Gilbert hadn't meant to. He really, really hadn't.

With the black rabbit slumbering in a deep unbreakable stupor in one room, a locked door portent to a Break of ambiguous status and a Sharon of dubious intent in another, he had yet again willingly donned the mantle of sleepless guardian as easily as the coat hung heavily around his shoulders. Vigilant as he had been every night, whether exhausted or gripped tightly by anxious insomnia made no alteration to the fact that it was his duty. His inherent right to patrol the one wing within the Rainsworth household that contained his Lord and Master, the eternally God-fearing prayer inducing Oz Vessalius.

Oz who, after earlier cheeky bids goodnight and slowly closed doors, always left Gilbert questioning the motives behind that shapely smirk.

The household staff were generally intelligent enough to abandon the West wing when they heard his slow, deliberate footsteps begin after nightfall and it had been shortly after their routine departure that the man had stumbled into yet another ploy to unravel his thinly wound up resolve.

He really hadn't meant to, but at the muffled sound of distress from Oz's quarters, his instincts had gone off like a well oiled gun, his boot had eliminated Oz's only means of privacy and 'regret' wasn't nearly accurate enough a descriptor for the massive migraine that had immediately threatened to punish him for his overreaction.

The other massive migraine had grinned congenially at him from the four poster bed. "You would think Gil would've learned by now."

And that had been that. Ten decades or ten days, Gilbert was Gilbert and Oz knew how to get a rise from him. A genuine smile, an overtly cheerful insult.

A naked, bedraggled, barely covered adolescent body with the legs posed just so.

He could still remember- how could he forget?- the first time he'd intruded on Oz's 'intimate evening activities'. The shame, the shock, the instantaneous physiological response, the arguing, the shame, the fleeting touches with the murmured reassurances and the shame. 'What about Alice', he'd said. What about Alice? Apparently Gilbert had not been the only one who had felt the wicked burn of a Vessalius tongue down his throat but give a Master an opening and he'd make evasive manuevers as elegant as his slightly upturned nose.

It had been similar to the revelation unto Oz that Gil was terrified of cats. Exploitable weakness doubled.

Show the right amount of interest, make the right kind of noises, push the right buttons and in would come an adrenaline pumped, easily distracted servant prone to accidental-on-purpose erections.

It was more for the sake of his barely in tact modesty that the hat perched atop Gilbert's head was quickly relocated to his groin. "I-I- I'm sorry I'll-"

Oz laughed. Waved a hand dismissively and eyed the hat as he offered brightly, "Close the door, dumbass. You never were very good at playing games- how many times is it and Gil's still acting shy?"

No response. He had no response to that other than to do what he was told and wallow deeper into his Master's trap. "Y-you know I should be out there watching for-" A gulp, a swallow. He hated the stuttering of his voice when Oz slowly drew the sheets away, snorting back more laughter when Gilbert's fingers continued to grasp at head wear that was no longer in his hands. Fallen to the floor from a brief twitch of shock, his pride gone.

"Doesn't matter, doesn't matter. I'm bored and you're here so- shall we?"

Gilbert stared. His master sighed.

"Come on, Gil. No one's going to attack us. We're safe now. Take off your coat and- stop looking at me like that. I told you the first time it's alright."

Which was true. Oz had delivered as many confirmations as he had kisses but no matter how often they came- Gilbert turned an impossibly darker shade of red- such a wretched creature could never admit worth for such a noble soul. It wasn't proper. Horribly selfish enough to have indulged in the barest of featherlight touches to supple thighs or a heaving chest even if he had been asked. His hesitant backward step served as a warning to Oz and lo, did his Master gain the most bewitching of smiles.

"No? Alright. Fine."

Oh sweet Relief. So damnably short lived.

"As your superior, I order you to touch yourself."

There followed a spectacular five minutes of useless floundering ending in the same open-mouthed, slack-jawed expression the man had begun with. He jammed his hands into his pockets, turned his face away and fervently wished Oz would start affirming that the suggestion was just a horrible example of trademark sadistic humor.

"That wasn't a joke you know."

Chuckling, at his expense. Gilbert could feel Oz's gaze lingering uncomfortably close to his stomach, lower, embarrassingly low. "What? What do you- Here? Now? But that's-"

"What I just told you to do."

"...Indecent."

They remained in a stand-off, watching, waiting, until Gilbert's hands finally, jerkily, withdrew to alight on the clasp of his pants. He raised one, tugged self-consciously at his cravat, sending reproachful looks to Oz who simply reclined and basked in self satisfaction.

There could be no denial that he needed to relieve some very obvious tension but it should have been in the darkness of a washroom miles away in the security of his empty, cramped nook in a nook. Not in a dimly lit chamber with an unnervingly steady gaze stuck fast to trembling fingers unhooking and pulling.

He flinched at the hum of disapproval when he paused mid-strip. "Oz..."

"Mm?"

"I can't do this."

"Oh really?" The boy's grin was picturesquely innocent as Gilbert mistakenly glanced up to witness a less than chaste palm curl around blood flushed flesh. It must have been the one too many he had knocked back the other day somehow returning to his system because a piteous groan sneaked out of his throat and the warm grip coaxing his erection out of its fabric confines was familiarly calloused. Never could ignore an order, unfortunately. If he just didn't look, pretended Oz wasn't there-

"I think you're doing just fine, Gil." The low intonation lanced through his ears like the crack of a shot. "Kind of slow though. Isn't that painful? Would it help if it were me doing it instead? My hands are much softer. Probably have longer fingers than you- proportionately. Bet you remember how they feel, right? Nice and slender and-"

"Oz."

"Just letting you know."

He knew. God, how he knew. His Master had beautiful hands. Sleek, dexterous unmarred skin that ever so lightly tickled the hairs on his neck and tweaked at the over sensitized imperfections of his torso. Ran along the underside of his jaw, the throbbing vein on his neck. Circled the agonized head of a cock far too frequently restricted to access anything more pleasurable than an occasional guilty stroke. Hands gifted with elegance and a proficiency for anything they touched dancing teasingly along an aching shaft.

Gilbert grit his teeth. Hissed with every slight trembling snap of his hips into tightened heat, eyes squeezed shut. A gentle tugging became a harsher pull. Fingertips all over a strained and leaking tip. Descending to a tightening sac. Coy. Frustratingly all over and never in once place long enough.

His knees began to waver. He backed into the door and felt hard wood at his spine, warmth at his front. Heard the lilt of a fluted cry that might have been his own then a piteous moan at the pain abruptly exploding in his skull when he threw his head back a bit too far.

More distant laughter. Fucking door, fucking clumsiness, fucking hand that felt so unforgivably good. Gilbert bit his lip while he thrust. Tried to think like a proper servant should. No embarrassment necessary. No hesitation required. Oz was there, yes, and he was, indeed, fondling himself while Gilbert shamefully mimicked him to mental images of their previous trysts together and yes he needed to set the pace faster dear God he had no idea how he was still standing when he angled his wrist again.

"Young Master..."

If his peers could have seen him. If Vincent or Eliot could have seen him- Gilbert shuddered bodily, curling in on himself. None of that mattered. They couldn't, they never would and the only one who did would be the only soul alive he could accept.

Emerald, black and white and gold and red seemed to blur together as vibrant as sound and sensation. Eventually Gilbert's only link to reality was the ever present paranoia that something could go wrong. That distant whisper at the back of his mind grown fainter and fainter with each brutal contact. Flesh, fist. Flesh, fist, Oz. Hideous, guilty Gilbert and gorgeous, ephemeral Oz.

He finally dared to blink once the filth that coated his fingers had cooled and deduced from the feet just barely at eye level he was already sprawled out on the floor. A rather convenient, appropriate place for one Gilbert Nightray. Much more gratifying to the impulse to bury himself and die.

"If you'd just come to bed with me instead of stalking Miss Sharon's mansion every night, you probably wouldn't have so many bruises."

Gilbert mumbled into the floor. Oz prodded him in the cheek with a toe. "Pardon?"

At no response, the feet padded out of view and Gil cautiously, stupidly raised his head.

"That's alright," His Master offered around licks to his own sticky fingers. "We'll just have to try it again next time."

He hadn't meant it, he really hadn't, but when Oz leaned over with a washrag and a helpful hand, pulling him to his feet and guiding him under the covers, Gilbert- for yet another night- neglected his watchman duties for the sweet release of sleep in clinging, boyish arms.