Death and the Maiden

I felt so clever, so stupidly proud of myself, heart thumping with the guilty little thrill of watching her.

Until she caught me.

She'd stepped away from Rhiannon's grave, and walked slowly off into the mist.

And I'd not checked that she was out of view before I'd slunk over to see how things were and stare at the fresh flowers that she had left.

I had tended graves before, after all; this one was neat and well-contained. Plain stone borders containing a patch of green, Rhiannon's family had elected not to seed her resting place with flowering plants that would die over winter.

A simple Celtic cross was chiselled into the headstone, and the dates and words that were never enough to express the loss the living had suffered.

Daughter. Sister. Light of our lives.

So poignant.

I wondered how Rhiannon was, in her healing sleep Above. I wondered how long she'd be there.

I knelt down, straightened the vase and the fresh Arum lilies...

"What are you doing?"

Her tone cracked like a whip.

I froze.

Shit.

"I said..."

And then I straightened and slowly turned to face her, heart hammering.

She went white and clutched at her stomach as if she'd been punched.

"You..." she gasped.

"Please don't freak out!" I begged, stepping back, trying to be as unthreatening as I knew how...

She took three swift steps forward and grabbed my wrist.

"Don't you dare disappear on me again," she snarled. "You! You have some explaining to do..."

I stared helplessly at her; there were at least three different ways I could free myself and escape that I could think of off the top of my head; not a single one of them would extricate me from this incredible mess of my own making.

I sighed and slumped, trapped.

"Yeah. I suppose I do, at that. Just... please don't make a scene. It's really important that... that you don't draw attention to me. Let's... let's walk. Please?" I begged her.

She eyed me, intensely suspicious, and tightened her grip.

"Ow," I protested. "Please. You're hurting me. My wrist. Please."

She slackened her grip by a notch or two.

"I promise I'm harmless," I added, for good measure.

"You're not though, are you?" she said, softly. "Who the hell are you and what the fuck are you doing here?"

"I've been... watching you," I said.

Her eyes narrowed.

"Why."

"I was... concerned."

"Why."

"I just... was. Please. Please, just walk with me and I'll... I'll do my best to explain. For... for what good that will do either of us now..."

She stared at me, then took a deep breath and sighed it out.

"Alright. I'll walk, and I'll listen, but if you so much as step one foot out of place I'm going to punch you right in the nose."

"You'll just hurt both of us. Look. We're getting damp," I said. I glanced upwards ruefully - the mist was slowly becoming drizzle. "Make that damper. Come. It's more sheltered this way. There's a group of Yew trees not far from here that we can stand under. It's dry there, if a bit gloomy."

I turned; she tightened her grip again.

"I'm not going to run away, Caitlyn," I said. "I swear."

"You're also going to tell me how you know my name," she said, low and angry. "I don't like people knowing things about me."

"Just walk with me and I'll tell you everything."

She stared at me for a moment longer, as if making up her mind. Then she let go of my arm, and shoved her hands deep into her jacket pockets. I rubbed my wrist where she'd grabbed me; she had a vicious grip and I knew I'd have a bruise to show for it.

I turned and took a step, and after a moment she took three quick skips to catch up to me.

We stalked, side by side, through the slow and mournful morning.

She shot me several direct and furious glares, but I could see something else in her eyes. Bafflement? Hurt? Madness, maybe? Who knew.

"I'm waiting," she said, after a minute or two.

"How much do you want to know?"

"Start with how the fuck you know who I am. I've never seen you before, well, bar..."

She paused, and bit her lip.

I took a breath.

Stupid habit... part of me reminded me.

"I'm... oh... fuck, how do I put this.... well. lets... lets go with Angel. I mean, you saw me. Wings included. My birthday suit, as it were. It would be kind of futile to deny what I am."

"Oh fuck me..." she whispered. "Are you... real? I mean, I'm not in the loony bin, right, doped up to my eyeballs on happy juice? Right? This is actually happening? I'm actually talking to... you?"

"If you were mad, how would you know?" I asked. "For what it's worth... I don't think you're mad. And you're not hallucinating. Though to be fair that's what a hallucination would tell you, I suppose."

"That's not helpful," she muttered.

She wrapped her arms around herself and took a shaky breath.

I slowed to a halt and waited for her to look up at me.

Her eyes were such a vivid green...

I swallowed, focussed on what I wanted to tell her.

"This is real. All of it. Really, really real. Your friend is dead. I'm sorry about that. Really, I am. You're walking through the graveyard her body lies in, talking to... to the being who was tasked with leading her soul away."

I held her bitter gaze for a moment, then looked away.

"So she's... in Heaven, then?"

The words were wooden.

I started walking again, she followed.

"Kind of. It's... somewhat different to how you maybe imagine it. Are you religious?"

"No. Not really... though that seems a bit of an oversight now."

"You know the Bible, right? Life after death, that sort of thing?"

"Sort of."

"Okay. Imagine a... a local council office full of... things like me..."

"Things?" she said. She turned partly towards me, looked me up and down. "You're a girl, not a thing."

"I... that's... that's kind of you. But I stopped being a girl... long ago."

Something about her put me off balance; I couldn't work out why.

"You're a girl," she said. "Pretty bloody obviously, really. It's kind of hard to miss."

She adjusted her coat, tucked herself further into it. "Doesn't matter what else you do. So. Christ... this is weird. So... what? You're the Angel of Death, then?"

"No. He's far older and far more... profound. I'm..."

"A... minion?" she said, seemingly amused.

I relaxed, just a little.

"That's not such a bad way to describe it. He always calls me his Usher, which pisses me off a bit."

"Are you allowed to swear, then?"

"Like a fucking sailor," I said, mostly just to see if she'd smile again.

She snorted, then glanced away.

So much for that idea, I thought glumly.

"At least I know how you know my name, now. I suppose that's something, even if I'm fucking crackers. How... how long have you been watching me?"

"Since maybe a week... after."

"Oh," she said.

We rounded a lovingly-pruned stand of hawthorn, turned right onto another grey gravel path, and carried on walking past the lines of watching headstones.

"Did you steal my sketch book?" she asked, at length.

"Yes. I'm really sorry about that. I was... "

"Stalking," she suggested.

"... checking on you and you stirred while I was snooping and I freaked out and..."

I shrugged.

Angels supposedly can't blush, but that's crap. My face was flaming.

"Not nearly as much as I did," she said, softly. "I knew someone had been in my room, and... and everything was all over the place. I thought I'd been robbed, or that someone had been doing vile things to my underwear."

"I swear I didn't touch your underwear..."

"I know that. Don't be silly. But you did scatter everything everywhere. And anyway... isn't theft... like... major black marks or something?"

"They'll pull out my feathers, one by one," I said, deadpan.

"Oh, as if."

This time the tiny smile was actually there.

I liked the tone and timbre of her voice.

She paused at a small bench under a canopy of an ancient oak, glanced at me, then sat.

She raised her eyebrow at me when I hesitated.

"I don't bite," she said.

"Oh. Um. Good," I answered, strangely perturbed by her statement.

I sat down next to her, not quite touching, and stared out into the mist.

She shifted next to me, her leg brushed against mine as she changed position.

I tried very hard not to notice.

"So... how old are you?" she asked me. "Billions of years, I guess?"

"Sometimes it feels that way. I was born in 1793, here, in Wales."

"Born?" she said, surprised. "Angels are..."

"Oh. No. I was human like you, once."

She stared at me.

"How..."

"Dunno. I... died; some time later I woke up in the Celestial city with pair of wings and a... I guess I should call it a powerful urge to meddle. Nobody's ever given me a satisfactory explanation for the first, and as for the second, I guess that's just who I am."

"And... and you basically just go along..."

"Helping the dead," I said, softly, after a brief but heavy silence.

"Did you help... her?"

I flinched; I hadn't been ready for such a direct question.

"No," I whispered, ashamed.

"Why not?" she demanded. "Didn't she deserve..."

"Yes! Fuck me, yes, she did, and yes, I fucked up, and don't you think I feel so fucking guilty..."

"Hey. Stop. It's okay."

I suddenly noticed that she'd taken my hand.

I stared down at the way her fingers fiddled nervously with mine.

"I'm... sorry," she added. "I'm just... seventeen different kinds of bitter. Did... I mean... was everything..."

She sighed.

"What I mean is... was she okay? Wherever she is now?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "She's... she'll be somewhere where she can heal. Sleeping. We all sleep for a while, until... well, generally until the people we knew are gone as well. It's... easier that way, supposedly."

"Oh," she said, softly.

"She'll be... fine, in time, though."

"How do you know?"

"I was," I said, softly. "Mostly, I suppose. It took a while, several decades. I was eighteen when I died..."

"Oh my God. So young? You were barely out of childhood!"

"Times were different back then. But yes. I was young, and stupid, and I... paid for it."

"Paid for... oh. Oh no. Were you..."

"Murdered? Yes. Amongst... other things."

Her hand clenched hard on mine.

"Oh God, I'm so sorry," she breathed.

"It's water long under the bridge," I said, profoundly touched by her sympathy. "Can't change it; nowhere to go but onwards."

She stared at me for a moment or two, then shook her head to clear it of whatever thoughts were haunting her.

"So... Annie's in something that's Heaven but not, and... and there are other... girls... like you up there. That's... I mean, it sounds fucking bonkers is what it does."

"Real Angels too. Archangels, Saints..."

"Oh fuck, Saints too?"

"It's a bit crowded. Demons drop in to visit sometimes as well..."

"What!"

"Oh, yes. They come up to the city for a break and to unwind. They're not that different from us, really. See... the whole thing about a war between Heaven and Hell is just stuff people made up. The Boss and Lucifer play cards, and Hell is really mostly just... a theme park of sorts for most people. Something to visit while you pass the time. Don't get me wrong, though - there are some right bastards down there, obviously - the ones who need... fixing."

"I need you to know that this is the most batshit crazy conversation I have ever had, and Rhiannon was a master of the absurd."

"It sounds surreal, doesn't it."

"Completely mad," she agreed. She slumped back against the backrest. "So... we live, we die, we go to some strange other place and then... what?"

"Choices," I answered, softly. "Come back here again, be like me for however long you can stand it, or..."

"Or..."

"Oblivion, forever."

"How is that fair!"

"It isn't, very."

"And you do this... willingly?"

"I want to. More importantly, I have to."

She stared at me.

"You want to help people die? That sounds... I'm sorry, I don't want to sound insensitive, but isn't that... morbid?"

"People die whether I'm there or not. For some of them it's a blessing. For some it's just another step on the road. But... for some it is really, really savage and brutal and... and... horrible. Don't you think that... just sometimes, just having a..."

I dropped my eyes, glanced at my hand, so tightly clasped in hers.

"... a kind hand to hold could be... infinitely precious? Could take at least some of the horror and pain and... lessen them?"

She glanced down and seemed to realise how tightly she was holding my hand in hers. She shifted slightly on the bench. Then she huddled into her jacket but, strangely, made no effort to let my hand go.

"Was it like that for you?" she whispered.

"It was... about as bad as it can be."

She made a little noise and leaned briefly over to press her shoulder to mine. I was inexpressibly grateful for her gentle wordless sympathy.

"And... Annie?"

"She was in no pain. She would have been dreaming at the end. Her death was among the gentlest possible, Caitlyn."

"Do... do you know how long she..."

"No," I said, soft but final. "It's not for me to know. Not even Azrael would know, I think..."

"Azrael?"

"Yes. My... boss. The actual Angel of Death."

"Christ..."

"He's around too," I said, deadpan.

She paused, then laughed wildly, her tone close to hysteria.

It took her some time to regain control. I sat there, pitying her deeply.

"Sorry," she managed at last. "Oh fuck me. Sorry. This is so strange. Sorry."

"For what?"

"For..."

"For being human? And in love? And, with all respect, broken? You're sitting on a bench in a graveyard where you buried your dreams, and you're talking to me. All in all, you're handling things pretty damn well from where I'm sitting. Last time a human talked to someone like me, as far as I know, the guy lost his mind and started painting the End of Days."

She shivered.

"I'm way ahead of him, then," she whispered.

I squeezed her hand and, heart hammering, leaned over slowly to gently touch my forehead to her temple.

"You're just fine, Caitlyn," I whispered. "You'll survive this. I promise."

She let out a little soft sound and turned towards me.

She wrapped her arms around me and buried her face in my hair.

And I slowly, helplessly, rubbed her back and cradled her to me as she softly began to cry.

It was brief, and sad, and pathetic and lonely and hopeless, and I felt the way she shivered against me.

And it was, in that moment, the most pure and precious thing in my existence.

All too soon, though, she pulled back.

She wiped her eyes, sniffed, and managed to look up at me.

"So," she whispered, "now that i know you're real, and that everything is really this fucked up... do I at least get to know your name?"

"I'm... Gwenhwyfar. You can call me Jen, or Jenny. Jenny would be nice."

"Hi, Jenny. You can call me Cait," she sniffed.

"Hi Cait. Sorry for fucking everything up for you."

"Not your fault, is it? You didn't give Annie cancer. You came to give her mercy. Thank you for that."

I sighed.

And we sat in silence for some time, busy with our thoughts.

"Can I... buy you some tea?" I asked, eventually. "There's a small cafe just down the road, and I can see you're getting cold."

"Yeah, okay," she said, with another sniff. "But no more disappearing on me, okay? You owe me that much."

"I'll try."

"I'm going to hold you to that, Jenny," she whispered.

Then she stood and offered me her hand.

And so I stood, and shook out my damp hair, and stepped off beside her, intensely conscious of the way she once again knotted her fingers through mine and refused to let go.

We walked up to the wrought-iron cemetery gates, and then through them.

"I always used to think cemeteries were haunted," she dreamily commented as we crossed the dread threshold.

"You were right, in a way," I admitted. "It's just us, though. And I suspect we don't do it very often."

"It's nice to know there are girls like you up there. It's nice to know that Annie won't be lonely, wherever she ends up. She'd have liked you, I think."

And I found myself blushing furiously at that; she noticed, but said nothing, merely squeezing my hand just a little bit tighter.

And later, much later, she hugged me goodbye and left an unexpected and almost... sacred... kiss on my cheek in farewell.

"Will I see you again?" she asked me.

"It would not be wise," I managed.

"Even if I beg?"

And I stared into those lonely, soulful green eyes and forgot everything about rules and dangers and the mess I was in.

"I'll... see you when I can," I whispered. "But it might be at surprising times, so please don't scream if you turn around and I'm there when you least expect it."

"I could bear that, I think," she said.

And she stepped in and hugged me again.

"You're pensive, Feathers."

I felt her fingers move slowly downwards over the bare skin of my back. I shifted my head on my folded arms, pressed slightly against her. She pushed back and shifted a leg over mine; the warm skin of her dusky breasts moved gently and wonderfully against me, one erect nipple trailing an abbreviated curve over my shoulder blade.

"Just... lots on my mind," I murmured.

"When is that not the case, Gwenhwyfar?"

"Touché."

Her hand wandered lower, over my left buttock, and from there downwards, nudging gently against the slender curving gap between my thighs.

I shivered.

"That's nice," I whispered.

"I know. You always tell me that."

"I like when you touch me there."

"I know that as well. Open your legs," she breathed, and the scent of cinnamon washed over me.

I grumbled at the requirement to move, but did as she demanded.

Jezebel's gentle caresses were always worth it.

Her slow, probing finger inched down to my already wet lips; she'd given me one orgasm already, a fast, frantic one when I'd first climbed onto her lap and begun to kiss her brandy-wet lips. She'd lifted me with that raw strength she possessed and pushed me down onto my table, torn my jeans off me and had me there and then, tonguing me and fingering me furiously, laughing exultantly as I writhed and screamed out my release.

Then she'd lifted me and carried me to my bed as she sometimes loved to do, and crawled in behind me and held me, skin to skin, fingers curled possessively over my hip.

She loved to take her time with me. I think she got off a bit on delaying her own gratification as much as she could.

And I knew she enjoyed my body, even with its abbreviated curves.

I also knew she was fond of me; that she looked forward to these times with me, no matter her camouflaging cuts and acerbic wit.

And I liked her warmth, her heat, the fierce and ruddy glow she shone into my dark places.

I liked how gentle she always was with me.

I moaned as she probed me, parting my lips with her fingertip, teasing it slowly along my slippery slit.

"You get so wet, Angel. Should be a sin," she chuckled, deep in her throat.

"Take it up... with the Boss," I whimpered. "I didn't make myself... this way... oh fuck, that's so good..."

"You do so love it from behind like this, don't you. So...Jen..." she whispered, slipping her finger slowly out, and then easing it back into me.

"Uh... huh..."

"There's a thing I haven't done with you before."

"What's... " I moaned, wriggling slightly.

"First... I know about what happened to you. So I understand if if you don't want to..."

I turned my head on my arms, met her gaze.

"Just... tell me."

She looked... almost shy, if that were even possible.

"We've... been fucking for nearly thirty years... you... can tell me..." I moaned, loving the way she slowly and wickedly curled her fingers just into and out of and over me.