The quality of mercy is not strained
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed -
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.

W. Shakespeare
"The Merchant of Venice"

"Wings take a lot of care," Warren said, watching him reflected in the tall mirror beside the closet.

They were in Warren's room, not his own, at the far end of the men's floor. Isolated. No other claimed room until Peter's three doors away. A room with tall windows on two walls, at the corner of the mansion. All of them open to let amber light and warm air spill inside. The room was still and hushed with the sleepy repose of late afternoon. The entire mansion was quiet. Morning training sessions gone wrong had given way to an afternoon off. A reluctant indulgence from the Professor for the entire team's lack of focus, their need to relax, to just be; young and restless and yearning.

Not knowing precisely why, Scott had allowed Warren to bring him here, when he would rather have gone into his own room to sit and gnaw and brood over the team's failure that morning. Over his own failure as leader to bring them together.

On the way to do just that, Warren's hand had closed hard around his arm in front of his door, pulling him away, to the far end of the hall. To Warren's room instead. And he couldn't bring himself to protest. Remembering a night not so very long ago, and a question asked. And the raw longing to give a different answer than the one he knew he had had to give.

Warren had drawn him inside the room, closed and locked the door firmly behind them, then released him. Leaving Scott to stand by the door as he moved across his strangely bare room, stripping off his belts, his tight uniform shirt, parting it along his back with a yank at the special closures that allowed for his wings. Then sitting down on a hard bench in front of the mirror and calmly taking off his boots, his socks. All while Scott watched in fascinated silence. Unable to tear his gaze away, pulse pounding in his throat, his ears.

They had barely spoken since the surgery on his hand two days ago. Jean had brought Warren out of the psychic anesthesia, made certain he was well, then knocked him out again with an actual sedative. To make him rest after the long sleepless night before and the trauma. Scott had let him be; carrying with him the tenuous memory of a vulnerable, if weary, blue gaze.

But since that night, they hadn't been able to talk. And Scott, at least, hadn't had much chance to even think. Between Xaviers' demand that he avoid Betsy and training with the rest of the team and Warren's recovery they hadn't had a moment alone, though they had seen each other often. Tense and wary like circling dogs. Their interactions brittle and superficial. So now skepticism, that familiar friend, had settled in Scott's mind.

That whole night had been strange, out of synch, unreal. He would have doubted any of it actually happened, if not for the evidence of Warren's broken finger and the cut on his own cheek. And by the puzzled way Jean watched the both of them when she thought they weren't aware of it. He was embarrassed by that night now. Too much emotion running free, too much pain shared; rash words said, yet so little actually resolved in the clear light of day and with the inhibitor of physical distance. There were things they still needed to understand about each other. So many things.

Warren had looked up at him then from his seat on the bench. Simply looked, blue eyes intent and shadowed, before he turned abruptly around and presented his back to Scott. No, his wings. Watching him in the mirror. Then he had spoken his apparent non sequitur.

Scott reluctantly met his gaze, then drawn, he walked over slowly. Groping in the pouch on his chest for his goggles. Finding them, he paused, closed his eyes and pulled his visor away. Swiftly exchanging it for the sleeker goggles that gave him a much broader field of vision and made his eyes glowing points behind their red shield. So that he could see more.

Warren gaze was still locked on him. Scott stopped behind him, staring at the golden-pale bare back, the white wings furled tight in front of him. Swallowing hard.

"Wings take a lot of care," Warren repeated, his voice low. "I doubt most people realize just how much. And they're chewed up and damn sore now after that fucked-up training session. But there's this." He held up his hand, waving it slightly to emphasize the taped and splinted finger. Warren's gaze left no doubt that he expected him to do something about his predicament. As proof. As test. Or from simple need.

Scott moved slowly, reaching carefully around the white wings, knowing they could send him across the room with one casual flex. Not afraid of that, exactly, but respecting the power in them.

Warren just watched. Still and silent like the waning day. In a moment frozen in time.

Then his hands settled on firm flesh, strong shoulders. Hands relaxing as they felt the heat and texture of the other man's skin. He sucked in a short breath. Warren raised an imperious, questioning eyebrow in the mirror and Scott stroked his hands lightly in from those shoulders towards the base of his wings. Not sure how, precisely, to touch them. Angel's wings. They looked so fragile, even though he knew they could carry him into the sky and had more than once clouted him to the ground.

Scott's hands reached the odd, long humps of the wing-joints, the shoulders. He tentatively ran his fingers over the short, sleek feathers covering the rise of skin there. No flinch of strangeness, they just felt cool and silken to his touch. He stroked harder, learning the texture and feel of the source of his angel's wings, the heavy muscle, the odd joint. With a short shuddering sigh, Warren allowed his wings to relax, lowering them, letting them fall down and away.

It amazed him how tightly Warren could pull his wings against his body. They would draw in close, fitting themselves along his back, down his thighs, the upper elbow joints crossed and looming nearly a foot above his head. But he could also trail them down so that they hung on the floor like now. He vaguely remembered seeing birds do something similar - spreading their wings out flat and low. Taking dust baths. Or sunning. But this was no bird under his hands.

Growing slowly more confident, he circled the muscular base, squeezing gently, then was surprised by a sudden damp sensation on his fingertips. He pulled a hand away, peering at the light sheen of some liquid there. Warren moved in the mirror, catching his attention, a guarded look in his eyes.

"Oil glands. For the feathers - to keep them solid." A dispassionate lift of a brow and cool hardening of a blue gaze. "At least they aren't on my ass, like a bird's."

"You make your own oil?" Scott asked, surprised and curious. A cynical twist crossed Warren's mouth as he nodded, his shoulders and wings flexing slightly, in tandem. He felt the odd motion under one hand.

"I'd kill for a tail, sometimes," he said, arching a golden brow again, a gleam of humor flashing briefly deep within his eyes. "But I'll do without the beak, thank you very much."

Scott laughed shortly, surprised. Warren's cool gaze searched his expression in the mirror, looking for something, he couldn't tell what. After a long moment, Warren seemed satisfied and lowered his gaze.

"Rub your hands around the base. Pressing hard brings it up. Get lots of oil on your fingers." Warren's voice was low and casual. As if giving instructions for grooming an angel's wings were normal. And it was, here. "Feathers soak it up like you wouldn't believe. Just stroke down the grain, along the edges, making sure to get every one. Frayed ones hum when I fly - they annoy me. And impair performance." Scott eyed the big wings, looking more closely at the feathers themselves. Looking for wear, for variations, for the reality of them rather than the fantasy. They were feathers. Just like a bird's. But big. Very white. Looking even closer, then. Some grayish. Some tattered. Some split.

"How do you do this yourself?" Scott asked, fascinated and frowning slightly in his examination.

Warren exhaled noisily, almost a snort. "I've got a little more flex in the shoulder than you might have, but it still isn't easy."

Scott wrapped his hands around the broad base of the wing joint again, squeezed lightly and Warren groaned in response. His gaze shot to the mirror, watching as Warren's eyes fluttered closed and his head tilted up. Baring his long, strong throat. Scott just stared, mouth dry.

"God, that feels good," Warren said, his lip curling slightly. Scott massaged for a few moments longer, feeling the oil come up on his hands, making them slick. He swallowed hard then, closing his eyes as possibilities flooded through his mind. Odd fancies. Desire. He fought it back. Warren was waiting. He opened his eyes again, feeling a slight shift of the other man's position under his hands.

Warren was now leaning forward on his arms, braced on his thighs. Eyes closed. In the mirror, Scott could see his face; strangely serene and more relaxed than he'd ever seen it before.

He rubbed up from the base of the wings along the bone, with the grain of growth, feeling the sleek slide of the oil on his hands. Spreading it over the feather shafts as he went. The oil smelled good. Rich and musky and somehow completely, essentially Warren. The feathers were smooth and cool, never quite warming to his strokes. Underneath lay the thin, deceptively fragile-seeming bones, layered with wiry, iron-corded muscle and heavy tendons, then the thin, tough skin overlying. Skin that was hot and pulsing with life and blood. Scott stroked up both wings as far as he could reach. Pinions spread slowly under his ministrations, white feathers flexed and moved, making it easier for him. He slid his hands all the way out to the ends, listening as Warren gave a deep, resonant groan of pleasure. The sound made his heart stutter.

He glanced in the mirror again. Warren's coolly handsome face was suffused with a kind of radiance, a deep, satisfied glow like that of a cat lying stretched and contented in a patch of sunlight. Basking, but without the sun. Feeling everything, obviously. And enjoying it. Scott's breathing shortened, quickened.

An angel. He was stroking his hands along an angel's wings. And they were live and vital. Responsive. Part of him; part of Warren. He paused briefly, hands at the wrist joints of the wings, before the broad spread of the flight feathers, feeling the impossibility of it suddenly. Wings growing from a man. Wings that allowed him to fly, like an angel. Not a messenger of God, or a holy being, but only a man; a mutant. He leaned forward then, and rubbed his forehead between the wing joints, against the slightly oily human skin between the base of the wings. Warren groaned, arching up, his back lengthening, stretching up, wings drawing away slowly, reaching out, reaching back. Bracketing him in white, then they lowered as Warren relaxed.

He leaned up and put his hands back on the base of those incredible wings again, working out along the grain as Warren had told him. Preening. That's what it was called for birds. Fixing the damage done by wear and flight, an essential task. Over and over again he stroked, the oil coming effortlessly and disappearing just as quickly as Warren had warned him. Constantly going back to the base of the wings to gather more. Stroking. Smoothing. Fixing them.

A long feather came loose in his hand. He stared at it in mild alarm.

"Did that hurt?" he asked quietly. Warren cast a look briefly over his shoulder, eyes half-lidded, eyeing with unconcern the feather he held up.

"No. I molt year-round, like an eagle. Too damn big," he said quietly, a hint of amusement in his tone. Scott fingered the feather thoughtfully, looking at the end, the wide quill. It was dark. Old blood. He stuck the shaft in his belt, then went back to his task. Working the oil along each feather, carefully, out all the way to the ends. The amount of oil was lessening now, he was having to squeeze harder to feel it well. Each time he did, Warren shuddered. As if it were painful . . . or perhaps very pleasurable.

Scott froze suddenly, gaze lifting to the mirror. Warren, alerted by his pause, looked up after a moment, eyes opening slowly to reveal a kind of sleepy, banked hunger.

Which quickly shifted, as Scott remained silent and frozen, to a sharp needy look. Scott rested his hands against the skin of Warren's human shoulders, meeting that look from behind his goggles, unable to tear his gaze away. Feeling unexpectedly urgent need pulse inside him. A wanting. A breathless instant.

"I want to fuck you," Scott said suddenly, voice so low it was almost inaudible. Warren's brows shot up, bitter amusement and a little fear appearing in those blue eyes. He shook his head slightly at him in the mirror, not looking away. Then he was turning, sliding around on the bench, wing bending nimbly to keep from knocking Scott away. Not going away, but coming closer. His hands caught at Scott's uniform as he instinctively leaned back, caught the straps over his chest. Holding him in place. Staring intently up into his goggles.

"No," Warren said. Scott blanched, almost reeling at the stark rejection. Before he could begin to free himself, face now flaming, Warren's hand snaked up and locked unyieldingly on the back of his neck, pulling him down onto his knees between Warren's thighs. Then a hot mouth descended on his; lips moving, tongue stroking. Seeking compliance. Scott groaned, mouth opening, eyes falling closed. Hands resting on the thighs around him. The tongue swept inside, possessing him. Demanding. Male. Warren. His hands tightened on the hard thighs, squeezing and kneading.

One hand held firm around the back of his neck, the other slipped under his tight uniform shirt, pulling it up. Bunching it under his arms, hung up on the straps there. Then the hand was streaking over his skin, making him groan into that mouth. Sliding down his chest, across his stomach and against the waistband of his pants. Mouths still fused, tongues dueling, breath mingled. He wanted, lost.

Warren's hand pushed under his belt, almost immediately brushing against the weeping tip of his erection. He groaned need and desire into the other man's mouth in response, shuddering. Warren froze, suddenly still and tense. Scott pulled back, eyes slipping open. To see pure shock on Warren's face. Shock and the flushing beginnings of shame and maybe even anger.

"I can't do this," Warren said, voice husky, eyes pressed tightly closed. Scott tensed.

"What?" he found himself saying. Warren opened his eyes, the blue hard, his mouth thin.

"I can't do this. . . with you," he said, voice breaking uncharacteristically. Scott felt anger rise in him. Anger and embarrassment and fear.

"I'm good enough to suck you off, but that's it?" Scott demanded, hands fisting on top of Warren's thighs. He didn't even feel the faint trembling in the big muscles under them, he was too busy shaking himself. "You were singing a different song a few days ago. Christ, you are such a bastard, Warren."

He pushed off, rising to his feet, only to be stopped by a hard hand on his arm, catching him before he could turn away. He glared down at the other man.

"No," Warren said, eyes narrowed. "It's not what you think, well, not entirely anyway . . ."

"Not entirely?" Scott demanded. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"I don't know what I'm doing."

"It's a dick, Warren," he said with chilling precision. "You have one just like it. Treat it the same and I promise I won't get mad."

"No, Scott," Warren replied, voice hard. "It's not just the sex. Part of it, maybe. Fuck. All right, I'm not used to lusting after a man. I like women, damn you."

"Not while you're with me you don't," Scott shot back, tone cold, expression still. He jerked his arm roughly out of Warren's hold. "I don't goddamn care what your preference is, you're with me only or we're done with this right now." Warren stared up at him, blue eyes shadowed and narrowed. Face strangely pale.

Scott was too angry, too frightened to try to read his expression. He just waited, taking slow, steady breaths. The silence dragged on in the still warmth of the afternoon.

"I raped you, Scott," Warren finally said, the quiet words not what he'd been expecting at all. He flinched. "By forcing you to suck me off. Then there was all that shit with Betsy. It makes me feel like a bastard. I don't understand how you can be. . . can stand to be with me." Scott staggered back a step, staring down at Warren's bowed head. Seeing now the guilty anguish. Feelings boiled in him, along with impressions, memories. Longings. Old fear.

"I don't know either," he said quietly after that long moment of tense silence. "Emotions are funny things. They don't always do what you want. Not exactly. Yeah, you forced me. Yeah, I hated your guts for a while. You might have been a bastard about it, but at least you were honest about what you wanted from me. And you didn't hurt me, Warren - you didn't slap me around or threaten to kill me." During his speech, Warren's head had snapped up. Now blue eyes narrowed with horrified anger stared into his goggles.

"That's your criteria? I was nice to you after?"

"The Savage Land was much worse." And he stayed still, feeling the tension grow, remembering the dormitory-like floor where he had stayed in Magneto's citadel. The shared bathroom. And the long, hot, fear-filled nights and never knowing when or where Toad or the Blob would attempt to corner him. Having to use his power, his training, all his will to defend himself or be ruthlessly, brutally hazed. Because he couldn't, wouldn't take the school-yard bullying to Magneto. He'd stood up for himself without trouble there, maybe because of Warren's reminder. It had been a warning. A slap in the face.

"So I'm less evil, is that what you're saying?" Warren's face was like stone.

Scott shook his head, shaking the musings and the memories away. "Not evil. Selfish. One's in the skin. The other's learned."

"Oh, God," Warren said, looking almost nauseated. "How can you be so calm about that kind of shit?"

"I'm not."

And as Warren looked him over, Scott knew he would be able to see the tension in his arms, the stiff line of his body, the faint shudders that racked him. And understand, maybe, a little more of the yawning distance between privilege and privation. But he didn't want to go into his past right then.

"Okay, I'm wrong," Warren admitted. Then sighed deeply, scrubbing his hands over his own face, staring at Scott through the bars of spread fingers over his eyes as he braced his elbows on his knees. "I don't like what I did, or why I did it. I was arrogant and cruel and wrong. You didn't deserve that."

"No, I didn't," Scott agreed, then crouched down in front of the other man again, hands hanging off his own knees. Feeling a lift to hear those words, his honest admission of wrongdoing. He stared at him steadily as Warren lowered his hands, letting them fall down onto his thighs again. The moment dragged out as he watched him. Wanting, so badly. Remembering oil and the feel of feathered wings and idle desires. Wondering if the impossible was possible after all.

"Do you want me?" Scott asked quietly, heart tripping wildly as he fought to keep the question light, casual. As if the answer wasn't all that important. "Want to be with me, I mean? And not just to fuck."

Warren met his gaze sidelong, a faint self-mocking smile on his lips. "You should know that by now. I follow you everywhere." The words low and resonant. And Scott thought back over the last few days, realizing, suddenly that Warren was right. Nearly everywhere he went, about his duties, during the day, on the grounds, eventually Warren would show up. Even if only for a few moments. To just look, make a comment or two, then disappear. But never remaining away long. Circling back, checking in. His spirits lifted.

"That's what I like then, I guess. You want to be with me," he said. "And not just to play with." Warren watched him calmly for a moment, searching his calm expression, his hidden, glowing eyes behind the goggles.

"You've really forgiven me, haven't you?" he said, in a wondering kind of way.

Scott thought carefully for a long moment, treating the question with all seriousness. Searching his feelings hard, looking for resentment, for pain. It was there, but dulled, prompting some wariness but little else. Over it all was this need, this desire, this strange new exhilaration when he thought of Warren. He wanted someone. All on his own. Without coercion or guilt . . . or fear.

The fight at the boathouse appeared to have dispelled his fears. If Warren had wanted to break him, he mused with ruthless deliberation, that would have been the time to do it. If his goal had always been to manipulate and hurt him, forcing him there, after all the turmoil and pain of the last few days, would quite likely have pushed him back into his old habits. Made him anxious to please again. Made him a whore again. But Warren hadn't done it. Instead, Scott had broken his finger in his desperation and even that hadn't driven Warren to do more than contain him, to try to prevent him from running away.

They'd been hard on each other. Maybe it would be enough to appease guilt on both sides. Eventually. Or sooner.

"Yes," he said, nodding at Warren's bandaged hand. "But you need to work on forgiving yourself."

Warren gave a tight, self-deprecating smile and another shrug of shoulders and wings. "Guilt keeps me honest. I'm not a very nice man, Scott."

"Not always. But you can be - to Jean and Ororo." He let a tight smile touch his lips. Not above a little dig there for his endless, automatic flirting with anyone of the opposite sex. Even the housekeeper. And she had to be nearly sixty.

"Fuck off," Warren said without heat, his gaze ironic and faintly relieved.

Scott laughed softly, warmed. "Isn't that my line?"

"Not since we got in here," Warren said dryly. "More like 'fuck me'."

"Really?" Scott said, heart beating wildly with the casual banter. Desire surging again, suddenly and urgently. Even though neither of them had moved - they weren't touching at all. Just talking. And looking. "There's lots of other things to do beside that." Warren's gaze flared with heat, his expression suddenly sharp with anticipation.

"Like?"

"Like sleeping." A grin tugged at his lips.

"What?" Blank shock was his reward.

"A nap. I think I need a nap."

Warren just stared at him, expression caught between startlement and anticipation. Scott laughed once, more of a chuckle, then stood slowly up, hands working at the straps around his chest. Letting the cases fall free. He crossed his arms at his waist and carefully drew off his crumpled uniform shirt, making certain not to dislodge his goggles. Then he felt Warren's long, elegant hands on his waist, fingers digging into the flesh there as he surged to his feet beside him, standing close, staring at him intently.

"Scott," the other man said, more of a gasp than his name. "What are you doing?"

He just shrugged and turned away. Taking the few steps to the bed. Where he sat down and started working on his boots. Tugging them free, then stripping off his socks. Standing to remove his pants, leaving on his long-legged briefs. All the while aware of Warren just standing and watching him. Hesitant, yet drawn. Undecided.

Then he turned and crawled up onto Warren's bed. Flopping down unceremoniously on his side and bunching a pillow up under his head. Shifting until the press of his goggles wasn't so awkward. Feeling the still heat of the room and Warren's gaze. He closed his eyes and settled down with a contented sigh. Feigning relaxation. Aware of his own erection as never before in his life, but determined to wait it out.

After a long, tense moment, he heard soft movement, cloth over cloth, felt a slow wafting of air over his body. Probably from the fanning of wings. Then a shift of the bed and a rustling of feathers as Warren settled on the other side. Away from him. He let a small rueful smile touch his lips which quickly faded as the movement continued and a splinted hand slipped cautiously under the pillow, a lean body sliding close behind him.

Naked. Christ. Warren had stripped completely and his cock was pressed against his ass, hard and tight. His right arm lowered slowly over his waist, hand spreading wide over his taut stomach, drawing him back against the other's muscled body. Then Warren's mouth was beside his ear.

"Want to sleep, do you?" he said softly. Scott stayed quiet, struggling not to squirm. But he wanted to. Wanted to rub against that lean, heated body with his own, even if the scars on his back blunted the sensation. Lips nipped the edge of his ear, making him shiver. "Okay, I can do that." Then Warren settled behind him, lowering his own head to the pillow, his breath warm and steady against the back of Scott's neck, his arm relaxing around him.

Stunned, Scott lay there for a moment in sheer disbelief. Then he flexed his hips back, unable to help himself. He heard a low chuckle from Warren, felt it through the press of flesh. And knew then that he'd been caught by his own ploy. Ignorant Warren wasn't.

"Oh, awake now, are you?"

"Yes, damn it," he ground out as Warren's hand flattened over his stomach again, circling slowly, sliding easily in the slight sheen of sweat that had risen on his skin. He felt the pulse of Warren's cock against him, an answering one from his own.

"You know," Warren began, his tone lightly conversational. Scott was breathing harder, chin lifting, hand fisted in the quilt below them. His hips rocking gently back and forth. Feeling the sleek glide against him, through the smooth cotton, the hard heat. Wanting and biting at his own lips to keep from begging.

"You know," Warren said again, tone rougher suddenly, husky. The hand not circling any more, but stroking up his stomach to his chest and down again in long sweeps, pressing back. "I really would like to just sleep with you some time."

"Later," Scott growled. He released the quilt, catching at Warren's hand and pushing it insistantly down. Warren didn't hesitate at all this time, but let out a low sigh as his hand cupped Scott's cock through his underwear, the sleek cotton little barrier. He was hot and hard and had already made a damp spot on the fabric. He groaned deeply as Warren's hand closed tighter around him, arching up into the contact. Finally, finally, he thought.

Warren rubbed his face against Scott's neck, the edge of his shoulder, breathing ragged.

"You are so hot," he whispered, almost hissing. "You feel good. So hard. I like the way you feel in my hand."

Warren was a talker, apparently, Scott realized even as the words made him tremble. Something he'd never understood but that some people just had to do during sex. But he didn't care just as long as he didn't stop what he was doing. The slow, heavy strokes on his cock, the equally slow pulse against his back that was gradually speeding up, felt too good. Sweat providing lubrication, easing contact. Only there was another barrier between them. Cloth. He wanted it gone, whimpering slightly, clutching at the quilt again. As if reading his mind, Warren released him and quickly slipped his hand under the elastic waistband, finding him again with unerring precision before he could do more than gasp in dismay. Scott groaned deeply. The rough feel of his palm, the tight grasp and slide of his fingers. Skin on skin. He rocked back against Warren's body, harder, in rhythm.

"Yes, you like that," Warren said, stroking sinuously against him. "Don't you?" Scott clenched his teeth, breath whistling between them, feeling Warren's lips on his neck, the nip of teeth behind them. Then a sharp sting as he marked him with a quick press of his mouth, a hard suck. All while his hand stroked, their bodies surged together, hot and sweaty in the afternoon daze. Feeling his blood thundering in his ears, the pound of Warren's heart against his back. Wanting, reaching for the end, the pleasure, yet simultaneously wanting it to last forever. Savoring the slightly uncertain touch. Reveling in the hard feel of Warren sliding against him, now fitted into the crack of his ass. Warren's gasps as he moved against him in counterpoint. Teeth on his neck, against the muscles, the movement of lips on his skin.

With a strangled cry, Scott came in a rush, spurting over Warren's hand, his own stomach. Delighting in the surge, the release, the closeness. But tensing suddenly as he realized he'd come first and ingrained fear struck him. Waiting, suddenly apprehensive, for anger, for disgust. But the steady, slow thrusts against his back continued without hesitation. His briefs were soaked with sweat and pre-come making a slick place for Warren as he surged against him over and over; releasing his spent cock to clutch him tighter around the waist, draw him snug against that straining erection. Not angry at all, but intent. He relaxed as he absorbed that knowledge, pushing back, matching Warren's motion, feeling the heat slowly stir him again.

"God, you're exquisite," Warren ground out between panting breaths as his hips moved, knee pressing between Scott's thighs, steady, relentless, drawing him back, holding him close. "I want to watch you do that next time." Scott felt enveloped, surrounded, possessed. And so hot, so needy, still, even after his own release. Savoring the feel of Warren behind him, his arm holding him close. Then the other man was freezing in place, trembling and shuddering as Scott felt a hot surge between them, a thick pulsing. Warren cried out with abandon, throwing his head back. The reckless sound made Scott close his eyes and tilt his own head back, groaning along in sympathetic need.

Then silence fell overwhelmed only by the hard throb of his pulse in his ears, in his throat. Warren held him tight, arms trembling, breathing in great gasps. Then finally relaxed with a deep, contented sigh

"Damn, Scott," Warren said, voice shaky, curling forward to press his mouth to Scott's neck again. "That worked rather well." Then he whispered his name again against his skin, lips gentle, tender. Scott shivered, his hand moving to cover the slack hand near his chest. Warren turned his hand over, twining their fingers together, elegant hand slick with semen.

He heard a rustle and a welcome waft of air passed over them. Cracking a heavy eye open, he looked up. One of Warren's wings was lifted above them, waving gently, sending air over them. Cooling them slightly with the breeze. The sun was lower now, shafts of light lying like bars across the room, reaching toward them on the bed, but the heat lingered from the long afternoon.

"Now that's handy," he said, his voice faintly rough. From spent passion. From biting back sounds of pleasure. From cautious joy.

"Certainly is," Warren said, laughing softly. "Now my third favorite thing to do with them."

"Third?" Scott asked curiously, delighted by the sleepy contentment in Warren's tone. So relaxed, so satisfied.

"The first is to fly, of course," Warren said, his voice husky. Scott chuckled, drawing their linked hands up near his face, snuggling down with Warren's arm over him, despite the sweat and the mess and the heat. The gentle breeze felt good. "The second, as of today, is having you massage them. Oh God, I can't tell you how good that felt. Almost as good as this."

Scott smiled faintly, listening to the soothing sound of Warren's voice rather than his words, slipping toward sleep. Content as he hadn't been in ages. There was someone with him. Not pushing him away. Not gathering to go. But just there. Lingering with him, holding him.

Scott sighed deeply, eyes closed, body sated, heart cautiously full as he drifted off to sleep, held securely in his lover's arms.