Chapter Text
It all started with one stupid question.
“Okumura,” Bon said abruptly one night, snapping Rin out of his thoughts. He’d have liked to say breaking his concentration, given that this was a study session and he had an open textbook in his lap, but Rin had to be honest here. It was late. He was tired. And for the past fifteen minutes, he’d been staring blankly at the pages in front of him without absorbing a single word.
“Huh?” Rin asked, blinking a couple times before reaching up to scrub at his eyes with the back of his hand.
Izumo glanced up from where she was seated a few yards away, her own textbook balanced against a single folded knee. Shiemi, seated next to her, looked over at Rin as well, concern touching her features for a moment. Probably wondering if Rin and Bon were about to get into another fight. Rin had the same question; they were all a bit sleep-deprived with their regular-school midterms coming up and it was making him and Bon bicker like a pair of stray cats. To be fair, Bon had also been helping him study a lot more now that they were all on good terms again, so it was possible the only thing that had really changed was the amount of time they were spending exposed to each other.
Bon tipped his head back. He had his arms folded across his chest, one foot braced against the table in front of him, and he was absently levering his chair back and forth on its back legs. Rin wondered how long it was going to be before he overbalanced and fell over.
“You’re a demon,” Bon said, and Rin squinted at him. Shima and Konekomaru were paying attention too now, lowering their books as they watched the exchange.
“. . .yeah,” Rin agreed eventually, when nothing else seemed to be forthcoming. “Is there a point here, or did you think I needed a reminder?”
Bon waved a hand. Koneko made a mildly alarmed noise as Bon’s chair gave an ominous creak. “I’m getting there, delinquent, calm down. I was just thinking about how we use milk and rotten blood to draw out goblins.”
Rin waited again. Again, that seemed to be all that Bon was planning on saying.
“Dude,” Rin said, “I’m fucking exhausted and I can’t read minds. What are you trying to say?”
Bon shrugged.
“Well, is that. . . appealing to you?”
Rin stared.
Rin closed his textbook, setting it aside on the floor and flopping down onto his back to join it. He reached up, pressed the heels of his hands into the hollows of his eye sockets, and thought very hard about how much he’d rather be in bed right now.
“Wow,” Shima laughed, “That was tactless even for you, Bon!”
There was a loud slam of chair legs against the floor as, presumably, Bon took offense to that and broke out of his relaxed reclining pose.
“Hey,” he snapped, “I didn’t mean it like that! I’m just curious! Okumura’s a demon, isn’t it possible he has some different tastes?”
“He’s cooked for us, man! A lot! You know as well as we do that he eats totally normally. Well,” Shima amended, “Not totally normally. He eats more, but it’s all normal stuff.”
“Actually,” Izumo’s quiet voice cut in, tone very nearly pulling off bored, “Part-demons have been known to enjoy things that most humans don’t. Even people with no demonic blood whatsoever can have strange cravings; is it so hard to believe Rin might be the same?”
“See!” Bon crowed, “Even Izumo agrees with me!”
“And I already regret it,” she said dryly. “I also agree it was impressively rude how you phrased that.”
“Oh shut up, fox-face. I was just thinking out loud! And you admit I have a point.”
“Can we all calm down?” Konekomaru tried, though he sounded less than confident. “Professor Okumura lives in this building too. We shouldn’t wake him up.”
“Stupid Yukio’s the reason we have so much work to get through on top of midterms,” Rin grumbled. He still had his hands over his face, and his voice came out slightly muffled. “I say it’s only fair if he loses sleep too.”
“You would say that,” Bon said. “Hey. Okumura. You never answered the question.”
Rin let out a breath, dragging his hands down his face and blinking owlishly up at the ceiling above him.
“I dunno,” he said, “I don’t think I like anything weird. It’s not like I ever actually tried to eat goblin bait before though.”
“I think you’d probably drink it, actually,” Shima mused. “Like a smoothie. A gross, chunky smoothie.”
An eraser sailed through the air above Rin. There was a quiet thwap, then Shima cursed.
“Hey!” he cried, indignant.
“You’re gross,” Izumo sniffed. “I need that back, by the way.”
“You’ve never tried it,” Bon conceded, “But have you wanted to? That stuff smells pretty nasty to me, I’d think with your freaky dog nose it would either be way worse or. . .”
Rin’s knee-jerk reaction was to declare that of course goblin bait smelled bad– one of the two ingredients was literally rotten, for fuck’s sake– but as he opened his mouth to do so he was forced to pause. It. . . wasn’t true. Sure, he didn’t find himself drooling whenever they broke out a vat of the stuff, but unlike how a lot of strong smells messed with him these days he’d never found himself gagging over the mixture either.
Huh.
“. . .come to think of it,” he said grudgingly, “It doesn’t actually bother me that much.”
Bon whooped in delight, and Konekomaru desperately tried to shush him again. Rin flipped the bird in Bon’s general direction, and Bon laughed.
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Rin insisted. “It’s not like I go around trying to eat people’s eyeballs or whatever. I drank something my old man made for Kuro once, but that– that was under unique circumstances.”
The circumstances being it was booze, Rin was willing to try just about anything to sneak some alcohol, Yukio had said not to and, oh yeah, his dad was the one who had made it. Sure, it had been. . . pretty fucking good, but it had also been potent as hell, and Rin was pretty sure that had colored his memory of the experience. Had been pretty sure. Now he was less so.
Stupid Bon making him question himself.
“What if we tested it?”
Shiemi’s voice was soft, but it still managed to cut across Bon’s snickers and Izumo’s pointed sighs as easily as Rin’s sword might slice through the air. Rin took a moment to process her words, then sat up and looked over at her. She just blinked back at him with those huge green eyes, expression genuine.
“What?” he asked.
Shiemi shrugged a bit.
“There are herbs that attract demons. Some you dry and burn, others they just like wild. Our shop stocks them for exorcists, I could bring you some for you to try cooking with. Maybe you could make tea or something.”
Rin hesitated. On the one hand, agreeing would mean giving Bon some level of satisfaction. On the other, a quiet evening in the kitchen with Shiemi and some experimental recipes sounded awesome.
“Couldn’t you just have your familiar grow some for you now?” Izumo asked. Shiemi flushed, cheeks and ears going a soft pink as she ducked her head.
“I– I don’t like asking Ni for these kinds of plants. He can get a bit disoriented afterward, and it’s not like this is an emergency.”
“You’ve got a point here, Moriyama,” Bon said. He was leaning against the far wall of the room now, one hand grasping his chin and the other wrapped around his waist. “We should be approaching this scientifically. Testing out options.”
Rin scowled at him.
“I’m not a lab experiment,” he snapped.
“Oh come on. You can’t tell me you’re not curious.” Bon looked back at Rin and gave him one of his rare, broad smiles. Rin would have appreciated it more under different circumstances. “What about blood?”
“What about blood?”
“Well,” Bon began, and Rin could already tell he was going to hate the rest of the thought, “A lot of demons eat humans. Even those who don’t go out of their way to do so still seem to like human flesh. Obviously we’re not going to try that, but we could see if you like the taste of blood.”
Konekomaru groaned and put his head down on his textbook. Shima looked between Rin and Bon.
“For the record,” he said, “If this ends with Okumura taking a bite out of your arm, I’m going to tell the teachers it was your fault.”
“I’m not going to take a bite out of the rooster!” Rin exploded, feeling his tail swish wildly against the floor in agitation and being entirely helpless to stop it. “I’m not going to take a bite out of anyone! What is with you guys?”
“What’s with you?” Bon asked. “For a guy who likes to cook so much you sure don’t seem to be culinarily adventurous.”
“Oh, you did not just bring my cooking into this,” Rin growled, and from there the whole thing probably would’ve devolved into just another argument between him and Bon if Izumo hadn’t hissed a quiet curse to his left.
Rin’s nose twitched.
“Izu-chan!” Shiemi sputtered, alarm in her voice, and Rin looked over to see that Izumo had moved while he wasn’t looking. Instead of reclining against the wall beside Shiemi, she was sitting upright with her legs folded, one hand cupping the other as she squeezed one of her fingers. A red bead of blood was blooming at the tip of her index finger, and after a moment she gave a self-satisfied nod.
When she looked up to see how many stares she was getting, she rolled her eyes.
“What?” she asked flatly. “You were just going to talk about it all night. Someone had to move things along.”
Several people tried to speak at once then, including Bon– you’re one to talk about insensitivity when you just go ahead and– and Shiemi– Izumo, do you need a bandage, Ni could make you some– but ultimately it was Rin’s voice that carried over everyone else’s.
“Are you crazy, polkabrows?” he asked, incredulous.
“I told you not to call me that,” Izumo said, though it seemed to be more on reflex than anything else, “And it’s not like this is a big deal. I lose more blood than this summoning my familiars.”
She scooted a little closer to Rin and stuck out her bleeding hand, palm-down. The droplet of blood threatened to succumb to gravity and splash onto the floor.
“Well?” she asked. “What are you waiting for?”
Kyodo had once sat Rin down and given him a talk about peer pressure. The subject had mainly been about drugs and drinking, about how just because everyone was doing it didn’t mean Rin had to join in, and he’d stressed that if Rin was ever in a situation that made him uncomfortable he should call Father Fujimoto right away. That the priests would never be upset with him for getting into trouble if he asked them to help him get out of it.
Rin wondered how his old man would have reacted if Rin called him to say his study group was peer-pressuring him into drinking blood.
“You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, Okumura,” Konekomaru said, then made a startled squawking sound as Shima reached blindly over to shove a hand over his mouth. He was watching Rin and Izumo with rapt attention.
“Shush, Koneko,” he said, “This is the most interesting thing that’s happened all night. Okumura, I triple-dog dare you to do it!”
Rin made a face. Everyone was watching him, each with varying levels of fascination and concern, and. . . well, honestly, he was kind of curious.
“You all owe me so bad,” he muttered, then stuck his tongue out and tentatively leaned forward.
The tip of his tongue made contact with Izumo’s finger. At first, Rin didn’t taste much at all, just a mild hint of salt from Izumo’s skin. Then the blood actually hit his tongue and Rin jerked back in surprise.
“What, what’s wrong?” Shiemi asked, eyes wide. Rin shook his head.
“I’m fine,” he reassured her, “It’s– uh. It actually tastes. Good?”
Good was one way to put it. Amazing would probably be a better one. Izumo’s blood tasted delicious, warm and thick like well-made hot chocolate with a savoriness to it that made Rin think of pork buns. He swallowed hard, the taste lingering in his mouth, and was already starting to contemplate if it was possible to replicate that flavor with run-of-the-mill spices. Rin. . . didn’t think so.
Bon crossed the room with a few heavy footsteps, shouldering Izumo out of the way slightly and sitting down in front of Rin.
“My turn,” he declared. Rin gave him a look.
“. . .I’m pretty sure it’s just gonna taste like blood to you,” he said.
Bon smacked the side of his head. Rin cried out in pain and rubbed at his ear, glaring at Bon as the other boy reached over to steal one of Izumo’s pins.
“That’s not what I meant, dumbass,” he said. He pressed the tip of the pin into the pad of his index finger, movement less practiced than when Izumo or Shiemi would draw blood. “I wanna see what you think of mine next.”
“You realize you just handed him the easiest opportunity to insult you ever , right,” Shima drawled, and Bon shot him a glare.
“Watch it,” he snapped, “Or I’ll decide we need a bigger sample size.”
“I wouldn’t mind taking part,” Sheimi said tentatively. “If Rin’s okay with it.”
“This is such a weird way to be picking up girls,” Shima groaned. “Okumura, tell me your secrets.”
Rin couldn’t have answered that even if he wanted to, because Bon had managed to get some blood flowing, handed Izumo her needle back, and promptly shoved his finger into Rin’s mouth. Rin was better prepared for the taste this time, and instead of flinching back in surprise he closed his eyes and tried to focus on the flavor– Bon’s blood tasted slightly different than Izumo’s, he noted with surprise. There was something earthy to it, a richness like the molasses bread he and Yukio used to smother in butter while it was still warm from the oven and eat together on the monastery's front steps. It was an unexpectedly nostalgic taste.
Rin opened his mouth, letting Bon’s finger slip free, and licked his lips before he opened his eyes. Bon’s gaze was demanding and aggressive, but he didn’t begin to outright interrogate Rin about his flavor profile, so that was nice.
“Izumo’s a little bit more. . .” Rin hesitated. “Meaty, I guess? And Bon, you’re kind of. Syrupy, almost.”
“This is so weird,” Shima whispered to the room at large, but Rin elected to ignore him. As did everyone else.
“Huh,” Bon said, crossing his arms and leaning back a bit out of Rin’s personal bubble. “I guess that makes sense. There have been cases where a demon gets attached to one person’s flavor in particular and keeps them around like–“
“Me next!” Shiemi chirped, squeezing between Izumo and Bon with a broad grin and an already-bleeding hand extended in Rin’s direction. Rin could already feel his cheeks flushing– Shiemi seemed so genuinely excited to be included that it was hard to think of anything other than how adorable she was– but despite his embarrassment and Shima’s loud wolf-whistle he opened his mouth and leaned forward. Shiemi tapped her bleeding finger on his tongue the same way she might dab it on her summoning paper, and Rin closed his mouth and rolled the flavor around. Shiemi was sweet. Fresh. Like a lungful of spring air or a light, flaky pastry dusted with powdered sugar.
Oh fuck, all his friends were delicious.
Rin was going to think about this every goddamn day, wasn’t he?
“. . .you taste like happiness,” Rin said after a moment, and immediately regretted it at Shima’s bark of laughter and Bon’s affronted look.
“I get syrupy, fox-face gets meaty, but for Moriyama you break out the poetry?” he groused. Rin spluttered, holding his hands up in defense.
“That wasn’t all I had to say!” he argued. “And– and it’s hard to describe, anyway!”
“You’re supposed to be some kind of food-genius! This is the one thing you’re any good at!”
“I don’t have a good vocabulary for this kind of thing!”
“You don’t have a good vocabulary at all!”
In the end, they did wind up waking Yukio with their yelling, though his brother was far enough out of it that he didn’t seem to realize what they’d really been up to. He just lectured them about how sleep was just as important as studying, that they all should be in bed, and it’s too late for you all to go back to your dorms now, you’re just going to have to sleep in some of the spare rooms here. For Yukio, the incident was probably forgotten as soon as it had passed.
But it wouldn’t be the last time Rin and his friends experimented with his demon side.