Chapter Text
Lilith took both of Michael's hands in hers.
He tried to avoid her gaze. "You're gaunt, your eyes are unfocused, your halo's dim and blinking inconsistently, your strings are tighter but your seams are looser-"
His irate attention snapped to her at once, although his breathy tone lacked venom. "You can't see my strings and you haven't had a good view of my seams in the last year."
"I've been a Goddess longer than a queen, dearest Michael, I know what grace deprivation looks like." She leaned a little closer, enough for the offer to be open, Michael never liked being touched outside his terms. "Let me help you."
He solely breathed, haggard to only keen ears.
And pressed forward, brushing lightly against her, a coo rumbling softly deep in his chest. Sometimes, she thought he could be even clingier than Lucifer.
"I have oaths." Oaths Michael held so very close to his chest, that calmed his writhing ichor as he walked this unthread path, that assured he wasn’t straying directly into rebellion.
Oh, he saw it in Lilith, many times. The pieces of his Father that lived amongst humanity he thought were myth. He wasn't that shocked to be proved wrong, it’s not like he knew Man well.
There were those that yielded grace of their own; he met a few, only realizing their nature in the shadow of Lilith’s grand unmistakeable example. Of what it meant to reflect His image.
She had tempted him, how could she not?
The allure of grace is baked into him, the whispers of how he’ll never see the world right without guiding sight.
Never mind that Michael already had His light, he shouldn’t feel need for her darkness.
He wasn’t built with other potential divinities in mind, he supposed, why would he be? There was only one God.
It should be easy to resist: it has been easy.
“It would be betrayal.” It scared him. It would be too easy to lose himself now, while... starving; there was no way around it as much as he loathed to phrase it as such.
“This is a necessity, it isn’t even a choice, if He loves you He’ll have no issue.” Michael knew she had wanted this the entire time he’d been living with them. She was over-correcting with faux concern. Whatever genuine worry was lost in this excessive performance.
She would love nothing more than to have him kneeling before her, it was an insult to both to pretend otherwise.
“It’s not that.” He pulled his hands away. “I can’t just- turn belief on and off for the benefits.”
Her smile weakened. “It wouldn’t work at all?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Michael, dearest.” She sighed, beginning to circle him. “Could you not accept my grace?”
Her voice purred low, he never thought himself susceptible to such simple charms he’d seen her use on a thousand chumps. But just here, his mouth went dry: he could see it. She reminded him so much of-; she shouldn’t, but she did, he could taste it.
Worship was an essential, he knew that logically. But that never meant it was comparable to hunger for Michael, it was more than that. It was enlightenment, revelation, connection; it meant something.
It disgusted him to describe himself as missing the taste; of hungering for it.
A base primal need he’d seek even at his lowest point, even when he didn’t deserve it, even with no understanding at all of what he was satiating. Like a dog mindlessly rutting into-
Stop. Stop .
His rusted mind skittered to a forced shuttering stillness.
Disgust won’t help, pain won’t help.
Suffering is not Necessary.
Suffering is not Redemption.
You’re okay. I’m okay. He’s okay.
A breath found its way between his teeth. He thought his niece would be proud of him.
“Are you okay?” Lilith traced her nails around the inside curve of his halo. “Still with me?”
Michael still found it unfair how much deft skill she had at handling him on day one, his twin had rigged this game from the start in her favour.
He blinked at her a few times, “Yes, just momentarily lost focus.”
She smiled, aware, because of course she was, what else could that have been? A vile grin of a successful hunt close at hand.
“So, you could accept my grace?”
He hated this, he could draw his blade and even in this dilapidated state strike her down in but an instant. Hated how she made ‘never known defeat’ feel like a lie on his tongue while never having to face him head on— he stiffly nodded.
“It’s not a struggle to believe, you already do.” She was a cheater, a fraud, a rule breaker of her own game.
In other words, she was a miracle worker. “Of course I do! But what if I can’t undo it? Restraint is the only measure I have left other than just refusing to be around you. Is that what you want?!”
“And so what if you can’t?”
“You don’t know what it does to us.”
“As if you’re my first.”
“Don’t phrase it like that!”
She laughed.
It’s a beautiful laugh, it beckons holiness. He had a lot less of these types of thoughts before the deprivation, he swore. Had a clearer view of the demonic, the temptation, yet here he was, mistaking it for the divine.
The pleasant quiet couldn’t last.
Lucifer was a quiet threat held between them. It was too late, wasn’t it? Michael had given too much of himself up already. She had already seen how desperate he was to stay with his twin, it was laughable to think Lucifer, that Ever Loyal Traitor, would see to him over Lilith—the brother who had already turned on him once.
There was no threat of leaving to be made, there was no future without Lilith in it.
Had she done this on purpose? It would be an extensive impossible intentionality to ever attribute to a mere soul, but this was Lilith.
“Your one experience was a long time ago. I don’t believe it was intentional either, Lucifer doesn’t know how it changed him. He wasn’t aware he was changing.” Michael bit out. “He was barely aware he was blaspheming.”
“You knew him, before and after and during, you tell me how different he was, what he ‘became.’”
“It’s deeper than that, God lives in our centre where you have a soul, defines the very core being of an angel, makes them what they are.”
“Of an angel?” She loomed over. “Or of you?”
He hated being made to feel small.
He spat, “You remind me of Adam.” A low blow, but there was no one of importance to judge.
Her gaze thickened with... concern, hurt barely visible. “I wish you wouldn’t do that.” She hushed out. She takes a breath, calculating what weakness she could show that wouldn’t break the allure. Forcing her voice harsher than she meant. “I know that you are scared. But I am not Him. And you may take that anyway you please. I am not trying to redefine your personhood to suit my needs, I don’t need you!”
He braced to meet her challenge once again, but she was running low on time.
She cut him off, “-you don’t have a God as of right now, there’s nothing of Him here. If you are nothing without one, then you are nothing now!”
His breath came out a dry painful rasp.
Then another wetter one.
Michael’s posture broke into something frail, hugging himself as if it offered any support. His wings fell around him in a tight blanket. The sapping from prolonged hunger aches at once became too much to bear—not while holding on to any trace of dignity.
The following sounds far more mortifying than a few rasps.
And she was still here.
Michael was so tired. Lilith was a threat, he should get to react like a threat. He was too tired to play. He was too tired to keep up. He didn’t want to fend her off gently, meekly. Didn’t want to always fight but never win. He didn’t want her to see him. He wanted her gone! Away! Out! Dead-!
He didn’t want to be alone.
Lilith hand graced his cheek. Michael pinched his eyes shut, pressing back the wet. She was still here, with him. Like she’d been for long over a year.
“I lo...” She stopped, and swallowed. “I care for you, dearest Michael, I’ve grown to. I don’t know what you are to me. But you could help me figure it out, it’d go faster.”
He leaned into her hand that he hated so, what a miserable needy creature he was.
“I’m not as strong as he is, I never have been.” If he didn’t cry, he’d hurl.
“That’s what I’m for.” Cupping his face in both her hands, stroking rhythmically with her thumbs. “I don’t need you, I’ll be fine giving you back. You don’t have to worry. Let me work it out with Him, I don’t have to be your enemy, you don’t have to keep fighting me.” She leaned away, Michael followed, shaky. “You hurt, and I have plenty.”
He tried the threat anyway, “I could go home.” And return a failure? Replace the hunger pangs with the endless dull ache of his brother’s absence again, could he go back to that, could he stand to reopen the wound? He’d always been the lesser half, it might just kill him. Pathetic really.
“You could go to Earth, and live off the scraps of your Father’s grace there while remaining in Lucifer’s reach.” She shrugged. “But you’d miss the chance to learn about yourself, learn what stays and what changes under a different master.”
He’d rather kill himself, “what if I don’t like who I meet?”
Distant understanding lit in her eyes, “he’ll still love you like he does now, as I will, as He will, for we all already know. Don’t you want to find out why?”
He was so, very, tired.
Michael grabbed her hands and stared at them. “I think I care for you too.” He blinked, and he spat. “and I think you’re right, I am nothing, take what you may.”
He dropped to his knees.
Lilith staggered back, but Michael refused any give in his grip. He pressed his forehead to her hand, and brought his overflow into a dense shroud.
The words of the language he chanted didn’t fit right in his mouth, but they were all he knew to say.
It was barely a taste before he began going weak. Lilith had steadied herself, and slipped her hand to his head, pressing him instead to her leg while she toyed with his hair. A brush of her hand against his halo sent his vision into a shuttering white-out.
The weight of definition and Truth wrung through him as Her darkness settled, in every surety he’d blinded himself to, hunger didn’t even begin to describe the suffering of Her absence.
She was here, She was real, She was Truth. He had been so close to missing Her, Her Absolution.
Despite the weight, he breathed light.
Lilith blinked, trying to keep the glaze from her eyes. The unbearably pleasant pressure of an angel’s worship, so easy to lose yourself in the motion, in the embrace of the true form encasing you on all sides. But she couldn’t do that, not this first time, not while Michael’s like this.
He was crying, that was normal for Lucifer’s more charged moments too, it was good, Michael didn’t let himself cry enough.
Time passed, he grew silent and still. Pressed against her in submission.
If this were to continue much longer she had to get them both more comfortable.
She shifted, Michael making no move to react. Head down, still held fast to her. A fond sigh escaped her before she began to shuffle him around as best she could, until the backs of her knees hit the bed.
He softly grumbled in complaint as she tried to pull him up with her.
Flicking her wrist she assembled the pillows into a stack and sat upright against them, Michael settled back down on his side, closer to her waist, his face and half lidded eyes partly visible now. A hushed melody mixing in with quiet purrs.
Lilith let her head fall back, and breathed a deep heavy sigh.
She was no stranger to fear, no avoidant of it. But watching this walking nuclear bomb wander around her kingdom in progressing states of decay was a gamble she was very glad was finally over.
She cared, she really did. But Michael would have survived nonetheless; more importantly now she had control again.
Her hand found its way back into his curls, they needed to be brushed, and conditioned. It was still nice, Lucifer didn’t let free his own nearly enough in her opinion.
The glow of his halo returned to a steady constant, breath deepened, threatening to fall asleep.
Suddenly, his hand reached out and found hers. Eyes still tired, but peaceful met hers. “Thank you, Lilith.” He muttered. “I’m aware I am not always... easy.”
She had long trained herself out of guilt, but if she could feel it: from those trusting eyes she knows full well Michael would never turn to her otherwise, if she hadn’t found him cornered and unspeakably vulnerable, if she hadn’t wrenched out his strings for her own whims, she imagined she would.
“Feeling better?” It doesn’t matter. She had done worse for less. It was His fault, like all things were: He’d left him in that state, and now she had him, he was away from Him, not attached to Him, she had him, he’d be okay now, she’d make sure of it. It was worth it.
“Wonderful, my Lady.” Michael... smiled at her, a strange, strange feeling.
She smiled back. It was nostalgic, Lucifer had this honeymoon phase all the way back in Eden, before either knew what was happening. It’d been so long.
She pulled Michael to an embrace, his silk warm and fuzzy where She touched. She ran hotter than Lucifer, was softer, bigger too. He was glad he didn’t miss this. There were so few people he could touch down here... well, there was exactly one person before just now.
She pressed a kiss to his temple. She felt so different than Him-
It felt as if a fracture split his halo and skull at once. His sight blacking out for a beat as he sucked in a sharp breath.
Yet her presence quickly chased out the ache and soothed the lingering ringing, leaving him barely even able to recall where the sudden pain had come from.
And...?
It reminded him...?
And a new thought resurfaced.
Why- why was he here? It was hard to place the last few hours. It was hard to connect with who he was just an hour ago.
What was he here for? Why bless him with Her grace?
What did She want?
His heart pulsed, energy rushing back into his limps after months of lethargy, active like only a dying creature locking around the throat of its last chance.
He did not remember the moment he forced his lips against hers, he does not remember the moment he concluded he had to.
His stomach rolled; the kiss itself wasn’t unpleasant yet, but he couldn’t help but dread the mingling of tongues. He compelled himself to take notice of every point of contact along their bodies, even the new lens grew his nausea.
He debated what to do with the information. He had seen how Lucifer indulged her, surely she’d desire the same from him, when it was their shared resemblance that attracted her?
Lilith darted back, creating a breath of space between them. Her eyes set in confusion, her lips forming an uncomfortable smile after a moment and a trace of indignation that cut Michael like a knife.
Did he bore her in his inexperience? Was he not propositioning himself properly? Some beginning cue he failed to give?
“Michael? wh-?” She glanced over his face again. He heard it, excitement in her voice; her displeasure must simply be at being made to wait so long. “Now, where is this coming from?”
He doesn’t let himself hear the incredulous note slipping in. Spurred on, he shot forth again, pressing into her; she was forced down against her back.
Every bit of mirth was knocked out of Lilith when she fell back, her heart shooting directly into her throat.
With her upper arms pinned down by both his hands he straddled her just before her chest, his face looming over hers.
She liked Michael.
She really did.
But she’d lived in hell far, far too long to let herself be pushed under anyone freely. Even if she didn’t mind it in concept.
Lilith was over twice his size and three times his weight, his knees barely reaching either side of the bed giving him barely any leverage with the majority of her body still being free below him, he’d been cut off from his source long enough to breakdown while she sat in the very centre of her power; however, Lilith was human, and Michael was an archangel.
She yanked against his grip, gaining nothing but a stab of pain. He didn’t budge an inch.
Held just tight enough it didn’t hurt until she pulled, the control and intention a display of power in of itself.
She fucked up.
She fucked up hard.
Michael could be terribly unreadable, equally as unpredictable; she knew that. Yet she had seen an opportunity, and had failed to take a proper survey of her surroundings. Lucifer was too far.
He was not to be trusted.
His recent discomfort was so overt to have blinded her to that. Now, she was scanning his face over and over, searching for anything useful, yet coming up blank. Her hair instinctually and uselessly tangled around his limbs.
“Michael.” she warned, carefully. Keeping a teetering edge just sharp enough. “Are we sure about this?”
He was panting now, alien sensations broiled and licked at his stomach, mingling with the rolling disgust as his body strained to accommodate its new intentions.
Without an intended erotic place on his form to coalesce, they floundered amongst his entire body in a burning haze, wetting his lips and clotting his throat and driving him onward to her.
She was beautiful, draped below him and framed by flowing hair of white gold; she always was. Eyes as intense as ever, although her gaze now raw in a way he hadn’t known before.
She looked of Glory itself.
And at this sight, as the fire drove him onward, sparking wisps and vague impressions of carnal impulses. Even the lightest brush of those images racked him with inner shuddering until he would beg to curl away in a corner and never be touched again.
But, he could not, for She had not willed it. What was he but to serve?
How strange, to know this warmth after distantly watching others partake for so long. To get a peek into their minds and for a moment, understand an appeal.
Finally, he moved. Michael stretched out, shifting their positions. Lilith eyes flared wide as she was bent further supine, snapping out, “Michael, Enough!”
He goes rigid, entirely, she can’t even make out his breathing; finally, his grip weakened.
This was very, very bad. A bad start to his devotion. Far too early for Commands, especially harsh ones; before his strings even had a chance to set. She doubted it would hold for too long.
Before anything else, she rushed to sit up and yanked into herself, knocking Michael off her torso at least.
His eyes shot back to her as he righted himself. She was right, he was already moving again.
Michael’s voice was unexpectedly soft, even to his own ears, nearly shy. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it?” For an instant, he dared to expect a wave of relief, there was only cold terror of his failure. Her tone was sharp, and he would try again.
Lilith caught her breath, floating the idea of running; slipping into the shadows and creating as much space between her and Michael as possible. She quickly dismissed it
She’d not forget his erratic state so soon. Now he may be treading lightly but there’s no guarantee how he’d react when left alone.
Even beginning to calculate the damage he could do to her kingdom, by the time she could track down her husband to stop him shot ice into her bloodstream.
Thinking about forcing Lucifer to face his brother like that again was no more pleasant.
No, Lilith made this mess, she could clean it up.
Perhaps she could see uncertainty in his expression now, perhaps she was so sick of his blank face she was making shit up.
His head tilted nigh imperceptibly, he was studying her.
She mulled his words over, was this his strange way of asking for permission? “Do you know what you want?” He startled slightly at her voice. She was doubting Michael actually knew what sex was at this point. “Do you know what I want?”
After a breath, he sat back and brought his hands to his chest.
He grabbed his sash, and pulled it off: loosening his belt and sheath until they clattered to the floor next to the bed.
Oh, okay.
His sleeves slipped smoothly down his shoulder, with a slow pace that nearly felt like an attempt at teasing. The open back of his robes fell easily inwards; exposing his bare collar and arms.
Small, every part of him, so small it long passed appealing and danced on the line of disturbing—at least, to anyone else. Nearly fragile, the deep slope of that waist she knew she could hold easily in one hand. His silk was patchy from subpar care, giving a gradient to the pure white. Following down his arms to the splotchy grey scars littering the silk of both his hands.
Although, they were tame in comparison to Lucifer’s, stopping just past his wrists.
Lilith hadn’t seen Michael’s seams this close before, the connection point outlining his joints and splitting his torso in thirds. With each subtle movement, she saw little flashes of his inner strings in those voyeuristic gaps.
Her mouth went dry; she tried to swallow normally. Licking her lip as inconspicuous as she could manage.
She tore her eyes back to his. “You want this?” She tried again.
Michael had never shown interest, never shown anything less than disgust for sexuality of any kind, for all her teasing Lilith had made peace, mostly, with that.
So, what was she supposed to do with this? If she’d just stopped hesitating, maybe it’d calm him down—sexual frustration could do even worse things to her.
But it still didn’t make sense.
“I can serve you, as you’ve asked me before.” Dammit Michael, that’s not consent! She needs yes, say yes! Or no, or something!
It’s difficult, but she held a carefully casual tone, she couldn’t risk another Command, “it’s unlike you, what brought this on?”
He pushed forward, and she nearly flinched away before his grip settled delicately around her elbows; his robes sliding further down in the maneuver. “Please, it’s unlike who I was– before I knew You. I will prove it. Forgive who I was, my-” He paused unsure, stumbling over the words. ‘What are you to me’ seemingly an echo between both. “...My Lilith, allow me, please.”
She could feel the warmth of his bare body seeping through her clothing. She had a fantasy, or two like this: she had imagined him inexperienced, maybe even shy, since it would always be his first time.
He was never so eager to please in her mind.
He bowed into the crook of her neck, still painfully unsure how to proceed, waiting for her guidance. It at least seemed to bring him a modicum of peace, she wasn’t sure trusted that anymore.
A creeping horror seeped in the silence of the peace. She rested her hand along Michael’s back, just above his wing cavity.
But she could see a path out—if she did understand what had happened. It didn’t make much sense either, she hadn’t seen anything like in other angels.
Veluda hadn’t suddenly dropped her bloodlust just because Charlie was a bit of a pacifist. Dedication to serving was one thing, a desire to please was one thing; this seemed pathlogic.
Now that, that almost did make sense. Michael was a tangled web of cognitive issues, a child soldier . Some complex or another He had given him. Just one more reason to curse Him thrown on the pile.
Lilith told herself she could work with that.
He tried to kiss her neck, messily, she wished she could still find it sweet.
Lilith pulled him off her, taking his hands in hers. “You’ve… asked this of me.” He repeated, sounding less sure.
Sitting fully up, she slipped into the authority of her Royal Voice.
“I don’t.” Addressing him as gently but as firmly as she could. “Not from you.”
She was always too reckless, too sure of her footing.
Despite everything he might think, might try to convince her or himself of, Michael wasn’t a machine. And he wasn’t stupid.
His ever blank face broke into quiet panic.
“I do, I want it, I do!” He blurted. “’I didn’t respond right before, I didn’t listen. I’m sorry- I do!”
Lilith felt the fluctuation in his extended form before anything. In a blink she had scrambled into the shadows and reappeared across the small room before he could grab her again.
His gaze had already narrowed in on her by the time she looked back, he made no moves to stand.
Words escaped her, how exactly was she supposed to make him understand, in this frantic state, that wanting sex didn’t mean she wouldn’t mind raping him, when has was clearly so unfamiliar with either. Or consent as a concept.
She blamed Heaven, she did for most things but she had reasons this time. This had their flavour of purity and repression plastered all over it.
“I promise, I wouldn’t lie to you, my Lilith, I do.” He swore breathlessly.
“Dearest Michael, enough.” If she meant it like a Command, it didn’t come out as one.
“It hurts!” He suddenly snapped.
Lilith’s eyes widened a fraction. “It-?”
“This hurts. I want– and it hurts.” He finally got off the bed, stumbling on wobbly legs. “You can’t- My Lilith please- I’m going to retch.” There was a note of dry humour that helped neither. “You can fix me, rid me of sick, I’m yours. Take it away…” He choked out pitifully.
Pleading eyes drilled into her.
He spat out the words in effort, maybe from distaste, maybe just from unfamiliarity. “Fuck me.” She might have laughed in different circumstances.
He collapsed to his knees. In proof of his deference, or in his weakness.
Lilith took a deep breath, kneeling down beside him.
He tilted his up, revealing a defeated expression. “Just, tell me what to do, I will, my Lilith.”
“I know you will.” She offered a hand he took immediately. Lifting him to meet the bottom of her chin. “Suffer.”
A beat.
Michael’s breath hitched. She rubbed soft circles into the back of his hand. “Endure for me. I refuse to bed you. So I ask you, suffer this for a time.”
His head and shoulders dropped, his eyes hollowly fixate on the carpeted floor, and she reminded herself; she didn’t feel guilt. She didn’t know how her younger self found this so easy to ask of Lucifer. Finally, Michael swallowed, and nodded. “Understood,” in a poor imitation of a soldier’s confirmation.
She took him in her arm and held him, fingers running through his hair once more. “Thank you, dearest Michael, my good and faithful servant.”
She heard a small sigh of relief, and allowed it to comfort her.
When she finally pulled away, he didn’t try to stop her. Drifting back in his own world.
Lilith stole one last glance at him before closing the door behind her.
She needed to talk to her husband.