Rejuvenated. He cannot recall when he last felt quite this strong, quite this good. He had armored himself at one point, to take up his mantle and return to work before being stopped at the door by the guard specifically placed there to keep him from doing anything silly.
     It's a thankless job, really...
     And what is the reason for this miraculous healing? Though not all of his forces have been restored, a sudden burst of Aspirations from the edge of Blandine's Marches has strengthened him. His Word gives light to his wings, strength to his steps, and an inner resolve to move more, do more, and heal.
     Though barred from rejoining the battle with his lover, Kit was allowed to wander the gardens of dreams in the main portion of the Tower where trees dream of forever and blades of grass dream of being trees. Clothed comfortably in such things as the earthly Kit might wear (including the basalt choker), he strolls the interior in jeans and a t-shirt, his illuminated wings pressing past and through the fabric to fan out behind him. A corona of Brilliance-backed light backs his head like a portable sun. He is the very modern picture of a cherub, is he not?

     "Sentinel!" comes the tiny voices of the night. They twinkle in the Tower walls and firmament.
     But as quickly as they speak does a whirling dervish of a portal appear on the other side of the garden. From it? A spinning wheel steps out, brilliantly flamed. The wheel sputters and almost trips out of the portal, twisting as if to accuse the portal of something.
     Karinda, Ofanite Master of Fire wheels over.

     "Karinda!" Kit hails with a bright smile, an enthusiastic lift of his voice. Passing angels can't help but take notice. "How is Soldekai? What is the news?" Surely you brought him with you. Kit looks around the spinning wheels of fire. "Oh, and hello," he blushes at his own lack of manners. "It is good to see you."
     Roseate the glow that moves through him. It turns his complexion rosy. Beneath that, somewhere, a dusky blue face is going violet.

     "Greetings, Sentinel!" The fired wheel spins, moving aside. "We...have to go. Urgently." It was a matter of supreme importance, apparently, as it was explained. "Please enter..."

     For a moment, he appears to question -- do I need to tell anybody? Old habits die hard, but there's no time like the present. Feeling the urgency -- it's hard to resist a spinning, fiery wheel when it tells you to hurry! -- Kit heads into the portal...

     The portal is as it always is. A spinning vortex of pink that lasts no time. Almost instantly, the ground is solid and smooth, almost damp. The portal vanishes, and the space is dim, opening out to a jagged coastline of basalt with white foam.
     For her part, Karinda is nowhere around.

     His feet are bare. On earth, it is winter. As he is suddenly quite aware. And Iceland in winter? It is a study of black and white. White foam sea and black basalt rock. There is snow in the white-grey clouds, but it has not yet decided upon falling to the earth in whiteness -- or in wetness either.
     The black basalt sand sparkles between his toes. Kit curls them into the sand, smiling as the edges of his jeans become wet with the sea. He turns to look for his lover, his smile becoming Brilliant beaming.
     His feet turn instinctively for the caves...

     Within, the space gleams low. His Supreme Commander, Soldekai, the Archangel of Brilliance, stands within, as if expecting an arrival. At the rear of the room, where baubles and stones glitter and the bed carved within the basalt and covered in the most delicate of feathers held fast in golden threads anchors, stands the dusky angel, wings unfurled. Around his neck, a strand of hematite, given him by an admirer some time ago.
     "I see you got my message," Soldekai grins, not leaving his spot. His hands are closed, suggesting that he might hold something within them.

     "It... was hard to miss it," Kit smiles, life in that smile and in the galactic eyes a sudden, desirous comet streaks by. He cannot hold up the power of seeming Kit for long. Slowly the human face fades into the more sculpted features of the beautiful cherub, his cheeks brushed with dreamdust, his violet curls illuminated along each spiraled tress by the Brilliant corona behind him.
     His winds are stardusted, dream dusted and illuminated things that stretch out and slide against the floor like the feathers of a courting dove as he moves forward to you. "I have missed you," he confesses, his heart-shaped face tilting upward to you. Those lips, those cupid lips, they hold an expression of delighted curiosity.
     What do you have behind your back?
     Christopher tips his head but then leaves that for now. A kiss first. Priorities are priorities. "What are you up to, Archangel?" he whispers with a grin.

     The Archangel grins, his ashen-glassy vessel flushing color to his wings. There, now, the hint of Dreaming blue, and the gleam of Aspiration. "The morning essence," he says sarcastically, knowing that's not what you meant.
     "What would you like me to be up to?" he teases coyly. Talk about in a mood.
     "You look..." good, edible. Soldekai steps forward slightly, grinning at his unfinished statement. He'll let you fill in the blank. "Tell me, how are you doing?"

     "I wouldn't dream," ah heavenly puns, "...of putting a thought into your mind, when you seem to have plenty of your own." The angelic tones chime lowly upon his melodic voice. He sing-speaks, a hand lifting to your hair.
     It is joined by his other, both arms around your neck. "I would like you to be up to holding me. I feel much better." And apparently enjoying the mood you are in. "Almost good as new," he is not lying but he is exaggerating.
     "I look ... as good as I feel..." Christopher offers with the lifting of his eyes. And he laughs. "Karinda said the matter was urgent. I was... afraid what I might find..."

     "You should be afraid," Soldekai says lowly, looking past you as he completes the embrace. It is strong, and he lifts you from the floor, immediately floating to the bed. "I have missed you," he says euphemistically, laughing as he does. Maybe that was an understatement. "I have something for you," he whispers, coming to lie with you upon the golden mattress. Once there, he looks between you as he comes to prop on his elbow. In his free hand, he opens it to reveal a small ring with a blue stone. "From India," he whispers, "...a love-token."

     To love a Malakim, formerly of Fire now of Brilliance. It means being lifted and carried frequently and loved within an inch of reality. Not that Christopher is complaining. He is no match for you tonight. "I will do my best to hold on," he whispers, grinning ribald as you deposit him on the golden surface of your bed.
     Your bed together...
     Christopher looks at you, and then blushing violet before your desire, he looks to your hand. And to the ring in your hand. He reaches for it, grinning. Galactic eyes lift to you again, novae in them bursting with your surprise. "It is very beautiful, Soldekai. My lover has excellent eyes. And he knows my weakness for India and baubles."

     His foot comes to rest flat on the bed, the other remaining extended. Soldekai takes the opportunity to delve into his lover's throat, presuming that the ring with occupy for a while. "It is," he whispers, "...not quite what it seems." He sighs, opening his mouth behind your ear. Hands now empty, he slides his hand between the thighs he has learned to love.

     "Hmmm... what else does it do?" Christopher purrs. He rolls slightly, a coy turn, his neck tantalizingly close -- but you will have to come and get it. Your hand, however, is not dislodged from between his thighs. Never that.
     Smiling, he lifts the ring for inspection. "Or is it for something other than a finger? Does it do tricks," he can't help the laughter at that. Biting a dusky lip, his galactic eyes shift to you. He watches you as he slips it on. And he thinks: I thee wed.
     Christopher rolls to you, his movement pressing against your hand, rolling him to your mouth. The kiss is a sudden, sweet, suckling thing. "Thank you," he murmurs at your mouth. Words scattered, pressed against your mouth, that is how he speaks to you. Half words, half embrace.
     "You have missed me," Christopher grins, his arms surrounding your shoulders. His wings likewise wrap around you, star-dusted feathers moving against your own. A thousand massaging fingers.

     The first bit is temporarily ignored. Soldekai enjoys his immersion, only piping up at the comment affirming what he's already said and shown. "Mmhmm," he rumbles, "...every moment. Distracting," he confesses warmly, eagerly. His mouth says all he wishes to do. His hand? Further explanation. "And you're welcome," he grins before biting your ear.
     "Take the ring off and...put it elsewhere." There's a smirk, "Try your wrist." Before you try anywhere else.
     "Did you miss me," he asks, a leading question if there was one.

     The ring is slipped from his finger and moved against his wrist, his arms wound around your neck as he does so. It is a suppliant position, one that he means of course -- it is no accident -- and one that brings his flush to you.
     Dreamdust sparkles against your skin as his wings travel where his hands cannot. Christopher laughs in his throat, a purring sound that could be loosely translated to -- you cannot imagine how much I have missed you. Feathers clasp you, squeezing as they do -- and strongly, the strength of cherubim -- when he is impassioned, he rolls against you.
     The metal chimes around his wrist, the stone shining as his hands pull at the fabric that has covered him. It shimmers and dissolves, leaving his dusky complexion visible, the musculature you have come to know -- the figure of a dream commander.
     "I have an idea," you know that tone, you once feared that tone, "... of where else I can put it." Ribald the grin as he twists in your hold, smiling at you before nipping at your lips.

     "It'll go anywhere," Soldekai pants. It expands, it seems. Blue eyes stare as the kiss is returned twice, three times. The last brings a pull from him, almost a challenge. "Seduction is not my forte," Soldekai pauses to grin. "We are," he blushes, "...direct and to the point," soldiers are. Ready at any moment; at any port, in any storm. Looking between you, Soldekai apologizes, "Maybe I am too rough," a hint of embarrassment there.
     "It will fit over your head too," Soldekai notes, his hand curling over a hip. His wings, like your own, move almost instinctively. He continues to watch where the two of you meet, his words falling away as he stares.

     "Archangel general," he murrs between you. "I am not one of Novalis' flowers. I do not bruise easily. And I like your point to be direct. And true. And straight through. You have been patient," he coos. "And have given me gifts. My Brilliance should have what he desires."
     Fingers and feathers and the slide of metal. The ring becomes a bracer around a bicep, then around your wrist. Fingers and feathers. Feathers move against your side, fingers slide against your chest. Fingers and feathers and the slide of his smile. Christopher grins, his lips blushed violet from your attentions.
     Hands disappear between you, where the two of you meet. "I don't need to be seduced," come the musical tones of his voice, "... I don't need to be convinced." The grin curves deeply. "I want you... what is to seduce?"

     Two hands together. You talk, and Soldekai consumes each syllable. "I...I...don't know," he says eventually, unsure of his own skills in these matters. But you have given him confidence, and Soldekai does not waver. With his hand around yours, Soldekai guides the pair in parting you both. "But...you..." he whispers, "...always...make me feel like I am..." he frowns, "...wanted." Desired.
     While talking, Soldekai slides downward, then upwards, so that hands are in the bed at your left and right. He touches his nose to yours, body squirming to settle in for a while. "Do you like the ring?" he asks softly, his thighs so strong as they ride upwards to lift cherubic ones. "I should have known that you would..." figure out some place to put it that he had not thought about.

     "And so you are wanted," Kit whispers between you, though you and he alone are here to hear the confession. But sometimes the strongest emotions must be voiced by the softest of tones. "I want the impossible when it comes to you," and now he smiles, stars blinking in the primordial dust of his eyes. "I want you for all my passing moments."
     He is smaller than you (and certainly has not near the forces that you do, yours growing with your Word -- and his depleted from his own trauma) -- but he is mighty. Mighty as all cherubim are, of form and heart both. His thighs are lifted thanks to you, but it is with his own flourish that he arches beneath you, his legs wrapping around you, clasping like the ring does around his wrist.
     He keeps moving it...
     "I love my ring, Soldekai. And that you gave it to me. And that I can wear it around anything," dusky lips blush as he blushes to think of the possibilities. "But most importantly... that you gave it to me. What a wonderful thing," and what a wonderful way he has of saying that, his wings flapping flirtatious as he kisses you.
     "I love you," he whispers there. "And I am so proud to be the one you love in return, Brilliant Soldekai." The ring next appears around his neck, a collar like a rajah's personal prized peregrine might wear. "You know how I like to adorn myself in pretty jewels when we are together," he arrays himself better than all the lovers on earth -- and most of those in Heaven. "You make them sparkle, and you know... how your Kit loves things that sparkle..."
     His toes are as dexterous as his fingers. They massage and stroke, his legs doing the same, softly but firmly against your sides. Bare of all vestments now, threads dissembling and falling away, Christopher smiles, teasing your mouth as his moving body rubs you -- an enveloping massage.

     A wash of relief ripples across his features. Soldekai smiles a little easier, although his subsequent kiss remains as intense. Even before it is complete, he begins another, inhales, and then takes a third. Only then does he pause, mouth widely open, and takes evaluative stock of the situation. A long drink for a parched man, to tell the truth, but Soldekai resists drinking the water in a stream down his throat.
     His enhanced corporeal form gives him slight pause. Maybe he shall never become used to making love in this form. Certainly there is intense enjoyment - that he has learned and now needs for its own sake and merit - but he remains mindful that an Archangel is certainly that, regardless of what plane or form. Even now, his wings partially banish the already dim light of the space. Yet he himself is the replacement of that. The edges of him bring illumination and thus clear vision, without the harshness of mundane light. Soldekai's feathers lift gently, causing a breeze, and his fingertips nestle into dark hair. He smiles as he closes his eyes to let his nose touch yours again. "I would have never imagined this...when I first met you," Soldekai whispers, his voice like a scant rustle. "Not ever," he trails along cheek, with last syllable pressing into the skin. Not a kiss, but words written there just as vows are carved into his very Essence. "And now," wings rise with his hips, "...I cannot imagine being without this...without you."
     Without being inside you, he thinks.
     And as he thinks, so he is.
     The pressing of his mouth causes his inhale to rush along the flesh, a visceral manifestation of the energy he draws and expends. Soldekai suspends himself, his body tensing in the instant, and his eyes close slowly, languidly, as if it could soon be too much.

     He was one of the loveliest songbirds at the foot of Blandine's throne. Was? Is, in truth, though he has not had much of a chance to sing of late. And no greater song leaves his lips, not even the song of transitions that called out to the Renegade across the Marches, as the moan of your name when his space becomes yours, yours his...
     It is not with the same explosive, universal deconstruction and recreation that is celestial lovemaking. One day, perhaps he can return to the celestial realm and know you in that way again. Could he get permission to return, with an armed guard, for such a purpose?
     The thought makes him purr a smile, his arms lifting and winding around your shoulders. He basks in the glow of you, illumination and clear vision. And such a vision he makes beneath you, your Christopher. His dusky blue form, midnight colored, muscled beneath you, his wings catching your Brilliance and cupping it in each pinion. Stars explode there, and reflections of the many universes in the dreams of God.
     Thighs clasp you tightly, leverage for his own motions. His body lifts to meet you, lifts to complete each thrust you make, and make a few of his own. Circling, lifted, he moves you within him.
     Christopher smiles, curving delighted beneath you, turning his face to murmur at your mouth, your cheek, whatever he can touch. "I did not think such a thing would happen to me. I dreamed the dreams for others. But... I saw you... that day with the basketball... and I dreamed a dream for myself..."

     Mortal eyes could not fathom the sight. Somewhere, the far north, upon a barren island of glacier and steam, where water crashes unbearably, is a cavern of black basalt. Unvisitable, uninhabitable, yet ever so living, changing, and exploding. The thrashing waves crawl up the black mountainside, and pummel the scant stretch of forlorn sands that have failed to resist the ocean. In the cave, a treacherous - if not impossible - climb, two of the angelic host twine together, hidden from corporeal, ethereal, and disinterested celestial gazes. It has become another home, forced from the ocean's bottom by one angel, barely tamed for a second, and warmed by the arrival of a third.
     Oannes perhaps thought of this time, when his faithful servitor, and child, Soldekai, was sent to the Legions of Fire. A time when water and fire would combine, and such a place for him would be necessary. A place of his own, Oannes saw that Soldekai would need.
     I love you...
     I dream of little more than you...
     Soldekai's head falls to your shoulder, a momentary anchor in a bed in motion. One hand reaches downward, to hold the thigh wrapped around his waist. One hand reaches upwards, to find the stone of the bed that has become his resting place. His body stretched, Soldekai undulates gently, in half-time against the sounds that rush within from outside. Across your nose, for he continues to kiss your cheek, he can barely see the cave opening, a ragged window to the ferocity beyond.

     You find yourself in a four-fold embrace, a universe of his own making, his own being. It is more, even, than this -- even as one universe is many -- for one must also count his love for you as another full embrace. Wings clasp around you, creating a space within a space where you and he move, a nook beneath the shelter your own wings create.
     His arms and his legs surround you, holding him to you and you to him. Every slide and press of your body is embraced by the hug and squeeze of his own. Around you, in quadruplicity.
     And where you are connected...
     Where are you not connected? But that there is only one physical way to do so, it is all the more intense. In rippling waves, in tempo with the rhythm his feathers make in the movement beneath you, that fourth hold surrounds you, delighting both him and you.
     O Soldekai...
     Christopher sings it, his voice murring and echoing in the cavern. If there are still spies who follow him, even here, they shall have much to report! The sounds are constant, melodic, sweet as the breaths that leave him quickly. Flapping wings encourage you as Christopher turns his head, his mouth pulling and plying upon your own. "I love you... my Archangel... my dream..."
     My dream...
     I did not know much of Love before you. I do not think I knew anything at all. I had memories... of others being in love. I remember Love himself when he was himself. And I remember my Master when my Master smiled.
     My Master's smile, that was the first thing of Love that I ever knew.
     Until you...

     Each call to him brings him forth. He cannot help it - if there is more to give, he will. Soldekai meets each word and kiss with one of his own, answering in the only way that is clear.
     Yes? Yes.
     More? Yes.
     Now? Yes.
     Soldekai...
     I am...for you...I am...
     Here, like this? It is too much. Soldekai's hand tells it, his grip tightening and pulling thigh with it.
     Andrealphus, what have you done to me...
     Already in motion, Soldekai's wings barely tense as they move the pair of you. The bed turns upside down, partially hidden by joined wings, and the Archangel pants as he comes to lie upon his back, span beneath himself. Both hands now reach around to hold you, and he arches against the bed before sinking into it.
     Outside, the rains begin again. So common this time of the year in the arctic. Sometimes the drops fall from cloudless skies, disappearing into sibling forms - ice, spray, steam. It is eternally comforting, the constant flow, and Soldekai's churning hands move in it.
     I should have destroyed you when I could. But if I had...would I have ever seen this...

     Chance encounters...
     Isn't that what they tell you about Love, the great stories about Love? Do they not always involve insurmountable coincidence? A chance meeting with Andrealphus in Clear Water. Then Kit Marlowe.
     Then this...
     And then, at the end of all of this, after a blossoming love affair blossomed further in Heaven with the installation of a new Archangel, a demon Prince makes his way across the Marches in search of Redemption, aided by the lover of the angel he happened to meet on the street in a small, American town.
     Destiny and his wards of Happenstance and Luck -- where would Love be without them?
     Christopher sits upon you, his wings thrown back in his own arch. Such a lovely perch, such a lovely bird. It is how he looks the best, it is his best side, facing you, straddling you. He beams down upon you, his corona, a gift from the love you bear him, shining brightly, becoming a seven-pointed star it is so defined.
     Midnight ringlets bounce with his bouncing body's echo. His heart-shaped face is tilted, mouth parted in ecstatic sounds. His fingers splay against and grasp your chest, bracing, balancing, kneading as he needs.
     Andrealphus, thank you...
     I will thank you as I love him... as I desire him...as he moves in me, and I on him... for this is not the heart of your flaw. It was the emptiness in what you did, the soullessness of it that damned you.
     Christopher lifts, his hips circling as he holds the crown of you within him. Feet upon the golden surface of your bed, he moves as your hands direct, as his being desires, sinking onto you fully with a loud, musical cry.
     He chants out his love, sing-song desire, the sweet chiming of bells as he shudders around you.

     In a small room within St. Paul's Cathedral, below the sub-level of tombs and watered-out corridors, a figure snaps up in the middle of his twin bed. It is a small, cramped space with cold, stone walls. A cross and a few books sit upon a nightstand, and a small chest-of-drawers is haphazardly open with a few white shirts and grey pants folded neatly within. The room is pitch black, save a small cross on a wall, seeming to illuminate of its own volition.
     The man sighs a gentle sob, keeping himself from crying more. He looks about, but cannot see. What is there to see? He sits up fully and massages one shoulder, sore from the night's unrest. Once done, his hand caresses the tiny cross around his neck, a simple thing often given to a child as his first communion.
     Julian blinks his eyes slowly, and allows the tiny silver cross to fall from his hand. Instead, he clasps at his chest, as if something was stuck there. A tensed muscle, perhaps, pulled from his arm. He massages gently, hoping the feeling will go away.
     Only then does he become aware of the dampness of his body, his sheets. Julian's hand slips lower to his stomach, then to his thighs. The need is overwhelming to touch his groin and the hardness there, but he stops himself short. He swallows the liquid that has filled his mouth, then breathes a breath of air to dry his lips.
     Samantha would help me. If she were here, she would help me.
     But she will not come, the girl he thinks about. She will not come, and she will never know. The former Angel of Desire, Knight of Pleasure inhales and exhales again, letting only his fingertips assuage the ache between his legs. It's her name he whispers, as if she were there to know how she makes him feel.
     His hand stops, and instead runs over his dark hair. Julian thinks of a second one, a golden blonde male, and for him he gives a purse of his lips. A hope that his Captain is alright and somewhere better already. In that, his deed, he finds an instant of comfort. Something done right.
     Julian sighs again, louder this time. Eventually, they will come. He will have to say the words and know Truth or Destruction. They will come to ask him formally of his Redemption, and he must be ready to face Gabriel's immediate wrath if he is a Liar.
     If...he is still a Liar.

     Smiling down, Christopher beams stars at you, Soldekai. His hands slide up your chest to your shoulders as his hips tilt and waver, lift and lower. Slowly, he lowers upon you, his body sliding along you. Anything to kiss your mouth, and so he does.
     He breathes his love, your name -- they sound the same. Yes, they are the same, Soldekai. Love. And you. Biting and covering, his mouth plays upon yours, parting it. Who is the intense one now? For he is burning brightly...
     As brightly as a thing of Night may burn...
     A star...
     A nova...
     It explodes around you as his own body buckles with joy, with delight, with adoration, with orgasm.

     Julian gasps for air this time, the ache throbbing in his chest, a thunder that grabs his heart and feels to crush it. He lurches upon his side, as if he should throw up at the edge of his bed. They are like convulsions, this, causing him to buckle with each heave. His hand reaches out to grab the table, to call for help, but nothing comes.
     Oh, God, please do not let me come this far. What have I done? I am ready! I am ready to tell them, to ask you to help me. I need you to help me. Forgive me, I swear, Oh God, for what all and ever I have done. I am so sorry! I am so sorry...
     Julian cries, knowing forgiveness has not come for him. Instead, it is Death - never did like her - his punishment. He shall never say the words to ask for help, for forgiveness, for blessing. To be contrite and to see his friends and loved ones again. To be asked to be fixed and righted. To rejoin the world and Symphony once more. It is fit punishment, that he shall die in this place, a step away. How deserving...

     Outside the door, a figure. The tiny door opens, a bit of light spilling in. The figure, in fact, is two, and one of them says softly:
     "He is ready. They both are..."

     The waves and the bed both undulate in quickening paces. Despite wings, this is a mortal form that knows the labor of lovemaking. Soldekai's skin glistens, and the heart in his vessel's chest pumps wildly. He watches his lover upon him, and the weight of the Far Marches bursts from his rigid body in an piercing angelic scream.

     There is a light that streams through the corridors of St. Paul's Cathedral and the catacombs of Notre Dame, Paris. A sigil unlike others, one that faintly burns the wrong-sided. When the light of the sigil fades, a delivery is made of two beings, their celestial forms left spent on the sigil's burn upon the floor.
     "We have not ever met," his voice comes. An older being, he is yet unfamiliar. "I am called Ielahiah, Master of the Order of Redeemers."
     "You know of this - both of you are of the older age. It is true and I speak the words:
     You may be remade for your service if your Heart is True. You must be willing to give up your very identity in this, your very being. If you cannot submit, the metamorphosis will rip your being apart and you will not survive. This is spoken with reverence. For the Hellborn, it is the first time they hear the full power of the Symphony. But for the two of you, those once Fallen, it is a return Home."
     "In this...it is the Glorious Angel, Our Novalis, who has spoken for you and who will hold your Heart. But it is our Purifier you must meet. Ask what you wish, in the tongue that is your first. Ask for the redemption that lies within your Heart."

Posted by rowan at January 09, 2006 08:43 PM