Your shiftmate whistled when you admitted the news.

“When I said get yourself a lover, I didn’t realize you would go out and bag yourself a prince.”

You smiled to yourself, immensely pleased.

“I was gonna offer to buy you a drink to celebrate, but I think you should just hop in his bed again. See what else you can get,” he added, elbowing you excitedly.

“Fuck you,” you laughed. You shoved him, but you also made the immediate decision to go to the palace that night.

As time went on, the sex got better. Genji learned how to please you better (which always included liberal use of his fangs), and you returned the favour. But that got you to thinking, if he was sleeping with you, there was nothing stopping him from doing the same with others.

You breathed deep and slow, staring hard at him. You asked him one night if there were others. Genji denied it.

“And even if there were others, truth be told, you have worn me out,” he said, regarding you wearily and resting his cheek in his hand.

You jogged across the room and jumped in his lap, where he sat on his recliner.

“Then just sit there. You don’t have to do anything,” you said, grinding down onto his crotch.

“Whatever you wish.”

You pulled his cock out, to his protest of, “Be more gentle!” The two of you spent the night rubbing and grinding and rolling your hips against each other, his cock sliding inside you with quick, shallow movements. Genji thrust up into you when your muscles refused to obey you anymore. Then you went to sleep in his spacious bed.

A hand touched your shoulder, and you groaned grumpily.

“Please do not be angry,” Genji pleaded softly. He pulled the blankets from your body, earning him a growl from you. He gently slipped his hands under your body. “I should have done this before, but I was making decisions with my dick.” He lifted, hugging your sleepy self to his chest. “Come on.”

“You’re a dick,” you accused.

“Yes, yes. Just come on.”

You welcomed the hot water he eased you into after being rudely ripped from the bed. You blinked away the sleepiness. Steam and a medicinal, but not strongly so, scent wafted upwards from the water. Tiny, fresh herb leaves floated in the water. You whirled your hand in the water, making the herbs dance around in the miniature currents. You gave Genji no snark this time, just smiled at him with genuine gratitude.

“Enjoy,” Genji urged you, “And clean yourself.”

A knock at the nearby door made you both look towards it. Genji got up from kneeling next to the tub to answer it. Two slender hands appeared with folded linens resting on them. Genji opened the door further to take them from the young woman standing there.

“The extra towels, Your Highness,” she said with a bow, politely averting her eyes from you. You wouldn’t have cared if she saw you. You had changed and bathed yourself many times at the barracks in front of your fellow guardsmen. This wasn’t much different.

“Thank you, Miho.”

The girl called Miho was apparently not the only person at the door, because two pairs of heavily-makeuped eyes stared at you from behind the maid.

“The latest conquest,” you heard one of them hiss, rudely feigning a whisper, before Genji shoved the door closed behind Miho. They continued to speak loudly out in the hallway.

“Too much muscle to be a woman.”

“Too many breasts to be a man.”

“What a freak!” exclaimed one, and then they both giggled.

You couldn’t believe your ears. They were right outside the door. You glanced at Genji with eyebrows knotted together in unimpressed disbelief. They insulted your body, with its curves and muscle from all your training. Your body was a living, walking example of your hard work. Resentment and an urge to punch someone starting tensing your muscles.

Genji opened the door again and strode out with his royal chin held high. Judging by the stiffness of his body, they were in for it.

“Go circle someone else and peck at them, you vultures,” rang out Prince Genji’s authoritative, raised voice. Your eyebrows shot up. He had never used that tone with you.

“Yes, Your Highness,” the women answered stiffly. You heard nothing more, so they must have left.

You could have found Genji’s use of his authority over the gossiping women amusing, but you didn’t. Instead, you wondered how awful it must be to live in a place with people like that in it. The downward-sloped, defeated lines of Genji’s shoulders confirmed what you thought. It gave you an idea. An adventurous one, but ever since you met Genji, you had been doing adventurous things.

He came back to kneel again next to the tub. He rested his hand against the back of your neck, staring at your mouth instead of into your eyes.

“What’s wrong, Tiger?” you asked, raising your chin.

He smiled sadly at the nickname.

“My problem is now yours since they know you are here with me. The gossip will make its way through the palace by the end of the day,” he explained. You shrugged. You were an adult and could handle yourself. The prince put his hand on the edge of the tub. “May I join you?”

You nodded. Genji peeled his clothes off quickly and let them drop to the floor. You got yourself a nice eyeful of naked man before he stepped into the water with you. You especially noted his semi-erection. He sunk down into the water to sit next to you.

He followed your gaze to his lap. He smirked but told you to ignore it.

“You know I could have you transferred to the palace, so we could see each other more often. But…everyone would guess correctly that I had a hand in your transfer.”

That got your attention, because you had been wishing for that earlier. Genji watched you, waiting for you to say something. His mouth was slack, and his eyes lacked a confident glint; maybe he waited for you to rebuff his offer.

Which you did. “No.”

Genji was all set to respect your decision. “If that is-”

“Wait,” you said, stopping him with a hand held high. “I have a better idea. Let me explain.”

“Very well,” he said.

“But first,” you said, “tell me the story again about the monastary.”

You snuggled in close to him, pressing your naked side against you. The warmth from his body and the water combined was so cozy. You did your best to appear coy, and it seemed to work. Genji regarded you like he knew you were up to something, but you just stared at him with expectant wide eyes. And he couldn’t resist stroking his own ego by telling you about his heroic adventures.

“Very well,” he said, slipping an arm around your waist under the water. “The one about the monks in the monastary.”

Genji told you of how he climbed a mountain to find a cloister of monks. They studied a religion unique to only them. They were a kind and patient people, and as such, a village of followers had settled below the monastary on the mountain to learn from them. The inner sanctum held valuable religious artifacts of great importance to the monks. All of which, except one, were pacifists. They refused to fight under any circumstances (you always scoffed at this point in the story, being someone who had learned to defend yourself a young age). Genji himself learned what he could from these people and left. After he left, he learned that a neighbouring group of bandits were planning to ransack the village and loot the monastary. Knowing only one monk stood between the bandits and the kind people, Genji decided to go back and fight alongside the single monk. It was difficult and exhausting, but Prince Genji and the monk, Tekhartha Zenyatta, held off the bandits until a blizzard picked up, and they retreated. And that was how the prince received most of his scars.

“You have heard this story.” Genji pointed out. He watched you again after the story was done, but his expression held less disappointment.

“That’s because I have a wild idea. I spent a lot of time thinking about the kind of man you are, and it occurred to me then.” You kept your gaze centered on his face to watch for any changes in expression. “Why don’t we go there and live in the village?” Genji’s lips parted, and his black eyebrows came down. You had his full attention. “You must care for those people if you went back to defend them with your life. You don’t seem to care much about the people, here, in the palace.”

The arm around your waist squeezed you closer. Genji implored you with his eyes.

“You are ignorant of the dangers outside the city. I almost died in my story, if my friend Zenyatta had not been at my side.”

“I’ll have you at my side,” you said, nodding at him. “You can teach me what you know.”

You saw Genji’s mind working behind his eyes.

“Zenyatta would like you…You are a rational person…” He blinked as if realizing something. His lips widened across his face in a grin, showing his long canines. “And I look forward to making a good lover of you yet.”

“Whatever,” you scoffed and splashed water at him, a few leaves sticking to his chest. He grinned and surged forward to kiss you to seal the deal on that matter, then he took a moment.

“I just,” Genji began, but he stopped, blushing. You suspected he wasn’t used to having a red face in front of others, and you took a little perverse pleasure in that. Then he smiled at you with shining eyes, the way he did only at you. He took your face in his hands and looked into your eyes to make you heard his next words. “You continue to amaze me, you know this?”

“Thank you,” you murmured.

Genji gently wiped his thumbs across the blush forming on your cheeks. “Of course.” He smiled wide enough that his fanged peeked out. Then gave you a lingering kiss, expressing his amazement and gratitude with his lips and tongue.