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It's so strange, being back.

Ishgard hasn't changed in hundreds of years, strange to think it would have changed since he'd been here last, but then, everywhere else he'd been has changed just in the time he's been there. So it's strange to be walking streets he knows from his childhood but with eyes that are so different.

Beside him, Emmanelain chatters on about the different facets of city life. He had made sure Haurchefant knew to petition his former family with as much discretion as possible. They, of course, had simply said their son had died and they were certain some fugitive from Uldah couldn't be him anyway. He hadn't expected any differently. He feels like that person is dead and he breathes on as someone wholly different anyway, but it's strange, to be being shown around the place he grew up in by a member of one of the High Houses, someone his parents would have killed for him to be friends with just a few short years earlier, as though he were a stranger to this place.

He has always been a stranger to this place.

Dressed in Gridanian fashion and tanned lightly by the sun, he doesn't expect there's anyone here who would recognize him. He'd been barely more than a ghost when he left, hardly a warrior of anything. But as they pass through the Jeweled Croizer and Emmanelain gets caught up talking to some girl he's been trying to woo, there's a sudden, strange sensation at the back of his head, something like and unlike the Echo, and he turns, eyes scanning the busy street for... something. Someone.

(For some reason, unbidden, he remembers the night of the Calamity, giant pieces of some other part of Eorzea raining from the sky..

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That's a conversation for another time-- even Gustavain knows this isn't particularly the time to get into any more of his deeper feelings regarding murdering the family members of his beloved. So he just purrs a soft,

"Good," instead, driving a little harder for a moment in an unspoken bit of thanks. It's clear that the next sentence isn't connected, a new bit of negotiation through the new places they find themselves,

"So do you have a big scary ~~scarf-hands~~ true form as well? Or was that something only Hades could do?" After all, Lahabrea's form seemed smaller, Elidibus didn't even seem to bother with it. He'd seen part of Phillip's true form, before, but it hadn't really seemed much larger than Phillip and he'd had truly nothing at that point to compare it to.

Somehow, Phillip manages a snort, even with his mind very much distracted by that drive in deeper. The pace is slow enough, still, that he can talk. "Big, no. Scary, I suppose it depends. Though 'true form' is... honestly quite relative. He certainly didn't always look like that."

What is the 'true form' of any being that can change themselves at will, really? The form Phillip had showed him that first night was a (smaller) version of the form he took in Amaurot, but what he'd seen from Hades... perhaps that was more like a manifestation of his soul, with the artifice of appearance stripped away. And he would certainly argue that, in that case, the image in front of him was not Gustavain's true form either.

"He seemed to act like it was some kind of..." he trails off for a moment, struggling for the word. It's particularly hard given what he's doing, Phillip not the only one having to work to keep a conversation going at this point, "Mmm... stripping away all of the pretenses... kind of a thing." He loses the thread for a moment, grinds in deeper at the end of one long, slow thrust. Once he picks it back up again, it's clearly more disjointed, breathier,

"Wasn't... thinking about it at the time but after I... remembered that first night in Ishgard and I.." he doesn't finish the sentence, but the rest of it is likely at least partially explicit even without words, the way his fingers dig into Phillip's thigh to pull him up closer, the way he seems to lose control of the pace, speeding a little but also just more clearly falling into the pursuit of his own pleasure for a moment.

Phillip doesn't give an audible answer, other than the hitch of his breath and a moan while his hold on the body above his grows firmer. But he did hear it, did make the connection, and does manage an answer, though in less of a direct way.

He shifts, ever so slightly, not changing his size but otherwise reaching out for that other form, that one he'd shown Gustavain that night, but this time with no robe to hide in. In many ways, he looks much the same; the Ascians still had the same basic shape as the races of these worlds, being what they came from and all. However, the differences are easily stark enough to be noticeable.

The first one Gustavain is likely to notice, given the grip on his legs and hips, is how slight his frame is. He is still the same height as a hyur, but the proportion of his limbs and torso is more akin to that of the pixies he'd met on the First. If he lifts his eyes up, he'd see the face still very much resembling the one he's familiar, just with any sharpness smoothed over, an almost unnatural delicacy to it. His hair may be the most obvious change, from deep raven black to almost snow white, likely near down to his waist if it wasn't tied up in a messy braid, slung over his shoulder.

Of course, it is not just the physical that changes. Under his skin, all the more obvious without the pretense of a hyur form, the darkness in him rumbles. It's almost visible like this, like an anti-glow at the edge of his skin, deep and endless.

Phillip goes alien and familiar all at once and the room feels like it spins a little, Gustavain glad he's braced against the bed. The pace of his hips doesn't stutter, particularly, though it was somewhat erratic already, but his breath catches and he makes a low, keening noise that's utterly involuntary. He doesn't remember, there's nothing to remember, not in his mind, anyway. But his soul knows this...

When he thought about their first night together, he'd always presumed his reaction to the form was some kind of sick desire for the darkness, some kind of reaction as one of Hydaelyn's chosen filtered through his own heart. "Communion" with Fray had only intensified that opinion. Now, he's not sure.

Whatever it is, it spurs him onward with a kind of banked violence, Phillip's wrists pinned to the sheets in his hands, thrusts picking up now with a brutality born of sudden desperation far more than any desire to be cruel.

The cry that pulls from Phillip is filled to the brim with an aching desire, any discomfort clearly overpowered by the pleasure. Indeed, he seems to melt under the hold, more than willing to let Gustavain do what he wills.

He has certainly wondered about that first night, especially in the days before he knew for certain if the love he felt was returned. Certainly, everyone here had once been one of his kind, but Hydaelyn's influence here was strong enough that the darkness seemed to unnerve most of them anyway. It begins to make sense now, even though he can't really put much thought to it at the moment.

"Gods," he gasps, his body beginning to shudder with each thrust, heat rising within him to almost become unbearable, "Please, love, please--"

They're not done; Phillip's going to want to go at least one more time and there's a decent chance they will keep this up, tangled up with each other and working this out until the morning sun. But this high is peaking, making the way for a release.

Gustavain is perfectly capable of taking something like that soft pleading and turning it into a game of it's own, teasing with words or with pleasure until Phillip's out of his mind with it, just as much as he's happy to submit to the reverse. But right now, there are too many layers of other "games" happening, too much that is testing all on it's own.

Mostly, though, it's simply because he's entirely too far gone to have the brainpower to toy with him in any way. He does hear the plea, though, and it spurs him into a low, growling sort of noise, undirected but possessive, and the thrusts turn harder, deeper.

He'll follow him over the edge, when he goes. If it takes much longer, he'll pin both of Phillip's hands in one of his and reach down between them to stroke him, but that's only if it goes on long enough for him to think of it.

Phillip has the level of comfort with Gustavain that he needs to even make that plea, enough to be happy to be submitted to being teased with it. But this is just as good, if not better- his cry being heard, and the response being to claim him.

It doesn't take much longer at all. With the intensity of the conversation, there is absolutely no room to consider holding back, especially when he's not holding back with words either. He's unable to keep his body still, straining against the hands holding him down as his body arches, riding the wave of pleasure as the release overtakes him.

It feels like it lasts forever, but in reality it's not long before he falls back on the sheets, limp and languid and relaxed in the aftermath.

Gustavain props himself up on his arms and a bit of his knees, just enough to not crush Phillip entirely in the aftermath, but he's not inclined to go even as far away as his side right now, not when he can have a few more minutes of being inside and on top of him. He presses his forehead down against Phillip's cheek, into the side of his neck a bit, and just breathes for a moment. And then, soft enough that Phillip might think he'd imagined it,

"You know well there's no such thing as promises with me, but I'll try not to stay gone so long, next time," it's clear he doesn't mean the First, or the other places he's been or might go. Phillip was right that even if Gustavain is Azem, he's Gustavain first-- a splintered soul is not the only indicator of a person. But that statement comes out sounding a whole hell of a lot more Azem than Gustavain, down to a lilt to his voice that Phillip hasn't heard in thousands of years.

That lilt alone almost breaks him open again, and he feels a wetness merging at the corner of his eyes even as he laughs, curling himself closer and wrapping his arms around his lover. "I'd appreciate that," he says softly in turn, and while the tone is as wry as it ever is there's a sort of brightness to it. He's never been particularly chipper, but it would certainly be fair to say that everything that happened took a lot of the light from him.

Phillip stays mostly still underneath him for the moment, hands making a slow, peaceful slide over his body as they breath together. He hasn't shifted back yet, though he certainly will before they leave this room. For now... it sort of feels right, to show who he is and was like this.

He wasn't lying when he said there was no such thing as promises, with him. There never have been. Not in this life or any other. He is, above all else, a wanderer, more liable to blow in and out with the winds than to ever try to resist them-- even for this, even for love.

But for once, he does wish he could promise, even if it was just something like I'll find you again. In every life, I will look for you, now that I know to look. He would mean it, if he said it, but he also knows there's no way he could guarantee it, no way to ever uphold his end of the bargain. Better not to promise, then, even if this is one he wishes he knew how to keep.

"I can't be what I was, even if I could remember," he adds, and it's more Gustavain's voice now, though there's still something achingly familiar at the edges of it. "But then, I don't think you are who you were, either, yes? I think, for me, it's enough to know there is a choice, and that I've chosen this now, regardless of whatever once was." There's a soft chuckle from him, barely a breath, "In that, I suppose it's not much different from anyone else, is it?"

It is for the best, then, perhaps one of the reasons they work well, that Phillip isn't inclined to ask for promises. There are times he would like to- he doesn't mind Gustavain's wandering, even to places he can't follow, but sometimes it would be nice to assured that he would come back. But promises are all too easy to break, even if the maker has no intention to. Hurt and heartbreak lie too clearly down that road.

He lets out a soft huff of a laugh, shaking his head. "No, it's not," he hums, and maybe there is comfort in that. Even if he is much longer lived than anyone else on this star, they are still in many of the important ways the same. It'll take time, for him to undo that thinking, of being one of the only 'real' beings, but for now... he at least has this choice to hold on to.

It's always hard for him to voice his thoughts, and in this moment he doesn't really try to. Instead, he just shifts enough to find Gustavain's mouth with his, pressing in a long, aching but still oddly content, kiss.

He leans into the kiss, finally shifting off of Phillip, but it's just to melt down beside him, curled as close as possible. His fingers trace quiet patterns on his skin, small and absent, but he doesn't seem inclined to keep talking, at least not right away.

"I wouldn't mind it, you know," he says, finally, "if you were to come with me sometimes. When you can." Because they both are and are not talking about other lives, but there's still this life to consider. "We could get into trouble together for a change."

Phillip snorts, though it's followed by a soft little kiss to his jaw. "That is the best kind of trouble," he says, playing with the threads of the other's hair, "I suppose I'll have to fess up that I do actually know what I'm doing with the right kind of weapon." He's been getting better as a Black Mage, but calling on the Void is just so much more natural at this point.

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