A/N: Yay for spring break! I can actually work on this stuff more often! does happy dance Okay, that's enough of that. This chapter really seemed to come out of nowhere, because I had no plans for it at all. I knew what would happen before this chapter (obviously) and I knew what would happen after it, but I wasn't sure what to put in the middle. This is the middle, and frankly I'm pretty pleased with it. And now, on to Chapter 6!

The Love of an Angel

Chapter 6

It was silent in the cave, but it was not the same breath-stealing silence as before. It was a comfortable silence, warmly wrapping itself around the two who simply lay in each other's arms as the night passed on. Ryou was leaning against the cave wall holding Bakura in his arms as one might hold a small child. Bakura's head lay on Ryou's chest, his arms wrapped around the angel's waist.

Earlier, Ryou had been trying to explain all the things that the demon had desperately wanted to know about. The first question had been about why he cried; when actually confronted with the question, Ryou found that he couldn't quite find an adequate way to phrase it.

"It's… when you hurt inside, like when you're sad, or unhappy. It just sort of happens when you feel that way, and sometimes when it starts… it's hard to stop." Bakura hadn't quite understood; at first he thought that one cried from physical pain, and Ryou had to explain that it was strong, and usually unsavory emotions that made it happen. Emotions were still a foreign concept to Bakura; his breakdown had mixed so many feelings together all at once that he had trouble distinguishing one from another, and thus was still rather confused.

Love had been the thing that Ryou wanted to stress the most. Bakura knew that he was missing something, and Ryou believed that it was love that was missing. The angel recalled to when his father had died; Ryou had cried, and had been sad for a long time, but had eventually decided that he would move on. He knew that his father and mother both loved him, and they would be waiting for him at the end of his lifetime. He had been strengthened by the love that they had given him while they were alive, feeling that as long as he could remember what it felt like to be loved then he could keep going through anything.

For Bakura, the only love he had ever known, which had been from his mother for only the first few years of his life, had been stripped away cruelly and mercilessly right before his eyes. Thus, all the strength he ever could have gained from love had been cut off, and from then on the demon had associated all feeling with pain. All that had been left was to shield himself from the rest of the world by keeping any form of feeling away, and therefore keeping pain away. That was what Ryou figured the demon's logic was, anyways.

Though Ryou had wanted to give Bakura love, Bakura still didn't quite understand it. Explaining it had been harder than the tears. "It's when you care about someone," Ryou had said, "and you care about them so much that you want to spend all your time with them, and you feel like you'd do anything for them just to make them happy, and they feel the same way in return."

He bit his lip, wondering if any of this was making any sense. "Sometimes it hurts a little, and it can make you cry, too, but it's really one of the best things you can ever hope to experience."

Bakura had thought about this and processed it carefully, still wary of these foreign concepts. Something instinctive had wanted to immediately abolish the idea of giving oneself so freely to another in this thing called love, saying that it was a weakness to the mind. But, a memory from a very long time ago had surfaced at the description of this strange emotion, and it overpowered everything else. It was warm, and he could hear a fire crackling and popping near him. Someone was looking down at him with soft eyes, and saying that they loved him…

Whatever was left of Bakura's composure had abandoned him right at that moment, and the demon finally broke down completely and began to cry. Ryou held Bakura close as the demon sobbed into his chest heartbrokenly, and for a single moment the angel could almost swear that he was holding a child in his arms.

Eventually, the sobs had subsided, and that was how they now sat, relaxed and thoughtful in the silence. The silence was broken, however, by Ryou softly humming a tune that had suddenly come to mind. It was something that was known by nearly every being in the White Lands, the words in a language so ancient that no one remembered their meaning. But, the song and the words had prevailed through time, and it was still known to many, including Ryou.

The humming stopped suddenly as Bakura shifted around, and looked up into Ryou's face. His eyes were thoughtful, with a tinge of uncertainty that Ryou still wasn't used to seeing in the demon's garnet eyes. Bakura was in uncharted territory; he was exploring things that were more dangerous to him than anything else he had ever done in his life.

"You said…" he began, "that a person who… loves… another… he will do anything for them?" Ryou nodded slowly.

"And he… wants to spend all his time with them?" Ryou nodded again. "And… that person will feel safe with them… right?" Ryou smiled, and said, "Yes. When you love someone, it feels right just to be near them, and you would ask nothing more of them except to just be near them."

Bakura looked thoughtful again, and there was silence in the cave once more. Eventually, Bakura said slowly, "So… if all that's true… then that means that…" Bakura double-checked it all just to be sure. It met all the criteria that Ryou had laid down, so it had to be true. Right? "That… I…" Bakura found that it was almost painful to look into Ryou's eyes, which were curious and slightly confused, and he looked away momentarily as his mouth finally formed the last two words, "…love… you…"

Ryou's mouth fell open. He had expected Bakura to be acting strange after such an emotional and mental meltdown, but he was left completely and utterly speechless at the thing that Bakura had just confessed.

The demon dared to look up again, and watched the angel carefully, his sharp features much more emotional than they had ever been before. His eyes began to cloud with tears again as he saw the shock, and what he thought to be disgust, on Ryou's face. Instead, however, Ryou threw his arms around Bakura and hugged him tightly. Tears were flowing freely down his cheeks as he laughed out loud just for the sheer joy of laughing, then on a sudden whim pressed his lips against the demon's.

Bakura's eyes widened instantly, and he froze. Everything inside him was exploding, a thousand strange emotions coursing through him and making the world around him spin uncontrollably. If he tried to rationalize it, it only spun faster. If he tried to control it, it simply increased its flow and broke through every wall. He was tired of resisting; he had been for a long time, and it was only this night that he was finally too tired to fight. The walls had broken, and now their ruins had been swept into oblivion, and Bakura gave himself away.

Closing his eyes, the demon kissed back hungrily and stole Ryou's very breath from his lungs. Completion; it was like some kind of sweet drug, something that invaded one's senses and left one wishing for more and to have it forever more.

Finally, the kiss was broken as the angel and the demon found their need for air much too great. They discovered that they had somehow migrated from a sitting position to the floor of the cave, Bakura lying on top of Ryou and looking down at him with lust-laden eyes.

The demon leaned down to kiss the angel again, this time traveling slowly and sensually down his neck, leaving hot, moist trails with his tongue. He gradually moved down to Ryou's chest, and began to unbutton the white fabric of the angel's shirt and push it off his shoulders. Ryou was overwhelmed by ecstasy, and was barely capable of doing anything except responding to Bakura's every touch with low moans and soft gasps.

Suddenly, Bakura stopped. Ryou looked over at the demon with half-lidded eyes, a questioning look on his face. Bakura was uncertain once again, a question evident in his eyes; should he be doing this? With a small smile, Ryou nodded, and Bakura let a half-grin appear on his face.

With permission received, Bakura proceeded to work his way down Ryou's chest, discarding the angel's clothes along the way. Ryou himself found a sudden unquenchable hunger inside of him, and pulled at Bakura's torn shirt until the demon eventually stopped his activities just long enough to take it off. Clothes abruptly became the most hindering things ever created as Bakura worked his way even lower, earning small gasps from the angel.

Then, Bakura suddenly crawled back up Ryou's body to kiss him once again on his sweet, full lips. As he pulled away, he saw Ryou's hot, flushed face with his soft green eyes unusually bright and clouded with passion.

"Bakura… I… I want…" Ryou panted, trying to form words to express what he was feeling. "I… want… you…" he finally managed to say, wrapping his arms around Bakura's neck and pulling himself closer.

A smirk that was rather characteristic of the thief worked its way onto Bakura's lips. "Let me show you…" he said softly, and leaned down for yet another kiss.

Light shone down from the sky as day broke, streams of it weaving its way through the brush and into the cave to fall upon the sleeping lovers. Ryou's eyes fluttered open first, his mind and soul at utter peace for the first time in what seemed like so very long. He felt the warm body next to him and the black wings wrapped around him, and reveled in the mixed pleasure of dawn and Bakura.

He gently touched Bakura's face, his fingers brushing over every angle and curve so as to burn the image into his memory. The demon's face was so relaxed in sleep, holding a peace within it that had never been allowed to him in wakefulness. Ryou grew sad for just a moment, wishing for impossibilities for just a bare second. Bakura's past could not be changed, he told himself; no matter how hard he or the demon wished for it, things were as they were. The moment passed, and Ryou was glad just to be in this very place at this very time, to be loving Bakura and keeping his dark dreams away.

At the angel's feathery touch, Bakura slowly awoke. The blood-colored eyes were soft as he gazed upon the angel, basking in the light of the first morning that he had seen in years. The night was finally over; how long it had lasted.

Ryou smiled his heart-capturing smile, and leaned forward to place a shy, chaste kiss on the demon's lips. The demon found himself smiling back, and also found himself not caring that he was doing so.

Suddenly, Bakura's pointed ears twitched slightly. Something had changed; something outside was different. Reluctantly, the demon tore his eyes away from his lover to look outside the cave. Ryou frowned slightly.

"Bakura? What is it?"

Bakura's eyes narrowed, and he rose into a crouched position. "I'm not sure…" he said quietly, and slowly crept towards the cave entrance. Ryou sat up, watching the demon carefully with a worried look on his face.

Creeping out into the tangled brush that covered the entrance of the cave, garnet eyes surveyed the forest around him carefully. He could sense someone here; he couldn't tell who or what it was, but there was something else besides the two of them in the vicinity.

Thinking quickly, Bakura slipped back into the cave. "We have to move. Now," he said in a hard, serious voice. Ryou simply nodded, and tried to get up as fast as he could. He bit his lip against a pained cry as he put too much pressure too quickly on his injured foot. But, the two of them managed to throw their clothes on and Bakura immediately picked the angel up as he crept back out of the cave into the brush.

The demon stood perfectly still, listening intently as he cradled the angel in his arms. After looking around carefully, Bakura darted out of the brush, running towards another cave that he knew of on his mental map of the forest.

Suddenly, he stopped. There had been a noise, like a twig snapping, right in the direction that he was going. Bakura tried to go around the area where the noise had occurred, but found suddenly that there were small sounds and traces of movement everywhere around him.

Ryou was clinging to the demon, his green eyes darting back and forth as he shook in fright. Bakura ground his teeth together. He could feel the presence of several others all around him, closing in quickly around them; they were surrounded. Bakura berated himself silently for not having been more careful beforehand.

Very suddenly, everything ceased. There was utter silence, and nothing moved. Bakura suddenly realized what was going to happen, and spread his wings as he leapt off the ground, but it was a single second too late. A sharp pain embedded itself in the back of his right shoulder, and he was flung forward to the ground. He tried to stand up, but suddenly found himself pinned down by five of the Demon Lord's guards. Bakura struggled against them, but the wound in his shoulder hindered him and all that he got was a fist in the stomach.

"Bakura!" The demon's head shot up as he heard Ryou's voice call out. Two other guards were roughly tying him up, pinning his arms and his wings behind his back. A scream erupted from the angel's throat as his broken wing was forced into an unnatural position, and it was abruptly cut off as one of the guard's fists connected with Ryou's jaw.

"Keep your hands off of him, you bastards!" Bakura shouted, which only earned him another punch in the stomach. He raised his head to see a figure cloaked in black standing before him, holding the bound angel by the collar of his shirt. Ryou was struggling frantically against the ropes and the stranger in black, his wide green eyes filled with fear.

"Ryou!" This was the last image in Bakura's mind as something hard and painful connected sharply with his head, and everything faded away into blackness.

A/N: Aren't I evil? Cliffies are so fun to do, and so are love confessions, so this chapter was a total blast to work on. I got a sudden rush of inspiration around midnight of last night, and almost everything in this chapter was the result. Must've been something in those cookies I had… But anyways! Please review, I love feedback.