Standard disclaimers. Happy birthday, Fran!
. . .
1104 days.
His words were molten lead that flowed freely from his lips, and Godric can still not scrape them from his skin. The whispered promises and threats cling to him in a thick web-work of deceit, stifling his senses until the roads of his mind fall into a single, winding path that is bound to lead him to the demon who wove this tapestry of lies.
"I am coming back for you."
One thousand, one hundred and four days later, the promise is still raking across his spine. Godric turns over in his sleep and prays for the most unholy catastrophe to come home.
1139 days.
Godric wraps his trembling arms around his trembling shoulders. The golden wash of firelight spills over the canvas of his wet skin, but someone put a coldness into his bones that he can not extract without undoing the pieces that make him, and Godric would never do that. A brave man, a foolish man, but never a weak one. Suicide is weakness as weakness is suicide, and that is one weight Godric will never set on his shoulders.
Wrapped up in insensitivity and warmth, he ignores the open door at his back and hesitantly brushes his fingers against his lips. He wonders what it would feel like to have those thin, hateful lips on him instead, and the first concept that comes to mind is cold. But he feels nothing, and sinks into sleep.
1140 days.
He had never once felt even the slightest touch of those fingers. Not even in passing a plate at supper, or a collision of elbows in the busiest of corridors. Not a hair on his head bore traces of memory left behind. And yet, no woman or man had ever made him feel so incensed, so despondent, so...impassioned. Godric had tried once, only to have it pass through his hands like smoke. All that was ever bestowed upon him were words.
"Whisper - falling - tongues - crying - hot - fingers - sweet - dissolving - sweat - scream - blood - fuck -"
And while vibrant, graphic images were painted across his mind's eye in the myriad of murmurs, Godric would only lie on his stomach and gaze into nothingness-- not hearing as much as he was seeing, but not seeing as much as he was wanting, soaking in his own silence.
Every time, he waited for that low, smug voice to rasp into a string of moans, waited for the god in the chair across the room to want him enough to cross the distance between them and cement those words in reality. But none of it ever did happen, and Godric was left to writhe on the hook he'd been ensnared with.
Afterwards, he apologizes to the Lord, cleans up, and goes to bed.
1192 days.
"Why?" Godric had asked on a night one thousand, one hundred and ninety-two days ago in his weary monotone, consumed by a craving he could not comprehend.
"So you'll be ready," he expects. Or maybe, "Because I can." They were both men of impulse, men of will. Godric would understand.
"Because you like it,"
he does not expect. Godric thought about it for one thousand, one hundred and ninety-two days, and realizes he did like it when that man had spoken to him, liked every sinful word that trickled past those lips. But he did not like him leaving on the same day, so he prays a little harder and hates a little more.
1217 days.
"When I fuck you. It will be in this room, on this chair, where I sit now,"
The shell of the sun feels like it's melting a little between his legs when he goes hard enough, and just imagines everything's the way he wants it to be. He wants the pads of the fingers he's never felt to press angrily into his skin, to leave marks he will remember and raise shadowy blossoms of pleasure over his flesh. He wants to be filled with enough heat to push out the coldness from the inside, to pattern his eyelids with stars until he is dizzy with ecstasy and screaming. Until his heart crawls out of his throat for the fire searing in his blood.
"and one of us will die because it hurts so much."
Godric never forgets a promise, but no one has ever made a promise he is afraid of breaking.
He thinks of his Lord, and remembers that he is on his way to Hell for these wishes that haunt his skin. Holding himself, he rocks into the fire and spills what's left of his conscience and consciousness into his waiting hands.
1226 days.
Once in awhile, Godric peers into the shadows beyond the range of the hearth and fancies he can just see the outline of a man, watching him. He envisions the slopes of long, dark hair and the eyelids heavy with lashes and lust. Godric's breathing barely trembles, but his hands do, and he feels colder than ever.
"I'll put my hands on your shoulders and my teeth on your neck. I'll scrape down, down, down, and slowly--"
He looks into the shadows again, but the shape is gone. Knowing it is silly to feel disappointed, Godric does the only thing he can do and goes to sleep.
1247 days.
Although he cannot remember moving himself to the chair that has haunted his dreams and the corner of his eye for one thousand, two hundred and forty-seven days, he runs his hands over the surface just to feel the rough texture of the cloth scrape his palms. Godric opens his eyes a little more, pressing his back into the chair and stretching like a cat. He ought to go upstairs and join the others for breakfast, but a glance at the painting of the grounds over the fireplace tells him it is late evening, and he has slept through the whole of the day. How tragic.
Sighing, he shifts in the chair in seeking a comfortable position and feels alone, as he is. He thinks a little bit, remembering how he had always been told he couldn't think anything logical if he tried. Maybe if he builds up enough spite, dams it up into an ocean of hate, this longing and sadness will have no room to exist and leave him.
"And it feels like you're being branded all over, but you love every moment of this because you're sick, sick and disgusting enough for it. I've bruised your hips and your legs and my tongue is warm on your--"
Godric decides this must be like the consequence of too many years in battle. He has only been a soldier for his King a few times, but really, his whole life has been something of a battle, hasn't it? Everyday was a fight against...well, someone, everyday a decision to make that would plot the course for dozens of children. And so many of them had...no. He closes his eyes and tries not to think of that, focusing instead on the living, hopeful students under his care. Godric knows now, knows, and will never make those mistakes again. Especially with him gone. No one is left to lie to him, to hurt anybody, to teach him the opposite of God's will.
Yes, he thinks to himself, yes-- starting tomorrow, he will sever the strings that have linked him to that bastard. He will stop thinking about it, stop these stupid prayers and devote himself entirely to the school. This is it.
Already, Godric feels a little better, and does not look into the shadows. He will have redemption.
1248 days.
"Blood. All over the walls, pooling on the floor. Yours, mine-- does it matter? It's in both of us, in our mouths, on our hands." His hand curls on the arm of the chair. Across the room, Godric shudders, feeling both the blood and the hand that aren't there. His hand...
Godric's dreams have gotten worse. But he will not be tempted, he will not go back. His smiles are growing closer to home, his distance shortening. The children warm up to him again, embrace the colour in his eyes and flesh and heart.
"The strawberries are growing again. I know how much you like them," murmurs Helga, her fingers digging into his shoulder at supper. Looking at her properly for the first time in one thousand, two hundred and forty-eight days, Godric notices something he did not see before and nicks his thumb with a knife.
"I am sorry," they both apologize, without much reason at all, but neither question it.
1249 days.
"I had this dream last night," is the confession at supper the next evening. "It's been plaguing me for some time... I was hoping you could help me interpret it, Helga. You too, of course."
"Oh?" replies Godric, looking up. He acknowledges a spot of strawberry jam on his thumb with a lick.
Rowena is not starlight, but fire. A fusion of darkness and light, possessing an honest sort of power without ever revealing much of anything about herself at all. "Well, there's this strange room... There's light filtering in from above in tendrils, barely penetrating the shadows and without a visible source." Precision without concision, as usual. Godric subtly dips his hand in the jam. "And this sort of low, rattling sound, like sand...I cannot be sure. But--"
Godric stoppers his ears and smears a wavy streak of red jam across his trencher, thinking about smoke and what happens when fires go out.
1265 days.
No more dreams. Godric stops sleeping in the dungeons and returns to his chambers. If he tries not to think of Helga crying on the stairs, he is even a bit happy. He is safe.
1298 days.
"Why is Helga always so sad?" Godric finally asks Rowena, brushing his fingers down a curtain of hair. The child in his arms giggles and puts her arms around his neck.
Rowena does not respond, but scratches some runes across the table. "Godric, bring the girl to me." Helga was the one to find her shortly after the end of summer. A good thing, too; the autumn has been nearly frigid.
"I am sorry."
1299 days.
His daughter. She's...his daughter. Godric kisses the child's brow. Just before he drops her in the lake.
1300 days.
Godric lies awake, thinking about last night and feeling chilly. Helga gave him a strange look today, and he thinks that might be why. He has always hated to see her unhappy, but now she is less than that. Is that what he was like when he was sulking in the dungeons?
Rowena leans against the wall in the candlelight, watching him pretend that she isn't there and isn't worried. "Have you seen the baby?" she asks softly, when she knows he is asleep.
1342 days.
"I breathe into you, and you are alive."
He wonders why his wife is so cold, sprawled across the floor. Perhaps he should bring her a blanket, but she does not respond to the suggestion. Godric tastes a bit of strawberry jam on his fingers and walks away, to think about the new set of dreams he has been having.
1373 days.
Screaming. She woke up screaming again, Rowena tells him, right before Helga vomits all over the duvet.
He says, "I don't see what this has to do with me."
She says, "Stop hiding things from us."
He says, "I'm tired of waiting."
She says, "I think it's time for you to go."
1380 days.
The arguments have died back down, just like they were supposed to, now that he is gone. Without him, fights never last more than a few days. Helga says it is because he was a curse, and Godric is still not sure how to tell when she's serious.
Rowena broods a little more in her study, locked away with the scrolls and texts she cannot read but always seems to understand. Godric broods a little more in his room, locked away with the letters he cannot understand but always reads. With fingers blackened by ink or plague, he holds the sheaves of parchment reverently, and sets the letters back into the drawer. Letters of promise.
"There is nothing left but an empty feeling of absence."
1384 days.
"Just don't tell anybody, okay?" Helga's eyes widen; whipping around in a flurry of robes, she runs down the corridor, her dainty slippers clapping on the elegant floor. He smiles at his reflection in the polished stone and walks foot-to-foot with himself. It is not the billowing of his cloak that darkens the torchlight in his wake.
1392 days.
Godric is latent on the bed, saturated with frosty wisps of cold that crawl like insects beneath his skin. It has been a long winter, and even these furs cannot keep the warmth from escaping his body, for there is none to escape. His face is rather gaunt, but it is not questioned; he is notorious for his cold-weather tolerance (or lack thereof), and there is something damp in the air that keeps his cheeks washed of colour. Nasty scraping on slate reverberates against his eardrums as a symptom of the sickness, rattling and unhappy. If only those wretched clouds would just...!
Were his lips not so stiff with ice, he would curse under his breath. How is it, that Rowena can prance about with naught but two kirtles and bared arms? This is a foreign universe, in which the witch can see the sun where the wizard sees clouds. She claims it is nearly the coming of the Beltane, but Godric is in no mood for festivities. The cold is just eating away at him, bit by bit, and he does not understand it.
1400 days; 5 hours.
It is of his own will that he is back in this room, his hands pressed to the floor while the hearth purrs placidly under his drained gaze. The heat only vaguely brushes his shoulders, and Godric is almost certain he is about to die. But like any good man with so few years to speak of on his sleeves, he smiles into the fire and crushes an unfortunate dormouse within the frigid cage of his fingers.
"I will not wait," he whispers, pulling the creature apart and setting its pieces on the floor. Godric smears the darkness on his fingers beneath the arrangement, and holds his letters close to his heart. Those sweet, sweet letters of broken promises.
1400 days; 11 hours.
The sky is a sick, exhausted display of grey, watered by an unearthly green that only taints the sky on Holy mornings. Rain trickles like vomit from the corners of the clouds.
'Redemption, redemption, hallelujah!'
Godric knows his time has come.
1400 days; 17 hours.
And it has.
1400 days; 23 hours.
Godric is in that chair again, when it happens, that is. The warm glow of the advent is around him, and he has the hissing sound of sand in his ears. The sound of time...the sound of serpents. Lots of them. Outside the castle walls, worms of every size and breed create a twisting and tangled frame around the castle. The advent. The coming. It is no surprise, then, when he is there-- in the shadows, where Godric always imagined him, with the same...the same...oh. (He is still surprised.) Godric shuts his eyes and pretends that Salazar does not keep his promises, that the letters he wrote himself were not premonitions but passing fancies, and no, no, no! Not so soon, not when he was so sure he was better. Pleasepleaseplease--
But he cannot even count the seconds that it takes Salazar to approach him; one moment, the enchanter is in the corner, yet he has moved six paces in the next without so much as a twitch. He is as unreadable as ever, and Godric takes solace in the thought that this is just another dream. Another dream where he is victimized by the temptations he's fought so goddamn hard to avoid. But he is still frozen, and he does not even move his eyes until the Devil hovers directly over him.
"You are not real, you are not real," Godric murmurs again and again, his gaze on the fire but his hands breaking with the effort of--
"Only as real as you want me to be," is the whisper that lingers at the edge of his ear in a cloud of warm breath. So warm...
Salazar's hands, thin and white like parchment seeped in water, are draped over the back of the chair where Godric cannot see them. "How about another story...?" Salazar's voice is as fluid as he remembers, but it is not the same. Want...
Godric's only response is a resistant, "Nn...," of disagreement, resolute and nearly hungry. Where Godric has faded with the shores of insanity, Salazar is only more...more...oh, he cannot even pinpoint it; but there is an immense ache in his ribcage where his organs had felt like they were melting away not so long ago, and there is a wetness in his mouth that wants to do things, bad things.
There it is.
"No...?" breathes Salazar, his eyelids sinking and this fucking look on his face, and Godric falls apart.
Salazar does not seem to mind when a pair of dark, unshaken hands shoot out like blades in a duel to seize the folds of his robes and drag him down. Salazar seems to mind even less when ravenous lips crush feverishly against his, twisting and turning to find something that fits. Salazar does not even seem to mind when those hands that had too recently been buried in his robes wind up in his hair, yanking and grabbing as a drowning man grapples for a lifeline. No, instead of pulling away or shouting or even kissing back-- Salazar sits, and Salazar waits, as Salazar is apt to do.
Godric's mind is wracked with delirium, but he is too busy devouring Salazar's mouth to care about the searing heat on his tongue, or the explosions of something very much like magic burning across the insides of his eyelids. He takes and takes and takes, past the point when dizziness overwhelms the remains of his awareness and well into madness. He does not care that Salazar does not return the kiss, because it is not a kiss. It is a feast, and he does not retreat until he is sated.
When Godric does draw back, he falls against the chair and stares at his hands, at the invisible flames licking his palms, making up for their lack of visibility with their heat. He does not notice Salazar, nor the knife in Salazar's hand, nor the ruin on Salazar's tongue. But Salazar does notice the glaze in Godric's eyes, from lust and tears and lunacy. Only as mad as the moon.
"Why did you leave her here?" Godric asks quietly. Not timidly, just quietly. He had meant to say 'me', but the question had been burning in his throat for far too long. "You left her here. You...left." Left, not right. He was always right, but he was always the wrong choice.
Salazar is looking Godric in the eye, and Godric is all too quickly caught up in a stormy web-work of blues and greens and fires. "I never had a place for a daughter," is his answer, and his answer is the truth. Godric knows he knows, about the lake, and says nothing. But Salazar is not finished. "I did not come back for her, if that's what you were thinking." Pause. Sugar and roses and water and-- "I came back for you. Like I promised."
The glass in the atmosphere is not yet broken when his breath is sliding on Godric's cheek and his knees are cushioning Godric's hips and his knife is in his hand. Scraping, carving across his pallid palm and painting a pool of bright, bright red; he doesn't even need to look, just to cut, until he feels that itch. And when his hand is tingling, he lays it on Godric's chest, staring all the while into Godric's waking eyes. Salazar smiles.
"Oh. Look at that."
Godric knows what this means, and his toes curl in his boots.
"I think you've got a spot on your shirt, Godric." The gaze is broken. Fire encases Godric's left ear, and he bites back a sound. "Better take it off."
The glass shatters. Godric is suddenly fumbling, frantically, at the obstructive laces and strings that hold his shirt around his body. He hardly notices when his fingers brush the crimson stain on the cloth. But Salazar, Salazar does make it so difficult with his fingertips slipping under and around and up and down, and he's not even sure what Salazar's doing to him with his tongue on his ear, but, GodJesusMaryfuck-- Godric writhes like a snake when Salazar starts sucking on his neck.
It takes a little too long for Godric to drop the reddened tunic to the floor, but neither man seems to care. Salazar is as slow and careful as he's ever been, raking his nails over Godric's skin at a speed that leaves the rest of him more sensitive than anything else, waiting to be touched and scarred and bruised. At the back of his mind, he wonders how much of this the chair will be able to withstand, but the thought dissipates into nothingness when Salazar smears a hot streak of blood down Godric's shoulder. He pinches and prods, licks and bites, wetting Godric's skin with a solution of saliva and blood. And Godric burns.
Salazar holds Godric's neck when he kisses him, not like a woman might put her arms around a man's neck, but like a man would strangle an animal. Godric whimpers a bit, kisses harder. Salazar has his tongue in and out of Godric's mouth; whenever he tries to imitate the gesture, Salazar pulls back. It is a sloppy and rough brawl, and Salazar throws him on the floor, but Godric thinks it must be worth it a little that Salazar moans when he manages to suck on his tongue. He is vaguely aware that the Parselmouth is hissing things in his own tongue, and it does sound a bit like sand, and some of the terrible things he calls Godric are in their own language, but it is more important that Salazar has his mouth on his nipple and his hands rubbing his hips and his knee between his legs. All Godric can do is grip Salazar's hair like the reins of a beast, but he thinks Salazar prefers it that way.
Godric has to sit up a little when Salazar finally opens up his britches. He glances towards the chair, but Salazar only laughs and holds him down, calls him a whore. "Not yet." This time, the knife is in his arm, cleaving a scarlet path that spreads and spreads until it is dripping onto the floor and Godric, who watches with widened eyes. Salazar puts his bloodied hands (red gloves for dinner with the Council) on Godric's erection, and Godric thinks he might end up unconscious with anymore of this. But it continues, as he knows it is going to, and he even watches when the man takes his penis in his mouth like the red corpse of a dead or wounded animal.
Heaven. No, not quite Heaven, but Heaven and Hell...because the only thing that stops Heaven from being a haven is Hell. A fiery chasm, like Salazar's mouth. "Ah!" Godric tries not to squirm when Salazar flicks his tip with his tongue, but his fingers and toes are curled up like rocks. Salazar takes it with slow deliberation, licking away the blood and digging his nails into his thighs. Godric punctures the inside of his swollen lip with the effort of not making anymore noise to interrupt this moment, but Salazar springs like a previously coiled serpent to devour the rest of him and swallows. The cry is stifled by his fist, before it quiets to a steady whine of need. Godric is trying to push up, struggling against Salazar's red hands, and he might succeed, except Salazar's elbows are thrusting all of the man's weight forward to keep him down. When he swallows again, Godric writhes, panting and growling distress through his tightly clamped teeth. Salazar sucks and Salazar blows, up and down, until Godric is firing seed like a wand fires incendio. Salazar pulls back.
He cannot help but stare, having nothing else to look at-- but what he sees looked both foolish and...
Salazar breathes. Smiles, even. "See what you've done, Godric...?" He smears semen down his cheek with a crimson finger, staining it with blood. "You ought to clean this up, Godric. You ought to clean this up at once." What Godric wants to do is lay there and rest. But if he has any law, it is Salazar, and he clambers up to sit in Salazar's lap, one leg on either side. Godric meets Salazar's emotionless stare with heavily-lidded eyes, before being guided by impulse to run his tongue over his face. He starts at Salazar's cheek, then goes everywhere, laving at the sticky mess of red and white until there is nothing but the pallor of Salazar's skin. Godric is flicking his tongue at the corner of his lips when Salazar unlaces his robes, without Godric's impatience. He takes his time in sliding the dark material down his sallow shoulders, revealing colourless collarbones and a flat stomach. The knife is faster than Godric's fingers, flipping across his naked torso and making pattern-less shapes, clean on the edges but seeping with blood.
"Stop," Godric whispers for the first time, worried by now for Salazar's life. Each time, the cuts got deeper. "Please...Salazar."
He does not expect Salazar to heed his word, but he does. Salazar sets the knife aside with a wry smile, touching Godric's jaw. "Whatever you say, Godric."
He stares then, his hands on Salazar's shoulders, trying to decipher what was going on. Godric wants time now, time to figure out Salazar's cryptic messages and time to exist. But his clarity is consumed under a pair of nightmare hands; Salazar is not finished, and in no time at all, Godric is pressed into the chair with enough force to know what is going on. "You wanted this, didn't you?" Salazar murmurs breathily in his ear, caught up in a surge of desire that shows through in the way he shoves down Godric's britches, in the way he nearly rips his own robes. Godric forgets about whatever time he wanted, having none now to remind him of it. He is sick once more, ensnared by lust and greed, grabbing the chair and expectant as the whore Salazar accused him of being because he wants it bad enough.
Godric waits without knowing why Salazar is rubbing at his opening with his wet fingers first-- "Ouch!"--and he cannot see what else is going on, but he does not care. He will not be satisfied until whatever his body is waiting for happens, and quickly. He can hear the knife again, and makes to reach behind him and grab it away, but Salazar catches his wrist.
And then there is nothing except an expanse of pain. One of us will die because it hurts so much. Godric has already screamed, feeling Salazar hard and invasive at his back, pushing and pushing where there's nowhere left to go like that knife pushing into the chair-- "Shh, relax," Salazar whispers, but Godric is choking back a dry sob and tense and dying from the aching around the foreign appendage in his body. "Shh..." He pulls back a little, which hurts almost as much as the going-in, and then drives it deeper. Godric sinks his teeth into the back of the chair, but his screams are still loud and grating in his own ears. And the worst part, is that Salazar is still as right as he has ever been-- he is sick enough to like it, sick enough to rock back into Salazar's movements and moan between his screams every time he hits those nerves that deceive his head with the illusion of pleasure. A pleasure that veils the burning and the breaking and the chaos, which shoot a little farther up his spine with every thrust.
Godric still struggles, shrieking broken fragments of Salazar's name and breathing harder than any battle of blades has ever made him breathe. Salazar's teeth are on the edge of Godric's ear, making his eyelids go down and his head tilt. The hand that isn't holding Godric's and the knife has slipped down, down, down, in a smear of ruby-red, to stroke and tease, until Godric is coming and everywhere, gasping for air and pushing back one last time. Inside of him, Salazar spills his heat with a resigned sigh, and Godric is just leaning forward to rest against the chair when his arm is yanked back at a speed and angle it was never meant to move; and Godric thinks, This must be my consequence. Just as the blade sinks deep into Salazar's chest, like slicing through air.
Godric jerks away, his eyelids flying up almost comically when the fountain of blood hits his back, except that there is nothing even remotely comic about it. Salazar makes no more noise than a stifled cry, and, "For...everything you did--" Breathe. "--to...me, you have my--" Breathe. Swallow. "--murder..." Salazar's eyes never once leave Godric's face, and Godric is not even sure that he is dead, until he notices the absence of the rise-and-fall of his chest. Dead. Godric shifts his legs out from under him, turns around as properly as he can with this new shame on his piece and a new pain snapping the plates in his spine. Dead. Salazar is half on the chair and half off, his shoulders on the floor and his white flesh barely covered by the robes. Dead. Godric, still bearing the marks of his own passion and Salazar's own hate, steps down into the blood and finally notices that the knife is still in his hand. Murdered.
One of us will die because it hurts so much.
&.
They knew. Helga is gone now. Rowena is gone as well. Godric has hired new assistance to help him take care of the children, and they don't guess a thing. The warm, vibrant Godric Gryffindor is exactly who they expect him to be: bold, protective, and fond of exotic animals. He recently brought up a Kraken from the Mediterranean, much to the delight of the students, who are let out on the yard to watch it on Sundays (under supervision, of course).
"What does it eat, Master Gryffindor?" inquires little Opal Kitchens, kneeling by the water's edge and sprinkling bits of grass into the lake.
Godric lies on his stomach by her side, one hand draped in the water to stir little circles of motion in the murky liquid. He has a very straight face when he answers without hesitation, "It eats people, Opal. Bad people." Opal's eyes widen, sucking in a breath through the space where her left front tooth used to be. Then Godric laughs, ruffling her hair as he rises from the ground. "So you'd better be good, or we might have to heave you in!" He makes a little monster noise, waving his arms about. Opal squeals with laughter and runs back towards the castle, giggling the whole way.
The headmaster smiles, before glancing back to watch a thin, mottled tentacle rise up to capture the shredded grass and pull it down beneath the surface. "I know you're hungry," he sympathizes under his breath, slipping a jar of red from his pocket and dumping the strawberry jam into the water. "I know."
I am coming back for you.