my_own_advocate | Under A Stack of Blankets, A Castle on the Coast of Norway, Tuesday Evening

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Under A Stack of Blankets, A Castle on the Coast of Norway, Tuesday Evening

It wouldn't technically be their anniversary for a few more days - or had already been weeks and/or days ago depending on whether you counted Duke's nearly-bungled proposition and which stage of it - but Fandom had Fandomed, so why wait? Lucifer had bustled everyone into the portal in the morning, and they'd driven up to his castle (which, at least, he'd gotten cleaned prior to the whole repeating Friday debacle), ooh'ed and aah'd at it for about five minutes, and then rushed indoors to get warm.

The old-fashioned way.

... both in terms of nudity and in terms of blankets.

And that was where they remained, under several layers of warm blankets in a room that exuded both modern luxury and medieval castle in equal measure. Lucifer hadn't been here in decades, but he'd made damned sure the place had been ready for their arrival well in advance. The wardrobe was old but cleaned and refurbished, as was the bed, there were mood candles aplenty, a full wine cellar, and... loads of other things he couldn't think about right now, actually.

"I'm never leaving this bed again," he informed Duke's shoulder. "Ever."

[[ for those who are there, and la la, I don't know what you're talking about, I didn't just linkdrop all that so I don't have to keep searching for those threads. ]]

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The repeat-y weekend had been rough, at least for one where nothing much at all happened. A small part of Octavia had longed to just retreat to her own boat, after, or maybe the preserve, and just be by herself for a while to unwind.

The bigger part of her, however, had been a little more willing to do exactly what they'd done. Including enthusiastically trying to work off all her restless energy and/or distract herself from it.

She heaved a big sigh on Duke's other side. "Sounds like a plan."

Duke was perfectly happy to just live in the moment and pretend the multiple Friday thing hadn’t happened at all. Especially when he was delightfully sandwiched between his two favorite people in the multiverse.

“Okay,” he said. “But at some point, we are going to need food. Don’t suppose this place comes with a very discreet butler?”

"I considered hiring one, but I haven't yet," Lucifer said. "Felt that might get in the way of potential nudism." He sighed. "I suppose I could hire one later this week..."

"We don't need an extra person here," Octavia replied, lazily eyerolly in her tone. "One of us will make the sacrifice of getting up."

“Uh huh.” Duke gave her a lazily amused look. “And is that you volunteering, gona?”

"It certainly sounds like her volunteering," Lucifer agreed.

"Apparently both of you are wusses, so, yes."

Rude, Tavi.

“The wussiest,” Duke agreed, rolling over to wrap himself around her.

What? She didn’t have to get up for food right now.

"Not wusses," Lucifer corrected. "Merely willing to take advantage of your no-nonsense approach to life."

He shifted into the space Duke just abandoned - couldn't waste all that warmth - and wrapped his arm around them both.

Octavia made a pleased noise, settling into Duke's embrace. She pressed a kiss to the top of his chest, while sliding her arm over his side, where her hand could find Lucifer's skin.

Times like these, it always felt important to be in contact with both of them. At multiple points, if at all possible.

"Sure, whatever you say. Wusses."

"Being a wuss involves being naked and warm and snuggly," Duke pointed out. "I'm not seeing the downside."

"True," Lucifer said, pressing an idle kiss between Duke's shoulder blades. "You're not really convincing us that being anything other than a 'wuss' is that terrible."

Sorry both your partners didn't have enough toxic masculinity for that one, Tavi.

Please, it had nothing to do with masculinity in the first place.

"Well, don't cry after me too much when I go."

"We'll do our best," Duke promised. Not letting her go. He was right where he loved to be. "But I'm sure we can muddle through."

"At least we'll have each other, hm?" Lucifer said, dropping his chin on Duke's shoulder.

Octavia wasn't in a rush to move, either. No one was hungry yet anyway, right?

"Yes you will," she murmured. Was that a whole lot softer, all of a sudden? Whoops.

"Together, pining away for our beautiful Tavi. . . ."

Lucifer laughed softly. "We'll get to wax poetic about her gorgeous dark locks..."

Octavia's softness gave way to something openly amused. "Oh, you can do that while I'm here, too."

"Oh can we?" Duke asked, running his fingers through said locks. "Can we really?"

"Perhaps absence makes the heart go fonder on the hair issue," Lucifer teased.

He had to punctuate this, naturally, by nuzzling Duke's.

Octavia huffed. "I can't believe neither of you are taking the bait to tell me nice things."

She was heartbroken.

Really.

"'My lady's hair is nothing like the sun. . . .'" Duke recited, still stroking her hair even as he turned his head a little into Lucifer's nuzzling.

Lucifer chuckled softly. "...Coral is far more red than her lips' red..."

"I'm not sure I like where this is going," Octavia rasped.

Like a heathen.

Duke laughed. "It's Shakespeare, gona. Ancient romance." He skipped most of the rest of the sonnet, jumping right to: "'I grant I never saw a goddess go;' My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground.'"

He thought she might like that bit, somehow.

Lucifer pressed a kiss behind Duke's ear. "'And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare. As any she belied with false compare.' It's a poem made for your contrarian yet lovely behind, darling."

"Sounds old," Octavia murmured, trying for a quip but landing somewhere much more soft again.

She pressed another kiss against Duke's chest.

"Sounds nice," she added. "You know. As much as I understood it, anyway."

"Shakespeare is pretty inscrutable," Duke agreed, dropping a kiss to her hair in return. "But I like him anyway. He's equal parts romance and dick jokes."

"Rather Duke in a nutshell," Lucifer teased. "Mm, I believe the idea of that poem is that one's love does not compare to all of the world's legendary beauties, because she's special, and thus better."

"Oh," Octavia murmured. Her fingertips were drawing random shapes against Lucifer's arm.

She nuzzled Duke's chest a little more. Feeling a little... small, again. But in that weird, good, safe kind of way.

"Right to the heart as always, Luce," Duke said. "Mochof."

Lucifer's lips quirked. "I should know, I've slept with a few beautiful humans in my day," he said. "A lot of them, actually."

He ran his fingers along Octavia's hip. "And now I get to keep the best ones."

Which was, frankly, insane.

And it wasn't the keeping them that was the insane part, from the other side.

"How can we be the best ones?"

Duke would agree with her, except that he thought she really was the best. He turned his head a little, still hanging onto Octavia, clearly waiting for the answer.

Lucifer really should have seen that question coming, shouldn't he?

"How can you not?" he asked, after a moment's pause. "I've never met anyone like either of you in all my life."

He shifted, cushioning his head on his free hand.

Much like everyone should have seen it coming that Octavia and Duke both thought the other one clearly was the best.

"But that's not very hard, is it?" Octavia murmured against Duke's skin. "He's a pirate from a cursed town. And my world's ended, only in this time, that hasn't even happened yet. The odds of you meeting people like us before aren't great."

"That's not what he means, Tavi," Duke said fondly, combing his fingers through her hair. "And you know it." He flicked Lucifer a raised eyebrow. "Not that I'm objecting if you want to go into more detail."

"I believe if I told you you only find Duke extraordinary because he happens to be a pirate with a curse on him, you'd stare at me like I was an idiot, and rightly so," Lucifer told Octavia, a faint smile on his lips.

He dropped back onto the mattress. "You know, it's almost the two-year - Fandom time, because all of our timelines are ridiculous - anniversary of the two of you dancing in my club together for the first time."

Octavia wasn't even going to try figuring out how many years it had been for her.

She remembered. That was the point.

"New Year's," she murmured, softer again.

"You looked gorgeous," Duke agreed. He remembered really well, for all he'd been on at least a few different recreational pharmaceuticals at the time. "Light, and wild, and absolutely free."

He hadn't realized it then of course, but that might have been when he really fell in love with her.

"You both did," Lucifer said.

He pressed a kiss against the back of Duke's neck.

"I'll never forget."

He'd told Octavia this, once. He didn't remember if he'd ever told Duke.

Octavia remembered that, too. It still amazed her that he'd even paid attention.

"And we had no reason to think you even saw us."

“You were watching,” Duke said softly. If he had been told, he hadn’t remembered. “We made an impression even then, huh?”

"Well, I was a bit sad and heartbroken as it was," Lucifer said, his thumb sliding idly up and down Octavia's hip. "And then there the two of you were, looking like some better deity than my Father made you to shine light on the universe itself together."

"We were just dancing," Octavia murmured. She sounded a little far away, because she was thinking back on it. Her memories were fragmented, more like flashes than the entire thing, and still strong. "Drunk, and high."

She paused. Her voice got quieter.

"But we were happy."

“You. . . .” Duke said. “You were more than happy. You were carefree. I was in awe.”

The next morning she had been anything but.

But she’d also used the L word the first time.

"Free, and caught up in your passions," Lucifer said softly. "Both of you."

Octavia's hand pulled away from Lucifer's skin - for the moment, anyway - so that she could slide it up to Duke's neck, to the line of his jaw.

"And you were dancing with other people, and then you just... left them."

Duke shrugged, smiling at her. "You were more interesting." He glanced back at Lucifer. "I'm just kind of sad you didn't join us then."

Not that any of them would have known how to handle that at the time.

Lucifer snorted softly. "And get my sad old broken heart all over your thrilling young love affair?" he murmured. "No."

"It wasn't a love affair yet."

Didn't it count if they'd only started figuring that part out the morning after?

"We were too distracted by our own sad broken hearts," Duke said. "But we were about to figure it out."

Lucifer let out a soft, amused huff.

"It certainly looked like a love affair."

"Maybe sometimes these things look clearer from the outside."

"Oh, I'm sure it usually does."

"It looked beautiful, is what it looked like," Lucifer said, pressing another, more thoughtful kiss against Duke's shoulder. "I wasn't in love with either of you then," he said, "But I may have fallen just a bit for your love affair. Visible or not."

"You liked us because we liked each other?" Octavia asked, softer again.

And like she could get that, actually. Was getting that, lately.

"He's a hopeless romantic," Duke said, faintly teasing. "And we're adorable."

"Just hopeless, mainly," Lucifer said. He closed his eyes and nuzzled Duke's back gently. "But yes, I suppose. There was just something-- right, about the two of you together."

Octavia shifted a little. Tried to get properly face to face with Duke, now.

"I think I understand," she murmured. "Kind of. From... watching the two of you."

"Not really one for fate," Duke said, pressing back into Lucifer a bit to give her space to turn. "But if anything's meant to be, might as well be the three of us."

"I don't know," Lucifer said, with half a laugh, and his hand slid off Octavia for a moment so he could hug Duke close. "I know I am in the one place in the multiverse I want to be. I know the two of you still look perfect together, and I'm... incredibly lucky to be here."

"We're not perfect." Far from it. "But we're trying."

And semi-successfully, lately, more often than not.

"Sometimes, we're a trash fire." Duke huffed a rueful laugh.

"But a gorgeous trash fire," Lucifer teased, but the joke missed commitment.

He closed his eyes and pressed his forehead against Duke's shoulder.

"No, I suppose... You're perfect enough for me."

Octavia pressed her forehead to Duke's.

"And you're perfect to me," she murmured. "Both of you. Together."

It had been a strange thing to learn over the course of the year.

"Only with you with us, too," Duke told her, cupping his hand against the back of her neck. "All three of us together."

"Yes."

Lucifer let out a soft huff.

"It's funny," he said thoughtfully. "I used to think I was just... a bit of a guest here."

"Why is that?" Octavia asked, soft and quiet, but she had a few guesses. It wasn't entirely an alien thought to her, after all.

She just didn't want to say that.

Duke had his own theories -- he'd been convinced that he was just getting between the two of them for a bit there, himself -- but held his tongue, waiting for Lucifer's answer.

"Well, you two were together, and clearly very much in love, in spite of your difficulties at the time," Lucifer said, with a little sigh. "So when you propositioned me, I... assumed I just got to borrow a little bit of your light. And... then eventually I'd either move on myself, or you'd have had your fun, and... that would be it."

As she listened, Octavia's hand found its way over Duke to Lucifer's shoulder again. Or whichever part that was, it was hard to tell.

Freckled skin all the same, she was sure.

She made a little noise. Sounded weirdly like hesitation.

Duke shifted, rolling carefully onto his back so he could better look at both of them.

"I had no idea what I wanted when I asked that," he admitted. "I just -- I thought you two were meant to be. And I wanted to be included, at least for awhile."

Lucifer blinked. "You thought Octavia and I were going to sail off into the sunset together?" he said. "She was your snogon."

Yeah, Octavia had also given Duke an inquisitive, confused look as soon she heard the words 'meant to be'.

She was still kind of giving him one now that she shifted a little, to prop her head up on one arm.

"You're the Children of Aurora," Duke said softly. "Luce, you know Trig without even trying. You're both . . . magic. I'm just cursed."

Lucifer snorted. "I'm not magic, I'm the Devil," he said. "And you are an incredible human being she is lucky to have, and vice-versa."

"You were my snogon," Octavia said, almost like a helpless sigh. "You are my snogon. And I -- I was willing to let you trade me in for Lucifer."

Oh, yeah, that worry about not being enough had morphed into something else before it had finally faded.

"Because he was the better thing I thought you deserved."

Duke let out a little helpless laugh.

"So basically . . . we're all really lucky that 'three way' was a legitimate option, so we didn't have to 'Gift of the Magi' each other."

Lucifer let out a hopeless chuckle of his own against Duke's back. "All of us thinking we'd be rightfully left behind by something all three of us wanted," he said. "So much time wasted."

He leaned up, stretching across Duke to press a kiss to Octavia's mouth.

Octavia used the kiss for quieting down her need to wonder out loud how much of that was down to the way they'd stumbled into this in the first place. Didn't really matter that much now, did it?

Her hand strayed briefly into Lucifer's hair.

Duke kept still between them, more than content to watch. To feel both of them press against him as they kissed each other.

Yeah, they were damned lucky this had been an option. He couldn't imagine it any other way, now.

It felt safe, didn't it? And right. And Lucifer had no interest in relitigating Duke's initial strategies here when, at the end of the day, Duke had gotten them here.

He let out a soft sigh, lingering.

"I'll save the actual speeches for the actual anniversary," he said. "But I feel incredibly lucky to be here. With both of you."

"We have an actual anniversary?" Octavia asked, but distracted, her head already turning.

Because she needed to duck down and kiss Duke, too.

"Several, I'm guessing," Duke said -- and then was kissing back. When they were done he looked at Lucifer. "Which thing are we actually counting from?"

"We should probably decide," Lucifer said, having leaned back to watch both of them in turn. "The fifteenth was when I kissed Octavia, but we've since passed that."

He patted Duke's arm. "I kissed you four days later," he said. "We got on the Rouge together on the 24th, and had sex for the first time - in this configuration, at least - on the 27th, so... pick a date."

Shut up. He hadn't memorized all that. Shut up.

Sorry, Octavia's face said plenty. Though mostly it was an elated sort of surprised.

"You... remember all of that?"

With dates?

“Told you,” Duke said. “He’s magic.”

"I'm not magic, I'm just celestial," Lucifer sighed. He looked up at Octavia. "And... those days mattered to me. Especially considering what came just before."

Octavia reached up again, to brush her fingertips against Lucifer's cheek.

"I knew they mattered," she said. "Just hadn't realized it was that much." That he could list them, name them, a year later.

"Not sure why you can't be both," Duke said idly. "After everything that happened this year. . . ."

He honestly couldn't have said what time of year they'd all gotten together.

"Anyway. I vote for that first boat date. The 24th."

Lucifer leaned ever-so-subtly into her touch. "Agreed?" he asked Octavia, softly.

The brushing became more of a solid touch, cupping his cheek.

Octavia nodded. "Sha."

Duke pressed a kiss to Lucifer's forehead -- or maybe his cheekbone. Whatever bit he could reach without moving and maybe disturbing them.

"What should we do until then?"

"Eat, drink, screw, let Octavia pull us into the woods, indulge you in some ice fishing or hanging about the water," Lucifer said, mouth curving. "Anything we want."

He slid just a little further up against Duke, into Octavia's hand.

"Accept that we all want to be here," he said, quieter. "And deserve to be."

Octavia had been doing so well without her expression going all wobbly, but there it was, rushing in with how tight her chest felt all of a sudden.

Her inhale was a little on the shuddery side.

(It was an old wound, not fitting in. It still mattered now when it was soothed.)

Edited 2021-12-22 22:46 (UTC)

"No matter how hard it is, sometimes," Duke agreed, clinging to both of them as best he could.

"The two of you saved me," Lucifer said softly. He was sprawled so far across Duke by now he was a bit worried he might be too heavy. "From being alone and lost and chasing a carrot that--"

He cut himself off.

"I want this to be a trip we can remind ourselves of when things are hard," he said, "And it seems easier to wallow in our own misery than to look to one another."

Octavia thought she should say something, here. Voice her agreement, tell them how much this all meant to her after the year they'd had, how she'd gone in the ice on the Eligius expecting to never feel like a part of a family again --

But sometimes the good could feel a little overwhelming. And render her speechless.

So all she could do was drop her head against Duke's shoulder, crowding him from her side the way Lucifer was doing on the other.

Duke felt the weight of both of them pressing in on him. It could have been overwhelming, weighing him down, but instead it felt . . . settling.

Like an anchor.

He owed Linda an apology. Especially as he imagined having this to hold onto, when Haven eventually dragged him back.

Lucifer let out a soft breath. He stretched his arm out until it wrapped around them both.

He dropped his head down to the pillow - he did realize that two heads on his shoulders might be a bit much, for Duke. He fell quiet, his fingers running gently up and down Octavia's arm.

Octavia gathered herself for a moment or two. It probably wasn't surprising which language she went for when she finally spoke again.

"Yo bilaik ai tombom." She swallowed. "Yo laik ai hou."

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Under A Stack of Blankets, A Castle on the Coast of Norway, Tuesday Evening

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