"What do you mean?" Azrael knew it was more than a little pointless to play dumb or put his impervious mask back on, but he couldn't fight his instinct to do so. His face remained cradled in Pavel's hand though, as if the crack in his voice and tears heavy on his waterline didn't betray the unspoken truth enough already. His walls were crumbling. Azrael had spent many years maintaining them, weathering storms inside that fortress, but this was an attack they couldn't fend off. They couldn't keep his emotions from leaking out anymore.
Pavel continued to look at him, his battered face painted hues of purple, as his unswollen honey-coloured eye seemed to see into Azrael's soul, laying its content bare. No part of him remained untouched by that gaze, every shadowed part of him exposed entirely. "I told you a part of my story; tell me a part of yours. It won't leave this house – I promise you that." He rubbed his thumbs across the skin under Azrael's eyes, a calming rhythm that didn't work. All it did was make Azrael painfully aware of how soft Pavel's fingers were, of how warm he was.
Azrael's eyebrows twitched, nostrils flaring as his face fought to stay in an unreadable expression. It didn't work for long when his mouth curved into a deep, unsightly frown and the first tear slid down from his tear duct and pooled along Pavel's finger. Unsure how to quell the trembling of his hands, Azrael reached out to touch something, anything, and the palms of his hands found the fluffy fabric of the towel covering Pavel's lap. He clasped onto the flesh of Pavel's thighs through the cloth, unsure if it would hurt the man or not but he couldn't think straight. Not now, not when he asked me that so earnestly.
Pathetically, his voice trembled as Azrael whispered another answer in a hoarse voice. There was something about Pavel that made him lower his guard completely. Something about him that made Azrael want to tell him everything, no matter how ridiculous that was. A deep, yearning desire filled him, desperate to confide his secrets and his sins in that man. "Pavel, I've done the unspeakable and worse bas been done to me."
Pavel's fingers deftly slid up the sides of Azrael's face, his other hand joining the movement until his touch ended with his palms cradling each side of Azrael's head. Hair parted for his fingers, dishevelled and wild, and Pavel rested his thumbs around the base of Azrael's horns, stroking the skin of his temples. That caress unravelled him at the seams, destroying him. "Tell me."
Azrael leant into Pavel's hands. He wanted him to take him apart as he desired and put Azrael back together in the shape Pavel thought would be best. He needed his touch, craved for the goodness that Pavel had no reason to be giving to Azrael.
So, like a catholic in confession, Azrael told him his sins and prayed for forgiveness from the mercy he could see behind the eyes of a benevolent god.
-
In 1997, I killed a man.
Two days after my sixth birthday, it happened. I was already too mature for my years and I had just been tasked to do what my training had been preparing me for years. I was still too young to even understand what that was. Not until during it, not until after it.
As soon as I could grasp a pencil, they filled my mind with things a child shouldn't know. I was bombarded with disgusting images to desensitise me to the horrors of what I would have to experience, of what would happen to me. Of what I would do to others. My life never had a moment of peace.
They utilised my growing range of flight to their advantage, teaching me manoeuvres that even experienced adult beings with wings wouldn't try to do. The risk of injury was too high. But Master Lynch never cared – he knew I would bounce back from injury in an hour or two because of my special blood. It wasn't for several years that he realised that it wasn't a miracle cure – that it was imperfect, even for the creature it belonged to.
Everything that I had been put through came to a head on that fateful day when Master Lynch took me to the house of a man he called an 'old friend', someone who really wanted to meet the interesting little albino hatchling. He had paid a lot of money to spend an evening with me, so, even though I didn't know why he spent money to see me or why he needed an evening with me, I knew that the master had tucked something into the seam of my jacket and told me to keep it secret. I didn't have a chance before or after to know what it was.
"You know what to do. You know how to deal with my old friend, don't you?" The master hissed into my pointed ears, causing me to flinch at the violent sound so close to my eardrum. While I didn't really know what was happening, I knew what death was and I knew I would be putting someone to death. His hands pressed against my back as I was led up the ostentatious drive of the castle-like mansion.
A woman in a black dress greeted me at the door and whisked me away from my pseudo-father and down a long hallway lit only by flickering candles. The lack of light made it difficult for me to see or focus and it disconcerted me – I was already hard of sight in good lighting and that was only helped partially by glasses but the master had refused me my vision. He told me I needed only to look perfect. He'd never cared how I'd looked before so his insistence on showing perfection was baffling at the time.
As I struggled to keep up with the woman, her cold clasp around my little wrist dragging me along, I saw a door at the end of the hallway and felt an emotion I couldn't recognise. I know what it was now: dread. My instincts were telling me something very bad was going to happen to me if I went into that door, but I didn't have any choice in the matter.
Once we reached the door, she tapped her knuckles on it and fled back down the hallway, as if frightened, leaving me alone as the door opened and revealed the man I was sent to see, peering down at me with a look that unsettled me. His face has long since vanished from my memory and I'm glad that is has.
I lost time after that.
I don't know what happened.
No, I know what happened to me even if I didn't know what that meant as a six-year-old when I snapped back to reality. Standing in a pool of blood, whatever Master Lynch had given me still in the seam of my jacket that had been flung across the room, I looked down at an unrecognisable mass of naked flesh. In my head, only seconds ago, it had been a middle-aged human in a tailored suit. Confused, I dazedly stared around the room, blood splatter coating every surface, and saw the pile of cloth that had probably been his suit next to the bed that was nothing more than a pile of ripped sheets and goose feathers, the wooden frame cracked and bowed. There had been two monsters in that room that night. I knew that much.
My solid white form had been dyed with his viscera and I hoped that my clothes had survived whatever had happened to me and to this man because I knew, I knew that if Master Lynch saw the fancy suit he got me had been destroyed because of my irresponsibility, he would punish me severely.
That was the night I lost my final chance at childhood and I don't remember a thing. For that, I am grateful because I don't want to remember what happened to cause me to react like that and feel the pain that I felt for days following it.
It's been 26 years and Master Lynch is dead.
He's dead and I'm still not free.
-
Finishing his recollection, Azrael could feel the decades of stifled tears that had fallen down his face, the salty residue making his face feel dirty, dry, and wet all at the same time. As his eyes focused back on the real world, he found himself to be confused by the view. Pavel's face was no longer in front of Azrael but it didn't take long to register that he had placed his head on Pavel's shoulder at some point. Pavel's arms were tightly wrapped around his torso, hands rubbing circles on the skin around his wing joints.
Azrael was sure one of his horns must have been pressing into Pavel's neck unpleasantly, be it the sharp point or just the blunt-body of it so he tried to move but Pavel refused to let him budge even an inch. Pavel's hands grabbed at the joint of Azrael's wings again so he promptly stopped resisting his touch. Remaining stiff in this position, Azrael was unsure how to continue as he had further pushed the boundaries of what this relationship was supposed to be. However, Azrael allowed himself to indulge in the gentle embrace of the golden-haired man as he carefully rubbed circles across his shoulders. It had been a long time since someone had been so kind to him, so willing to listen. This is quite nice.
"I'm so sorry. It is clear it weighs on you heavily, much like how my own past does." Pavel's voice cut through the weak sound of Azrael's sniffles and sobs, blanketing him in the warm comfort that he had unknowingly craved for what felt like all of his born days. Azrael grasped at Pavel hopelessly, desperate for him to stay in front of him. "Thank you for telling me. Cry as much as you need to; it is the least I can do for you."
"You don't need to do anything for me, Pavel," Azrael murmured against the bony point of Pavel's shoulder. A tickling on the tip of his nose made Azrael realise Pavel had a rather thick section of fur across his shoulders where Azrael's head rested. So soft. In a hushed, barely audible whisper, Azrael let himself admit something more. "I am glad that you are here."
Pavel laughed gently and Azrael found himself entranced by the sound. It was deep and chesty but still had the soft, melodic lilt his voice had when he spoke. That's the first time he's laughed genuinely. "Well, I knew I couldn't get professional medical care without any intrusive questions or people sticking their noses in where I don't want them to."
"I understand that." Azrael let out a chuckle but it was still restrained. His carefully preserved, reserved appearance was a facet of himself he couldn't tear away from, even after he had cried in the arms of his meaning for being. A deep inhale allowed Azrael to settle properly, his crumbling wall hastily patched back together before anything else came tumbling out. He could now pretend again, putting his stern, infallible mask back on – Pavel and he matched, both wearing their own type of mask. "I'm alright. I need to finish the butterfly stitches, so you can let me go, Pavel."
He nodded and hummed in acknowledgement but he dragged out the breaking off of the embrace as if Pavel knew that Azrael wasn't being completely truthful. Even as he sat straight, he kept his hands gently resting on Azrael's shoulders, refusing to sever his act of comfort. Well, he isn't a fool – he knows I'm lying about being okay. "Come on, doctor, get on with it then."
Azrael could feel the way that he stared at Pavel was slightly shifted after the comfort he'd given, but he was no expert on the nuance of emotion so he ignored that odd new feeling. His gaze was far more tender as he glanced at Pavel, Azrael could tell that much, and his eyes crinkled in the corners like he was someone who often smiled freely and genuinely. "I'll get right on it, sir."