26. sensual kiss / 3. neck kiss :***
iii. neck kiss & xxvi. sensual kiss .
there is a story of a knot that cannot be undone until a king cleaves it in half with his great sword, rending it into two irreconcilable halves. this is not that story. this has never been that knot. their heads bowed close together and voices bent at the knee they murmur and laugh at their own cleverness, vice and virtue sit in a loose but intricately snarled tangle — yet a blade would do not good in this inextricable problem. that’s the terrible nature of immortal things. cassiel sits raised and golden upon his lap like a gilt sundial, samael the shadow that sprawls below and around her, an arm sweeping like endless time around her waist.
“and if you didn’t love me ⸺”
“i don’t.”
“no.” their mouths, slowly, lift into the same shape. it is only slightly turned upward, but no more or less a smile than a well-carved bow is. how often they had pointed these at one another, arrows drawn close enough that the sharp tips brushed the gauze along their chests. how many more opportunities before they would be leased? “of course not.”
“ ⸺ and as you don’t,” she continues, her hand slinking across his hip till she reaches the scabbard left tied there, little hand fisting around the bronze hilt, pulling it loose. “you would never let me do this.”
his eyes are tight to hers as the jaws of the snake that swallows its own tail, the drawl of his tone slow as the poison from that same serpent’s fangs, as the tar from the black pit beneath his ribs: “never.”
“mm.” cassiel hums in agreement, drawing the great weapon only to let it clatter and ring against the floor like so many spilled chalices and ruined evenings. neither look to where it falls. “you wouldn’t let me do that, either.”
“no,” the demon exhales as she sinks down once more and rests her cheek against broad shoulder, samael’s long breath a sound not unlike that of the beasts stirring from winter-long slumbers. “i don’t suppose i would.”
“of course not. and because you do not love me,” the angel pouts her lip, the bottom rung plump and pink in a way god had crafted flowers after. “you cannot ask for my worship.”
samael’s large hand raises to enclose her jaw in his palm, thumb pressing upon the lower petal. he chuckles, dark and a moment too late, watching how a blossom opens itself. there is a teasing, testing nature to it. “perhaps. but it could be demanded.”
from her place upon his legs she rises, the ornament and embellishments of her gown a soft clatter, bronze shoulders released from heavy straps as she takes to his neck with that terrible, lovely mouth. “and yet,” warm insistence traverses his collarbone and veins, making a journey across open skin. “you know as well as i that veneration cannot be commanded... it must be willingly given.” teeth, teeth, there must always be teeth. fuck me can be the same urge as eat me. “but it is for the best, samael, isn’t it...” how she raises like smoke from the fumes of the fire that culled both god and the devil, curling, inviting. she means to clog his throat like the fumes from his wings. o, how they must always be alike. “what terrible things we might do, otherwise —” one thigh slinks over his hip. he holds it. her mouth hovers above his. he takes it. “how debased i might be before you —” she murmurs between the slow, heavy exchange of their tongues. and the reverence i might demand in return. “what transgressions we might invent... and yet—” her palm rests flat over the space his heart rules, feeling the thrum against her, the feathery turnings of a dark thing they both shore. “because you do not love me ⸺” tongue, teeth, palm. everything is warm. it is like the beginning of the world. stars could birth here. “⸺ i can simply leave.”
he says her name after she has stood and removed herself from his grip, and she smiles as she calls back, dropping think of me, won’t you, over her shoulder as if that not the way every saint in history has parted from a transgressor. she ponders, briefly, stripping the entirety of what she wears, shedding all garment to walk the length of infernum naked and resplendent in this fanned desire. o, that the hellhounds and demons might snarl at her, lined on either side to paw and simper. how they would froth. how they wouldn’t dare to mar such beauty. she pauses long enough in her revery for white feathers to shed at the entryway, and for samael to call out once more, sunk deep into the seat upon which she left him.
“i do not love you, cassiel.”
she turns, observing the look upon his face. she dresses herself to match.
“i know.”
