most inspired by this Dionysian display — this was what they were studying for.

Cicero had met Stravo a few times before, though never in his religious capacity, and he found he rather enjoyed his garb — tight leggings that left nothing to the imagination, sandals, and nothing else except for the prodigious hair on his chest — in this situation, so different to the brightly coloured tracksuits he was used to seeing the man in.

Cicero had first met Stravo when, as an irritable sixteen-year-old, he’d been dispatched to Kythira to attend a magical training camp. It had been a great honour to be invited, as they’d invited representatives of all manner of warrior clans and families from all around the world, but battle mages were relatively stationary by nature, and for all Cicero was really quite physically fit, he had not been suited for the challenges set out for him.

Running again and again about a track, flagging further and further behind the various great big demigods from all the world around, Cicero had felt like he was soon to sweat his organs out through his skin, and when he had complained, Stravo had responded by running him faster.

The first week had been quite the exercise in humiliation for Cicero and other more lightly-built fighters — other battle mages, archers, assassins, poisoners — until it had come to the point where they were all in the arenas with one another, fighting with weapons of their choice, and brawn and speed didn’t count for everything.

Cicero had won half a dozen bouts before Stravo had taken him down to the beach to reward him, and they’d stayed in loose touch ever since — more so, in fact, than Cicero particularly stayed in touch with any of the others he’d met at the camp, although that was no surprise.

He’d never much got on with people his own age.

Stravo gestured with two fingers for Cicero to walk closer. “How close?” he asked, voice laden with such implication that it was as thick and heavy as the earth, and when Cicero stepped within reach, Stravo dropped the cloth aside and pulled at the fastening of Cicero’s clothes, first dropping aside his belt before he unhooked the front of his outer robe and pushed it off his shoulders. His under robe was little more than a muslin blouse on the top end, worn to keep the reinforced fabric of his outer one from rubbing or dragging at his skin, but the skirts were just as heavy as those of his outer robe, and Stravo was impatient with the lacing over Cicero’s belly.

“You know, it isn’t the twelfth century any longer,” said Stravo irritably. “You battle mages could stand to wear simpler armour. Never heard of a zip?”

“When a stray fireball hits a zip, darling, it fuses together, and some poor squire has to cut me out of my clothes, not that he’d complain, I’m sure,” said Cicero, leaning in closer, breathing on the other man’s mouth and smelling the wine, thicker than blood, that stained his lips purple. “Sometimes, the old ways are best.”

Cicero took pity on him, reaching up and undoing the central clasp holding his under robe closed at his sternum, and Stravo shoved it from his shoulders with no small show of prejudice before, without ceremony — and yet, given that he was a priest and they were within a temple, Cicero supposed with more ceremony than usual circumstances would dictate — he picked Cicero up by the hips and thrust him back over the altar.

Stravo was not an especially tall man, but his body was dense and strong: all his strength was in the core, protected by the rounded curve of his gut, and Cicero reached out, grasping his forearms and then sliding his hands up to the fatter, more muscled curves of his upper arms, feeling the muscle twitch and shift as he squeezed.

Stravo could flip a car with ease — Cicero had seen him to do so — but it was nice to think one appealed more than an old Ford Fiesta bound for the scrapyard, and Cicero allowed himself a moment to admire Stravo’s chest, the carefully waxed and groomed hair on his chest but not on his belly, the artfully edged lines of his stubbled jaw.

“Is that sweat or olive oil?” asked Cicero as he slid his palm over the glistening, slightly slick surface of Stravo’s chest, and Stravo laughed, his belly shaking with the movement in a way that made Cicero shiver with anticipation.

“Taste and find out,” said Stravo, but before Cicero could lean to do so, Stravo was kissing him, shoving him onto his back on the cold marble surface. He could feel wine sticking to his body as Stravo leaned over him, but more than that, he could feel the lingering thrum of the altar — it was hot and cold at once, so much magic having been channelled through it, and he moaned as Stravo slid his cock inside him in one smooth movement, slick and easy and hard.

Cicero gasped into Stravo’s mouth, wrapping his legs as best he could around Stravo’s waist to pull him deeper, and he moaned when Stravo leaned his weight over Cicero’s, pinning him down against the table. Between the hard, unyielding stone and the wonderful weight and strength of Stravo’s body, Cicero experienced a sensation of utter, sensational powerlessness, and when Stravo’s hips slapped against Cicero’s arse, the sound was wonderful — better was the crackle of ambient energy that was spurred to life by the movement, and sent an electric tingle directly up Cicero’s spine.

His cock gave a sudden pulse as he heaved in a gasp, raking his fingers down Stravo’s back, and he tipped his head back, moaning incoherently as Stravo leaned to lick up some of the wine sticking to Cicero’s shoulder.

Stravo tipped one of the small jugs over, and Cicero let out a shout of surprise, then moaned, as cold wine was spattered over his chest, but Stravo dipped to follow its splash, drinking it from the divot between Cicero’s pecs and the hollow of his collarbone as though he were a man made of cups.

Crushed between his own belly and Stravo’s, Cicero’s cock was enveloped in slick, oiled heat, and he whined as Stravo changed his angle somewhat, sending more sparks up his spine as the sound of the slaps heightened in volume and speed alike, and the change in angle hammered directly past his prostate in a way that had him seeing stars.

“Are you trained to fuck like this?” asked Cicero headily, feeling drunk even before Stravo caught him by the lips and transferred wine between their mouths: it was so strong Cicero felt that he was swimming in it, its sweet depth running over his tongue, and although the wine was thick, it was easier than water to swallow. Cicero felt hot all over, his whole body flushing, and Stravo laughed: he slapped his mighty hands down either side of Cicero’s head, sending wine and oil splashing and sparking more crackling electricity, too, and Cicero giggled senselessly, arching his back for more. “Priests?”

“Only priests of Dionysus,” said Stravo.

“Well, I expect the priests of every temple say the same thing for themselves,” said Cicero, dizzy, and he opened his mouth as Stravo poured wine directly from the jug and into his mouth, swallowing. There was too much of it, and some of it flowed over his cheeks, his chin, down his throat: Stravo’s mouth followed the mess, and Cicero choked out a sound as he sucked a mark into the side of his neck.

Cicero’s orgasm came sudden and hard and wonderfully, his cock jerking and pulsing where it was squeezed between their two bodies, and Stravo, wonderfully — typically — did not stop, but fucked him harder.

Cicero was drunk and laughing, a sort of overwhelming heat and strange, springy overstimulation radiating out from his very core, and he gave himself over it, let himself ride the dream-like wave of pure sensation, and cast his thoughts to the four winds.

Time thinned and went filmy at its edges, and Cicero had no idea how long had passed when Stravo finally pulled out and came over Cicero’s belly, grinning at the way his come marked Cicero’s stomach, his thighs, his cock.

When Cicero raised his head, he felt the drunken lurch of his inner ear, and laughed, sitting up clumsily on his elbows to watch Stravo tuck his cock back into his leggings and pick up the rag he’d been cleaning with earlier, rubbing it now over Cicero’s skin.

“You’d be a wonderful priest,” said Stravo despairingly. “You give yourself over so easily to the flow.”

“By that logic, I’d be a wonderful sacrifice,” said Cicero, and Stravo laughed, kissing the inside of his knee.

“I just fucked you on the altar plinth. What do you think you are?”

“A helpful volunteer,” said Cicero, and dispensed with trying to keep his head up, falling back on the altar again and letting Stravo scrub his way around him. Stravo must have drunk at least two thirds of the jug, and yet he wasn’t even slow as he moved, barely seemed drunk at all, and Cicero sighed blissfully.

“How are your new classes going?” asked Stravo, so casually that it took Cicero by surprise, and he began to laugh.

“Very well, as you can see,” he said, and picked up the jug, drinking directly from it before he sprawled back out again.