Chapter Text
zero-sum game
noun: a situation in which one person or group can win something only by causing another person or group to lose it
-Oxford Dictionary
a·byss
noun: 1. a deep or seemingly bottomless chasm.
"a rope led down into the dark abyss"
Similar: chasm, gorge, ravine, canyon, fissure, rift, crevasse, gap, hole,
gulf, pit, depth, cavity, void
2. a wide or profound difference between people; a gulf.
"the abyss between the two nations"
3. the regions of hell conceived of as a bottomless pit.
"Satan's dark abyss"
-Oxford Dictionary
“You’ve got my heart in a headlock
You stopped the blood and made my head soft
And God knows
You’ve got me sewn” -The Feeling
***
Will’s footsteps echoed as he slowly walked around Hannibal.
His presence surrounded the older man, this evening’s prey for his sadism, his insatiable, pained and smiling need for dominance… to punish the ultimate sinner. The one who belonged to him.
The Chesapeake Ripper, Dr. Hannibal Lecter, Il Mostro.
That monster, with his chin raised only by exerting most of his remaining strength, was compelled to strive for this difficult achievement because it gave him the best chance of seeing Will at any given moment. He never knew when.
He was rewarded when a faint stripe of yellow-gold light fell across Will’s face, with eyes dark as night, full of stars and empty of mercy or forgiveness. That smile, one of the best rewards of all. It was cruel and absolutely stunning. The most beautiful sight in the whole world.
It made Hannibal smile, although this could only just barely be seen, given the ball gag stuffed in his mouth, straining it with a constant, smarting tug. The gag was attached to a matching black leather strap which was secured much too tightly around Hannibal’s head, the back of it lost under a waterfall of sweaty, soft and loose, silver-strewn hair.
Will disappeared into the shadows again before Hannibal could see the effect of his answering smile (Will always knew when he was smiling, even without looking). But his dominant’s deep, yet silken voice, cold with intangible wonder, still reached him. The precious sound pierced the darkness with its awful power of deprivation, that of making him lose sight of Will.
His Dominant's voice saved Hannibal, lifting him before the jaws of despair could close and the pain of loving so much, only to be despised and used as a pincushion for experimental vengeance, could slice into the parts of him that hurt much more than his pleasurably wounded body.
“You and I are the only ones who can understand the beauty in the blur of blood. Others see it differently. We share a vision.” Will’s calm, even tone held an underlying malice like a gleaming piece of rare onyx, black in the moonlight, full of blood.
“The art of the savage feast,” Will continued.
As he spoke, fully clothed in his now typical attire of a pressed black button-up shirt tucked neatly into slate gray slacks, Will rhythmically patted the handle end of the electrostimulation device in his hands, a quiet and emphatic threat.
A preview. Hannibal craved his discipline badly enough that the sound of the wand, that repetitive, heavy tap, made him moan around the gag. The sound was distorted and weak, raspy. It could be mistaken for a meek cry for help or relief, but Will knew better.
Please.
All in good time. Will meant to taunt Hannibal before he would Touch again. Hannibal was to listen and wait, continually being drip-fed minuscule tastes of Will’s discipline via verbal riddles and accusing, smirking reminiscences of Hannibal’s many past sins against his beloved.
Then at some point, the preview would be whisked away and the real show would begin. This was Will’s design now, the aching slow burn which gave way to the main attraction: his use of Hannibal’s body to his preferred satisfaction. It had never yet been gentle.
When Will was in this mood, he punished Hannibal perfectly, with a greedy fervor. It hurt so good that Hannibal knew he’d be weeping for a long time, during and after. In those moments, it was hard for Hannibal to regret his former self’s mistakes. He was sorry. But it had led him here, all of it had put him here, and what could possibly be sweeter?
Perhaps only that which would blossom from this in the future, that which was now unknowable, glimmering with a tease like the echoing, intellectual arrogance in Will’s wounded voice.
Smooth and clear, manly, deep and sensuous, with a hint of Southern honey pouring over it as his indignation inevitably made his emotions almost show. Will's bitterness was tightly controlled, but it was powerful.
That voice was a sonic aphrodisiac, powerful as the electricity in the wand. Hannibal felt the rise and fall, every small nuance in Will’s tone and delivery, as small but potent, tingling waves, and he was an ocean struck by lightning. Everything he was, was a reverberation of Will.
Goosebumps broke out on Hannibal’s naked body as veins bulged and sweat trickled faster down from his brow, sliding over golden-tanned skin which was already covered in red scratches and many bruises of various colors – depending on how old they were – some dark purple, others, soon to fade, were yellowing by now. Hannibal comforted himself with the hope that every bruise he lost would be replaced.
Small pads which would emit currents from the electro-stimulator were arranged in strategic places on Hannibal. The device itself had been created for sexual and BDSM use, so it was not created to deliver serious pain, as such. But within hours of sweaty, begging edging, there was nothing worse than the sweet pulse of pleasuring vibrations. Will knew where to put it and when, so that Hannibal received only what he had determined was fair. In this way, Will sculpted pleasure itself into a weapon.
The blatantly erotic, more popular places to put the male electrodes were intentionally neglected. Will had a set of cock rings which could be used with the electrostimulation for tremendously blissful sensation. There was one ring that fit around the base of Hannibal’s erection and another which could be slipped on just below the head. Those items were in a drawer somewhere in the meticulously organized cabinet behind them, and Hannibal sadly didn’t expect to see or feel them tonight.
Instead, Will had used a fine quality, but standard cock ring. It wouldn’t stop him from experiencing pleasure…just slow down his ability to come.
The younger man had only put electrode pads in one place that made Hannibal’s heart skip a beat. There were several attached to his ass, quite close to his entrance, and the light, barely discernible presence of the pads was…distracting.
Will went on, conversationally, with a cynical and mocking facade of nonchalance.
“But we’ve taken it all too far to put us back together again, so how can we feast now? We can only feast on the hunger. The holes we’ve bored in each other with fangs of desire, anger, vengeance, lies and denial. That void which only the other can fill, maybe it started as a twinging pinprick, but then, so soon after, it was a gnawing gash. The kind of pain you can’t breathe without feeling. Under your skin and mine, vibrating in our bones, corrupting our blood. Turning each of us into this new person who can’t ever be saved from what? This."
Will went on, telling them both a twisted bedtime story of sorts. A fantastically true story without an ending. "A pinprick, a gash, then a longer, deeper, lashing wound, from sternum to pelvis. Stopping just above the seat of desire. We weren’t willing to give that up, maybe that will never go, even as the rest of us does. By now? This Thing between us, It’s a gaping, howling abyss. The winds of the world rush in and whistle, swirling down through layers and layers, but there’s no bottom, it goes on forever. It’s hopeless and yet it’s everything that could be. Limitless potential and unending annihilation. You know that Dante said hell has nine levels, or circles?”
The Dominant stepped back in the dim room, where he had allowed Hannibal fleeting, unpredictable glimpses of him, lit only by a bare bulb hung from the ceiling of the undecorated and blunt, small space. While Will’s basement was finished and newly converted for this purpose, he had not turned it into a place that screamed “Sex and Pain Lair here!”
Like the “normal” life Will forced himself to cling to, the room was plain and gray. The cabinet and several benches which were the main furniture, all black. And the room smelled of Will’s cologne, the high-end, decadent one he had purchased several weeks ago when embarking on a journey of revenge which had certainly led to an unexpected destination.
Noticing how profoundly sensitive Hannibal’s sense of smell was, and how deeply Will’s scent affected him, the younger man had purchased a large candle from the same fragrance line. It emitted an identical scent, except that it did not contain Will’s natural, underlying smell of woods and decent, simple soap. Hannibal did not need it to, since Will was usually hovering over or around him, or directly administering his discipline.
With Will close by, he could always smell the way sophisticated fragrance formed a scrumptious layer atop Will’s irresistible, personal essence. The additional influence of the candle was a silent reinforcement, deluging Hannibal’s senses to increase his state of tense vulnerability.
Will had asked him a pointed, though absurdly rhetorical question about how well he knew Dante’s Inferno. Hannibal couldn’t nod yes, of course. Not tied up on the severe, divinely uncomfortable bench which Will had crafted for him by hand.
But his warm, animal eyes, ferocious with love he no longer made any attempt to hide, but rather, offered to Will along with the rest of himself…
Yes, his eyes said it all, and Will read them like a boldly printed page in a well-loved book. A book he reread and reread, just to shove it under his pillow and hide it whenever someone else might catch him.
Hannibal’s eyes said “Yes, of course. I’ve read Dante’s Divina Commedia many, many times. In the original Italian.”
Will chuckled darkly. “Well, I assumed you were more than familiar. If I knew with absolute certainty I was going to Hell someday, I’d want to read the travel guide thoroughly, too. Maybe I should be reading up, considering what I’ve gradually been…Becoming. But…no. I don’t need the scenic tour guide. Because I’m living it. A little gift you gave me. We’re in Hell, now, together, burning alive. Can you feel that, huh? Monster.”
He slapped Hannibal’s lightly stubbled cheek hard enough to make a loud sound of calloused palm snapping against soft bristles and sharp cheekbones. Enough that it must hurt Will’s hand, too.
Not hard enough for Hannibal's liking.
Not even close.
Worse, Will had called him Monster. When Will was in a more indulgent, gruffly almost-affectionate, reluctantly susceptible mood, he called Hannibal “Pet.” And Hannibal loved being Will’s monster, but he loved “Pet” better.
A few teardrops coursed down Hannibal’s face, falling from eyes which were now slightly reddened, sending a maroon tinge into the iris that grew like an inkblot or a puddle of blood, spilling emotion into a man who used to lock out anyone’s access to his heart, himself included.
A man now so locked to Will that he was trussed up like a roast for Sunday dinner, wrists and ankles bound in sailor’s rope and tied into beautifully inescapable knots, pressing into Hannibal’s tired, aching, bruised and chafed skin. It made him so happy, that strain. Will having all the power. Owning him. Using Hannibal however he wished.
There was the wonderful stiffness of the unnatural position Will had devised, sitting with his arms bound behind his back, secured to a pole on the back of the bench. Another rope encircled his torso, on the sensitive, soft place right between his chest and belly, under his ribs, digging into him. These marks wouldn’t go away anytime soon; this was immensely comforting to Hannibal.
Two thicker loops of knotted rope secured Hannibal’s thighs to the frame of the bench. The seat was so narrow it barely supported Hannibal’s backside. To either side of it were various hooks built in by Will to attach bondage tools of all types. Hannibal’s knees were bent, ankles bound behind him, tied to the lower part of the pole. Such a beautiful, special gift. Will made all of this, just for Hannibal.
The wood had been sanded and finished with oil until it was smooth, then painted in a slick black shade that shone when Will put his index finger on the light bulb and made it swing back and forth. Hannibal could feel Will smirking haughtily. He always knew.
His eyes kept flitting around every time, desperately trying to follow the light back to Will, just to see his beloved for a moment. Will’s eyes, flashing in grimly determined but otherwise unreadable emotion, deep navy blue like Hannibal’s own heart and soul, deeper into the colors of love every day.
This was the truest shade Hannibal had found yet, so of course it could be found in Will’s chameleon eyes. And only glimpsed in little fits of glorious beauty that could never be predicted, when the light of a room or the natural glow of the sun, or a reflection in just the right color crossed them and gave Hannibal that gorgeous view.
It could be there and gone again in a second, and Will’s eyes might be cerulean gems, or swirling sapphire seas, waves crashing over Hannibal and knocking him down, stealing him in a single swallow of salt, moonlight and heavy water pounding over him, drowning him.
Sometimes it was that sage green shade that seemed so deceptively peaceful and calm; even a sharper jade color on rare occasions. Every variation was a delight. Hannibal had been counting, and he was sure there were more combinations, shades, reflections and minute, expressive differences in Will’s eyes.
This was…only one reason it was a tormenting horror not to be able to keep his own searching amber gaze on Will. To have the pleasure of looking upon Will, who was his reason for existing, merely in such rapid and lost-again intervals was like giving Hannibal the antidote to a lethal dose of poison, just to poison him again, then start all over.
Will could see Hannibal better than vice versa from the place he’d paused his languorous circling. “What? Your mind is all over the place. Concentrate. Are we in Hell? Think about it.”
Hannibal tried his best to focus on Will’s question. But he did not know the answer, because he did not know if Hell was real, or what it was, if so. Dante’s rendition was striking, indelible, and formed a believable image. If this was one of the damning circles of hellish punishment, Hannibal wasn’t going to complain.
“Some would argue we signed up for it.” Will’s gloomy, glowering expression was perfectly apparent from his tone. “If this twisted, gruesome joke of a Thing between us is a form of ‘love,’ then maybe love is hell. Maybe we’re hell to each other. I’m just a half hell made to match its identical opposite. Is the worst pain we deal to each other in the loving, Monster, or is it in-between. The Purgatory. Waiting. When we’re separated. The void, the absence, even of misery, until we’d do god-awful things to ourselves and anyone else just to get that miserable agony back for a little while. Do you feel it, Beast? The void. The need? What is empty, begging to be filled?”
Will stepped closer and gently tapped the tip of the electro-stimulation rod to the top of Hannibal’s spine. Then he used the second-highest setting to trace every vertebrae until he swept the tingles of overwhelming sensation down to Hannibal’s hole. He’d left it carefully available when tying Hannibal into position.
With unspoken, entertained approval, Will listened to Hannibal’s cries and moans, and then he circled the older man’s hole with the waves and tingles, slowly, teasing. He enjoyed this for a minute or so, dragging it out, taking breaks to make Hannibal wonder if he was going to stop or take it further.
Finally, Will pressed the tip against Hannibal’s hole, not penetrating with the stimulation tool itself, but with the brief, potent electricity it sent cascading through his sensitive erogenous zones. The void, the place where he was so empty and needed Will to fill him up. Hannibal wanted it every second of every day, and Will knew it.
This thrilling pleasure, intermingled with lancing pain, throbbing out from his hole and resonating through him like the poisonous, blissful sadness and rage Will had described, was a form of carefully devised torture.
It was flattering. Orgasm denial. Edging Hannibal, punishing and hurting him, letting him feel pleasure, taking it back viciously. Creating suspense and anticipation, always: that was where a masochist’s true elation lay. Knowing that It - the discipline - was most likely coming to him soon and it was going to be rough, it was going to hurt, it would be glorious and everything he needed. Will was in charge, and he knew what was best. That was, whatever was best for Will, however long Will decided Hannibal should languish in Purgatory, even if it was forever. This was fine with Hannibal. Actually, an honor and a prized delight.
He hadn’t a prayer of finding release now, incapable of touching himself, except perhaps to rub against the bench, which would ruin everything. He’d rather die. So he swallowed the depriving pain down, his cordial of life. The vigorous need thrummed through his body, chasing the fleeting pleasure from the electro-rod with a physical whimper of disappointment Hannibal could feel in his very pores.
“You’re crying a lot already,” said Will in a lethal purr. “So sensitive. Imagine if they could only see you now, Doctor. Or Ripper. Both. You don’t look so elegantly threatening at the moment. There’s nothing mysterious about letting me tie you up, naked, with a cock ring on and edge you, along with whatever other suffering I deem appropriate for this occasion. How the mighty have fallen.”
Will clucked his delectable tongue, making Hannibal fantasize about feeling it tangled with his own. He tasted the wet heat in his mouth and it watered. He had already been drooling a little, only a few times, from the work it was to be gagged so tightly. This was to be expected. Now, it was hard not to let it get worse.
And his Dominant approved. “My drooling, sexually desperate Beast. Half-forgotten plaything that you are. An out-of-tune instrument, once splendid, now jangled into nonsense. Sweating, buck naked, trembling, gagged, begging. You’re nonsense, that’s all you are, isn’t it? You want to come? Hmm? I know. You only want to come if I want you to. That’s a good Monster. You’ve tolerated this well. I enjoy that ring. It’s awfully pretty, the sight of your cock tightly enclosed and throbbing with unfulfilled need. More symptoms of the void. Our hell. My, my. Look at that. Your body is an impressive machine.”
Hannibal could just make out Will from looking over one shoulder, where his beloved began dragging the electro-stimulator wand slowly all over Hannibal, not applying the pleasure to any of the node pads. Instead, he used the rod as a pointer in a lesson he was teaching, a scientific-philosophical inquiry into Hannibal’s form. The cool metal tip and smooth, silicone handle caused Hannibal quivering lust and excitement as Will traced his broad shoulders, then his biceps, following to his forearms where they were pulled taut behind him. Lingering on the row of scars from the Matthew Brown incident, Will admired his handiwork, which only served to excite Hannibal more. He must know that.
Will said in a lazy drawl, “God did take a large amount of time forming you into a work of art, considering what he also made you. You were born this way, I believe. Evil and warped. But beautiful, enough to make anyone think it was really the Devil who made you especially to corrupt pure souls. I wonder. You remember what Dante said about the final circle of Hell he visited with Virgil, the circle where the Devil resides?”
Hannibal blushed at the compliment, but the question made him want to roll his eyes (he did not).
“Rhetorical questions are annoying, huh, Beast?”
Will slapped Hannibal using his bare hand, harder this time. Two swift hits with the flat of his palm, reigniting lingering aches from earlier. “You like that, though. You’re such a slut for pain, your legs are wide open all the time for me. It’d be flattering if I believed that was genuine openness and not a selfish gratification. Speaking of which.”
He grasped a handful of Hannibal’s hair and jerked his submissive’s head up, forcing the older man’s body to pull and strain with another bright eruption of sweet agony. Hannibal could not help the faint whine which slipped messily around the ball gag, a pleading combination of arousal and love. A promise to keep submitting, and a question, did Will believe him?
Will mused coldly, “Dante said that the Devil is forever and ever eating the souls of three great traitors. You’re saying the names in your mind now like a schoolboy showing off in front of the class. So proud you didn’t need flashcards. Cassius, Brutus, Judas. Inside Satan’s wretched, disgusting mouth, crushed and torn apart and swallowed, for time beyond time. That is how severe the sin of betrayal is, Hannibal.”
Hannibal’s eyes stared up at him in shock. Will only very rarely used his first name.
“I’m using a name that belongs to the disguise, the one who betrayed me,” Will growled, pulling Hannibal’s hair harder until the older man felt a dueting pain in his neck, shoulders, upper back and skull which bore into him like four separate pairs of shears thrust in at once.
Hannibal tried to take a deep breath, only half-successful because of the gag and his own inevitable exhaustion. It came out as a horse-like whine, even more embarrassing than the last one, therefore increasing Hannibal’s arousal.
His cock thickened at Will’s angry fervor. Especially the humiliation Will gave him. And the tight ring surrounding him, preventing him from even approaching climax, added another invisible blade to the collection which Will so enjoyed plunging into him.
This was good. It was more than pleasure, it felt like progress. A yank in their tug-of-war, where Will seemed to be in control, but Hannibal had the other end of that rope. And he was not going to let go. He would never abandon his boy, even if it was what Will expected.
Will was beginning to unravel and show his own feelings. Hannibal wanted it, the rage, the bitterness, he wanted to suffer for it, and to serve his darling boy forever and ever, for time beyond time.
How silly, to have lived nearly fifty years never realizing this was what he’d been made for. And odd that Will still refused to acknowledge this. But Will was odd, his strangeness sewn in eccentrically dangerous designs, like Hannibal’s own, and that was indescribably endearing, special and rare. Yes, this sudden interrogation was much more than Hannibal had dared to expect from tonight. And it was still early.
Still not enough, but better. Starving humans could survive for a long time, getting by on tiny bits of sustenance. Hannibal knew from experience.
Will had none of those details because Hannibal had not opened for him that widely yet, not enough to speak of his childhood, the attacks, terror, deaths, grief, guilt and starvation, worsening a hunger which had already made him a monster simply from birth. His brilliant Dominant had that part right.
Hannibal had happened, and then become even more of a monstrous mask of a man, ugly inside and hungrier and hungrier, as life happened to him. Of this, Hannibal remained in staunch denial. He hated to think that he was just a weak, hapless victim of random, traumatizing atrocities, or failing that, just God’s little plaything, tormented for His amusement and curiosity.
Instead, Hannibal once made himself into an untouchable God, but now he’d found his own deity in Will, and he’d learned not only to love submission, but to thrive on it.
Just for Will.
He was afraid of what might happen to him if Will successfully sliced him all the way open, only to reject what he saw inside. But he steeled himself against the possibility. Will had taught him so much already. There were unfathomable lessons that lay beyond the surrender which was the only one Hannibal still feared. He wasn’t going to stay closed if Will found the hidden seams with his prodding knives of words, deeds, beauty and perfection. Their intimacy was the greatest threat.
The only reason Hannibal was still closed was that Will feared the same intimacy. In one way, it was obviously already too late; Hannibal’s love for Will ran so deep that it would be his salvation, perhaps within his doom, as his beloved predicted.
He wondered too, but while Will’s curiosity was fueled by a need for true reciprocity, Hannibal’s was a constant, eternal offering. All of him belonged to Will now. His body, his soul, heart and mind. Didn’t Will See, couldn’t he understand what was so obvious, right before his eyes, every day? What did justice have to do with them? Nothing, for all Will’s efforts to stay on the moral side. That wasn’t what mattered!
Hannibal and Will lived together and fought their battle in eroticism, domesticity, Will’s tolerance that almost felt like love, and punishment. They got closer and the fear mounted, and they both ran back to their hiding places just to come back together more fiercely, claws and teeth bared.
“Are you chewing me up, or am I eating you down to nothing, during every second of your conscious and unconscious existence?” Will let go of Hannibal’s hair and smacked him with impressive strength against the side of his face which was more reddened from earlier blows.
He couldn’t even finish crying out from the searing pain in his face before Will was just as drily twisting his nipples, ruthless.
“Is it better to have loved and lost,” Will said, panting slightly from his own exertion and the emotional toll of it. “Than never to have loved at all? Love is loss. Loss of the Self, jumping into Satan’s mouth, begging to be eaten alive. It’s over before we ever get to make a choice. Or it was for me. I want to know if we’re really a zero sum game, Beast. Monster. You’re whatever the fuck I say you are. Calling you Hannibal has no special meaning. Animals don’t really have names. If I adopt a dog, I give them a name. I don’t care what the previous owner called them.”
He sighed in exasperation, almost like he did when he called Hannibal “Pet,” in his own rare moments of weakness. “Yes, I do love my dogs. I love you, in some eviscerating, damning way. But the difference is, I’m not sure you love me. Is your heart, this–”
Will shoved the tip of the electro-stimulation wand against Hannibal’s chest, above his submissive’s heartbeat. He did not switch it on. It was a point-making thrust, not an attempt to apply potentially life-threatening electricity to Hannibal’s heart. The threat, which never came to pass, was enough in this heightened mood they shared.
If Will wanted, he could give Hannibal a heart attack just to find out if his heart was real. It would be metaphorical and condescending, but it would not be insane. Perhaps it would be a succinct and direct lesson, but the possibility did not seem to interest Will beyond the reminder that he could.
Hannibal thought Will had probably dreamed about doing it. How remarkable, to be a presence inside Will that way, to have a special place carved out in the deepest parts of his beloved even when Will slept.
He was nothing but a fish on Will’s hook now, to be gutted and eaten with the boy’s beautiful, blood-soaked hands. He could see that image so vividly, it felt real. It might be how long they’d been down in the small room together like this, his mind drifting into unreality more believable than what existed during clear-headed life.
Although Will was welcome to take his life, Hannibal hoped that if it happened, it would be intimate, with hands and blades and blood. The idea of some artificial device doing him in was repugnant.
Will crouched down, leering at Hannibal’s naked, sweat slicked, bruised and bound body and then putting his hand against the same place he’d just stimulated with the rod. “This thing, pounding against me, trying to burst through your skin. Why does it do that?”
He pressed his pale fingertips in a circle around Hannibal’s heart where he knew it lay beneath his chest, and pulled harshly at his submissive’s chest hair before digging his nails into tanned skin.
The Monster closed his eyes, lost in Paradise. Will was leaving a deep, claiming mark around his heart! Who cared if it was an accusation? It was acknowledgement of belonging.
Will snarled, his hot breath with its hints of mint and whiskey brushing Hannibal’s sore flesh, tantalizing, tormenting. “Is this a working, feeling human organ?”
The younger man watched with a ferocious glare as Hannibal kept moaning at how Will’s nails sank deeper into the skin, leaving dark red, half-moon cuts that would bleed soon unless Will decided to stop.
Will bit his own lip, kept the pressure on Hannibal’s chest, and continued staring. “The thing is, the way you respond to pain is just a stimulating response from your brain. It’s not even connected to your supposed emotions, it’s knee-jerk, like your leg going up when the doctor smacks it with a small hammer once a year. That doesn’t prove that you love me. Your pain, your submission and surrender, anyone could do that. They might not look as pretty. They would probably not last as long, but then, you’re a wild Beast I caught, so it's to be expected. Does your incredible endurance have an emotional drive? I have no idea. But I can use it as a tool for my own purposes. Is this real?” Will repeated, his nails now embedded slightly under Hannibal’s skin, tips neatly filed, but clearly having been allowed to grow a bit longer than usual for this very purpose.
He kept them there, allowing the same throbbing pain around Hannibal’s heart to be suspended, five tiny blades this time, sharp as Will’s pretty white teeth. Will could use those to eat Hannibal’s heart raw, but he was staring into the eyes that loved him beyond description, simply to doubt that the heart was even emotionally functional.
“Or is this a lifelike fake that beats and pumps and keeps you alive, but doesn’t feel a damn thing?” Will removed his nails, and Hannibal would have hissed with delighted pain if he could. Little bursts of blood decorated his skin, under his silvering chest hair, brightly surrounding his heart.
“Can you love?” Will asked with a waver in his stony voice. “Or have you lost the ability, if you ever had it to begin with? Are you emotionally castrated? Am I right, or am I wrong? Is that something I can find out for sure? I wonder. You’re a consummate liar, so I won’t waste my time by trying to have a healthy conversation about it. There’s only one way to deal with you.”
He abruptly unbuckled the strap around Hannibal’s head and yanked the ball gag out, uncaring of the immediate pain in the older man’s mouth and jaw as Hannibal slowly moved them, allowing him to be capable of speech.
“Speak, Beast, what’s in your heart?” Will demanded.
“Yes, I do have a real heart,” Hannibal croaked, only able to offer a slight, wincing smile from swollen, cracked lips. “And yes, I love you. You can…” He coughed apologetically. “Find out for sure.”
“What the fuck did you just say to me?”
Will sneered and slapped him on the mouth, causing a shock of targeted agony. This time, Hannibal only responded to the discipline with more tears; he was far more concerned with rushing to make up for his mistake.
“I’m sorry, Sir,” he whispered. “I love you, Sir. I –”
“That’s enough,” Will said, standing, hands on his hips with a sound between a gasp and a sigh escaping his lips. It sounded sad, but not defeated.
When he turned around, chest rising and falling quickly to fuel Hannibal’s beautiful hope, Will stared down his bound, but no longer gagged submissive. He threw the electro-stimulation device aside. The flung object landed with effortless accuracy in a velvet-lined case which lay on a nearby table.
Will put a hand to his own lips. He squeezed his eyes shut, ruffled his curls and collected himself before looking at Hannibal again. “You should be fucking sorry. Slut. Disrespecting me like that. Do it again and we’re done for the night.”
“Yes, Sir,” Hannibal murmured in a threadbare remnant of his own deep, hypnotic voice. “I promise not to forget again, Sir.”
“Your promises. How hilarious. Are you my paddle, Hannibal? Huh? You promised me that, too. You were doing so well a few minutes ago, and now you’re just pissing me off. I’m going to punish you for the rudeness, and then we’ll continue. I would still like to enjoy my evening, so you’d better learn your goddamn lesson and get back on manners. Last chance. And this is important. Pay attention.”
“Yes, Sir.” Hannibal’s eyes watched him lovingly, devoted as a dog.
Will’s jaw twitched. A bead of sweat ran down the younger man’s angelic face. “We’re going to find out once and for all if you love me, tonight, right here in this room, no matter how long it takes for me to be satisfied that I’ve found the truth.”
“Yes, Sir.” Hannibal concealed his excitement as best he could (the pain helped with this, yet another benefit it brought him).
It sounded like a task he did not even need to try to win in order to ace with not only a 100 percent, but extra points as well.
Will could prove a lot of truths, he could even prove that Hannibal was an evil, unforgivable monster, but he could not prove the impossible. Trying to locate, dislodge and examine the heart of Hannibal’s betrayal would only reveal the love. Nothing else.
It was Hannibal’s own past, foolish attempts to protect himself from vulnerability that had prevented it from shining through right from the first day their eyes met. His heart was pounding with adoration and worship, always ready to take and endure absolutely anything to demonstrate it, at last, beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Will had a rolling cart on which, with typical care, he had placed a neatly organized assortment of tools. Each object was expertly wielded, allowing Will the rightful power to decide whether to give pain, pleasure, or both, and in what amounts.
“Yes is right,” Will growled under his breath. He gripped the bar on the side of the cart which he’d used to tug it closer until his knuckles whitened. Then he was ready, exhaling sharply. “Let’s begin.”
He held up an instrument which made Hannibal deeply regret his earlier lapse in proper manners. The cock cage was going to be far more difficult to endure than the comparatively mild discomfort of the ring.
“Since you need to be reminded what happens when you forget who’s in charge.” Will showed Hannibal the cage from a few angles, allowing him to contemplate the deprivation and suffering that lay ahead before it was actually applied.
Hannibal couldn’t help trembling harder. “Yes, sir. I understand, sir. You’re always right.”
“When I’m right, it’s because I know the difference. But with you?” Will shook his head with a bitter laugh. “With you, I don’t always have those answers. Not to the big questions. That’s why we have to do this tonight. Oh. Look at those big brown eyes,” Will gripped Hannibal’s face tightly, turning it side to side. “I haven’t seen you this scared in a while. Are you frightened, Monster?”
Hannibal smiled, a tender, gentle one. Fragile, with lingering apology and heart-breaking love. “Yes, sir, I am.”
Will released him and stepped back to look at Hannibal again, objectifying his firm, muscular body. Hannibal’s intense self-consciousness battled with deep happiness at the attention. The younger man licked his lips slowly as he enjoyed the view. It was his whenever he cared to have it.
The smile Will gave Hannibal now, as he approached with the cage in hand, was certainly demonic. He huffed a wicked laugh. “This is going to be fun.”