Disclaimer: Characters - not mine. No profit made.

A/N: Timeline: tomes 1, 2 and 3

The Scent of Sunshine and Storm

Oh... Kevin...

William woke up, blinking into the darkness. He had the impression that he had a very naughty dream. Again. At least this time it was in the privacy of his dormitory room instead of a church pew during mass.

Yes, William frowned, that had been quite disturbing.

He tried to roll onto his side and groaned, only now noticing that the sheets were rather uncomfortably sticky. Yes, he knew it was perfectly normal for a young man his age to have nocturnal emissions. Really, it was all basic biology. But it was third time this week!

He huffed in exasperation and rolled out of bed. Grimacing slightly, he changed the sheets and his nightshirt and lay down again. Maybe from now on he should take the matter into his own hands - so to speak - before going to bed? Theoretically that should ease the problem if not eliminate it altogether. But honestly, he had more important things to do than lie about and play with himself. What with the demons dogging his every step and claiming outrageous things, and he had studying to do and exams were only a month away and William was more often than not simply tired when he went to bed.

And anyway, what could he think about to aid him in this pre-bedtime endeavour if he decided to follow it as a routine? He was pretty sure he was supposed to have an image of his beloved firmly in his mind at such times, but what did one do when one had no beloved? William was not engaged (though he sometimes wondered if, had his parents been alive, they would have bethroted him to some girl of sound social standing and excellent manners) and had little contact with girls his age. Or with girls, full stop. Astaroth didn't count.

Well, there was also Sytry. Even if he was hardly a girl, William knew some boys did find him attractive. The problem was William didn't. At all. Even if - as an overheard conversation among older students went - Sytry was the prettiest boy in school.

William snorted, hardly a boy either and William would be damned - no pun intended - if he succumbed to the dubious charms of the demon.

Which rather brought William back to the starting point. He sighed, deciding to put the matter out of his mind for the moment and get back to sleep. Well, all right, he wasn't very sleepy now but there was no sense in not trying.

Or he could read for a bit. William's eyes rested on a pile of letters on his bedside table. All from Kevin. William smiled with exasperated fondness. Kevin must have written two-three letters a day for William to receive all twenty of them this week. Silly man.

William picked one letter up and brought it to his face, sniffing it. Maybe it was odd of him, but he'd always liked the smell of paper and ink. And Kevin's letters had always had a particular scent about them in addition. Like air just after the storm and... sunshine.

William inhaled and closed his eyes, his memory conjuring the image of himself and Kevin waiting for the storm that caught them midway from a neighbouring village to pass. They'd found a wooden shed by the road and hid inside before the downpour really started. William was six and too short to see properly out of the shed's window the storm outside. And he very much wanted to. Just recently he'd read a book explaining how lightning was really an electrical discharge on an impossibly grand scale.

He wanted to see and the only chair in the shed was occupied by Kevin. This would not do.

"Kevin, I want to see the lightning."

Kevin quirked an eyebrow. "Very well, young master. But aren't you afraid of the storm?" he asked, nevertheless picking William up and seating him in his own lap.

"Of course not," William scoffed, wriggling to get comfortable. "There's nothing to be afraid of. You only need to be careful if you're the tallest point in the storm's area. There are trees taller than this shed on the other side of the road, see?" William pointed at a clump of trees some twenty yards away. "We're quite safe," he added with certainty.

"Mhmm," Kevin murmured non-committally.

William felt his butler's chin rest on the top of his head. Even though the wind had turned cold outside and blew the chill in through the gaps in shed's walls, William had felt warm and safe within the circle of Kevin's arms.

William smiled to himself sleepily.

If he tried to sit in Kevin's lap now, he would be taller than him. Kevin would be only able to rest his chin on William's shoulder. And if William turned his head just so and Kevin looked up a bit, they'd be able to... kiss.

William gasped and his eyes snapped open in shock at his own thoughts but also because he suddenly remembered the contents of his very inappropriate dream. That was Kevin! He'd been dreaming about Kevin!

Good Lord!

William's body flushed hotly, his heart beating wildly. Possibly in panic or shame but William was unable to stop himself from remembering the dream and Kevin doing wonderful naughty things with his tongue.

William moaned quietly as he felt the arousal stirring within him. He stifled it with difficulty. He had to think first.

So. Kevin.

At least now, if William decided to "take the matter into his own hand" before going to bed, he had an image - lots of images - he could rely on to bring about the desired results.

No no, William irritably rolled over in his bed. This was not the direction his thoughts should be taking right now. He took a couple of deep breaths, his heartbeat slowing down. Yes, that's it, let's think rationally.

It was possible William simply missed the physical contact. When he was a child, Kevin had often held his hand when they were going somewhere, or gave him hugs. Maybe William's adolescent body simply reacted this... hormonal way to the loss?

William chewed his lip in thought. That could be it, except if William was honest with himself - and he usually tried to be - he noticed Kevin now.

When he went home this holidays and saw Kevin working in the garden, it didn't register first. Well, that was understandable, what with learning he was suddenly without a pence to his name and his whole glorious future was slipping away.

Now, however, after the bill for this semester was settled at least (by Dantalion, William gritted his teeth) and he was no longer so stressed, he started to remember those little details. Like how Kevin looked divested of his frock coat and tie, the top buttons of his shirt undone. The hollow between his collarbones bared to William's gaze, as was the little bit of chest just visible between the sides of his shirt - the skin pale and smooth and unblemished.

William had noticed then too, of course, but had quickly put these observations and the strange fluttering they caused out of his mind, distracted by the things that followed.

Now, it was an entirely different matter.

And this wasn't the first time he started thinking about it, but every time he did previously, he somehow got distracted. By Dantalion and Sytry, by Dantalion's little helpers, by Isaac summoning Hell's beast. There was a lot of it.

So. So okay. Maybe he had a bit of a crush on Kevin. And maybe it wasn't exactly normal or commonplace, but William's intellect was not commonplace either and maybe the two went somehow hand in hand...

"And maybe I should stop babbling nonsense", William muttered into his pillow.

He had to face the truth: he was one of those awful lecherous employers who harboured deeply impure - and in his case smacking of sexual inversion - thoughts about their own servants. He was only marginally more decent in that he would never mention his perversion to Kevin. The poor man was quite safe from William, his embarrassing teenage crush notwithstanding.

It would probably pass sooner or later anyway, William reasoned. It had to, didn't it?