He brought Sela’s clothes over, draping them over his arm carefully. His hands deftly undressed them, hanging everything on a cedar clothes hanger inside a garment bag. He zipped it shut and hung it aside for Sela to take with them when they left. He returned to their side, leaving the alpine glow on their wingtips as he helped them get dressed again. His fingertips lingered on their skin, practically worshipping them as they spoke.
“Whenever you want me there I’ll go with you. It’s an honor to spend time in a place so special to you.” He pressed a kiss to their hand, helping them down from the platform and walking them over to his workbench where his latest materials sat. Sheer yet vibrantly colored ribbons sat in rolls, made from the beams of light shining through stained glass. Taylor handed one of them to Sela for them to better examine. Dust motes shimmered within the ribbons, suspended in time.
Next was the jar of sequins, each one crafted from a tiny dot of light from the broken chandelier inside the church. The colors varied, differing based on where he had taken them from. He poured a few into Sela’s palm so they could see them better, letting them pick through the greens, browns, reds, off white, and golds.
Finally he handed them the perfume bottle, uncorking just enough to allow them to smell the musk of rotting wood, the fresh scent of living plants, and hints of the frankincense and myrrh incense left behind by the people who had abandoned the church many years ago. He closed it again, leaving it in their hands. “That’s all yours to take with you. So you can remember that place when it’s been consumed by the forest completely. I have some for myself, so I can think of you when we’re apart.”
The unexpected gifts revealed just how well Taylor had come to know them. Each item offered Sela pieces of the world in the way they experienced it, distilled into the physical. How many centuries since they had felt truly seen? The surge of affection that rose was nostalgic, pure in a way emotion had been, back when Sela held their place in the choir.
Each item was tucked away carefully in the small, well used messenger bag they had brought for the purpose. They lingered over the perfume, even after it was stoppered, caught by how perfectly it summoned the church. Of all the gifts, the scent was a very clear favourite, and Sela packed it away with even greater care.
"You have given me so much. Things I lack words to explain." Sela murmured, moving to cup Taylor's face in their hands. Earlier shyness retreated, melting under the fire of Sela's adoration.
"May I have one thing more from you? Something you wear, something that smells of you." The desire to complete their nest in the church, to show that sacred and private space to Taylor, was more compelling than any embarrassment they might have felt at making the request. "...and maybe also, a kiss?"
“Anything you ask for I will give willingly, my muse,” he answered, wrapping an arm around their waist and kissing them, pouring his love into them as best he could. He lingered, breathing in their scent, tasting them on his lips, treasuring all the ways he could experience them.
Finally he let go, grabbing a wider clothing bag and hangers before walking to his clothes hamper and sorting through it looking for something of his that Selaphiel might wear. Soon enough the hangers were full of clothes. A sturdy, deep wine colored toga from his time in Rome, a pale linen poet shirt from his Byronic phase, a silver blue hanfu set from China, and a vibrantly colored Basotho blanket from Lesotho, all worn in the past few days now carefully hung inside the bag.
“I think these will suit you,” he explained as he hung the bag right next to the one containing the lingerie, unzipped to allow Seraphiel to investigate the pieces if they wanted. Already his eyes were glazing over as his mind filled with more ideas of what to design for Selaphiel now that they’d given him permission to dress them. Overalls made from the skin of a stone, with metal vein embroidery and moss lining to cushion them and regulate their temperature. Tall socks knitted from wool dyed with the colors of twilight. Loose shirts cut from the early morning fog. Boots made from the sun heated sands of the Sahara to warm and cushion their feet. “Do you want to eat? It’s late but Aisling won’t mind me grabbing something from the kitchen.”
