Chapter 1

We forge the chains we wear in life. – Charles Dickens

Damian disabled the alarms and slid silently in through the window. The apartment was dark, though that did little to hide its shabby, filthy nature. There were dirty clothes littering the floor, stacks of old pizza boxes and beer cans placed like works of art on various makeshift box tables, and the whole place reeked of the overflowing ashtrays that he knew had to be lying around somewhere, although he couldn't immediately see any. He crept closer to the bed, stopping about a foot away just to watch him sleep. He'd been watching him all night, in fact. He'd set himself the personal challenge to prove his skill at stealth, for stalking the Red Hood undetected was no minor feat.

'Hood had been in top form tonight. Damian had studied his movements with a faint smile and a simmering heat in his stomach. There was something about the way 'Hood moved that still screamed Robin even after all these years – a certain grace and fluidity that reminded Damian strongly of both Nightwing and Red Robin - but that's where the similarities ended. Red Hood's acrobatics lacked Nightwing's flexibility and flare and Red Robin's speed and agility. No one could ever claim that his fighting style was beautiful, but it was brutal, efficient, and deadly. His attacks were concerted, no extraneous movement, every strike designed with one goal in mind, not to disable or distract, but to kill.

Damian had watched him kill a man tonight. It was the first time in a long time that he'd seen someone die, and it had sent an electric shiver down his spine. Even after all these years, he still recalled vividly what it had felt like to take the life of another human being, that surge of power and dominance as you felt their weak and thready pulse slowing inexorably against your fingers. He licked his lips and palmed himself through his jeans. Alas, that pleasure was no longer his to savour. A Wayne kept his promises. Still…once you ate from the Tree, it was impossible to return the knowledge, or the memory of the power you once wielded.

There were compensations, though. He smirked down at Jason's naked form, the sweep of his broad chest, one well-muscled forearm flung over his face, a sculpted calf escaping from under the sheets to hang down over the side of the narrow cot. Even now he radiated power and potential energy like a taut bow. Damian wanted that power, wanted to own it, bend it to his will. Perhaps the rush wasn't quite the same as killing, but it was intense nonetheless.

With a graceful leap, he landed on top of Jason, knees bracketing his hips. Jason started awake with an undignified yelp, though there was nothing comical about the flurry of punches that would have fractured Damian's skull, if they'd connected. Damian caught his wrists easily, though restraining Jason was a bit harder. Damian had grown tall like his father, and he was taller than both Grayson and Drake, but he didn't have Jason or his father's sheer strength. He had the ability to put on the muscle, but he'd decided a few years back that the bulk would interfere with his preferred style of fighting, so he'd chosen to keep himself fairly lean. Perhaps he couldn't quite take Red Hood in a flat out wrestling match, but it didn't really matter. In a real fight, 'Hood would never get close enough to touch him. That wasn't hubris, that was just fact.

"You sleep too heavily. You should get a dog," Damian said.

Jason froze at the sound of his voice. Damian felt him slowly relax in his grip.

"I have alarms. What do I want a pet for?" Jason asked.

"A well trained dog isn't as easily disabled as an electronic alarm. Besides, pets have a variety of uses," Damian said as he deliberately wedged his knee up between Jason's legs.

Jason sucked in a sharp breath, the sound unnaturally loud in the quiet apartment.

Damian pressed his wrists into the mattress and leaned down to nuzzle at his neck. Jason smelled terrific, like sweat and metal and gunpowder, and when he sank his teeth into the side of his neck, he tasted salt and the faint metallic tang of blood.

Jason bucked in his hands, a low moan escaping through clenched teeth. Damian loved feeling him struggle in his grip, though it was a fantasy that they both perpetuated. Jason could've thrown him through a wall by now, if he'd wanted to. But even the knowledge that it wasn't real turned Damian on, because it meant Jason's submission was willing.

Damian sucked a bruise into Jason's neck, just above the angry red bite mark. "You smell fantastic," he felt constrained to say as he ground his knee mercilessly against Jason's groin.

"Tired…forgot to shower…didn't know you'd…ah!" Jason's hips arched up involuntarily as Damian bit him hard, mostly to shut him up.

"When I want an apology, I'll beat it out of you," Damian growled as he lapped at the small amount of blood that oozed from the bite wound he'd made just behind Jason's ear.

Jason shivered.

Damian captured Jason's open, panting mouth. His tongue delved into that hot well, and when he pulled back slightly, he was pleased that Jason arched up to meet him. By the time he broke off the kiss, Jason was shamelessly rutting against him and flexing his wrists meaningfully in Damian's grip.

"You want to touch me?" Damian asked coolly.

"Yes," Jason breathed.

"Have you earned that privilege?" Damian said with a small smirk tugging at the corners of his lips. He knew how much Jason hated being asked questions in the middle of sex. His pet took direction well enough, but he hated thinking beyond immediacies like yes and more. But for Damian, sex was as much mental as it was physical, and he loved the byplay.

Jason frowned as a look of irritation flitted over his features. "I…" he trailed off, struggling to think of something to say.

Damian resisted the urge to laugh at his efforts. "Have you been a good boy today?" he asked instead.

Jason's eyes narrowed, and Damian suddenly remembered the man Red Hood had left broken in a dingy alley, not two hours ago. For one heart stopping moment, he realized he'd inadvertently crossed the line. What Red Hood and Robin did or didn't do had nothing to do with Jason and Damian, and for all of Jason's concessions to Damian's demands, there was a hard limit to their play, and they both knew exactly where the line was.

Damian quelled the rising panic in his chest and hardened his expression. "I asked you to masturbate while thinking about me once a day, without coming. Have you been faithful?"

Jason swallowed hard, and Damian watched the anger drain slowly from his eyes. He was always so quick to anger, but it often took hours to calm him after something had set him off.

"Yesterday, and the day before. Today was…busy." From the frown on his face, Damian knew he was thinking about work – most likely he'd been stalking his victim all day. "But-"

"But?" Damian said forcefully, trying to take back control of the situation. Damn his slip of the tongue, Jason thinking about work and coming up with legitimate excuses was about the farthest thing from what he wanted. "You couldn't be bothered to follow the simplest of orders but?" he hissed. He let go of Jason's wrists and opened a compartment in his utility belt to retrieve a ziptie. "Your insolence astounds me, Todd. Not only are you not allowed to touch me, but I'm going to have to punish you, as well."

Jason's eyes darkened and Damian felt him shiver beneath him. That was more like it. He quickly ziptied Jason's hands to the metal bed rail and climbed off the bed. He took off the modified version of his Robin utility belt, which he wore when in civilian dress, and dropped it to the floor with a dull clink. Jason watched with keen interest as Damian slowly stripped off first his dark blue blazer, and then his white dress shirt. Lacking an actual place to hang these items and not wanting to throw his designer clothes onto the dirty floor, he settled for draping them over the back of a dilapidated chair. In retrospect, it was a good thing he hadn't let Jason rip his clothes off – he quite liked that shirt. He pulled his undershirt over his head and dropped it onto the chair seat. Then he kicked off his Converse and slid his jeans and boxer briefs down over his hips, eventually kicking them to the side as well.

Jason licked his lips at the sight of Damian's bobbing erection, and his hands twitched involuntarily in their restraints.

"Perhaps next time you'll think twice before disobeying me," Damian said haughtily.

Jason let out a low, frustrated growl.

Damian smirked. Jason could have slipped those restraints in a heartbeat, he knew, but he also knew that he wouldn't. He was now firmly back in control, and as long as he didn't make any more careless mistakes, Jason would take everything he dished out, and then some. He turned and grabbed a shiny black leather briefcase off an overturned box cum table in the corner. Its presence was completely out of place in Jason's ramshackle "safe house" as he liked to call it, and for good reason, because it belonged to Damian. He put in the combination, which only he knew, and clicked open the gold snaps. Inside were his implements – whips, floggers and crops of various types, a variety of restraints from metal to leather to rope, and of course lubrication and condoms. There was one other item in there, something he'd been longing to use for a while now but hadn't quite worked up the courage. The moment never felt quite right. He stroked a finger over the soft black leather. Maybe tonight. For the moment, he selected a leather flogger with two-foot long lashes. It was one of their mutual favourites.

He stalked back to the bed, swinging the flogger idly in his hand. Jason watched him with a naked hunger that made Damian's mouth go dry. The first lash was hard, fast, and left a bright red mark on Jason's chest. Jason hissed through his teeth. Damian never started slow, never bothered to ease him into it. He lacked the patience for such things and anyway, Jason could take it. He followed it up with a third, and a fourth, until he'd set up a steady rhythm. Jason writhed beneath the lash, his back arching with each blow, every muscle tense and straining. Damian stroked himself roughly in time to the snap of the lash. Jason was never more beautiful than when he was in pain, and it just made Damian want to hit him harder, to push him as far as he'll go and then a little further. After a few more minutes, Damian was forced to stop before he came just from this.

Jason panted softly, struggling to catch his breath as though he'd been running hard. His chest was red from neck to navel, and his skin was slick with sweat.

Damian turned his back on him and took a deep, shuddering breath. He counted to ten as he slowed his racing heartbeat, a technique taught to him by his mother of all people. He exhaled silently. Feeling more in control, he exchanged the flogger for the cane. He loved the clean, sharp welts it made, and the precision with which he could inflict pain. Jason, however, was not so fond of it.

Jason's eyes snapped to the cane and then back to Damian's face, where he gave him a long, searching look.

Damian had to work hard to keep the smirk off his face. "I did say you would be punished. Now turn over."

Jason clenched his jaw stubbornly, but he turned over without so much as a protest. Damian waited while he worked to rotate his wrists in the restraints. Zipties were remarkably unforgiving, particularly with their sharp plastic edges, and Damian had been sure to tie him tightly. After a final grunt and a hard, frustrated jerk, Jason managed to work it out.

"Tt," Damian muttered under his breath. He went to the head of the bed to check Jason's wrists, to make sure he hadn't shredded them in his impatience. One of the negative consequences of Jason's high tolerance for pain was that he had a rather blasé attitude toward injuries that annoyed Damian whenever he was overly careless with himself. Satisfied that there would be no lasting damage to Jason's wrists, Damian returned to the side of the bed.

The cane whistled through the air and landed with a satisfying thwack on Jason's ass. Jason gasped, flinching hard. He really didn't like that, Damian thought with a sadistic thrill. He bent down and slowly licked a wet stripe down the angry red welt, loving the feel of the hot, raised flesh against his tongue.

"Oh, god, Damian…" Jason moaned loudly into his mattress.

Damian grinned as he blew lightly on the wet strip he'd left. Jason squirmed, grinding against the bed in his excitement.

"Stop that," Damian commanded.

Jason groaned in protest, but he ceased his movement nonetheless.

Damian's next blows landed across Jason's broad back, three hard whacks to the same spot. Jason hissed, in genuine pain this time. Damian worked him over deftly, varying the location and intensity of the blows so that he wouldn't be able to predict the next one, whilst creating a rather aesthetically pleasing crosshatch pattern. Jason's skin wasn't particularly easy to mark, and things like the flogger never left lasting impressions. The cane, however, could leave welts that lasted for days, and it made Damian smile to know that his little work of art could be viewed again at a later date.

Jason writhed against the bed, his hisses and gasps becoming increasingly louder and less controlled, until Damian landed a particularly hard blow to the sensitive small of his back, and Jason actually cried out. Damian was so hard it actually hurt, and though his hair was wet with sweat and his arm ached, those hard won cries were something that he yearned for, that he dreamt about and masturbated to late at night when the manor was still and he was sure that everyone else had gone to bed. The cane sang through the air, harder, faster, until Jason's back, butt, and thighs were a mess of red and blue welts and he was thrashing and swearing incoherently. Suddenly, Damian couldn't take it anymore. He dropped the cane and rushed to retrieve Jason's buck knife from under the mattress. He sliced the ziptie with one swift stroke, the knife clattering to the ground a second later.

Jason twisted and lunged at him with a speed that startled Damian. Before he could react, he was body slammed onto his back, Jason's considerable weight pinning him to the mattress. Jason kissed him the way Jason always kisses, desperate and sloppy and absolutely filthy. His hands were hot and hard all over Damian's body, as though he might die if he didn't touch every inch of Damian's skin. He ground a thigh against Damian's leaking erection, and Damian bit back a shout, his back arching into the touch.

"Please, can I…?" Jason begged, his voice raw from shouting.

"I might kill you if you don't," Damian growled. He leaned over the side of the bed and scrabbled around in the briefcase on the floor until he found what he was looking for. He tossed the condom and lube at Jason.

Jason tore open the condom package with his teeth and slipped it on with a well-practised stroke. Lube came next, and then Jason's sticky hand was hiking Damian's leg up onto his shoulder. Jason penetrated him in one hard thrust, and Damian bit the inside of his cheek to choke back a snarl at the fierce burn. Jason never bothered with easing into anything either, and he started to move before Damian even had time to catch his breath. Jason rocked into him hard and fast, and Damian wrapped his legs around his waist to pull him closer, because as much as it hurt he desperately needed more. Jason slipped a hand between their sweat-slick bodies to wrap around Damian's dick. Damian arched off the bed, even as he gritted his teeth and swallowed down a cry of pleasure. Jason jerked him roughly in time to his thrusts, the calloused friction of his palm at once so good and too much. Damian sank his teeth into Jason's shoulder, partly out of spite for the punishing pace Jason was setting but mostly to muffle the pathetic, needy sounds trying to escape his iron control.

Jason gripped his hips tight enough to bruise. "Oh, fuck, D-Da-ah-" he stammered. "Can I…come…please…?"

"No!" Damian snapped. He was so close, he just needed something, something more and he wasn't sure what. On impulse, he wrapped his hand around Jason's throat and squeezed, feeling Jason's frenetic pulse hammering against his palm.

Jason's eyes widened, and for a second Damian saw real fear filter through those blue depths. Then Damian was coming, his body contorting as every muscle strained in silent orgasm. Jason followed him over the edge a moment later, his whole body shaking in Damian's hands as he choked out a hoarse shout.

Damian let go of his neck and Jason collapsed to the side of him, his chest heaving as he dragged in ragged lungfuls of air. Damian petted his sweat-damp hair in an awkward attempt to soothe him. Jason probably hadn't really been afraid, because why would he be, but Damian felt a pang of guilt nonetheless at springing something so intense on him without warning, and without any prior discussion.

After a few minutes of mutual breath catching, he propped himself up on an elbow to study Jason's face for any signs of distress.

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah," Jason whispered hoarsely. His breathing had evened out into something approaching normal, although Damian caught him wincing when he swallowed.

Damian bit his lip and looked away. He always tried so hard to control himself that he could never really relax, not fully. Jason made it easier to let go. Too easy, in fact, and in the last few months, Damian had grown lax in his company. This was precisely the sort of thing that happened when he failed to control himself – his baser instincts slipped out, and people got hurt.

"Hey, stop it," Jason growled, giving his shoulder a rough shake. "Look at me."

"Tt," Damian muttered, though he forced himself to meet Jason's eyes.

"It's fine. You just surprised me, is all."

Damian tilted Jason's chin up to inspect the damage. Jason let him with minimal eye rolling. There were numerous bite marks, some hickeys, and now a collection of finger-shaped bruises decorating his neck, but there didn't seem to be any permanent harm done. Jason was even breathing fine now. Damian nodded. He let go of Jason and lay down next to him, sighing in contentment as Jason's strong arms wrapped around him, holding him tight.

They lay like that for a time, listening to each other's hearts beating as the sweat cooled on their skin.

Then suddenly, Damian remembered the item in the briefcase. He'd wanted to give it to Jason last week, but they'd had an argument that night over some petty thing. Now he rolled over and searched around in the case for it.

"I have something for you," Damian said, keeping it hidden in his hand. "You don't have to accept it, if you don't want to. I'll understand if it's too much."

Jason raised an eyebrow at him and sat up. "Did you buy me a Gulf Stream? You know I always wanted my own private jet."

Damian gave him a pained look. "You're such an idiot."

Jason grinned. "It's part of my charm. Now come on, make with the present."

Damian rolled his eyes. Leave it to Jason to totally ruin the moment. "Fine, here," he growled, dropping it unceremoniously into Jason's hand.

Jason stared down at the strap of leather, mystified. "I'm sorry, what is this?" he asked after a moment.

"It's…" Damian's face heated, "…it's a collar."

Jason blinked at him. "For…me?" he asked incredulously.

Damian was glad for the darkness of the room, because by now his face felt like it was on fire. "Yes, Todd, for you. Why would I give it to you if it was for anybody else?" he snapped to cover his own discomfiture. "If you don't want it, I'll take it back!" He made a grab for it, but Jason deftly avoided him.

"Hey, stop, I didn't say that. Just…gimme a second to think, will you?"

Damian huffed out an irritable sigh, but he clamped down on his rising agitation with an effort of will. Unsure what he was supposed to do now or how long this was going to take, he settled for crossing his arms and glaring at Jason.

Jason stroked the soft leather of the collar contemplatively. "You…you really want me to wear this?" he asked, looking Damian in the eye.

Damian bit his lip so hard he tasted blood. "If you don't want to, I-"

"No, it's not that," Jason said quickly. "It's not that at all. I just want you to be sure that this is what you want. I mean, right now, it's not like we're exclusive or anything. NOT," he raised his voice to pre-empt Damian, "that I've been with anyone else. Well, just the one time after our first time in that alley, but how was I to know you'd come back for more? Anyway, the point is, I need to know that we're on the same page here about what this means, because I can't…I can't go down that road again."

Damian took Jason's hand in his own and pressed a kiss to his chafed wrist. He felt Jason's heartbeat racing against his lips. "It's what I want, Jason," he said simply.

Jason smiled then, not a devious smirk or a manic grin, but a small, shy smile that made Damian's heart beat faster as a strange, fluttery feeling grew in his chest. He'd never known Jason to be shy about anything - the man could shamelessly discuss the vilest things without flinching. But watching Jason smile down at the collar in his hand, he could totally see it.

"Would you mind if I…?" Jason asked as he started to wrap the collar around his right wrist. "It's kind of hard to strike fear into the criminal heart while wearing some other guy's collar around your neck."

Damian snorted. "Whatever," he said with a dismissive wave.

Jason buckled on the collar with a few deft tugs, and then they both stared at it, each silently considering the changes this would render in their lives, and the implications and potential ramifications.

Then Damian launched himself at Jason, shoving him hard enough into the wall at his back to knock the wind out of him. Damian straddled his legs and kissed him, open mouthed and demanding as he felt his dick stir to life once more. Jason kissed him back just as fiercely and this time when they made love, it was slower, though not gentler really because neither of them knew how to do that.