We Are Bulletproof

Birdy Bee Coffee Cafe—BBCC, as some (okay just Raphael) called it—was a quaint, cute, modern, trendy little place. It caught Raphael's eye immediately with its colorful decor and he couldn't help visiting it often. So often that one of the baristas got to chatting with him, and then let him behind the counter to try out the espresso machine, and then taught him how to make leaves with milky foam on the surface. With money not being much of an issue for them, he already tried out one of everything on the menu during his frequent visits, and of course—he had a lot of espresso.

So when he told Rhys that the coffee here was good, he knew what he was talking about!

But his chances at a date were initially dashed by his impetuous departure from the group. That... couldn't really be helped. Raphael wanted a date with Rhys but he needed freedom a sight more. It just happened that his conversation with Professor Jack took a turn in that direction, before he had a chance to hang out with Rhys and... Well... Here they were.

Or were they?

Were they here?

Where was here anyway, because Raphael was thoroughly confused. He thought Rhys was angry—which proved to be correct. And then he wrote that letter hoping to make everything better and he sent it off by private Seek-Me, not realizing that it tried to deliver the letter to the apartment first. But eventually the letter landed in Rhys' hands so he had no real reason to suspect that it had been intercepted. The glaringly obvious conclusion to be drawn about Raphael was that he wasn't exactly bright. He was not the brightest bulb in the package and he often failed to think his actions through. Unfortunately, not knowing that the letter had already been read meant that he was in danger but even so, he felt that his new friends would protect him.

Professor Jack promised and Brayden backed that up. Marge was even guarding him—he felt safe! And when Rhys finally responded to him, he was elated. He showed Marge the message with a bright grin and although abuse was slung by both parties—Margie didn't take well to being called an idiot or a pervert—Raphael was too happy to care. "A real date Margie!" He crowed as Marge patted him on the head approvingly, having alternately coached and yelled at him through the entire exchange. "And we're going to have espresso! And—ooh! Play footsies under the table!"

"Great." Marge drew out the word with a slight roll of the eyes. "But you remember what I told you, right? Get him to the park, into the little nature walk."

"Oh! Yes. Of course Margie! I'll get him there, and... um. Why did you want him there again?" Raphael distractedly fiddled with the clasp of his messenger bag, which held that precious gift he wanted to give to Rhys.

"To talk." Something about Marge's smile made him feel a little anxious. "Just to have a little chat, no big deal. Now off you go~ Have your little date~! Kiss and make up~!"

Then she all but pushed him out the door, where he stood in the courtyard sort of confused. Raphael glanced toward Professor Jack's apartment, wondering if he ought to let him know where he was going, but earlier Marge said they were busy... (And what would two lovers be doing when they were alone? Things that didn't bear interrupting! Raphael wasn't about to be That Guy either!)

With a smile that was very much un-Fallen-like, he set off across the courtyard and out of the building, into the street. The cafe wasn't terribly far away—just far away enough to help him settle his nerves. But then he caught sight of the back of a head with familiar dark curls and the nerves flared up worse than ever. Now, Raphael didn't think that Rhys would actually kill him, but he might... he might make good on that promise to throttle him. (And then kiss him? Maybe?)

As he approached, his heart rate kicked up to jackhammer going at full speed. If—If Rhys was going to throttle him, then he had to get his kiss in quick!

So Raphael sorta dove at Rhys—His Majesty the third Prince of the Kingdom of the Fallen—and planted one on him without much warning!

This shouldn't take long. Honestly, Rhys didn't even know why he bothered agreeing to it. Or telling him to meet up or whatever. Rhys firmly believed none of this would be happening if it weren't for Raphael. What was wrong with him? Why couldn't he just keep his teacups or whatever to himself? I should have said no. There was no reason to actually humor him. In fact, if anything, this was probably the worst step to take.

Rhys didn't like the fact that there was a paper trail connected with this. Before, when it was just them... Actually, that was just as bad, was it not? It wasn't on paper but it was in text form. Words that could be tracked if somebody wanted to watch them. And Rhys had to admit, he felt especially watched right now. Ever since treason made its way into the conversation, he felt the prickly sensation of being watched. Maybe it was "guilt," which he hadn't felt in a long, long time.

Whatever it was, he didn't like it. He left a paper trail just as much as Raphael had. Maybe they should run off before they were found. But he knew it was pointless. They were going to be found regardless. Even Rhys' attempt to give Raphael a "head start" was pointless.

None of this was going to go down happily.

So he didn't know why he bothered coming here, in this bright, cheery cafe with its overpriced menu and its too-smiley barista, and the cutesy little bees on the walls. Rhys didn't even say anything to the barista when he entered, nor did he order anything. He just found a table without other people nearby and slid into the chair to wait.

The distracting pop music over the speakers annoyed him and so did the couple nearby. The girl had an irritating giggle and the guy had a stupid grin on his face the entire time. Rhys turned away, bored. He was just about to rest his chin in his hand when out of nowhere he was accosted. Before he knew what he was doing, reflexes took over--Rhys swept up to his feet, grabbed the crazed kisser by the arm and twisted it behind his back before shoving the assailant facedown against the table.

Only to find that it was... Raphael.

"Oh for--" Rhys let go of Raphael and stepped back. "What the hell was that?! Are you trying to get killed?"

WHAM! THUD!

"OW!"

The side of Raphael's face thudded off the table so hard that the salt and pepper shakers rattled in their holders, and he swore his brain got jarred loose inside of his skull, too! On top of that, his arm was twisted hard behind his back, which didn't help matters in the least! To his credit, aside from the surprised and pained yelp, he didn't whine on. (Well that never helped anybody, did it?)

Raphael peeled himself off the table with a grievously injured Look at Rhys, who admittedly had every right to be indignant. He did sort of get kissed non-consensually... And he was a highly trained, skilled assassin of sorts, with lightning reflexes...

"You're jumpy," replied Raphael unhelpfully as he rubbed his sore shoulder, noting absently that everyone else in the cafe was now staring wide-eyed at them, wondering why Rhys had just attacked him. "And I wasn't trying to get killed, I was trying to get a kiss before you throttled me like you said you would." Gingerly he sat down, alternately rubbing the side of his face and his shoulder. The couple nearby whispered something to each other, promptly rose and left the cafe, casting fearful looks at Rhys as they passed.

Raphael thought he heard the girl whispering 'psycho' as she passed.

Oh yes, he was jumpy. He glared at Raphael. What did he expect? For Rhys to kiss him back? He'd come at him from behind! And Rhys wasn't feeling good about any of this. He felt like his father just... knew. He couldn't help it; his father knew everything back home. But maybe his tentacles didn't reach this far. Hard to tell.

It disturbed Rhys that he felt so "jumpy" as Raphael put it. This wasn't like him. Boredom. Ennui. That was more like Rhys. Worrying that somebody might be watching him? Back home, Rhys never cared even if he was aware that he was being watched in some capacity or other. Everything he did was a test in his father's eyes. Rhys learned that very early on. He knew Satine did, too. Everything they did was scrutinized and examined. Their every strength... and weakness.

Rhys slid back into his seat.

He heard the girl's remark but chose to ignore it. He wasn't a psycho. But her opinion didn't matter and he didn't care if they were afraid of what they just witnessed. All the better, since they weren't there in his peripheral vision anymore and he didn't have to listen to her awful cackle anymore.

"You're an idiot."

In the face of Rhys' annoyance, Raphael smiled a new smile he learned here in this human world—the smile that hurt the side of his poor face that had gotten slammed into the table. He didn't know what it was to really smile until he came here, out into the sunshine and out from under the shadow of that ominous black castle with its tall, sharp spires and purple pennants waving to remind everyone of the Fallen King's omnipresent rule.

Raphael had always been a bit of an oddball within the Fallen kingdom, simply because of his disposition. He wouldn't have said that he was sunny, exactly, but he was more optimistic than most. Somehow he couldn't help but see the silver lining in every storm cloud, a fact that made him rather unpopular. After he came here, though, the sun broke through those storm clouds. He changed—oh, how he changed!

He was allowed such freedoms here! Enrolling in the local community college put him in touch with Professor Jack but it also put him in touch with other young people his age, ones who befriended him and genuinely appeared to like him. A few even tried asking him out! Raphael found himself being the center of attention in a positive way; he was wanted, he found, and his cheery attitude earned him only praise, never rebuke. Everything wrong with him suddenly became right. He felt as if he finally found home, not with his greedy mother or distant brothers, but here with the humans who were supposedly beneath them all.

Meanwhile, Rhys and Keith... They didn't seem to find much amusement in the human world, unless they were hunting. Raphael's hands weren't bloodless either but he never found joy in taking lives. It was necessary to his job but really... He was much happier collecting teacups and going to cafes to befriend baristas who made espresso art.

"So you've said," he laughed gently, "about a thousand times." Rhys probably meant it every time, but that was Rhys for you. He seemed to have changed too. Jumpy, irritable, secretive, begrudgingly acquiescing... None of those things were indicative of ennui. They were just the opposite, in fact, but it didn't take an 'idiot' like Raphael to point that out, did it? Under the table he nudged Rhys' ankle with his ankle. "This just makes it a thousand and one."

And... probably also the last time Rhys would ever call him an idiot to his face...

And there was the ankle under the table. Rhys sighed and moved his foot back and away from Raphael. He hadn't come here to play footsie under the table or whatever else Raphael thought this was. He'd come here at his insistence, actually. Was that what he wanted to give him? A foot rub? Footsies? This wasn't a date. Was that what Raphael wanted it to be?

Of course it is. Raphael hadn't been secretive about that. He wanted a date with Rhys for who fucking knew what reason... For almost as long as Satine had been in his life, so too had Raphael been there. But they weren't really friends, even then. Rhys didn't play those imaginative games that he played with Satine, not with Raphael. But he was there at his studies with a handful of others around their age. They all tried to be his friend, all of them shoved toward him by families who wanted to be close to the royal family. Raphael was the only one that seemed genuinely interested.

Rhys still kept him at arm's length.

"Are you going to order your fancy drink or did you just want to meet here to kiss me and play footsies under the table?"

Rhys, as usual, was skittish like a little frightened colt. Okay not frightened, but he was skittish! Withdrawing his leg as though playing footsies was beneath him... But Raf was willing to bet that he'd never played it in his life! He didn't know how much fun it was to flirt and make eyes at someone over the table and—ahem. Raf was getting a little ahead of himself here, wasn't he?

He sighed and withdrew his leg too. Attempt number 1 foiled! But the smile persisted as he shrugged. "Maybe I did just come to kiss you and play footsies! What's wrong with that?" Nothing! If he liked someone—maybe even loved them—then it was only natural to want to kiss them and flirt with them and think dirty things about them. Even Rhys wasn't immune to the needs of the body, although Raf suspected that most of his 'consorts' were merely there to relieve that biological need, and not to offer emotional support.

But even as he waved, Luka was coming over, seemingly concerned. "Baby are you okay? Did this jerk hurt you?!" He reached out and cupped Raf's cheek, the one that had been smushed into the table. "Aww poor thing, that's going to leave a mark. My little unicorn, do you want me to call the cops?!" Luka glared at Rhys.

"No! Nono it was a misunderstanding!" Raf clutched his arm. "Don't get him in trouble, please! He's my—my best friend!" Raf side-eyed Rhys to see if he bristled at that. For Raf, it was true: he considered Rhys to be his best friend. But the reverse generally didn't hold true... Clearing his throat self-consciously, he turned back to Luka. "Can we get two espresso please? Really I'm okay, I swear!"

"...all right. But if I see him being shifty, I'm calling 911!"

Rhys glared right back at the barista, not at all impressed with the fact that he touched Raphael like that. Yes, there was likely going to be a mark where Rhys struck Raphael's head against the table but that was Raphael's own fault for jumping him! (Although in Raf's defense, Rhys wasn't normally... that jumpy. He would have been aware of the movement and waited calmly to see who approached.)

So he was jumpy after all.

He still felt oddly... restless. Paranoid. And he didn't. Like. It. He didn't like any of it. He didn't like the fact that the boredom was starting to be overtaken by something else. On the one hand, it was different and that things less boring. But it scared him, worried him--and that in turn irritated him. Why? Why did it irritate him? Even he had no answers for that.

Rhys saw the side-eye and he avoided Raphael's gaze by looking off at the nearby wall, which was painted an annoyingly sunny yellow and white with the thinnest black stripes in between. Everything in this place was unbearably... cute. No wonder Raphael was attracted to it.

Not bothering to say anything at all to the disgusting human, Rhys continued to watch the wall until he left, then slid his gaze back toward Raphael.

"These people would never last an hour in the dark kingdom if they think that was violence."

"Well good thing we're not IN the dark kingdom, and these people don't have to know what we know..." Raphael laughed, but it was a subdued kind of laugh as he recalled the horrors of being a Fallen. None of it was fun and games. It was all grisly and terrifying and... Well, it was no way for anyone to live! Even Rhys didn't get off scot-free. If anything, more pressure was placed onto him because he was the one who was 'allowed' to stay by his father's side.

How he ever withstood the pressure, Raphael didn't know. He suspected that it was because Rhys came from strong stock—his father was mighty, even if he was evil. Those genes had to be in him somewhere, even if he acted nothing like his father even on a bad day. Rhys didn't do that whole... killing subordinates for no reason thing. Sometimes he had bad days and it showed, but Raphael didn't think Rhys was... evil. Misguided, perhaps, but not evil. Raphael could never fall in love with an evil man, after all!

Propping his elbow onto the table, Raphael rested his chin in his hand. He gazed at Rhys. This was going to be the last time he saw Rhys in person and he needed to memorize every aspect of him, from the downturned frown formed at the corners of his mouth to the unimpressed glare in his eyes, to the way his hair curled and wisped around his face. "I'm going to miss you, Rhys," he whispered wistfully, still staring at Rhys with adoring eyes and a little sad smile.

A part of Rhys wished they did know what it was like there. These people had the luxury of living light, happy lives because they didn't know all the things they had seen. Even Raphael, who somehow managed to keep a hold of some part of his light. Rhys didn't know how he did it because he himself had obviously never been able to do so. But when he was young, he was a light, hyper, mischievous little thing. His mother loved him then. He remembered it... so well right now. For some reason.

He didn't remember it so well before but sitting here in this colorful, cute cafe with Raf sitting across from him, he suddenly had it there. The memory of his mother holding him, running her hand through his hair, murmuring to him how she loved him, her baby boy always.

It didn't help, really, to have Raphael staring back at him the way he was. Rhys stared back. What was he searching for? Did he... know? Did it show in Rhys' face that the memory had come to him, of his mother? She used to all him a little monkey, for getting into scrapes and messes. Always insisted on washing him up herself. Never wanted a nurse, never wanted a nanny. She was so protective of him. Rhys had forgotten that. He just assumed she only cared for her lost son. Now he was realizing that she'd lost two.

Rhys lowered his gaze, feeling a foreign sense of emotion overtaking him. Abruptly, he got up.

"I'm using the bathroom," he said, before Raphael got weird about it.

"Oh—okay. I'll be here!"

Obviously he wasn't going anywhere. Obviously. Raphael watched Rhys until the last moment, up until the bathroom door closed on him, and then he turned back with a sigh. Luka came over with the two cups of espresso, one with a fun sunflower design on it—for Raphael—and one with a... a... "What is that?" Raphael asked as he studied the spiky design.

"It's abstract." Luka plonked the other cup down in front of Rhys' spot, whereas he had gently slid Raphael's cup before him. "For the jerk who hurt my little baby!"

"But we're the same age!"

"Yeah well I've already adopted you, so. You know. Shut your little baby mouth and let me love you." Luka slid into Rhys' chair and again cupped Raphael's face, stroking the reddened spot with tender fingers. "Are you sure you're okay with him? He really went for it, it looked like he wanted to hurt you!"

"Oh no. Rhys would never hurt me." Raphael touched the back of Luka's hand gently. "He's always protected me. I snuck up on him, it was my fault."

"...yeah and you kissed him, I saw that!"

"Well. Yeah." Raphael grinned. "I did kiss him didn't I? And isn't he handsome? And tall?"

"Mmmhm." Luka sounded unconvinced but was forced to leave to tend to some new customers entering the cafe. Raphael picked up his cup and sipped it carefully, so as not to disrupt the pretty sunflower on top. He glanced over his shoulder. Was Rhys going to be there a while? Was he pooping? Fine time to do that now when this was their first AND last date!

The bathroom was thankfully empty when Rhys entered. He stood in front of the mirror, wondering if it showed. Whatever was going on in his head. Then he turned on the tap and let the water run for a moment before he splashed his face with it. Cold water was a shock to the system but he needed it. He was losing grip on himself and he didn't know how to... fix it. And goddamn, his back itched like crazy.

After scooping some more water into his face, he looked up. Eyes widening, he held onto either side of the sink, heart leaping into his throat when he saw his father standing behind him in the mirror. Frozen in fear, he watched as he moved closer. The sink began to brown and rust and crackle beneath his hands.

"It was a mistake to let you go," he said in his low tone, hateful, glowing eyes piercing through Rhys' even through the mirror. Rhys could feel his mouth go dry. "You were perfect but something about the human world changes you."

Rhys turned around and found that his father was not there with him. Limbs shaking, he backed up against the sink. It crashed down, rusted and ruined and when Rhys turned back around, he could see his corruption had sunk into the sink and its components. And in the mirror, his father was still there.

"Keith will remove them," he said.

"What?"

"Those fucking wings. I knew you were too young to send. I should have listened to my instincts."

Rhys stared. What? Wings? The itchiness... He reached back to feel something startling protruding from his shoulder blade. Not a lot but... something. No.

"I'll get rid of them myself."

That changed his father's expression. He arched a brow and looked on with interest as Rhys reached back and grasped onto one of the wings with his hands. And he let out an agonized cry as the corruption poured from his hand to the pure magic trying to grow from his shoulder. Dropping to one knee in the mess of crushed metal and porcelain, he could feel it cutting into his knee and legs. The corruption spread down to the root of the wing and it throbbed painfully, like an infected tooth. He bit his lip to keep from making another sound.

"That's right..." His father encouraged him. "Remove the purity... it's a blight..."

The bathroom door squeaked open and somebody was asking what was happening, then calling out, "Luka! This customer is... I think he's trying to kill himself!"

What a pretty little sunflower Luka made for him! Raphael sat looking at the lovely design on the surface of his cup, waiting for Rhys to come out so that they could resume their date. This was something he only dreamed of, never dared to approach Rhys about because... Well, Rhys would have said no and even if Raphael might have shrugged it off and laughed about it, a part of him would have been hurt. That was the human world's influence on him—he had emotions that ran the gamut from delighted to... less so.

But for some reason, Rhys did say yes—twice. He had to remember that. Rhys agreed twice now and so there was hope for Raphael that maybe whatever changed in him was also changing Rhys, and both for the better. That was something he held on to in the days leading up to his... defection, he supposed was the word. He defected from his homeland, from his people, so that he could live and love and party with the humans.

Something clunked behind him, followed by a series of quite frightening sounds. Raphael shot to his feet at the sound of a familiar cry, but another cafe server got to the bathroom first. Hearing him calling to Luka and saying that a customer was trying to kill himself, Raphael bolted to his feet and dashed over, pushing aside random people who were clamoring to see what was happening.

"Rhys? Rhys?!" He pushed past the other employee too, and stared aghast at the crumbled bits of porcelain and wood and metal that Rhys' corruption had made short work of. What was he doing?! There was something on his back that he was pulling on and without knowing what it was or why it was important that Rhys not pull it out, Raphael grabbed onto his arm to try and get him to let go. "Stop! Rhys stop it! Stop! What're you doing?"

Did it hurt this much when he was young? Or was it because he was doing it himself? It was like... honestly, the closest thing he could think of was that it felt like he was pulling a literal bone out of his body. It was like ripping out his own teeth or his nails. A part of him that was definitely meant to be there. The corruption made it so, so, so much worse, though. It was rotting the wing all the way through and down his back. He could feel its blackness crawling like cold sin down his back and it hurt like fuck.

So despite trying to fight the hand pulling at his arm, it was hard to when his energy was flagging. The pain made him weak. More so, he was already physically affected by seeing his father in the mirror. He tried to look up at the mirror but he couldn't see into it from this height. Besides that, he couldn't see past the tears of pain that blurred his vision--a physical reaction.

"Somebody call 911!" somebody was saying. Rhys could hardly even see them, hear them. Everything felt like it was covered in the flutters of hundreds of moths. His hearing went in and out. Something... had gone wrong in his attempt to tear his wing bodily from himself. Now it felt rotten.

And he finally realized that somebody familiar was there. Shit. Raphael. Rhys forced himself to get to his feet, even though his legs felt like a young horse's--unstable and unsteady.

"He's in the..." Mirror, he started to say but when he looked, it was just him, with an ashen face. And the worker, who looked worried and Raphael, who definitely looked worried.

"No no! Don't!" Raphael turned on the employee—and on Luka who was staring at him with wide eyes. "He's—I'll take him home. I'll look after him!"

The magic in the air was stifling. Hot. Dark. It was corruption at its finest and at its worst, its most powerful. Raphael felt His Majesty's presence too—Drake Nightshade. He had been here and that meant bad things were about to happen to all of these innocent people if he and Rhys didn't immediately leave. The first thing he thought of was Margie—she could help Rhys, he was sure! And if she couldn't, she knew a fixer, she said! Fixers were incredibly rare in their realm but out here maybe they weren't so hard to find!

Gently he slipped his arms around Rhys, to help him stay on his wobbly feet. There was a blight on his back that Raphael could see, where some kind of dark magic had seeped into him. It looked so awful, almost like an open wound, that he could hardly bear to look. The fixer. Marge! "Come on Rhys. Let's get you out of here. I know someone who can help."

What... was Drake Nightshade doing here? Did he know? About Raphael? Surely someone as unimportant as he was didn't warrant the King himself visiting the human realm...? He didn't realize he was shaking from adrenaline and fear until he looked down at his own hand, to see it trembling where it was grasping onto Rhys' shirt. "Come on," he said more softly. "Let's get you out into some fresh air."

Help with what? he wanted to retort but there just wasn't enough energy in him to say it. He barely even thought it, mostly as a remnant, mostly as a reflex. Fuck, he felt awful. Why did he think it was a good idea to try and rip those things out of himself? Even just the one... it was a pain beyond anything he could ever remember feeling in his entire life. It made him weak. Like he hadn't eaten in ages, like he had been laid out sick for weeks and was just getting up. It didn't feel good.

So he didn't retort and he didn't argue, only let Raphael help him out of the bathroom and past people that he didn't know or care about. He could hardly believe his own stupidity, when he thought about it. He himself told Raphael that they didn't physically rip wings off fairies to make them Fallen. It was a magical procedure. So what did he think he was going to do? And why didn't he think that his corruption touch wouldn't do anything? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!

He hated being reliant on anyone but any time he tried to take a step on his own, it was as if his body refused to let it happen. Still, once they were outside, he tried again to step back. Thankfully, there was a bus bench nearby that he could drop into. And just like a bad tooth, he couldn't seem to stop himself from sliding a hand up over his shoulder. He hissed and took it back.

"You did this," he said through gritted teeth. "Ever since..."

He didn't finish because it was so incriminating. He licked the blood from his lower lip, where he'd bitten down too hard. "My father was in there. In the mirror."

"Whoa! Hey hey careful!" He didn't understand why Rhys kept fighting him but luckily there was a bench to catch him as he fell. Raphael was on his knees beside the bench immediately, reaching out to lay a hand on Rhys' shoulder to steady him, in case he rolled off. The area on his back was spreading. Corruption did that. It was a blight, after all—a darkness that consumed. That was the dreadful, awesome power that fallen were bestowed once their wings were removed.

"M-me?" Did Rhys mean that it was Raphael's fault this happened? That his father—was in the mirror?! It sounded like that was what Rhys was saying! It was Raphael's fault because he defected and the King himself was so displeased that he came and... attacked his own son? But surely he would have simply removed Raphael! He would have used the corruption to erode Raphael into nothing more than a pile of ashes!

He's always protected me.

He said that to Luka not some five minutes ago. Maybe Rhys tried to stop him...? And this was the result? Raphael was frantic with worry and nearly on the verge of tears in his panic; he didn't know what to make of all this. "I felt his presence there," he gasped out as he finally worked up enough courage to look at Rhys' back. Blanching, he swallowed hard to force the bile back down his throat. God... god it looked awful!

"Rhys we need to stop the corruption from spreading. It's—what happened?!"

"...yeah, he's kinda hard to miss," he said, teeth still gritted against the corruption spreading on his back. It was moving upward, too, up his neck. His eye didn't feel quite right. His hearing was fading. It was like his entire right side was failing to function correctly.

Rhys couldn't really move his right arm without it hurting like hell, so he couldn't just pull off his shirt. Instead, he used his left hand to grasp onto the collar and he tore the fabric, pulling it off his body and leaning forward. He didn't know how it looked but he had an inkling it looked bad. Still, it was a relief to get the fabric off. It just felt like it was burning more with it on.

"...he said... wings," he said. "...tried to rip them out but--" He blacked out, slumping against Raphael.

"Oh oh oh OH OH OH RHYS!" Raphael lost his head completely once Rhys fainted, after tearing off half of his clothes and then saying something about wings. Wings? Wings?! Rip them out?! He only just caught Rhys in the nick of time and gently eased him back onto the bench before once again losing his mind and grabbing his phone out of his bag.

"MARGE! MARGIE HELP! HELP RHYS IS DYING!" He wasn't but that set the tone, he thought, and conveyed the seriousness of the situation. After babbling nonsensically to Marge over the phone about sunflowers and footsies and wings, she told him to shut his mouth and wait there. Then she hung up on him and he... sat on the ground beside the bus bench, watching a bus pull up and open its doors.

"We're not getting on!" He called hysterically to the bus driver, who seemed a little too quick to pull away from the curb. Moments later Marge showed up in her car, screeching to a halt beside the bench. A young man with sandy hair was with her, goggling at them through the window. Raphael leapt to his feet as Marge got out and immediately began to cuss him out for fucking up her plans.

HER plans?! Raphael was momentarily indignant but then he was too busy helping Rhys into the back seat, where the young man was. Charles. A fixer. WOW Marge worked fast! "Is he okay?" Raphael cried as he got into the car, and it pulled away again to take them back to the apartment. He was too flustered to realize how dangerous this was—the King was connected to Rhys at all times. He would know, now, where Professor Jack and Brayden lived but... but Raphael was far too concerned about Rhys to even think about that.

Charles the fixer was muttering something as he traced designs and sigils on Rhys' back. He didn't respond, but he looked grim and Raphael had to shove a fist into his own mouth to stop from asking a million more questions. Luckily the cafe was close to the apartment; not ten minutes later he was helping Charles lay Rhys face-down onto the sofa of Brayden's apartment. While Charles set about trying to dispel the corruption, Raphael held Rhys' hand. "He said... something about wings and trying to get them off," Raphael whispered.

"Oh no, he didn't..." Charles sighed. "Oh boy. This is going to take a while then."

"Where did he get wings?" Raphael felt stupid for asking it. "We're Fallen, we—I mean he—shouldn't have wings."

"Then what are these?" The fixer pointed to something sparkling between Rhys' shoulderblades—a light that not even corruption could dim.

"Wings!" Raphael breathed, eyes wide as saucers. "Rhys... grew wings!"

Even his dreams were distorted by the corruption. Rhys didn't even know he could corrupt himself; he'd never done it before. But he didn't have wings then. And now... he did? It didn't make sense. He remembered scoffing at Raphael saying that he had them. And now, Rhys had followed. Why? When? How long? What did it mean? He didn't recall this being a thing. There was no manual to being Fallen but he just assumed that once the wings of a fairy were taken, they were gone forever.

And he searched for answers but his dreams were do distorted that nothing made any sense. Walls became the floor, dizzying as he looked around, trying to find something that looked familiar.

Oddly, the first thing he found was a teacup. Frowning, he walked over to it and picked it up. It was one from Raf's collection. He turned it over in his hand. It started to corrupt in his hand, though. Quickly, he dropped it and it shattered on the wall-floor. He looked up and there was his father, standing there with those hateful, glowing eyes.

"You've done a number on yourself."

Rhys looked down at his right hand. It was blackened. Corrupted. His whole arm, actually. And when he touched his face, everything felt tender.

"But your friend the fixer is... fixing you."

"I don't have a fixer friend. I killed him."

A ghost of a smile. "You did." He paused. "If you want to have those wings removed properly, you're going to have to come home. I don't think Keith will be able to handle this one."

"Does he often? Take care of wings growing back?"

"You'd be surprised. Fairies... are such stubborn creatures."

He was about to speak again when the strange surrealism of his dream world melted away.

Pain. He still felt pain. But it wasn't as harsh as it had been when the corruption was spreading. His cheek was pressed against something soft and he was lying on his stomach--not a sleeping position that he would normally choose for himself. He cracked an eye open.

"Ugh... where the hell am I?" This wasn't his bed. It was... a living room that he didn't recognize.

"So let me get this straight. He went to the bathroom to take a shit. And then he tried to rip off his own wings to protect you from dark fucker daddy?" Marge didn't sound impressed and even Raphael had to admit that his version of events sounded... unlikely. Implausible, perhaps. But it was true! Rhys went to the bathroom and something happened in there and when Raphael found him he was trying to remove something from his back—now understood and confirmed to be actual wings.

"Something... like that," said Raphael haltingly as he cast anxious eyes on Charles, who was still drawing glowing sigils on Rhys' back. The corruption had stopped spreading but it wasn't going away, and the little pinpoint lights where wings were supposed to be were growing dimmer. Raphael clung to Rhys' hand tighter. "Is he going to recover Charles? Are his wings okay?"

"I have noooo idea," Charles grunted as he drew a particularly intricate sign and ended with a flourish. "But he's coming around. Something's blocking my magic, I can't get around the barrier."

As Rhys stirred, Raphael glued himself to the side of the couch. "Rhys? Rhys are you okay? You're here! I mean—you're with Margie and Charles and me!" He reached out and tenderly dabbed at Rhys' forehead with the edge of his sleeve. "How do you feel?"

As much as he wanted to, Rhys didn't even try lifting his head. There was something utterly wrong with him. He could feel it. Most of the right side of his body felt... numb now. The corruption had stopped but it was still there. What was he thinking... He just thought... he could.... fuck.

"Like half my body isn't mine."

That was how he felt. Half his body wasn't his. It was corrupted. But he was already corrupted as a Fallen, wasn't he? It didn't make much sense to be able to corrupt himself. He hadn't corrupted himself before. Was it just the wing that he touched? The other one, he hadn't had a chance to try and tear out. Maybe that was why only half of him was suffering. Fuck.

"I have to go back home. This guy's useless. He can't fix me."

"Hello, this guy has a name, and he's trying really hard to not let this corruption take over?" Charles muttered as he kept working, brows furrowed.

Raphael clung to Rhys' hand. "Go home? But—but you just got your wings! And Charles can fix you, I'm sure! He's a fixer! That's what they do, they fix people, right Charles?" Another grunt, sounding wholly noncommittal. Charles did spare him a brief glance and the suggestion of a smile, but whatever he was doing seemed to require concentration.

Marge hovered behind the couch, staring at the region around Rhys' chest. "You can't go back. Your core light's already changed. If you try to take off the wings, the light will go out."

Raphael gasped. Then realized he didn't have the foggiest idea what Marge meant. "What light? Where?"

"His heart. The light from his heart has connected to his wings. You take away one, you take away the other. Looks like little fairy prince here caught some feelings out here."

Yeah and that was all well and good but the guy with the name or whatever couldn't remove the wings. And that was how he meant to fix them. Rhys sighed and rolled his eyes at the way Raphael clung to his hand and insisted that Charles could fix him because he was a fixer. Not that kind of fixing, he wanted to say but the woman was staring him down and blabbering about core lights.

He had no idea what it meant, any more than Raphael did.

Ignoring the last part, Rhys scoffed. "I don't care if some light goes out. I need to get rid of these things. They're worse than the corruption."

He'd rather be dead than have to go through having feelings. He didn't want to feel sad about his mother or be worried about his father catching Raphael or any of this shit. Feelings sucked. The only thing he agreed with here was the term "catching feelings" like it was some nasty disease. That was exactly how it felt.

"Okay little fairy boy, listen. To. Me. I know that dark corruption shit didn't affect your hearing. If you take the wings off, your heart will die. Your soul will die with it, too. Understand? You're not going home. Charles, keep going. I think I can find a way around the barrier."

Raphael lowered his voice to a soft whisper. "You'd better listen to her, Rhys. She's real scary when she's mad. And... well... what's wrong with wings? It's not bad, you know, to feel things. Don't you want to feel happy again? Or—or to feel love? This is your chance! Why don't you give it a try?" He scooted closer to the couch—if that was even humanly possible.

"You can still take the wings off if you don't like the feelings. At least let Charles take the corruption away before you do anything. Please?"

"I'd rather die than have feelings," he said flatly, even though Raphael tried to warn him that she was scary. Her tone was a lot more intimidating than her face. He turned his gaze back to Raphael, who was trying to make it sound like wings were a positive thing to have. But he didn't want them. The idea that feelings were occurring bothered him greatly.

Maybe Raphael, in his infinite sunny disposition, didn't see it but feelings were bad things to have. As far as Rhys felt, they were nasty. They were the reason humans couldn't get anything done; they were constantly distracted by their feelings for other people, for themselves.

"And do I really have a choice?" he asked, annoyed because he knew that he didn't. He wanted to get up but he couldn't. He felt too numb and too shitty. He couldn't even lift his head right now. No, he was stuck here, lying on his stomach like a baby, with his face pressed against some baby blanket. He felt like a fucking baby with no way to defend himself or any autonomy.

"Typical Fallen," Charles grumbled as he made room for Marge, who was drawing things alongside him now.

"He's not typical! He's the Prince!" Raphael had to speak up—people were dumping on the love of his life here! Not that... Rhys acknowledged his feelings in any way but you know, he had to do what he thought was right, and speaking up was right! Although he quailed under Marge's glare, he didn't move away or try to hide behind a bookcase.

"This is the Prince?" Marge snorted. "He's Jack's little brother? The one you told me about?"

"Y...es..." Raphael stroked Rhys' hair back from his eyes, and then gently patted his cheek. He imagined these were comforting gestures, what with Rhys down and out—and just down in general, in a terrible mood. Or they were annoying, he didn't know. Most things he did seemed to irritate Rhys, to be fair...

"You're working with Keith." Marge's tone was dangerously low. "Oh this is going to be beautiful. Charles, change of plan. Bind him. He's not going anywhere for a veeery long time."

"Traitor..." He narrowed his eyes at Raphael. He actually, really did tell them more than he should have. And now look where it got them. Fuck it all. Why did he have to try and take matters into his own hands in that cafe bathroom? What he should have done was escaped and gone back home on his own. The problem would have been fixed and he wouldn't be delivered right into the hands of the enemy in a weakened state.

Rhys couldn't even appreciate the nice way it felt to have his hair brushed back, like his mother used to do. Which was good because he didn't think he could handle appreciating things right now. No, instead, he fiercely put all of his power into rolling himself over onto his back. It didn't quite work. The back of the couch stopped him and he ended up on his side, pressed against the couch pillows.

"Keith's not going to come for me," he said, assuming that was the Plan. This wasn't strictly true, though. Keith worked for the king and he was one of his best and brightest. Or darkest, as it happened. He would do whatever the king commanded and if he was ordered to rescue him... But maybe he wouldn't and his bluff would ring true. His father had many sons still. He didn't... necessarily need Rhys, as depressing as the thought was to his newly found emotions. And anyway, Keith's only true motivation was self serving--and that was Jack, not Rhys.

"I'm not!!" Why did Rhys keep calling him a traitor? Raphael wasn't even a Fallen anymore! He was...? A fairy? Fae? He had wings now! Not proper ones but they had grown quite a lot since he first came out here. And he abandoned that world and that lifestyle so he counted himself among the fae and humans, and even then he didn't tell them anything that he deemed important.

Of course, that was up to his own judgment and Marge, she had such a way of extracting information from people... In fact, even now she was smiling and it sent a chill down Raphael's spine. He reached out to brace Rhys as he flopped around like a fish out of water, but thankfully the couch stopped him from moving too much. Even Charles tried to stop him, only to sigh and then continue with whatever new thing he was doing. Bind Rhys? Bind him to this apartment maybe?

"Who the hell wants that fucker?" Marge snorted derisively. "He can go all the way to hell. No I've got something better up my sleeve." She pointed directly at Raphael. "You. Other little gay fairy boy. You're going to stay here with him and you're going to take care of him. I don't want to see you step foot outside of this apartment, understood? Your job is to tend to him."

"O-oh... um... I... that was already my job so..." Raphael was taken aback. That was it? All the sinister smiles and that slow tone and... she wanted him to stay with Rhys? Well Raphael was going to do that anyway! Her plan didn't sound very... smart... And yet he couldn't help but feel that there was more to it!

That was her brilliant, evil plan? Rhys scoffed again. He didn't even have to say it because Raphael said it for him. That was already his job. Nothing new was happening except that they were trying to bind him to one area. That would only work for so long. Eventually, his father would find them, if he hadn't already. And if it wasn't Keith, it would be somebody better. Or maybe a portal. That would be more helpful.

"He's not going to be much against anybody my father sends," he said, which was true. If there was a rescue operation, they would just rip through Raphael like paper. (And he was annoyed with himself for even caring that it could happen.)

Also, he had his own home. If the brilliant plan was to stick the two of them together, they didn't have to bind him here at this random place. Then he narrowed his eyes and tried to sit up.

"No," he said in his most imperious prince voice. "You're trying to make me care about him so my wings keep growing. Let me tell you why that's a stupid plan; they can still remove them." But he'd never thought about why they took them when they were young and how corrupted an adult with wings had to be in order to shed their wings. Well! He could still do it. Their plan was stupid. It wasn't going to work.

"I'm not," Raphael admitted sadly as he looked down at his own useless hands. His abilities were tied in to others'. He could absorb magic and then unleash it, but that had a high probability of killing him. He used to be a magical amplifier but if it was only himself and Rhys, whose magic could he amplify? His powers of hypnosis worked loosely on humans—on other creatures, it was merely 'suggestive.' Raphael was not a royal fae, and so his abilities were weak. What chance did he stand against the King of the Fallen if he chose to reclaim his son?

Marge, though, laughed. She laughed and she patted Rhys on the curly head. "Aww you're a smartie, aren't you? But baby you've got one thing wrong. I don't have to make you care for him."

Raphael struggled to come to terms with her plan. It was to make Rhys... care about him? As in she wanted Rhys to... fall in love with him? Was that a thing? Forcing someone to fall for another?! Raphael couldn't even imagine how he would go about doing that! He wanted it, of course. Oh, goodness. If he could make Rhys love him, he would gladly do it!

"Marge? I don't know—" He was cut off by her glare.

"We're not discussing the plan here. The plan is happening. Okay? Okay. Perfect. Anybody hungry? I made soup."

If Rhys could, he would have bitten the woman like an angry dog when she patted him on the head but then he'd just be the dog she was treating him like! He frowned but didn't argue. It was a checkmate situation, wasn't it? Even if he did try to argue, his body had betrayed him. Sprouting wings! Imagine! Him, growing wings.

But they could still get rid of them, even if they grew bigger. Adults Fell all the time. But they were also terrible; they were the kind of people whose entire lives were stained with darkness. Rhys wasn't sure he could say the same. It didn't really count when the things he had done weren't entirely on him. What claim did he have over them when his soul was essentially robbed from him?

Being bored all the time was an agony of its own kind but at the moment, he would have preferred it to this. Rhys didn't like thinking about feelings. He didn't like any of this. Turning his head away from them, he didn't even bother answering about the soup. As he recalled, Raphael asked him about it once and his response had been something like it reminded him of vomit. And it still did. He had no desire for any such thing.

"Margie? Could we maybe have a moment? Please?" Raphael moved to shield Rhys from them, now that Charles seemed to have finished casting his binding spell and Marge was moving on to delicious soup. It sounded good right about now, something warming and comforting, but he could see that Rhys was having a hard time with being... essentially helpless, and it didn't sit well with him to feel as if everyone else was piling onto him. It just... wasn't the way he knew Rhys to be.

Rhys was cocky, sure. He called himself confident but Raphael knew that he knew he was cocky—when he wasn't speaking in that affected, bored manner to indicate how full of... er... ennui he was. It was a product of his upbringing, really. If he wasn't The Best, he was nothing. That was how the King treated all of his subjects and it was how he treated Rhys, too. The only way for Rhys to gain acceptance was to act like his father in many ways but he wasn't his father. Only Drake Nightshade could be Drake Nightshade and frankly, Raphael was glad that Rhys never bought in wholesale to his father's regime of terror.

It made it easier to stay with him, honestly. In some moments Rhys was more human than Fallen and that helped to smooth over the moments when he could be haughty or insulting or superior. Not all aspects of him were pleasant, but there was enough in there to give Raphael hope. And so seeing him at a low point now, Raphael felt instinctively protective.

After a moment, Marge nodded and took Charles with her into the bedroom. Why the bedroom, he didn't know, but they closed the door and gave them some privacy. Raphael reached out to touch Rhys' shoulder with a soft touch. "I'm sorry," he said as he got to his knees, in order to look over Rhys' back. The area was still corrupted but it seemed smaller now, and the wings were thankfully still there, still glimmering. "I'll try to talk them into letting you go, but could you let them take care of the blight first?" He didn't know they would try to take Rhys hostage! Really, he didn't—if he did, he might not have called them.

The blight, he knew, had to be taken care of, regardless. If he let it go, it was just going to start spreading again. And it would leave him nothing but dust. Nobody wanted that, even Rhys. He might say he would rather be dead than have feelings but did anything with a beating heart really think that? Maybe. When Rhys said it, he believed it. But if he hadn't been bound to the area and he was able to leave on his own two legs, where would he even go next? His father said Keith could help but that was only if he was under strict orders. Otherwise, he could only imagine that bastard laughing at his plight.

Sighing, Rhys said, "Fine."

What else could he say, anyway? He was stuck here whether he wanted to be or not. There was no choice in the matter. It was either let them fix him here or risk attempting to get back home on his own. And that wasn't happening because he was hardly in a position to try breaking their stupid spell.

Wow! Rhys was being... good! And he wasn't putting up half as much of a fight as Raphael expected, given that he was such a warrior. A bored warrior, but a warrior nonetheless. Raphael didn't think Marge and Charles combined could take down Rhys on their best days—if not for this blight, he probably wouldn't be laying back and taking it like this.

Still, it was nice to see this side of him too! Raphael always knew there was more to him than that ever-bored side of him! Smiling, he pulled the fleece blanket on the couch up over Rhys' waist to keep him comfortable and warm. "Good! They're not really that bad, you know, once you get to know them. Ooh! Maybe Professor Jack will come over! And Bee!"

That was exciting, wasn't it? Brothers reuniting after a lifetime of being kept apart? Raphael leaned up against the couch, letting his chin rest on the edge of the cushion. He reached out again and stroked Rhys' hair affectionately, taking this opportunity to touch him—because once Rhys was back to being himself in full, he might never get another chance!

"Do you need anything? Are you thirsty? I can get you some water or juice." That was all Bee had here, sadly. Water or juice. He wasn't very exciting in the drinks department, apparently.

"Yay," he said unenthusiastically. Just what he wanted; to meet his elder brother while he was unable to do much of anything. He could barely even move right now. Well, no. That wasn't true. With the blight pushed back, he found he had a little more strength left in him. Maybe he should sit up. At least then he'd feel less helpless. And he hated feeling helpless. He hated. Great. Feelings.

But he didn't make a move to sit up because Raphael was stroking his hair and... well, he could use his current status as an excuse to just... let him. (He couldn't believe he was even thinking it. But there it was.)

"No." He didn't need water or juice. He needed to not be in this position. Ah, if only he didn't go to the bathroom and see that asshole in the mirror. Har har. What would have happened if he just sat there and humored Raphael? Instead of... panicking. Fuck. These damn wings were doing a number on him already.

"You should tell them not to come here," he said. "They'd basically be walking into a trap at this point."

"I'll tell them you said that but I think they really want to see you though! They were asking all kinds of stuff about you! Not-not like your powers, about you I mean. As a person!"

That was what convinced Raphael that they didn't mean to do Rhys any harm. Otherwise they would have wanted to know his weaknesses and how to get at him! And he never would have told them that, because that would really make him a traitor. But telling them about where Rhys grew up and what his family was like, and how he and Raphael and others attended lessons together, that didn't do much harm.

"Anyway it's hard to convince them... especially Margie." He threw a fearful look over his shoulder at the closed bedroom door. "I know she's just a witch but... she feels like a demon, doesn't she? Professor Jack is much nicer though! I think you'd like him, too, Rhys, if you got to know him." Rhys would probably like all of them if he gave them half a chance!

Raphael continued stroking his hair, since he wasn't protesting—or turning to bite him. Well that was promising! This was much better than playing footsies, he thought.

What could they possibly want to know about him? Rhys had never asked questions about Jack or any of his other siblings, for that matter. He knew who they were, what they looked like. He had also been able to observe them from afar, though, which Jack didn't have the luxury of doing.

He couldn't imagine what Raphael could have said about Rhys as a person, though. There wasn't much to him, just a bored prince with little to nothing that interested him. Where did Raphael even get off, liking him, anyway? There wasn't anything to like. It just didn't make sense. A bored prince wasn't interesting. Not even Rhys was interested in himself.

"Some witches come from demon bloodlines," he said dryly but it was also true. They called those types of witches warlocks. The ones who made pacts with demons or gave of themselves to demons in order to spawn demonic half blood children with evil magic. It wouldn't surprise him at all if she was one of those types of witches. She definitely had a demonic sort of presence.

"And it doesn't matter if I like him or not. My father is watching me. That means he knows I'm here."

Maybe Margie was part-demon then... Yeah, that seemed about right. Raphael got a little shiver down his spine thinking about that and goosebumps rose up all down his arms. Yikes! Demons were nothing to joke about either!

"He knows where all of us are, I'm betting," Raphael sighed. The Fallen King had eyes everywhere, didn't he? And this was sort of important to his Big Plans, whatever they happened to be... But at least if they were all going to die horribly, they could enjoy the moment! The present moment, that was. If death was inevitable, Raphael wanted to have a good time going down!

That was kind of foolish and he knew it, but who said he was smart to begin with?

Thinking along those lines, though... He leaned in and kissed Rhys again. This time Rhys saw him coming so no more heads bouncing off of tables like watermelons! And he didn't explain himself, either. He kissed Rhys because he wanted to, and then he went right back to stroking his hair like nothing ever happened.

Good point. Even if Rhys hadn't come here, Raphael had. And if not him, then eventually somebody would know where they were. And... anyway, if they could observe the brothers, then it was a no-brainer that the Fallen King himself could also observe what was happening. He probably knew where they all were at all times. Was he just toying with them all at this point? Or was he testing them? His father was ever so fond of tests, he thought bitterly.

O...
kay.

Even if he saw it coming this time, Rhys didn't have the wherewithal to stop Raphael from kissing him. It was really nothing more than a peck, just like the surprise kiss at the cafe. Just as quickly as his lips were on him, they were gone again. His traitor heart flipped a little in his chest and he hated it for betraying him. (Even if Raphael couldn't see it or feel it, Rhys could!)

He didn't know what the hell possessed him to say it but he said it: "You aren't a very good kisser."

What he should have done was not acknowledge it at all, just the way Raphael did. But no, he had to... taunt him or something. But it was true; it was like Raphael had never kissed a person before. Or only grandmas.

"And you're a jerk!" Raphael retorted hotly, stung to respond to what was really quite a rude and personal slight! He was good at kissing! He was Very Good at kissing and lots of boys said so! Lots as in... maybe two, out of the four he kissed while he was out here but the point was, he wasn't bad and Rhys was very much out of line here! After all that Raphael did to help him and-and he was being considerate by not sticking his tongue down Rhys' throat and now this!

Now this!

Now this!

Incensed, he rose up and pushed Rhys back against the couch, ensuring that he had nowhere to run—and nowhere to move his head, unless he pressed hard into the back of the couch. Raphael kissed him again, this time not an old person considerate sweet kiss. An angry kiss! A—a pretty heated, sultry, seductive type of kiss that was a lot more passionate than his previous ones. His tongue probed past Rhys' lips, seeking out the hard edges of his teeth and slipping past that, exploring the contours and warmth of his mouth.

For someone who said a lot of downright mean things, Rhys tasted sweet. But there was something a little needy in the kiss too, as a soft moan rumbled in the back of Raphael's throat. He pressed in closer until he was half on the couch and one of his hands slid into Rhys' hair to grasp at the curling, dark mass, Call him a bad kisser now!

Yeah! He was a jerk! And he knew it. He didn't feel sorry for saying what he said, though. Because he knew kisses--good kisses. He had plenty of lovers back home; there was no shortage of consorts to spend his evenings with and they were trained in the art of pleasure. They knew how to kiss. And by proxy, so did Rhys. Bored as he was, at least he'd learned a thing or two from those evenings. Even if they were mostly passionless and more an exercise in clearing his mind so it wasn't clouded by his body's desires.

Rhys wasn't actually sure what he expected out of Raphael after taunting him. It was... oddly, it was a part of his mother's bloodline peeking through. The mischief maker, the game player, the toying with somebody merely for the joy of their reaction. He didn't realize that, of course. But that was exactly what it was.

Hm. Now he was trapped in place but... His taunting was not for nothing. It seemed to spark something in Raphael. Something competitive, maybe. Or a will to prove himself. No longer a grandmotherly kiss, this time he delivered something decidedly more passionate. There was no way to ignore it now. Or try to play it off as if he didn't acknowledge it. He'd dug himself into a whole, Rhys did. But somehow... it was hard to care too much.

Embarrassing as it was, the desire in that kiss combined with the way Raphael grasped at his hair sent a wave of pleasure running down his spine; something he couldn't ever remember feeling ever with any consort. It surprised him so much that he actually let out a soft sound in the back of his throat. An embarrassing sort of sound that he wished he could bury immediately after eliciting it.

Push him off, idiot. But he didn't. Instead, he grasped onto the front of Raf's shirt and pulled him back in with a slightly shaking hand to bring him in for another kiss. It was a bad idea from second one but he was running on fumes and new emotions; it was impossible to stop it now.

The first time Raphael felt anything close to pleasure while kissing someone was out here, with a classmate who had been slowly getting closer to him. He was shy, and Raphael was a bit dense, so it took maybe two or three weeks before the other boy finally worked up the courage to say anything to him. Raphael went along with it; he was still kind of new to this world and he thought maybe having a 'lover' would aid in establishing his cover.

But when they kissed, it started out slow and soft and sweet and then it progressed to the kind of passion that was in the kiss he shared with Rhys. And he loved it. He had never felt anything like it, the way pleasure built up and up and up, the way his groin tensed. The more people he kissed, the more he realized how much he enjoyed it, and also—the more he realized the power of a kiss. It could bring a man to his knees.

Or it could make even a man with a heart of stone react.

He couldn't deny that he absolutely loved the sound Rhys made. It was so... primal. So reactive. No thinking, no stupid ennui, no taunting, just a sound of pure enjoyment and Raphael brought that out of him! He was even smiling as Rhys dragged him in again, and he eagerly pressed into a second, third, fourth kiss. Raphael slipped onto the couch fully; their legs criss-crossed, bodies sliding against one another intimately just as their lips slid together equally intimately. They fit. Their lips, their bodies, there was something innately right about it all.

Raphael might not have had impish fairy blood in him but he was curious enough, playful enough on his own. His free hand—the one not tangled in Rhys' nest of curls—slipped extra low, to that hot, throbbing, sensitive area between the legs. He didn't go beneath Rhys' trousers but he rubbed and squeezed and petted. This was all in good fun. All for fun. His heart pulsed and he was filled with such a strange and indescribable joy, that he couldn't help laughing softly into Rhys' ear after he broke off for a breath. Raphael nibbled on the lobe of that ear too—playfully—even as his hand danced to a different tune between them.

And he was. A good. Kisser. Damnit!

Emotions made certain things feel very... very different. A body was a body and it had requirements. Sex, then, had become another such chore in his life; like bathing and eating. Having sex was just something to fulfill a bodily need. Nothing more. There wasn't even any real pleasure in it for him. And he had been far too young to know the difference when his wings were taken away.

This was... unlike anything he had ever felt. The feelings, sensations, emotions. They were all over the place, confusing. His head spun and he didn't know what to think or how to feel. All he knew was that he was clutching onto the front of Raphael's shirt, practically begging for more. It should have been dead embarrassing but it felt too good to be shameful.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew it was a bad idea to not push Raphael off, to tell him to stop. Instead, his eyes closed and his breath hitched in the back of his throat. The electric shock that shot through his body as their groins met... was much stronger than anything he'd felt in his relatively short life. He didn't know how to deal with the sensations in his groin. His legs pressed together around Raphael's hand and then realizing what he was doing, he forced his legs apart. That only made him feel more... wanton.

He slid a hand over Raphael's far too teasing hand in a bid to stop him from doing whatever heavenly thing he was doing to his lower body.

"...stop."

But Rhys liked it! His body definitely liked it, judging by the state of his arousal. Raphael's hand did pause when bidden but he didn't lift it away. He sort of just left it there, curled around Rhys, ready to restart its ministrations at any given moment. Raphael was sorta ready to go, too! Stopping now felt like a little bit of sweet torture when they could be doing so much more. (Oh, the things they could be doing...)

"Why?" He nuzzled Rhys with the tip of his nose at that soft, tender area right under the ear. "Don't you like it?"

Eagerly he squeezed Rhys again, rather meaningfully. Raphael knew he was no consort, and his skills probably paled in comparison to theirs as he hadn't spent half his life learning how to pleasure another person, but he was doing his best! And... and he was having a lot of fun, honestly. This was what sex was meant to be—not a bodily function or a chore, the way some Fallen treated it.

It was supposed to be fun! Light-hearted, a romp between the sheets for two like-minded consenting people. Rhys telling him to stop sorta took the consenting part out of the equation, but... his body was all for it, Raphael could feel it!

"Just lay back and enjoy it," he whispered as he squeezed Rhys again. "Let me make you feel good."

A soft noise of protest escaped him. Didn't he like it, he asked.

"No."

He said it but they both knew he was lying. It was a point of pride to hang onto, some shred of dignity that he refused to let go. Still, his toes curled as he was squeezed, like his entire body wanted to betray him. Was it not bad enough that it decided to grow wings and his own damn hand corrupted himself with the blight? Now he had to deal with this?

Why did he taunt him? If he just let the granny kiss go by, this wouldn't be happening. His hair would still be nicely played with and he could pretend it didn't feel as good as it did. They could just sit there, not acknowledging the kiss at all. Rhys could even just... close his eyes and pretend to sleep after a while. Instead, he had to be a snot and taunt Raphael--whom he did not expect to retaliate.

"Ng." His toes curled again. Why did Raphael keep squeezing him like that? Rhys was a prince; he was accustomed to servants making him feel good. As good as they could manage, anyway. But there were people in the next room. People he'd rather not see him in an even more vulnerable state. He glanced in that direction.

"We're not alone," he said tightly.

What a prude!

Was something Raphael never thought he would say about Rhys, mostly because he liked his head on his shoulders and not in a basket. But it was true! All of a sudden he cared about people being around! (Lesser beings, they would have said back home, with their noses in the air.) Sighing, Raphael removed his hand and slid off the couch. He sort of slithered off and fell onto the floor to lay in a disappointed heap.

"That means when we're alone, we're doing it, right?!" He glanced up at Rhys with an injured expression. Somewhere below the belt, his body was expressing extreme discomfort. And Margie and Charles were still inside! They hadn't taken a single peek out into the living room, so Raphael totally thought they could have gotten away with it.

Booo!

While his body definitely said green to go, his brain said no. Being in a vulnerable state around those people was bad enough. Being caught at it... He frowned. Plus, he would just be proving that bitch woman that she was right. Rhys was nothing if not stubborn about some things.

Still, it seemed like Raphael still had some modicum of his servitude left in him, because he slid off Rhys, allowing him to breathe again. Automatically, his response to that question was a scoff but he didn't immediately answer. There was nothing to lose... right, if nobody else was around...

Wait. Why was he even entertaining these thoughts? Struggling, he forced himself to sit up and though he crossed his legs, he notably placed a throw pillow over his lap. All of his body felt... tired and less than full capacity. It was like when he got sick as a child and his mother had to nurse him back to health. But for days, he was weak and helpless. No wonder it reminded him of being a child. Being sick felt... infantile.

"Maybe," he said, noncommittally. "If you don't tell anybody about it."

Rather than sitting or standing with his Problem on full display, Raphael laid on the ground face-down, at the foot of the couch. Bray had a nice carpet so it wasn't horrible. He let his head rest on top of his forearms and made a frustrated sound half-way between a grunt and a little scream. He was sort of hoping that if he laid on it, it would go away. Maybe it would flatten itself out and not be so noticeable?

Horrible rotten Rhys McCabe! First he taunted Raphael with his jerk comment and then he pulled Raphael onto the couch and now he was all shy! But realistically, doing it on a couch while Rhys was ill from the effects of the corruption and with two people in the other room was a terrible idea. Or an amazing idea. Raphael wasn't sure which—he was just beginning to discover this new world and he was coming into his own body and sexuality. What he liked, what he disliked, he didn't know in full yet.

"Who would I tell?" His voice was muffled as he still laid there, prone, with his face in his arms. "We're not allowed to leave here anyway!" Besides, nobody wanted the details, probably. Nope, it was just them! Marge and Charles had to leave eventually, he'd bet. And then Rhys was going to get it!

"Who wouldn't you tell?" he asked, because it felt like lately, Raphael was sharing everything with everyone. He was lucky Raphael hated Keith so much or they would have been fucked twenty times over by now. Also, sitting as he did wasn't actually helping much. But what was he supposed to do? He supposed he could just sit there and think about Keith's hateful smirk. That was a real... what did the humans call it? A boner killer...?

What a disgusting term. Boner. He moved his pillow slightly to get a better look at what was going on down there. So far, not much was changing. Normally, it didn't even last this long. His consorts knew to do their fucking job and then get out. It really was nothing more than a chore to him. Then as he came into his feelings, it started to become an annoyance. And now... now it was something else.

Putting the pillow back, he sighed. Then he looked down at his hand, where the corruption had started. It was no longer all blackened and veiny, thank... Charles, he supposed.

"We're playing right into their hands," he said softly, not wanting to be heard if they were being eavesdropped on. "You realize that, right?"

"I'm not a traitor!"

How many times did he have to say it before Rhys believed him? Raphael was a chatterbox but even he knew that some things needed to stay inside his head—things like having sex with someone he cared deeply about! Those memories were meant to be sacred, anyway. Raphael didn't go up to people and start telling them his life story, and even if he might have one time, he was drunk!

"They're not bad people! We attacked them first! Or—Keith did!" Raphael looked up, twisting the upper half of his body so that he could get a glimpse of Rhys sitting up on the couch. Story of his life—he was always one tier lower. Rhys was the prince and he was a mere peasant. Rhys was given the best, trained to become an assassin; Raphael was kind of... fodder, actually. If worst came to worst, he was expected to lay down his life so that the other, more valuable people, could escape.

"You should try to see things from their perspective. Professor Jack just wanted to live a nice life with Bee!"

"Keith was doing his job," he said tiredly. Nobody liked Keith but he was at least doing his job... Well, not to Rhys' taste. All this toying and playing with Jack was just prolonging what needed to happen. Bring back the boys. Bring them back so they could become Fallen.

But there seemed to be issues going on with some of them. Jack was currently impenetrable, but Keith said he could break in no matter what his new boyfriend did to protect him. And Niall, he had apparently fucked somebody up, from what Satine said. Rhys heard about it, of course, but the point was, people were protecting them.

"He was never supposed to meet him," he said, still tiredly. "Personally, I think he's a lost cause now and we should just let him go, but it's not up to me, is it?"

"Keith is a humongous asshat!" Doing his job didn't mean he had to torment Professor Jack for all those years! He could have done it far earlier, if he wanted to make his target fall. Raphael had seen him do it within a matter of days, so all of this was nothing more than a disgusting form of foreplay for him, Raphael was sure.

Scrambling to sit up finally, Raphael laid a pleading hand on Rhys' leg. On the knee—a safe place. "Can't you ask your father to let him go? There are others, aren't there? Professor Jack, he already fell in love with Bee, and it'll be almost impossible now to get him to fall, isn't that right? So if you tell the King that, he would believe you! You're the closest to him..."

And if the King called off the hunt, not even Keith could disobey him. And besides, Keith had Ripper! Raphael didn't see why he couldn't learn to love Ripper—or whatever passed for love in Keith's mind. Not the same thing that most normal people thought of, definitely, when they thought of love. Poor Ripper, too. Raphael liked him. They were the two misfits in the bunch and they got along, he thought, which made leaving him even more sad but... Raphael saw a chance and he had to take it!

"I doubt he'll listen to me. He didn't listen to me when he was proud of me... Why would he listen to me now that I'm some kind of..."

Rhys didn't know what word to use for what he had become. Something mutated. Some half feeling thing that started caring for people. Or at least one person. He lowered his gaze, turned it away. Why did it happen? Was he not careful enough? Did he become so bored, so complacent, that he forgot himself? It made sense; maybe his boredom with life had become so all encompassing that he couldn't help but reach for something... less so.

"I don't know what he was thinking, letting them grow here, in this world. They all seem to... have somebody important in their lives." He let out a soft scoffing sound. "Jack and Niall... They were so close to Falling... and for some reason, he let them meet their soulmates."

He didn't understand that. What could the possible motivation for that be? If it was a test, it was a bad one; as soon as they found their soulmate, they were bound and protected by love. And as cheesy as it sounded to Rhys, it was the strongest kind of magic there was.

"They could be Fallen now, if he didn't wait so long. If he got to them before Jack met the prince and before Niall reunited with that hunter."

"You're perfect just the way you are," exclaimed Raphael mutinously, as though daring anyone to disagree with him. He thought there was nothing wrong with Rhys at all! Everything that he was made him uniquely himself; take away one small portion and he became someone else. Even if he was starting to grow wings, that only made him more interesting and unique in Raphael's eyes!

But he knew realistically that the King would be pissed. Beyond pissed. And whose fault was it that his one loyal, obedient son had sprouted wings? Raphael... who still couldn't believe it. He made Rhys grow wings? There didn't seem to be any other explanation because everyone knew that the only way to undo falling was to experience love, and so... the logical conclusion...

Raphael laid his head against Rhys' knee, looking contemplatively up at him. "A whole fae prince... Professor Jack is lucky. There's something about princes, you know?" Well, obviously there was. Although both Professor Jack and Brayden were princes, and so was Rhys. That hunter man Niall had fallen for, Raphael didn't know about him except from what Satine said when she visited. Maybe he was princely, too.

"What if... even your father couldn't stop it? What if there are other forces at work, putting everyone together?" Raphael knew this was dangerous speculation but he imagined that the King didn't wait this long for fun, just to lose his sons to love. Surely someone else had their hand in this...

Of course Raf would say something like that--that he was perfect the way he was. Personally, Rhys was having some serious issues with "who he was" but no amount of sharing that was going to help Raphael see it. He was blinded by... feelings for him. And what did that make Rhys, then? Just as blind? A fool? People never had nice things to say about falling in love.

It was pure reflex but... Rhys laid his hand on top of Raphael's head. And once it was there, it was either snatch it away like it was on fire or just... leave it there and pretend it was totally normal, totally what he meant to do. He would rather have his pride than look like a skittish child... he'd done enough of that for a lifetime already.

"Like who?" Rhys asked, not even able to fathom what force could be at work, putting all these people together and making them fall in love. He let out a soft snort of semi-amusement. "Cupid is real? Angels are... I suppose it's not that far fetched...."

Hmm... that was nice. That hand on his head, just resting there, a comfortable weight. Raphael's mother never did that for him, not one single time that he could remember. When he was ill, she told him to suck it up. The King didn't tolerate weaklings and neither would the Prince. He had to act like nothing was wrong because people like them, the lower class, didn't have the luxury of being ill—not when they were supposed to devote their entire lives to the royal family. There was no time to snivel, no time to stop and be comforted. He had to soldier on, and that was that.

Emotion welled up at the simple gesture of affection—because that was what it was—and he let it. It was strange, but freeing. He could feel and he revelled in his feelings, no matter if they were happy or sad or otherwise. Some people called that being a drama queen but Raphael knew he wasn't that at all. He just... was experiencing the world all over again!

"Maybe there's a goddess of love. Aphrodite." He grinned at Rhys, reaching up to touch the back of his hand. "Or maybe there is a cupid, who knows? He got you pretty good though! Pew! Dead in the heart!" Cupid got Raphael too, long before he got Rhys, and that was another bullseye! The guy had perfect aim!

Annnnd then Raphael had to go and make it weird by touching his hand where it rested on top of Raphael's head. Slowly, Rhys withdrew it. Well, his mistake. He kept forgetting that Raphael was the type to take the whole mile when given just an inch.

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that," he said. "But what about the other two? You think whatever it is got to them, too?"

The younger pair weren't as important because Jack and Niall were the ones that were supposed to be ripe enough for the picking. They were both very close to it, actually, and not that long ago. But they had been too slow, too late. Before they got to them, they were swept up in love. Rhys didn't even want to think about himself. But there were two more. Maybe they weren't too late for them yet.

What? Was it the comment about cupid hitting Rhys in the heart? He was hinting at deeper feelings, yes. The wings were a dead giveaway! It was the white elephant in the room now, to be honest. Raphael wanted to talk about it but he could tell that Rhys didn't, and no amount of cajoling, threatening, bribery or otherwise would induce him to talk about something he didn't want to discuss, which was a real shame.

It sort of left Raphael hanging, if he had to be honest. He couldn't move on, knowing that there could be something between them and wanting it so badly. Yet waiting for Rhys was excruciating, because he also didn't know if Rhys would ever broach the subject and—well, maybe other opportunities were already passing him by.

Still, this wasn't so bad. Raphael frowned at Rhys' other knee when he felt the hand move away and he pulled it back. No. That hand went there. It should stay there, regardless of whatever careless comment he made!

"Are you sure there are only two more?" If the King could have five children, he could have fifty! Who knew how many brothers Rhys actually had?! Raphael thought about the remaining two, though, with a little dissatisfied noise. "Why do you want them to become fallen? Don't you think they'd be happier out here, living a normal life?" Rhys kept talking like he was going right back to doing his father's bidding and that bothered Raphael. And these were his own brothers that he was committing to a fate that Raphael saw as being worse than death. To be stripped of all feeling, to be cast into darkness and despair for the rest of their lives...

How was that ever preferable to being loved and loving someone with a pure heart?!

"No..." He wasn't sure of anything when it came to his father. Was this right now a test? He didn't know. Was he supposed to try and rip those wings straight from his own back? He could still hear his father's encouraging tone when he saw what he was doing. That was what he approved of and some part of Rhys had wanted it; his approval. But it didn't matter before. Why did it matter now?

Because. Feelings.

He sighed as his hand was pulled back to its apparently designated spot atop Raphael's head. Why did it matter to Raphael if his hand stayed, anyway? (Why was it important to play pretend earlier when Raphael's hand was in his hair? ...same answer.)

"So... what? You're suggesting I turn coat, too?"

"Nope." Because if he suggested it, Rhys would either do the complete opposite or if he listened and something went wrong, Raphael was afraid that he would be blamed for it—forever. And that was going to be a wedge between them that he didn't think even the power of love and positive thinking could remove. He didn't want that on his head. It might just ruin whatever tentative friendship they had at the moment.

But he cast the seed of doubt, he hoped. Maybe his questions would make Rhys really think about what he was doing, instead of blindly following orders. Raphael did just that for his entire life and he never once felt... right about doing what he did. He did it because someone else told him to and because he wanted to fit in, but not because his whole heart was in it. He didn't believe in what he did. Maybe Rhys didn't subscribe to all of it wholesale, either—he could only hope.

"You have to do what's right for you." He closed his eyes. "I think deep down you know what's right and what's not, though."

Right. Rhys rolled his eyes. Nope, he said, after clearly trying to steer Rhys in the direction he hoped that Rhys would take. But he claimed it was for Rhys, whatever was right by him. That sounded like a cop out to him; like if Rhys didn't do what felt right to Raphael, it wouldn't count as right.

Anyway, it didn't much matter because Rhys didn't know what was right, so how dare he suggest to him that he knew. Rhys had been raised without a moral compass. More than half his life was spent without feelings, other than that ever present feeling of boredom.

So which was worse? Being so bored he didn't care if he died? Or being so filled with emotions he couldn't handle that he hoped that he died? Which was right, there? Was he really just supposed to do the right thing by whomever thought it was right? Like Raf? Or was he supposed to figure out what was best for him? And even so, what was that? Because Rhys thought going home, getting these wings off, and doing his job was the right thing to do.

Raphael was clearly not on board with that, chastising him about his brothers and their stupid lives...

"There is nothing right for me," he intoned. "There's just what you want and what my father wants and what my mother wants and what my brothers want and what my sister wants. And whatever choice I make, I'm fucking somebody over."

So Rhys didn't know what he wanted then. The right thing was not to screw people over, even brothers he never knew, but he seemed reluctant to admit that. Well, it was likely because everything Rhys knew was tied to the wrong side—the bad side! The side that killed people and tortured them for information and left their mangled, corrupted bodies out in the woods to crumble to dust. The bad side that wanted to erase an entire civilization of fae from the face of the earth, simply because one man decided that he didn't want them around.

Defecting was scary. Leaving everyone he knew and everything that was familiar behind, it was terrifying! Raphael didn't blame Rhys for hesitating, and for wanting to stick with what he knew. That was... easy. The path of least resistance was to offer no resistance. He didn't judge Rhys, though, because obviously he had been part of the Fallen world in a much more involved way that Raphael. He was the prince of the Fallen—people looked to him as an example of the future of the kingdom.

Who was Raphael but a mere pauper, serving at his feet? How could Raphael comprehend the immense pressure that had been heaped onto Rhys' shoulders since birth?

He tried, though. It wasn't in him to simply give up—not on Rhys, especially. Sighing, he wrapped his arms around Rhys' legs as though that might comfort him. "And you think what I want is for you to jump over to the other side? But I want you to be happy. Even if you went back to your father, I'd still feel the same way about you, you know. That wouldn't change. It's just that maybe... sometimes we should think about what we're doing instead of blindly following orders, that's all. Right and wrong, it's all subjective anyway. But it doesn't hurt to think..."

It was definitely easier before, when there were no feelings to consider. And Rhys was intelligent but he didn't have to think much about what he was doing. There was never any point where he had to agonize over his choices when he was a Fallen because he rarely had to make them. And even when he did, the choice was always... whatever amused him most. And that usually meant toying with a victim for a while before killing them.

Which now translated to guilt, which he very much did not want.

Death was looking preferable from all angles at this point. Death looked good from either end. Dead instead of bored. Dead instead of living in emotional agony.

"Happy?" His laugh was scornful. He almost spit out that he was never happy, that he never knew what that felt like but he stopped because... it wasn't true. He was happy, once. When he was coddled by his mother, when he was playing with his sister. Elaborate, creative stories that only somebody with spirit could come up with. He'd come home dirty as hell, without telling his mother or his shadow--Raphael--where he'd been. But he was happy. At least, until his father intervened. And when he intervened, people died. People were tortured.

And he could have sworn, that he'd gone out with Raf a few times, when they were young, when Satine was being punished or had work to do, studies to complete, or was otherwise not available to play. But it all stopped. One day. When Raphael was beaten in front of him and taken away. And when he finally came back, he was different. Rhys felt cold inside.

"What did my father do to you?"

What were they if not the sum of their choices? Good and bad, right and wrong, everything added up on different ends of the scale. The bad choices weighed them down; the good choices lifted them up. Where they ended up, no one knew. The totality of their decisions didn't matter until the end, when they laid on their deathbeds and reflected back on their lives. Then, it was the moment of truth. Would there be regret? Or peace?

Raphael wanted peace. So much of his young life had been lived in regret, in torment and darkness. His light strove to shine through but in that oppressive environment it was repressed and beaten back—sometimes literally. Literally beaten back. They tried to slice off his wings again and again, torturing him down in those cold, dark cells underneath the castle where such things were kept away from prying eyes. Where screams couldn't be heard.

Somehow they couldn't do it. And they were forced to leave him as he was, because he learned that if he didn't resist and if he obeyed their word, they were willing to turn a blind eye. If he killed someone because they said so, they stopped trying to corrupt his wings and he could avoid being hurt needlessly and senselessly. And those decisions, they weighed down the scales heavily—and Raphael had to live with that on his newfound conscience for the rest of his life. But still he hoped that when it came time to close his eyes for that eternal sleep, that he would be allowed to go peacefully.

He could at least live what life he had happily. But Rhys didn't believe that and Raphael couldn't force him to, either. He sighed at the tone of Rhys' voice, feeling despondent. Would Rhys ever learn to accept his new feelings? To embrace them as being a long-repressed part of himself? Raphael had—and he was happier for it. There was nothing wrong with having feelings—not having them, that made them wrong.

"Huh? Your father?" He looked up, startled, confused. "What? Nothing. I'm still here!"

"I can see that," he said dryly. "I have eyes."

Obviously Raphael was still here. But what an odd way to phrase his response. All Rhys was asked was what did my father do to you? And that was his response? I'm still here? He was, that much was true. But what happened when he took Raphael away? And why did he take him away? What did they do that day that warranted such a long punishment period?

They left the way Rhys always left when he wanted to go out and be left alone--without a parade of guards. Out through the labyrinth garden. Turn left three times and it was there--a gate out into the fields beyond. He went with Satine all the time. She was the one who showed him the gate. He went with Raf a few times before, too.

It was different that time, though. Why...?

"You don't remember?" he asked, and his hand moved from the top of Raphael's head to the side, the tips of his fingers brushing an ear, the side of his neck. His hand rested on Raphael's shoulder as his brow furrowed. "We went through the secret gate... and when we came back, father took you away. I didn't see you again for months."

"They're very nice eyes," Raphael said in what could only be described as a completely sappy manner. Hazel eyes, so pretty. They changed colors depending on Rhys' mood, he could have sworn. Light green when he was pleased; darker, almost brown, flecked and speckled with golden motes of magic when he was displeased, or when he used his abilities—often when he was displeased. Or bored. Looking for entertainment.

Mmm but what was Rhys doing with his hand? It felt like he was stroking an invisible line from the top of his head to his shoulder. It was nice. Raphael's eyes half-closed like a contented cat; he would have purred if he knew how. But Rhys' words made his good mood disappear. Suddenly he didn't feel very good at all. He felt sick—sick to his stomach.

The door creaked open with a loud and ominous noise. The guard behind him shoved him hard in the back, causing him to stumble inside. His clumsy, dirty, bare foot stepped on something fleshy and-and he tripped over the object. Landing with a low grunt, he was startled to find that it was not the floor he felt under him but... but... a body.

A torch was lit behind him.

Looking down at the thing he fell onto, he let out a shrill, frightened scream.

The blue-black, swollen face of a dead boy greeted him. He scrambled back as far as he could and as quickly as he could, still screaming, screaming in terror as his eyes refused to leave the body of the young boy with brown-black hair and open, staring eyes. Someone cuffed him hard on the side of the head and told him harshly to shut up. When he didn't, they gagged him and even then he screamed, the sound muffled into the dirty, filthy rag they tied around his mouth.

The boy was dressed in the tattered clothes of a noble. His wings were bent at odd angles behind his back but he was broken all over. Tortured. Beaten, burnt, cut up, torn apart. He couldn't have been much older than Tarwyn himself, although he was obviously brought up in luxury, and not in the slums.

"Strip him and prepare his soul." A high, cruel voice behind him finally made him stop. It was the voice that everyone knew—and feared. The voice of the Fallen King, Drake Nightshade. "Maybe this one will be more obedient than Raphael."

Raphael shrugged off Rhys' hand and stood up. Goosebumps ran all down his arms and he shivered a little inside, feeling chilled. "You—oh you haven't even seen the gift I made you Rhys!" Hurrying over to his fallen messenger bag, he dug down into it and pulled out a small plaque. He held it up with a bit of a forced smile. "I was going to give you wings! But you already had them! Isn't that funny?"

The plaque had a mosaic of blue stones in the shape of a butterfly, a little sentimental gift that had taken him years to make.

Well. Rhys didn't know quite how to take that, now that feelings were involved. He had nice eyes? Compliments were just par for the course normally; he expected them, they bored him. And now... there was this. Compliments from... somebody that he might maybe sort of... like a little bit. Maybe. Rhys cleared his throat.

"Thanks," he said, a little gruffly. He was out of practice; thanking people was not something Rhys ever really had to do. At least, not when his soul had completely instilled itself into a void of nothingness. Now... He was about to say more but when he touched Raphael's shoulder, something seemed to come over him. Rhys blinked and watched his expression change.

But then, he was back to himself. Like whatever he thought about was being swept under the rug. Rhys knew a little something about that. It must have had something to do with Rhys' question. About what the Fallen King had done to him. Rhys felt... strangely pained. Was that what it meant, when it felt like somebody was physically squeezing his heart and taking the breath from his lungs?

Whatever he remembered, Raf was apparently in no place to share it. Instead, he scurried off to get something out of his bag. Presumably, it was The Thing he was going to give Rhys before he vanished and they never saw one another again.

Wings.

Rhys swallowed. He lowered his gaze. Wings. He suppressed the urge to touch the wings that had apparently grown on his back. Oh... he was still without a shirt. When had he...? Oh right, the burning sensation from the blight. He'd torn off his own shirt to rid himself of the feeling. Lightly, he reached up to touch his shoulder, but didn't go all the way back to the actual wing. He was... admittedly... half afraid to touch it now.

"I bet with some magic," Rhys said, trying to fill the ensuing silence with words, "you could have made them real..."

But they would have been the equivalent of magically gluing wings to his back. They wouldn't have any of his magic in them, they would have been mostly like a glamor, visible but not really usable. Still... Sensing something was wrong, Rhys forewent the sarcasm and just said, "It's a cute... gift, Raf."

Rhys could never know. What happened down there in the dungeon, he could never find out because it wasn't just a matter of hurting him—hurting Rhys with the truth. There were other lives on the line too, people who were never a part of all this but who were being used as leverage to ensure Raphael's silence. For now, he only had to know that something 'bad' happened but that Raphael was still here.

I'm still here!

Strangely, Rhys didn't push or poke or outright command Raphael to tell him what happened. He was distracted by the plaque and by the blue wings that Raphael made for him. Was that a product of his new wings, and his newfound... humanity? Whatever the reasoning, Raphael was glad and relieved, and bounced back to the couch to sit beside Rhys. "I think your real wings look much prettier than this!"

There was something odd going on with Rhys, in the way he kept lowering his gaze and touching his shoulder. What happened to normally haughty Rhys who always kept his head high? The feelings? The wings? He was becoming a whole different person now! ...downright nice, actually... which was surprising and unexpected and a little weird? Thanking people? Thanking Raphael?! Just a little weird.

"See, each one is from a different place we've been together! This one is from home, from that big lake we used to go fishing in. And this one, it's from the first time we came to the human realm. Remember how Keith yelled at me for digging around while we were spying on Professor Jack? I was pulling this out of the ground! And this." His fingertip slid over a long, shiny piece. "This is from right here. It's the last one that fit the frame. I found it just outside Birdy Bee Cafe, someone dropped it I think."

Raphael gently placed the gift onto Rhys' lap. "I'm glad you like it, Rhys. And thank you for... calling it cute. You're pretty cute yourself!"

"...I can't see them." They were too small. All he'd done was feel them, grasp them, and pull with all of his might. Stupid move, he saw. Of course, hindsight was always 20/20 and in this case, he felt like he had done the least intelligent thing possible. He'd panicked. That wasn't like him. And then he did something out of character. And it felt like he was continuing down that path, what with the gift. And... gratitude.

Annoyance took over as he tried to push away the gentle moment. Hard to do, though, when Raphael pointed out that each stone in the wings were from different places they'd visited together. After he said that, Rhys could actually remember seeing some of them. He just assumed that when Raphael started collecting them that he planned to make a collection display, like he did with his various cups.

It was set in his lap and Rhys just sort of stared at it, feeling almost numb from an overwhelming amount of conflicting emotions. He was, on the surface, annoyed. Because he was touched and he didn't want to be touched. It was just a silly collage of gems arranged as wings. So why did it get under his skin like that? He only let out a snort. Being called cute, now that was new. Rhys was anything but cute.

And he was still half thinking about whatever happened with Raphael with his father. It seemed to be either a big deal that Raf wanted to hide from him or he genuinely had no memory of it. Both were equally plausible. But he thought he saw something in Raf's gaze for a moment that belied his lack of memory.

"...is that why you don't want to go back?" Rhys asked. "My father?"

"You can look in the mirror later!" They were very pretty, even if they were nothing more than the beginnings of wings. It wasn't the shape or the color, really, but the purity. Their newness made them pretty, the way they glistened. Raphael was tempted to touch them, but of course that was quite a big no-no. It was taboo to touch a fae's wings without invitation or permission! (Even a Fallen, at that!)

As usual, Rhys was inscrutable. He appeared annoyed judging by the furrow between his brows, and he didn't touch the gift. It sat on his leg. Raphael couldn't tell what he was thinking, what he really was going to do with the plaque. Put it up? On a wall somewhere? Or throw it away? Raphael didn't want him to toss it into the garbage but maybe that was its eventual home, if Rhys went back... Having contraband like this on him--something associated with a traitor--would land him in quite a lot of hot water, too!

"Oh." Raphael sat there in silence for a long moment. Then he shrugged gently. "Yes... but it's also... everyone. All the Fallen there. There's no happiness, no color. We can't laugh, we can't sing, there aren't any teacups. It's just... dark there."

He stood up and walked over to Brayden's bookshelf, which was stocked with all sorts of things. Books, yes, but also knick-knacks and figurines. "I like it here. There's all kinds of different people, and they like me and they're nice!"

Yeah, right. Part of him was curious but not curious enough. Mostly, he just wanted them... gone. He kept telling himself that, especially the more he started to feel. The numbness was fine, though. And understandable when so much wanted to express itself after years of not being able to do so. Who knew it would backfire so hard? To take his soul and his personality and throw it away... only to find it was still there, under layers of dark magic...?

Lightly, he touched the blue glass, half afraid that the corruption was going to spread across everything Raphael had created. But it didn't. And he felt silly for thinking it would. After all, he touched Raphael earlier and the side of his head hadn't melted off. His shoulder hadn't corrupted. He was fine, and so, too, were the blue gems and stones of the mosaic wings.

Rhys listened in silence. All those things still felt like home to a big part of him. The darkness and the lack of color. He had grown used to it. Sometimes, he thought this world was too annoying, too loud. Now... He didn't know. As Raf stood and crossed the room, Rhys finally looked up. He watched as Raphael brushed his hands over books and other odds and ends.

"You've said all that before," he said with a sigh. And here he thought there was some legitimately dark reason for Raphael's reluctance to go back. He just didn't want to go back to being with a bunch of boring, dark, serious types. (Which really begged the question: what the hell did he ever see in Rhys?)

"Well... yes!" He picked up a little fairy figurine and smiled at it. It was colorfully painted, a tiny wispy pretty girl sitting on top of a mossy rock. Its wings were like butterfly wings, a multitude of colors to show off how happy it was, how joyous. Fairies were supposed to be happy. They—the Fallen—were aberrations, Raphael was almost certain.

Why would their wings come back? Why did they have to remove them to become Fallen? To Raphael, it didn't feel natural. It wasn't organic. The way he was now, that felt right, more so than being gloomy and forced to endure harrowing 'jobs' out here in the human realm. Going to classes and watching movies at the theater and even dancing at the club, those things seemed so much more fascinating than hunting and killing and spying!

He returned to the couch with the figurine, sitting beside Rhys again. Raphael dared to sit closer to him this time, such that their shoulders brushed. After a brief moment's thought he laid his head against Rhys' shoulder but he didn't look over. He kept looking at the beautiful fairy. "You were the only reason I ever stayed. I thought you might be lonely if I left."

Not lonely in the physical sense, but perhaps... emotionally. Perhaps in the sense that there would be one less person who truly liked him and whose intentions were only pure. Someone who kept an eye out for him without expecting a reward at the end of the day.

"But I didn't feel anything."

Why should he worry about some prince with no emotions? If Raphael wanted to disappear so badly, he could have. Rhys didn't think he had much of anything by the way of feelings for him back then. Maybe in some small way, before all that made Rhys Rhys vanished. But after that? There was no point in sticking around. It was only a matter of time before Rhys became his father. Or like... Keith. Or many of the others.

"One--you weren't supposed to feel anything so why would you even think that?" Rhys asked. "And two--I didn't feel anything except this overwhelming sense of boredom. Every day, it only got worse. I didn't even know what loneliness was."

"I've always felt things. Just... no one knew about it." He had to become good at hiding it, or he would have been killed. Raphael felt things. He was killed. The person whose soul was forced into his body felt things too, but he knew better than to say anything or show anything while he was 'home.' Perhaps the real Raphael had been too naive and too sheltered; he didn't know suffering until the last moments of his young life and by then it was already too late. His wings had already gained colors and that meant he had to go before he 'tainted' the prince.

And when he—Tarwyn—took over, they tried to remove his wings so that it wouldn't happen again. For some reason it didn't quite work and by then it was too late to find another soul. He was trapped in Raphael's body, masquerading as the prince's companion. Those months that he was locked away in the castle, he was taught everything he needed to know about serving the royal family. He was brainwashed and they tried to remove as much of his wings as possible, to no avail.

"I guess you wouldn't understand unless you've been in love," he sighed resignedly, shrugging again. Raphael patted Rhys' knee gently. "It's okay. You don't have to try and... be nice. I know that when you go back home... All of this will mean nothing."

"Yeah... I guess they'd have you killed for that."

Rhys saw it happen more than once. People were killed all the time over having feelings. If Rhys wanted to feel anything as he grew into his soulless new existence, he had to do it where nobody else would see. Especially those beneath them. He had to show that he was united with the family.

He thought of his mother, though. Still alive, last he knew. And her wings had never been taken from her. Why? Torture her? Or was it simply impossible to birth a child when there was no feeling? No soul? He shuddered to think what would happen to a person who was born that way. Without a soul.

"Stop talking to me like I'm a child and you're an adult." He moved his knee away from Raphael's hand, irritated by the grandfatherly gesture. "I don't need you patronizing me. And I'll choose what means nothing to me."

It annoyed him--Raphael talking like he knew Rhys was leaving for sure, that he knew for sure everything met nothing. Like he was trying to guilt him into staying or like it was just a foregone conclusion that Rhys would leave to go back to the fairy realm. Either way annoyed him. Like Rhys couldn't think or feel things out for himself.

He would choose what meant nothing to him... Even that was said in the negative. Not that he would choose what meant something, but that he would choose what meant nothing.

Slowly Raphael pulled back his hand, the one that had offended. It wasn't exactly new, though, to be rebuffed by Rhys. Of course usually there was no annoyance accompanying it; generally Rhys didn't seem to like having people in his personal space, not even the person designated as his companion—and the one who had been with him the longest. But there was never any real emotion tied to any of his actions or words towards Raphael. For much of their lives, Rhys treated Raphael like a servant, and with cold, detached indifference.

He moved to the other end of the couch and drew his feet up onto it, tenting his knees and wrapping his arms around his legs. Raphael rested his chin on top of his knees—something that took quite a bit of contortion, but he was pretty flexible—and looked at Rhys. He really looked at him and he tried to see him as he was in the moment, struggling with newfound feelings, confusing emotions that conflicted with what he had been taught growing up. Raphael knew how he felt; it was so much easier to embrace the known than to explore the unknown. For a long while, he tried to deny his own feelings too but... the beauty and the unfortunate thing about feelings was that they couldn't be ignored forever.

But there was more at stake here than a bad relationship. Death was still a possibility. It was very much a possibility, honestly, given how the King operated. Was love worth it? Raphael thought the answer was yes but did Rhys? Or was he saying those things just because he was told no? Raphael lowered his gaze. He spoke to the section of couch separating them.

"You keep talking like you still want to go back." Talking about removing the wings, about having other brothers out there to corrupt for his father... Those didn't sound like he was planning to stay in the human realm. And besides—how much was a servant worth to him, anyway, over the value of his own life?

Yeah, that was more like it. Raphael moved away, stopped touching him, stopped leaning on him. Not that it was what Rhys really wanted but it was the goal in speaking the way he did, in removing himself from the situation. Raphael had all these feelings, true. But Raphael seemingly had time to deal with them. And pushing them onto Rhys was just... sending all kinds of red flags on Rhys' sense of boundaries.

Plus, he was a prince. He had been born not to be touched unless by his manservant, who dressed him and touched him in no other way. And the consorts, of course. They were boring to deal with over time. He had to "teach" them and "train" them how to touch him and what was appropriate and what was allowed. But it also made sex boring. It truly was a chore, just a way to get rid of that uncomfortable feeling in his groin and his balls. Nothing more.

And so what if he talked about going back? Rhys didn't know what else to say. He had been a part of that family, that regime, that lifestyle for so long. Did Raphael think it was easy to just turn his back on everything he knew just to fling himself into something dangerous and uncertain?

So he said nothing because there was nothing to be said. There was no point in arguing because there was nothing to argue about. There was no point in agreeing or disagreeing because Rhys did talk like he was going back. And maybe he would. And maybe he wouldn't. But he didn't know and that meant there was no point in talking about it. He didn't need people making his decisions for him based on their feelings. Rhys didn't even know his own feelings; he didn't want the two mixing up. That would just end up in bad decisions all around.

Taking the blanket that had been draped across him, Rhys pulled it over his shoulders and curled up on the other side of the couch.

And so, silence. Raphael lowered his head into his arms for a long moment and closed his eyes. He knew from the outset that this... that these feelings he harbored for Rhys didn't have a good chance of going anywhere fast. Rhys was a prince and he was 'the companion' so he was fully dispensable. It was only because he listened to the King's instructions that he survived this long; otherwise he had no delusions that he would have been replaced in the blink of an eye.

Now, he was bucking the reins and that... would not end well. And yet he couldn't be sorry that he defected. He wasn't sorry. Whether or not Rhys followed him, he wasn't sorry that he sought out freedom when the opportunity presented itself. Even if he loved Rhys with all his heart, he knew that he would die if he stayed. His spirit would die; the light inside would snuff itself and in the end, it would be no different than leaving Rhys' side, for him to become just like all the rest of them.

Besides, he had no idea how Rhys felt. The wings were an indication but Rhys himself was so stubborn and so reticent where it came to his feelings. Raphael was trying to find clues, digging down deep through years of brainwashing and training... Even if he could somehow be sure that Rhys had feelings for him, if Rhys himself said nothing and refused to acknowledge anything then... What was the point? He would still be pining after someone who was emotionally closed off and unavailable.

There was still... Wesley Carter, he supposed.

But realistically he knew that he could never feel this way about Wesley, no matter how handsome he was. There wasn't anyone like Rhys, anywhere. Raphael lifted his face from his arms and rested his chin on his forearms, still curled up on the opposite end of the couch. It was only about a foot between them, but the distance felt larger. He swallowed and he kept looking at Rhys, looking for a sign, something to let him know that it wasn't time to give up. Or maybe he was just taking his last, long look at Rhys before Rhys was either rescued by Keith or left of his own accord.