Author's Name: Soo W
Disclaimer: These characters belong to WB/Joss/Fox etc etc, but certainly not to me. I'm only writing this for fun and therapy. And because there are NEVER, ever, enough flashbacks.
Pairing: Liam/Anna
Spoilers: Based loosely on events in Becoming and The Prodigal
Short Summary: The newly risen Angel and Darla have run amok in Liam's village. As they try to hide the evidence, Angel is obsessed by memories of a recent event in his human life.
Rating: [R]
Comments: This is a follow-up to Pen Pictures, but I don't think you need to have read that to read this, so don't worry. It's based on the premise that Liam was having an affair with Anna, the servant who appears in flashbacks in AtS, before he was turned.
"Darla?"
Her cold, hard face is sniffing the air for another victim. It is my first night, and I've consumed so many souls I feel quite bloated with them. After the initial triumph of besting my Father, I cared less and less for the rest.
So, when I've finished licking the blood from her hand, I carry on talking, even though I know she is no longer really attending to me; she is elsewhere, already mentally seducing the next kill.
Anna broke first and pushed me away. She sat down again and reapplied herself to the red-currants, but her hands shook slightly. Footsteps on the path outside announced the arrival of the lady of the house.
I threw the bunch of crushed berries onto the table and waited for my Mother to appear. She came in with a new basket-full and added the shining masses of scarlet to the pile. She hardly glanced at me, but said, "Liam? What are you doing? Don't get under Anna's feet, she's busy."
Without waiting for a response, she crossed the kitchen and entered the small scullery, shutting the door. I moved quickly over to the exit to the garden, opened the door and then shut it without leaving. Then I came back to the table, and moving aside one of the empty chairs, ducked underneath before my Mother returned.
Anna bent down to see what I was doing and, finding me laughing up at her, was about to tell me to get out, when the scullery door opened again, and she sat up, anxiously reapplying herself to her work.
My mother fussed around the room for a few minutes, checking the pots and watching Anna with the fruit. Underneath the table, I picked up Anna's feet and placed them in my lap. I unlaced her boots and pulled them off quietly. Running my fingers over the wool of her stockings, I stroked her arches from the balls of her feet to her heels. She stifled a giggle, and instinctively tried to draw her feet away, but I wouldn't allow it. Resting them in my lap, I smoothed my hands along her shins, slipping them under her skirts. When I reached her knees, I ran my fingertips over the bone - I remember the kneecap was proud because her legs were bent - and went just high enough to touch the bare skin above the woollen covering. Then I skimmed around to the back of her knees, where there was a small crease in her skin, and allowed my hands to slip down her calves until my fingers measured the slenderness of her ankles.
She waited until my Mother broke the silence (I don't recall what she said, something about work to be done) and gave me a sharp kick in the ribs with her stockinged foot.
The clatter of the door announced my Mother's departure, and as soon as she was gone, Anna bent down and beckoned me to come out. I made no move and she pleaded with me, offering another kiss if I behaved (and not commenting on the contradiction inherent in the bargain.) She stretched out her hand for me, and I caught it and drew one of the stained fingers into my mouth, savouring the taste and the look of surprise mixed with desire that broke over her sweet face. Afterwards, I retained control of her hand and asked, softly "Did you do what I asked?"
She shook her head at me, "Liam, not now..."
I insisted. "Did you?"
I had been trying to persuade her for over a week. She denied me access to her room at night, so the only chance for me to touch her intimately arose during daylight. Whether she believed that this self-made rule would make our encounters less frequent, I could not tell. In spite of this restriction, or perhaps because of it, I found an opportunity to kiss and caress her almost every day. No, in truth, I knew why she refused me her room; if there had been any privacy, I would have enjoyed her at the first, at every opportunity, and she couldn't let me have my way in that, she was adamant.
When I described what I wanted to do, she was shocked.
"No! Liam, you aren't in earnest? I can't."
"Of course you can. You won't need to do anything else. Just that which I've already asked. I'll do the rest."
"But it's not..."
"What? Virtuous? No... but is this? Or this?"
"Liam, stop, I'm not one of your women down at the tavern. There are some things..."
"There's no danger in it."
Then later, "If your Mother were to find out..."
"With my Father as a husband? There's really no chance of that."
"You know that's not what I mean. If she were to catch us."
And another time, a refusal on the grounds that she wouldn't like it, couldn't possibly be expected to enjoy such a thing. I laughed at her.
"You'll like it. I promise. All women do, as far as I know. I've even seen two women together..."
But she ran away before I could explain, and wouldn't listen to me for the rest of the afternoon. So that day, when I'd succeeded in overcoming her modest opposition, I recall thinking that I'd be damned if a few currant bushes ripening early were going to stand in my way.
So I asked again. "Did you?"
A shrug, followed by the reward of a small smile. "Yes. Yes, I did what you asked."
"I did what you asked." I murmur.
"Did you?" Darla's voice breaks into my reverie. "Did you bury them deep enough?"
I look at the soil on my hands. The child is gone; the last of my old life concealed in the ground. A pity; I was enjoying the sight of bodies decorating the village, but she said it was necessary. Because angry mobs tend to assemble if leftovers are not well hidden. Because I was a fledgling and not yet strong enough for a fight. Because it would be day soon and we would have to hide nearby. The unexpected complexities of being a blood-drinker.
"Good." She smiles at me. "Then if it's done we can go."