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Most vampires find it odd that the doors of the church are not always open. As the night fades in, the faithful shut them— lock them too—and pray to keep the beasts out. Never mind the weary and poor and downtrodden, they have to wait for daylight to find God.
It's a laughable practice in the eyes of immortal beings. No door has ever saved a man from the ghouls of the night.
When Emmanuel locks the church doors and retires to his chambers, Mizrak slips out the back of the abbey and into the dark alleys of Machecoul. The moonlit jaunt makes him feel devious, no better than a thief or a harlet. He’s only gone to the inn across town two other times, but he knows that God has seen his transgressions and the guilt has begun to mount. He prays that his faith will outweigh his sins even as he hurries back for more.
The innkeeper ignores Mizrak when he emerges in the entryway, leaving him to find his room from memory. He’s not the first of the devout to stray through these halls, and he won’t be the last. The coming-and-going of holy men doesn’t interest the innkeeper anymore.
It’s not until Mizrak knocks on the door that he realizes that he has a bible in his hand. It’s the copy he studies from, the same one he’s had since childhood. He meant to take it to his quarters before leaving but had forgotten in his haste.
The door opens to an empty suite, Mizrak invites himself in, unamused by Olrox’s tricks. He sets his bible on the bed and heads to the window to check that no one’s followed him. A gust of cold air washes down his back and lets him know that he’s no longer alone. The bed creaks as Olrox’s corporeal form materializes from mist.
A few candles keep the room washed in orange light while the moon pours silver through the windows. Olrox notices the book on his bed before he greets Mizrak and reaches to examine it.
Dull iron buckles hold it closed like a book of secrets. Olrox sits at the edge of the bed ignoring the itchy sheets, and opens to a bookmarked page. Mizrak winces at the sound of the straps coming undone, a sound that has been familiar only to him until now. Embarrassment keeps his eyes trained on the street below the inn. If it was anyone else meddling with his things he would have threatened them for being so intrusive. He has so few possessions, and none more important than this one, but Olrox is not like anyone else.
Bright green eyes scan the pages paced by a slender finger tracing beneath each word. The margins are filled with notes and annotations, a few idle thoughts about the scriptures, and summaries of what priests have said about them. Olrox recognizes the fury of passion in the handwriting. Each stroke’s saturated with intention and devotion. Mizrak’s endless effort to unburden himself and give his heart over to faith is evident in the etchings. Clearer still is his struggle, shown in every strikeout and question mark, telling of how hard it’s been to obey, and perhaps how there lies chinks in his armor.
The sound of singing cuts through the tenuous silence between them. Perfect Latin sung in an operatic key that Olrox learned to love after a few trips to Europe. He can hear it with his preternatural ears, but Mizrak is none the wiser.
Lacrimosa dies ilia. Qua resurget ex favilla. Judicandus homo reus— “Mournful that day when from the dust shall rise guilty men to be judged,” Olrox repeats, chuckling softly as the implications of the song become clear. “He’s threatening you. Your reluctant demon.”
Reluctance. The gravely consonants of the word pull Mizrak from his distractions on the street. He turns to see Olrox waiting for a response about the night creature, but Mizrak would rather seek his own understanding.
“Why was the Belmont boy so afraid of you?”
That’s how the question finally leaves him, but it’s just a fraction of what he wants to know. How old are you? How dark are you? How afraid should I be of my own reluctance to accept what you are?
Olrox hadn’t noticed the dissonance, how Mizrak’s mild inquiry didn’t align with his heavy glare. He answers as succinctly and honestly as possible. “I’ve lived a long time as human and vampire. But I’ve only really loved once.”
Olrox can feel Mizrak’s gaze growing heavier, senses his body tensing. It’s unlike him to care so much about a human’s opinion, but he wants to explain it so it makes sense. He wants Mizrak to know he’s not the only one capable of devotion.
“He was from a small town in Massachusetts, if you’ve ever heard of that, which in those days was a colony.” Olrox glances back at the open pages of the bible, not reading any of it but appreciating how young the pages are to him—and how old they are to Mizrak—before closing it. “But he was not a colonist. He was proud to be Mohican, with roots deep in the land and forest. He burned with such passion…about the world, about how the people—‘the people,’ that’s how he talked—could win this thing called freedom. Even people like him.”
The more Olrox speaks the more he realizes how little Mizrak knows of the world. There’s oceans and centuries between them even when they’re standing in the same room. Despite the urge to cut himself off, he forges on, trying to explain a time and a man and a love that make no sense to this knight of God.
“People whose land had been stolen, I mean. Like mine was, oh, so long ago.” Olrox stares at the dancing light cast by the candles onto the floor, his truer emotions remain tucked neatly behind his expressionless face. “But he fought with them—the revolutionaries—he fought with them,” he confides.
New waves of frustration and dismay roll to the surface as Olrox recalls the valiant life of his one true love. The worst of his woe knots his brow, turns his face sour with quiet rage. “He almost made me believe in it too. Then Julia Belmont killed him.”
None of his confession moves Mizrak. He feels no pity nor empathy. All he hears is the story of a devil that corrupted a good man, a fate he desperately wants to avoid. Whenever Olrox is near he feels weak and subdued. His base begins to falter, giving way to a need that betrays everything he believes in. His body succumbs to the vampire in ways that it has never succumbed to God.
“Because he was a vampire. And you did that to him,” Mizrak spits, angry and scared. “Did you even ask permission?” He’s been lured against his will—or hopes he has—and he wonders, has Olrox always been like this? Taking lovers and molding them in his image? Sick with hubris and lust?
The truth is that Mizrak misunderstands the creature before him. He calls him a devil without considering the mark of humanity lingering in Olrox’s long-dead heart. He sees the evil glint in his emerald eyes, storming and dangerous, and feels how it captures his body’s attention. But what he misses is the staggering grief from so many lifetimes lived, the thirst for new delights in a world that ages so slowly, and the uncompromising pursuit of freedom. Mizrak looks into Olrox’s eyes and fails to see past his own moral failings reflected back to him.
Olrox doesn’t take kindly to the implication that he ruined his lover, moving from the bed and appearing in front of Mizrak in an instant. He leans in close so his words are not lost to the stale air in the room.
“I was in love with him,” he replies plainly. “I wanted him to be with me forever.”
His lips are close to Mizrak’s but he can’t sense his human heart racing like it did before when they met in the courtyard. Something about Mizrak has grown sturdier since then, more insistent upon understanding what it is they were doing in the shadow of night when no one was around to hear them.
“And is that what you have planned for me?” Mizrak asks, thinking that he’s finally figured it out; he’ll be be Olrox’s new lover, a plaything to sate his desires and curiosities.
Disinterested in dragging out their exchange, Olrox takes a step back. “Of course not, Mizrak. I’m not in love with you.”
Olrox smirks as the righteousness drains from Mizrak’s face, pulling his shoulders toward the ground, deflated. Neither of them were under the impression that what they were doing—indulging their flesh while the world spun into chaos—was anything like love. But hearing it put so plainly unnerved Mizrak, choked him of air, infuriated him in a way he barely understood.
“That’s a relief,” he gruffs. He lies.
Satisfied with regaining the upper hand, Olrox moves back in, pinning Mizrak against the window frame. “Then I’m glad I could unburden you.” He slides a hand down Mizrak’s chest and torso, then palms between his legs. “This is why you came here, not to share stories and hurt each other’s feelings.”
Mizrak grabs Olrox’s wrist and grunts, leaning in to speak clearly. “I’m not your plaything and I won’t do as you command.”
Olrox sighs, disappointed in the charade. He frees his hand then clasps both around Mizrak’s neck, snug but not suffocating. “Then leave, Mizrak.”
His fingers tighten, nails digging into Mizrak’s pulsating carotids. “If you’re the one in charge here, have me release you.”
“Your tricks do not scare me.”
“Then what do they do, exactly? I can hear how your pulse races when I get this close. If it’s not fear that I inspire, what is it?”
Olrox knows. Mizrak knows. Their bodies press together as they exchange heavy breaths, careful not to break away from each other’s gaze. They both know.
And perhaps there was more fear before they laid together, but that fear has swelled and grown into a carnal desire. They both know as much, but Mizrak wouldn’t dare admit it.
Instead, he kisses Olrox. Rough and needy. His teeth snip at the softness of Olrox’s lower lip before it’s pulled into his mouth. Mizrak pushes his tongue forward, licking as Olrox gasps.
“Fuck,” he growls, grabbing Olrox’s forearms to free himself from the vampire’s hold. “I do not like what you’ve done to me.”
Olrox laughs, quiet and hot. “I’m only doing what you allow.”
“Enough!” Mizrak commands, pulling Olrox’s waist against his own. He spins them so Olrox is backed against a wall, and slots a thigh between his legs, hitching it upward. The sharp breath that Olrox sucks in is satisfying yet inadequate. Mizrak turns his mouth to Olrox’s neck, dragging teeth and tongue over his skin until it’s red and swollen. He wants Olrox to know some semblance of the pain he’s caused. To feel devoured as his victims do.
Mizrak leaves a trail of bruises that he knows Olrox will heal by morning. He rids them of clothing that they’ll have to return to before the sun breaks the horizon. He lifts Olrox off the ground and grabs under his thighs to hold him up.
Their mouths meet again, lunging together, slick and insatiable. Olrox opens his maw and lets Mizrak fill it, fucking his tongue to the back of Olrox’s throat. He’s well braced, pinned between Mizrak’s body and the wall, but he throws his arms over Mizrak’s shoulders and holds on, capturing enough leverage to roll his hips forward.
Olrox’s cock finds the sweet friction of Mizrak’s abs, rutting against the sweat soaked skin. He’s keenly aware of how his ass rests on Mizrak’s hard length, rocking gently as they kiss, and dampening his ass from precum. The right angle lets him feel the girth against his entrance, and the muscle quivers with anticipation.
“Would it help if I asked for it?” Olrox pants, trying to catch Mizrak’s eyes before he drops his head to find more flesh to lave.
When he finally locks in on those brown irises, he finds that he doesn’t need an answer. He can see the conflict welling, torturing Mizrak endlessly. Where he stands, he must admit that he is not a man of faith or that his faith is devoid of the salvation that was promised. An impossible choice, so Olrox frees him from it.
“I’ll have my way whether you obey or not. It’s best to give me what I want.”
In those words lies permission, absolution. Gifts that Olrox rarely offers to feeble men.
Hearing them sets Mizrak loose. He reaches for his cock and guides it slowly, sliding the tip toward Olrox’s hole. He feels a smaller, softer hand meet his own, and they both push it in.
An unsteady sticky breath rattles from Mizrak’s chest as he’s squeezed. Olrox is surprisingly warm and impossibly tight and inexplicably slick. Blood rushes to Mizrak’s core, gorging Olrox’s hole until he hisses from the hot pleasure of being filled.
“Is this what you wanted?” Mizrak husks, throwing his hips forward. Hard, steady, and unrelenting.
“Yes! Nnn— yes. All of it.”
Olrox offers himself up as a sacrifice, penance for Mizrak’s sin. He takes him deeper with each devastating thrust. Lets his body be worked open recklessly. Lets Mizrak pull out nearly to the tip, then spear back in, moaning desperate curses. Mindless and wanton.
And Olrox takes it; the pain is not even a fraction of what his body has endured. The pain Mizrak offers is tortuous and intoxicating, and comes in waves that take Olrox to the edge without being touched.
When Mizrak’s body tightens at the precipice, Olrox rubs the back of his neck, brushing his lips against Mizrak’s ear. “Give me what I want,” he pants, answering the strength of Mizrak’s pumps with the roll of his hips.
He rides the cum out of him, pushing his hips forward in jagged spurts while the white hot seed gushes from him and runs down Mizrak’s leg.
Mizrak sets Olrox down and relies on the wall to support their weight. He drops his head on Olrox’s shoulder to catch his breath, soothed by the gentle sensation of Olrox’s fingers playing in his hair. “I— I should not keep coming here,” he admits, spent.
Olrox cups his jaw and lifts his head. “There is a world of beauty and dreams between what we should do and what we will do.”
Just then, imaging the world between, Mizrak cracks a little more. He loses one more battle in the war to save his soul. He drops to his knees and draws Olrox into his mouth.
God forgive him for what he should not do.