The Duke’s Demon by Iris Foxglove

Chapter 4

It didn’t truly strike Devon that his father was dead until well into the early morning, when the oil in the lamp on his new bedside table sputtered out.

There was just enough light on the horizon for Devon to see the shape of the piano in the corner, the single shelf of books, and the rack for his clothes if he had a proper valet to press them, but Devon’s eyes moved past them, towards the door, which he half expected to lay open.

It wasn’t. Devon was alone in the dark, and his father was dead.

How many times had he said it? Why won’t you just die?

The first time he said it, he’d staggered into the breakfast room where Marius was reading the paper and his father was stirring cream into his coffee. Devon was sore, aching deep in his chest, which his father hadn’t even touched the night before, when he snarled for Devon to stop fighting me, while Devon kicked and cursed and finally sobbed his rage into the sheets. He hadn’t fought him so much before, but now he could feel it, that ache, the rage building under his skin as the sun set and the servants scuttled away in the dark, letting the hallway beyond his bedroom yawn dark and hollow as a mouth opening.

“Dev!” Marius folded the paper. “Late as always. I was going to saddle the horses without you.”

Devon had looked at both of them, Marius smiling in the oblivious way Devon had thought charming the day before, their father sipping his coffee, the sun shining behind them. It was as though nothing happened. As though Devon had dreamed it all, fallen into nightmares that left him pushing his drawers in front of the door and lighting all the lamps, sleeping on the floor by the fire.

Devon sat in his usual seat. His breakfast was laid out for him, a cup of the coffee he always tried to choke down to seem more like Marius and his father, a few extra cubes of sugar hidden under a cloth from Marius.

The ache in his chest twisted, slowly.

“I was thinking,” his father said. Devon looked at him. There was a pale red line at his neck, where Devon had scratched him the night before. Devon stared at it, watching it as his father leaned forward to take the paper out of Marius’ hands. “We should go to the city tonight. There’s a play at the opera—dreadfully boring stuff for you, Devon, I know—”

Devon knocked over his coffee.

Marius blinked at him. “Here, Dev, what was that about?”

It wasn’t enough. Devon took the empty cup and dashed it at his father’s feet, and kicked back the chair, letting it thud and tumble against the wood floor. His father’s brows lowered, only slightly.

“Devon,” he said. “Don’t cause trouble.”

“I hope you die,” Devon said, and Marius gasped, clutching the edge of the table.

His father looked at him, and Devon saw it, then, his life laid out before him, the truth that could only be told in the dark. His father sighed.

“Well,” he said, pushing away from the table. “If that’s how you feel about it, Devon, then we’ll save the opera for when you’re feeling a little more civilized. Go to the office and take out On the Education of Young Lords, and read aloud until I deem you contrite enough to return to breakfast.”

Devon was old enough not to find the taste of coffee bitter, now, but the dark still made his pulse race and the knot twist in on itself in his chest. He stared at the empty room of the Abbey, full of lovely quiet paintings and comfortable window seats, and slipped out of bed.

His father was dead. It had taken years of whispering it, grinding the words in his teeth, letting them wrap around him even as he pulled the trigger that struck Sabre de Valois in the back. He was dead, hanged, just another traitor who failed to do his job.

Devon lit the lamp again.

He was probably going to die, himself, soon enough. The demon was probably stirring even then, tasting Devon’s tangled mess of grief and fury and fierce, terrifying relief, and it was only a matter of time before he was dragged into the room, brought under a knife to scream himself hoarse.

No knife,the demon had said, while Devon played, fumbling over the notes of a simple dancing tune. Devon played one or two keys on the piano, letting the sounds shiver in the night air.

There were music books in the library.

He knew he was running from it. He was always running from it, ever since it started, pushing himself into hunting, or riding, or training the hounds in the back of the estate. There was always something to do, some excuse he could give, a reason to be too busy to be called into his father’s office.

Eventually, of course, the excuses ran out.

It was too early to play, but it didn’t matter, really, because demons probably didn’t sleep.

Slowly, he picked his way through the first few pages of one of the books, worn and yellowed with age but still legible. While the knot didn’t go away, it gave his hands something to do, and Devon was doing well, quite well, until he realized that he’d stopped playing altogether and was sobbing, great, hideous tears that made him gasp and shudder and want to sink to the floor. So he did, just for a moment, just long enough to be able to uncurl again, one day.

There was a knock on the door, low and heavy, the kind of thumping sound that would have come from a cane banging against the wood. Devon laughed into his hands.

“Come in, I suppose,” he said. The door pushed open, and the duke stepped inside, staring down at Devon with that slight bewilderment in his pale eyes.

“You’re on the floor again,” he said.

“And you’re here to…to let that thing eat me.”

“No,” d'Hiver said. “It’s curious. You’re…tangled. Many emotions at once, all too strong.”

“My father is dead,” Devon said, dully.

“Yes. I told you.”

Devon wrapped his arms around his legs. “So maybe people are allowed to feel more than one way about the same person. Tell it that.”

“It’s awake. We know.”

Good. Wonderful. “Then can you just…” Leave, he couldn’t say. He didn’t want to be alone, he realized, and how pathetic was that, to want to keep a demon and the duke it possessed with him just to push away the specter of Lord Chastain? “If you aren’t going to kill me, can you…get rid of it.”

Duke d’Hiver raised his brows. “Are you asking for my demon to feed on you? Your pain.”

“I don’t know!” Devon dragged his hands through his hair. “I don’t know, I just want to—don’t touch me!”

The duke stopped in his tracks, just a step away from Devon, and crouched down, peering into Devon’s eyes. “My demon, I come to it when it calls me. And I called to it, once, when it was needed. Is it all touch that scares you, makes you tremble like a fox before the hounds, or is it touch without an invitation?”

Devon took a moment to parse the question, trying to think of it as a man bound to a demon would, bound to their rules. It made sense that there would be rules—there were, with magic, so he’d heard. But then he doubted any of the people who screamed under the knife asked for it.

“Invite us, and we’ll come,” d'Hiver said.

Always, you ask for this,his father had said, when Devon never did, not once, staring at the door in the dark.

“You can touch me,” Devon said. “Like before.”

The duke moved slowly, catlike, taking Devon’s wrists in a firm grip and moving them over his head. Devon lay back on the rug under him—which was fine, he was never on his back before—and shuddered as d'Hiver’s eyes started to widen, impossibly round, his hair falling over Devon like a curtain.

“Let us in,” he said.

“Just come in and take it,” Devon said, and d'Hiver sighed, slow and shaky, with the sound of wings rustling in the distance.

Devon closed his eyes.

It was less painful, this time. It was like reopening a new wound, at first, the initial pain of skin peeling back, but then it was just...just the force of it, his grief, the shame, the rage that the king had done what Devon never could, that Marius had seen and did nothing, that Devon was treated like a wild creature thrashing in a cage when the beast was right there. And under it all, slowly unfolding as Devon sobbed under d'Hiver’s demon, a strange, guilty elation. Relief, strong enough that when the rest started to dull like an old ache, Devon felt the thing above him stir and shift.

“What is this,” d'Hiver asked. No. The demon, it was the demon, speaking through him, just as it had at the piano.

Devon opened his eyes, and immediately regretted it. d’Hiver’s mouth was a black, gaping maw of a thing, with teeth too long to be human, and while there were no wings above him, Devon could almost feel them brushing against his face. And there were indistinct shapes against his hair, like the ears of a cat, or horns, and Devon shifted beneath him, wondering whether they felt like anything but smoke.

“What is this,” the demon said again. “What you feel.”

“What I—” Devon flushed. He was growing hard again, impossibly, probably because he was so deeply fucked it took a demon cradling his actual fucking soul to do it.

“No,” the creature said, and there was that horrible pull again, and Devon gasped at the almost unbearable relief that shuddered through him, the private, horrible joy he felt when he knew his father was gone. When it was over.

“I’m happy,” Devon said. “I’m happy he’s dead. I’m a fucking, I’m a terrible son, I’ve always been terrible, but I’m glad he’s dead, I’m glad he’ll never…he isn’t going to...”

“What is this,” the demon said, and the pull drew the joy forward, the shame that came with it, until Devon, forgetting to close his eyes as he arched towards the demon like a fish on a line, could almost see the horns curling out of d'Hiver’s hair. He jerked his wrists against d'Hiver’s hold, and the demon, still staring wide-eyed at Devon, let him go.

Devon raised his hand to d'Hiver’s hair, and his fingers trailed over something that only just gave at his touch, like heavy smoke, like silk.

d’Hiver’s demon tilted his head again, and for a second, Devon could almost hear something, like a rumbling in his throat.

“Give it again,” the demon said, and Devon, finally still, his emotions pushed back as though behind a veil, sought out the strange ear he’d almost seen before.

“You’re almost like a cat,” he said, in a low murmur. “A terrifying, murderous cat.”

“Again,” the demon said, softer, but no less insistent.

“Don’t have anything left,” Devon said, dropping his hand. He snorted. “If you want more, make me happy. Won’t that be a miracle.”

He closed his eyes again. It was still overwhelming, the absence, but it was better when he wasn’t cowering in a bathroom with a demonic duke feeding on his fear.

No, he was in a bedroom this time, which was, of course, much different.

It took him a moment to realize d'Hiver was holding his wrists again, just crouching over him, pinning him to the floor. He slitted his eyes open to find d'Hiver’s eyes less round, his mouth almost back to normal, watching him.

“Do you want to see to that,” d'Hiver said, and Devon blinked as he realized his cock was pressed up against d'Hiver’s thigh. Of course it was.

“Not. Not now,” Devon said.

“But you like this,” d'Hiver said. “Being held.”

Devon thought about it. “I don’t know. I don’t think I was held before.”

Not like that. Not securely, like it wasn’t to keep Devon still but to…hold him, for a time.

“Your demon,” Devon said. “What do I call it.”

The duke raised his brows. “I call it—it’s my demon.”

“Well, its face is fucking terrifying,” Devon said, and he closed his eyes again, forced them open, drifting. “But the horns were interesting, I suppose. And it purred, like a cat.”

“Yes,” d'Hiver said, curiously, as Devon closed his eyes again. “How strange.”

* * *

Sebastien prodded the limp,sprawled form of Devon Chastain with his cane, and frowned when Devon’s response was to do nothing more but sigh and shift just a bit, as if he didn’t mind. “Hmm.”

Why, the demon asked, shifting in him, fluttering again.

He is under, Sebastien thought, at it.

What.

It did not understand, and he lacked the ability to explain the complexities of biological imperatives to a creature that was confused by music and had only just learned what joy was.

“He is as you are, when you have fed.”

The demon fluttered its wings again. He is as you are, when you lay on the floor when I eat the things in the dark.

“Yes,” Sebastien said, amused. “I suppose so.” He put his cane down, then turned back to Devon. He did not know how the demon would respond to him touching someone, but it seemed fond enough of Devon, in its way, to allow Devon to touch it.

Sebastien picked him up, and the demon helped as it always did, when he required some strength. But Devon was not too much of a burden, when Sebastien had carried heavier men, deadweight, to and from the place where they would die.

Devon, he took not to the octagon room, but his bedroom.

Sebastien slept, not often, but enough. His dreams were strange things, not entirely his own, and the demon dreamed of dark places and wriggling creatures, and something cold and bright with a flame that did not burn. Sometimes Sebastien dreamed of the room and the men and the knives and the screams, but there were times, when the demon was sated and curled up asleep within, that he dreamed of a life before this one, the boy he was, the family he’d watched die while the men who slaughtered them laughed and made it last far longer than was necessary.

He did not care for those dreams, which he knew, somewhere, were not dreams at all but memories.

He placed Devon on the bed, and then went to bathe.

The demon was particular about that. It did not care for deep water, and it would sometimes hiss as if Sebastien were trying to drown them instead of bathe. It was easier to do when the demon was glutted and sated as it was now, and so he stripped his gloves, his clothing, his boots, and finally, the tie holding back his hair.

When he was naked, Sebastien turned and saw himself in the mirror.

He was pale all over, save the ragged scar across his stomach. It stood out like polished silver on snow, and he brushed his fingers over it. He had no idea where it’d come from, and every time he thought he might remember, it fell away like smoke.

No,the demon said, softly. It clicked, and hissed a bit, and Sebastien sighed and turned to the bath. I would keep you safe, Host. Your pain is not for us.

It hissed louder when Sebastien climbed into the bath, and said, why, and Sebastien sighed and explained, once more, that it was required to be clean, he was not made of the same sort of substance as the demon, he needed the water.

It also hissed at rivers and creeks, the small lake near the edge of the Abbey, and the one time Sebastien went to see the northern sky lights from the hill, it beheld the ocean as if it were a living thing come to claim it. The high heat of the bath helped, as it seemed to like the steam.

Devon had called it a cat. Sebastien thought about this, as he soaked in the bath, his skin turning red from the heat of the water. The demon did not like it when he went under to wash his hair, but it did like when Sebastien drew the comb through it, and he thought of Devon touching his head, while he’d fed from him.

You grow warm, the demon said, slyly.

The bath is hot, Sebastien thought at it.

Like you do in the dark, on your back.

Sebastien’s hand slid down, fingers brushing against the scar there on his stomach and lower, to curl around his cock.

Be warm, the demon said, and Sebastien thought perhaps it wanted him to do it, take himself in hand. So he did, and stroked himself, awkward with it, and slow. It had been a long time since pleasure came from his hand; there were times he woke up with the act half finished but no idea what had roused him in the first place.

Hold again, the demon said, and it fluttered, pressed against him and Sebastien felt something strange on his hand, like something else was helping, guiding him. He leaned his head back, and let it.

Nothing much happened. It felt good, he supposed, and for the first time he was aware of just how hot the water was, and how thickly the room clogged with steam. But his thoughts were not conducive to the act, and Sebastien’s demon was simply there, watching. It chirped at him. Sebastien did not think it had ever made that sound, before.

Hold again, the demon murmured.

Sebastien thought of holding Devon against the floor, and his cock lengthened in his hand. The demon fluttered immediately, excited and pleased.

He thought of how Devon’s cock felt, hard against him. His hand moved faster. He thought of the time he’d watched Joaquin with Clara, in the old garden, from up in his room. She had taken his cock in her mouth, and his hand was in her hair. The thought did very little for Sebastien, his cock, or his demon.

He thought of Devon kneeling, there, before him on the tile in the steam-filled room. Eyes wide and mouth open, for Sebastien to press his cock into, slowly, sliding it in like he did with the knife. The demon started to purr, and his own breath caught, slightly, as he continued.

Hold again, it murmured. Hold, hold.

He thought of putting Devon on his knees, and, oh. Perhaps something on his wrists, to hold them. A rope? Sebastien could hold the end and pull it, so that it would be tight. Maybe also. The rope could go—where? His ankles. Perhaps he could put Devon on his back, tie him to the frame of the bed. Yes. Climb atop him, that way.

“Ah,” Sebastien moaned, head going back, the water splashing as he pleasured himself.

And then he felt the demon pressing against him, as if it would like to come forth, though it could not, here.

What is it, the demon demanded.

Lust, Sebastien thought at it, close now to coming over his fist. Desire.

Images flashed. Sebastien saw himself writhing as the demon fed on the creatures it found. Saw the man who came to the Abbey with Clara, forcing her, how much she’d hated him. The way he’d sounded when he’d screamed, the smile on her face when she saw Sebastien in the hall with the knife, bloody, and threw a wedding ring at her feet so she could toss it in the river. Her kneeling for Joaquin, his fingers in her mouth. Devon in the bath, that first night. Devon against the mirror, Sebastien holding him, mouth pressed to his racing pulse, alive and so warm. His hard cock against Sebastien’s hip.

Devon, asking for it, there on the floor of Sebastien’s old bedroom. Reaching toward him, afraid but eager for the demon to take what it wanted, growing hard from the touch. Sleeping in Sebastien’s bed, right now.

You can touch me, Devon had said.

Sebastien was panting, loud in the bathing room, inhaling hot, cloying steam with every breath.

Just come in and take it, Devon said, and Sebastien’s head hit against the edge of the bathing pool as he came in hot pulses, pleasure making his toes curl and his calves tighten, wringing it out of him in slow, aching waves.

Oh, the demon thought, and then, again, host. Again.

Sebastien gave a slight laugh, which somehow was the most startling thing of all. “I am not...able to, immediately. It takes some time.”

The demon’s wings fluttered. Host.

“Yes?” Sebastien asked, head resting against the rim of the pool, eyes closed.

That one. His name.

“Devon,” Sebastien said. “His name is Devon.”

The demon fluttered within, clicked again. Host.

“Yes?”

Host. Your name.

“Sebastien,” Sebastien said. “My name is Sebastien.”

The demon was so agitated, it almost tickled. Host.

“Yes?”

A pause, and then, the creature said, as it began to retreat, sink back to sleep, what is my name.

Sebastien’s eyes opened. The steam was cooling now, the water turning lukewarm. “I do not know, my demon.”

It sighed, and went quiet.

Sebastien climbed out of the bath and drained the water, then went to the mirror. He touched his scar, again. Something pulled at his memory. Pain, his hand red with blood. Slipping on something, crying. Crawling when the pain was too much to walk, toward the doors that were, for the first time, standing open—

No, the demon said, soft, and—bit him, slightly, like a cat might, clawing at him. No, Host.

Sebastien frowned and shook his head, but the memory was gone, back into the void. He slipped into a robe, started the fire in the hearth, and poured himself a glass of Starian whiskey. Sebastien sat in the chair across from the bed, draped in his black silk robe, sipping his whiskey, his ice-pale hair wet around his face, and watched Devon, asleep in his bed.

* * *

Devon woke slowly,free for once of the tight, sharp jolt of fear that always came when he opened his eyes in a strange bed. He was dimly aware that he was still in the Abbey, that his life was dangling by a thread, rage, and a few half-remembered piano tunes, but they were all dim fears, distant, sated. All he could think of, as he rolled over in the soft sheets, was that he was half hard again. He took himself in hand and teased the head of his cock, slowly, languorously working himself up until he was panting into the pillows. It was lovely, really. He could have drawn it out all morning, in this big, mostly empty house, with no one around to—

He stopped, rolled onto his side, and stared directly into the eyes of Sebastien d'Hiver, again.

“You could’ve said something,” he said, reluctantly dragging at the covers to hide himself.

“You don’t have to stop,” d'Hiver said.

“Why? You don’t want me for my cock.” There wasn’t any real bite to it, though. Devon was still drifting in that strange quiet place, feeling easy and slow, almost pleased. If he even remembered what pleasant felt like, anymore. “Do you? You wanted to hold me down, before. Or your demon did.”

“Yes.”

“Have you ever been with anyone?” Devon asked. He started stroking himself again, slowly, straining not to thrust his hips up to chase the building pleasure. “People say you never married. Of course, neither have I, and I’ve done this more than I care to count.”

“What did you like about it?” d'Hiver asked, probably for the beast inside him, watching through his eyes. “Before.”

“Nothing,” Devon said. “Apparently, I like being accosted by demons.” He closed his eyes, gave in to the pull of his desire, hips moving to meet his fist. If he was going to die, he might as well die honest, and what he wanted right now was to feel d'Hiver’s mouth on his neck, the flutter of wings as his soul was held, the outer layers peeled away, the tight knot loosening.

“Fuck,” he moaned, and came with his head tilted on the pillows, his neck bared to Sebastien d'Hiver and his demon.

Which wasn’t what a dominant should have wanted. It probably wasn’t even what a submissive should have wanted, but Devon was the kind of man who shot people in the back and pet demons, so it was best not to think too hard on it.

“Did you enjoy that?” he asked, still breathing a little hard, opening his eyes just a sliver to look at d'Hiver. He was watching Devon keenly, and while it wasn’t easy to tell how he was feeling without a demon to clue him in, there was a tension to the way he sat, the line of his back, that wasn’t there before.

“You could probably put out an ad in the papers,” Devon said, sliding out of bed. There was still steam glistening on the door to the bathing room, and Devon pushed it open with his foot. “You can sell your services to fucked-up nobles everywhere.”

“I don’t believe they would all feel as you do, when it’s done,” d'Hiver said, as Devon wet a cloth to clean himself off. He was still watching him, like Devon was the strange creature that attached itself to people, draining them of…

Ah.

That was a distressing comparison.

Devon pushed it out of his mind. Marius was the leech, anyways, basking in his noble privilege while Devon snapped like a wolf with a leg caught in a trap.

“I suppose I’m unique,” Devon said. “How lucky for me.”

“Yes,” d'Hiver said, and Devon wondered what, exactly, would happen when he stopped being unique and went back to troublesome. He dried off his hands and adjusted his slightly wrinkled clothes, and looked d'Hiver up and down, considering.

“We could spar again, if you wanted,” Devon said. “I know I have the time.”

d'Hiver’s face lit up like a child’s on the longest night, and Devon almost smiled.

He’d never been much of a swordsman. Devon was best suited for hunting. Not with a gun, which was faulty and loud, startling off all the game just to show one’s family was rich enough to waste ammunition—but with a bow, like generations of Chastain nobility before him. There was a satisfaction in hitting a target accurately or bringing down a bird in flight, and Devon could sense some of that in the way d'Hiver—Sebastien, he supposed, he was always more Sebastien when he fought—moved during a bout. He took an expert’s pleasure in the blade, in the dance of it, and Devon found himself working himself into a heady breathlessness just to match him.

“You are improving,” Sebastien said, when Devon was left leaning against the mirrored wall, panting hard, having only moved past Sebastien’s guard twice. “But your form, it’s…”

“Lousy, yes.” Devon pushed his hair out of his eyes. “I know. Father always...” He grimaced. “Always said there was no teaching me. Too hot-headed.”

“No, it’s not that,” Sebastien said. “It’s the way you move. You fall off center every time I push you back. Stand up, I’ll show you.”

Devon gave Sebastien a wary look and pushed away from the wall.

“I’m going to touch you,” Sebastien warned, and Devon nodded tightly. He still stiffened when Sebastien moved his shoulders and tapped his feet apart with his cane. “This is how you stand. This foot gives you balance, when you move, like an anchor.”

Sebastien was a careful teacher, Devon noticed. He would have made a good tutor if he weren’t a duke, not doing more than raising his brows and offering a slight correction when Devon fell out of step. No sighing. No eye-rolling. No pausing to call for his father and whisper, in strained voices, about how impossible and combative he was.

“Remember this tomorrow, when we fight again,” Sebastien said, and paused, hesitant, meeting Devon’s gaze. “We will fight again, tomorrow.”

“Sure,” Devon said. “What else do I have to do?”

More than he thought, it turned out. The piano tuner came in that afternoon, and Clara, the beautiful servant woman who didn’t at all act like one, frowned at the children’s piano for a solid minute before she told the tuner that there was, in fact, a grand piano downstairs.

“We’ve been using it to have breakfast on,” she said, and the man from the village sighed.

“This’ll need extra parts,” he said, looking into an old, dusty piano cleared of cups and saucers on the first floor. “It’s a disaster, honestly. You might as well keep using it as a table.”

“The duke would want it done,” Clara said. Devon frowned at her, and she gave him an arch look as the man gathered his tools to leave. “Yes, boy?”

“It’s Devon,” he said. “And should you be giving orders for him?”

“Yes,” Clara said, without any shame whatsoever. “Otherwise, he wouldn’t eat. This is how all the old houses are run, don’t you know?”

“Not really,” Devon said, running his hand over the keys of the broken piano. “I always assumed it was done through correspondence.”

“It takes more than that,” Clara said. “This place was falling into ruin before I came along. The laborers were directionless. No one to filter orders from on high into something practical. Something that works. The duke trusts me to do my job,” she added, meaningly.

Devon rocked back on his heels. “And here I pegged you for a submissive.”

“I am one,” she said. “What does that have to do with running a house?”

She gave Devon a curious, bewildered look as she swept out the door, and Devon sighed, dragging his fingers through his hair.

The demon didn’t kill him, that night.

It didn’t kill him the next, either, after Devon had managed to break past Sebastien’s guard properly, eliciting a flash of a smile from the duke that almost looked human, or the next, when Devon found an unused bow and spent most of the afternoon working on it, marching arrows in a line across the snow. He caught Sebastien watching him from a window, pale as a ghost through the glass, and shivered. He still didn’t dare venture too far beyond the walls. Not with that demon watching, waiting for him to chafe enough at the bit to be worth feeding from.

He slipped back out of the quiet, softened state the demon had put him in quickly enough, but while he could feel it all pushing against him, hot and insistent as a fire burning under the skin, it wasn’t as bad, exactly, as the morning it all came crashing down. He could almost manage it, this time.

Almost.

The night the grand piano was dusted off and fixed properly, Devon started to play one of the new songs from the books in the library. He was unsurprised to find Sebastien darkening the door, watching. Just as before, the demon started to stir, drawing the duke forward until he was standing over the piano, looking down at Devon’s fingers moving across the keys.

“It’s a waltz,” Devon said, pausing briefly to turn a page. “Does your demon know what a waltz is?”

“No,” Sebastien said, in a soft voice. “It’s a dance. We used to have them here, when I was.” His face went strangely blank. “Young.”

Devon had a feeling Sebastien wasn’t talking to him, this time.

“A dance is when you move,” Sebastien said. “With the music.”

“You should let your demon out more,” Devon said, foolishly, before he realized what he was suggesting. His fingers stumbled over the keys. “I mean. That is.” He gave the duke—and his demon, fluttering so close below the surface—a searching look. “Do you want me to show you how?”

Sebastien seemed to startle, his gaze darting to Devon.

“I’m on borrowed time anyway,” Devon said, with a shrug. “And who can say they taught a demon how to dance?”

* * *

Sebastien never had learnedhow to dance properly.

He’d had a lesson or two, maybe, before his family was slaughtered. Etienne, two years older, was further into his lessons than Sebastien; as the future duke, he would have been presented at court at sixteen. But all he could remember was the dancing tutor, the stuffy room, and wanting to go outside and play in the yard.

Sebastien put his cane against the wall, flexed his hands in his gloves and stood before Devon, expectant. “Well, then. I expect you’ll lead, since you know how to dance, and I do not.”

“I. Yes.” Devon looked momentarily surprised, but it was hard to tell if it was because he expected to lead, or expected not to.

Either way, he stepped in, took a deep breath, and placed a hand on Sebastien’s back, then took Sebastien’s hand in his. “We’ll start with a simple step.” He started humming under his breath and then gently tugged Sebastien. “Like this.”

What is this, the demon asked, as Sebastien stumbled a bit in the unfamiliar movement. You do this without the long knives.

“The demon does not understand why we do this without swords,” Sebastien said.

“Well, I don’t know, either.” Devon glanced at him. “How did you get the...others, that are here?”

“Joaquin came from the village,” Sebastien said. “He wanted to see to the gardens. They’d died of neglect, and he wanted to bring them back.”

“And you—no, turn, the other way, your other left,” Devon said, bossy in a way he never was, when they were fencing. “And you just allowed him to live here?”

“Yes,” Sebastien said. “An estate needs someone to look after it, and the gardens were rather dreadful.”

Devon stared at him, and his fingers pressed gently against Sebastien’s back as he hummed, gently urging him into another turn. “The demon didn’t want to...eat anything of his, then?”

“No. He was not afraid.” Sebastien allowed Devon to move him about, finding the rhythm of it like they were fencing. “He said he’d heard the stories, but the gardens spoke to him, and it was their call he answered. I suppose I was impressed with his dedication to his craft. Either way, he does an admirable job with the grounds.”

“And the woman—you’re doing it again, trying to lead. Follow my count.” Devon wouldn’t meet his eyes. He was such a tangle, all those emotions from fear to anger to shame and now, something else. That desire to be held down, the lust that had him stroking his cock in Sebastien’s bed before he knew Sebastien was watching, and the spike of want that made him finish, when he knew that Sebastien was watching him.

Sebastien did not point out that Devon kept trying to follow, which was why he was trying to lead even though he didn’t know the steps. “Clara? She and her fiance, they came here in a storm. The demon knew it wanted him, he was cruel, mean. He would take her as a man does to a woman, but she did not enjoy it. She suffered through it, and thought of killing him. So I did it for her. And she was grateful, so she stayed to run the house.”

“She’s a submissive,” said Devon, going tense, as if saying the word was somehow difficult.

“Yes, but that does not mean she cannot lead,” Sebastien said, with a pointed look at him as they turned. “This house might have a dark heart but it is still just a house, Devon. It needs looking after, and she seems to enjoy doing so, regardless if she kneels for the gardener or not.”

“Here, try it all at once, now.” Devon hummed, and Sebastien found the rhythm easy enough. “You’re not hopeless, I suppose.”

“Thank you,” Sebastien said. “Why did you hate your father?”

Devon stumbled, and Sebastien easily took over the lead for a moment. “You killed your family, and you ask me this?”

Sebastien tipped Devon’s chin up with his black-gloved fingers. “I did not kill my family. I told you that, and I do not lie. Answer the question.”

“Can we just dance and not talk about me and my problems.” Devon dragged in a breath. “If your demon wants to feed from me, I’m already fucked up enough.”

“I am asking you because I am curious,” said Sebastien. “But you needn’t tell me now, if you do not wish. Have I learned enough, then, to dance a proper waltz?”

For a moment, it seemed like Devon might answer Sebastien. Instead, he shuttered his gaze and said, “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to try.”

He sounded so begrudging about it that Sebastien almost smiled.

“Did you,” Devon asked softly, not looking at him as they began to dance. “Did you hate yours.”

“My father?” Sebastien shook his head, aware of how strange the demon thought this was, dancing with only the sound of Devon’s humming to keep time. “No.”

“And it still came to you,” Devon said. “I wonder if I could have called a demon, like you did.”

Sebastien stopped and the demon clicked at him as it awoke in a stretch of imagined wings. “I think mine was always here, and I made room for it. My family was slaughtered, but I was not the one who wielded the knife.”

“Did the demon want something from you? After your family...died.” Devon stared over Sebastien’s shoulder, angry again, and oh, he was a pile of smoldering embers, just waiting for kindling to rage up bright and hot.

“I suppose it did,” said Sebastien, moving Devon backward and Devon either didn’t notice the shift or didn’t care enough to stop him.

“I would have let it have me, if something had come to me. I would’ve given it whatever it wanted, in return.” Devon’s voice shook, like the discordant notes of the piano before it was tuned. “And now it’s going to kill me.”

“It is not going to kill you,” Sebastien corrected. “It hasn’t the strength to take life, in that way. It will just feed on your pain, and then swallow your soul when the end comes.”

“And that means, what?” Devon was trembling, and he’d given up trying to dance, hands clutching at Sebastien’s coat like he was going to try and fight him, or push him away, or perhaps pull him closer. “I lose my life, my soul, and it will be awful, excruciating and then nothing?”

“I do not know, but I think it means you will be extinguished, like the fuel that starts a fire is rendered into nothing, once the wood begins to burn and consumes it. It took my own soul, when it came to me, or most of it. I think I was dying.” Sebastien frowned, pushing Devon against the wall almost as an afterthought, curling his fingers around Devon’s wrists. “If something happens to a soul after death when it is not consumed, I do not know what it is, nor does the demon. It is of this world, as strange as it may be, and has no particular knowledge of the next, if there is one at all.”

“But you,” Devon whispered. “You’ll be the one who kills me. Painfully. So I scream.”

Host, the demon purred. Hold, again.

Sebastien took Devon’s wrists and gently pried them off his coat, then pressed them above Devon’s head. The demon unfurled and came forth, and Sebastien felt his eyes go round, the curious vibration in his throat as the demon spoke through him.

“We would have liked this father under the knife,” the demon said, in its flat, atonal voice. “We would have taken his soul for you.”

Devon was crying, and the demon pressed against Sebastien with more force, wanting to be closer, though not necessarily to feed. Sebastien felt his vision blur, as the demon arranged itself firmly in front, staring at Devon, into his eyes.

“Do you want me to bring that one here,” the demon asked.

“My father is dead,” Devon said, and in the distance between himself and the demon, Sebastien could hear the worry there, like maybe he wasn’t dead, and it was a lie.

“Yes,” the demon said. It tilted Sebastien’s head. “The other one.”

“My brother? You found him? Was he—where was he? How would you...”

The demon pressed Sebastien’s face close and hissed.

Sebastien thought at it, he wants to know how you found him.

“He is found,” said the demon, beginning to dissipate, as it took a great deal of strength for it to take over like this outside of the dark room. “The ratchets will bring him. We will take him with the knife. For you. The soul, swallowed.” With that, the demon pressed Sebastien’s mouth to Devon’s pulse and then dissipated, curled back up and let Sebastien return to himself.

“I would have done it for you,” Sebastien murmured, against the frantic beat of Devon’s pulse. “I would have let you watch. You may, when it’s your brother, if you would like. It would seem my demon wishes to make a gift to you. Like a cat with a bird caught in its jaws.”

Sebastien lifted his head. Devon’s face was white, his eyes wide, and there were streaks of tears on his face. His breathing was too fast, so Sebastien pressed gently on his wrists, pinning him more firmly.

“My demon did not ask to touch you. It does not understand that it should. Would you have me unhand you?”

“If my brother comes,” Devon said, ignoring the question entirely. “Will you let me decide if he goes to the knife, or not?”

Sebastien and the demon both considered the request. “Yes, we will allow that.”

Devon breathed out, shaky and slow, and nodded.

And then, before Sebastien could ask if he should let him go, Devon leaned up and pressed his mouth to Sebastien’s.

Sebastien did not understand what he was doing, or why. He moved back enough to ask, “are you trying to pull it forth, to feed from you?”

Devon said, “No.”

That one is warm for you, host.

Oh.

Sebastien pressed his mouth to Devon’s and kissed him.

Devon made a sound into his mouth, and Sebastien shifted so that Devon’s wrists were a little higher above his head, wanting to hear that sound again. This time, when Sebastien felt Devon’s cock, he did not move away but instead shifted so his thigh was pressed up against it.

There, yes, Devon did it again, made that sound again, and it wasn’t fear, or pain, but Sebastien shivered at the sound of it all the same. His body felt warm, like he had in the bath when he’d touched himself. The demon was curious but quiet, watching, and it left Sebastien uncertain how to proceed.

Sebastien let go of Devon’s wrists and pulled off one of his gloves and laid his fingers to Devon’s throat to feel his pulse, and then up to his mouth, Devon’s breath spilling against his bare skin. He wanted to slide his fingers in Devon’s mouth, into the wet heat there.

Sebastien stepped back. “Thank you for the lesson. We shall have to do it again. If you need my demon, my flame, you know where to find us.” With that, he took his cane and curled his fingers around the rounded head of it. As he left the room, he thought he could still feel Devon’s breath there, on his bare skin.

* * *

When he turnedin for the night, Devon sat in his borrowed room for some time, staring at his own hands.

He’d never kissed anyone, before. Not properly. He barely let anyone touch him, most of the time, flaring like a wildfire if anyone came too close. It went to show something, perhaps, that Devon’s first kiss would have been with a man with a demon for a soul.

It had felt right when he did it. It didn’t make him feel sick, afterwards, or heavy, restless, unable to focus. It was a little like the feeling he had when the demon was done—drifting, pleasant.

He sat on the bench before the children’s piano and thought of the way they’d danced, twisting back and forth between leading and following, Sebastien’s hands growing warmer, more human. He played a chord on the piano—no, higher, that felt better—and stared at the keys.

It was dawn by the time he looked up again. The back of the book he’d been reading was dark with his own writing, hand-written staff marks and crossed-out notes, and while Devon was swaying in his seat and hazy with exhaustion, it took some effort to push away from the piano. When the knock came on his door to signal that his breakfast tray was waiting outside, Devon opened the door just as Clara was turning to leave.

“Excuse me,” he said. Clara raised her brows. He would have never called a servant by first name at home, but he doubted any of the usual rules applied at the Abbey. “Clara. You don’t have paper here, do you?”

“A little,” she said. “For bills, letters to lenders. Why?”

“You don’t think you could acquire some?”

She gave him another long look. “So you can write about the duke? No, no thank you.”

“It isn’t—look, just come in here, let me show you.” Devon felt like a child, trying to drag Marius into his room to show off a new toy or a book. He gestured to the piano. “I was. I had this idea, you see, about making the left and right hands seem at odds with each other, but still keeping time?”

Clara stood there, hands on her hips, as Devon weakly demonstrated. “Yes? And what does a song have to do with paper?”

“It isn’t written yet,” Devon said. He could feel the heat rising in his face. “Never mind. I was just…I haven’t slept, you can—”

“Oh.” Clara’s blank expression shifted, and the quiet beauty Devon had seen there when he first met her returned, bright as a sunrise. “So that’s it. You’re a musician.”

“I don’t think I’m technically—”

“You hear of nobles keeping them, sometimes,” Clara said, and Devon stared at her, bewildered, as her tone took on all the warmth and good humor she’d been missing, until that point. “To entertain at parties. The duke doesn’t have any, of course, but maybe, well, the way you went on, I thought you were a lord, but it turns out you’re just an artist. That’s fine, then.”

Devon blinked. “I’m not—”

“He should hire you out to the village some time, for the solstices,” Clara said, picking up the book on the piano stand and running her finger along the notes he’d made. “Our own musician. I wondered what he was keeping you for, you know. Well, if you’re one of the staff, you should have breakfast downstairs. I’ll introduce you to Joaquin—he likes reels, the kind you can dance to?”

“Yes?” Devon said, a little helplessly, as Clara grabbed his breakfast tray and started walking off with it. He followed her, still a little dazed, through the sunny halls and past windows overlooking the high hill behind the village. “You know it’s just something I do for fun, though.”

“I’d hope so,” Clara said. “Isn’t that the point?”

Devon didn’t have an answer to that. He was a little more than desperate for breakfast, though, so he followed her anyway, letting her lead him into a small drawing room cleared of all but the shabbiest furniture, where an older man in a red knitted sweater was drinking tea. He had silver hair and weathered skin, and was built like a barrel, but Clara beamed when he set his cup down to look at her.

“Good morning, my star,” he said. He glanced at Devon, who drew back, keeping to the doorway.

Clara set down the tray. “Joaquin, love, I brought the duke’s musician down for breakfast. Devon, this is my husband, Joaquin. He’s the gardener. Devon’s writing music for the duke.”

“Is he?” Joaquin gave Devon a cursory look. “That explains it. Artists always are, what’s the word? Eccentric. Sit down, boy, you don’t have to wait on us.”

Devon sat at the low table, where his breakfast was, and watched in mild shock as Clara poured him tea. He’d never been in the servants’ quarters before. He never had a reason to. But they all seemed to have their own hierarchy there, with nobility right down at the bottom, and artists somewhere in the middle, next to cute dogs and children.

“So. What brings a musician to the Abbey?” Joaquin asked. Devon nearly choked on his tea.

“I. I shot someone,” he said. No use hiding it. “And the duke found me.”

Clara gave him a sharp look, but Joaquin just frowned. “Did they deserve it?”

A few days ago, Devon would have said yes. “I don’t know. I thought he did.”

“Well. Artists do tend to be dramatic,” Joaquin said. “He’s alive?” Devon nodded. “Good. So the duke found you, like he found Clara.”

“He didn’t find me, love,” Clara said, sitting comfortably at his feet with her tea. “My fiancé and I came here in the storm.”

“He was called here,” Joaquin said, firmly. He set down his tea. “That demon, it calls dark things to it.”

“And me, by your own words,” Clara said. She sighed. Devon tried not to stare. He didn’t know if Clara wanted anyone to know why she’d come to the Abbey, what Sebastien and his demon had done to her fiancé, and quickly looked down when she caught his gaze.

“Called here or no,” Joaquin said, and his face went dark, “I wouldn’t have minded having a word with him, alone. It’s a hanging offense, taking someone against their will.”

Clara rolled her eyes. “No, that’s just what the village does if it cares enough about you to be bothered on your behalf.”

“Some hang anyways,” Devon said, and Clara and Joaquin both looked at him, Clara’s gaze sharp.

“Did you come with someone?” she asked. “The doors were shut, that night.”

“No, it’s nothing.” Devon could feel her gaze boring into him. She knew. She could see it on him. Like a scar, for anyone to recognize.

“They still hanged, though,” Clara said, softly. “In the end. Whoever they were.”

Devon drained his tea without even registering the taste. “Yes,” he said. “He did.”

“Good,” said Joaquin, and set down his cup. “And now you’re here, like Clara.”

“I…suppose so,” Devon said.

Clara leaned forward to refill his tea.

“Now,” she said. “Tell us all about this song you’re writing for the duke.”

* * *

Devon was startingto understand why Sabre de Valois found being a commoner so appealing.

It was as though a door had opened in the Abbey that Devon hadn’t even seen before. Maids nodded to him as he passed. A servant boy, working in the courtyard, showed him his hand-carved knucklebones, and Joaquin even took him along a tour of the gardens, pointing out what he was going to plant when the spring thaws came.

He ate lunch in the courtyard, with the servants who were hired to work during the day and head down to the village at night.

“Does this mean the duke will hold a ball?” one of them asked. “Since he has a musician, now?”

Devon shuddered at the thought of so many people passing the black doors on the second floor. “I don’t think so.”

“Maybe he’ll lend you to the mayor,” said a girl in a starched white pinafore. “We have dances in the barn, sometimes, but it’s always the same four songs, over and over.”

“I’ll…I don’t know if I can,” Devon said.

“Oh.” The girl sighed. “Then will you write me a song? Something pretty. Like swans, or a field of flowers.”

“Music can’t be swans, Molly.”

Devon quietly retreated as the maids started to bicker among themselves over the nature of music, and disappeared into the manor.

His paper came that evening, whole sheafs of it, and Sebastien watched at the door as Devon worked his way through the first part of the song.

“You repeat yourself,” he said, after a while.

“Yes, I’m trying to get the sound of it,” Devon said. He twisted around to look at Sebastien, and again, felt the stirrings of what he’d felt before, with Sebastien and his demon crouching over him, holding him down by the wrists. Kissing him, like they wanted it.

Like he wanted it. Devon blushed. Even he was starting to think of them as two people.

“Do you want to sit closer?” Devon asked. “I can. I can play you something.”

“Yes,” Sebastien said. He crossed the room to sit next to Devon, who set aside the papers and pulled up one of the books. “You didn’t say you liked to write them. Songs.”

“I didn’t know I wanted to,” Devon said. He started to play again, and felt Sebastien stiffen at his side, the demon uncoiling from its rest. He pressed his shoulder to Devon’s, and Devon nearly jumped as he whispered something under his breath, to his demon.

“Can I touch you again,” Sebastien said.

“I…yes.”

Sebastien raised his hand to Devon’s neck, and Devon stilled, fingers slipping on the keys. But instead of pushing him down, or squeezing too hard, Sebastien just held him there, a thumb brushing just under his ear.

He held him, and Devon played, until Devon stumbled over the keys and slowly pulled away, his eyes fluttering closed.

“Tomorrow,” he said, softly.

“No,” said Sebastien. “Tomorrow you will be busy.”

Devon turned to him, already half asleep, and for a moment, he could almost see the demon there, drifting like smoke.

“Why?”

“Because tomorrow,” Duke d'Hiver said, still holding his neck firmly, tenderly, “we will be bringing in your brother.”