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[softlyfalling]

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[softlyfalling]

How does someone like you end up with demon-hunters, anyway?

[selfpreservationist]

... that's a good question.

[softlyfalling]

...I suppose not all of us get a choice as to whether we find our way to the field of battle or not.

[selfpreservationist]

At the very least, I don't think it's the kind of career someone comes by naturally. I'll be very surprised if I was a young man with aspirations of murdering devils during grade school.

[softlyfalling]

[ pfft ]

I suppose I can't necessarily take Nero as the rule, there, as cute as it is to imagine.

[ tilts her head— ]

What do you think you intended to be?

[selfpreservationist]

... I don't know. One could surmise I wanted to be a poet or a writer, but the poems are... not something I aspire to create. They're more like... a security blanket.

[softlyfalling]

Comforting, you mean, or more just comfortingly familiar?

[selfpreservationist]

Comforting. I kept a book of Blake's poems on me even during combat.

[softlyfalling]

They must really have a special place in your heart, then...

[selfpreservationist]

Evidently.

[softlyfalling]

[ looking back at him in the middle of moving forward down the hall of artwork. ]

Which one's your favorite? Of his poems, I mean.

[selfpreservationist]

Hard to say. They all speak to me, in one way or another. But...

[pauses, for a good few seconds]

I keep coming back to "The Clod and the Pebble", more often than not.

[softlyfalling]

Oh, this Cuckoo and Azaleas painting is pretty—

Ah, I don't think I've heard that one before. What's it about...?

[selfpreservationist]

[abruptly raven takes shrike's hand and lifts it to his lips, kissing her knuckles]

[softlyfalling]

[ holy shit

...she was going to say something but now she’s just blushing furiously as her heart tries to beat its way out of her chest, and reflexively tightens her hand against his. ]

I, ah...

[selfpreservationist]

[his eyes lowered, raven keeps her hand by his lips as he speaks, so his breath tickles her skin]

"Love seeketh not Itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care,
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell's despair."

So sung a little Clod of Clay
Trodden with the cattle's feet,
But a Pebble of the brook
Warbled out these metres meet:

"Love seeketh only Self to please,
To bind another to Its delight,
Joys in another's loss of ease,
And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite."

[when he finishes, he finally lifts his gaze to meet hers]

1/2

[softlyfalling]

[ she's dead, call a zrael live ]

[softlyfalling]

[ well she definitely needs to lie down and be dead but also

first she needs to lean down and kiss him, because she's a disaster and happens to be extremely weak to that— ]

[selfpreservationist]

[oh

that's not

at all what he was expecting

which she'll probably be able to clue in on by the way his breath catches right before their lips meet, a soft shocked inhale, but as soon as they kiss he's leaning into it, his hand holding hers tightening as if to say--don't you dare take that back]

[softlyfalling]

[ she's always hyperaware of other people's reactions so she's like 75% sure she made a very stupid move until his hand tightens holding hers, at which point she very obviously relaxes.

that's

nice.

she's just sort of going to rest her other arm at his back, and let herself lean against him, pulling down lightly on his lower lip. ]

[selfpreservationist]

[he's tense at first when she touches him, but slowly he relaxes as he feels the warmth of her body leaning against his. his hand not grasping hers touches her cheek, and he sighs into her mouth, deepening the kiss]

[softlyfalling]

[ that's all right? that's all right.

she readjusts her hand to lace their fingers together a little more comfortably, and returns the intensity in the kiss until she has to pull back for air, breathless. ]

[selfpreservationist]

[he squeezes shrike's hand, for himself as much as her, and when she breaks the kiss he's almost tempted to steal the breath from her with another one--but he needs to breathe, too. he stays close, watching her face]

...

[softlyfalling]

[ she'd be beet red if her blood wasn't a slightly too-dark color; her eyes slide down to focus on their hands, but she also doesn't... let... go... ]

I... might've gotten a little carried away, but...

[selfpreservationist]

[softly, his voice almost a murmur]

If I had known reciting poetry would induce that kind of reaction in you... I would have done it sooner.