A.N: Well here is chapter 5. For those of you who were worried, fear not! The smut ain't over yet! It returns in this chapter, though this will be the final time, sorry.

Er... that is the end of the smut, not the story.

The plot's still here too, and we will reveal just why Kain was being such a badass last chapter. Enjoy! Please keep up the reviews! They give us warm fuzzies!

(Kain)

What else could I do? I could not stand to see his face! So innocent, unknowing, my Raziel. My love! And how could it be that I would have to do this thing to him? That I could not tell him? He would have to make the ultimate sacrifice, and yet what did I have to sacrifice? My lieutenant, my lover, my child. He would never understand, never forgive. That was the idea after all, wasn't it? I had seen it in the streams of time, newly discovered beyond the Oracle's cave. I would have to betray him in order to cause the events that needed to happen, in order to restore Nosgoth. I could not bear the thought, and yet I knew it was the only way.

(Raziel)

Within a few days of that outburst, Kain had once again gone into seclusion. Another change was taking him. A few weeks after that, I too began to change. I emerged stronger, more defined, but not significantly changed. It seemed odd, a bad omen, perhaps, of things to come. I saw Kain rarely, and only from a distance, but his change had obviously been more dramatic than mine. His skin had taken on a sort of tree bark texture and had changed from its previous bright white to a sort of olive brown. He had also developed new ridges and protrusions...almost horns...around his head, and his hair had come down his forehead accordingly. He looked strange, in many ways no longer human, but I still found him beautiful, and though I tried to deny it, missed him. He refused to see me, and so I could not learn what had caused this strange and sudden distance. I was left only wondering, and yearning for him. Inside I was deathly afraid that his feelings for me had truly waned, though I did not want to believe it.

(Kain)

The sun was beginning to set, slowly, behind the distant hills of Nosgoth. Though its rays no longer harmed Raziel's toughened skin, he still often slept much of the daylight hours away. I stood and watched the bright red glow enhance the reflections in his skin. My Raziel, my child. He was beautiful, lying there, his face serene in sleep. I realized with surprise that he had served me for almost a thousand years. Time, to a vampire, seemed short, where it would be long to a mortal. We had done so much together. The human base of power had been slowly smothered as our kind expanded from their bases across Nosgoth. We were confident and in control, rulers once again. For at least part of this, I had him to thank, my second in command, always, and I had repaid him with cruelty and alienation.

I slipped over to his bed and sat beside him, running my hands slowly through his hair. A part of me wished he would awaken; another wished he would not. For what would I face when he awoke? Anger? Doubt? Fear? I had ignored him so long. Disgust? Revulsion? We had not been together since my change, and I felt the unfamiliar pangs of fear and regret within me.

I had not wanted to see him. I had not wanted to face the thought of what I might one day have to do. But, after all, the time streaming device had belonged to the treacherous one, Moebius, and perhaps what I had seen was just a specter, a ghost, another one of Moebius' tricks reaching out from beyond his own death. It had to be! I could not do what I had seen myself do, and this change...this thing that was predicted...could not be. Always in the past I had entered the change first. What reason could there be for this to alter?

Raziel's eyes fluttered and then flashed open, and he turned his head to gaze up at me. A slight smile crossed his face, as if he did not want to believe what he saw. He blinked and sat up, staring at me with confusion.

"Kain??" he asked, his voice startled. "What...what are you doing here?"

"The sunset is beautiful from your room, Raziel." Raziel frowned.

"Kain, you haven't spoken to me for several months and now you're telling me you came to my room to admire the sunset?" I turned to him, filled with shame and confusion.

"I knew you would not understand," I said, turning to leave.

"Wait!" Raziel called. I turned. "Please stay," he said softly. "I did not mean to sound cruel, but Kain, it has been so long. I thought...I thought perhaps you had found a more meaningful pastime." His voice was thick with the repression of tears. Of course, I could easily see through this.

"I...I am sorry, Raziel. I have changed a great deal in recent months. I thought perhaps..." Raziel stepped towards me and put one hand boldly against my face.

"Is that what this was about, Kain? You thought I would no longer find you beautiful?" (So strange, Raziel must have thought, to see me acting this way.)

(Raziel)

Kain, self conscious?? This was a side of him I had never seen, thought I would never see. And to think he had actually apologized! With words! Before it had always been the same. No matter what Kain did, he was never sorry for it. He was always right, impeccable, perfect. And we, as his lieutenants, as his children, followed him. But now? Now, was I finally getting to see him as simply my lover? I wanted to hold him in my arms forever until he would never feel pain or fear again, and yet my own fear was so great. I still thought, perhaps, his love for me was not what it had once been.

"Kain, you could never be anything but beautiful to me," I said, trying to be reassuring. I put one hand against his shoulder, daring to be gentle, almost intimate. He surprised me by running one of his hands back through my hair.

"My beautiful Raziel," he whispered. "I should not have stayed away as long as I did." He kissed me, then, forcefully, and I found myself immediately hardening against my pants. We no longer spoke as he pushed me against the bed and kissed me deeply, his hands roaming wildly against my skin and pulling at my pants, passionate, repressed.

"You're hungry tonight," I accused playfully, though I felt the same way. He reacted by ripping his claws through the laces on my pants and removing them. He grabbed the back of my head and pressed his lips to mine, then slid down to suckle gently against my throat. His teeth grazed the skin but did not harm it. Neither Kain nor I now had skin soft enough to be easily wounded. With this hardening of the skin had come a slight deadening of the nerves, but even so I could feel the slight tickle slip down my spine as Kain's teeth slipped along my neck. He slipped down from there to kiss my chest and locked his mouth suddenly around one of my nipples, pulling gently. The feeling of ecstasy was instant and intense. The lust rising in me, I began to slide my claws down along Kain's chest and slowly worked open the laces of his own pants. I placed my claws (for I suppose they could no longer be called hands) against his hips and slid his pants away from them.

"My my," I said coyly, observing and handling slightly his newly uncovered member, "it would seem that your skin was not the only thing changed by these transformations, Kain. Unless I'm much mistaken, you've grown." Strangely enough, an almost indiscernible flush crept into Kain's cheeks, but only for a moment.

Curious and aroused, I seized the hiatus in Kain's stroking and weaving to grab him with one hand and place him soundly in my mouth. A slight moan escaped his lips, and he laid his own hands--claws--against the back of my head, caressing my hair. I was surprised to find I was almost able to swallow his newfound glory, but all of this was too much for Kain. He finally pulled my head away, turned me, and pushed me so that I lay upon my belly on the bed. He crawled onto the bed after me, straddling my hips, sitting upon my buttocks, and rubbing his hands down along my back. As he did so, I noticed an unexpected soreness on either side of my mid-back. I reached my hand backwards, pulling his away.

"Don't," I said. "It's sore there." I figured I must have pulled a muscle, or bruised myself in one of our many battles. It was of no consequence, but Kain seemed disturbed by this. For a moment he merely sat, stunned, still upon my back, his hands frozen over the slightly tender flesh. "Kain?" I said softly. "It's all right, Kain. You didn't hurt me. I was probably just bruised in battle or perhaps while sparring with Turel."

"Of...of course," he said, stuttering strangely, but then his hands once again began to wander. Strong but deliberately gentle, he stroked his hands around the sore areas on my back and then, scooting backwards, rested them upon my buttocks. For a moment he just stayed there, his hands squeezing slightly, and then he removed one hand and spit into it. I could see his arm moving out of the corner of my eye as he lubricated himself. Then his hand was back where it had been, pulling me apart slightly, and he entered.

I felt pain at first. After all, it had been quite a while, and he had grown, but as he moved slowly within me, reorienting me to the sensation, the pain faded and all I felt was the heat of arousal, throbbing within me. He rocked forward inside me, his hands on either side of me on the bed, leaning into me. Then he placed his hands upon my hips and pulled me up onto my knees, gaining access to my own swollen member. His hand slid up and down against me below, while his hips ground against me behind. I heard a strange cry and realized that it was coming from me, my voice flying uncontrolled and free out into the room.

"Quiet, Raziel," Kain whispered towards my ear. "Unless your intention is to attract an audience." I bit one lip, but the noise came out nonetheless, restrained but not contained. Kain continued to thrust against me, driving a thick liquid fire down from where he had penetrated me towards the space between my legs. It would not be long. I threw my head back and closed my eyes, struggling against the approaching tide, but to no avail. Kain began to pump his hand faster against me, and I could feel it as the orgasm traveled from somewhere inside me, up and out. Kain had one hand still between my legs, and the other still leaning on my hip. That hand slowly tightened its grip, and I knew that he was feeling the same thing I was. And as he relaxed his hold on me and gently pulled away, I felt a sudden overwhelming love for him rise from my heart into my throat. I turned to look at him, adoration overtaking my face. His eyes were closed as he sat back, breathing and recovering, and I felt as I had always felt with him. I was his lover, but more than that, I felt again like his child.

"Kain," I breathed. "I do not understand what has gone on between us." His eyes opened slightly, looking at me, dangerously calm. "I will tell you this now, so that there will be no misunderstanding between us. I love you. I love you so much sometimes I feel I might burst into a thousand pieces, I am so full of love. I have been at your side for almost a millennia, and will remain there for many more to come. I will always be your lieutenant, your lover, your child. Please tell me that you want this? Please tell me I will always be yours?"

Kain was silent for a long time, his eyes distant, and for every moment he remained quiet, my heart became more cold with fear. Would he reject me, once and for all, after the intimacy of this night? Had he been avoiding me because he was afraid--after everything, the impenetrable Kain was afraid--to tell me that he had tired of our love affair? Was he, in the end, as everyone said he was, actually incapable of real love?

"Raziel," he said softly. "There is much you do not understand, but at least this much you must know to be true. I have always loved you, as a son and as an equal. For as long as is possible, I would have you remain by my side."

"What do you mean by..." I started, confused and wary. But he silenced me by placing one claw against my lips.

"Sshh," he whispered. "Do not worry yourself. You are mine. You will always be mine." He pulled me towards him, then, and we laid down side by side, holding each other against the raw cold of Nosgoth, this world that surrounded us.