CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Embracing Fidelity

Gareth woke slowly, uncertain how long he'd been asleep. Or perhaps he'd died. It was unclear in his mind what had become of him. He only felt his body warming to Fydelis's touch, and drank in the breath Fydelis gave to him when he'd pressed his lips to Gareth's.

Gareth opened his eyes slowly, looking up into Fydelis's face. He looked human again and his eyes were rimmed red. "You've been crying…" Gareth's voice came out somewhere between a whisper and a croak.

"I'll get you some water." Fydelis got up and Gareth realized he was in a bed. He didn't recognize the room— likely an inn. An oil lamp on a table cast an amber halo in one corner, but all the rest was dark. His fingers absently felt the texture of the blanket stretched over his body as he watched Fydelis come to him with a cup of water.

Gareth struggled to sit up and Fydelis helped him, putting an arm around him and offering the cup. Gareth sipped it, amazed at how clean it tasted, and how soothing it felt going down.

"How long have I been out?"

"About thirteen hours," Fydelis said.

"Why don't I feel hungry, or…" He looked down at his lap, realizing his bladder did not feel full.

"You won't need to do much of that anymore. You've… changed."

A shudder of alarm went through him, causing his muscles to clench. He reached up and dragged a trembling hand over the top of his head and felt the indication of hair just starting to grow back. "It seems then, that makes two of us." Gareth tried to smile but in truth, he was afraid. The reality that he was no longer the man he'd once been was finally taking hold. The reality that his soul, the thing he'd worked so hard to cleanse and make pure for the Creator, was no longer his to offer. He closed his eyes, clutching a hand to his chest as he fought back the pain welling up inside. Cool hands pressed against his cheeks and he raised his head to look into Fydelis's eyes.

It was his undoing. The sob escaped him before he realized it was coming, and the tears spilled over.

"Shhh, it's okay… it'll be… all right," Fydelis murmured, searching his face. Gareth nodded between Fydelis's hands and held his wrists as though they could save him from drowning. A moment stretched between them, then Fydelis leaned in and pressed his lips to Gareth's. It was tentative at first, uncertain and questioning. Gareth's lips parted, letting Fydelis come inside, and he tasted him; sweet and smoky, like blood, the scent of lilacs, and the flavor of rich wine. The saltiness of tears seasoned the kiss as Fydelis traced the mark he'd laid on Gareth's tongue when they'd first met in the burning church, and Gareth realized he had but one regret.

Fydelis slowly broke the kiss, and Gareth looked earnestly into his eyes. "I love you. Regardless of what you are or what you were. I love you. I'm so sorry you thought I'd stopped."

Fydelis shook his head, answering him with a smile that was both beautiful and sad. "I love you as well, Gareth De'Aubyn. I always have."

Their lips met once more and Gareth fought through a sob as his heart felt like it might burst in his chest. He'd never thought he was good enough to feel the love he'd had for his Fidelity returned, yet he'd remained steadfast. And here, all this time, Fidelity had been with him, feeling as though he was unworthy of Gareth. Gareth moved his hands from Fydelis's wrists to his shoulders, then across his back. He gripped the fabric of Fydelis's shirt, uncertain if what he was feeling was normal, or as a result of the changes his body had undergone. He felt hot, yet he wanted to feel Fydelis's warmth against him, and something fluttered and ached through his core.

"How long have you known?" Fydelis asked softly when their lips had separated once more.

"I knew for certain after the battle with my brethren. Though I think I suspected quite a while ago… I… could not admit it to myself. I am sorry, Fydelis."

Fydelis sighed, lowering his head. "I am sorry. I did this to you, I could not let you go, even after I'd been… changed. Malaketh enjoys my suffering too much." He raised his head, his eyes sparkling with tears. "I am no longer your angel, Gareth. I never will be again."

Gareth moved his hands once more to cup Fydelis's cheeks now, and he gently wiped at his tears with his thumbs. "That's not true. You've changed, perhaps, but my angel has always been here." He touched his own chest, just over his heart. "Fydelis, you have given me such a precious gift. You have given me back my faith; my Fidelity." Gareth pulled Fydelis against his chest, holding him tightly and praying that he would be granted a few more moments to make up for so much time lost. Gradually, he slid his hands up beneath the material of Fydelis's shirt. He rubbed the smooth skin of Fydelis's back, feeling him shiver and sigh. But Fydelis tensed when Gareth's hands found the rough scars over his shoulder blades. "Does it hurt?" he murmured against Fydelis's temple. "It's where he tore off your beautiful wings, isn't it?"

"Yes," Fydelis answered simply.

Gareth began to move his hands away, but Fydelis repositioned himself so that Gareth's hands were once again over the scars. "No. Touch me there. Touch me everywhere." Fydelis leaned back and unlaced the neck of his shirt, then he pulled it off over his head and pressed his bare chest against Gareth's own.

The sensation was something he'd never experienced before— the feeling of another warm body, so close, so intimate. Gareth began to run tentative hands over Fydelis's heated flesh. "I've never…"

"But you've wanted to," Fydelis murmured with his lips brushing the rise of Gareth's throat.

"Yes," Gareth answered, surprised by the huskiness of his own voice. "Gods, yes."

"Then touch me… and let me touch you."

Gareth nodded, no longer trusting his voice to work. Fydelis sat up once more and leaned back in the circle of Gareth's arms. His hands went to his breeches and he unlaced them, then reached back and guided Gareth's hands to help him take them off. Gareth's fingers skimmed over Fydelis's hips and thighs as he followed the fabric down as far as he could reach, then slid his hands back up over the curve of Fydelis's buttocks to rest at the small of his back.

Fydelis lifted the covers and slid underneath, and Gareth felt the heat and hardness of his erection brush against his thigh. His own body responded, setting his mind into a spin. Years of punishment and suppression with prayer warred with the promise of pleasure at the hands of his one true love.

"I… I don't know what to do…" Gareth swallowed hard, trying not to succumb to the panic that threatened to pull him away.

"Give up your control, Crusader," Fydelis said against his neck, running his hot tongue along the tendons. "This battle is lost. Lie back, and simply accept it… accept me."

Gareth felt Fydelis guide his arms above his head, caressing his forearms with smooth, spidery touches. When he tried to bring them down he found that they seemed pinned in place by invisible ropes. Fydelis looked down into his face, his dark eyes luminous and kind. "This is what you need, to keep your fear from pushing me away, yes?"

Gareth nodded, relief forming tears at the corners of his eyes. "Yes. Thank you, thank you so much."

Fydelis's smile was sweet and sad. "Of course, my Crusader." He leaned down and kissed Gareth again, leaving him gasping for breath once his lips slid away and began a slow, tortuous descent down his body.

The shame of his arousal would have certainly made Gareth push Fydelis away, but having no control— being forced— no— allowed to succumb by Fydelis taking away his will— made the humiliation almost liberating. It made Gareth feel safe to submit to the needs of his body and heart. He closed his eyes, arching his spine as Fydelis's kisses became soft grazes of teeth and tongue over his chest. He gasped, a shudder going through him when Fydelis closed his lips around one of his sharp nipples and sucked, flicking against it with his tongue. He felt the sensation acutely through his groin, and his cock throbbed, hot and hard on his belly.

"So lovely." Fydelis worshiped him quietly, his breath came in searing puffs against the wet trail he'd laid with his mouth, licking hot at Gareth's flesh like flame.

Gareth's hands flexed and fisted in his invisible bindings and he squirmed as his skin sparked from each gentle caress or brush of hair across its expanse. But he whimpered with alarm and tried to curl away, to hide himself when he felt Fydelis's long hair brush against his hip.

"No." Fydelis pushed his hands down over Gareth's hips. "Don't hide from me."

There was a moment of panicked silence as Gareth was aware of Fydelis looking at him— at his mutilated sex— and it caused him to go flaccid as he tried to come to terms with the anticipated rejection.

"My poor, poor Crusader…" Fidelity whispered and kissed the scar that angled across his shaft. Gareth gasped, his cock hardening up once more as the kiss gave way to Fydelis's inhumanly long tongue following the scar, then curling around his cock and tugging it upwards.

Gareth tried to cry out in protest, but suddenly Fydelis's fingers were in his mouth, and all he could do was close his lips around them and suck at them brutally in an attempt to pacify his warring sense of shame and lust. He lost the battle to his body's own reflexes as Fydelis took his weeping cock into the humid cave of his mouth. Gareth's hips flexed forward as sensations he could never have imagined shot up his spine. His toes curled against the bedding, as his body tried to go deeper, to be swallowed whole by the feeling of his cock sliding in and out of that tight, sucking heat. At the back of his mind, a dark panic started; what if he couldn't recover? What if he never stopped feeling this way? Fydelis pulled his fingers out of Garreth's mouth as he began thrashing his head from side to side. The pressure in Gareth's spine pressed up through his groin; tightening, aching, holding him on the edge of something so powerful and terrifying that prayers, and pleas, and gibberish tumbled from his lips; and tears from his eyes. Fydelis held him steady as he bobbed his head up and down on Gareth's cock, circling the base tightly with his fingers to keep the pressure contained.

"Nnno! N-no! I-I can't!" Gareth cried out, his protests empty and born purely from years of repression and guilt as a climax built inside of him. And then suddenly, it was upon him. He opened his mouth in a silent wail, his body arching so hard that every muscle locked and burned. Gareth's climax was powerful and frightening. The intense pleasure of it zinged through his brain and caused lights to flash behind his eyes as Fydelis swallowed his length and each pulse of semen that he pumped down his throat.

When it finally subsided, the emotions Gareth had blocked for so long came free, shattering from the cage he'd so carefully constructed. He felt like he was falling, being swept away, but there was Fydelis, with his arms around him, holding him and rocking him as Gareth wept like a child. His arms now free, Gareth clutched at Fydelis, clinging to him as though at any moment he might cease to be.