Ink and Steel

“What could such as you want with such as me? “We have our reasons. Thou livest with demons that fright thee more than I do, and so for that which thou art as much as that which thou dost carry inside thee, as I have healed thy scars, I will give thee the power to destroy thine enemies.”

“That which thou dost carry inside thee?”

“Power.”

“How?”

“Why,” the Devil answered, his fingers dimpling Kit’s skin, “Be thou a warlock, who was Christofer Marley. I shall make of thee a witch, as I have bewitched men before thee. As thou hast said … Tis only sodomy.”

“Only.” But he tasted something on the word. Revenge. “Lover.” the Devil whispered. “Brother. Thou givest me that only which isalready mine.”

Kit closed his eyes on the glorious eyes, the broad white wings, the twist of fire and purity that was the Prince of God’s Angels, and whispered yes. Lucifer smiled, and this kiss tasting of whiskey and smoke began with Kit’s lips and ended there after an exploratory interval, during which clothing vanished by magic under the touch of caressing hands. Kit pressed both palms to the fallen angel’s smooth-muscled back, clawing fingers digging for purchase against the base of those wings. Lucifer’s forked tongue stopped his mouth as effectively as the scold’s bridle would have, and Kit didn’t care; the angel’s arms clipped and embraced him, lifting him bodily, cradling him against the perfect strength of a chest that might have been carved of warm white marble by some Grecian master. The angel knelt, never breaking the kiss, wings fanning wide for balance, their breeze pulling soft fingers through Kit’s hair as Lucifer drew him down to straddle white thighs. Powerful shoulders, deep-rooted muscle nothing like a man’s flexed under Kit’s fingers, sliding beneath soft skin and slick feathers. Kit broke the breathlessness of the kiss to gasp sharply. With one hand he stroked the angel’s belly, wrapped the silken member that dented the flesh of his thigh. The angel shuddered again, as he had when Kit touched his wing. Lucifer drew back, glanced down, and smiled in intimate provocation. Kit’s loins ached as if the regard were a caress.

“Come unto me.” The Devil’s hands clenched on his flanks, lifting him without effort, indenting flesh and coaxing him open. Soft hands, strong. Kit winced in anticipation, wrapped his arms around Lucifer’s neck to bear his weight, for all it seemed as nothing to the angel. Witchcraft,he thought, how cunning, how quaint.A silent chuckle shivered his belly, breath becoming an expectant whimper as Kit braced himself for a pain that never arrived. If He hurts you, silly boy, it will not be out of carelessness

It came not as a thrust, or as the lingering accommodation that gentleness had almost seduced Kit into expecting. But one massive downsweep of those incredible wings hurled them upright one, and then another, as the pale perfect mouth found Kit’s again and Lucifer stood in a fluid arc, and Kit was pierced.

“Christ,” Kit whispered, impassioned, hearing his own awe and fear, disbelief thick in his voice.

“Tis not Christ thou wilt bear on thy back.” Amusement, wryness. Wrathful irony, almost a lover’s teasing. Lucifer’s hair tumbled down around Kit’s face, bearing his smoky, bitter, musky scent.

This is not real. This is not happening. There is no Devil. There is no Hell. God is love, and God judges not what is done in love Christ, Christ, Christ… . Rapt. Speaking in tongues. Possessed. Yes, possessed.

“God.” Warm arms and wings supported him. “God judges. And He is not pleased with His creation, for it can never echo His perfection and His will. He does not wish thy love. He commands thine obedience and fear. The lord thy God i sa jealous God, and thou wilt have no Gods before him.”

Bitterness? Sorrow? Oh, but that mouth on his throat, on his breast. The effortless puissance bearing him up. A decade and more of rationalization stripped away by that calm, gentle voice in his mind. Passion on him again, divine will, and remembering the agony that had come with the realization that whatever God had made of Christofer Marley, that Marley was a thing whose love the God of the Church would never return. A calling. The craving they named vocation. Put away now with other childish things. Raped away from God, and So this is what Leda felt, which made him giggle. Kit leaned into the embrace, trusting himself to those powerful arms, body decisive while his heart struggled and tore itself in his breast.

“No Gods before Him. Not even love. To love God completely, thou must set aside all others.” The Devil moved in Kit, and Kit wept and clung. “Christ the Redeemer.”

“God’s Redeemer, perhaps.”

“Oh God, forgive me.”