OATHS
By Hydraa
This is the sequel to "Horns." Read in order, the stories are:
"To Find the Watch"
"Demons"
"Horns"
"Oaths"
Reviews don't make me write, but they do encourage me to prioritize it higher. If you like the story, let me know. Enjoy.
---000---
The Jazz club was old and dark, the walls darkened by the smoke that clouded the ceiling. The furniture was old as well, tattered and needing new upholstery, the tables stained and scratched by the decades of glasses put on them.
The music was marginally better, a saxophone player sitting on a stool atop the stage and playing a mournful tune for the dozen or so people watching. It was a dark place, the feel of it heavy enough to drive most people away.
The blonde and the little boy looked spectacularly out of place.
"Look," the blonde said, dressed in a gown that was too big for her and a hat with a lacy brim that didn't match. "I heard that you know how to do it. I came looking for information."
The man she was talking to, a seedy enough individual on his own, regarded her dubiously. She looked like she was playing dress-up in her mommy's clothes and her little brother wasn't much better. Half his head was hidden in a tweed cap, covering his hair completely, and he was so shy he never looked up. He wore clothes as old as the girl's, his shorts tattered and his shirt torn. They looked like clothes picked up at the salvation army, by people too poor to afford better.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he said evenly, trying to go back to his drink.
The girl's eyes narrowed. "Look," she snapped. "Fast Eddie said you were the one to come talk to, Frank. I want some answers." She grabbed his wrist, her grip surprisingly strong. He tried to pull away, but she actually held him still and he felt the first flash of anger.
"Look, girl, you don't know what you're messing with. I'm doing you a favour. So buzz off and forget this. Otherwise you'll end up dead."
She wasn't moved. "I'm not leaving. You know how to summon demons. I want to know how to control them."
"Shut it!" he hissed, looking around to see if anyone was listening. No one was, all focused drunkenly on the saxophone player or their own conversations. "This isn't the place to bring this up."
"So take us somewhere where it is," she retorted. "I'll make it worth your while."
Frank frowned and gave her a more considerate look. She was temperamental and probably more trouble than she was worth, but she looked like she might just clean up pretty well and it had been a long time since he'd been with a woman. His interest started to peek. "All right," he decided at last. "Meet me out back in five minutes." He pointed at the boy. "Leave him here." The boy just shrugged his shoulders, never looking up at him.
The girl frowned. "Fine. Five minutes. But you better have something good for me, Frank."
"Trust me," Frank said and stood, heading out. He was starting to get excited as he went outside and around the building to the back alley, straightening his tie. Perhaps this night wouldn't be such a waste after all. There were lots of girls interested in summoning their own pet demon. It usually turned out bad for them, but they didn't know that and were willing to do anything for the information. Or so Frank had heard. He'd certainly never had any women coming after him wanting to know how to summon demons. He knew in theory; he'd never had the nerve to try it himself, but his cousin had and they'd learned the techniques together, before Frank chickened out and Arthur ended up eaten.
He went into the alley, a place of more than one clandestine meeting, and leaned against the wall, trying to be nonchalant. She wanted the info. If she wanted it that badly, he didn't have to feel guilty. She'd be happy. He'd be happy. Everyone would be happy.
A few minutes later, the girl rounded the corner, stumbling in her too-long, pink dress. It really didn't look good on her, but Frank was getting too aroused to care. She had long, curly hair under that blue hat of hers and heavy boots on her feet. She'd look better without them on. The little boy was nowhere to be seen.
She walked up to him and stopped, her hands crossed over her chest. "Okay, start talking. I want to know how to summon and control a demon. How to make them do exactly what I want."
"Don't you want us to get to know each other better first?" Frank cajoled, reaching for her, but she stepped out of his way.
"I want answers," she told him, her lips curling. "Don't touch me."
Frank stiffened, suddenly angry. She was just like all the other women. If he told her what she wanted, she'd run off on him, laughing about how useless he was. He flushed. No woman treated him this way, at least not when he had a few glasses of liquid courage in him.. "Don't you p-pull that," he stammered. "You're going to give me what I want."
She laughed. "Or what?"
He stepped towards her, looking as threatening as he could. "I'm bigger than you are, girlie. You better do what I say."
"Not likely." She looked past him. "Chrno?"
Surprised, Frank turned. Standing behind him, where the alley stopped at a dead end, was the little boy. He'd taken off his cap and his long hair hung down to his knees, twisted into a braid held by a ribbon. His hands shoved in his pockets, he lifted his head and looked at him.
Frank gasped. The boy's eyes were slitted like a cat's, his ears pointed. He looked at Frank and snarled, the edge of a canine poking out between his lips. "Don't touch her," he growled and changed. One moment, Frank was looking at the boy, the next he had grown to tower over him, wings flaring out from his lean frame and a bone tail coming out from the back of his head. It lashed dangerously in the air, making a singing sound. Frank backed up, whimpering at the demon until he felt the girl's hand on his back and heard her chuckle.
"You better answer my questions now," she said.
Frank gaped at the demon. "W-why do you need to know how to control demons?" he gasped, distantly horrified at the realization that he'd wet himself. "You have one!"
"None of your business," she snapped. "Now start talking."
---000---
Home, at least for the moment, was the third floor of an abandoned building near the wharfs of New York. Rosette kicked the door open and stomped into their small space, her skin itching from the cheap material of her dress. Without even pausing to look around, she yanked it off over her head and tossed it into the corner, along with the hat she'd been wearing to hide her horns.
Behind her, Chrno followed her in and shut the door behind him before going to light one of the candles. He was back in his little boy form and he had to stretch to reach them all. Lighting one, he used it to light the others and the one lamp they had.
"I don't know how much help he was," he said at last, his only comment on the situation.
Rosette grabbed her usual skirt and shirt and yanked them on to hide how disgruntled she was feeling herself. Frank had known a bit about how to summon a demon, but not nearly enough on how to control one. If he'd ever tried it himself, he probably would have botched the job and ended up dead. "We can't use any of it?"
"I don't think so. I'm not exactly an expert on this."
Rosette glared at him, standing there in the warm glow of the candlelight. He looked depressed and she resisted the urge to snap at him. He hadn't had much choice but to get into the trouble they were currently trying to get him out of.
"I guess we're back to square one," she admitted instead.
"Yeah." He looked away, at the pile of blankets that had to serve as their bed and the old crate that held their only belongings. There wasn't much. Just a few pieces of clothing and her gun belt and guns, none of which she had ammunition for anymore. "We do have the other names."
"Yes. Frank was the easiest to get to though." The other one would likely be much more dangerous.
Chrno went to stand by the broken window and Rosette sighed. When she first joined the Holy Order of Magdalena, they hadn't been willing to just accept a demon tagging along with her, even though his powers were bound at the time. They'd taken Chrno without her knowing and bound him further. Rosette didn't know for sure what they'd done to him, but Chrno couldn't change shape on holy ground, couldn't act to hurt a human, and couldn't disobey an order made by someone in the Order. That included an order to die. For years, it hadn't been an issue, until he used his legions to turn her into a demon and save her life. Now the Order saw him as an enemy and he had no defence against them. That was the source of his current depression. They could do anything to him if they found him and he blamed himself for it. Somehow, they had to find a way to break him free of their control.
Rosette walked over to him and put an arm around his shoulders. No longer dependant on her life force, he could change shape now and preferred his adult form, given their intimacy. For him to be a boy again meant he was shutting himself off from her, not wanting to share his mood. Rosette hugged him against her and noogied his head. "Well, nothing's going to get done with us just sitting here. Let's go after the next name." Wrapping an arm around his neck, she dragged him out of the room, slamming the door behind her. A moment later, Chrno banged back in and blew out the candles and the lamp before running back out to her. Rosette considered it a good sign that he put his head back under her arm as they left. Their belongings they didn't really worry about. They didn't have much worth stealing and she'd convinced the last thief that it wasn't worth the effort. He'd really taken the lesson to heart by the time she let him go.
---000---
Their second destination was a hotel in a more upscale part of town. In an alley around the corner from it, Chrno glided to a landing, Rosette in his arms. It was risky to fly, since someone might see them, but they hardly had money for a taxi. He set her down and she went to check the mouth of the alley as he changed back. The street was mostly deserted, not surprising for two in the morning.
Rosette glanced back at Chrno, back in his boy form. "Change to adult," she told him. "You'll stand out too much otherwise." He sighed and shifted, becoming a tall young man with long hair and, still, pointed ears. He wore a bandana around his forehead to hide the eyebuds there and he wore a poncho over his more western style clothing. He'd still stand out in a New York hotel, but not as badly as a little boy in the middle of the night. That had been okay in the Jazz club since it made them both look harmless to the paranoid Frank, but it wouldn't work here. Rosette just hoped her clothes didn't stand out too badly. They were the best she had left anymore.
"Come on," she told him and took the lead. Chrno followed her without protest, much as he always did. He argued sometimes, but his was a submissive personality, much like most demons. She'd dominated him since the moment they met, and even if she were inclined to wonder if she was being unfair, he preferred it that way. He was a soldier demon and had to have a master to feel complete. They were equal though. Rosette may have been the leader, but she made sure he had as much say as she did.
If she hadn't basically bullied him into it though, she suspected he'd still be in Magdalene's tomb, sleeping eternally next to the crypt of the last woman he'd given himself to.
Magdalene, however, had never had as much of him as Rosette though. The girl smirked over her shoulder at her lover and saw his confused look before she led the way into the hotel.
Their clues came from her barely remembered look at a list of suspected demon worshippers back when she was in the Order. The first name had taken them to a bookstore owner who sold occult books, and five minutes of Chrno in his normal form got a list of four names out of him. The first two had been dead. Frank had been the third. This name was the last. The night concierge of the Elegant Swan hotel; a clean, brightly decorated establishment that Rosette never would have thought of as being a centre for demon worship and summoning. According to their contact though, it was, and had been for years.
Rosette wondered if Sister Kate knew.
The night concierge with a stout, middle-aged man with a thick moustache and the name "Daniels" on the badge he wore on his jacket. He looked at them evenly as they came in, nodding in greeting until they got close enough for him to see Chrno's lavender coloured hair, eyes, and pointed ears. Rosette's horns were hidden strategically underneath her pigtails.
Daniels turned back to Rosette, his expression suddenly more calculating. "How may I assist you, madam?" he asked.
Rosette leaned on the counter and grinned at him seductively, missing how Chrno rolled his eyes. "I hear this is the place to come to party," she told him.
"Oh? What sort of party are you referring to, madam?"
Rosette twirled her hair around her finger, unwittingly almost uncovering one horn. "The sort where people bring special guests," she intimated, cocking a thumb towards Chrno.
Daniels inspected the demon for a moment, making Chrno look away uncomfortably.
"Yes, madam. Come this way, please." He led the way through the back. Rosette shot Chrno a thumbs up and followed him. Rolling his eyes again, Chrno followed. Rosette was nothing if not a lousy actor and he kept his eyes and senses open. He could feel demonic energy here, something he doubted Rosette was sensitive enough to pick up on yet, and he had no way to tell her.
Daniels led them down a staff corridor and stopped at a door. "This way please," he told them as he unlocked the door. On the far side, a staircase led downwards towards a basement.
Chrno heard the music immediately, an oddly discordant big band tune that echoed bizarrely. The staircase led straight down and opened into a foyer with a curtain closed across it.
"Welcome to Hotel Hell," the concierge told them and opened the curtain.
Rosette and Chrno both gasped in shock. The entirety of the basement was lit by electrical light and filled with huge, soft pillows. A massive, ornate circle had been drawn in the centre of the floor, something sinuous and inhuman twisting in it and mewling. On many of the pillows were men and women, coupling with things that were definitely demons, some vaguely human in appearance, many of them not. Rosette's face flamed bright red.
Chrno looked around in confusion. They were low rank demons, late births in a clutch that didn't receive the same care as the earlier ones. As a result, they were weaker and stupid, barely good enough for manual labour or in some cases food. They were the easiest and most common form of demon summoned, but he'd never imagined an orgy like this. Demons almost as a rule didn't have sex. Only Pandemonium did and she killed her partners. After thousands of generations of it, demons were at their most vulnerable during sex, their minds open to destruction by any but the most gentle of touches.
Chrno glanced at Rosette's blushing face. This whole thing made a mockery of what he had with her. He gave her his legions with his body, she gave him her astral with her kiss, and even though both were demons, he survived her touch. He could feel how open the demons in the room were, only held back from destroying their partners and each other by the strength of the Oaths they'd been bound by. They raged against it though and he reached out to grip Rosette's arm, his touch a silent warning.
She forced her blush down and turned to the concierge, trying to look haughty and failing. "V-very good," she stammered. He looked doubtful, but Chrno let his eyes glow, a hint of his true form shimmering around him, and the man nodded.
"Enjoy your visit, madam. Someone will be here to explain the rules of the house to you. I need to return to my station." He nodded to someone and turned away, vanishing back through the curtain.
Chrno tried to say something then to Rosette, but a woman rose from a group of pillows, leaving something with multiple arms behind, and swayed towards them, dressed only in a piece of translucent lingerie. Rosette gaped at her.
"Welcome," the woman purred, smiling sleepily at Rosette and then looked at Chrno. "Oh, he's gorgeous. I've never seen one like him." She circled him and Chrno flinched as she reached out to trace a hand along his ribs and around to his backside.
"Hands off!" Rosette snapped. "He's mine."
The woman frowned. "We like to share here."
"Not him you don't." Rosette stepped between them, her embarrassment banished by her anger.
"Then why are you here?" the woman pouted, crossing her arms.
Chrno saw Rosette start, realizing her mistake. Neither of them had expected to find an orgy though. "Um… that is…"
The woman's eyes narrowed. "Why are you here?" she asked again. Some of the others were starting to take notice of them, turning away from their demon partners.
"Ah, applesauce," Rosette muttered, looked up at Chrno, and then punched the woman solidly in the nose. She fell down onto her bottom with a shriek.
"Okay!" Rosette yelled, hands on her hips. "I want some answers out of you people!"
Chrno sighed, already seeing what was coming.
"Kill them!" the first woman yelped nasally. "Now!"
Instantly, the demons surged forward, attacking. Rosette blanched and then Chrno was past her, changing into his full demon form as his wings spread and he lashed around with the whip tail that came out of the base of his skull. It speared through the first of the demons, ripping it apart, and its blood spattered on the suddenly screaming human witnesses. They tried to run for the door, but the demons were between them.
Chrno fought back with his claws and whip, lashing out at the demons. He was immensely more powerful than they, but his energy sources were limited by how much Rosette could give him, and she couldn't fill him enough to let him use his greatest powers. He had to settle for tearing them apart, trying not to get bit or clawed himself in the limited space. Rosette cursed behind him and he heard a crashing sound before she appeared beside him, brandishing a chair leg.
A demon with three heads facing outward from a long stalk lunged at them, its eyes insane. Chrno knelt and slashed, slicing his sharp claws across its throat. It shrieked, throwing itself to the side, and Rosette bashed it on top of its heads, knocking it to the floor. It was replaced by a thing with a body like a malformed baby and the wings of a dragonfly, screaming curses as it flew for his face. Chrno impaled it on the end of his tail and whipped the creature around, flinging it at another of the demons. Rosette hit a fourth with her chair arm and he slashed it with the whip tail as well before it could rise again.
The entire battle took only minutes, all of the demons killed and most of the humans fled. The woman with the broken nose still knelt there though, staring around herself at the carnage as though her entire world had fallen apart.
"What have you done?" she wailed.
Rosette stomped over to her while Chrno peered at a deep cut on his chest and walked up to her side.
"I want to know how you control demons," Rosette said coldly. "How you bind them and what Oaths you use."
The woman stared at Chrno and then back at her. "But you have a demon already."
"Don't argue! Just answer me!" She brandished her makeshift cudgel and the woman flinched.
---000---
Some hours later, Rosette soaked a cloth in the bathroom of an all-night diner and pressed it against the cut on Chrno's chest. He winced slightly but let her, his sleepy eyes never leaving her face. She cleaned it and peered at the wound, hoping it wouldn't need stitches.
"You shouldn't have let them hit you," she scolded.
"I hardly planned it. At least we got the information we wanted." He yawned.
Rosette glared up at him. They had, but it angered her still that there were people like that, and without the authority of the Order to call on, they'd get away with it. They were lucky beyond belief that they'd survived their stupidity and they'd probably just do it again, until they messed up and got someone killed. Usually, it was someone innocent who died too.
"Stupid bloody idiots," she muttered, dabbing at the wound. It wasn't bleeding anymore at least. "They're not getting away with it." Chrno's eyes closed, his head nodding, and her expression softened. He'd used up a lot of energy in that fight.
Straightening up, she hooked a hand around his neck. His eyes opened to look at her again as she pulled him down to kiss her.
Immediately, astral flowed out of her mouth and into his. He accepted it gratefully, letting it saturate his starving cells as the wound on his chest closed.
Rosette let him go and smiled. "Better?"
"Better," he agreed.
She tossed the cloth into the sink. "Come on, we better get out of here before someone realises we're both in the same bathroom. I want to go get some sleep." She led the way out into the empty diner, the waitress asleep in her booth and not noticing them. It wasn't even dawn outside, the view out the window still dark.
Rosette paused, remembering the last diner she'd been in. She glanced at Chrno and went to the back of the diner, where a pay phone hung. "Do you have a nickel?" she asked.
"What are you doing?" he asked, even as he fished one out of the tip jar on the counter and handed it to her.
"Making sure those people don't try something like this again." She dialled a number and waited.
"Holy Order of Magdalene," she heard a sleepy voice say a few moments later.
"Get Sister Kate on the line," she ordered. "It's Sister Rosette Christopher."
"Oh! Yes!" the startled voice replied. "Just a moment." Rosette heard the phone put down and the sound of footsteps running.
"What are you doing?" Chrno asked warily.
Rosette grinned at him. "Ratting out some demon worshippers. Unless you want to spend the next year tracking them down, that is."
"Not really."
It took three minutes and a few more nickels before Sister Kate came on the line.
"Sister Rosette?" she heard and tried hard not to think about how the woman had captured Chrno, imprisoned him, and tried quite seriously to kill him.
"Shut up and listen," Rosette snapped. "I'm still mad at you, but I found out something you should know. There's a demon worshipper cult working out of The Elegant Swan hotel. The concierge, a guy called Daniels, is in on it. They summon demons in the basement. Chrno and me got rid of the demons, but they can just summon more. You go get them and leave us alone."
"I see," the nun said. "I'll have the militia investigate." She paused. "Are you all right, Rosette?"
Rosette hung up.
"Well," she said to her partner a little too brightly. "Let's go. I want some sleep before we try this."
He looked at her for a moment, but he knew better than to push when it wasn't wanted. He nodded and followed her obediently out the door.
---000---
Chrno slept until late in the afternoon and woke with Rosette cuddled against him, her head on his shoulder and her drool pooling on his chest. She was snoring, like usual, and he smiled. She was just about the most unattractive woman he could imagine like this, but he loved her anyway.
He especially loved what she was trying to do for him now. He knew he hadn't been much help with it. He'd been depressed since the Order captured him, using the Oaths he'd sworn to knock him out. Rosette had nearly died getting him back.
He was a liability to her, but he couldn't leave. They'd both die if he did, but he couldn't trust himself. He just didn't know what the Order did to him. He remembered being led into the huge room with the circle in it, the militia gathering around it as the circle was closed, but nothing after that. Not until he woke up.
It never should have happened, he never should have let them, but what else could he have done? Rosette needed the Order to find her brother, and she needed him to help. He had to do what they wanted, for her.
Only now they didn't have the Order's help to find Joshua anymore, he thought miserably. It had all been for nothing.
Except Rosette was alive. He could never regret that.
Except she had only been dying in the first place because of you and that cursed Contract, he thought. If only they hadn't found him, he could have stayed asleep in Magdelene's crypt, his remaining astral draining away. But even if he did, Joshua would still have been taken by Aion and driven mad. Only Rosette would have been frozen in time like the rest of the children at her orphanage without him to save her.
Chrno shuddered violently and Rosette punched his chest, mumbling something. He stared at her, eyes wide. He hadn't thought of that before. He clutched her tight, suddenly not able to get close enough.
She started awake. "What the-" she managed, her voice muffled.
"I love you," Chrno breathed into her hair. "I love you so much. Don't ever leave me."
"I'm not going to- mmph! Chrno!" She smacked him in the ribs and struggled free, her eyes wide and angry. "What's wrong with you?"
Chrno shrugged, embarrassed. "Nothing."
"Don't nothing me, what's wrong?!"
He looked away. "I think I had a bad dream. I just needed to hold you." She looked dubious and he managed a smile. "Sorry I woke you."
"Idiot," she grumbled, scratching her hands through her hair and rolling away from him to stand up, not wanting him to see how he'd frightened her. "We should get started." She picked up an old book she'd bullied out of the Satanist woman. The chapter she was wanted was well worn by use. She didn't want to think how many demons had been called up using it.
She looked over her shoulder at Chrno brightly. "Come on."
---000---
What was it with them and warehouses? Rosette wondered, looking around. They were in one near the building they'd been sleeping in. It wasn't abandoned, but there was a lot of open space in it and no one was there on a Sunday.
Using a piece of chalk, Rosette drew an immense, ornate circle, careful not to make it any different from the one in the book. Neither of them being sure if he should help when he was the subject of the spell, Chrno sat in the centre, waiting quietly while she drew it around him. He was back in his child form, twisting his braid in his hands while he watched her.
Finally, Rosette finished and cocked her head. "Does it look right?" she asked.
"I think so. I didn't really study the first one."
Rosette frowned. She couldn't exactly stand around all day wondering about it. Best way to find out if it worked was to try. She rubbed her hands together eagerly. "Well, let's do it." Picking the book up again, she turned to the next page and carefully pronounced the words written there.
Power flashed through the circle, turning the chalk lines into glowing shards of red light. Rosette gasped and flipped the page, reading aloud further. The lines turned green and then white. A low hum sounded, echoing through the warehouse.
"It worked!" she gasped. "Chrno, it… Chrno!"
The small demon sat in the centre of the circle, his hands limp in his lap and his head lax, his eyes closed. Rosette had to fight the sudden urge to run to him. She didn't know what breaking the circle now would do.
Instead she swallowed and went to the next page and the instructions it gave to bind a demon.
"Chrno," she called. "Chrno the untitled one, Chrno the hornless one, Chrno the killer of a thousand demons. I call you."
"I hear you," Chrno answered, still unmoving. His voice was deeper than normal, reverberating strangely. "Command me."
"Right," she muttered, reading further. "Where was it… ah. Chrno. I call you by name. You will obey me without question. Without guile. Without hope."
"I will obey you without question. Without guile. Without hope," he repeated.
Suddenly, Rosette was outraged. This was what a summoning was? This was what was done to demons called up from Pandemonium? This was what the Order did to her Chrno? She wanted to hit someone, or scream, or something. Instead she took a deep breath.
"Chrno," she told him, careful to keep using his name. "The Order of Magdalena gave you Oaths. List them for me."
"I will not harm a member of the Holy Order of Magdalena," he said. "I will not harm a human. I will not change my shape on holy ground. I will sleep upon the command of the Order. I will die upon the command of the Order. I will do nothing to harm Rosette Christopher."
Rosette pressed her lips together. "Chrno," she said furiously. "You will not be bound by these Oaths anymore. They will have no effect upon you. Do you understand?"
"I will not be bound by these Oaths anymore," he repeated. "I will not… I will…." He thrashed, eyes still closed. "I will do nothing to harm Rosette Christopher. I will do nothing to harm Rosette Christopher!" He shuddered in pain. "Please!"
She blinked in surprise. The book warned that demons would try to fight the Oaths, but she hadn't really been expecting it of Chrno. Still, what was the harm? "Okay, okay!" she decided. "Chrno, you are bound by one Oath only. You will do nothing to harm Rosette Christopher. Do you understand?"
"I will do nothing to harm Rosette Christopher." He relaxed again.
Rosette sighed. She couldn't really complain about that Oath, much as she didn't like him being held by anything. "Remember your Oath and be under its command," she intoned and with that, she kicked the circle, breaking it.
The light vanished instantly and Chrno blinked, coming awake. Rosette ran to his side. "Are you okay?" she asked him.
"I think so." He rubbed his head. "What happened?"
"I got rid of most of the Oaths," she admitted.
He looked at her. "Most of them?"
"You wouldn't let me get rid of one that says you can't hurt me. So I left it in. The rest are gone."
The little demon stared at her and shimmered, becoming a man. "I'm bound not to harm you?"
"Apparently," she admitted, sitting beside him.
Chrno stared at her and started to laugh, shaking his head. "I guess you're safe from the big bad demon then."
She smirked and leaned against him. "Like I was ever in any danger from you, you pervert."
---000---
"Gee, we should have brought popcorn."
Seated on top of a building a few blocks from the Elegant Swan Hotel, Rosette and Chrno watched the Magdalena Order overrun it, dragging out screaming, half dressed humans and throwing them into the back of paddy wagons. Chrno grunted noncommittally and she grinned, giggling under her breath while she watched the excitement.
Chrno leaned back against an air vent and watched his lover instead of the Order. He'd been thinking since she'd broken the Order's hold on him and he'd come to some conclusions.
Something inside him had desperately wanted to keep that last Oath and he thought he'd figured out why. He loved Rosette, he loved to be with her and to make love to her, but he was still a demon. Her very humanness let her touch his opened mind and soul without hurting him when they were together, but he wouldn't be able to do the same. Without that Oath, he wouldn't be able to hold himself back from her own opened mind and he'd kill her reaching for it. The Oath protected her from him.
It seemed he owed Kate something. Chrno sighed and leaned closer to Rosette. He didn't exactly plan to thank her or anything, but he could be grateful. Rosette felt him move over and leaned against him, still watching the hotel.
"We should do this more often," she giggled.
"Yes," he agreed, putting an arm around her and resting his head atop hers. "We should."
They watched the Order work then for a while, just enjoying each other's company for the time being. Everything else could wait until later, including Joshua. Chrno cuddled his lover and smiled, content at last.
THE END