Dumat: The Dragon of Silence (nearestvessel) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2013-12-04 16:05:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, damon salvatore, samandriel |
Who: Samandriel & Damon Salvatore
What: Truthiness Plot
When: 11/12
Where: Lux, a vineyard in Italy, A smaller island of Hawai’i
Rating: High-ish for oversharing and adult conversational themes.
Status: Complete
Samandriel didn’t typically work on Tuesdays, but he was annoyed enough at the goings on in his world that being at the bar where he forced himself to behave like a decent human being was the best place for him. He wasn’t making music that night. Lux was, after all, a piano bar and not The Samandriel Show. That was fine, of course. The pianist was a lovely young man, and Samandriel enjoyed listening to him play.
Officially that night, Samandriel was there in his unofficial capacity as Lucifer’s boyfriend and counting down the days until that could be a real thing that they acknowledged publicly. It was the worst kept secret in the history of the establishment. Worst kept and most easily accepted. Lux was safe space for Samandriel in ways that most weren’t.
Regardless of all that, Samandriel was glad when he felt the slight shift in the hum of energy in the room that belonged only to Damon. It saved him from hearing about whatever happened in Cabo from the patrons that he was very literally having to bite his tongue to keep from being destructively honest with. Samandriel was many things, but rude was not one of them. So, he politely excused himself and went to go greet his friend with a charming, yet strained smile.
“We’re going upstairs. Don’t ask questions, please.”
Damon had barely entered Lux, hadn’t even seen the angel yet, before he suddenly appeared, much to the soon-to-be-vampire’s amusement. He smiled at the man, “Now that is a welcome,” he said, although he wasn’t going to complain either. He was looking to unwind from the long day, and upstairs or downstairs suited him fine.
He surveyed the crowd only briefly as he left to follow the younger man up to the room they had talked in before. “I figured that I would stop in for a drink. Elena is studying, and I’m a distraction.” He laughed a little bit at that. He was a very good distraction, which wasn’t always helpful around her deadlines.
“I figured that I would check in since you told me about the dreams. That was a pretty fucked up way to end them.” It was typical of his banter, yet there was a sincerity in the words as well. He had been concerned, worried even. He could add in protective as well.
“At that point, death was a relief,” Samandriel said once the door was shut behind them, not considering for a moment if there would be gossip downstairs. It wouldn’t matter, truly. It wasn’t anyone else’s job to police his relationship, but he realized that he was very much not looking forward to the possibility of having to explain that no, he was hiding absolutely nothing from Lucifer. Then again, knowing who would be willing to attempt to blackmail him with things was a useful bit of information.
“I’m only upset at the angel who forced my brother to do it.” He couldn’t have known for certain, but there was enough evidence to make it a pretty good guess.
He smiled brightly at Damon, corners of his eyes crinkling with his happiness. “I am glad to see you, though. More than.” And it would seem that this whole inability to lie even a little bit extended to himself as he found himself faced with the very stark knowledge that Damon was a gorgeous young man and his intellect and cunning would have made him dangerous for Samandriel to be around if he and Lucifer hadn’t already discussed things. “What can I get for you?”
“Bourbon, or whiskey, whatever you have,” Damon answered, taking a seat on the sofa. He stretched out his legs. There was something different about today that he couldn’t quite put his finger on. He was usually very blunt, and fairly truthful, but today he was even more so, almost compelled into a frank honestly that he wasn’t quite used to.
“I don’t know if I can say that I’ve wished for death, or that I’d be relieved by it. I also don’t think I would be forgiving. I don’t really do forgiving very easily.” He remembered Rose from his dreams. Killing her had hurt, but it had to be done. She was dying, so he gave her a dream, the last she would have, sitting in a peaceful field, looking over the hillside. He drove in the stake when she was ready. He hadn’t forgiven himself, even though they had never met outside of the dreams.
“So who forced your brother to kill you?” he asked, wondering why there was so much in his head, threatening to tumble out of his mouth.
Samandriel poured them both a bourbon and went to sit down next to Damon instead of across from him. Frankly, he could use someone else in his space right now and he was rather getting the feeling that distance wasn’t a thing Damon really needed or wanted either.
“An angel called Naomi. She runs what you might compare to heaven’s equivalent of the CIA except that when she orders you to do something, you have no choice. She’s in your head and your actions aren’t your own.” Samandriel took a swig of his drink. “But if I had gone back to Heaven like she wanted, it would have been more torture and more effective torture since Heaven is far more aware of angels’ weak points than Hell is. In the end, I would have either been killed by her or I would have been completely reprogrammed and the essential things that made up me would be gone.”
“How does that even happen?” Damon asked, looking incredulously at the angel. He didn’t consider Samandriel as fallen. That term didn’t quite apply either, but Damon was human, at least so far, and his background in religion had been one that was taught in the churches, where Heaven was a paradise, and angels were like cherubs, not warriors. They were just stories to him, not reality.
“So there is a CIA for angels to find out if they are out there going against whatever is thrown down from the big man? You can also be programmed to obey, or do his bidding without thought to what you want. They take away choices.” He cocked his head, not bothered by the closeness. “Is that how the keep the peace, by squashing revolution through torture? It’s not that different than it is down here. It’s a really fucking dysfunctional family.”
“Our father left the building a very long time ago,” Samandriel said, hating how true it was. They’d all found that out when Michael ended up stuck down below with Lucifer and Castiel slaughtered Raphael in the name of free will. Heaven had been chaos. In a way, it still was.
“People get choices. Animals get choices. Even insects and bacteria to a certain extent, have miniscule amounts of free will. Angels do not.” He looked over at Damon. “That is why Lucifer incited war in heaven the first time. That is why he fell.” Samandriel held that gaze for a long, quiet moment and looked away. “I should have noticed it earlier with him, but everything Lucifer has ever laid before me has always been a choice and in the end it’s always been my choice. If i didn’t want something to happen, it didn’t happen. He doesn’t make anyone do anything.”
Samandriel took a swig of his drink and stood up again, leg brushing Damon’s while he moved away, considering all the options in front of him. “Watching him fall is still one of my most painful dreams.” He looked down at his shoes, amazed that he actually still had them on. “Would you like to go somewhere else, Damon? I’m feeling rather cramped and while the liquor selection here is very good, there are other places in the world that do it better.”
Damon was perfectly quiet, reflective, a side that not many saw. His ego often rode front and center, but there was a side to him that was quite intelligent, and often introspective. It was easy to see how this side could be a bit of a scholar, definitely seeking understanding and depth. “The parallels are stunning. My father, Papa Salvatore, thinks I am - not worth much - or unworthy maybe. I am his great disappointment. I’m not sure why. He is from the very old world, or he likes to think so. He has high expectations and I never seemed to fit that. I still don’t know what he wants from me or for me. Mom is a bit more understanding, but dad doesn’t believe in choice. It’s all about duty, and I’m all about choice.”
“Honestly, I wouldn’t have fallen, I would have jumped voluntarily if that was how it was.” He could see himself siding with Lucifer, or whatever version of Lucifer. The dreams presented differently at times. He thought of Theo’s version of his own life. He was a bit more ruthless in her version, but he was still recognizable. He was still Damon.
He looked at the angel with that characteristic brow up, the light smirk curling one side of his mouth. “The world? Are you feeling the urge to travel? Tequila in Mexico, wine in an Italian vineyard, or maybe some sake?” He wondered if that was really possible. The supernatural world was still something that was unfamiliar, but yet one that he would be a part of. “What did you have in mind?”
Samandriel had gotten around to the back of the couch in his wandering of the room while he listened to Damon. He understood all too even in this life how messed up parents could be, but then again his father was a dormat, and his mother had treated him as little more than a pretty accessory right up until she literally sold him to Lucifer. He leaned over the back of the couch enough to touch Damon’s cheek. “You are a brilliant, thoughtful, human being. If your father can’t see or accept that, then he’s not worth your time.”
With that, Samandriel smiled, infinitely kind and the sound of great wings ushered them from their private room at Lux to the vineyard Damon had mentioned. “It’s always nice to stretch my wings,” Samandriel said, disappearing briefly again to get a bottle of wine. “Though the urge I’m fighting right now has more to do with kissing you than traveling and the kissing you has absolutely nothing to do with your cheekbones. It’s very odd.” Samandriel frowned. He didn’t like that he couldn’t even seem to avoid the question in this strange compulsion that was on him. He shook his head and uncorked the bottle. “The vineyard’s Italian. The vintage is French and expensive.” He probably should have gotten glasses, but there was only so much effort he was willing to expend. It wasn’t like Damon could catch anything from him or vice versa.
“The stars are gorgeous out here, aren’t they?” Being away from cities in general definitely helped things.
Damon wasn’t sure what was happening from the time he stood to the time he arrived. It was the blink of an eye, a moment in time, and he stood on Italian soil. “I am not sure I shouldn’t kiss the ground of my homeland,” he joked, but inside, he was still processing how he had gotten here.
The air smelled cleaner, fresher, not like the air of Orange County, or what passed for it. He took the offered wine, definitely French and definitely expensive. “I have no idea how you did that.” There was nothing else he could possibly say.
He came back to the angel. “My cheekbones are one of my best features, or so they say. I know though. I knew when I walked into Lux.” He looked handsome against the night sky, breeze blowing through dark hair, eyes darkening against the backdrop. “I’m not quite immortal yet. It’s like being on uneven ground.” That feeling of inferiority was not something Damon was used to. His dream self struggled with the original vampires as well, not that it held him back as it should.
Samandriel looked at him curiously in the dark. “You knew I wanted to kiss you even then?” he asked and then shrugged. It made sense, he supposed. He wasn’t exactly good yet at navigating what other people did or didn’t observe, but if he had been able to pick up that Lucifer wanted him just after one too long smoothie interaction, it wasn’t any surprise that after all their conversations, Damon had figured Samandriel out.
“When I say you’re beautiful, Damon,” he said, meeting the other man’s eyes in the dark easily, “it has nothing to do with your eyes or your cheekbones or what I’m sure is a body that ought to be cut out of marble and not flesh. It’s the parts of you that aren’t physical that you let me see, the cunning hiding behind your eyes, your intellect, how much you question absolutely everything and the thoughtfulness you seem to have to make sure that you’re not actually doing any harm when you do keep going after a topic.”
Bringing his wings into the visible plane when he was particularly nervous was a habit that Samandriel had developed at some point and really wished he hadn’t. Everyone had tells, he supposed, and at least this time, he kept them at his back and wasn’t curling them defensively around himself to try to protect soft, emotional bits.
“I don’t entirely know where I stand with you. I know where I stand with absolutely everyone else in my heart, but you remain a mystery to me.” He smiled, but it was almost edging towards sad. “You’re not the only one on uneven ground here.”
“You are doing fine,” he said, reaching out to touch the wings. The smile was back, not offended in the slightest. “Relax.”
He wasn’t entirely sure how to put everything that he was thinking into perspective. Compliments were not very easy for him to take. They were often a little different than how he thought of himself. He considered himself to be a pretty selfish guy, right until it came to those he cared for and then there was a selflessness to him that was pure. “I’m going to remember the marble thing. You are right about the questions too. I do have a lot of them.”
His smile went from the usual one to one that was softer. “Those questions are killing me. I’m turning into something that I didn’t think existed, due to dreams of me in a life that I have no memory of but it feels like I did it. I’m going to die. As if it isn’t enough to need blood all the time, and to have all these strange powers, I am going to die for it to be complete. I don’t know what the hell I am supposed to do with that, or what I am supposed to think. I am not going to have a wife or kids like my brother, and I am going to see history long after everyone is gone. That’s why I said after the transformation because I am on overload, and I have no idea what I am doing, or when the next round of dreams will show me what an asshole I am.” Those were truths he hadn’t told Elena or anyone else. They were his truths, his insecurities, and he didn’t really have a choice in the matter.
Damon’s truths were almost as heartbreaking as Samandriel’s, more actually, but in different ways. Fingers against feathers felt rather like fingers running through his hair, a gentle, intimate gesture that Samandriel could only reciprocate by resting his hand on Damon’s chest. “I don’t know if you were impacted at all by the mess with the stones, but I had the misfortune of picking one up and finding myself face to face with a...a nightmare version of myself. All the power that I had at the time and yet with all the goodness people keep telling me I possess replaced with nothing but cruelty. He…” Samandriel looked down at his hand on Damon’s chest, his fingers slightly curled against the fabric of his shirt.
“He kicked the shit out of me,” because one of them was willing to fight dirty and the other wasn’t, “took photos and convinced my boyfriend and my brother that I was dead when really he’d bound me up with sigils and left me buried under the floorboards in my best friend’s room while he gave her the dreams my brother’s husband has of his four decades in hell. He nearly killed Dean twice, absolutely destroyed any remaining relationship I could possibly have with my parents, actually giving my mother the idea to blackmail Lucifer...put my best friend in a coma for almost a week, probably longer if I hadn’t gotten out to save her and…” Samandriel licked his lips, continuing, “and got things to the point where Lucifer had to put a very special bullet right between that thing’s eyes just to stop him from causing more damage.”
He looked up at Damon again. “I know a thing or two about monsters and dark creatures. You aren’t either of those things. It’s hard, looking out into the future and knowing that there is no conceivable end for you, utterly overwhelming. I know. God, I know. But that doesn’t mean that any of us have to do any of this alone.” Samandriel leaned in and brushed a kiss against Damon’s cheek, speaking even softer, “Your dreams tell you you’re an asshole, and mine tell me I’m not worth saving. I don’t think either one of us believes that to be true about the other.”
“I don’t know if that’s it exactly, being a dark creature. The teeth,” he smiled, showing the points, “they really are all the rage. This is that unknown. I am going to physically die. I don’t know when it is going to happen, but one day I will wake up and my heart won’t.” Part of his joking nature covered up the disturbing thoughts that plagued him. “I’ve seen me in dreams, how I handle the blood, the death, and I do what I have to do. I don’t love it, but I can find a way.”
“What do I do about Elena? She’s human. She can have a life, family, everything, and with my non-beating heart, I can’t give it to her.” That had just come to him recently. In her dreams, she wasn’t a vampire, and she wasn’t in anyone else's yet either. “Could you give up Lucifer if you had to?”
He leaned his head against the man’s. There was something between them that was different from nearly any other relationship in his life, and he liked it. Samandriel had made it to the inner circle that Damon only opened to very few.
Samandriel’s first response to the strange sort of intimacy that had built up between them was to protect Damon further, wings stretching and then encircling them both. His hand found the other man’s waist, resting just above his hip.
“I think you should be asking that question to her,” he said softly, quietly enjoying the press of Damon’s head against his own. “Her life is her own to make her decisions with, and not yours or anyone else’s.”
“Lucifer and I are complicated, in a way. In the dreams, I’ve already lost him once. Here we’ve had maybe too many talks or maybe not enough of them together about my angelhood or what functional immortality means in a practical sense. The only reason I can imagine giving up Lucifer is to save him, to protect him and while it’d be hard, I’d do it. It’d be just as hard to imagine walking away from you or Castiel or Abigail, but if I had to, I would.” Disloyalty and abandonment weren’t traits that ran strong in the young angel, and that was that sort of action felt like, for the greater good or not.
Samandriel didn’t know how Damon had managed to end up feeling so vital to him so quickly, just another person that he could be this close with and not worry about feeling locked up within himself somehow, like he was going to be judged or dismissed. If his and Lucifer’s relationship weren’t so solid and open, Damon might well have been dangerous.
“I can hear your heart beating,” he whispered, nose pressed lightly against the other man’s cheek before he shifted so that they were cheek to cheek, even if there wasn’t any dancing, “the shifting of your lungs with every breath.” The heat radiating off of Damon’s body, shifting in intensity the further parts of him were from his core. “One day, you’ll be aware of all that too, won’t you?” He licked his lips, knowing that such a movement was impossible to hide with their closeness. He had other things to say, but couldn’t find the phrasing for the fact that Damon would be aware of every shifting bit of angelic blood in wings that most people couldn’t even perceive, that the night would not be silent or full of fear to their ears or eyes. Instead, what he came up with was, “it seems strange to me that you don’t seem to understand that I see your first instinct to be the same as mine: to protect.” That vampires tended to protect themselves first didn’t mean much. The instinct was still the same.
There were some things that Damon was looking forward to, and it was a contrast to the reservations that he had about being a vampire. “I think I will take the ultimate travel package. I can see everything in world, watch all the new movies coming out, and never get old. Those are things I want. I’ll take the strength, power, compulsion, speed, and even hearing.” His attitude shifted from nervous, to amused again, just letting everything he felt flow through him without trying to cut it off.
“I think I heard my name in there as well. I am the same, protective, at least of those who are close,” he smiled. The angel was protective and really he was just as protective. They came from completely different places, were heading towards different planes altogether, but there were similarities that couldn’t be denied. He was also nearly drunk off the wings, and this whole trip. It was almost as if time stood still and left them in one of the most beautiful places in the world. This was just not possible in any sort of ‘normal’.
His eyes closed, trying to listen, to become aware of all those things that surrounded him. He wasn’t quite there yet, but he was beginning to picture it. There was a rush that came with all of the power. “You know the rocks brought out that evil side, and they made me so sick that I couldn’t move. I think we both got fucked on the deal, but you aren’t like that. I know that. You aren’t turning into that either.”
His head turned, and the angel’s neck was there. He felt his teeth, and a hunger. “Now that is something I’m going to have to control.” He stepped back a little bit, shocked back into reality.
It was still a little strange for Samandriel to not have to look up at one of the men he allowed this close. Strange, but not bad. “That’s why I added in the parts about your dreams telling you you’re an asshole and mine telling me I’m worthless,” he pointed out gently. “We are not our dreams, and we might not have any control over what happens to our bodies in this whether they even stay our bodies or not, but we can control what we do with the gifts we’ve been given.”
He made sure to hold the other man’s gaze as he kept talking. “You don’t have to be the thing you’re afraid of and neither do I even if we’re both going to have to hide what we are from much of the world.” For their own safety and that of the people who mattered to them. It wasn’t the appointed time yet, but Samandriel couldn’t help but press another kiss to Damon’s cheek, chaste and fleeting. They’d had an agreement and as much as the angel wanted to know what those lips tasted like before they went cold, he wasn’t going to break anyone’s promises for them. “On the days you can’t hold onto that truth yourself, I’ll give you a hand.” It could help, he thought, to know that an angel believed in your goodness even though Damon didn’t know that most angels weren’t like Samandriel at all.
He stretched his wings again and put them back in the pocket dimension where they generally belonged and went for the bottle of wine that he’d rightfully stolen. “We really are an unlikely pair, aren’t we?” Samandriel asked, smirking as he took a drink. The wine was definitely far too expensive for its own good. Shame it wouldn’t be enough to get him drunk, but he’d enjoy the taste of it for its own sake.
Damon stayed where he was for a moment, in that same reflective state. ‘The truth shall set you free’, he thought, feeling more like himself. He was relieved, as those issues were things he had been struggling with. He was calmer as he picked up a glass of wine. “We are a very unlikely pair, and I wouldn’t change it.” Blunt and honest. He wouldn’t change this very unconventional relationship, because as much as he wanted to deny the existence of Heaven and the hereafter, he needed to know it was there, and he liked the angel.
“Don’t get me wrong, I am a real dick at times. You are not worthless.” He took a drink and stretched his legs in front of him. He liked the view from the little table. “I do have some good, I guess. I haven’t always made the best choices, but even in dreams, I care. I can’t seem to turn it off. The funny thing is that I’m only afraid of losing people, not of becoming a vampire. I have the worst time letting go.” That was a lot of truth at once. He couldn’t seem to stop everything from seeping out in a rather random order.
He took the bottle and filled the glass again. “Where do you think we would be if we hadn’t started all of this transformation business?”
Samandriel considered the question heavily for a moment. “I’d still be an only child living with a mother who sees me as more of a commodity than a human being, much less her son, and a father who is too afraid of her to actually stand up ever. I’d be hiding my relationship with Lucifer as diligently as possible as it’s technically illegal and if my mother wished to press charges, she would, though I suppose I should be glad that she just opted for extortion instead.”
He leaned back against a tree, looking out over the vineyard. “I wouldn’t have a list as long as my arm from licensed medical professionals, who, hilariously, aren’t my actual therapist, permitting me to finish out my senior year from home. I’d still have my perfect SAT scores, so I suppose that’s something, and I’d probably be in the middle of applying to colleges I had no desire to attend because I’m so burned out on school it’s not even funny, but I’d still pick an institution that had an art therapy program because in the end I do want to help people angel or not. I’m not sure we’d know each other at all. I’d have no reason to post about the apocalypse being canceled nor any desire to get into a theological debate.
If we did meet, it’d probably be because there was some sort of Model UN event or Debate Tournament being held at your school and you just happened to be there. At which point, I probably would have smiled politely at you in a suit that was tailored far, far too well, because of course I’m still dating Lucifer and he refuses to let me go anywhere in the kinds of things I was wearing and then I would’ve forgotten all about it. Or I would’ve checked out your ass and then forgotten all about it, but most likely I would have been too focused on what I needed to be doing that your existence would have been secondary to absolutely everything else in the world.” Samandriel shrugged. “Either way, we would not be trespassing on Italian wine country, drinking stolen goods.”
The angel frowned, looking down at his all too expensive shoes. “I’m okay with all of it except the not knowing you or Castiel."
Damon just listened, smiling once in awhile at the long explanation from the angel who seemed to be having the same word vomit issues that Damon was. “I should have guessed that you were one of those kids with the perfect scores. You have a natural intelligence that comes out beyond years.” He continued sipping the wine, a bit more comfortable with all that tumbled from his lips.
“I was the underachiever. I could have done better, could have done worse. I partied a lot, and my father used to tell me that I was going to waste all my opportunities to make something out of myself. He always expected me to fail, to embarrass him, to end up in jail, or knocking some girl up.” Damon looked out at the sky, which reflected back in his eyes. “I never knew how to please him, but I tried. I really did try. I went to UC Irvine, got a degree, and it isn’t so bad being a high school history teacher. What the fuck could I have done?” There was no way he would be putting his relationship with his father in such terms if he wasn’t busy spilling the truth. “I was the oldest. I should have been setting the example, not trying to stick my hand up every skirt I came across. Finally I just said fuck it.”
“I’m keeping you. Hell, I tell you things that I haven’t told anyone, and it isn’t just my love of the great philosophical debate. And I look great in everything I wear from suits to my black leather,” he told him, turning those blue eyes on the angel. That part was simple. He had a lot of good things since the dreams came. Elena, Stefan, Nat, Bekah, and the family, and he had an angel. “Our relationship does defy logic. An angel and an agnostic vampire to be.” He laughed again as he took a drink. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Samandriel arched a brow, mouth pulling into a deviously playful smirk. “Now now, Damon. Don’t be a tease and mention keeping me in the same breath as black leather unless you actually plan on putting out.”
The comment nearly made him laugh, but he kept his usual level of cool. The smirk was present, and he was amused, and interested at the same time. He couldn’t do anything now, of course, but his impending transformation left a lot in question. “Now Sammy, patience is a virtue, not that I would actually know that. I’m not properly dressed though. Damn, temptation.” If he was with anyone other than Elena, there would be no holding back. Damn, damn temptation. He folded his arms, clad in the blue sport jacket, more appropriate for Lux, just for effect. He was teasing, of course, but damn, damn temptation.
Samandriel laughed. “If anyone else called me Sammy, they might get a very stern reminder not to ever do that again.” There was real happiness in his eyes, crinkling at the corners even in the dark. “Instead, I’m more concerned that there seems to be a preoccupation with the men in my life and making me wait.” His gaze raked over Damon’s lounging form. “You know I can feel you checking me out far more than the obvious, right? I’ve gotten good at filtering out most everything, but when you’re that loudly intrigued...”
The young angel shifted his weight onto his back leg. “Is it the wings? Or maybe the taboo? I suppose that begs the question of will I still be interesting when I’m legal? For both you and Lucifer.” Samandriel’s expression fell just a bit, having not considered that before. There shouldn’t have been any question where he stood with Lucifer, and there definitely wasn’t one when it came to Castiel (below Dean, always.) Now that the thought had entered his mind though, it was hard to shake. Would his birthday bring true freedom or just the end of the slight thrill of perhaps being caught? He had to hope it was the former. To believe it to be true with his whole being or it might undo him. He made a mental note to speak on it with Lucifer later.
“Can you?” He considered that for a moment but held no embarrassment at all. “Good thing I don’t deny that, not that I could right now. I don’t think I can actually lie.” He had noticed that, not only tonight, but earlier in the day. His normal vocabulary was laced with sarcasm, and was often veiled just enough to have a double meaning. “I am hardly one to worry about taboo. I was seeing one of Elena’s friends, or fucking her really, while she was in my class. Then there was her twin sister. Katherine got one up on me when I was drunk though, so I gave in, fucked her, got into it with my brother. I am a relationship disaster, but great in bed.” He took a drink of wine and laughed. “Oh fuck, that sounds bad. In dreams, I think I called myself the eternal stud.”
His eyes came back to the angel. “Now that we’ve explored my not so perfect history, Elena. I actually waited until she was 18. I’m only 23, not like a dirty old man or anything. Still - she loves me, and I don’t really deserve it. She’s good and sweet, and I’m a twisted piece of shit who will turn into a vampire, and I don’t know where that leaves us at all.” He put a hand over his face, looking up at the stars - truth really was word vomit.
Samandriel considered all of that and decided that the best place to start was by simply saying, “Lucifer’s 42, and I think briefly considered actually waiting until I was legal to do anything but be the biggest cocktease in the world, but ultimately I won that battle of wills.” Ultimately, Samandriel won most battles of will in this life. It seemed to go much better for him here than in the dreams. “The other two men I share myself with are 34 and 37, so I really wouldn’t be in a position to judge if you happened to be a dirty old man. Though with all these words and names you keep dropping, I’m getting the impression that you’ve not actually ever found yourself bending anyone but a woman over your desk.”
He walked over to Damon and crouched down in front of him, one hand on his knee to bring his attention away from the endlessness of the sky above them and back down to something more grounded. It was just after he made that movement that he was really very glad he hadn’t made an oral exam joke instead though it had been on the tip of his tongue. “You have to stop thinking of yourself as a piece of shit. You’re not.” Licking his lips, Samandriel looked down briefly before he met Damon’s eyes again. “Tell me what you think of me.” He wasn’t fishing for compliments, and it’d been clear throughout the night (though Damon was the one to say it first) that neither of them was capable of lying to the other. There was a reason for him asking, and he’d enlighten Damon as soon as the opportunity came for him to make his point properly.
Hearing that Lucifer and the other two, one of which he thought might be Castiel, were older was actually more reaffirming than anything. Damon’s moral fiber had been called into question more than once, and he wasn’t one to consider himself an upright citizen, he wasn’t completely twisted. “Elena’s parents died, so I didn’t really push it,” he said, still wondering what she saw in him, and if that would continue past his immortal state. He wouldn’t be able to give her a family, and he wasn’t going to age. Those could both be a factor in an unknown future.
“Now, I’ve just given you highlights. We can say my college years were a little more hedonistic, but the one nighters didn’t have as much of an impact. I’ve crossed the road,” he said, shrugging. He didn’t have any issues with sexuality, or any acts that he had committed - absolutely none were unwelcome. That was why the temptation was there, and also why he indulged it.
When the angel knelt before him, Damon straightened up. His eyes didn’t really believe. His father had told him over and over how he was a disappointment. He had nearly been thrown out of the family gatherings after his feud with Stefan, and was still the black sheep. He rarely talked about it, becoming quite good at downplaying how he actually felt. “You are - ,” he paused, blue eyes focused, “fascinating, not many can give me a challenge that holds my interests.” He tipped his head to the side, “Tempting, goes without saying. Good. Definitely good. I would even go with a little intoxicating. I think I’m different with you than anyone I know. Is that even normal? I could just say that I want know you.” A dark brow arched, holding his position. “Same question to you.”
Those eyes felt like crosshairs to Samandriel, almost like he was being taken apart and judged for the worth of all his parts. “I think you’ve been wounded so deeply so many times that you’re perpetually on guard. I think you’re far more caring and attentive than you ever let anyone see because it would ruin the image you’ve crafted so carefully to keep yourself safe. I know deep down you believe every last horrible thing that anyone has ever said about you, and I think you repeat those things in their voices whenever you make a mistake to remind yourself how terrible a person you are. But here’s the thing,” the angel said softly.
He rose up and pressed their foreheads together in lieu of the kiss he was practically aching for, leaning over Damon and bracing his weight on the arms of the chair. “If those things were completely true, you wouldn’t be here with an angel who can see past all your walls and armor to your very soul, one who wants desperately to kiss you so you can feel the depth of his conviction.” His weight shifted onto one arm, fingers carding through dark hair, while he kept speaking quietly, “An angel who is pretty sure he’s at least a little bit in love with you and that that feeling will diminish not at all even when your heart stops.” Samandriel was almost entirely certain he shouldn’t have said that last bit, should have kept it to himself, but Damon, he thought, needed the knowledge that someone Good felt that way more than Samandriel needed to save himself the embarrassment.
But sticking his neck out only went so far, and he knew that he wasn’t ready yet to hear Damon’s response. His options were limited and the only one that didn’t involve abandoning the conversation completely was breaking the rules. Breaking the rules won out, and he figured it should have been no surprise at all. His lips met Damon’s, slow and far too sensually for someone who had been working so hard at being chaste and staying Good.
Damon couldn’t say that Samandriel was wrong. He had absolutely no argument for the fact that the angel was pretty dead on. He wasn’t sure if he liked someone absolutely seeing right through him. His brow furrowed a little bit, as he felt the stone walls crack. Maybe it was the fact that he couldn’t lie. He wasn’t entirely sure.
He opened his mouth to speak but found himself listening to more. A little bit in love, made his eyes widen. Words, which usually flowed off the tip of his tongue, were just gone completely. That was a very rare thing, being stunned into silence. His breathing was nearly as silent. He was aware of the kiss, which brought back whatever part was stubbornly trying to process. Much to his surprise, he found himself returning it in response. His hand moved up the man’s chest, taking a fistful of his shirt, adding an intensity to the kiss that even he hadn’t expected.
He let the man go a moment later. The look on his face had moved from shock, back to his usual smirk, which broadened into a devil grin. As his lips peeled back, he revealed fangs that were more pronounced than they were when he relaxed. “They speak for themselves.” It was a typical Damon answer, although the kiss answered far more questions for words he simply didn’t have.
That Damon not only kissed him back, but kissed him harder almost with a kind of desperation that threw Samandriel for just as much of a loop as Damon apparently had been by those five short words in the first place. At some point during the kiss, probably around the part where his shirt was being grabbed, the young angel found himself actually in Damon’s lap. He was still a little breathless when he saw those fangs. Those fangs did speak for themselves, they spoke the same kinds of volumes that the constant pulse of deep emotional intimacy they’d kept up through the night had had on other more obvious parts of Samandriel. Parts he’d been diligently ignoring no matter how much desire and temptation he felt radiating off of Damon in turn.
Now, however, it seemed that was returned in near equal measure. It took him a beat to gather his thoughts again. Samandriel kept that closeness, almost afraid to move away. His gaze dropped down to the much more obvious shift in his trousers only briefly. Samandriel’s shoulders rolled back a bit, helping him to stretch out his neck in a way he knew was deliberately tempting, but for Damon he spread his wings again, glowing just a little brighter with their own light than they usually did. “I think I’ve developed two new kinks in the span of knowing you, and that eventually, sharing my blood is going to be just another consummation of this intimacy that’s seemed to always exist between us.”
He leaned in and brushed his nose against Damon’s, briefly catching his lower lip on one fang, though not enough to actually break skin. “But I’m glad it’s mutual in its way,” he whispered against those lips, acknowledging what he believed to be Damon’s feelings on both what had been built (was still being built) between them, and Samandriel’s own awkward admissions.
Damon didn’t make him move, not that he had really thought a lot about the motion very much. Damon had a face that had a cool exterior and with a pit of molten lava at the core. His fangs were a symbol of hunger, physical, sexual, and angry. All were forms of a desire that did indeed exist. He reached up and touched the vein of Samandriel’s neck. “I’m getting used to the idea of feeding, not just for hunger. I actually like the pleasure aspect, feeling someone’s blood, warm and wet. Vampire lore states that it is more intimate than sex.” His tongue licked over the points of his teeth. “I think I can understand that one. I’m not sure about testing it yet, but the desire is there.” More admissions. They were driving him crazy, twisting his head in all sorts of directions.
He reached up and touched the wings, fingers running down the center, instead of staying along the edges. How had he even gotten used to a man with wings was beyond him, but the fact that he was becoming a vampire was well beyond any form of reason. “What are those kinks?” His voice rumbled, low and smooth as he reached for the wine. He swirled it over his tongue, never losing that eye contact even for a second.
Samandriel couldn’t help the way his breathing fluttered a bit as Damon’s fingers smoothed down his neck. Damon spoke and Samandriel could feel himself wanting more just at the sound of his voice, the way he refused to look away. The contact with his wings was what broke him, a soft sound slipping out his throat and between slightly parted lips. The beginning of a moan, just barely too low to be a whimper.
“Your teeth are definitely one of them,” he replied, not backing down from that gaze either. “The other is more standard run of the mill fucking figures of authority type thing. Less a man in a suit and more a man with a gradebook and a lesson plan.” Samandriel had been a student far, far too long, and that suddenly had an appeal he hadn’t been expecting. “When you’re fully what you’re becoming, I’ll probably be able to add combat foreplay to the list too.”
His fingers finally slipped out of Damon’s hair, traced along the line of tendon in his neck and rested lightly at the overlap of buttons on his shirt. “Blood is life,” he whispered, tracing one of the tiny plastic circles with the tip of his finger. “To willingly offer it is to offer life and vitality, and if some traditions are to be believed, a piece of your soul. Of course it’s more intimate than sex. There’s no real primal sacrifice involved in sex, something ancient and powerful enough to make the gods listen.” His gaze raised to meet Damon’s once more. “At least that's the lore."
Damon had found a pleasure point in those wings and he knew it. The smirk on his face was telling enough. It was also something that he would remember. It shouldn’t have surprised him, really. The veins were also a source of life, of blood flow, a lot like a neck, and maybe even the feeding ritual. He was not about to bite into them, although the thought was there.
“It’s no wonder there is a general sexuality about vampires that can’t really be denied. No matter how they kill, there is always that seductive quality.” Even Damon was attracted to that particular aspect of the impending transformation. “Hunger and need are pretty fucking intense all by themselves, and that doesn’t even tap onto the actual sharing bit.” His eyes were on that neck, transfixed by the thought.
His eyes finally left, moving back upward. “So my gradebook is a turn on?” he laughed a little in that low rumble. “I could always gel my hair into place, put on some glasses. I don’t really like to look the part, at least not every day.” Of course he could be talked into it, and he would have a great time playing the role. “Are there others you take a fascination, or interest in?”
The tension between them had built to such a fog that Samandriel could barely see through it. He swallowed, well aware that he was wrapped so neatly around Damon’s finger. Still straddling his lap was helping absolutely nothing, but there they were, both too close and not close enough with fangs and wings at the ready.
“Less your gradebook and more the authority implied by it,” Samandriel corrected softly, eyes not leaving Damon’s face. “It’s a running theme. Lucifer, the archangel only equaled in power by Michael and only weaker than God himself.” He tested his boundaries, undoing a button. “Castiel, who started a war to bring free will to heaven, who defeated the one remaining archangel up there to end it.” Another button. “Dean Winchester, the man who stopped the apocalypse, who was meant from day one to be Michael’s vessel.” He looked down at his fingers and then back up at Damon. He was really beginning to regret that he eschewed sport coats for vests. Rarely did the expertly tailored garment feel as constricting as it did just now.
“And then there’s you.” He reached up to brush his thumb gently along the other man’s lower lip. “Right now my plan is to tempt you, to continue this dance until you end up pinning me down and taking what’s been offered to you. Until all you can think in that moment is ‘Mine,’ and for whatever time we spend together, it’ll be true.” Because that was how Samandriel did sex. No one else mattered except for the person he was with when he was having it. It was the only right way in his mind to fuck. “But the number of ways you and I could play with each other? Oh, those are nearing infinite. Particularly when you consider that Lucifer is very fond of watching.” Samandriel leaned close enough to whisper against those lips, breath warm and just begging for another kiss by proximity alone. “Your move, Damon.”
Damon watched the first button pop, and then the second. He made no effort to stop in although he had a war going in his brain. He could have had a devil and angel whispering in his ear and he was completely torn. His finger trailed from the man’s chin, down his chest. He had arched into the touch. His body could feel that tension, and it was sweet, pumping his veins. The other voice, his own angel, warned him of his own words. I just don’t want to screw it up.
There was also the word vomit that was going to come with what he was doing, but dammit, that man was pulling cards that were working. Very deliberately, he picked up the angel and stood him up. He stood with him, putting his hands on his shoulders. “I can’t believe I am fucking doing this. I can’t believe it. Because - ,” he was fighting for the right words, but they were all going to come at once, “I will do that. I will attack, and there won’t be much left of any buttons, and - .” He paused, an incredulous look in his eyes. “I can’t hurt her. I can’t. Even if I want to. I just - dammit why do I have to be responsible right now.” He was breathing a little harder, but his eyes were every bit as bold and intense as they had always been.
“I am not - fuck - you know I am leaving options open, because - I have to. I don’t know what will happen when I change, what Elena will want with me, and vampires are hedonistic in the first place, so -. Dammit, I want those possibilities.” There were very few times when Damon was truly flustered, and this was one of them. His body was begging to attack, and he was going against everything that he had been before he met Elena. He loved her.
“Fucking word vomit,” he said, stepping back. He took the bottle and drank, handing it to Samandriel.