Exhaustion finally propelled Angel upstairs to collapse onto his bed; the sleep he feared didn't creep up on him, it ambushed him. In Morpheus' dubious care, he was trapped in his own memories, trapped in a very personal dreamtime. His own past, himself and the childe he drove to his death the only players. Not the recent past either, but a much more distant past. The night of his very first meeting with the man who would become first his beloved William, then be abandoned to become his troublesome William the Bloody and finally, in the fullness if time, his estranged childe Spike.
The warmth emanating from young William was far more than a simple physical reaction to his simply being alive. It was a true reflection of his inner being. It was his smile, his laugh, even his polite greeting to a stranger just before they collided. An apology, kissing his lips like carolling angels. It was all the dark haired vampire could do not to steal him away, Angelus had fallen hard for that so naive mortal in those first moments. And with no immediate ideas of turning him, not then, not ever, not really. Angelus was prepared to take all the time in the world in this angel's seduction. Somehow he knew it would be so worth it.
"Forgive me, sir, I wasn't paying sufficient attention. I trust I didn't hurt you at all through my dereliction of care and attention?" The brown haired young man reached out a hand to prevent Angelus from any possibility of falling over. His concern so very evident at the other man's somewhat stunned appearance. What he did not know, nor could possibly understand, was that the dark man before him was entranced by the pair of clear blue eyes that looked up to his own face so shyly. And the young man attached to those bluer than sky eyes was no hardship to look upon either. So pure, so innocent, so very ripe for corruption. He smiled, slowly letting it enter his own eyes, mimicking mortal friendliness to perfection.
"Why, good sir, 'tis surely not all your fault now. You're a full grown man and if I'd been paying any attention at all I'd surely have seen a man such as yourself quite clearly. That I didn't is clear indication of my own lack of attention. I trust I didn't hurt you either, young sir?" Angelus had turned on the charm, he let a hand drift over the nearest forearm, beseeching reassurances, welcoming platitudes. Touching but not gripping.
"I am quite well, quite fine." The young man blushed, like a delicate rose in full bloom. Ripe for Angelus to pick it. And Angelus had never had a greater interest in horticulture than he did at that moment.
"Liam, Liam Saunders" Angelus stuck his hand out towards the now stunned young man and grinned at him. Giving him a name, granted his own true forename but one of many false names he used to travel freely around the mortal world. Showing him a cheeky grin offered in open friendship. Finally his young quarry responded in true civilised manner.
"William Mansfield, hello." He took the pro-offered hand and shook it firmly, but briefly, returning the grin in full measure with one of his own.
"Well, William m'lad, how about you and I go sit in yonder coffee house and get better acquainted? I'm kinda fresh to London, just arrived back from Paris and find myself in need of a friendly face and good company." He lowered the intensity of his smile to a warm, jovial one. Less intimidating, more just openly friendly.
William responded as Liam thought he would, he glanced over to the coffee house Liam mentioned and then back at the man before him, finally he glanced at his pocket watch and smiled.
"Well, I could spare a little time, mother is not expecting me back for a full half of an hour yet. Yes, I'd be happy to join you." He smiled a little hesitantly and indicated the other side of the road. "Shall we adjourn to the coffee house and a far warmer and quieter arena in which to converse?"
"Surely, my friend, surely." Liam placed a light, almost glancing touch to the small of the younger man's back and ushered him safely over the busy street, dodging the mess from horses and the debris from such a densely populated city. And so began the painfully slow seduction of his William. His, and only his, gentle William.
It had been so easy to insinuate himself into this sweet young man's life, so shy and yet, so desperate for friendship. The young mortal had a deep seated hunger for attention. So Angelus took it upon himself to feed that hunger until that beautiful young man was satiated, and no longer so needful that he looked everywhere for friendship. His William now looked only to him to fulfil that need. They became a familiar pair in certain social circles. Angelus introduced his William to so many pleasures, but slowly. He had had the time to take it at his mortal's pace. His lady's were in the north, touring a few estates with the entourage of young nobles and moneyed young men that they had enraptured. Well away from the temptation that was his William, where he wanted them. For the moment.
Even though at first he was annoyed that he had been left behind, alone in London until serendipity brought him into collision with young William Mansfield. Where upon his new adventure begun. Angelus had so long enjoyed the seduction of the innocent that he revelled in this new game. A game of conquest. William soon lost himself in the far more ebullient personality that was his new friend Liam's charming self. Just as had been Angelus' intention. Not only did he loose his need for friendship to his new friend, he lost everything to him.
However, it was a far greater shock when Angelus had found himself lost and captive to his William in turn. In all his years of hunting, of preying on the mortal world he had never once lost his heart to a mortal. Most certainly he had never been this drawn to a man so innocent. And drawn he was.
It had been a good six weeks, filled with theatre, opera, even music halls and a great deal of laughter. The nights spun past them both in a plethora of very private dinners for two, long conversations, brief touches of fingers against gentle flesh. William had gladly given his innocence to his new friend. Just as Liam willingly gave his body to his William in return. It was a love affair.
It had been during one such late supper for just the two of them that Liam had hosted in his rooms that their friendship blossomed into the next stage. William was a swift and perceptive student, he had quickly learned how to use his lips and tongue and hands to pleasure Liam. Tasting the wine they had shared as they kissed. William had never questioned Liam about his much lower body temperature after Liam explained what he truly was. On the contrary, all he did on that memorable night they first made love was smile at his friend and suggest they built up the fire, even though it was a warmly comfortable Autumn evening.
"Why should we do that?" Liam quizzed his so very desired friend.
"It'll make you more comfortable to touch, to hold, to do this to.." And hesitantly, that shy, wanton man had slid a hand inside Liam's shirt to stroke the side of his friend's body.
"Sweet William, do you know what you're saying? For surely, this is the one and only chance you get to change your mind before I make you part of my heart forever!" Liam had truly believed he meant every word of his declaration. By the light he saw in his William's eyes, he knew his friend did believe Liam meant his offer.
"My dear Liam, I have graduated from Oxford University you know. I fully know what I am saying, what I am asking of you. If you are willing to teach - I am willing to learn." And he had leaned over and kissed Liam one more time, trailing that hand within the Irishman's shirt up his back to hold him close.
"Then slowly, my William, we go slowly. Come, let's eat!" And both man and vampire had laughed at Liam's declaration. It being common knowledge between them that only one of them would truly dine that night. William, as always, ate the food and watched, enraptured, as Liam drank his goblet of fresh blood. It had been such a pleasant shock to discover that his William was neither repulsed nor revolted by his true nature.
Liam had made a nest of blankets and pillows before the fire, settling his sweet William beneath him, helping him to divest himself of his confining garments. Many soft entreaties were shared, many voraciously hungry kisses.
They had gloried in their mutual exploration of their naked bodies. Delighting in the touch and feel of each other. Liam stroked William to an almost painful hardness, he whispered softly to him all the time. Showing him, telling him what they would do together, guiding his hands, and in an uncharacteristic moment, let his William take him as his gift for allowing him his virginity. Liam straddled William's hips after they had stretched him together, getting his William used to such activities. Sliding slowly, impaling himself on William's deliciously hard cock, for the first time in almost one hundred years Angelus was letting another man fuck him. This time by choice. Not since the Master had staked his authority over the vampire had Angelus allowed himself to be on the receiving end of this act. Whereas before it had been duty and his place to do this, this time it was all about joy. His and his William's.
"Buck up, meet me half way, my William. That's it, slowly at first, let's find ourselves a sweet pace." Liam kept up a litany of endearments and encouragments as he let his lovely boy fuck him. Never showing a seconds discomfort on his face, lest he frighten his boy off this act before it was his turn to take, he purred deep in his throat, showing his delight. They moved faster and faster, Liam guided William's gentle fingers around his own hard cock and the stroked together.
"You are so beautiful, so wonderful, so generous, so... so..." William ran out of sufficiently emotive terms right about the time he ran out of brain power to think them with. He gave up all pretence to civilisation as he felt the tension building up, the pressure in his groin was such it was fit to explode. Speeding up their stroking Liam brought himself ever closer to William's ready state, but William's body ran out of patience. The young mortal man orgasmed, for the first time he spilled his sexual fluids in the body of another person. He filled his beloved Liam. "I'msorryI'm sorrytooquicktoosoon..." It all became a jumble of sounds and words, but Liam knew what he was trying to say. The feelings so evident in William's eyes. Even now his lover's thoughts were for his enjoyment.
"Shhhh, sweet William, my turn will come. Now, if I'm not mistaken?" And he lifted himself free of William's softening cock, smiling, teasing, laughing. He rolled them to lie side by side, himself right behind William. "Are you ready, my William?"
"Yes!" William had hissed back, a slight tremor in his voice.
"Sweet love." Liam whispered, his fingers entering William, smoothing his way with oil, warmed by the fire William had wanted. He stretched and readied his lover, ensuring there would be as little pain as either humanly, or demonically, possible.
Slowly he entered his William, he knew that this time he wouldn't last too long himself. Which would no doubt be to his William's benefit. Not too much for his first time. He rocked William in time to his short thrusts into his strained but still willing body. The heat was beyond anything Angelus could remember. Even from his previous mortal conquest, though they were normally unwilling participants, William's willingness to love, to join with him was enough to drive him over the top so fast. He came in a drawn out silent scream, fighting the urge to sink his fangs into his William's neck and drink him dry. This was about sharing, not conquest, not about adding to his standing as a sire. This was about something almost forgotten in all his time as a vampire. This was about love. Angelus' own possessive, twisted love for the fragile young mortal now drifting off to sleep in his arms, trusting him.
Their time together was a time isolated from reality, a time out of time. Until that had telegram arrived. The one telling them that Angelus' ladies would be returning to London slightly ahead of schedule. The vampire's feelings on their immanent arrival had transmitted themselves to his beautiful William, and the young man had been smiling for him. Just as excited as he at the immanent return of his lover's family, because he knew how important his family was to Liam.
They had just finished making love, on a night so similar to their first. Before a fire, both warm to the touch, bitter and sweet with cum and sweat. Angelus had had the devine warmth of William's body, heart and soul, wrapped around him when he told the young man that his ladies were returning to London, soon. William had smiled at him, a warm, loving smile and leaned over him, stroking a single finger over his facial ridges. Unafraid now to touch either the man or the demon. In love with them equally, always tender. William never treated the demon any differently than he did the man, he loved both.
"And I know you'll be so happy to have them back by your side. Your mother and daughter, where you no doubt think they'll always belong. I can see you, so easily, as a really protective father. No one should ever be allowed to touch your children." William had smiled, a warm loving smile. He used the terms he was familiar with, but Angelus had understood his meaning well enough. He had had to agree that the young mortal was in no means in error in his assumptions. He was a somewhat controlling and jealous sire. He didn't like sharing. "It's a father's duty to protect his children, a son's duty to protect his parents after all. I should like to think that, in the fullness of time, once I wed, that I too would make such a good father as you do for your Drucilla. If you have time once they return I should like to meet your Drucilla. To find out if she is as fragile as my minds eye casts her." William had continued to smile, to touch, to shine his love on Angelus.
That had been William's downfall. The images of his William entwined with a woman, any woman, fathering children in her body. The jealousy and rage that filled Liam, caused his demon self to react before thinking.
"You are mine! No one else's! Least of all some bovine half witted girl's baby machine." In his rage he drained his young lover. In his immediate grief he fed him his own blood. And in his certainty at having destroyed the sweetness that had been his William, he left the demon to arise and die, unaccompanied, untutored, damned to perish in his first and last morning's sun. But never unmourned.
In his last look at what had been his precious William the vision was clouded, blood everywhere and that spiked collar he had found, wrapped around his long, sensitive neck. The discontinuity of that item shocked him awake.
That hadn't happened in 1873, it hadn't. That collar is a new addition. He knew where he'd gotten it, but now he felt he should know what it meant. The fear of his dream recurring dragged Angel from his bed and downstairs to the few reference books that remained from his sacking Wesley and the others. There was something about that collar, something that filled him with a greater dread than ever before.
***
[Reviews - 0] [Kudos - 298]
Download story PDF format or ePUB format or MOBI format
Table of Contents
Download story PDF format or ePUB format or MOBI format
Table of Contents
Author's Chapter Notes:
Note: Guest appearances by members of the Greek Pantheon
Note2: The writing style may be a bit different in this chapter - I've tried to reflect the Victorian setting by the language used. Their English differed from modern English-English in it's more structured form and sesquipedalian leanings! I hope it works.
Dedication: to Vixen - a great sounding board, thanks a bundle luv!