Requested by ChibiLarya- thank you
Aizen x Orihime
This was one of those superstitions I heard as a child that always stuck with me
Knock
She remembered someone telling her, when she was child, that when the devil comes to play, he knocks three times. She had had nightmares of the sound, and of hands curling around the wood of her door- sometimes black and burned, sometimes as white as death, but more often red, slick and dripping with blood. She wondered about that now, in this place of shadows and sins, because no-one ever knocked on a prison door.
Arrancar and defected Shinigami alike pushed the door open without warning or concern- they came as they pleased, and she supposed that whilst she was at their mercy, she could not afford to have any problems with that.
He, though, had knocked.
The first time, he did not wait for an answer, just swept inside. The cursory sound of cordiality had made her jump though, and hope, for just a moment- it reminded her so much of home, and the bitter-sweetness of reminders from home always made her forget herself.
He had stood in the doorway for a moment, staring at her with his dark, unfathomable eyes, and she had felt like her knees would give way, like she would fall to kneel before the man who had become her master.
But before she could, and before he said anything at all, he left.
Then she had fallen, at the sound of her door once more shutting, and had sobbed until it felt like she was breaking. Not just because of her imprisonment, or her fear, but because of the unbounded confusion, the heat that spread through her when those eyes were fixed upon her.
The second time, louder than before, he had waited for her to call out a hesitant, shaking "come in". She was sat on the narrow bed provided for her, and could not bring herself to stand, simply stared wide-eyed as the door swung open, even though part of her knew who the only one who would afford her that courtesy was.
He looked at her for a long, lingering moment, and then took three steps into the room, swinging the door shut behind him with such a force that it should have banged- instead, it settled into place with a gentle click, as if not even noise would defy him his atmosphere.
He beckoned her to him, and she stood shakily, moving towards him and hoping that her fear was not as obvious as she knew that it was.
"Are you quite comfortable, here?"
She nodded dumbly, wondering if her heart was going to break her ribs and push free of her body, ruining the white of his clothes with the red of her blood. His eyes were dark, near-black in the shadowed room, but she could only look at them for a moment before she was forced to glance to the side.
His fingertips were on her chin, and he observed her the way a knowledgeable man would an animal he was considering buying.
Which, she supposed, she was not much more than.
"Good."
And then, with a final calculating smile, he left once more. That time, she made it to the bed before the tears came.
The third time, it was she who knocked on his door.
They had never locked her into her prison, supposing that she would be too scared to leave her room. Escape was impossible anyway, and they could trace her reiatsu, just as she now was following the coppery taste of his. The corridors in this part of the building were deserted and cool, the shadows broken at every window by the sharp beam of moonlight.
Her fist was gentle on the wood of his door, barely there, but he heard it.
Maybe he had been tasting the movement in her reiatsu just as she had his; maybe he had the corridors monitored, watching for movement; maybe he really was a God, who could see all. Perhaps he simply knew just when she would break.
She realised, as the heavy wood swung open and he smiled down at her, that none of that really was of any consequence. All that mattered was that she was there, and he was reaching for her, and that although his touch was ice, his lips were fire against her skin.
She had knocked; the third time.
That night, she let the devil in.