Azorius Charm

“I am not a stick in the mud!”

Jace barely even looked up at the sound of Lavinia’s voice from outside the door. A moment later, it opened to let in both the Azorius arrester and the person she had been speaking to.

“You are the stickiest stick that has ever been stuck in the mud.  Other sticks stand in awe of your stickiness and hope one day to stick as firmly in the mud as you do,” said Ral Zarek cheerfully. “You simply have no idea how to have fun.”

The wordless growl that came out of Lavinia’s throat made Jace wince slightly. The air in the room felt noticeably colder as she stalked over to the desk and deposited a chin-high stack of papers in front of him with a thud. “I do too know how to have fun,” she snapped.

“Oh really? What, pray tell, do you call ‘fun’?  Signing with an especially large flourish?  Staring contentedly at an alphabetized bookcase?”

“Um—” Jace tried to put in, desperate to head this one off, but Lavinia cut in.

“Wagers can be fun,” she said simply.

Ral paused, then nodded slightly.  “Okay, I’ll admit that.  Wagers can be fun. But I’m sure you only make boring bets. ‘Which clause will be up for review tomorrow?’  ‘Which date will they finally decide on for the Festival?’  That sort of thing.”

Jace knew that the date of the Festival was turning into a particular sore point with Lavinia, as it had been changed back and forth at least twice daily for the past three days. He wondered what would happen if they settled on changing the date, then changed it back after the original date had already passed.

 “You want an interesting bet, Zarek?” snapped Lavinia.  “If you can put together a machine that is capable of reviewing and sorting my paperwork for me, I will sleep with you and Jace!”

“Um,” said Jace, after a moment’s pause to rein in his imagination.  “Lavinia, are you sure you—”

“I’ll take it!” Ral interrupted, eyes gleaming.  “And, if I can’t, I’ll finally answer those subpoenas I keep receiving.”

“Is a verbal contract sufficient or shall I draw something up?” asked Lavinia coolly.

Ral grinned evilly.  “Well, I wouldn’t want you trying to back out.”

“Ah—” said Jace.

“I’m sorry, Living Guildpact,” Lavinia said, turning to him.  “This, of course, involves you as well.  Would you have an objection to carrying out the terms of this agreement, should Zarek somehow manage to win?”

“W-well—no—” Jace admitted, his face burning. “I mean—if it was all right with you, obviously.”

“Good,” Lavinia said briskly, leaning over the desk and reaching for  pen.  “Let me just modify this appropriately.”  She wrote for a moment and then slid the piece of paper over to Ral.  “You have a week to complete the device. Are these terms acceptable?”

Ral chuckled evilly. “Oh yes.  Sign this for me, will you?  And you, Guildpact.”

“I-I’m not sure if—” Jace protested.  Both Lavinia and Ral simply looked at him expectantly.  “Are you sure about this?” he asked Lavinia wretchedly.

“On the off-chance Zarek actually manages to deliver, yes, Jace.”  She gave him a calm smile.

“All right…” He took the pen and scribbled his own messy, distinctive signature before turning the paper over to the other two.  As soon as Lavinia’s pen lifted from the page, Ral snatched it up and ran for the door, crowing gleefully, “I’ll be back in a few hours!”

“Aren’t you worried?” Jace asked as the door shut behind him.  “He seems very—confident.”

“Not at all,” Lavinia said, giving him another bland smile.

~

Jace was not terribly surprised when Ral produced a machine capable of processing Lavinia’s paperwork. He was somewhat surprised that it had only taken about three hours, and even more surprised that—unusually for an Izzet device—it did exactly what it had initially been intended to do, without any obvious flaws or explosions.  Lavinia’s response had been both measured and calm, opposite to Ral’s obvious glee.  “Are you sure you’re all right with this?” Jace asked concernedly for the third time.

“Yes, of course,” Lavinia said as Ral eagerly waved the contract at both of them. “I’ll just need a few minutes to finish up the necessary paperwork.”

Jace, who had seen the amount of Azorius paperwork that had to be prepared for even a simple task, filed this under ‘deeply suspicious,’ but held his tongue.

True to her word, Lavinia returned within a few minutes with a bundle of papers. “I have a room reserved a few streets down,” she said, then paused, raising an eyebrow at the confused looks she got.  “Did you really think I was just bed you on the pallet in here?”

Jace sputtered, but Ral kept his composure.  “I was thinking the desk,” he leered.

“Well, then, you should have said something earlier,” Lavinia responded primly. “The paperwork you filled out and signed specifies private accommodations, such as a personal bedroom or rented lodgings. Offices fall in an entirely separate category, and we would have had to requisition an additional set of forms.” With that, she turned for the door, making a ‘follow me’ gesture.  “Come,” she said, which sent Ral off into a paroxysm of laughter.

“Don’t—don’t I have things I need to get done?” Jace asked weakly.

Lavinia simply flourished the sheaf of documents at him and head out the door.

“Well, don’t just stand there drooling, Guildpact,” Ral said.  “Come on.”

Lavinia took them to one of the more high-end inns of the Tenth District, a fairly expensive establishment mostly patronized by the Orzhov.

“How did we get a room here?” Jace asked Lavinia quietly, as they were mounting the wide, plushy-carpeted staircase.

“I used some of the funds allocated for employee functions and staff training,” Lavinia answered.

“Whose ‘staff’ will we be training?” Ral put in with a grin.  Jace smacked him, but Lavinia just gave a sudden amused smile. Jace eyed her suspiciously. She was entirely too calm about the whole thing, though Ral seemed too elated to have noticed.

After entering a large, luxurious room with a king-sized bed, Lavinia pressed several sheets of paper into his hands.  “Before we begin, I would appreciate it if you checked to see that all this is in order, Living Guildpact,” she said formally.

“Ah—yes, of course,” Jace said.  Ignoring Ral’s impatient snort, he seated himself on the bed and began to check it over. Though it wasn’t long, it was coached in somewhat esoteric language, and Ral sighed loudly and flung himself down on the bed as Jace tried to decipher it.

“Hang on,” he frowned, halfway through.  “This says ‘two women.’”

“Oh, yes,” Lavinia said primly.  “Well, after all, I have been privy to an unfortunate number of your trysts with Zarek, and more often than not—”

Ral snickered, but Jace pressed on.  “No, but this says ‘two women and the Guildpact’,” he said, looking up to meet Lavinia’s bright, demure gaze.

“Does it,” she said, completely deadpan.  “Oh dear, it seems there has been some sort of clerical error.”

There was a moment of perfect silent, broken eventually by Ral’s slightly nervous laughter. “That’s absurd,” he said. “Besides, it’s just a piece of paper.”

Jace gave him a wide smile.  “But Ral,” he said, with a wink at Lavinia.  “As you’ve so often pointed out, I am a living legal document.  I think it’s very important for me to adhere to these instructions.”

Ral opened and closed his mouth, then shrugged.  “Well, maybe,” he drawled.  “But since I’m the only one who knows how to—”

Jace smirked and began to draw mana.  It was slightly trickier in practice, he had to admit, but—

Ral stared down at himself, opened his mouth and shut it again, then cleared his throat. “I don’t—” he shut it once more when his voice came out a pitch higher than normal.

Jace leaned in toward him with a grin.  “What, you expected me not to pay attention to a spell you’ve used on me a dozen times?”

Ral drew himself up and crossed his arms.  “You appear to have failed to execute the spell properly, Guildpact. You haven’t given me any breasts.”

“Really?” Jace asked, sliding a hand up Ral’s waist and across his chest.  Ral gasped in shock as Jace tweaked a nipple teasingly.

“But when you’re a woman you’re—” The Izzet mage made petulant, curving-outward motions with his hands.

“Maybe you’re just skinny,” Lavinia put in amusedly.  She began to unbuckle her belt.  Ral rounded on her.

“You—you,” he exclaimed. “You. You…you!”

“Me,” Lavinia agreed.

“You planned this.  You knew I was working on that machine!” Lavinia’s smile was small, but she looked very pleased with herself.  She merely raised an eyebrow at him.  “You magnificent bitch,” Ral said in wonder.

“Thank you,” said Lavinia, then paused thoughtfully.  “I’m not sure I want your approval, Zarek—if that is approval—but I suppose I’ll just have to live with it.”  She paused for a moment, then spoke again.  “I think it would be best if I climax first,” she said in a businesslike manner.  “I imagine it will make the rest of the afternoon more enjoyable.”

Jace opened his mouth to offer, but Ral beat him to it.  “No, no, I’ve got this,” he said magnanimously. “She outmaneuvered me fair and square.  You just sit there and—” he winked at Jace.  “—get a good view.”

Lavinia paused as if she were about to object, then finished tugging her trousers and boots off and sat back on the bed, shooting a challenging look at Ral. Jace hovered for a minute, ready to interfere if it looked as if the Izzet mage was going to do something particularly awful, but Ral just knelt between Lavinia’s legs and began to stroke the insides of her bare calves slowly.  She watched him with what looked like slight trepidation as he lowered his mouth to her inner thigh and began to kiss up it.

A spike of sudden arousal shot through Jace, who knew how good Ral was at that, and he had to lean back against the wall, biting his lip.  Lavinia’s eyes were on him, bright and filled with an emotion he couldn’t identify. She gave a soft little intake of breath as Ral arrived between her legs, and Jace had to stifle a groan, both at the sight of Lavinia’s face beginning to flush and the sight of Ral kneeling between someone else’s legs.  Jace shivered, sliding down the wall, his legs starting to give out as all the blood pooled between them.

Lavinia was silent as Ral’s head bobbed eagerly between her thighs, but her eyes slid shut, and she leaned her head back, her ankles slowly rising to cross over the Izzet mage’s back.  Jace bit his lip harder, refusing to reach for himself, trying to think unarousing thougths, which took him to Rakdos, but that took him to Exava, which was more or less the opposite of unarousing.  He whimpered audibly.  Ral looked up for a moment, snickering, and Lavinia’s eyes shot open and caught his face for an instant before closing again as Ral resumed his ministrations.

She was obviously close, and Jace watched with fascinated arousal as the light flush grew on her cheeks.  She squirmed slightly—Jace felt his breathing getting rougher—and then she cried out softly, her legs tightening around Ral’s back.

Ral sat back onto his heels, looking very pleased with himself as he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.  Jace couldn’t quite stop himself from moaning, and, after a minute, Lavinia opened her eyes as well and smiled, then beckoned him over.

Jace nearly tripped over his own feet getting up and across to the bed, but he was still a little nervous as he leaned toward Lavinia.  She gave him an impatient look, reached up, took the back of his head and guided him in for a kiss.  Jace’s hands dropped automatically to her shoulders as he carefully explored her mouth.  She kissed clumsily at first, lips soft and motionless, but she followed his lead quickly and began to move her mouth against his own.

“Hey!” Ral said. “I exist, you know.”

Jace pulled back from Lavinia just long enough for the two of them to exchange wicked grins, and then he pulled back the hood of his cloak and shrugged it off, letting it pool on the bed behind him. Lavinia questioningly reached for one of the many buttons on Jace’s shirtfront, and he nodded at her.

“Oh, you’re ignoring me now,” Ral said irritably as Lavinia started trying to undo Jace’s shirt.

He had to take pity on her after a moment and undo most of the clasps and buckles himself, blushing slightly.  “Sorry,” he said before reaching for the bottom of her hood.  “May I?”

Lavinia nodded, and Jace took a deep breath and tugged the hood up and over her head. Her hair, which she seemed to have left unbound, cascaded down as the hood was removed, falling in gentle, light-brown waves around her face.  Jace paused to look at it.  It didn’t soften her face in the least, but it made her look a little less put-together, a little more vulnerable.  He ran a strand of it through his fingers.  “I like your hair,” he said.

Lavinia smiled.

“Oh, for the love of—fuck her, already!” complained Ral, flinging himself across the bottom of the bed.  “You don’t need to court her!  She signed a document and everything!”

“Now, Ral,” Jace said, briefly looking away from Lavinia.  “Not everyone is as unromantic as you are.”

“I’m romantic,” muttered Ral sulkily into the bed.  “I’m very romantic.  I bring you roses.”

Jace turned back to Lavinia.  “Um, should we get your tunic off as well?” he asked.

“That seems appropriately inappropriate,” smiled Lavinia, helping him get it off over her head.  “You may wish to get rid of your trousers, Jace.  And there is a protection scroll on the dresser by the bed.

Jace put his face in his hands with embarrassment.  “Oh, Krokt, I’m sorry,” he said.  “I’m so used to being with a man that I forgot.”

There was a pause.  “Jace,” Lavinia said slowly.  “Half the time, you are a woman.”

“Well, r-right, but it’s not as if I could get pregnant,” Jace said.  “Right, Ral?”

Dead silence. Jace looked behind him to see the Izzet mage examining his new breasts in a conspicuously insouciant way. “Ral!” Jace demanded.

“Dunno,” Ral finally said.  “Never thought about it.”

“What?” Jace squawked.  “You what?”

“It didn’t occur to me,” shrugged his lover.

“I’m going to kill you,” Jace said, with what he felt was remarkable calm.

“You’re not pregnant, so it seems to have worked out,” Ral pointed out.

“No thanks to you,” muttered Jace, making a mental note to start stocking protective scrolls. He turned back to Lavinia. “Of course we will be using a scroll of protection,” he said. “Like all reasonable people.”

“Yes, good,” replied Lavinia.  “Would you prefer me to activate it?”

“I’ll do it,” Jace said, desperate to regain at least a little dignity.  He reached for the scroll, thanking his lucky stars that he had practice using them.  It required only a spark of mana to prime, and then the spell cast itself, with a gentle flash of light.  Jace took his trousers off, folded them, and put them down on top of his cloak and shirt, before turning back to Lavinia.  The bed moved slightly as Ral kicked his feet impatiently, but Jace continued to ignore him.

“And, um, you’re really sure you’re okay with this?” he asked Lavinia.

“Do you want to read my mind and see?” she asked.  Jace almost laughed it off, but he suddenly realized she was serious.

“Um,” he said. “Maybe?  Is that all right?”

Lavinia rolled her eyes.  “You are an idiot,” she said.  “Go ahead.”

The inside of Lavinia’s mind was as orderly as Jace would have expected, even her arousal and desire for him slotted into their own place, but he also felt a little spark of mischief, which beckoned him, and he followed it.  The sudden realization hit him like a load of bricks. “Lavinia—” he stammered. “Y-you’re—”

Shhh, her thoughts cautioned him, and she nodded to Ral behind him, and winked.  This is going to be very funny.

I’m honored, Jace thought to her.  No, really, I am. Thank you. He kissed her gently on the mouth again, slid a hand down between her legs to make sure she was sufficiently prepared.  Lavinia squeaked at the gentle touch of his fingers, then moaned into his mouth, and Jace moved his hand to line himself up with her, gasping slightly.  Tell me if this hurts too much, he said, and tried to push himself in.

Lavinia made a soft noise of protest, and he stopped immediately.  Just go slowly.

“What are you two doing over there? Do you need me to show you where it goes, Jace?”

“Shut up shut up shut up,” Jace panted, as he inched forward, holding his erection in one hand, propping himself up with the other.  Spread your legs a little more. Lavinia complied with a nervous little huff, and Jace was able to wriggle and reorient himself until he had gotten the tip inside.  Try to relax, he told Lavinia, and began to rub his hand across her clitoris.  She squeaked and trembled, but her muscles relaxed, and Jace was able to push himself completely inside, not without a moan and gasp at the heat of her. “Oh Krokt—Lavinia—”

Her mouth had fallen open, her eyes half-shut, and he checked her mind again in sudden panic. The pain was gone, and she was going to—

“Guh,” said Jace, as Lavinia bucked her hips, rocking against him.

“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Ral’s voice said from behind them.

Jace tried to think of a retort, but his mind fell away as Lavinia moved again, rocking her hips from side to side.  “You’re cheating,” he panted to her.  “You got this out of my head.”

And you got it from a former girlfriend, didn’t you? I’m simply reappropriating it.

“Oh,” Jace moaned.  “Can I—”

Lavinia bit her lip and nodded, and he began to thrust, gently but quickly, heat mounting in his belly, and sobs spilling from his lips, losing himself in the scent of Lavinia’s sweat, and Ral’s sweat, the heat—Lavinia’s hands on his hips, then clawing up his back—Jace arched his back and cried out.

He heard Ral moan softly from somewhere, and then swear, loudly and angrily. “Ow—dammit—Guildpact, you didn’t make me functional!”

Jace sighed. “Yes, I did, Ral.”

“Then how does this thing work?”

“You do fine when it’s on me.”

“Well, this one’s different,” whined Ral.  “I still say it’s defective.”

Jace sighed again. Lavinia giggled, and the sound vibrated through him, drawing another gasp from his lips.  “Maybe we should stop ignoring Guildmage Zarek now,” she said.

“Yes, we should!” snapped Ral.  “What happened to two women and the Guildpact?”

Jace glanced at Lavinia again and winked, before slowly pulling out of her, both of them trembling and gasping as he did.  “Come on over,” Jace said to Ral, patting the space on the bed between him and Lavinia.  Ral, after shooting him a suspicious glance, did so.  “Bend forward,” Jace instructed, pushing Ral over onto Lavinia. The Izzet mage gasped, and Jace saw that Lavinia had slid her hand down his pants.

“It—didn’t do that before,” Ral protested.

“Didn’t it?” Jace murmured in his ear, nibbling down his neck and reached for his trousers. Fortunately, the Izzet mage seemed to have already divested himself of his heavy belt and the various odds and ends that hung off of it, making it easy for Jace to drag Ral’s trousers off. Lavinia reached for his shirt, pulling it off over his head, which gave Jace easy access to the small, pert breasts that had appeared on Ral’s front.  He ran his hands over Ral’s chest, and the Izzet mage moaned again, sharp and surprised.  Lavinia pressed herself into his front and began to kiss his throat and then his chest.  Jace leaned over Ral’s shoulder and kissed her head, and then kissed Ral’s mouth when he turned around to protest.

“Lean forward,” he instructed Ral again.  “Lavinia, lie back for a minute.”  The other two complied, and Jace slid a finger up inside Ral, who hissed and then moaned.

“All right, so possibly—ghngh—barely functional,” he said, his voice muffled, and Jace realized Lavinia was kissing him.  Despite the lightning mage’s insistence that Jace had done a terrible, awful job and ought to be ashamed of himself, Jace’s finger was almost immediately covered with slippery wetness, and he added another briefly to check that Ral was ready for him.

“Oh, just put your cock in me, already,” grouched his lover.  “Agh—Lavinia—what are you—”

Jace’s hand brushed against Lavinia’s before he withdrew it, and Ral gave a strangled moan.  “I need you to keep leaning forward,” Jace said with a grin, and he leaned forward as well and thrust into Ral, not particularly gently.  The Izzet mage gasped and squeaked, then moaned, high and breathy, and let his head fall back onto Jace’s shoulder.  The mindmage put a hand across Ral’s chest and pulled him backwards until he was sitting on in Jace’s lap, and Lavinia followed them up, leaning over Ral’s shoulder to kiss Jace, and then pressing herself forward until Jace felt her just beneath where he felt Ral, and he keened softly into her mouth.

“Ah—Lavinia—” he murmured.

Ral, panting and whimpering, started to move clumsily up and down, and Lavinia matched his motions with her body and her hand.  Jace broke the kiss with her to bite down on Ral’s shoulder in desperation, even the familiar taste of his lover enough to arouse him further.

He groped for Ral’s breasts with one hand, the other sliding down Lavinia’s front to grasp at hers.  Both she and Ral mewled almost in unison, and Jace continued to thrust, his breath coming in short gasps, losing himself in the heat of Ral and the tang of his and Lavinia’s sweat.  Soft lips brushed Jace’s hair, and a hand caressed his shoulder, another one falling to land on his own. Fingers threaded through Jace’s, clenching tight, and it was only as the nails dug into his palm that he realized from the orientation they must be Ral’s, not Lavinia’s. Jace smiled and thrust harder, though his rhythm was starting to stutter as the motion of Ral’s hips pulled him closer to the edge.

“Ah—I—Ral—” he moaned, the heat becoming too much.  The tantalizing brush of Lavinia against him where he was joined with Ral drew a sob from Jace’s throat, and he was thrusting wildly, head pressed forward into Ral’s damp curls, Lavinia’s hand clawing into his back as she moaned and moved in a rhythm all of her own.

Jace climaxed suddenly with a choked cry, freezing in mid-thrust, his back arched, the smell and touch of Ral and Lavinia surrounding him.  As he began to slump backwards, a sudden smell of ozone and familiar crackle drew him back upright.  “Don’t you d—”  It was closer to a second orgasm than an aftershock, the lightning shivering through his limbs dragging bliss in its wake, and Jace cried out again, Ral’s name falling easily from his tongue.

He fell backward, half-out of Ral, but without enough energy to disengage properly. The other two were still moaning against each other, and Jace watched, exhausted and vaguely tantalized, twitching slightly as Ral slid up and down him.  “Yes, like that—ghhngh,” Ral panted, and Lavinia answered with another moan.

“Oh, Krokt,” murmured the Izzet mage.  “Oh, Krokt—this is—different—”

Jace poked him in the side.  “So I made you functional enough?”

“I suppose I must concede—hnagh—ah—you didn’t do too bad a jo-o-ob,” Ral finished his sentence on a short, high-pitched moan, his legs spasming, body arching back and crashing into Jace.  They lay tangled together for a few minutes, breathing hard.  Lavinia sat back, flushed and sweaty and looking very pleased with herself, and Jace reached out, took her hand, and said, I can finish you off again if you’d like. She was close, he could feel it—could feel the pent-up orgasm beating at the inside of her mind and legs. Lavinia nodded, and Jace reached with practiced fingers for part of her mind and tweaked.  The Azorius arrester’s eyes slid shut, and every muscle tightened.  Jace moaned softly as her ecstasy crashed across him as well.

They lay, breathing together, for quite some time, before Lavinia stretched lazily and began to sit up.  “Thank you both,” she said formally.  “That was a most enjoyable first sexual encounter.”

There was a pause.  “What!” exclaimed Ral, shooting up so quickly that he fell back over.

Lavinia smiled. “Recently, my exposure to the idea of sex has been, shall we say, increased. I decided that it was high time I tried it, so I decided to arrange something with two people I trusted.”

“I am not trustworthy!” Ral practically wailed.

“Two people whom I knew would respect me and my boundaries and not push too hard if I didn’t want them to.”

This time Ral wasn’t even able to manage a rejoinder, his mouth hanging uselessly open as Jace snickered into the bedclothes.  Drawing himself up, the Izzet mage stalked over to the door. “I am not a good person,” he snarled.  “I am going off to my lab to electrocute some goblins.”

The door banged open and shut.  Jace looked at Lavinia, who looked after the disappearing lightning mage with an air of vague curiosity.  “So, you knew he’d been working on a machine, and then bet him he couldn’t make it?”

Lavinia laughed. “Of course.  I may trust him, but I also couldn’t resist the chance to beat him at his own kind of game.”

“So, why do you trust him, exactly?  You two are always fighting.”

She closed her eyes for a moment.  “Because I’ve seen him worry about you.”

Jace snorted at this.  “Don’t tell him that. He’d sooner walk across Ravnica naked than admit that he cares about people.” He looked over at the scattered remnants of Ral’s clothing.  “Speaking of which, do you think he’ll come back for his clothe—”

The door banged open again.  Ral stalked back over to the bed, grabbed his shirt and pants and stomped back out the door and slammed it.

“Well,” Jace began, before being interrupted by the door again.

“BABY goblins!” Ral snapped, shaking a finger at them menacingly before disappearing once more.

“It’s rather cute, really,” Lavinia continued.  “He desperately tries to pretend that he only wants to have sex with you, and you desperately try to pretend that you don’t want to have sex with him.”

Jace opened his mouth, then closed it again. He really didn’t have anything to say to that.