Just thought I'd tell you in advance; this chapter is slightly AU, and like the rest of the story, very fluffy. Italics mean thoughts, or quotes, as in the case of the poem at the beginning.

Oh yeah, and I don't own Demon Diary.

Chapter Three: Summer

Summer, looked for long am I,

Much shall change or 'ere I die.

Prithee take it not amiss,

Though I weary thee with bliss!

From a poem by William Morris


Eclipse couldn't help but grin when he saw the look on Raenef's face. It almost made dressing up in only black board shorts and sunglasses worth it. The young demon lord stood on the hill overlooking the ocean in front of him, and just stared wide-eyed at the mass of water in front of him.

Raenef was still wearing the maroon board shorts he had found in the castle. He had insisted that the two of them should dress so that they didn't stand out.

Eclipse had to agree with Raenef. The demon lord was showing a rare amount of logic, after all. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Raenef wasn't wearing anything on his top half; nothing at all to do with that, of course.

"Come on Rae! I'll race you to the waves!"

That's right, Eclipse's thoughts groaned. The damned swordswoman is with us. He had almost forgotten about Erutis.

The knight was currently wearing a red bikini. Chris had been forced to stay at the castle, but there was no way Erutis was being left behind. Once she had Raenef convinced the rest was easy. Eclipse now wished he hadn't given in so easily to a pair of puppy-dog eyes.

Raenef began running towards the water before Erutis could finish what she was saying, leaving Eclipse standing on the grassy hill, looking up at the sun.

My skin is going to fry in this sun…


Raenef tripped over his feet in his rush and fell face first into a salt-flavoured wave.

"Bleah," he complained, getting to his feet. "This water tastes disgusting."

Erutis came up behind him just in time to push him face forward in the water once more, causing him to swallow another mouthful of water.

Raenef could just imagine Eclipse berating him for that.

Demon lords do not get pushed face first into water, nor do they trip over their own feet!

Raenef found himself grinning.

Wait a second! Raenef's thoughts began to scream. Where was Eclipse?

He turned around to discover Eclipse, still standing on the beach, carefully applying sunscreen to his pale body.

Poor Eclipse, Raenef's thoughts began to scream. His skin really does make him look beautiful and fierce when he cares to show it off, but in this sun his skin is going to burn bright red.

Maybe I should go and help…


Damn sun! Eclipse mentally cursed, forcing himself to restrain from casting a Black Hole spell on the bottle of sunscreen beside him.

It was hard enough to coax the liquid out of the bottle, harder still to get anything less than a litre to pour out onto your hands.

His hands were currently smothered in the stuff, even after coating his arms and legs with it, and he had no idea how he was going to do his back without using magic and causing some serious questioning from the people around him.

"Hey Eclipse!" Eclipse was startled to look up and find Raenef's smiling face less than a foot away from his own. "Did you want some help?"

Eclipse was, for the first time in his life, completely dumbfounded. How did he sneak up on me like that? Was his first thought, before Raenef wants to rub sun screen all over your back! quickly took over.

"Raenef, you don't have to…" Eclipse found himself saying. Surely it would be undignified for a demon lord to do a favour like that for an underling.

"Come on. It'll be fun!" Raenef chirped, wiping some of the sunscreen off Eclipse's hand. "Besides, I want you to come swimming with me!"

Raenef proceeded to wipe the sunscreen all over Eclipse's back; flicking Eclipse's hair over the demon's shoulder with extreme reluctance. Raenef's touch was delicate and soft, and Eclipse found himself leaning into the demon lord's touch.

Oh no! Eclipse's thoughts screamed. You're going to have fantasies about Raenef and sunscreen for weeks now! Not to mention how undignified the whole situation was.

What did it matter? It felt so good…

And then Raenef stopped.

Wha..? Eclipse's thoughts screamed in a very un-Eclipse-like manner. It can't be over yet!

"There you go Eclipse!" Raenef squeaked. "Now you have to come swimming with me!"

"Master Raenef…" Eclipse hesitated, glancing at the crashing waves and wondering how he could get out of his current predicament.

Before he could say anything though, Raenef had taken hold of Eclipse's hand and dragged him into the water.

"Come on Raenef!" Erutis called, prompting Raenef to drag Eclipse further out into the water.

Eclipse frowned. This was going to be a long day.


And so the next hour passed, with many smiles, or in Eclipse's case, frowns, and many mouthfuls of salty water. After a while Raenef took to clinging to Eclipse every time a large wave crashed over the trio, as the older demon stood against the ocean's fury with ease.

All was good in the world, until Eclipse realised that, despite the presence of a large amount of sunscreen, he was beginning to burn.

"Master Raenef," Eclipse said softly to his liege, who was currently attached to Eclipse's arm. "I fear I must leave now," he continued, a not-so-small part of him feeling real regret at having to part Raenef from his current life-raft.

"But… Eclipse…" Raenef brought out his puppy-dog eyed stare, and Eclipse would have been maybe been tempted to stay, if it wasn't for the fact that bright red skin was not at all fashionable for a high ranking demon such as himself.

Within seconds Eclipse was back on shore, and Raenef was left chest-deep in the water, staring after him.

"Eclipse…" Raenef sighed in disappointment.

A massive wave chose that exact moment to crash over the young demon lord's head, proving that Neptune, the god of the ocean, does in fact have a perfect sense of comedic timing.

"You know what they need here," Raenef said as he came spluttering to the surface. "They need somebody to stay on the beach to make sure nobody drowns."

"I'm serious!" he added when Erutis gave him a doubtful look. "I could have just drowned then and nobody would care. If they had a person sitting on the beach and watching for people that get surprised by waves, then he could have jumped in and saved me!"

"I bet you Eclipse would jump in to save you," Erutis commented, a sly grin beginning to form on her face. "He'd probably give you mouth-to-mouth too if you needed it."

Erutis couldn't help but giggle as Raenef oh-so-obviously began to work out that maybe be wanted to almost drown, if only for the experience of receiving the kiss of life from Eclipse. Gods, Eclipse and Raenef's feelings for each other were so obvious. She briefly considered attempting to drown Raenef herself, but decided that the joy of knowing that Eclipse and Raenef were finally together was not worth it if Eclipse's fury meant that she wasn't around to see it.

Neptune decided to interrupt again, this time throwing off Erutis. The knight resurfaced almost twenty metres away, a scowl on her face.

"This stuff really does taste disgusting," she said, spitting out as much salt as possible. "You know what? I'm going to go find something to eat. Something with preferably as little salt as possible in it."

And so Raenef found himself all alone in the waves.

"Oh," he whined. "This is no fun by myself. I wonder if…"

His thoughts began to run wild, and within minutes, this time without interruptions from the almighty ocean god, Raenef had convinced himself that he definitely wanted to find out whether Eclipse would be willing to give him mouth-to-mouth.


Eclipse was meanwhile enjoying his own private version of hell.

It had been hard enough to find a spot on the beach where he wouldn't get completely burnt. The sand… Well, that was even harder to get rid of than the sun. It seemed to get everywhere; in his pants, under his nails, and it was going to take hours to brush out of his hair.

Well, at least Raenef was enjoying himself.

Wait a second. Where was Raenef?

Eclipse got to his feet and began staring at the waves as he realised he could no longer spot his master.

His stomach seemed to roll inside him, especially when he spotted one of Raenef's hands flinging about just above the surface.

No longer caring about the beaming sun over-head or the unwelcome presence of sand in his shorts, Eclipse sprinted towards the ocean and dived in, his arms moving at almost inhuman speed as he raced towards where he had last seen his master.


Well, Raenef thought as he felt Eclipse's arms drag him to the surface. That was quicker than expected.

It had been quite easy to play dead really. All Raenef had to do was relax and let his body go all loose. Oh, and hold his breath really well. Not like that was difficult though. Eclipse had, after all, taught him a spell that would help him hold his breath for up to an hour.

Raenef hadn't really remembered to use the spell before this occasion, but then again, he'd never had a reason to remember it, had he?

Raenef forced himself to stay relaxed as Eclipse carried him towards the beach. It would be so easy to just lean into Eclipse's chest.

Eclipse shifted him slightly, so that Raenef's head rested on his shoulder.

Ah, Raenef thought. Much better.

Eclipse put him down on the sand, quickly, yet still incredibly gently. Raenef forced himself not to give the game away by smiling. It was so difficult, especially when he felt Eclipse's lips thrust against his own.

Eclipse was, as Erutis had guessed, giving him the kiss of life.

Eclipse's lips were gone as soon as they had come.

Raenef's eyes shot wide open.

Wasn't it supposed to be longer than that? He hadn't even been given enough time to kiss back yet.

Eclipse was just about to press his lips back on Raenef's when he realised his liege was staring up at him, and definitely breathing. In fact, he was breathing quite heavily.

"Eclipse!" Raenef grinned. "I… I was just practicing that spell you taught me!" Raenef tried to excuse what he had done. "You know, where you can hold your breath? I think I got it right!'

"You mean," Eclipse frowned. "That you're perfectly fine?"

"Umm… Yeah!"

"Oh." Eclipse felt his cheeks flush bright red as he realised what he had just done. His lips had touched Raenef's, and there wasn't even mouth to mouth to blame it on now.

Although, the small part of Eclipse's mind that managed to cling to rational thought no matter what the situation, pointed out, you did think he needed mouth to mouth.

And now Raenef was lying underneath him, staring up at him with flushed cheeks and lips, and the most wanton expression on his face. It would be so easy to just lean forward and…

"Hi guys!" Erutis yelled. Eclipse looked up to find her standing there, holding on to three cones of rapidly melting ice-cream. Her eyes went wide as she took in the situation; the very small distance between the two of them; the vagueness in Raenef's eyes.

She blushed.

"Oh!" she cried. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

"No!" Eclipse said, recovering his dignity by jumping to his feet and brushing some stray sand off his chest. "No. Master Raenef was just showing me how well he has mastered a spell I taught him a while ago. You weren't interrupting anything."

"Oh. Erutis sighed, sounding vaguely disappointed.

Eclipse wasn't really going to accept the ice-cream that Erutis held out for him, but Raenef insisted. Eclipse was surprised to find out that he actually enjoyed it.