Title: Hemiola
Rating: R (for several kinds of fire)
Disclaimer: --
Warnings: An uneducated attempt at historical!fic.
Author's Notes: I had to write a paper about maps. You explain to me how that makes sense, because I still don't get it. I chose London because I stare at it a lot on GoogleEarth. It occurred to me that nobody had written fic about Crowley and Aziraphale during this particular event, at least not that I've read. And so a bunny was born. Also this isn't entirely historically accurate, which makes me twitch a little, I assure you.
The noblewoman—girl, really—wasn't putting up much of a fight. He supposed that made it actually noble.
A nobleman was decapitated. But your average man was first dragged down the bumpy streets and hanged for all to see—but not quite dead yet, of course. Next came the disembowelment, and Crowley had never wanted to see that much of anybody, ever. And since it was all out in the open, as it were, they might as well char broil the contents of the noodley entrail soup separately. Over the sadly neglected eyes. After all that work, a simple concluding decapitation seemed a bit anticlimactic. Crowley had once thought people would get tired of these elaborate ways of killing after so long—someone knew they were quite talented at thinking up new ones—but hanging, drawing, and quartering was an old standby.
Hanged, drawn, and quartered didn't really cover what it was they did, and it could've done with a snappier title. It sounded so clinical.(1)
Crowley, for one, didn't think public executions were all they were cracked up to be. Samuel certainly seemed to relish them along with the masses, though. Crowley really didn't find human entrails particularly appetizing, nor did he savour the fragrance of burning flesh. Blame it on the body he was in. The way Crowley saw it, it was a cheap way of entertaining the people. He thought they could jazz it up a bit more, though, like the Romans had.
The body was smoldering now, he smelled. He really needed to get out of there. He made for the Old Swan. Why not?
-----
1. Not that 17th century medicine was dictionary definition "clinical," anyway.
-----
Aziraphale avoided even acknowledging the manner in which the English executed people, and so was not in need of a drink. He was, rather, walking down a cheerful, bustling street. The leaves had not yet fallen, and the greenery was deceptive in telling the weather, for although the sun was warm enough, the wind had an edge of coldness. Soon it would be autumn in truth and the world would match the town wonderfully.
He was in a good mood as he made his way into a gem of a bakery near London Bridge with its door swung open welcomingly. Inside the bakery it was very hot indeed, but the angel would endure it for pastries.
"Good morning, Mr. Ziraphale!" greeted the floury man near the hearth. "You'll be wanting the usual, then?"
Normally a bakery wasn't the sort of place where one could order the usual. Aziraphale was unaware of this.
"Yes, thank you, Mr. Farriner."
Thomas Farriner was a hard worker, but today he was flitting about and multitasking rather more than usual. His family were scattered around the place, undertaking various jobs that made the business of baking run that much smoother.
Aziraphale studied delicious things laid out on the worn wooden table while Mr. Farriner bustled around. Sunlight kindled the entire room in brilliant yellow slants through the shutters, falling across breads and pastries and further sugar coating them, dough being baked again by the sun for another layer of sweetness.
The angel looked up to find the baker politely asking him to pay. He rummaged through the coins in his pocket and handed some over—it was probably too much, but one ought to do a good deed whenever the opportunity presents itself. And in any case, Aziraphale's pockets were becoming congested with heavy change.
The Farriners' timid maid was tidying unobtrusively in the back of the bakery—the angel hadn't even noticed her until he'd turned to leave. The girl really could do with more confidence. Aziraphale would do another good deed, reaching out invisibly and with some reassurance—
"Good day to you, Mr. Ziraphale!" Mr. Farriner called after him.
Aziraphale stopped in his tracks. "Oh. Good day! And don't work yourself to the bone, my dear man. Goodness knows, if you continue at this pace you'll manage to burn all of your hard work away!"
Mr. Farriner laughed. "Ah, but tomorrow's Sunday. I want to get this finished before tomorrow," he said, wiping his brow.
"All the same. Well, a very good day to you!"
He left the heat of the bakery for the less immediate heat of the sun. The Thames glinted at him from afar just as he sunk his teeth into the sinfully iced pastry he'd just procured. After all, there was certainly nothing wrong with treating oneself, every so often.
"Good day, Mr. Ziraphale! See you tomorrow!" said Mrs. Farriner, who was tending flowers in the bakery's windowsill.
Yes. Well.
Aziraphale strolled down a path he knew so intimately well it seemed to walk itself. Before he knew it, he was standing by a familiar corner booth that had long ago been designated the property of a familiar entity of the occult.
"I thought I'd find you here," he said.
Crowley was hunched protectively over his tankard. He lifted his head and stared at the angel. "It's you," he said. "Hello."
"Oh, it is a lovely day, is it not, Crowley?" Aziraphale said as he took off his coat, not nearly as elaborate as Crowley's, and sat comfortably across from him.
Crowley took off his dark glasses. It was gloomy and smoky in the tradition of taverns throughout time and nobody was noticing them. "I'm not sure we're talking about the same day."
"Why, I don't know what you mean. It's a perfectly lovely day, my dear," he said absently as he set his cravat in order.
"Did you somehow miss the richly greenish mud that constitutes a street around here? And by 'around here,' I mean 'London.' Don't tell me you flew," he sneered.
"It's certainly nice enough for it, today," Aziraphale said, his eyes going keen.
Crowley smiled slowly, fiddling with his nearly empty tankard because there was nothing else to do, the Swan counting as in public, in the angel's books.
"What are you having?"
"House ale."
"What?" Aziraphale made a face. "Why?"
"Why not? Nice stuff gets boring after awhile. Too much of a good thing, you know how it is." Although the angel really didn't, the greedy bastard. Crowley was sure that every last tooth in Aziraphale's mouth was sweet.
"Mm." Aziraphale picked up the glass jug of a savoury wine that must have been on the table before and poured into the elaborate goblet Crowley handed him. The angel only became aware of the distant music when it rose briefly above the contours of conversation.
"I haven't heard this, before," said Crowley. "Is it new?"
"Not terribly. It's fairly popular, you know. Surely you've heard it?" Aziraphale peered at him.
Crowley shrugged. "I've been out of the world."
"You've been daydreaming."
"Yeah, well, it's a good day to be doing it in, right?" He took a mouthful of his ale, nearly finishing it. "So, how's business?"
"As usual. And for you?"
"Booming. Just look around," he said irritably, gesturing at the tavern in general.
"Really, Crowley, we have endured worse times. And it's surely not as bad as it was under Cromwell," he muttered.
Crowley laughed. "You approve of all this debauchery, then?"
"Don't be ridiculous. But I don't approve of forcing people into proper behaviour, either."
"Ah. And what you do is . . . ?"
Aziraphale glared. "People have to choose for themselves. Repentance means actually repenting, not signing in blood on a whim and having their souls whisked away by the likes of you no matter their true feelings on the matter."
Crowley downed the remnants of his drink. "Hey, are you done yet? I have to get going," he said, squirming into his coat.
Aziraphale sat motionless, seething quietly. Crowley stood up, wielding the cane he carried around like a swagger. "Not coming? Okay. Try not to catch the plague before the day is out." He headed for the real light spilling from the doorway.
The angel waited until he had disappeared from sight to rise and follow him. He found Crowley waiting just outside the door, leaning on his stupid cane, splattered with mud but shiny at the handle.
Aziraphale covered the hand covering said handle with his. "Ready?" he asked, and tried to tug Crowley along Thames Street.
"Wait—not that way. Come on, if we go this way—"
"My dear, I can't very well get home by swimming across the river."
The demon sighed. "Oh, fine," he said, and let himself be led. "You could fly," he added.
They wove their way through the crowd and the animals, getting smooshed into other, dirty people when a carriage plowed its way through the street. There was a fiddler up ahead playing a merry dancing tune, but as they passed him the music modulated into something dragging and sophisticated.
"Not again," Aziraphale said under his breath. "You enjoy doing this, don't you?"
"No, I don't, Aziraphale. There was a reason I didn't want to come this way. That bloke's always loitering around here." He pushed his glasses up his nose. "Let me try to explain this to you, all right? All demons are cursed, yeah? Well, this is my very own patented curse. It's the same with the hissing. I believe the idea is, theoretically, to give people a chance to identify us before we lead them into temptation. But what it really is is bloody annoying."
Aziraphale was reluctantly guilty, his pale eyebrows knitting. "Oh, dear. I would imagine so."
"Yeah, so take it up with the Big Man next time you get a chance, eh?"
"But it's always the same music, isn't it?"
"No. Currently it's Jean-Baptiste Lully. Some silly opera."
"I told you spending that much time in France would catch up with you," the angel admonished.
"I'm sorry I left you for the French, Aziraphale, but they're infinitely more engaging," said Crowley, but it came out more venomously than he'd intended.
Aziraphale was choosing to let it slide.
"Do calm down, my dear," he said, patting Crowley's shoulder. The demon made a disgruntled sound but leaned into it. His state of being could only be described as pouty. "Really, people have advanced. They've vastly improved from the previous centuries, surely you agree with that?"
"Better than the fourteenth," the demon grumbled.
They watched the bustle of the street. Entertainers, grocers, the whiff of fish markets closer to the river, the occasional unfortunate (the angel's term) woman or the occasional lord, rank being all too obvious in the details and the grime. All of them, swarming in their corner of the street and letting passersby churn through and judging one another greedily. So much movement and stagnation, it never stopped.
Crowley hated them, but only because he knew they could do better. He did try.
Aziraphale, on the other hand, was regarding Thames Street with the same absent fondness oblivious fathers bestowed on their bratty children. For somebody who must have been holding disappointment in God's formerly green earth firmly down, he was remarkably cheerful. But his eyes were the dark blue of waters at the poles, nearly black eyes, not normal eyes at all. Sometimes Aziraphale was all paleness and gold hair and blacked out eyes, which was considerably more terrifying than the demon's strange yellow ones. The angel wasn't entirely like that now, but it hovered beneath, making his cheer make Crowley uneasy.
Crowley realised his counterpart was trying to pull him into some sort of hug, that he was doing something to Crowley's neck with his mouth (in public, too—goodness).
The demon took hold of Aziraphale's shoulders and placed him back in his own part of the street.
"Oh for Heaven's—we've been courting for how many centuries, now?" the angel snapped.
"Buggered if I know. All I know is it was a hel—a fuck of a lot easier when we were doing the courtly love thing."
"You've got to be joking. It was a good deal more complicated, that little fad, and you know it."
"Whatever. I'm just glad decorum isn't demanding I sleep with you."
Aziraphale was used to Crowley saying too much when he was in this kind of mood. He didn't bat and eyelash, although he did roll his darkening eyes.
"Thank you for that, Crowley. I feel very appreciated," he said sarcastically.
"You see? This is why I don't like it when you think we can kiss and make up: 'cause we can't. Never mind that we're enemies—you just have a real knack for annoying me."
"Well, then," Aziraphale said huffily. "Perhaps we simply oughtn't continue to court one another. There really are better things to do with one's time."
"There really are," Crowley said, unwilling to let Aziraphale gain the upper hand.
"So that's that." Aziraphale dusted off his lacey sleeve busily, glowering at it.
"I guess so!" Crowley barked.
Aziraphale lifted icy eyes. "Fine."
"Fine!" Crowley stormed off, too angry to register that he was heading straight for the fiddler.
Aziraphale had started to walk briskly in the other direction when he remembered something. "Two o'clock tonight at the park, wasn't it?" he shouted.
"Yes!" Crowley shouted back, not even bothering to turn around.
"Fine! Good day!"
-----
Crowley took pride in the pleasing blend of envy, avarice, and anger his house in Westminster inspired. Guests unfailingly left considering it perfect, the very model of what a gentleman's house should look like. The windows ushered in the sunlight just so, keeping his small jungle of indoor plants thriving. Candles were always melted a third of the way down and never seemed to shorten. He even had a portrait of himself hanging prominently in the foyer, it being the sort of thing a respectable person with special blood in their veins did.
The hallways were somewhat dim even during the day, but candles all over the house illuminated Crowley's path to the kitchen.(1)
"Oh, there you are, Lord Crowley!" Crowley wasn't actually a Lord; he had led people to believe he was a Lord. It was easy enough when he already behaved like one.
The servant was flushed and still wearing her cloak. "I looked all over the house for you, I did."
"I was not in fact here, Abigail," Crowley said, trying to remember why this situation made no sense. "Didn't I fire you?"
"Ah, well, I know you didn't mean anythin' by it, Lord Crowley, sir. Why, who would keep your house for you?"
"Abigail. I'm touched by your concern, but I have it all taken care of," he said, leading her to the back door. "You really don't have to keep stopping in. I'll keep sending your wages. Now goodbye."
"Yes, I know that, sir, and I bless you for it—you're a good soul, you are—but Lord Crowley—" He closed the door on her.
Crowley didn't see the point in having servants, but he did pay them year round to occasionally make food or open doors for people in wigs. It was important to keep up appearances. But in truth the demon often had nothing better to do than potter around in the parlours and rearrange pretty decorations and dust at things.(2)
He walked back into the foyer, forgetting about his search for something to drink, and became aware of himself, standing in his enormous, luxurious abode that afforded him such peace and quiet. Buttery sunlight painted all the world of his foyer in the same thick yellow-orange. He swore he could hear its colour deepening as they day waned. Watching it change would make a petits motets that shifted key lower and lower, and he stood on a fine Oriental rug for so long his heeled shoes made permanent indents. When the sun had finally begun to burn in hue on his furniture, he remembered himself and put his cane by the door and hung up his coat, the sound of his feet on chequered marble very loud.
He made his way up the stairs, past tapestries depicting a variety of things and random decorative urns he didn't fully understand the purpose of. There were tassels at every corner, but somehow he managed to distinguish bed curtains from the rest of the brocade-infested room. He threw them open, letting the fiery sunlight bathe him again as he lay down on the plump pillows, determined to stop associating the light with what happened to traitors.
-----
1. Having night vision only got you so far with dark glasses in the way.
2. Unfortunately, cleaning such an extensive house when you are a demon took all of one hand wave, which didn't exactly have the desired effect of killing time.
-----
Aziraphale's didn't own property in the way that Crowley did. What he did was spend most of his time in a dusty old bookshop that was home to a number of unobtrusive mice underfoot and uninteresting birds in the eaves. There were only two windows in the main shop, and they were blurred with both street-grime and cobwebs and afforded little light. The rows of books, scrolls stuffed around them in their snug shelves, were a world of wooden shadows. Creaky stairs in the corner of the little room led to a modest bedroom on the second floor with a slanted ceiling which Crowley always managed to bump his head on. Crowley said he liked it up there because of the view, but the only things revealed when he threw the shutters aside were rooftops and the sky. Crowley said he couldn't look at the world from his house. There was a bed upstairs, but Aziraphale only occasionally used it. He slept when there was nothing else to do, mostly, and when his eyes were stingy from reading too much.
He was thinking of relocating the shop to a different area of the city, but the fact was that living in the City was convenient. Places he frequented were nearby, like the bakery and the Old Swan. Crowley wasn't a hassle to reach if any vital business needed to be discussed with him. Whitehall wasn't far. It was simply more convenient to stay where he was.
But he still wanted a room to himself, a little back room to entertain his guests in—it was only proper. A place to house the most valuable stories like a temple, where he could worship them in peace without the occasional customer peeping into the shop.
Aziraphale was currently at his desk, surrounded by candles that weren't necessarily situated in the safest of places had he not been of angelic blood. He opened a drawer overflowing with a variety of expensive blends of tea and selected one for the suddenly steaming cup in his hand.(1)
He tried reaching at random for a book but he knew his cataloguing system too intimately for it to be a surprise. He knew the story better than its author did.
The angel really had accumulated a handsome collection in the past two centuries. Printed books were so much easier to read, not to mention decipher, than handwritten copies. There were plentiful volumes of painstakingly recorded scripture on the bottom shelves and within sight of his desk. There were books of all lengths and languages, of varying degrees of importance or relevance, but Aziraphale felt it necessary to keep the past around him in order to focus on the future. It was a reminder of how far the world had come. Crowley always forgot, for all that he perpetuated a great deal of mankind's advancement.
Aziraphale was a master at killing time. It was past midnight when Benedick exclaimed on the page before him: Suffer love! a good epithet! I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will, and Aziraphale looked up and noticed the time. He put his book aside, reheated his tea with a small, familiar gesture and savoured the last few sips of it before heading out the door into London night.
It was true that St. James's Park wasn't at its most respectable in the middle of the night, but the fact was that he and Crowley had laid claim to the park as their meeting place long before people got the idea into their heads that sexual escapades were all right if conducted under cover of dark and old, watchful trees. Personally, Aziraphale felt it was becoming rather too chilly for such activities. The reason they still met there was the relative quiet to be found in the tucked away pockets of the park only they knew about.(2)
He had been walking for some time when he heard a church bell tolling the hour distantly. As he turned onto a thin side-street he noticed the glow of bright lights ahead, which was curious, at this time of night. A small detour wouldn't make him terribly late—truth be told, he was early because he wanted to intercept Crowley at his house, perhaps suggest they talk over some of the demon's rare vintages. Aziraphale was worried about him.
-----
1. Crowley's various investments and connections meant he was in a position to acquire more tea than the angel would ever need and leave it in his desk for him without saying a word about it. It was nothing short of sinful to let it all go to waste.
2. And if the demon had ever taken advantage of these secluded areas in the dead of night, well, it hadn't been Aziraphale's intention when he'd agreed to meet him there.
-----
They were in the park. It was day, though, which was odd because the sun should have disappeared by the time he woke up.
"Good morning, Crowley," the Aziraphale leaning over him said.
Crowley took in the world behind the angel. "Hey, it's really nice here," he said, sitting up and scratching at his head. "That's a bit off, isn't it? It's green and things."
Aziraphale plucked a strand of grass from Crowley's hair and smiled.
"What are you so happy about, anyway?"
"It's a nice day today. It's a perfectly lovely day." The angel's eyes were light blue and clear, which put him at ease.
Aziraphale shifted so the sun flooded into Crowley's face and his own was cast into shadow. "Hey!" Crowely said. "Come back here, I can't see . . ." He grabbed at the front of Aziraphale's toga to block the sun out. It made them much closer than before.
"Why are you wearing this?" he asked, thoroughly confused now. "Even you ought to be aware that this went out of fashion . . . very long ago. Right? Hey, come on, why aren't you telling me anything?"
Aziraphale's smile wasn't moving, but Crowley was positive he hadn't made time stand still. "Don't be silly, Crowley," he said kindly. "You know I never tell you quite everything. Anyway"—he captured Crowley's wrists—"you want me to kiss you now because you think it proves I don't just indulge you. So I will, if that's all right." He pulled at the demon until he could lean in and kiss him lightly and lingeringly. Crowley sighed and wondered whether he'd taste expensive chocolate or wine in Aziraphale's mouth this time. It was strange that they were in the park during the day. All Crowley could hear was light green foliage, and all he could feel was the sun where it heated his hair and lips and encircled his hands and burned along the tendons there. He heard green and saw green but felt golden.
"Hey," Crowley mumbled when Aziraphale decided to kiss at his jaw. "Hey, do you know if this is symbolic? Does it mean I'm experiencing some positive growth? Is this all some good omen or other? Why aren't there any flowe—oh, hey, you. Mm."
"Just be quiet, my dear."
"Yeah," Crowley breathed. He thought about getting to kiss Aziraphale more extensively than he was ever allowed to and Aziraphale laughed and fit his mouth to Crowley's rather forcefully. It was nice, improvising against Aziraphale's tongue with his own, but this path wasn't allowed, so Crowley pushed him away carefully. The angel looked at him with dark eyes and dark mouth and the deepening sunlight behind him. Crowley watched his hand run down Aziraphale's abruptly clothed arm. "Never mind. This is what I meant," he said, and placed little kisses over Aziraphale's mouth. "That's all."
"I don't think it's symbolic," Aziraphale said, regarding him suspiciously.
"Oh."
"Let's go back, shall we?"
"What?" Crowley mumbled as Aziraphale kissed at his jaw. "Do you know if this is symbolic? Does it mean I'm experiencing some positive growth? Is this all some good omen or other? Why aren't there any flowe—oh, hey, you. Mm. Well?"
"There aren't any flowers because they mean too many different things, my dear."
"Oh, that's right!" Crowley exclaimed. "I knew that, I just didn't remember." He was so relieved by this he couldn't stop laughing.
Aziraphale only said, "You wanted me to kiss you, you know. And I've already told you some things. You just don't want to pick up on them—you're a good soul, Lord Crowley."
"I know, but I just didn't remember," Crowley told him again, gradually taming his laughter.
"Here," Aziraphale said, and pulled him into another kiss, stroking Crowley's wrists lightly and making him shiver with warmth. They were alone except for the sun illuminating the secluded little garden.
"Crowley," Aziraphale whispered after awhile, detaching their mouths. "Why are we doing this? I've completely forgotten. Surely we have better things to do . . ."
Crowley blinked. "What, like go to the theatre? Have a drink at the inn?" he asked dryly. "I'm sure the Lord Protector wouldn't mind."
Aziraphale sighed. Crowley played with the ends of the angel's hair because they curled slightly. "Hey," he grinned. "Just how many laws do you suppose we're breaking right now?"
The angel regarded him suspiciously. "Not so very many right now, my dear."
Crowley was experiencing a strong sense of déjà vu. He said so.
"Well, obviously," Aziraphale replied. "That would be because this happened before. In Rome. And a few years ago. And today. You've been dreaming."
"Yeah, well, it's a good day to be doing it in, right?" He frowned at himself.
"No, Crowley, you're not angry yet. Keep up, would you?"
"I'm sorry, I just remember this happened before, too."
"My dear, do you want to enjoy your dream or don't you?"
Crowley smiled like a snake. "You should kiss me again. But I don't want the sun, all right?"
"Of course," Aziraphale said reassuringly, tucking hair behind Crowley's ear, hair that had been screening the sunlight, and soon Crowley was blinded and consumed by it. He could almost hear Aziraphale's voice over the roar of burning in his ears, but he couldn't make out words.
And then he woke up again, but he couldn't have, because he already had, and also because he was dead. He sat up and stared around the blackened room until he remembered about the tapetum lucidum and realised he was in his London house. He still wasn't totally used to it.
"Oh," Crowley said. That was a dream. Right, that made more sense.
There was no clock in his bedchamber, so he slithered out of the covers and pillows entrapping him and went to the window to try finding the moon. He felt a presence materialising farther down the street, what he felt around each and every church, but a with better kind of familiarity. Soon he could discern a point of extreme heat approaching. He made his way down through the house, thinking to himself, Who dreams about kissing, anyway? Bloody pathetic.
Sure enough, Aziraphale was about to knock when Crowley opened the door and met the angel's surprise with an impatient, well, get on with it expression.
"Crowley. Something's happened, and you must come with me—"
Crowley was studying Aziraphale's outfit. He nodded at the hat. "Still masquerading as a Puritan, I see."
"At least I haven't bows on my shoes, 'Lord Crowley'. Now, please, listen to—"
"Oho, it's been awhile since you went for the shoes. I thought you'd comment on the feather in my hat." He leaned forward and said lowly, "It matches my eyes." His brows knit. "Wait, you . . ." He flickered his tongue. "Yes, you smell like smoke. Aziraphale?"
"I am aware of that, Crowley. It probably has something to do with the fire that is currently raging down the street."
"Um, excuse me?"
Aziraphale didn't seem to notice him. "Yes, and we need to help now, Crowley, all right? Come along, the weather has been so dry it's sure to spread quickly." He yanked on Crowley's sleeve until he started walking. "We are coordinated enough to talk on the move, I believe. Right. This is how it happened—oh, goodness, you know, I really can't—"
"Oh, come now, angel. Nothing has ever totally consumed the city," Crowley said dismissively.
The angel opened his mouth to protest—
"I'm sure it'll all be taken care of. Now can we get out of here, or did you want to come inside—?"
"No, Crowley, I do not want to come inside. Can you please not drag your feet? Really." The angel was dangerously close to jogging, preoccupied with finding streets in the darkness. "Oh, why did there have to be a drought?" he was muttering.
"Hang on—there was a drought?" Crowley did a little sprint to catch up.
"Yes! Do keep up, would you?"
Crowley blinked. "Uh? Where are we going, anyway?"
"Crowley, could you just sodding shut up?" Aziraphale shouted. He didn't stop accelerating or even look at him.
"Aziraphale." Crowley grabbed his shoulder and spun him around. The angel's face looked frozen in the dusty blue light of nighttime. His expression was icy, to be sure. But then it melted.
"Oh, you don't have your glasses on. I always forget about your eyes in the dark." He laughed, which was vaguely offensive amid the tension.
"You don't," Crowley said, and made it so their faces were close.
The angel shivered slightly, but then again it wasn't summer anymore.
"How are they still blue?" He was peering at Crowley's eyes despite himself. "I'm blocking what little light there is, er." He seemed suddenly aware of the demon's proximity.
"Don't be stupid. Your aura is atrociously bright, so they're reflecting off of that. Ugh, you really do smell of smoke, angel."
"Yes," he said, stepping back and focusing again. "Don't let's bicker at this particular moment, all right? We have to go now, my dear."
"Where's the fire?" he asked sweetly.
Aziraphale's face turned back into stone. Crowley laughed at how easily it did so. "It's on Pudding Lane. And it's been spreading alarmingly for over and hour now. Are you going to help me put a stop to it or not?"
"Now, why would I want to stick my nose into His plan, angel?" Crowley asked, perfectly reasonably if it weren't for his tone.
"We have a purpose, Crowley. Well I do, anyway," he said, his voice getting louder and less controlled.
Crowley grinned. Amazing, getting Aziraphale to lose it. "How do you know it isn't ineffable, then? You don't. Maybe He's wanting to burn up the remnants of the plague, punish some sinners while He's at it. I say good riddance." Crowley realised he was only challenging the angel out of habit, and was forgetting why.
"I have a job to do," Aziraphale said simply, and turned and walked through a shadowy alley. Crowley followed because that's what he did.
"They always manage to get them under control, angel, you know that!" It was beginning to smell of smoke in the air itself, now. And of burning wood, which he tried not to feel guilty about savouring. They rounded a corner and the noise of panic and high tensions hit them bluntly. People running this way and that, people standing doing nothing, people seeming official and people who looked like they knew what they were doing. Some were in the process of tearing down buildings while still others scurried by with leather buckets filled with water.
Crowley stopped and pointed at the men pulling pieces off of somebody's house with long hooks.
"Oh, finally!"
"What the—what are they doing?" Crowley said.
Aziraphale rolled his eyes. "They're fighting the fire, what do you think? Really, Crowley. Have you been asleep for the past—however many years?"
Crowley blinked. "Well, yes.(1) Hey, come on," he added when the angel let out an exasperated breath and turned away. "You can't keep up with the pace humans invent things; I barely can. And I don't exactly make a habit of attending fires like the masses do. They don't come close to fireworks."
This was apparently not Aziraphale's final destination, for he was now weaving his way toward the illuminated part of the city where the fire raged. The streets were becoming increasingly crowded and Crowley realised that most of the people were fleeing.
"Please, Crowley," Aziraphale said. Crowley looked and found him near, eyes wide. "They don't have this under control."
"Why do you care?" He knew why he did.
The angel took a calming breath that didn't seem to help much at all. He stared at the ground. "Know that if you aggravate this at all I won't just—well, I won't let you get away with it."
"Excuse me?"
"Oh, don't take it like that—"
"Wait a second, here. Are you suggesting I would start a fire? Or make it worse? You think this is all Below's doing or something, angel? 'Cause if it is I sure as Someplace didn't know about it."
"Well, I don't know . . . " Aziraphale said quietly.
Crowley pressed his forehead to Aziraphale's, horribly frustrated with everything. He whispered rapidly, "Someday, Aziraphale, you will finally figure out that damnation isn't all it's cracked up to be and not be a prick about it. I don't want people to go to Hell. In fact I don't want them to die at all because Heaven's the biggest joke I've ever endured besides mortality—or immortality, really. But I still think God's enough of a bastard to do something like burn up a bunch of people. I'm the good guy here, Aziraphale. Being 'evil' has nothing to do with it. You don't pay attention—" He gestured in vain, settling for a hand raking through his hair. "I don't know. You don't learn history's lessons. Experience doesn't show on you and it makes you so pathetic, Aziraphale . . ."
The angel couldn't do anything other than gape at the Names Crowley was using. Crowley pulled back and regarded him for a tense, frozen moment. "Well, at least it shut you up. See you around," he said, and left.
Aziraphale made sure to look at anything other than the demon's retreating figure until he was sure Crowley was truly gone.
Once Crowley had turned the corner he stopped. He stood there breathing and felt his heartbeats like stabs. He stared at the people scurrying this way and that but only heard them as one blurred voice. He was impossibly angry with the angel and equally as worried for him even though he shouldn't have been either. After he'd caught his breath he left at a speedy pace in the direction of Whitechapel.
-----
1. Crowley slept when he was annoyed with the way things were going. And he had been fed up with Cromwell before he'd even taken office.
-----
After Crowley's departure, Aziraphale searched high and low for the Mayor of London. When he did finally find him, he was having difficulty getting through to the man.
"But there is clearly a fire in progress, my Lord," Aziraphale said, his patience nearly gone.
"Oh, really! Everyone is making such a fuss! I'm sure it'll . . . that it will, you know, sort itself out." He wiped his brow and looked around as if searching for the answer in the steadily encroaching flames. "You'll see . . ."
Aziraphale could only stare, seething. "Yes," he said, taking a quick, deep breath. "We will see."
-----
Crowley did not travel at the breakneck speed Aziraphale had earlier insisted upon, and by the time he arrived at the house he was looking for, had been admitted inside, and made himself as comfortable as was possible, it was quarter past three in the morning.
The demon could hear somebody coming briskly down the stairs, and shortly thereafter a man in a nightshirt entered the parlour Crowley was being held in.
Crowley stood up, and just as he opened his mouth to speak, the man said, "Yes, I know all about what has happened, Lord Crowley. And I can see you must," he added, gesturing at the thin but noticeable sheen of soot over the demon's face. "My maid has just informed me. But we have nothing to fear, as it is as yet far off."
Crowley gave him a disbelieving look. "But, Samuel, surely you ought to head over—"
"You are welcome to stay the night here, of course. But I really must be getting back to sleep, myself, a feat which is proving entirely impossible with this continuous stream of rude awakenings. Oh, I'm not angry with you, Anthony. I am considering barring my doors to keep out any more well-meaning visitors, however. But never mind all that. I'll see what I can do about it all in the morning, if there is anything left to be done. And the paperwork, ugh, I shudder to think of it."
"But—"
He patted Crowley on the shoulder. "I shouldn't worry just yet. We have people to take care of these things. For God's sake, I'm not the Mayor of the city, am I?" he laughed. "Let him deal with this. But for now, good night. Bless you, Lord Crowley!"
Crowley winced. "Thanks."
Samuel smiled at him. After a moment he returned to his bedchamber, leaving Crowley in his darkened parlour to stare out at the suddenly frightening glow across the river.
-----
Crowley hadn't slept all night. At sunrise he left Samuel's house, and the light of day didn't comfort him in the least.
-----
Aziraphale was as grimy as every other Londoner by midday. He was beginning to exhaust his ethereal resources fighting the fire and looked for Crowley halfheartedly. He wondered how many people had even gone to church today.
-----
Crowley really needed a drink that night, but it would be somewhat dangerous to brave the Old Swan, considering its location. He hadn't done much of anything that day but watch desperate looking people flit past. In spite of the hugeness of the fire in his mind, he wanted nothing more than to apologise to Aziraphale right now so he could attribute it to the general stress of the day.
-----
On Sunday night Aziraphale realised that he hadn't spoken much at all to the people he was working with. Wasn't it his duty to comfort them? He still didn't. Whenever he tried he discovered a sad little life being further broken down, and Aziraphale hated really seeing suffering.
-----
With the morning sun came the realization that, for all that stopping a fire was undemonlike, Crowley could help out just to spite Aziraphale, which was surely acceptable whether the fire was the fault of Above, Below, or just plain carelessness.
-----
Aziraphale was thinking too much, and he was starting to think the fire could just as easily be his own fault—his ignorance of everything happening around him was worse than Crowley's where it counted. He concentrated on the flames.
-----
It was Tuesday now, and Crowley had been bossing people around to the best of his ability to halt the fire's progress. It had extended past the old city walls now. Who knew how much more it would consume today. It had multiplied terrifyingly.
Someone knew what a fire hazard the angel's bookshop was, he thought.
He stopped moving, a bucket of water still in his hands. Instead of passing it to the next person it tumbled and spilled and the demon ran off through the flames at an impossible speed.
When Crowley arrived at the bookshop he was smoldering and entirely unaware of the fact because he could sense a familiar presence inside.
"Aziraphale! Hey!"
He passed through the open door and found Aziraphale running up and down the aisles, muttering to himself. Crowley caught him going by, which startled him.
"Come on," the demon said simply, and tried to lead him away.
"What are you doing here?" The way Aziraphale's eyes were enhanced by his sooty face made them especially dark.
Crowley let go of him and pointed at the fire raging mere feet away from the door. "Come on."
"O-oh," Aziraphale said, comprehension dawning. Crowley gave him an odd look. "Bless you for coming to help me, Crowley. You know how much of human history is in these books—"
"No, angel, I can't say that I do. Now come on." Aziraphale didn't budge. His lips moving to words and titles and little protective enchantments he didn't have the energy to really back up after the past three days. "Hey, Azirahpale, snap out of it," he said loudly. "Can you forget about your fucking pieces of paper for one moment and help me save these human souls? Isn't that what you do best?"
That did seem to get through to him because he finally focused on Crowley, unblinking. "I know. I know. I know. But I can't help it, Crowley. These stories are about real people, and many of them will be lost forever. I need to remind myself of how far everything has come, sometimes, don't you see? And they're mine, and they all mean something, and—"
Flames were licking at the doorframe now. "Stop it," Crowley said, eyes darting between Aziraphale's wavering composition and the swiftly igniting walls. He unfurled his wings and grabbed the angel's arm.
"No, wait! Wait--" Aziraphale's voice broke.
Crowley looked directly into Aziraphale's unclouding eyes. "I'm sorry," he said, and took flight through the flames and up into the sky. Aziraphale unfurled his own wings but did little more than glide along beside him.
-----
Crowley existed in his beautiful house in the days following the fire. He was afraid of contacting Aziraphale himself—he wasn't sure how angry the angel would be with him. And so he opted to wait to be contacted. He had to admit he was afraid of leaving Aziraphale alone at a time like this, but then Crowley couldn't be of help in reconstructing what was left of the bookshop, and Aziraphale wouldn't want to see him if he'd fallen into depression over the whole ordeal.
He spent his days indoors with the windows carefully closed, leaving the world outside to inhale the smouldering remains of London. He felt utterly apathetic, wanting to know the damage but unwilling to face it, stuck sitting in his house in different chairs wondering why the fire had happened at all, trying to see how it could be his fault, rereading books until a certain word or a the very act of reading recalled Aziraphale too much. He closed the curtains in every room but not the shutters, and gold light still leaked through. He felt wretchedly safe in his stuffy sanctuary and wished somebody, anybody really, would break into it.
Boredom was threatening to truly overwhelm him when Aziraphale finally showed up at his door.
"I thought you would've turned up sooner," Crowley remarked. He didn't move a muscle.
Aziraphale cleared his throat. He was standing behind Crowley. "Even I needed to sleep that off."
Crowley said nothing.
"Well," Aziraphale began briskly, "you ought to know that I didn't lose all of the books. My earlier precautions ensured that many did indeed survive."
"Oh." Crowley was surprised into relief by this. "You're—so, they're okay, then?"
"Well . . . yes. They're fine now."
Crowley couldn't think of anything to say. He still wanted to apologise the right way, but he suddenly saw that words were empty, and so he didn't say anything at all.
He heard Aziraphale's sigh, inaudible to anyone else. And he heard him leave.
Crowley's fingertips seemed to hurt with longing.
-----
Aziraphale's bookshop had been rebuilt with uncanny speed, Crowley noticed, not at all unsurprised as he approached it that afternoon. The streets he had walked through to get there were for the most part untouched by the fire, but as he neared the shop silence hit him with nearly a physical force. The workers must have been working elsewhere. It was entirely motionless and void of living things here, and all he could feel was Aziraphale without distractions.
Crowley threw open the door and strode purposefully toward Aziraphale, not even bothering to greet him.
"I am only going to say this once," Crowley said. "I cannot believe that you nearly got yourself killed for the sake of books."
Aziraphale gaped at him. He was clearly in the process of reorganizing said books, and had frozen with one in his hand. He was so unmoving and like the dead world outside that Crowley had to touch him.
"Or that you are so selfish," he said, his hand running through the angel's hair of its own volition.
Aziraphale just stood before him and breathed. Crowley's hand froze and his eyes locked with Azirapale's and he breathed too.
"That you." He forgot what he was saying. "You, uh—" But Aziraphale cut him off with his lips.
In the heat of everything Crowley soon lost control of himself and watched in fascination from the vantage point of his frozen brain. His arms held Aziraphale and his body trapped him against a wall that turned up at just the right moment. He heard Aziraphale's breath catch and let out a muffled moan in response—the feel of his unattainable body writhing around, hands clutching at his clothes and arms and hair, more little sounds escaping from both of them. Aziraphale pushed against him, separating their mouths, and Crowley couldn't help but feel something. Or, rather, nothing.
He put his mouth to Aziraphale's ear, still holding him fast. "Now, angel, don't be shy," he breathed, unable to stop moving subtly against him.
"Ummm . . ." Aziraphale laughed nervously. "My human body doesn't always, ah, respond properly in situations such as these . . . out of necessity, of course," he muttered.
"Mmrgf. Aziraphale," Crowley groaned, both at the angel's words and at the way they reverberated enticingly through him.
Aziraphale took a shaky breath. "Yes. And it's a good thing, too." He slid away from the demon and took another, deeper breath. "Yes. There is a reason we don't do this, Crowley."
Crowely knew that. He took a deep breath of his own. The oxygen would help him ignore Aziraphale's rumpled shirt and flushed cheeks and voice.
"Look, maybe we should've stuck with dating mortals," Crowley said, but there wasn't much feeling in it. It hadn't worked before. There just wasn't anything to talk about with them. Deciding to "court" one another had been necessity at the time, but now it was becoming too necessary.
Aziraphale didn't believe him. "I thought you said they didn't understand about wings."
"Yeah, well." He found himself hypnotised by the angel, never mind that he was supposed to be the serpentine one. Although Aziraphale was talented enough at lying in wait and striking, in all manner of ways. And that's what he did.
Crowley didn't make any noise of surprise when Aziraphale finally kissed him like he really wanted him, Crowley, and not just Crowley-who-was-around-at-the-time, but the demon was hit with the most disastrous, glorious feeling in the pit of his stomach when Aziraphale did. And he was blind again, clinging to him.
"I just don't care," Aziraphale panted around Crowley's mouth. "I just don't."
"Oh, good," Crowley sighed.
"Very good."
Aziraphale moved on to the demon's neck, and Crowley closed his eyes and shut up.
-----
"This is bad. This is very bad," Crowley was saying.
Aziraphale summoned a weakly encouraging smile, half dressed on the unusually clean floor of his bookshop. Crowley continued to mutter variations on the theme of We're screwed as he shakily shoved various layers of clothing back on. Aziraphale watched him moving from his frozen corner on the floor.
"You know, just because They were so harsh the first time doesn't mean they will be now."
Crowley stopped. He didn't look at him.
"I mean, before . . ." Aziraphale continued. "Well, that was literally ages ago, wasn't it? Times were a little different back then. And anyway that was before the Arrangement." He tried to meet the demon's eyes. "And I think They may be a bit distracted at the moment with the fire."
Crowley opened his mouth but closed it again. "Hm."
"Don't you think?"
"Hm. Let me get this straight, angel. You think that as long as we make sure to have sex during catastrophic events—instead of doing our jobs, I might add—we should be able to slide by?"
Aziraphale sighed and started rearranging his own clothing.
Crowley touched his arm. "I didn't really mean—"
"It's fine."
-----
A few mornings later, when they did finally make it to St. James's, the city was slowly chugging toward normalcy, but the rich people still held handkerchiefs over their lead-painted faces with ring-covered hands. Crowley wasn't about to go that far in his efforts to be a model aristocrat, he thought, as a noble woman walked by with a man who was, frankly, more dolled up than she was. Crowley was wondering how to sabotage the gentleman's painstakingly arranged ensemble. It would be a bit mortifying for him if the wind caught the garish ostrich feather in his hat and wafted it tidily into his lady friend's brimming bosom. Crowley laughed to himself.
"You aren't listening to a word I am saying, are you?"
He looked at him. "Well, no. But I'll bet you any money I know what you were saying."
Aziraphale rolled his eyes. "What, then?"
Crowley stroked his chin. "Hmm, now what would be an appropriately Aziraphallic thing to say?"
Aziraphale groaned. "Please, Crowley."
The demon laughed. "I do agree that it is a lovely day, though."
"You certainly are in a good mood lately," Aziraphale pointed out suspiciously.
Crowley shrugged. He was watching the sun rising, and he was finding it uncommonly beautiful. "Yeah," he said. "Commendations tend to do that."
"Yes, well, now that you are recorded by Some as having been directly responsible for the fire, I can blame you for it, can't I?"
Crowley shrugged again. "I didn't start the fire," he said nonchalantly. "And what do you have to be grumbling about, anyway? It's perfectly acceptable to harbour a little pride for having wiped out the Black Death, even if you are an angel."
London still smoldered in the background—neither could ever help thinking, deep down, a city must have deserved it when this sort of thing happened.
"I don't care what Above thinks. This is terrible. If only I'd gotten my hands on that book," he muttered.
"Huh?"
"Oh, you remember! The prophecy book, written by that Nutter woman a few years ago." He ceased his pacing and succumbed to looking miserable. "I don't even know if there are any copies in existence."
"You couldn't possibly have tracked her down?" Crowley rolled his eyes.
Aziraphale pressed at the bridge of his nose. "You think I didn't try?"
Crowley almost touched the angel's arm, but stopped himself. "Anyway, what would the point of knowing everything be?"
"Says the Serpent."
Crowley laughed. "Knowledge isn't all it's cracked up to be," he said with a hint of an aftertaste. "And nobody can know everything." He sought out Aziraphale's hand with his own, instead, which was better.
-----