A/N: Alright, so, let's start with apologies. This summer vacation has been absolutely insane, and I've been traveling and also relaxing from such a nightmarish school year so much that it took me a month or so to realize that I'd spent so much time away from my story. You'll never believe how long it took me to get started on this chapter, and then how long it took me to finish it. I'm kind of plunging into new territory here, so the writing process has been a little cramped. But, anyway, I'm back, and I'm sorry that I've been away for so long without updates.

The next item up on the list is some technical notes: A reviewer recently asked me if Xander was so powerful, shouldn't he be able to kick Angelus' ass? My answer: Xander's power is contained right now, and it hasn't been released, nor is he even aware of it.

Also, Xander was technically 'kidnapped' at the beginning of the season two episode "Passion" (arguably one of the best written, acted, and tragic episode in the series), but, in case any of you haven't noticed, Jenny Calendar isn't dead! This is because I need her for later chapters – she's just such a good romantic foil for Giles that she fits in later chapters. So, she hasn't figured out the Ensoulment Curse for herself yet – but she is working on it…

Special A/N: Let's all remember that the previous installment, "Hello?" is taking place all throughout the next set of chapters, during Xander's stay chez Angelus. So, with that said, let's get back to the story.

the Passion of Angels and Demons

Chapter X

Rules of Engagement

"Where are my clothes?"

It had seemed like the most pertinent question that Xander could have asked when it was sounding out in his head, but suddenly it seemed to not matter as much as other things. Such as the fact that he was in an unknown location, a prisoner of Angelus, willing or not. He struggled to put on a blank face as opposed to the chaos swirling around inside his mind. Of course, the whole dignity thing would have helped had his dick not been stirring due to the undeniably sexy slide of silk sheets over his unclothed member…not to mention Angelus standing there and staring at him with those impenetrable black eyes….

"I see you're awake."

The way he was smirking at Xander's groin, Xander just had to sarcastically wonder if Angelus was aware of the double entendres dripping from his tone of voice. Xander's eyes narrowed. He might have come here because he wanted answers from Angelus (you want something else from Angelus, too, his brain nastily informed him), but that didn't mean that he was just going to let Angelus walk all over him.

Drawing himself up with all the dignity that he could muster (the fact that his cock was half-mast didn't really help with that situation), he looked Angelus right in the eye and said, "You didn't answer my question."

Icicles were warmer than his tone of voice. Angelus' eyes widened a fraction, and then narrowed to slits. "Watch your tone, boy," he said flatly. If Xander wanted to play this game, fine; he wasn't going to coddle the boy to get what he wanted. Xander would submit to him, he knew that; but he wanted to boy to do it by choice. If, however, a little persuasion was needed…

Well, he was a vampire.

"Or what?" Xander challenged. Angelus smirked, and Xander felt a little uneasy. This wasn't the same game that he'd been playing on the balcony at the Bronze; Angelus was playing by different rules now, rules that Xander wasn't completely familiar with, but he wasn't illiterate enough in the field to recognize what it was. He blinked, suddenly feeling queasy, as, with a flash of leather and a blur of preternatural speed, Angelus moved.

"Jesus Christ!" he yelled as he found himself lying down on the bed with Angelus on top of him, looking not even winded. Xander stared up at him, all of his uneasiness finding its way back to the top of his mind. Angelus wasn't smiling, or even smugly smirking anymore, he was just regarding him calmly, as if looking for words.

Xander wasn't sure that he wanted to know what those words were. Lines of demarcation between what was right and what wasn't, between what he should want and what he shouldn't, were starting to blur. Willow had taken a semester of psychology when they'd been freshmen, and she'd told him about some passage in a book she'd been reading about the subconscious and what it controlled. Something about 'our most secret and dangerous desires, the monsters and demons from the Id,' if he remembered correctly.

Boy, who'd have thought that those little tidbits would come to mind in a situation like this? Well, delirium is a funny thing, and now all Xander could seem to focus on was the impossibly beautiful face of an angel, hovering a mere foot from his face.

"It's time for us to talk about some house rules while you're here, boy," Angelus said, staring down at Xander with an inscrutable expression on his face. Xander stopped squirming against the big, immovable body holding him down to stare back into the vampire's face. Something else was going on here; there was some part of this that he hadn't signed up for. At all.

"Rules," Xander said slowly.

"Rules," Angelus agreed, still with that maddeningly calm demeanor. Xander frowned.

"Fine. Get off me," he said, struggling to sit up.

"No." Flatly.

"Get off me, Angelus," Xander snapped. He wasn't in the mood to screw around with vamp power games.

"Watch your tone," Angelus said again, coldly. The tone of his voice stopped Xander's struggles, at least temporarily. Angelus looked mighty pissed. And this tenuous connection between them wasn't something that Xander trusted enough to believe a pissed-off master vampire wouldn't hurt him. He noted the approval in Angelus' eyes as his struggles desisted. A small part of him was very happy at the thought of receiving Angelus' approval.

The larger part of him, however, was very angry. If Angelus thought that he was just going to let him control him…well, he obviously didn't know what he was getting into.

"While you're here, you're in my house, under my clan," Angelus said, breaking the silence. Xander vaguely remembered that Angelus, Spike, and Drusilla had inherited the mastery of the Order of Aurelius, after the Master and the Anointed One had been killed. "My minions and my Childers obey my commands, and I'll expect no less from you. The consequences for breaking my rules won't be pleasant. Follow my rules, and I'll see to it that you're kept warm, fed, and comfortable, and all of your questions answered."

Xander lay beneath him, neither agreeing nor arguing with him. Angelus carefully kept his face blank. What was required in this phase of their…relationship was for Xander to learn his place, to learn not to fight Angelus. Once Xander's pride allowed him to submit, to trust him completely, only then would the next stage take place. But he needed his boy's complete trust first.

This wasn't going to be easy, but Angelus was rather looking forward to it. Xander's pride would prevent him from giving in too easily, and while Angelus had broken many a human pet by physical tortures, he wanted Xander's incredible loyalty, protectiveness, love, and trust directed at him. Physically breaking Xander would be pleasurable, but would ultimately accomplish nothing.

This new way was going to be long, difficult, and challenging – more than enough to keep him interested. Very interested, he amended silently, thinking of the too-brief taste of Xander's blood on his tongue. He had to exercise all of his hard-earned self control (Darla had been a grueling sexual taskmaster) to fight his erection as he remembered the searing pleasure that had brought him to his knees. Even now, Xander's blood flowed freely through his veins, singing to Angelus of its taste, its power.

Beneath him, however, Xander's eyes had darkened stormily, his eyebrows snapping together in a vicious scowl that let Angelus know of the anger boiling beneath the surface.

"Your commands?" Xander snapped. "Who the hell do you think you are?!" he continued, heedless of Angelus' warning growl. "I came here of my own free will, to get some answers, not to sign on to be your little slave, and I can walk out that door anytime I damn well please!" His face set in a mutinous scowl, he gave Angelus a very 'so there' look.

Angelus gave himself a moment to calm himself, and to remind himself that humans broke under vampiric strength much easier than demons did. Once he knew that his inner demon was calm enough to not beat his insolent boy into submission, he set his face blank and moved off of Xander, stepping casually to the side. No, he didn't want to break his boy by physical means, but Xander did need to learn his place before Angelus could risk setting him loose in vampiric society.

"Please, try."

Xander eyed the flat-faced vampire suspiciously. No way was this going to be that easy. But he was far too pissed-off at this point to even consider the 'consequences' that Angelus had mentioned earlier. He carefully tied the bed sheet around himself like a makeshift toga before stiffening his back to the demon and heading straight for the door.

He made it all of three steps before cold hands slammed down on his waist, hard enough to bruise, before, with a sickening rush of vertigo, he was flying through the air, landing with a hard whumph on the bed, exactly back where he'd started. "God," he gasped, looking up to see Angelus standing there with a cold expression on his face.

"Exactly. I am your god. And I think it's time we explored why." With another blur of preternatural speed, Xander found himself underneath Angelus again. The demon was straddling his stomach, holding Xander's hands above his head, his face inches from Xander's own. He took Xander's right hand and guided it to his face.

Xander's fingers were trembling as they traced the angelic features that had for so long been his most hidden desire, his most secret want. His head was awhirl, his emotions going through a state of flux. Whilst they'd been talking back in the Bronze, they had been dancing through motions that some distant, animal part of Xander had understood. Here was a situation where Angelus was the master. And that notion, in particular the part of it where Xander didn't have a problem with said notion, was the most disturbing one of all. What was that story called, the one they'd read in English last year?

The Most Dangerous Game.

"This is the façade," Angelus said simply, breaking through Xander's slightly delirious reverie. "This is the mask that I wear when I choose, when I hunt humans down, hunt them down and kill them for food or sport." His voice was cold, matter-of-fact, and Xander shied away from it instinctively. Then the face under his fingers shifted, changed.

The face of the angel disappeared, to be replaced with the face of the demon. A face, Xander was shamed to admit, some part of him found to be as attractive and natural as its angelic counterpart. "This is what I am. A demon, soulless." Xander lay underneath him, transfixed. "Any kindness I show you is for my own goals. I want you. You will be mine; you will be mine mind, body, and soul. You belong to me. And here's what you need to face."

"Angel is gone, and he ain't comin' back. So just you remember that it's Angelus who you want, Angelus who you belong to, and it's Angelus who, one day very soon, is gong to take your sweet virgin body until you beg me never to leave you."

Through this speech, Xander had stared, stunned and silent, into the implacable golden predator's eyes of the ancient, powerful creature atop of him. The flushed, red young mortal opened his mouth, perhaps to agree, perhaps to deny it all. He never knew, for in that moment, Angelus bent his magnificent head down…

…and Xander Harris kissed the demon.

The world fell away. There was nothing else that Xander could think to describe the incredible sensation running throughout his body. Angelus' lips were cold and rough against his own, but so right, so incredibly lush. This was a kiss of ownership, and Angelus plundered Xander's virgin mouth with a skill unlike anything that Xander had ever known, could ever even imagine. Angelus' tongue, rough and cat-like, and yet so amazingly erotic, plunged into Xander's willing mouth, sweeping, tasting, teasing Xander's hot tongue to play.

Tentatively at first, Xander licked along the length of Angelus' masterful tongue. The vampire seemed to like this, judging from the growl of pleasure, so Xander gently licked along his lips, shyly seeking entrance. Angelus gave an approving moan, and sucked Xander's tongue into his mouth. Xander explored the cool interior with a rush of excitement; god, this was Angelus he was kissing! His mouth was incredible, cold and hot at the same time. He tasted of leather and pleasure, and a rusty taste that Xander felt a rush of shameful pleasure at the thought that it was blood he was tasting.

Angelus' fearsome fangs seemed to be calling, so, following instinct, Xander lightly trailed his tongue along the ridges and foreign edges of Angelus' fangs. He felt a thrilling sting in his tongue and realized belatedly that he had cut himself on the vicious incisors. A small stream of his blood entered Angelus' mouth.

The vampire froze completely. Not a single inch of him moved, and Xander stopped, nervous that he'd done something wrong. But then he felt something hard as stone against his chest, and he glanced down to see Angelus' prodigious erection straining to be set free. The size of that…

Angelus suddenly came back to life, withdrawing from Xander's lips, and licking his own. His expression was fierce, frightening; he suddenly reached down and grabbed a handful of Xander's own straining boner through the silk sheet. Xander froze, flushing a deep, deep scarlet, but Angelus' quiet words cut through his embarrassment.

"Xander, look at me," the demon commanded quietly. Xander found himself obeying without hesitation. He looked into those strange, alien yellow eyes, and he froze. Angelus squeezed his throbbing member once, hard. "Cum for me. Now."

Without conscious thought, Xander exploded. He cried out, caught in the grip of the most powerful orgasm that he had ever experienced. Angelus, watching him, only added to the excitement as he creamed the sheets. Angelus gave him a pleased smile, again revealing his sharp teeth. Quick as a snake, while Xander still lay in shaken wonder, Angelus leaned down and buckled something around Xander's neck.

Xander yelped in shock as Angelus locked the collar closed around Xander's throat. Xander froze as Angelus gave him one last hard, quick kiss.

"I will be your master," Angelus promised him, whispering in his boy's ear. Before Xander could so much as think to formulate a response, Angelus had already left the room, locking the thick door behind him, emphasizing his earlier point. Xander wasn't going anywhere. He left the boy stunned and shaken to his core on the big bed, sheets like bloody satin, and all Xander could do was tremble.

A/N: Okay, so, there you have it, the first kiss! I was all excited. But, anyway, I'll try to update again in a week or so. I really forgot how fun it is to anticipate the reviews. To all of my reviewers that have stuck with me this far, thanks a lot!

Oh, and by the way, someone in one of the reviews once asked me if they could recommend my story on the xangel community on LiveJournal. Let me emphasize that I go there constantly, and I love the stories. I would really appreciate it if someone would rec it for me there, as I don't have an account. Thanks!

Until next time,

PyroPadawan.