Chapter Text
One half-day spent in hell leaves the boys with a lifetime’s worth of exhaustion. Blissfully so. But that could be from fucking their brains out for hours at a time. At least, that’s what it feels like down here as the dimensions of time stretch longer on this plane. Having a sex demon for a boyfriend turned out to be a life-altering experience.
As soon as they get to the bedroom, the door behind them closes on its own and Zayn holds Liam up against the door with both hands under his thighs, kissing him slowly. Taking his breath away.
Everywhere his lips brushed - on Liam’s jaw, down his neck on his Adam’s apple, along his clavicle - Liam's skin sang. Goosebumps bloomed beneath his skin like little flowers. Waves of bliss spread over him. And Liam bit his own lip in, letting the sensation wash over him. Soft, flower petal-like blossoms open in his lungs with Zayn's smell, making each inhale feel like a massage on the senses. Intoxicating.
He couldn’t get enough of Zayn kissing him. Planting his garden through his body.
“Love this part of you,” Zayn murmurs against his collarbone. “So sexy.”
Liam was done for. He whimpered, holding onto Zayn’s shoulders and tipping his head back, breathing hard and feeling himself swelling hard against Zayn’s stomach while his heart seemed to swell as well as it pounded in his chest.
It was the narcotic of loving someone like Zayn - it made you exhilarated. It's in your body and it affects you so completely. He wanted to take their clothes off. Wanted Zayn’s mouth all over his body. Make him transform into an actual flower.
“Take my clothes off already.”
“Arms up,” Zayn murmurs softly against his ear, nibbling on it.
Liam obeyed, lifting his arms up above his head and Zayn lifted his shirt off with one hand, up and over his head, dropping it on the floor. Then that same hand moves down Liam’s chest to his stomach, dragging his fingers across his skin with his molten touch, pressing hard enough to leave his print there, resting at his waist. Then Liam dived his head down into Zayn, taking him into his mouth again with his own hands going under Zayn’s shirt, lifting it up and off.
“Are you gonna make love to me against the wall?” Liam said in-between their kissing.
“However you want, baby.” Zayn replied, which made his tummy flutter pleasantly, Zayn calling him that.
“Tell me your fantasy.”
“You.” Liam says simply. “You’re always my fantasy.”
Liam pushes against his shoulders, motioning for him to sit on the bed so Zayn lets him down and backs up into it. Liam pulls his trousers down as he gets on his knees in front of Zayn, moving his hands up his thighs, then massaging one hand down Zayn’s cock. Zayn leans back on his palms behind him, his eyes fluttering closed as Liam licks down his shaft.
“I masturbate thinking about doing this to you,” Liam admits as his kisses down to the tip. “Sucking your cock.”
Zayn’s face crumbles slightly in response, opening his eyes again and looking down at Liam in amazement.
“That’s so hot, baby.”
Zayn’s hand cards through Liam’s curls, watching the leaking of his essence smearing across Liam’s tongue, his heart squeezing deliciously when he swallows it, desire consuming him, melting him down.
“Fuck, you’re fucking amazing.” He swears when Liam dips downward, sucking and bobbing his head up and down while his hand massages at the base of his cock, jerking it deeper into his mouth until he’s swallowing it into the back of his throat, deepthroating him.
“You look so pretty like this,” Zayn strokes Liam’s cheek. “So fucking hot,” Liam, who swoons at his words, moans around his cock, the humming vibration sending Zayn into bliss.
He can taste jonquil, the flavour subtle. Something he can feel sliding on the back of his tongue and throat. Almost too good, earthy and bitter.
The quiet room creaks and sighs against the pummeling heat drifting from the windows, making them both sweat. Light fell languidly through the room, gold and burnt orange dancing across Liam’s perfect skin and hollowed cheeks. He was the most beautiful thing Zayn had ever seen. He couldn’t take the sight of it.
“Okay,” He gasped at a particularly amazing flick of Liam’s tongue, pulling Liam’s head up by his hair and then gripping him under his armpit, dragging him up onto the bed.
“Need to fuck you now or I’m gonna bust in your throat,”
Liam blinked dazedly as he was pushed onto his back on the bed, his eyes large and bright and fixed on Zayn leaning over him, pulling his pants off his body and tossing them off to the side.
The sight of Liam naked and waiting for him maddened him wondrously. He gripped under his lovely long legs, kissing his kneecap before pulling them up so they’d wrap around his waist. He didn’t waste another second, impaling him in one swift movement. Liam gasps, closing his eyes and surrendering to Zayn. There was no gentleness, no opening him up slowly. Just the way Liam wanted.
He blankets himself over Liam’s body, pumping himself in and out slowly, mouth biting at Liam’s collarbone. Liam moans quietly, his fingers digging into the back of Zayn’s bum, pulling him in tighter with every thrust while Zayn’s hands come up into the back of his soft curls.
It’s more than just Zayn’s body getting Liam off. It’s also the sound of him hitting his ears as Zayn grunts and moans and swears under his breath ever so often. The sound of him getting off lurches through Liam’s brain, making Liam’s senses react while he touches him. Making him writhe at the overwhelming pressure and fullness that pushes all the way to his stomach.
Inside Zayn, he feels Lux moving through his body, moving him in a different way and stirring restlessly as his voice clouds his thoughts.
‘Choke him now,’ Zayn hears him murmur in the back of his head, and Zayn lifts up his head, sees Liam losing it under him. So he brings his hand down from his curls to his throat, wrapping his fingers around him, feeling Liam’s pleasant keening in response.
‘Yeah, he likes that shit a lot,’ Lux encourages him, moving Zayn’s other hand down his stomach to his dick, massaging Liam steadily, darkness spreading through his body slowly. It ripples through Zayn, moving down his spine and the feeling is almost orgasmic. But Zayn pushes him back with all his might, panting against Liam’s throat.
‘Come on, don’t be stingy. I want to feel too.’
“No.” Zayn growls, thrusting harder.
“What?” Liam pants, and Zayn shakes his head against him, kissing him. Liam just pants into his mouth rather than attempting to kiss him back.
‘Bite his throat again… he's sensitive there.’ Lux still instructs, and Zayn does, right over his scars, sucking at the skin, moving his tongue over it. Liam turns his head away, whimpering and moving his hips up in Zayn’s hand.
“God you're so deep… fuck,”
He can barely focus on what Liam is saying as he’s trying to stay in control of his body, fighting against Lux, who still manages to move his body in a way that makes Liam completely submit his over, rolling his hips.
His stomach clinches as he slows down a little, dragging it out, driving Liam insane with want.
“Harder, Z,” Liam begs, kissing his jaw.
“Yeah,” Zayn drags his teeth over his bottom lip, feeling himself fall deeper in his body despite his mental effort to stay in front. Feels a tidal wave of fire dragging him back and forth, moving his hips without him, harder like Liam wants it. He wonders if Liam can feel the difference. He can for sure feel the temperature rising and falling, at least.
Liam’s hand holds his jaw, bringing his face up, brushing his hair back out of his eyes.
“You okay? Feels okay?”
“Feels amazing,” Zayn nods, taking Liam’s hand and pushing it up above his head on the pillow, holding him there, digging into him deeper again.
He buries his face in the side of Liam’s neck, inhaling the smell of his pheromonal sweat - a warm, intimate, sun-soaked skin smell - letting it anchor in him and pull him fully to the surface of his body.
It’s like velvet is wrapped around his dick every time he plunges in, soft and silken. He tries to stay focused on that. On Liam. But it’s a struggle.
They go on like that for a while, changing positions occasionally. On Liam’s side at one point, which makes the angle better for hitting his prostate, then turned around so he’s on his knees and pushing back against Zayn’s thrusts, an even better angle. Normally, Zayn could go on like this forever, delaying himself finishing. But his orgasm keeps escaping him now only because he has to slow down to keep Lux from taking over his body. It’s frustrating, like he's edging himself out, losing feeling in his body ever so often, only to have the sensation come back all at once, slamming into him.
Every nerve in his body would light up when he pulls back in front, fire racing along the silk of his skin. The heat of it ripples outward in waves, spilling down his arms, into his fingertips, curling low in his belly as Lux’s presence thrummed against him like a sin-drenched rapture daring him to explore its forbidden pleasure that promises something divine on the other side.
It doesn’t necessarily feel bad - just beyond distracting. Like an accompanying existential crisis is threatening to break through every stroke of his dick.
His hands grip Liam’s hips to ground himself. He’s sure Liam has somewhat figured out what’s happening to him, too. Why he keeps slowing down and dragging it out, pulling out almost completely before he’s shoved back all the way down. Or maybe he can’t tell.
Regardless if Liam can tell what’s happening… from the look of it, he’s loving every second of it, feeling both of them in him. It’s driving Zayn insane.
“I’m gonna… f-finish,” Liam cries, holding onto the headboard and pressing his face into his knuckles as his breath comes out in spurts.
“Lux- shit-Z-Zayn,” He fumbles with their names, looking back at him all flushed, “Sorry--”
“Go on then,” Zayn doesn’t mean to snap at him, but he can’t help it.
He just wants Liam to finish so he can pull out before he loses himself. Liam doesn’t even notice, clenching around him in a broken off swear that Zayn barely registers. He shoots his load onto a pillow, spasming on Zayn, rocking his body. There's a sense of relief in making him cum, relief that he actually made it through. Zayn doesn't even bother with finishing himself.
He’s too afraid Lux will spread through him completely and he’ll disappear again. Also, he doesn’t want to give Liam the sickness of fucking a demon without protection.
Liam falls back against his chest and Zayn holds him there. His forehead presses into the back of Liam’s neck as he squeezes his eyes closed and pulls out of him gently. Liam’s hand reaches up behind him, going into Zayn's sweaty hair.
“Did you…”
“No,” Zayn shakes his head, breathing hard against him.
“I can’t… not inside of you.”
“Do you want to do it on my face?”
A snort bursts out of Zayn unexpectedly as his blinks his eyes open, shoving Liam slightly forward.
“You're so fucking dirty.” He laughs. Liam looks back at him, beaming through his lashes and quirks his eyebrows up and down with a cute smirk.
“You like it.”
Zayn sucks in a breath when he leans forward and kisses him, both of them smiling through it, moving a hand through the back of Zayn's hair. Although that was… quite tempting. He didn't want to deal with Lux again.
“I just want you to finish, too.”
“Next time, babe.” Zayn says against his lips.
It’s really quiet as they settle down together after their passionate, blazing sex, save for the firestorm outside, Zayn rubbing along Liam’s shoulder and chest.
After so much stimulation, he feels strangely hollow now. Empty in a way that almost angers him. He hated feeling like he was in the middle of Liam fucking Lux instead of him again, like the first time. Can’t stand even the thought of it, let alone actually going through it physically.
He moves off Liam to the edge of the bed, his breath ragged and his body still trembling. Not from pleasure, but from the tug-of-war that had raged inside him almost the whole time.
“That… was some bloody amazing dick slinging, Captain Cock.” Liam whispers as he crawls up the bed and lays back down on his back, half-draped across the sheets with his chest rising and falling, curls damp against his temple.
“Just… wow. Sublimation of the flesh. 10/10.”
Zayn snorts, not expecting this from his not-so-innocent-anymore angel.
“Pretty sure you just made up that word.”
“All words are made up.”
“True.”
He checks him out from the end of the bed, biting his lip in.
“Thanks for the review, Backdoor Baron. As if I couldn’t tell from the way you took it so well.”
Liam laughs, rubbing his tummy and his face flushing even more. There was a softness in his expression that illuminated the room in a quiet glow, like he was still somewhere between worlds and caught in the aftershocks coming back to his body. But for Zayn, that glow made his chest churn strangely.
Too bad it wasn’t all me. He manages to bite his tongue, to not say that part and ruin the moment.
Zayn uses the end of the sheet to wipe himself down with his hands trembling slightly, even as he leans over and wipes Liam’s skin as well, licking his lips as his eyes travel up every inch of Liam’s body. Careful. Like he was touching something he didn’t really have a right to take the credit for.
It’s not Liam's fault he feels this way. Not his fault he loves how Lux moves his body… he just wonders if he’ll still enjoy it as much when he’s not there anymore. If they’ll even get the chance to.
Lux stirs inside him again in response to his thoughts. Zayn's knuckles curl into fists.
‘Yeah, you felt that on your cock, didn’t you?’ His silky voice snickers, curling around Zayn’s mind. ‘The way he opens up. The way he begs. Screams our names,’
“Please shut up.” Zayn whispers under his breath with his jaw tight, trying to drown out his voice in the sounds of the storms and the small, rhythmic rasp of Liam’s breath.
Liam shifted, watching Zayn with hazy, half-lidded eyes.
“You sure you’re alright?” His voice was low. There was no suspicion in it, only concern. Somehow, that made it worse.
Zayn nods without meeting his gaze, dragging the sheet down Liam’s thigh, then reaching behind him, taking off the soiled pillowcase and tossing it on the ground.
“Yeah. Just… tired.”
Lux laughed fully, a sound only Zayn could hear.
‘Tired? Call it what it is: you’re scared. Scared he enjoys me more than he enjoys you. Stop being such a fucking baby.’
The words slice through him because there’s a kernel of truth he couldn’t bear to face. Liam had shivered, gasped, clung to him in a way no one ever has before - but was that because of Lux threading his essence into every touch?
He wasn’t used to feeling inferior to anyone. It’s a really ugly feeling.
‘You’re far too in your head about it, is the thing mate. I’m not doing anything different than you would. It's your essence. If you’d just go with it, let the energy flow instead of fighting it, you’d enjoy feeling it too just as much as Liam does. Like riding out an intense orgasm. I haven’t steered you wrong yet, have I?’
‘Definitely have.’
Zayn glances over at the mirror in the wardrobe across from the bed, seeing the mirrored boy now floating in there, hoovering above the bed, sitting up cross-legged with his fingers pinched together over his knees like he’s meditating. But he's biting back a smile. As if he senses Zayn watching him, he opens his grey eyes, which beam supernaturally, and flashes a full, pretty white smile mischievously at Zayn.
‘Not with sex. Not with this fit body of ours.’
Lux attaches a wink to it attractively.
Zayn swallows as Lux looks his naked body up and down, Zayn ending up doing the same thing. At his bare chest and toned abs and how his whole body appears mortal at first glance. Familiar. Human, even. Like looking at his own body in a different complexion.
The same mouth. Same hands. Same soft curve of collarbone - which Zayn’s eyes linger on for some reason. Yet… different. Because after a second, he can see that it all glows faintly under his brown skin with each breath, his mortal fragility laced with the same divine blaze that pulsed through Zayn.
In a way, he was the same as his reflection has always been to look at. Alive in ways Zayn wasn’t - sharper, slightly unreal… reminding him of some physical semblance of who he was. He wasn't being entirely honest when he told Lux he always hated it. It honestly thrilled him to look at himself.
Zayn didn't always have a complex about his reflection. His reflection started in poetry and the eyes of his best friends. Things that made Zayn feel closest to the person he was inside. Things that made him love himself. But as time made them grow apart, for a while - and he’d never admitted this to anyone but one other person - he started searching for himself elsewhere and losing his old sense of self. Especially in the eyes of others.
People had been staring at him for as long as he could remember, whispering, orbiting around him as though he were some rare planetary system plucked from the sky. It wasn't anything he really read into until he was a teenager - when social hierarchies and cliques became more prevalent in his life.
He started to notice how things that came natural to him triggered strange reactions, both from other kids and adults. How when he tilted his chin a certain way, it seemed like people had to look up at him even if they were taller, which he liked. How when he spoke in class, people sat up straighter and listened more, which he also liked. How people were eager to partner with him, even if he didn’t contribute to the work. How just a smile could get him into almost any space, got him what he wanted without asking for it.
Free weed from dealers. Concert tickets. Invites to every party. Even a car from his parents, while his older sister just got a computer. Better grades than he knew he actually deserved from teachers who favoured him. He knew he could skip class as much as he wanted and they’d still pass him - why he knew he could get away with sleeping in every morning and missing his first period every term.
As he got older, he started to understand it. It wasn’t just about beauty. It was aura. There was something about him that made people want to give offerings. And all the attention and admiration he constantly got made him feel self-absorbed.
He became shallow… slightly materialistic. Picky about who was in his inner circle based on how they fit next to him. He’d get a thrill out of the symmetry, of perfection reflected back at him in their eyes. Out of the way strangers treated him better than most people. Out of the way just one look intimidates people while enticing them at the same time. Out of the way he could get just about anyone to kiss him. How it awarded him the hottest cheerleader in school, who would put up with his aloofness, his vain lifestyle just because it was him. It didn’t feel like he was doing anything but playing a game with everyone where he knew he would always be the winner. The winner of generally nicer things in life. But after a while, something else began to bloom. Something darker.
Admiration is a strange kind of hunger. It feeds you until it hollows you out. Because in the end, when the music died down and the lights went out at night in his room, something was missing from it all.
Substance. Growth. Any sort of challenge. Who wants to keep playing a game when you know you’ll always win? And he didn’t feel like he really knew who he was outside of just being someone everyone liked for no reason at all. Or that anyone other than like one or two people really knew him. As if there was anyone to know anymore, anyways.
He felt so empty. Trapped in a cycle. And he'd get so tired of everything. Tired of looking around and seeing the same looks, over and over again. Tired of himself. He missed how things were before he became aware of all this. And he'd trace back to where it all got lost and sickeningly realise the answer was so obvious: he missed Liam.
God, he missed him so much it was painful to think about.
His unique softness. His kind eyes and smile that lit up the whole room. His otherness that matched Zayn’s. The way he saw things from the perspective of someone from another dimension.
Zayn never stopped hoping they would eventually just come back together somehow… but he was aware that they’d both become very different people. That Zayn was someone that Liam obviously didn’t like anymore.
There were so many times Zayn wanted to walk up to him in the hallway anyways, just to say hello, when he'd see him drifting off to class with his faraway, glazed over eyes behind his glasses that didn’t seem like they could even see anyone around him. Or sit at his solo table during lunch and introduce him to new friends that would tug him back down to Earth. Pretend like nothing changed. But he knew Liam was deeply wounded and wanted to be alone, that he had basically returned to outer space where no one else could hurt him. He knew there were things in his world that he couldn’t bring Zayn along for.
His childhood best friend, one of few people who ever looked at him and saw the boy beneath the symmetry, saw past the flawless surface into the quiet, strange, poetic thing inside him.
He missed sitting under summer skies where they would lay in the grass and talk about everything. Death, and dreams, and the strange music of the universe. That friend he could be quiet with and still understood him on a level no one else had been able to reach, touching his thoughts instead of his face, loving his flaws, accepting the way he cried during storms and sang when he was happy.
Somewhere along the way, Zayn had let that version of himself go.
Without Liam, he was empty in a world that only saw his shell. Until Harry offered him a place in the band and he found a new outlet. The music became his confessional, his prayer. A place to write poetry again and vent about what he truly thought about. In a way, he felt closer to Liam again, learning how to play songs Liam had written. About boys who burned in different atmospheres and went through space-travel and drifted from their ancestry.
Even if Liam wasn’t there anymore, wasn’t paying attention to them. His spirit was there.
He’d only been in the band for six months before they were ready for Battle of Bands. At that point, with the hype surrounding it once word spread that Zayn was the bassist, the anticipation had surmounted to being the biggest social event of the year.
He tried to play it ultra-cool the night of the party, which he's really good at doing. Like he wasn’t silently dying inside with nerves when he saw Liam in the theatre and vibrating with excitement that he hadn’t felt in years when Liam said he would come along. It was finally happening. There was nothing more Zayn wanted to do than sing directly to Liam, all his guts spilled out in front of him. Excited that Liam would glimpse a more evolved part of him again.
He didn’t need to calculate a plan. He was used to getting what he wanted and that night, all he wanted was to have Liam back. Only for him to meet death and Lux that night instead and be confronted with who he really is… which he should’ve known all along.
Now he was stitched together by this image and something more violent. He had a way back into Liam’s stratosphere… but at an enormous personal cost. All the things he fears to admit have lived inside of him all this time. Things that touched Liam. Left scars on Liam’s body.
He’s started thinking that maybe Lux isn’t moving his body in any way he wouldn’t himself but showing him yet another thing he’s capable of.
‘That’s a… slightly healthier way to think of it.’ Lux thinks after listening to Zayn’s deep reverie until it inevitably comes back to Lux.
His brows were furrowed like he was fascinated as he watched Zayn's thoughts fly by in only a matter of seconds.
‘You know, you're really not as big of a dick as you think. Developed a bit of a god-complex but… that's only natural, considering your ancient gene codes. But he really grounds you. I know sons of gods who have been walking the Earth's surface for centuries and still never really touched the ground, if you get what I mean.’
When their eyes lock now, it’s like looking into a secret they’ve shared. It was still so insane having someone looking directly into not just his mind but his soul, something Zayn craved for so long.
Zayn won’t lie to himself and say the guy isn’t doing things to him, internally. He was still very conceited. Lux really is gorgeous and Zayn gets a quiet thrill out of looking at him right now.
‘Like what you see, do we?’ Lux wiggles his eyebrows with a knowing smirk, smoothing his long black hair back.
Zayn’s body heats up against his wishes, making him shudder as Lux’s gaze pulls a strange desire from marrow and muscle. Not for the first time, he wanted to touch him. Only this time, it wasn’t with the intention to hurt him. Just… feel.
He closes his eyes to it, making the feeling go away. He now knows what it feels like when other people look him in the eyes.
‘It’s okay, you don’t have to admit it to me. You have the same effect on me, is all.’
He feels a blaze consuming his heart rapidly, not quite burning him. Just… a touch.
‘I wish I could touch you too.’
Liam’s hand suddenly rested on his wrist, right over the star tattooed there, bringing him out of the strangeness in his head. Zayn finally looks back at Liam, meeting his soft brown eyes. There was no judgment there even as he was watching him talking telepathically to his reflection, although Liam didn’t seem interested in looking at it himself right now.
Only Zayn is in his eyes, grounded, warm, and impossibly human in a place built to strip humanity away.
“I dunno what he’s saying to you… but you don’t have to carry it alone, y’know.” Liam says, like he can maybe see Lux fucking with his head in his eyes.
“Whatever is clawing at you… I’ll hold it with you if you share it with me.”
He pulls Zayn to lay down with him, wrapping his arms around his chest so they’d lay nude in bed together, kissing Zayn’s shoulder, then once on his lips.
Zayn leans back after and moves a hand into the back of Liam’s curls, tries to dislodge whatever is stuck in his throat, which burns hot with words he doesn’t fully know how to form. It was a curious feeling inside when Lux makes passes at him… or implies he wants Zayn in some way, sexual or other.
Honestly, he thinks most people would do it, if they had the opportunity to fuck themselves. He spent so much of the time resenting him that the thought of it didn’t really entice him until now. No, he didn’t want to share Liam or his body. But this was something entirely separate from that. Separate from sexuality in general.
So many people around him expressed the same desire, he didn’t expect it to phase him at all. It’s just the sudden desire he feels in return, a different kind than he feels towards Liam. Like Lux is something inside him that he wants to feel now, something forbidden that had belonged to him - trying to think about it the way Liam described it before.
Zayn tells Liam all of this, everything that’s on his mind - from how he let the attention of others consume his identity after they stopped talking, how it couldn’t replace what they had, to how Lux makes him feel now. It should've made him feel overexposed. But Liam’s face was a marvelous picture of understanding and compassion, which made Zayn open up even more.
About how when they’re making love, he doesn't know if Liam can tell where he ended and where Lux began. How Lux told him it would feel more seamless if he let the feeling flow instead of fighting it. How he was still afraid that if he did that, the lines would blur so violently he’d lose himself entirely to someone that’s trying to manifest as both of them.
Someone whose name isn’t even Zayn or Luxuria. But Narcissus.
He sees goosebumps spreading across Liam’s skin.
“Can I… ask you something about that? If it’s too personal, I’d more then understand-”
“Go on.” Zayn smiles a little.
“How does it… work? The curse?”
“I promise I could always see you, Liam. Brighter than I’ve ever seen anything else.”
“No,” Liam shakes his head. “Not like that I mean, when you see yourself in someone’s eyes and you can’t stand it. Have you always known about it?”
“Sort of. It seems like it only became more apparent the closer I got to 18.” Zayn sighs a little, looking forlorn while Liam watches him.
“Remember when I told you I sort of… forget who I am when I am not looking at myself?” He asks. Liam nods.
There’s a small pause.
“It always seems like everyone sees me and they already know who I am before I've even had a chance to introduce myself. There's all these different versions of myself in their eyes. And this person I see… didn’t even seem real. At first, I thought someone would look at me and they just saw this pretty Wasian kid. Then I remember, oh yeah, that’s me. The pretty boy. But then… it’d go beyond that. I’d get things from people, like… offerings or whatever. Secret notes. Exclusive access without knowing why. So much of everything was thrown at me except for what I truly needed. Which took me a while to figure out… but I wanted the universe to speak to me the answer.” His eyes trail back down to Liam again.
“It was you.” He says. “You were basically the answer to the whole universe.”
Liam inhales deeply, the smell of their sweat and breath mingling, feeling Zayn’s warm touch smoothing down the back of his neck as he looks at Liam the way people look at the sky at night: completely captivated, pupils widening as though trying to drink in infinity. His other hand traces over Liam’s cheeks as his gaze trails down, his thumb smoothing under his bottom lip. Liam almost thinks he’s going to kiss him, which makes him hard again almost immediately. But Zayn wasn’t and Liam would think he wasn’t doing something right until he realises that Zayn just simply wanted to look at him.
“Even my parents would look at me and see this kafir.” Zayn continued. “This disobedient child who thinks he's above God that they had to bribe with offerings, too. So that’s what I saw in myself. This guy everyone knows, that’s me walking around as whoever they think I am cause if not, something is missing that I have to look for. Whatever I see in their eyes, suddenly, I remember... that’s who I am. I started to hate it. Wearing glasses helped… I’d stop looking at people. But I still have to look at him because that’s me and I’m stuck like this. And then it came alive.”
“That’s so horrible, Z. I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.” Liam moves against him, Zayn letting him tuck himself in his arm, his red nose pushed up on Zayn’s chest.
“Nothing to be sorry for. I understood that you had your own problems. And I wasn’t completely on my own in it even if it felt like I was…”
“You weren’t?”
“No. I had good mates that kept me distracted enough. The only person I ever told some of this to was Jade, once. When we were high at my house.” He sniffs a little when he mentions her, shaking his head as he looks towards the window with a small smile.
“But… none of that shit matters. Cause whenever I look at you, I don’t feel like I’m stuck staring at something I’d grown to hate. It was always love with you. And it’s always so easy with you… cause you always see who I am. You don’t see… Narcissus.”
“Do you feel like that’s who you are when you’re both there at the same time?”
“Maybe…” Zayn murmurs, moving slow circles through Liam’s scalp as they both stare out the window.
“I mean, we used to be one entity, right? Before all this. Before I was born to this life. The one who fell in love with what he couldn’t touch. When he separated from that, I came out. Even if that life ended… maybe that’s who I’m always gonna become. Whenever he comes through me, it feels like I’m sinking. Like fire and water closing over my head or summat. Sometimes, it feels like that when I wake up from a dream, too.”
He forced a sad, uneven smile, looking down at Liam.
“I don’t know what’s really on the other side of that feeling. Who will be emerging on the surface…”
“Maybe it’s your next life.” Lux’s voice stirs from the mirror, his voice soft like a caress.
Liam shifts against Zayn’s chest, shaking his head.
“Or maybe it’s just you remembering what happened before, like how I do sometimes.” He counters.
“You’re not quite the same as Zayn. If it’s destiny to be the same person over and over again, then you’re destined to always drown, little vessel.” Lux went on.
“Even if there’s no pool… it’ll be fire this time. Afterall, Nemesis said you’d burn.”
Zayn didn’t flinch, just closed his eyes like he’d accept it.
“Maybe.”
The conversation tapers off into silence after that, until Liam had an idea, thinking about his latest astral trip.
“You could talk to Hypnos about it!” He suddenly gasps, sitting up with wide eyes.
“Like how I did! He told me he’s Nars’s uncle and he guided my soul to Earth… he’s pretty chill for a god. Maybe if you asked, or bargained with him, he’d let you stay in this life.”
“Is there, like, an underground secret society of gods you're in, babes?” Zayn chuckles. “You didn’t get a chance to tell me what happened this time.”
So Liam does now as he’d almost forgotten about the whole thing, suddenly very awake and talking very fast. About the memory of them on the hill and entering Hypnos’s cave afterwards. About everything he told him about where Adara came from, how his body was made for her light to enter, who made it and where he was now.
Zayn is genuinely intrigued by all of this, listening intently and nodding along with furrowed eyebrows… until Liam mentions that his maker resided in Cocytus now.
Zayn’s eyes darted to the mirror, where Lux was slinking back lazily in the window sill again with his one leg bent up and the other dangling over the edge, looking like he’s afraid of his reaction.
“Cocytus, huh.” Lux snickers, shaking his head at the window before he looks over at them slowly.
“No fucking way am I stepping foot in that place.” He says, calmly. Like he’s just stating a new fact about himself.
“But--”
“But nothing, Liam.” Lux cuts him off sharply, his voice multiplying briefly. “I’ll accept anything to happen to us but ending up there. ANYTHING else. If it’s Zayn’s next life you’ll have to wait for then, so be it. Nar’s wrath was sent there to rot. Forever. I don’t plan on joining the party. We’re all still connected to each other despite the massive distance due to us residing on an etheric plane. If he senses our presence… if he traps us there, I promise you, Zayn’s heart and body will be taken there and you’ll never see each other in this life or any other ever again. That’s what Ira promised.”
“Lux,” Zayn sighs. “If he’s really still down there, he’s probably chained up.”
“You don’t know that! I won’t go.” Lux huffs, crossing his arms and leaning back against the window again, pouting like a child. Liam rolls his eyes.
“Well… if you won’t go to Azazel, then we’ll bring him here.”
Zayn sits up on his elbows, watches Liam get out of bed and start to put his clothes on, pulling up his grey sweats and looking for the Batman tee Lux gave him.
“Holy shit, does he ever run out of ideas?” Lux says incredulously. Zayn snorts, shaking his head.
“Not since I’ve known him, no.”
That was the thing about Liam. There was no end to the lengths he’d go for the person he loves.
“Where are you going this time?”
“Back to the surface to retrieve the Enchiridion.” Liam answers. “There was a section I skimmed about how to summon an entity.”
“You don’t have to get your fancy demon guide for that.” Lux sighs, rolling his eyes like this should be obvious.
“If you really must… I can show you how to summon whoever you want, here.”
“Brilliant.” Liam came over to the mirror after getting fully dressed, eagerly sitting in front of it on the ground at the side of his bed, holding his hands in his lap as he looked into it.
“Tell us now.”
Zayn didn’t know when or how everything between them shifted into this easy comfort… but it was nice. Liam somehow had a way of getting them to open up wider than they’d ever done for anyone and Zayn is satisfied with Lux offering to help instead of going into a frenzied tantrum that before would’ve left him with twisted limbs and broken bones.
“You know, I actually like this. A lot.” Zayn says, getting up and finding his own clothes while Liam talks to Lux behind him.
“You like what?” Liam asks. “Summoning more demons into your life in a way that could potentially devastate the already unstable balance of our very finite universe?”
“Smart-ass.” Zayn tosses over his shoulder with a snort.
He finds his half-smoked joint in his pants pocket before jumping back in bed, snapping his fingers in front of it, summoning fire from his fingertips and lighting the end, then inhaling the smoke into his lungs. Then he gives Liam a sideways smile and there was something triumphant in his expression. Relief.
“I’m just glad,” He says softly, “that no one’s trying to kill anyone this time. Or seduce anyone. Or… y’know. Both. Nothing behind my back.”
Lux’s smirk softened into something almost human as he watched the storm.
“Small victories,” he whispers, shrugging in the window sill. “I’ll show you… after your date.”
Liam blinked.
“... date?” He repeats.
Zayn’s grin curved slowly and his eyes brightened with excitement, like a secret he’d been dying to share.
“Open mic night,” he says. “There’s concerts in Lust, Li. Music here doesn’t just get played… it lives in a way that’ll blow your mind. We went the other night.”
Liam froze, looking between him and Lux, who, for once, didn’t scoff or roll his eyes. Lux only leaned back against the small frame he was in, arms crossed, gaze unreadable.
“Fine,” Lux says. “But when this is over, we leave for the Ritual Grounds.”
“Deal,” Zayn said quickly, his hand reaching down for Liam’s curls absently while he smokes his weed, ruffling them up.
“You need a haircut.”
“I know.” Liam beams with a dopey smile, closing his eyes and sighing in contentment.
A date with his demon boyfriend in Hell. How marvelous his life turned out, eh?
Lux’s expression grew weary.
“I just hope for your sake that you know what you’re asking for,” he murmured. “Because when we call Azazel from Cocytus… nothing will be the same. I don’t know if he’ll come for free,” he said, fingers trailing lazily along the tattoo on his wrist.
“But he’ll come.”
The sky behind him flared as if in answer, shadows twisting up the walls like serpents. While Zayn started saying something about getting another face piercing, a labret or dolphin bites this time, Right here, he said, pointing to the space right in the centre below his bottom lip, which Liam told him would look cute on him, somewhere out there, the first chord rang out a single trembling note that could cut through flesh and thought alike.
And for one suspended moment, everything felt normal and calm between them. No death, no betrayal, no blood on anyone’s hands. Just the sweet promise of music and a ritual waiting in the dark.
🌩
The house sat on a massive hill that literally touched the sky, which burned low and endlessly. Its walls pulsed faintly, breathing with the rhythm of a place alive. Zayn leans over the open balcony rail outside on the porch, caging Liam against his chest as Liam leans over the rail in front of him.
The air is thick with the scorching scent of something faintly metallic, like blood carried on lightning. Below them, pale red dunes of ash stretched toward an endless, churning horizon where black storms gathered.
Liam was humming with nerves, holding Lux’s guitar in front of him while Zayn pressed kisses on the back of his neck.
“You’re sure this is the only way?” he asks, looking back at Zayn and steadying himself against the chaos that always seemed to move around them these days.
Zayn pulled back with a smile playing at his lips, the kind that promised trouble.
“We can’t exactly take roads.”
Liam swallowed, his grip on the neck of the guitar tightening. “Then how?”
A piercing cry tore the heavy air apart, sharp as a shredding eclectic guitar. From the clouds above, something descended. Massive, black, alive. A beautiful creature with wings spanned wide enough to blot out the sunless light, each feather tipped with streaks of silver fire that hissed faintly when they cut through the air.
His dark-skinned, humanoid face glimmered faintly beneath its hooded crest, eyes glowing a deep indigo like bottled lightning.
“Meet Ari,” Zayn said softly. “The way we’re going, we ride the storms.”
Liam had seen an image of one of these in one of his books. A thunderbird. This one almost looked human in its face. For a split second, Liam thought he was going to speak to them.
They climbed onto the creature’s broad back, the texture of its feathers shifting beneath their palms, soft and metallic at once. Zayn swung up first, settling at the base of the neck, while Liam slung the guitar around his back and slid in behind Zayn, looping his arms around Zayn’s waist. He couldn’t believe Zayn was still wearing that bloody leather jacket in this blazing hell. But he looked good in it so Liam wouldn’t question his choice.
Then Ari leapt from the porch and Liam’s stomach somersaulted.
The house dropped away beneath them, became a smear of glowing coals as Ari sliced up through the dense clouds, wings tearing lightning apart. The air burned against their faces as they broke into the upper atmosphere.
Below, clouds churned like living seas of smoke, lit from within by molten rivers threading across infernal plains. Above, fragments of stars hung suspended, slowly turning as though caught in an invisible tide. Ari’s wings tilted, catching a current of raw energy, and the three of them surged forward like an arrow.
Liam tightened his grip around Zayn’s waist, breath catching as his body pressed against his. The heat of Zayn’s body, the rhythm of his heart racing, the faint scent of roses and ozone, was grounding in the weightlessness.
“This is absolutely insane!” Liam laughed over the wind, voice nearly lost to the storm.
Zayn turned his head just enough for Liam to hear him. “I knew you’d like it. As much as you dream about being in the sky. Now you’re finally here.”
“With you.” Liam smiles, closing his eyes to the wind whipping his curls around. He leans forward, pressing his cheek into Zayn’s back. Zayn’s hand covers over Liam’s around waist, squeezing back.
“Love you, Z.” He murmured. Zayn sighed in his heart, murmured it right back.
They rode in silence after that, Ari’s wings thrumming with the pulse of storm-forged power. In the distance, the clouds parted, revealing the faint glow of the deeper levels below. Vast cities there, sitting over rivers of lava, black towers crowned with pale fire, and bridges formed from the fossilized ribs of ancient structures. The faint vibration of music carried on the wind, low and heavy, as if the whole underworld had a heartbeat that throbbed in time with their descent.
Liam’s senses felt dialed up. The colours popped in his eyes. Sounds swirled with the visual. His inner voice fell very, very quiet. Everything felt dreamlike, his brain now processing this world as if it was running on brand-new software.
“Z,” Liam whispered, awe cracking his voice, “Do we… really have to go back?”
Zayn nods his head, once without hesitating.
“Yes.” he murmured, his words trailing like smoke, “Although, I wouldn’t really mind burning forever if you were here with me… You wouldn’t last here.”
“Hmp.”
Ari screeched, a sound like thunder splitting open the bones of the world, and dove headfirst into the storm. His wings cut through the last veil of storm clouds, the roar of their descent fading into a low, thrumming pulse of sound that rattled their bones. Liam loosened his grip around Zayn’s waist as the clouds fell away beneath them, revealing a vast expanse of a city of obsidian spires rising from molten rivers that twisted around the area.
They’d arrived at an ancient looking amphitheatre - one that could’ve come straight from ancient Greece.
It was all stone with light pouring over seats stacked on top of each other like the ribs of a titan. The columns had winged figures carved into them, locked in dance and combat, and, in the centre, a stage made of bones. The stone glows honey-gold under the light around them, weathered smooth by probably thousands of years of use. Tier upon tier of seats rise in concentric arcs, arranged so perfectly that every whisper, every roar, travels effortlessly to the furthest corner.
The scene before them felt uncanny, as if they’d gone back in time. Golden amphoras filled with wine sat between the benches. Laurels crowned the heads of beings too strange to be human, their faces painted in swirling mineral pigments. Mortal souls floated like soft, transparent ghosts in the upper rows, murmuring prayers and fragments of songs. Lyres, zithers, and flutes played faintly in the background, weaving together beautiful melodies he wanted to sway to.
And yet, threaded through all that antiquity was something jarringly modern: amplifiers lined the stage. Microphones stood waiting, cables like serpents coiled at their bases. A makeshift drum kit sat off to the side.
The sea of beings gathered inside. Gods with eyes like burning galaxies sat shoulder-to-shoulder with demons wreathed in smoke, their twisted wings folded tight against their spines. Even the mortal souls that floated between them seemed fragile but unafraid, pulled here by the same gravitational hum of music vibrating through the realm. Above it all, colossal serpents of living lightning slithered lazily between the spires, their luminous bodies shedding showers of sparks onto the crowd below.
“Zayn…” Liam’s throat felt dry against the electric air. “What is this?”
Zayn twisted off the thunderbird, jumping on the ground then reaching up a hand to help Liam hop off too.
“A promise,” he says simply. “Something I swore we’d do when we were kids. Before all of this.” He gestured toward the gathering, where thousands of beings waited together.
Then Liam heard it. Familiar chords of a song he learned how to play when he was 12. Faint at first, threading through the rumble of the crowd. Then, a rasping, familiar voice carried by the shifting currents, rough and low, like an echo from a dream:
“I’m so happy… cause today I found my friends, they’re in my head,”
Liam froze. No - it couldn’t be.
Ari ascended up onto a terrace carved into the side of a massive obsidian spire, his black talons striking sparks as it landed. The ground trembled beneath their feet.
“Tell me that isn’t who I think it is,” Liam breathed, half in disbelief.
Zayn’s grin curved wicked and soft all at once, the expression of someone who knew exactly what they were doing.
“Welcome,” he murmured, taking Liam’s hand and leading him inside
“to Nirvana.”
The stage was carved into the hollow heart of the colossal skull of what must’ve once been a truly massive creature, its ribcage arching high above its performers to form an open cathedral where firelight and shadow tangled. Smoke coiled lazily from braziers of molten gold, rising to meet glassy orbs lights that hung over the stage and pulsed faintly.
And there, standing barefoot on a platform of bones, a battered left-handed Fender slung low across his torso, was Kurt Cobain.
He looked the same and not the same. Still 27-years-old. Still a shaggy blond, hair hung in uneven strands over his beautiful face, damp with sweat, his skin pale and translucent, as though lit from within by something he’d brought back from death. He wore the same tan cardigan he’d always worn on stage in the 1990s. His gaze swept over the crowd that sang along with him, mortals, gods, and demons alike. And for one brief moment, he almost smiled.
He didn’t seem as broken inside as he once did on the surface. In fact, he looked more alive than ever.
The notes streamed out, bending under his fingers, and the entire gathering surged forward as one, possessed by the weight of his sound. Beings older than they’d ever know threw their heads back and howled like wolves to a moonless sky. Shadows ripped free of their owners and danced across the stone walls, limbs twitching and stretching into unearthly shapes. Even the lightning serpents above coiled tighter, crackling in rhythm with the beat.
Liam could hardly breathe. His chest clenched as though the music had hooked a wire around his ribs and was pulling him somewhere far away. Back to when he was twelve, sitting cross-legged on his bedroom floor with Zayn, headphones splitting between them, Nirvana’s lyrics speaking to them like another language they’d learned together.
Now they weren’t just hoping between dimensions together. They were also time-traveling. He felt like they were just two teenagers in the 90s that had snuck out of the house together, rebels without a curfew.
They sat in an empty corner, closest to the stage.
“This is impossible,” Liam whispers, tears stinging his eyes. Zayn leaned close, his quiet in Liam’s ear.
“I guess some artists,” he says softly, “don’t really die. They just… find better stages.”
Apparently Kurt was here for every open mic night. Liam lost his voice somewhere between Lithium and Come As You Are. Zayn closed his eyes during Polly and swore he felt his soul leave his body and come back wearing eyeliner and a grin. The crowd moshed at one point, which they didn’t join but laughed together as the theatre shook around them. Zayn drummed his fingers on his knees, smiling and nodding his head wildly with his eyes closed.
It was like somewhere church and chaos met, for soft boys in a hard world getting baptised by sweat and distortion.
But not everyone came to listen.
In the farthest shadows on the other side of the theatre, hooded figures moved against the tide of bodies, silent and deliberate. Black-gold masks hid their faces, but the flicker of sigils marked them as envoys of being Liam recognised from the Enchiridion: Archons - keepers of forbidden thresholds and hunters of mortal trespassers.
Their presence stirred the air, slicing through the heat of the crowd. Like they were security.
Zayn noticed them the same moment Liam did. Above them, Ari’s feathers rippled restlessly, the thunderbird’s indigo gaze locking on the danger below.
Liam looked at Zayn, worried.
“Do you think they’ll notice us?”
They had to be the only live humans here. Or at least, Liam was. Zayn shook his head, unsure about it himself.
“I don’t think we have anything to worry about, as long as you’re here with me.” he says.
And onstage, Cobain’s voice cracked, low and ghostly, as he leaned into the mic:
“I miss the comfort in being sad…”
The crowd roared, writhing to the weight of sound, and above it all, the thunderbird spread its black wings wide, ready to take flight at the first sign the storm turned against them. Liam noticed someone looking at them a little ways away from their corner, sitting between a demon and a humanoid being with the face of a bear. He looks human, too.
He looked like an ordinary person, no older than them. Golden blonde curls, vibrant blue eyes. Very pretty face, wearing a sheer, deep charcoal silk shirt, unbuttoned just enough to expose the elegant line of his collarbones and the subtle gleam of sun-kissed skin. When the amphitheatre lights catch, it shimmers. And a delicate gold chain resting against his collarbone, carrying a small laurel-leaf charm.
He watched them in a strangely concentrated way that made Liam nervous. Or more so, he was watching Zayn. Like he was trying to figure something out. He makes eye contact with Liam and smiles charmingly. Even winks at him. Liam looks away from him then, frowning slightly.
Without thinking, Liam instinctively puts his arm over Zayn’s shoulder, which makes him scoot into Liam more, not even noticing their spectator. Liam doesn’t want to alert him this time that someone is watching them. Even as he still feels the man’s gaze, he refocuses on the stage.
During the encore, Kurt looks out and says, “Don’t let the world fix you.”
“Now that was a word.” Liam says.
“Word.” Zayn agreed. Then he curled an eyebrow up at Liam. “You ready to go up there, now?”
Liam blinked, taking his arm back.
“You’re joking… right?”
“No. You brought the guitar for a reason.”
Liam looks towards the stage, where a dark-skinned girl with brown skin and three long, obsidian braids intricately weaving down her back plucked a three-stringed lyre, her voice spilling out in a language Liam didn’t know. He could see Zayn going up there, doing that thing he does when he opens a portal with his voice and captivates an audience, easily. Liam could not do the same thing. Or at least, he never had before.
“Come on, Liam.” Zayn nudges his shoulder. “This theatre listens.”
“And you want me to-” Liam stopped, shaking his head. “Z. No. I can’t go up there in front of all these… Gods.”
“Yes you can.” Zayn weaves his fingers through his. “Just pretend like it’s just me here and we’re in your room again.”
Liam stares at him, chewing through his cheek as he thinks about it. He could just dissociate. Completely zone out and just focus on his boyfriend right in front of him, encouraging him, being supportive, easy.
“I haven’t… played in front of anyone else but-” He cut himself off, heat crawling up the back of his neck as he looked down at their entwined fingers.
“But me, Perrie and Harry, I know.” Zayn says softly. His other hand comes up to the back of Liam’s neck, massaging him gently. “But you’re going to be amazing. You have an incredible voice. You can sing that song you showed me… about kissing and missing someone.”
Liam closed his eyes, exhaling his words. “That song is about you.”
Zayn smiled. “And it’s wonderful.”
They looked at each other again and Liam couldn’t stop himself from smiling back at him. He wanted to sing to Zayn.
“Okay.” He sighs, rolling his eyes away. Zayn did a little happy dance, which made Liam laugh. He reached for the guitar behind his back, letting it ground him for a few seconds before he stood up.
“If I choke, I’m blaming you.”
“You’re not gonna choke.” Zayn pushes him towards the stage, motioning with his hands for Liam to go, smiling in a way that makes Liam’s mind calm.
He waited at the bottom of the stage, bouncing on his heels and waiting for the other performer to finish. Then he stepped up, each step echoing faintly as though amplified by the theatre itself. The crowd was a massive blur in his eyes, which he didn’t mind as long as he could see Zayn clearly. But he could feel the weight of their eyes boring into him.
“Alright, here goes nothing.” He murmurs to himself, his trembling fingers brushing the strings, coaxing them into tune.
In the mic, he tells the audience who he is - Liam Payne, visiting from England, on Earth. That he wrote this song when he was 15 about his now boyfriend and that he’s never performed on stage before and that he’s a little nervous. To his surprise and delight, he gets a few coos from the audience, who must find him sweet. Someone shouts something from the audience that sounds like either, kill it or brilliant. And he thinks it’s Zayn but, his heart is pounding in his ears too loud to know for sure.
Then, he started to sing with his eyes closed. And for once, his voice didn’t crack.
“Where did you go?
I~ know
you can’t stay but~
Home is a place I know~
But it’s far from here~
And I~
I know that~
I wish sometimes I could
fly~y~”
His sound poured through the amphitheatre, reverberating against the bones and stone. The crowd swayed together, like blades of grass moving in the wind. Even the gods, who moments ago had been laughing and spilling wine, fell silent as their divine shapes flickered faintly.
Zayn couldn’t look away from him, his heart swelling, full of Liam and old memories rushing into him.
He could imagine Liam at 15, scribbling lyrics in a notebook about him, with a guitar balanced on his knee - a spacey, star-eyed kid, terrified of how much they meant to each other without ever saying it out loud except in his songs. And here he was now, singing it again, years later, where even the dead could hear him.
He was tearing up a little just when someone on the side approached him, tearing him out of his focus.
“Luxuria?”
The name wakes him up in Zayn. His head snaps to the side, startled. Lux moves in front of him briefly. A man stood there, blonde and beautiful, wearing immortality very obviously on his like his swanky outfit that exposed his chest.
“You look amazing.”
Shit.
Adonis.
His name echoes in Lux’s panicked thought.
‘Your boyfriend?’ Zayn asks. Lux scoffs.
‘Hell no. More like… a fuck buddy.’
Zayn manages to get back in front, not wanting this to turn into something inappropriate. Adonis leans against a column casually but his face looks slightly stunned. He studied Adonis with a guarded curiosity before finally replying.
“... that’s not my name.”
Adonis frowns, for a moment debating if he believes him. Then the corners of his lips lift into something hopeful as recognition dawns on him.
“No… its you isn’t it? You’ve come back.”
Zayn tilts his head back, his dark lashes casting shadows like moth wings as he looks back at Liam on stage.
“I probably look familiar to you.” He says, tone soft but uninviting. “But I’m not who you’re thinking of.”
“Then who are you?”
“Zayn.” he says simply, offering no more than that.
“Zayn.” Adonis repeats, letting the name taste itself on his tongue. His gaze swept over Zayn’s face, drinking him in like he’d been parched for centuries. He pushes off the column and steps closer, just enough for his voice to slip beneath the roar of the crowd.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” Adonis murmured. Zayn shook his head no without looking at him.
“I told you, I’m not who you think I am.”
“But every curve of your face hums like memory. The mouth, the eyes, the aura… it’s all Nars.”
He almost thinks he’s going to touch him as he stares in awe. But he keeps his hands to himself. For the first time, Zayn’s lips curved into a small, almost knowing smile. Like he had a secret he wasn’t going to share.
“Maybe. But I’m not.”
“Yes… I heard he died, 20 years ago.”
He can feel him connecting the dots as he tries to do mental math for how old Zayn looks.
“I've died like a million times.” Zayn says. “I'm great at it. How many times have you died?”
“Only once.” Adonis says.
The stage erupted suddenly - a raw voice cutting through the underworld like lightning has struck. Adonis glanced towards the sound and saw the boy standing beneath the golden lights, guitar cradled in his arms like it was something holy. He sang as though the cosmos had cracked open inside his lungs, a beautiful falsetto spilling out of him carrying light in every note.
Zayn followed his gaze.
“That’s Liam,” he told him. “He’s pretty bloody amazing, right?”
Adonis made a noncommittal sound that Zayn decided to take as agreement.
“He’s my boyfriend.”
Adonis looks back at him, his jaw ticking as understanding settles in. Still he smiled faintly, a thing carved from charm and beauty itself.
“Then he’s lucky.” He says, then he leans towards Zayn, which makes Zayn still, tense.
“But so are you, wearing that face.”
Zayn shifts away from him, an edge of steel behind the softness now.
“Can’t say I agree.”
He liked how Adonis looked at him. Like he's a mystery to him.
The music swelled again and Zayn turned his attention back to the stage, his hand unconsciously resting over his heart, beating in rhythm with Liam’s song. He was grateful that Lux remained calm on the inside, pretending like he wasn’t there too, although Zayn could feel that he was itching to say something to his friend.
Adonis stepped back, swallowing down the ghost clawing at his ribs.
They watched Liam finish together, Zayn’s eyes occasionally darting over to Adonis still standing next to him, swallowing hard. He didn’t press any further about who Zayn really was, didn’t say anything else at all. So Zayn became less on edge about it.
The last note hung in the air like smoke, trembling above the crowd before collapsing into silence. The theatre erupted for him, Zayn swiftly joining as he stood up and clapped and whopped for Liam, smiling so wide.
Liam had a bashful smile on his face, moving his hands through his curls as he stepped off the stage and ran to Zayn and embraced him warmly.
“You were so bloody amazing, listen to everyone!”
“Thanks I was so fucking nervous.”
“Well, you looked great. Completely natural.”
Over Zayn’s shoulder, Liam’s eyes meet with the blonde man from before, who is still watching them unnervingly. He waves at Liam with a smile.
“That was fantastic, Liam.” He says, nodding like he’s impressed.
“Thanks…”
Zayn pulled back, glancing between them.
“Liam, this is Adonis.”
Liam’s eyes bulge.
“You’re Lux’s boyfriend!”
He didn’t mean to blurt that, but it slips out. He immediately flushes in embarrassment that makes Zayn laugh.
“It’s okay, Li.”
Adonis laughs too with his arms crossed.
“And you’re the one Narcissus chose.” He bites his tongue, frowning in apology. “Sorry, I mean, Zayn.”
He couldn’t imagine how much history they probably shared. Didn’t want to, really. He could see it in the guys eyes, how he looked at Zayn like he could see past the surface, into something buried deep inside him. He wondered if he could see Lux.
He was still riding the high of performing in a place like this so, he didn’t want to kill his own mood. Zayn’s arm snakes around Liam’s waist, pulling him along gently as he tips his head to Adonis, bidding him farewell.
“We’re gonna head off.” He says, backing away. “Enjoy the rest of your evening.”
They made their way back to Ari, who descended from his resting place down to them, shaking his feathers awake. Neither of them looked back as they left, though the weight of Adonis’s gaze followed them like a heavy shadow.
“Did you see how that guy looked at you?” Liam finds himself asking on the way up into the sky, more in curiosity than anything else.
“Adonis?” Zayn tilted his head. “Hardly. Everyone looks at me in a certain way… I just tune it out now.” Zayn lies.
“Well… I think he wants you.”
Zayn snorts, shaking his head.
“He might’ve hit on me a little. Too bad for him though… I was made for someone else.”
“So you’re not attracted to him?”
“Are you really asking me that right now?”
“I’m just curious! He’s supposed to be like… the inventor of beauty.”
“Who cares? Beauty is overrated anyway.” Zayn turned towards him slightly, narrowing his eyes at Liam with a slight smile. “I didn’t take you for the jealous type.”
“Who says I’m jealous? I’m just asking questions.”
“You’re the only guy I’ve ever been attracted to, bean.” Zayn assures him, reaching back and tickling Liam’s side, which makes him jerk sideways, giggling.
“I’ve heard differently...”
“Okay… I might’ve had a thing with H for like, a split second… but that wasn't about attraction. It was about availability.”
Liam couldn’t believe he actually admitted to it.
“Wow-”
“-but then it felt like I was sucking off my cousin or something, so I had to stop--”
“You sucked him off?!”
“Don’t go into a full-on strop about it, please... I regretted it immediately--”
“Bet he didn't." Liam teased. "There’s no way I’m letting either of you live that down, now.”
Liam couldn’t stop laughing.
“You’re insufferable.” Zayn groans.
“At least I didn’t sleep with Haz.”
It was only teasing. Light, both of them laughing about it. The stars above watch like they’re in on the joke too.