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The final demon hurls itself at him, snarling and frothing at the mouth. Kyojurou needs nothing more than a shift of his hand and its expression warps into one of disbelief, eyes growing wide as its head severs from its body, rolling away on the forest floor with a thunk.
With a gentle clink, Kyojurou’s red blade returns to its sheath, flame hilt pressing to the edge. For a moment, he focuses solely on evening the pattern of his breathing: in, out. In, out. Something prickles at his abdomen but he ignores it in favor of turning with a swish of his haori, surveying the damage.
Around him, grotesque demon corpses, severed heads and all, litter the ground. Many have turned into dust already, while others twitch and spasm, clinging to the last dredges of their life. Spilled blood stains the dirt scarlet, from both Kyojurou and the demons.
A sharp pain flares up his chest and it is only because of his experience with far worse that he does not double over from the sting. Gingerly, he presses a hand to his abdomen. It comes away wet, slick with blood. His lips thin into a flat line.
It had been a careless, juvenile mistake, to focus all of his attention on a single demon without keeping tabs on the others. In the time he had shifted his attention to a low-level demon flinging itself at him, he had failed to notice the demon with Blood Demon Art sneaking up on him from his blindspot. In the blink of an eye, claws had raked down his front, taking his uniform with it. He had lurched away from bearing the brunt of the attack, but the damage had already been done.
With the moon hidden behind the silhouettes of trees, the full extent of the wound is difficult to study. With a little luck, it is as shallow as it seems to be, and he’ll be able to make it back before it gets infected. Now, if he could get himself to a place to deal with himself…
That itself is the problem. Kyojurou has not an inkling of where he is, surrounded by the mangled corpses of demons and the shadows of the night cloaking him in their darkness. He had lost sight of his crow ages ago, and scanning the inky horizon does not yield any clues.
The adrenaline of battle caves away into his exhaustion and his shoulders sag. His next course of action should be to get himself back on a familiar path, seek a safe place to tend to his injuries. But no plan comes to mind, not when his thoughts are slow as molasses and his body seems to be burning up from the inside. A little rest, maybe.
Taking a seat proves to be more difficult than it would seem, but he successfully props his blade against the trunk of the nearest tree, lowering himself with a grunt. While the slash at his stomach does not hurt much, an uncomfortable warmth has settled over him, trickling down his limbs like a second skin.
Maybe the injury is not as minor as he had originally assumed it to be.
His bangs, ruffled from the flurry of actions, stick to his sweat-slicked forehead and Kyojurou pushes them back, wondering over the sweltering heat. Although it is the middle of summer, it had not been this hot even when the sun had been out. Did it have something to do with the forest? Nothing had seemed particularly strange about it when he walked in.
And then there’s the steady pressure growing just behind his temple, rendering him almost light-headed. Kyojurou’s clammy fingers tug at his collar, attempting to waft cool air down the suffocating warmth of his uniform.
A crunch of leaves. The gentlest touch against bark.
At a moment’s notice, the heat disappears along with the pressure behind his temple as Kyojurou is snatching his blade, rising even with how his body protests. His vision swims from the sudden movement and he presses his back to the tree to ground himself, hand ready at his side.
He had assumed he had rid the forest of all its demons, a lofty task even for a Pillar such as him. For there to be more who had escaped his notice…. With how his breath is coming out in short pants, he can only pray he has enough stamina to grip his blade with precision and strength.
“Who is there?” His voice rings out in the night, loud and confident despite how his thoughts muddle and crash into one another. “Reveal yourself.” His knees quiver from the energy it takes to hold himself up and he curses himself for yet not being fully recovered from the devastation at the Mugen Train.
No one steps into view and still, Kyojurou stays ready, standing for what must be seconds but feels as if they are minutes. A lone cicada chirps and Kyojurou’s eye narrows because he can feel it. The familiar presence he can recognize in a heartbeat, that follows him wherever he goes.
The exception to the nature of demons. By now, any other demon would have lunged at him, torn off his head, and suckled his flesh dry, but he is different. No, he follows Kyojurou relentlessly, obsessively, like a predator stalking his prey, and yet he never dives in for the kill.
A twig snaps and Kyojurou is wheeling to his right, blade drawn. A figure cloaked in shadows and moonlight emerges, rays of pale light slanting over the planes of his face. A smile grins itself his way, white canines shining bright. Pupils set in fractured blue glimmer like molten gold in the night.
“Akaza.” Despite himself, Kyojurou’s body sags back down, relief washing over him. Relief? Since when he had been relieved to be paid a visit by the fourth most powerful demon in the world?
Before he can horrify himself with what that must mean for himself, Akaza is gliding his way, smile sharpening into a smirk. “Kyojurou!” He sounds almost giddy at seeing the other and Kyojurou’s stomach twists itself into knots at the excitement that shoots through him. “Missed me?”
Another throb of pain at his skull and Kyojurou pinches the skin between his brows with a thumb and forefinger, willing for the pain to fade away. Despite everything he had been taught and experienced, he sinks back to the ground once more.
If any other demon slayer had been witness to him utterly abandoning all efforts to keep his guard up not just in front of a demon, but an Upper Moon, they would have been horrified. Surely, Kyojurou himself will be appalled at his lack of concern for his own safety later. But now, with the heat that clings to him and the ache shooting through the passage of his veins, Akaza’s presence is more of a comfort than anything.
“I cannot play with you today, Akaza.” His bangs have flopped down to his forehead once more and he lifts a hand to push them off but changes his mind halfway, draping his arm across his abdomen. Akaza makes a noise of offense, strolling nearer.
“You wound me, Kyojurou. Shutting me down the very first minute-” His footsteps stutter before they stop entirely, eyes curiously taking in the sight of Kyojurou slumped against the tree, his hair in his eyes, the utter lack of his usual defiance. “What’s wrong with you?”
If Kyojurou hadn’t known better, he would have almost thought that Akaza’s tone is one of concern. But he does know better, and he knows it is incapable for a demon to feel sympathy for a human.
Even if said demon had never been quite like the others he had encountered.
Perhaps it is weariness that lowers his guard, that clouds his rational mind, that compels him to tell the truth. He gestures to his stomach, where the flesh has nearly become numb from the pain. Akaza’s gaze follows his gesture, taking notice of the sticky blood there for the first time. “Blood Demon Art got me.”
Akaza says nothing, instead, drawing closer. Every one of Kyojurou’s instincts should be shouting at him to move away, escape before it is too late, and yet they remain suspiciously quiet and he stays put, even as the demon kneels at his side. “Careless of you, Kyojurou,” he says, scrutinizing the mess of blood and dust. “Don’t go getting killed in such a stupid way.”
“Do not fret," he says, smiling reassuringly. "It is a mere injury. I will not die from it."
Once again, Akaza does not spare him a reply. The question rises to Kyojurou’s lips once more: why are you following me? But there is no chance to utter it, not as Akaza’s fingers just barely graze the exposed skin of his uniform and goosebumps rise along his arms.
All at once, he is vividly reminded of their last encounter; Akaza holding him down, his touch against Kyojurou’s cheek, his hair, his neck. Kyojurou’s heart slamming against his ribcage, blood pumping through his veins, painting his cheeks the shades of sunsets.
“You have a fever,” Akaza says and Kyojurou’s chin jerks up, tearing himself from the memory. A fever? His brows furrow, suddenly able to make sense of the heat clinging to him, the throbbing of his head. But to get a fever… “Your injury must have gotten infected.”
Ah. So his luck had run out and it had gotten infected after all, in such a short time as well. For Kyojurou, with his sturdy body and strong immune system, to succumb to a fever so quickly… He gnashes his teeth. The telltale signs of his gradual weakening continue to come and he continues to ignore them.
Then again, there is the possibility that Akaza is lying, although he sees no reason for the other to do so. But Kyojurou has yet to fall so low as to trusting a demon.
His fingers curl loosely around the hilt of his blade. A silent warning, although if Akaza had noticed it, he remains unfazed. “How do you know?”
“I won’t do anything, so you can stop acting as if I’ll lunge at you any second.” Kyojurou levels him with an incredulous look, gone ignored by the other. “I can smell it.”
Smell it. Akaza must be assaulted by the scent of Kyojurou’s blood and flesh throughout the entirety of their time spent together. Any lesser demon would have succumbed to their urges already, but for Akaza to go without showing any signs of his hunger, even after getting a taste of him…
“Why… Why should I trust you?” It is a useless question to ask now, when Akaza has had all the chances to kill him but still hasn’t, for reasons Kyojurou cannot fathom. Akaza glances up at him, seemingly mull over it.
“Hm…” Kyojurou holds back from reaching out and pressing a finger to the scrunch of his brow. Akaza presses a thumb to the underside of his own chin, tilting his head as he grins cheekily at Kyojurou. “Because I’m charming and irresistible?”
Silence follows his statement.
Kyojurou blinks, speechless, wondering if he had heard him right. But no, Akaza continues to smile serenely at him and the strongest urge to draw his blade seizes him, fingers clenching around the hilt. Akaza seems to notice, the amusement dropping off his face.
“How dull,” he mutters, tucking his arms behind his head. “If you really need a reason: I haven’t killed you, a Pillar, yet, when I could have the moment I stumbled on you.” Stumbled, more like stalking, Kyojurou thinks wearily. “I could have killed you countless times before If I had wanted, when you were at your most vulnerable, but I didn’t.”
He voices out loud all of Kyojurou’s thoughts, without offering an explanation why. Why Akaza hasn’t taken the chance to slit his throat and rip out his heart from its chamber. Why does he continue to follow him, if not having the intention to kill, pushing Kyojurou to the edge each and every time, before ultimately abandoning the chance and leaving him not quite whole but still alive.
There is nothing Kyojurou can say in response and he glances away. The demon must take his silence as approval for him to stay because he shuffles closer, careless as Kyojurou’s sheathed blade nudges against his thigh. The lack of concern for one of two things that could end his life tells Kyojurou all he needs to know of what the other believes of him.
That he will not have the courage to pick up his sword and fulfill his duty as a demon slayer, end Upper Moon’s prolonged time in the world.
And some part of him, deep between the ridges of his ribs where his heart is nestled, knows the other to be right.
“Staying here while you are injured and ill isn’t safe,” Akaza says, and what must surely be faux concern has a laugh bubbling from his throat.
“Wouldn’t me being weakened by demons and fever please you? I had assumed your goal was to kill me.”
“My goal is for you to become a demon and immortalize the perfection that you are now.” His expression darkens, taking even Kyojurou aback by its entrance. “And I loathe the thought that others are chipping away at that perfection.”
A smile twitches at his lips. “Only you are allowed to hurt me, I presume?”
“Yes.” The simple word, the certainty it is uttered with: a tendril of warmth snakes down his skin, trickles into the hallows of his bones. The fever. It must be the fever. Kyojurou swallows hard. His head feels light, mouth thick like it has been stuffed with cotton.
“I see.” To say he had been successful in keeping back the tremble in his voice would have made Kyojurou a liar.
He doesn’t see Akaza’s hand move until it is already slipping between the tree trunk he is slumped against and pressing to the small of his back, sending little tremors dancing down his skin. Kyojurou jolts, instincts kicking in as he reaches out for his blade blindly, only to find it out of reach. A brush of his hand against blue markings reminds him of where he is and who is with him. Akaza, he reminds himself. It is Akaza. The reminder should not be a reassurance to him and yet it is, no matter how desperately Kyojurou wishes it isn’t.
“What are you doing?” No sooner has the question left his mouth and another hand is slipping under his knees, gathering him up. Kyojurou has not blinked and suddenly, he is hovering in the air, head settled against shoulders, hand on a chest. A strong, warm, very bare chest. Bands of blue peek up at him from between his fingers.
He blinks, and the situation hits him all at once. He is in Akaza’s arms, pressed flush to his chest. A dream. He must be dreaming.
“What-” He begins, only to stop short as stars burst behind his eyelids, suffocating heat clawing at his skin. Groaning, his head drops back to Akaza’s shoulder.
“It isn’t safe here,” Akaza says curtly. Kyojurou’s blade is deposited into his lap and without warning, Akaza launches himself up into the sky. It is only because of Kyojurou’s quick reflexes, honed from years of battles, that he fastens a hand around his blade and the other onto the nape of Akaza’s neck in time.
Wind whips strands of gold into Akaza’s face, earning a disgruntled snort from him. Kyojurou watches the forest floor grow closer and away again as the demon bounds from branch to branch, holding on for his dear life.
Peculiarly, not an ounce of panic settles in him; rather, a strange calm floods him as Akaza delicately lands on a tree, the impact eliciting a wince from Kyojurou. “Where are you even taking me?” He asks, and Akaza’s golden eyes snap down to him from where they had been scanning the expanse of the forest. “Do not forget that I will not hesitate to return the favor of what you did to me.”
Akaza seems to find humor in his threat, a smile curving his lips. “You wouldn’t do that.”
Kyojurou’s eye narrows. So Akaza truly did believe him so thin-skinned as to lay limp and go along with whatever the other had planned for him. “You undermine how deep my feelings for you run.”
“Feelings of love, I hope,” Akaza replies, and whatever Kyojurou might have said next dies on his tongue as he gapes at the demon in surprise. The other does not seem the least bit fazed. “There is an abandoned home nearby that has not been occupied for days,” he says, answering Kyojurou’s previous question. “Better for you to bleed out there than in the middle of the forest where it’ll take days for someone to find you.”
His mouth opens to speak, to argue, only to find he has nothing to say. Just as Akaza had said, if the other had come to kill him, he would have sooner. Why bother with exchanging small talk, and go as far as scooping him up and carrying him to supposed safety, if only to kill him at the end?
Reluctantly, his body relaxes, head lowering itself onto the expanse of Akaza’s shoulders. And he loathes to admit it, but the chill of Akaza’s skin in contrast to the burning of his body is a delightful sensation he is not willing to part with just yet.
It’s slight enough that he nearly misses it: the corner of Akaza’s fanged smile tugging up, pleased at the Pillar’s reluctant surrender.
Just as he had not had enough decency to give Kyojurou warning before he had launched himself into the air, there is no warning before he’s jumping down to the ground once more, Kyojurou’s head thumping painfully against his shoulder, the impact rattling his bones and leaving him hacking. “I’m beginning to think I was safer on my own,” Kyojurou groans, and it’s nearly embarrassing how white his knuckles have gone from where they had been clutched onto Akaza’s vest.
Akaza lets him down with surprising gentleness, no shame as his grin stretches wider. “You chose to trust me,” he says, infuriatingly smug. “I fulfilled my promise: I didn’t bring you anywhere but where I told you I would.”
Indeed, he had. Kyojurou brushes past Akaza and his smirk in favor of warily eying the seemingly abandoned shelter before them, built from hewn wood and empty of anyone, as he finds when he hesitantly knocks on the door before pushing it open.
It is clear that no one has lived here for days. Kyojurou traces the walls, fingers coming away coated in fine dust. A low table, set in the center of the room, is the only furniture other than an unrolled futon. The owner of this home, whoever it had been, must have been in a hurry to leave. Only to never come back.
Kyojurou stares at the shoes tucked into a dusty corner of the room, wondering what had become of the owner. Had they had an unfortunate accident on their way to wherever they had been? Simply up and left? Been killed in cold blood by a starved demon?
“Kyojurou.” The sound of his name prompts him to turn to Akaza, eye zeroing in on the object in the other’s hand. A roll of gauze. “Sit.” The command is punctuated with a jab of his finger at the futon.
The gauze roll in the other’s hand is enough for Kyojurou to know what the other’s plans are, and obediently, he takes a seat, pulling off his haori as he does. He casts his eye over the flame-tipped cloth, finding it clean of any blood. That, at the very least, is a relief.
Akaza makes a noise that sounds suspiciously like a laugh as he folds the haori with the utmost care, only to cough as Kyojurou eyes him. Still suspicious but brushing it off, he makes a move to shrug off his uniform, before pausing. His eye darts to the demon before him, still waiting for him patiently. Stripping himself bare in front of others is nothing he is not familiar with, but doing the same in front of Akaza is… different, and not only because the other is a demon. Akaza seems to notice his hesitance, a single brow lifting. “Shy?”
Kyojurou’s face warms. “Not at all.” Shy? Because of Akaza? Preposterous. Suddenly inflamed by a great desire to prove the other (prove himself) wrong, he wrestles at the buttons of his uniform, clumsy fingers slipping on the shiny gold.
Fingers catch his wrist, stilling his movements. They can only belong to one person (demon), and Kyojurou looks up to find Akaza crouched at his side, eyes unreadable. “I’ll do it.”
Without waiting for his approval, he’s brushing aside his hand, fingers working at his buttons. Kyojurou can only watch in a daze as the first button slips free, exposing skin. Fingers brush against the bareness of his chest and his breath seizes. Fingers drenched blue, fingers that could easily thrust through his flesh, rip his heart out of his ribcage, fingers that had punched a hole through him before.
His body is impossibly warm, fire raging in the pit of his stomach, climbing up his systems and setting his organs aflame. The oxygen seems to be trapped in his throat, struggling to push through.
The second button is unfastened and then the third, the burning only growing in strength, every accidental graze of Akaza’s hands sending warmth shooting down his arms, to the tips of his toes, to his head, leaving him dizzy and delirious. Akaza’s gaze flickers to his own unfocused one, and it must be the fever that imagines the darkness clouding over those eyes of molten gold.
Akaza’s hands settle onto his belt and the slide of leather is agonizingly slow.
By the time the black cloth slips off his shoulders and pools around his waist, he is slumped against the wall, breaths coming slow and heavy. Is it the fever, he wonders, or is it the aftermath of Akaza’s touch against his most vulnerable areas?
The belt slides off his waist and the impulse to clamp his arms around his naked chest is nearly impossible to fight against as Akaza’s golden gaze drinks him in. He isn’t a pretty sight, Kyojurou knows, not with the dozens of dozens of scars that wreck his body, each telling a different story.
And yet Akaza seems entrapped, captivated even, as he runs his eyes over the spiderweb of scars until it settles on what he had been looking for.
Darker than the rest of his body as most of his scars and standing starkly against the tough flesh, his closest brush against death, the scar that had marred him deeper than skin.
The pads of Akaza’s fingers press against the scar and the rush of blood through Kyojurou’s veins is loud in his ears, heart trapped in his throat along with the oxygen. “Does it hurt?”
Caught up in the jolts of stars dancing down his skin as Akaza traces the ridges and points of his scar, it takes him a moment to realize the other has asked him a question. “N-no. It healed a long time ago.”
Although, when dreams and nightmares of the events at the train, of Akaza and the amusement dancing in his eyes and the smirk twisting his lips, of Akaza’s weight on him, pushing him down, down, suffocating him, plague him for days on end, he wakes up to find his abdomen burning so painfully it steals his breath away and leaves him wondering if today will be the day he dies.
Like now, as Akaza’s hand splays wide over his abdomen, the same hand that had thrust through his gut. The ghost of the pain floats to the surface, crackling, waiting for the kindling to be added to the fire.
“Beautiful,” Akaza murmurs, and Kyojurou’s scar burns.
Beautiful. There are many words that Kyojurou associates with his scar—failure, weakness, shortcoming—but beautiful is not one of them. There is no beauty in the ugly scar that will continue to remind him of his inadequacy, that would forever mar his body.
Akaza seems to think differently, hands running over the great scar in wonder, almost childish amazement twisting his features into one of delight. And perhaps, it is beautiful to Akaza, the scar his masterpiece, his greatest work of art. Something bubbles and festers under his skin.
Rengoku Kyojurou, his masterpiece.
The thought alone crushes any vigor present in Kyojurou, his body sagging from exhaustion. Akaza’s hands move away and his skin starves for the touch once more, to have Akaza’s hands on him until the imprints are burned into his flesh just as his scars are.
“Your hands are stained,” Akaza says and Kyojurou blinks away the haze, focusing on his hands. Somewhere along the way, his hand had found itself clenching at the cloth of Akaza’s trousers, blood staining the otherwise unblemished clothing. Blood from when he had pressed it to his abdomen, he distantly recalls. The demon’s fingers encircle his wrist and tug his hand off, although it’s too late.
Kyojurou pulls his hand away, the other’s grip remaining firm. “Ah, my apologies-”
Akaza brings his wrist to his lips and Kyojurou's words, thoughts, everything screeches to a halt.
It is nothing more than a press of his lips to the inside of Kyojurou’s wrist, where the blood rushes under his skin, where the stuttering beat of his heart runs wild, and yet, it leaves him breathless all the same. Kyojurou can do nothing but watch as Akaza’s lips trail higher, pressing to his wrist once more, to his palm, to the creases of his fingers, to the tips, leaving trails of fire in their wake.
There is no care for the blood that stains his palms, if anything, Akaza seems to relish in it, lips smeared in scarlet when he pulls away. A tip of a pink tongue darts out to swipe over his blood-stained lips.
His lips, stained in Kyojurou’s blood. His chest feels as if it may very well burst if he attempts to breathe.
The fingers loosen and Kyojurou’s wrist drops back to the futon, head spinning as he desperately tries to make sense of the course of events. There is no chance to recover because they are returning at a moment’s notice, pressing to the hollows of his collarbones.
“It’s gone,” Akaza murmurs, and Kyojurou knows instantly what it is he is speaking of. Why wouldn’t he, when he had spent nights dreaming of it, of Akaza’s teeth digging into his neck, his lips against his skin, spent even the time he was awake dreaming of it?
Akaza studies the stretch of healed skin as if he wishes to leave another bite and Kyojurou does not know what his reaction will be; he truly does not want to know what his reaction will be. Hates how he craves the sensation once more.
But he does not and Kyojurou shoves the yearning down, into the depths where if enough light is shone, it will emerge once again.
It is only when Akaza’s touch returns, pressing against his chest and back as he wounds the gauze around Kyojurou’s abdomen, does he finally regain his sense of speech. “You are surprisingly good at this.” Akaza hums in reply, and Kyojurou waits to see if he will elaborate. He does not. “How, when demons do not require it to heal?”
Akaza’s fingers skim against his skin, the warmth a continuous assault. “I remember.”
“Remember?”
“Things from…” The other stops short, lips pressing into a flat line, forehead creasing as if it is taking his utmost concentration to speak. “...when I was human. I must have done this many times before. Bandaging myself. Others.”
Kyojurou’s brows quirk in interest. In all their time spent together (fighting, fighting, and more fighting), Akaza had not once mentioned his time before he had been a demon. And there was a time before, Kyojurou realizes. A time when Akaza had been just as human like him, had bled and healed and felt pain, empathy, agony.
For a split second, he wonders. Wonders how much things could have differed if he and Akaza had met when the other had been still human. Wonders-
He banishes the thought. Mindless musing would not do anything but fester regret for what could have been.
“How much do you remember?” He watches as Akaza wraps another layer of white, concealing the wound underneath. “As… As your time as a human.”
The bandages tighten around his chest almost painfully and Kyojurou somehow manages to shove down the hacking cough threatening to escape from him. There’s no answer for a bit and Kyojurou wonders if he has pushed his luck.
“Not much.” His tone is short now, clipped. “Flashes of things. Flickers of bright lights. People I should know, but I don’t. Emotions that confuse me.” A hint of frustration colors his tone. “I see things, do things—feel things—that I should know the name of, should recognize, but I can never put the pieces together. And if I do, it’s gone in the next moment.”
For the demon to be so honest, so open… Sympathy unfurls in Kyojurou, overshadowing the hint of delight that Akaza had deemed him, a demon slayer, trusted enough to reveal such sensitive information about him. Just the frustration tugging Akaza’s lips downwards… It is enough for Kyojurou to catch a glimpse of the demon’s struggle, of what he experiences.
The image of Akaza, pathetically lunging to clutch at the faded corners of his memories, anguish rolling off him as he wonders why, why he cannot recall what must have been no doubt near and dear to him, flashes across his mind.
The fever has his tongue a little loose, his actions not considered beforehand and without thinking, he’s reaching out, hand cupping over Akaza’s on his chest. He tilts his head up, meeting the fractured gaze. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs, words slurring into each other, “I cannot… cannot imagine how it must be for you.”
It must be his imagination once again that spies the surprise flashing across Akaza’s expression before he’s tugging his hand out of the other’s grip. “Yeah, well,” his eyes avert themselves, hands busying themselves in cutting the gauze cleanly with his teeth, “it is all in the past. I hardly remember anything.”
The frayed end of where the gauze had been cut is tucked in and Kyojurou watches him as he finishes. “You are a strange demon.”
“Strange? Why is that?”
“You have a strange sense of justice. You don’t eat women. You are taking care of me, a demon slayer, but more importantly, a human. Your source of food.” He watches Akaza’s expression, but nothing flickers across it. “Why?”
No answer. Kyojurou plunders on.
“Why haven’t you killed me yet, although you have had all the chances to?”
For a moment, it seems as if Akaza will not answer, turning away as he carelessly deposits the nearly-finished gauze roll. But then he is shuffling forward once more until his knees brush Kyojurou’s thighs. “I find you interesting, Kyojurou.”
Kyojurou’s brows knit together, puzzled. “Interesting?” Akaza hums, and is it just him, or is the other closer than before?
“Yes, interesting.” His breath ghosts Kyojurou’s face and there is no doubt of the rapidly shrinking distance between them. And yet Kyojurou remains frozen, unable to move away. “Find your beliefs regarding the strong and weak interesting. Find it interesting how you can keep such a smile on your face even in the direst of situations. Find it fascinating to see every one of your reactions-” A hand settles itself next to his hip and Kyojurou tenses, eye darting to it, “-from every little thing I do.”
He’s so, so close now, pink, blue, amber all he can see. Despite himself, his eye flickers down to Akaza’s lips, inches away from his own, parted just slightly, so close, so inviting.
Just a little closer… the tiniest shift of his head… and…
Those lips curl up into a smirk and the spell breaks. Kyojurou shuts his eye, pulling back. A hum vibrates from Akaza’s throat, although he makes no comment.
“A thank you would be nice,” he says airily and Kyojurou scrambles to collect himself.
Thanking a demon. He had never believed the day would come, and yet here he is. And no matter how everything he had been taught protests to him otherwise, Akaza had done him an immense favor, bringing him to this shelter and bound him when he could have quite simply rid of him.
Sincerity shines brightly from his eye as he tilts his head up. “Thank you,” he says earnestly, and his hands find Akaza’s, squeezing. Akaza blinks at him owlishly. Then he snorts, and Kyojurou would have been affronted if not for how thickly condensed the clouds in his mind are.
“Thanking me? A demon?” Kyojurou shakes his head. Akaza has it all wrong. It is not about whether the other is a demon or not, but for what he had done.
“You helped me, did you not?” He says, and Akaza’s blinks of surprise morph into a stare of disbelief. “I say it from the deepest part of my heart—thank you.” A smile blooms on his lips, twinkling at Akaza with the force of a thousand sunbeams.
A beat passes. And then another. And another, and Akaza continues to just stare at him. Kyojurou’s smile falters, the fear that this has been all a very big ploy creeping in.
Except, a gusty sigh is leaving Akaza and-
He is right there.
Pressing Kyojurou flat against the wall, cupping the underside of his jaw, forcing his chin up. “You should be more careful with what expressions you make around me, Kyojurou,” he purrs, and there it is again: the pronunciation of Kyojurou’s name that never fails to send a shiver up his spine, name uttered languidly, as if he is tasting it, savoring it. “When I see you so sincere, so honest-” A thumb rests on the plush of his lower lip, tugging it down. “It makes me want to ruin you.”
He draws closer, their noses brushing, breaths of air puffing against Kyojurou’s lips. His lashes grow heavy, with sleep, with exhaustion. Maybe it is the fever, maybe it is because Kyojurou has spent days, nights, weeks, pondering over the vexing mosaic that is Akaza. Maybe it is because he cannot deny it any further. Whatever it is, it compels him to stay.
Akaza does not pull closer nor pull away. Just hovers there, drawing oxygen from Kyojurou’s lips, the other’s chin tucked between his fingers. Waiting, seeing. And still, Kyojurou does not back away.
A strangled groan and it is gone. Akaza’s fingers, his breath, the warmth from his body. Kyojurou’s single eye flutters open, clouded over gaze attempting to locate the other. A heavy scowl carves itself into the demon’s features, expression warped in irritation, annoyance… restraint? “Do not entice me, Kyojurou.”
In his muddle state of mind, he can only blink up at the other slowly. En… tice? “It… It was not in my intention to entice you.”
Akaza groans once more, but it is only a warped noise as sleep clamps its claws around Kyojurou, dragging him down into its murky darkness. “Show a little resistance, then, or else I will begin to believe you truly do want it.” His voice is rough, tempered as he stands fully, raking a hand through his short hair. “The fever must be worse than I thought. Rest.” With that, he steps away.
Moonlight streams over his form, painting him in silver, highlighting the bands of blue ringing his arms, his chest, his face. Somewhere in the depths of his mind, Kyojurou wonders how it is that a demon can look so much like an angel.
The other is moving away now and Kyojurou’s arm whips out with surprising strength, snatching Akaza’s wrist and yanking him back. “Stay,” he mumbles, and he thinks he catches a glimpse of Akaza’s lips as they part in mute surprise.
Whether the demon stays or not, he never finds out. All he knows is that the sleep he sinks into—deep, dreamless—is the best rest he has had in months.
Outside the realms of the Pillar’s dreams, a demon sits, amber eyes casting a glance over at the defenseless human before him, at the features relaxed with sleep, the hair that reminds him oh-so vividly of the sunrise, loose and wild, the moonlight as it spills through the cracks of the window and paints silver freckles across Kyojurou’s cheeks.
Akaza’s gaze flicks down to the hand, worn from use and calloused with battles. Without a thought, his own, marked fingers slip through the grooves of the other’s.
It is almost ironic, how, although the two have been destined to be the other’s killer, their hands fit together as perfectly as they do, the key to a lock.
Kyojurou murmurs, lashes fluttering with dreams, drawing Akaza's attention back to him. His eyes fall back to the unmarred skin of the other’s neck, where he had left a mark during their last encounter, from when the visage of Kyojurou pinned under him, flushed, heaving, had been burned into the crevices of his mind.
His fingers press against his neck, Kyojurou shivering under the cool touch, and Akaza wonders.
When Kyojurou comes to, it is to his crow cawing at him, sweat clammy on his skin from when his fever had broken, and his neck stinging.
The home is empty of anyone but him—as if it had been only him all along. The purple flower blooming at his neck tells him otherwise, affirms that the events of the night before had not been a product of his feverish dreams, but reality.
And Kyojurou is not sure which he would have preferred them to be.