Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Hey, Pigeon!

Go put on something cute, then come down to the den. X marks the spot.

H+D 

Thanatos folded the note into his pocket and clenched his middle against the writhing in his stomach, as he descended the steps to the apartment’s basement level. 

On the one hand, he hated surprises. On the other hand, he loved his partners. Hermes and Daphne weren’t like him. They were colourful and wild and optimistic. They threw themselves into things, they did the unexpected, they turned the tables on him daily. Thanatos was a creature of the status quo, despite it never having been much good to him. Hermes’ mischief and Daphne’s exuberance hadn’t just been a new kind of fun: they had reordered him, or rather, disordered. He thumbed the note in his pocket, taking the stairs slowly into the yawning darkness.

His heart hiccupped. 

As much as he hated to admit it, disorder felt pretty good. All his long, long life, he had craved peace and quiet. He’d done pretty awful things to avoid fights and change and losing people that gave him stability, if nothing else. This past few months living with his chaotic duo, growing closer to them, trusting in their schemes and delight, had been extremely unpeaceful, and he had finally begun to learn that he didn’t have to be afraid of that.

This, however: this was just childish.

Thanatos stepped into the den and rolled his eyes so hard that they almost stuck in his skull. The cosy room was usually stacked with couches and floor cushions, dim and snug without the cool, blue light of the Underworld able to reach it. But it had been gutted, leaving a square empty space. The shelves of books and DVDs and records lining the walls were draped and drowning and groaning under the weight of kitschy, nonsense, macabre decorations. Plastic skulls with scarlet glowing eyes, figurines of leering and leaping devils made to look like carved and battered stone, dripping fabric cobwebs, splatters of fake blood in a red gel that glimmered like spilled jam, tacky crucifixes turned upside down and daubed with occult symbols. 

And candles. Everywhere candles, their winking, orange flames dancing and leaping on the dark walls, slipping in the smears of blood and drenching the bare mahogany floors. Wax oozed down their sides, clumping on the small tables around the rim of the room. They filled the enclosed space with the honeyed scent of beeswax. It made Thanatos’ mouth water. 

Thanatos ticked his jaw. This new religion sweeping the Mortal Realm really had his back up. It was a big fan of peaceful death, which he could get behind theoretically, but it had really messed up the division of labour, both between him and Hermes, and between him and the rather haughty psychopomps moving into Greece. And it was very into dualistic morality, which honestly just irritated Thanatos and his millennia of being... like, not bad, but not awesome. But when Hermes had heard about this new autumn festival, the little demon had lit up like a firecracker.

Thanatos’ mind drifted back to Monday.

“It’s called All Hallow’s Eve!” Hermes announced enthusiastically to Thanatos and Daphne, both cuddled up on the couch and watching him wave his arms about and smile like a lunatic. “It’s the one night of the year when all the devils and wrong-doers and mischief-makers get to run about all over the earth, doing exactly what they want!”

Thanatos narrowed his eyes. “That sounds like it’s asking for trouble.”

Hermes beamed, eyes aflame. “ Begging for it.”

“But… Why?” Daphne asked.

“Who cares?” Hermes exclaimed, “We should totally go!”

“And what?” Thanatos relaxed back on the couch, looped his arm around Daphne, and absent-mindedly coiled one of her pink ringlets around his finger. “Fuck shit up for no apparent reason?”

“There is a reason, Pigeon,” Hermes huffed, “The reason is Halloween. You know what they mean when they say ‘devils’? Pagan gods! That’s us, Baby! It’s a gods-damn invite!”

“What happens at the end of the night?” Daphne asked, a little sceptical.

“Oh, psssh.” Hermes flapped his hand. “The angels storm in and drive the devils back and unleash their heavenly wrath or whatever.”

Thanatos and Daphne exchanged a look.

“We’ll obviously leave early.”

Thanatos clucked his tongue. “I’m sorry, Parrot, but no-can-do. I’m having a hard enough time maintaining a working relationship with Michael as it is. This whole Conversion nightmare is a real bitch to manage already, without me being caught cavorting with all their least favourite beasties.”

“Dude, you think I’m having a better time with Gabriel? The guy is SO full of himself. ‘Oh, aren’t you working with visions? The latest thing, waaay more effective than mail.’ Like, for real, fuck that guy. That’s why we gotta go! Remind the mortals who they really wanna party with.” Hermes clapped and rubbed his hands together.

“I’m the God of Death, Hermes. No one has ever wanted to party with me.”

Hermes dropped to Thanatos’ other side and snuggled under his chin, batting his eyes up at him. “I do.”

Thanatos raised an eyebrow.

“It could be fun.” Daphne stroked the back of Thanatos’ neck, moving her fingertip in the little circle at the nape that she knew all too well could get him to say yes to anything. “We haven’t let loose in a little bit.”

Thanatos wriggled between Daphne’s clever touch and Hermes' coaxing eyes, the two of them tucked into his body and heating him, like he was in a kiln. He ground his teeth. “Fine. Right now, I’m sorry, but I’m on the side of the angels. But you have a week to persuade me. If you can make this ‘Halloween’ appealing enough by then, I’ll take the risk.”

“Challenge accepted!”

Thanatos was squished into a hug from all sides, crushing his torso and making his face flush neon blue.

The week had spun into a long procession of spooky stories, horror movies, and garish, extremely untrustworthy candy, heaped on Thanatos every spare hour, with pleading, persuasive looks from Hermes and Daphne. All they’d managed to do was convince him that this holiday was in even poorer taste than the initial pitch had suggested. The transformed den hardly contradicted that, but he had to admit that it was always entertaining when Hermes was allowed to indulge his flare for the theatrical. It was objectively monstrously tacky in here, but the candlelight gave it an alluring, curious atmosphere. Half of Thanatos wanted to laugh through his nose; half of him wanted to be drawn in. 

He looked back at the steps up to the apartment. A bright, electric light intruded from the passage, dimming the flailing firelight. Thanatos closed the den door with a soft thunk. Shadows cloaked the room and brought the flames to impassioned life. He thumbed the note in his pocket again and took a deep breath of the melting beeswax. It tingled on his tongue. He blinked slowly, adjusting to the light down in the depths of the apartment building. His eyes fell to the middle of the dark floor. Two concentric circles had been sketched on it in chalk, the ring between them filled with mystical symbols. What was that? Hebrew? Cyrillic? Thanatos squinted. In the centre of the inner circle was a small, neat X.

X marks the spot.

Thanatos frowned suspiciously.

Okay, Parrot, I’ll bite.

He walked cautiously to the circle. His footsteps scuffed and clicked on the hardwood floor. His shadow painted up the walls, rimmed red. He looked about him. He seemed to be alone. The room was silent, save for the occasional snapping sound on a burning wick or the rumble of a car on the street overhead. A cool, excited prickle traversed across his shoulders and the back of his neck.

He stepped inside the circle.

CLANG.

A resounding, metallic crash reverberated in Thanatos’ bones. His heart hurtled into his throat and a shock went up his spine, as a square cage plummeted from the ceiling and slammed down around him, capturing him in the circle. It was tall enough for him to stand, and wide enough for multiple people to spread their arms, but it was small enough to make his lungs constrict. Thanatos spun about, eyes flashing frantically around him, scouring the room. His heart ricocheted around his chest and the back of his mouth.

“Caught him!” Daphne’s spritely voice rang out. 

Thanatos wheeled around to see her sashaying out of the shadows. His jaw dropped. Her tall, finely sculpted figure was wrapped in a hugging black dress, so short that it showed the heart-shaped gap at the very top of her thigh, tapering into where the soft flesh met. The cut of the neckline scooped so low it fully showed her breasts, forming another blooming heart, veiled in black lace. She wore a pair of spiked jet sandals, and an ebony, leather garter on one round thigh, with sharp steel studs. Her lips were painted dark, rhododendron pink. Her eyes were lined with thick, smoky black. Her hair was loose and wild, a pair of dainty, pink, sparkly horns peeking unevenly from the mass. She was twirling what looked like a toasting fork in her hands. 

Daphne never wore black. It made her rose and bluebell skin look richer than macarons. The flickering darkness of the room stroked around her, running its hands on her and making Thanatos’ palms itch with the desire to mimic it.

“ H-hi…” He husked, his eyebrows floating up.

Daphne smiled deliciously at him. “Hey, Pigeon.”

“In character!” A familiar, dramatic voice snapped through the air. Hermes bounded out of the shadow behind Daphne, pinching her ass. “Damn it, Glitterbug, we talked about this!”

Daphne shrugged, her long ears flicking at him. “He looked startled.”

“That was the point.”

Thanatos put his hands on his hips and smirked at Hermes through the bars. “So is the cage the surprise, or is the cage to stop me running, because you know I hate surprises?”

Hermes ducked behind Daphne and peeked playfully over her shoulder, his lips grazing the blue shimmer near her neck. “Column A, Column B. You not being able to run is a key element of the whole thing.”

Thanatos took this in and nodded, he was still a little nervous, but Daphne’s open expression and Hermes’ giddiness could always extinguish his anxieties. “So, what is the whole thing?”

“Well,” Hermes stayed stooped, rested his chin on Daphne’s shoulders, and jabbed his eyes exasperatedly sideways at her. “You would have found that out in a way more exciting way if someone here hadn’t broken the immersion.”

Daphne chuckled and prodded his nose with her fingertip. “It’s a special Halloween roleplay,” she said with a bubble of excitement in her voice. “You’re an angel who’s wandered into… What do they call it?”

“Hell,” Hermes said around a kiss on the base of her neck.

“Right, Hell. And we’re two naughty devils who’ve caught you.”

All the hairs on Thanatos' body stood on end. His calmed pulse whipped up again and his honey-clogged mouth went dry. “That sounds…”

“Fun, right?” Daphne said brightly.

A smile tugged at the corners of Thanatos’ mouth. He eyed the sparkle in the excited nymph’s face and the sly tease dancing around Hermes’ lips. He cleared his throat, clenching a little against the already awakening ache between his thighs. “Sure. Sounds fun.”

Hermes perked up. “Yeah? You up for it?”

Thanatos narrowed his eyes and sneaked slyness into his own smile. “Stop hiding behind the hot one and let me see what I’ll be working with.”

Hermes grinned. He popped a kiss on Daphne’s cheek, stood straight, and sauntered around her to the cage. He came right up to the bars and coiled one hand around the top, leaning over Thanatos and drawing his long, lithe body taut. Thanatos caught a curl of his cologne mingled in the dense scent of the melting candles, something a little like spiced rum. The pirate. Thanatos let his eyes wander down his partner’s body, keeping his hands on his hips, despite the instinct to close his body against Hermes’ boldness. This had taken him a lot of practice. He was very much a fleeting-glances-over-the-top-of-a-pillow kind of guy, but Hermes and Daphne both enjoyed being enjoyed. They wanted to be drunk in. And Gods, what else was anyone supposed to do? 

Hermes was wearing a closely tailored, jacketless suit. His black trousers accentuated the length of his runner’s legs. His smoke-grey shirt cut the angles of his shoulders sharp, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows and showing the ridges of muscle in his lean forearms. A narrow, black tie trickled into a scarlet waistcoat with a silk sheen that glimmered in the candlelight, like the fake blood. Hermes spent so much of his time in junk food hoodies and jogging shorts. When he dressed up, it always hit Thanatos like a sledgehammer. In the fine tailoring, his athletic body looked chiselled by a devoted artist. But it was the little details that made Thanatos squirm. The pair of neat, black kid gloves, the black spiral through his ear piercing, the flaring, scarlet bat wings on his shoes, the cute little black horns sticking out of his rakish sweep of tangled, crimson hair, the long, red tail that sprouted from the back of his belt and flicked away to a heart-shaped arrow-point, stirring a little with some kind of enchanted liveliness. 

Hermes kept grinning with infuriating smugness, as Thanatos’ eyes went glassy, roving around him. He held out his free hand and flicked his wrist. A long, wicked pitchfork appeared in his grasp: an elegant, charcoal-black handle fading into a red hilt, adorned with a spiral of metalwork, and three long tines fading into red, as if it was freshly used. 

Thanatos swallowed.

“Like what you’re working with?” Hermes murmured.

Thanatos fought not to sigh like a schoolgirl. He tried for nonchalance, but it came out in a needy rasp. “You look… Uh… Dapper.”

Hermes cocked an eyebrow. “Oh yeah?”

Thanatos drew back an inch and folded one arm over his middle shyly. “Yeah.”

Hermes leaned in further, the bars slicing shadows down his torso. “Good job putting on something cute, by the way.” 

Thanatos’ cheeks prickled. Compliments were another thing that had taken some work. He looked down at himself. It was just grey jeans and a white shirt, falling open lower than he would normally have let it.

Hermes took his hand from overhead and slipped it through the bars. He cupped Thanatos’ chin and raised his face. The devilish twinkle was gone. He spoke carefully. “All OK, Pidge? Want us to back off?”

Thanatos looked up into Hermes' suddenly gentle face. He glanced past him at Daphne, watching them with a sweet smile. He leaned into the soft leather of Hermes’ light touch on his chin. His chest flooded warm at his partners' caring, patient expressions. He looked back to Hermes and loosed a grin from his tight lips. “Definitely not.”

Hermes grinned back at him, the wickedness flying back onto his face. “Want a run down?”

Thanatos put his hand back on his hip and opened his body out, easing his confidence into place. “Surprise me.”

Hermes chuckled gleefully. “Safe word check in, please.”

“Honour.”

“Good little bird.” Hermes dipped his face through the bars and pecked the end of Thanatos’ nose.

Thanatos wrinkled his nose and gave Hermes a ruffled smile.

Hermes winked and snapped his teeth. He walked backwards from the cage, cooling the air around Thanatos. He slid to Daphne’s side and looped his arm around her. She tucked into his body and bumped the point of the toasting fork against her lips. Hermes propped the pitchfork up alongside him and leaned on it in an easy slouch. He gave Daphne an affectionate squeeze. “Count us in, Glitterbug?”

Daphne rubbed her lips together eagerly and shimmied her shoulders. She raised onto her toes and ran the tip of her tongue along Hermes’ jaw, drawing a low snarl from his throat. She flicked her dazzling eyes to Thanatos, watching her with quiet enticement from the cage. Her wide, full mouth bloomed into a broad smile. Her murmur snaked on Thanatos’ skin.

“Caught him.”

Chapter Text

“Well, well, well…” Hermes straightened up from his heavy lean on his pitchfork and stroked Daphne’s bare arm with the leather-capped fingertips of the arm around her shoulders. “A cute, little, innocent angel has wandered into our kingdom. Whatever shall we do with him?”

Daphne stroked down his torso, weaving around the buttons of his waistcoat. She spoke teasingly to him, but she kept her large, shining eyes on Thanatos. “We can't just let him leave; people will say we're going soft.”

Hermes also kept his eyes on Thanatos, the two hot, mischievous gazes cooking him like a marshmallow on the end of Daphne’s toasting fork. 

“We can't have that,” Hermes drawled.

Thanatos’ stomach squirmed and sweat pricked his back. His eyes glued to his partners’ fingertips skating on each other in subtle, spidery movements. He could almost feel those light, taunting touches on his own skin. He didn’t have to act much to put on a tremulous voice, as he assumed the angel persona. “Please, let me go.”

Hermes and Daphne exchanged a glance. Hermes trailed his fingertips down her back and brought her closer into his body with a firm scoop of her ass. He smiled, as he saw Thanatos’ gaze wander with his hand. “You sure you want to get back to Heaven?” 

Thanatos bit his lip. He took a step to the edge of the cage and let his body go slack, resting his temple on a bar and flashing the both of them with his sky blue eyes. “I’m sure,” he crooned. “Please. I'll do anything.”

Hermes licked his teeth. “Anything?”

Thanatos smiled. “Anything. Please .”

He spotted Hermes slink a little against Daphne. 

Gods, I love what it does to him when I say ‘please’.

Hermes saw Thanatos notice his reaction. He grinned, his white teeth blazing in his dark face, the ruddy, rippling light washing his ruby skin onyx. He nipped the quill point of Daphne’s ear and she giggled. He pulled from her, took her hand, and led her to the cage. He flourished his pitchfork and began to drag the tines along the bars, the sound ringing raucously in the small room. Daphne followed suit, lagging behind him to half-surround Thanatos, like they were dancing round a maypole. Her toasting fork sang on the metal in a high hum, harmonising with the low clink from Hermes’ fork. The noise pierced and echoed in Thanatos’ skull. He bristled, like a cat, and stumbled in a dizzy circle to meet their entrancing gazes, as they prowled around him. His pulse skipped.

“So, my sweet succubus,” Hermes purred. “Little angel here says he'll do anything to be allowed to go scampering back to the clouds. What shall we make him do?”

Daphne followed him with a coquettish swing to her hips. Thanatos was hypnotised by it, and then by the twinkle of candlelight on the metal studs on her garter.

“I want to see his angelic body.” Daphne made a show of sucking on her tongue behind her pout.

Thanatos stared helplessly at her glossy lips. Hermes banged his pitchfork on the cage and startled Thanatos back to attention.

“You heard the lady,” Hermes commanded, laughter hopping over his tongue.

Thanatos’ blood jolted. He obeyed like a puppet. Hermes and Daphne had a combined magnetism that moved his body for him. He hastily unbuttoned his shirt, his chest flushing turquoise. The warm air and light wrapped him, shadows oiling his body, as the shirt dropped to the floor. Daphne’s lips smacked in satisfaction. She twizzled the toasting fork in her long fingers and it tinkled on the bars. The blush on Thanatos’ chest warred with the candlelight. His fingers trembled on his belt buckle. He writhed out of his jeans and underwear and kicked them away. Daphne’s eyes widened. Hermes sucked in through his teeth. They stilled, the final song of metal on metal dying away. As the quiet returned, a feeling of exposure crept over Thanatos. His skin turned so hot, he thought his blood vessels must be bursting. He wasn’t sure what to do with his hands; he flexed them and bowed his body a little, fighting the urge to fold his arms.

Daphne caught his eye, noticing his shyness. “Take out your wings,” she said softly.

Thanatos’ twitchiness settled. He closed his eyes and took a deep, steadying breath. His back prickled. He felt a weight lifting from his shoulder blades. His wings unfurled. They fanned from his back and stretched to the edges of the cage, the firelight streaking through the feathers and glimmering behind them, turning Thanatos into a frosted lantern. He flexed and flickered them, easing them out, letting the unknotted muscles in his back relax and reform. Hermes and Daphne lit up, the paled candlelight through the sweep of white washing their faces, making them glow. Their mouths fell open in unison.

“Timeout real quick,” Hermes said, a little distantly. “You are fucking magnificent, Pidge.”

“Wow,” Daphne breathed. “Gets me every time.”

Thanatos’ frame softened, his wings dropping into a relaxed fold. He nestled into their gaze. He let it make him feel good, proud.

“Shake your hair out?” Hermes asked, his eyes shining.

Thanatos smiled. He reached up and tugged the band securing the bun on top of his head. His hair fell in loose, cotton strands around his face. He ran his fingers through it and gave it a small shake, tousling it so he looked something between an ethereal spirit and a collie that had just run around a windy field. One side of Hermes’ mouth perked up. Daphne bit the point of her toasting fork.

Thanatos tucked his hair behind his ear and wafted at them awkwardly. “Alright, I’m not a museum exhibit.”

“I mean...” Daphne unhooked her teeth from the fork and tapped the cage. “You are a bit.”

Hermes snickered. Thanatos smirked. Daphne giggled demonically. They rode her laugh back into the scene.

Their eyes roved down his body together and settled below his soft, narrow waist. He was hardening. 

Hermes grinned. “Thought you weren't happy to be here, Little Angel.”

Thanatos raised his chin and gave them a haughty look. “I'm not.” He cocked his eyebrow. “I'm just ready to do that ‘anything’ we talked about.”

“Oh, I think we want you readier than that.” 

Hermes’ growl sent electric shocks up Thanatos’ spine. He tripped around the cage with another stern strum on the bars that shuddered through Thanatos. He stopped at the corner where a long, white feather was balletically extended, close enough to reach. He pinched it gently between finger and thumb and stroked down the central bone of the feather with the extra friction of his leather gloves. The sensation eddied through Thanatos’ flesh. He shivered and sighed, biting his lip.

Hermes chuckled. He did it again, pinching a little harder.

Thanatos dug his fingernails into his chest and let out a strained moan. “You really are the fucking devil.”

“Just him?” Daphne beckoned Thanatos over. 

He stepped to her side of the cage, letting his wings fold back so Hermes could keep playing them like a harp. Daphne reached through the bars and stroked her fingertip down Thanatos’ throat and chest, landing on his nipple, like a bee on a flower, and circling slowly. The tingling pleasure of her touch threaded into the pleasure from his feathers, as Hermes kept softly pinching and stroking. Thanatos’ gaze fell to Daphne’s tight dress and the swell of her breasts in the black lace. His hand floated dreamily up. She gave it a light slap. He jumped.

“Those sigils,” she murmured, pointing to the smudged chalk on the floor, “mean that angels can’t reach out of the cage. No touching for you.”

Thanatos shot her a sulky pout, glancing with his wide, hypnotic, winter lighthouse eyes. Daphne twisted his nipple. He sucked in through his teeth and ruffled his feathers, shaking pleasure around his body as Hermes met the motion with a series of drums of his fingertips.

“Devils, both of you,” Thanatos whined.

Daphne giggled and dipped her fork through the bars. Now one hand caressed him, massaging his chest, the back of his neck, his jaw, and his thigh, while one set of keen points dragged around his skin, leaving a trail of sparkling pain. She pricked his nipples and scratched the supple, sensitive skin around his kidneys and his collar. Every time he tried to buckle back, Hermes gave him a harder stroke, shooting him forward again into a fresh wave of duelling sensations. He gripped the bars high in front of him and leaned heavily into the writhing weakness of his skeleton. His cock swelled and ached, pulsing pale blue like twilight on marble. It was inches from Daphne’s touch, his blood chasing her desperately. The flush on his chest and face heated, casting a haunting light into the flames. The trails from the fork glowed blue too. He looked like a jar of fizzing lightning, and felt just as electric.

His eyes went glassy, the magenta glisten of Daphne’s skin hazing. “Can I really not touch you?” he whispered.

“That doesn’t sound very angelic,” Daphne tutted, drawing the fork in a long, tormenting U shape from his collar bone to just above his cock and back up to his other shoulder.

He slinked with the motion and moaned, nearly dangling from the bars overhead. “You said I could earn my way out, right? You’re not even going to let me try?”

The shuffle at Thanatos’ back told him Hermes’ ears had pricked up. Hermes gave his stirring, relaxed wing a final tweak, then scooted around the cage and appeared back in front of Thanatos. He beamed in evil satisfaction when he saw Thanatos’ hazy eyes and patterned skin and the deflation of his torso, as he heaved for steadying breaths.

“Want to get your hands on my succubus, huh?” Hermes teased.

Thanatos shot him a rueful look. “I’m just offering service. I thought that was the deal: service for freedom.”

Hermes slowly dragged his teeth over his lower lip, sucking it dark, the candlelight dancing in his clever eyes. “I’d be careful, you feathered floozy; you’re playing with fire.” He stroked his knuckles up Daphne’s thigh, and her liquid eyes flowed to him. “Once you get tangled up with a succubus, there’s no going back. You won’t want to stay on the side of the angels.”

Thanatos huffed out and regained some of his composure, tossing his hair. “Please. Angels don’t experience temptation.”

Hermes’ smile slid over his mouth like a smear of sweet chilli. “Oh yeah?” He plucked Daphne’s fork deftly and dropped it and his own to the floor with a clank . He took her hand and pulled her a few paces from the cage. He positioned her in front of him, facing Thanatos, just far enough away to be out of reach, just far enough away to make the full length of her body visible. He caught Thanatos’ eye, peeking around her cascade of pink hair, blood-drenched by the flickering light and twinkling with falling glitter from the goofy, clip-on devil horns. Thanatos’ eyes burned with having to choose where to look. Daphne had essentially come to this party as every single girl in college he would have died for, except better, because it was fucking Daphne. But Hermes’ dark eyes were like Tarot cards, frightening and captivating and full of possibility and secrets. 

Hermes bit his lip, just the glimpse of his teeth awakening the echoes of sensual, maddening bites in Thanatos’ body. Hermes held his gaze hostage, but turned his mouth into Daphne’s neck and kissed her. Daphne sighed and dropped her head back, sweeping her hair aside for him and humming, as he kissed her again, deeper. 

“She tastes sweet,” Hermes murmured. “Sweeter than any of the treats you can eat in Heaven.”

Thanatos swallowed a welling of saliva.

Hermes hooked the straps of Daphne’s dress. He drew them down her arms, grazing her skin with his knuckles. He peeled her dress away, letting it fall at her strapped feet. Thanatos’ throat closed. Daphne’s body glimmered ruby and sapphire in the warm light. Black lace lay over her breasts and pussy, inking her in delicate, caressing detail. Her head lolled to the side, drawing Hermes’ lips, her face blissful and dreamy. Her body swayed very slightly in the rhythm of his tongue on her skin. 

Hermes kept glaring at Thanatos. “She’s so hot, isn’t she?”

Thanatos mouthed wordlessly. His cock jutted from his body almost painfully.

Hermes chuckled darkly. His hands vanished behind Daphne’s back. There was a quiet click . He peeled her bra away and let it fall too. Thanatos whimpered in his throat. The light writhed on Daphne, like it was trying to cling to her beauty and never let go. Her taut, firm curves and the thick, round padding of muscle on her thighs and hips were painted in watery shadow, sliding over her like satin, bringing every tactile cup and slope of her into focus. Her breasts swelled into a warm glow, her nipples pert and pointed and berry-dark. 

Hermes snarled into her ear; it was dropping a little from the hypnosis his tongue had put her in. “This body. She’s so soft and so firm.” He cupped her breasts and bounced them a little, making her flesh quiver. He grinned. “And perky.”

Thanatos mustered just enough consciousness to roll his eyes. “Poetry, truly.”

Hermes shrugged, grinning more broadly. 

Daphne hummed into a giggle, reached back, and patted his cheek. “Mmmm, Gods, Boy…”

“God,” Hermes mumbled.

Daphne blinked misty eyes. “Huh?”

“Character, Gorgeous. They only have one god.”

Daphne blinked again. “Only one?”

“Yup.”

“But that’s so much work!”

“Conversation for another time, please,” Hermes chuckled. 

She hummed again. Thanatos smiled at them.

With a glance and a grin, Hermes quickly spun the story back around them. He nipped Daphne’s jaw. He stroked his hands down over her abs and hooked the string of her panties over her hips. 

Thanatos’ pulse kicked.

Hermes poured a wicked, lustful look over Thanatos that made him dizzy, as he rolled her panties down and let them drop to the floor.

Daphne stood naked, save for her heeled sandals and the black, leather, studded garter clinching her thigh. Her pussy gleamed raspberry. Thanatos was suddenly washed with painful awareness of his own nakedness. Not out of shyness, but out of a horrible, empty feeling in his flesh. He wanted so badly to be pressed to Daphne, with Hermes running those crooked lips over both of them and binding them together with the tracks of his tongue.

“Fuck…” he muttered breathlessly.

Hermes hugged Daphne tight from behind. His redwood-carved forearms crossed over her belly, his fringe tickling her neck as he buried his face in it. His black horns pointed at Thanatos from the crown of his head. He sank into caressing her. Thanatos watched as Hermes’ careful, controlling demeanour gave over to the hungry, restless sprite he knew much better. Hermes raised each of his hands to Daphne’s mouth in turn, so she could bite his fingertips and pull the leather gloves off with her teeth. His freed fingers fluttered like a pianist’s, and fell to her body. Thanatos and Daphne moaned in harmony. Thanatos gaped, as Hermes’ hands delved into Daphne’s flesh, running eagerly over her thighs and back and waist and hips, into her hair and down her arms. He scooped her breasts, pressing to her back, and squeezed. He massaged them with a tantalising mix of heat and tenderness, stroking and plucking her nipples, delighting in her flesh. He sucked greedily on her neck and filled his touch with her body. His flicking tail sneaked forward and curled around one of her legs.

Thanatos pressed himself to the bars of the cage, cool steel aching in his muscles. He burned from the soles of his feet to the tips of his wings. His fingernails scratched the metal and screeched. He almost gnawed on it, like a rat. Daphne ground back against Hermes, one knee cocking and almost giving out. He clutched her ass to hold her up. She reached round and snatched his hand, tugging it impatiently to her pussy. She laid it over the wet flesh and laid her hand over the top, driving a deep, speedy rhythm. She combed her other hand behind her into his hair and gripped. Hermes groaned, willingly pleasuring her clit under her hand, simultaneously massaging her breast and rolling her nipple in his fingertips. He kissed her neck and shoulder fiercely, peppering her with teeth marks.

Gods, those marks…

Thanatos’ knuckles went bone white on the bars. He desperately wanted to be doing that to Daphne. He desperately wanted Hermes to be doing that to him. Images burst and wheeled in his mind like a swarm of bats. Thanatos’ cock throbbed. His hand strayed to it. He worked himself slowly, his need surging into the tip too fast already.

“Stunning, isn’t she?” Hermes panted, lapping Daphne’s ear and clutching her, as she shuddered.

Thanatos nodded pitifully, battling to keep his stroke slow. “Fates, Daph, you're so beautiful…”

Hermes cleared his throat pointedly.

Thanatos blinked. “I mean, uuuh, she's such a tempting succubus.”

Hermes’ sharp face lit up. “I thought angels couldn't be tempted.”

Thanatos’ voice lightened and cracked. “Hey, theology is ever evolving.”

Both Hermes and Daphne broke into laughter, Daphne snorting a little, then clapping her hand over her mouth and nose. Hermes laughed harder and kissed her cheek. He flicked his glittering, merry gaze to Thanatos, bundling him up in comfort and ease. “Nerd.”

Thanatos warmed. He narrowed his eyes with mock disdain, but his traitor mouth wriggled into a smile.

Hermes tucked Daphne into another tight hug, then zipped his hands back to her tender points and crazed them. She squealed and writhed in his grasp. 

“I mean, we can't be tempted,” Thanatos stammered, seizing his cock to keep it restrained. “Angels don't fall to desire. I will serve you to be let free, but you will never tempt me.” He levelled a defiant, needling stare at them.

Hermes appraised Thanatos brazenly, taking in the hand trembling and tight on his cock, the billow of his torso as he battled with his breath, the mist of sweat on his thighs, the turquoise glow of his cheeks. Hermes tilted his head and the choppy flicks of his fringe dusted into his jack-o-lantern eyes. His horns caught the light. 

He ploughed his fingers deep into the furrow of Daphne’s clit. She arched her spine and moaned. He curled his fingers and corked her pleasure at breaking point and held her firm. “You hear that?” he whispered to her.

Daphne’s breasts quivered with her shortness of breath. She stroked her fingers through his hair and pecked his lips. “Sounds like a challenge,” she sighed.

Hermes pecked her lips back. The sweetness of it ached in Thanatos’ gut. “You like a challenge, Petal?” 

Daphne pushed her clit into his fingertips, thighs bunching, and hissed. “I sure do.”

Hermes chuckled. He released her, winking at Thanatos and sucking her taste from his fingers. Thanatos involuntarily licked his lips. Hermes smirked. He led Daphne back to the cage, the scent of her arousal seeping into the heavy, beeswax-infused air, drugging Thanatos. As they both drew close to his body, the bars began to feel like a straight jacket, crushing him, keeping him from a sorely longed-for release. Hermes kept hold of Daphne’s hand with one hand, and with the other reached through the bars and stroked Thanatos’ cheek. Thanatos smiled and kissed his fingertips. He could smell the last of Daphne’s essence on them. Hermes tickled his earlobe and withdrew his hand. 

Hermes reached into his pocket and drew out a small key. He slotted it into a lock in front of him and with a sharp click , the cage swung open. Hermes gave Daphne a pat on the ass. She nipped his jaw, but slipped inside. Hermes locked the cage again and pocketed the key. Thanatos rushed Daphne instantly. He wrapped her in his arms and brought her wonderful warmth and her sweet, pomegranate and pop scent into his body. His wings folded forward and shaded them, enveloping them in a deep, indulgent, relieving kiss that cascaded through his muscles and his veins. Daphne sighed and squeaked and flung her arms around his neck, returning his kiss with a hunger that rushed him. His partners made him feel so wonderfully wanted, it floored him every time.

Thanatos’ eyes peeped open. He saw Hermes smiling hotly at them, leaning against the cage, their positions now reversed, gazing at his two lovers falling for each other all over again. Thanatos swam in his gaze. Hermes’ eyes were so penetrating, they left no part of him untouched, they flitted about like each body they encountered was a puzzle of pleasure to be solved. Thanatos knew Hermes loved nothing more than finding which tricks sent you into bliss. Even after months of living together, he was still cataloguing all the ways Thanatos and Daphne could be overcome with desire. He licked his teeth and began to palm himself through his tight trousers. Thanatos smiled against Daphne’s lips.

You want a show, Lover?

Thanatos sank down Daphne’s body, glazing her with indulgent kisses, his mouth following all the coaxing pathways that he’d watched Hermes’ hands traverse. He sucked her neck, he stroked his lips along her shoulder and collarbone, he swirled his tongue on her breasts in ever-narrowing, concentric circles, until his teeth closed around her nipple and he pulled softly. Daphne dropped into him, her flesh filling his mouth. He sucked gluttonously, his mind teeming with the image of her and Hermes together, not just tonight, but countless times over these past months. He dropped to his knees on the wooden floor, kicking up a cloud of chalk. He pressed kisses over her abs and hips. He drew his lips down her leg and bowed like a monk to kiss her foot, then he travelled back up her calf and sucked the inside of her thigh, turning a blue smudge indigo.

Daphne’s hands tangled in his shaggy hair. 

“Than… Thanatos…” The way she moaned his name made him high. “Go down on me…”

Hermes dropped his brow to the cage and pushed into his palm. “Mmm…” he groaned, forgetting to scold the character break. “You heard the lady.”

Thanatos didn’t hesitate. He dived to her pussy. His tongue scooped her flesh, craving her floral flavour, pouring her wetness into his open mouth. He stroked her ass softly. She pricked the roots of his hair with her fingernails and he felt the tingle in the tips of his feathers. He bunched his shoulders and dove deeper. He mined her for pleasure, his tongue relentless and slow.

“Oh, God!” Daphne gasped, tossing her wild hair back, the pink horns knocking out of place.

She rocked her hips to pull more from him. She beamed at Hermes. He gave her a glittering smile, working himself hard through his trousers. Thanatos glanced around her hip and the pleasure at the sight of Hermes’ stare rolled through him. Hermes’ eyes drilled resolutely into Thanatos. Behind him, plastic bats and gremlins and black cats stared too. Thanatos sucked Daphne like forbidden fruit. She quivered in his hands and his body echoed her.

“Yes! Oh! I’m… I’m going to… OH!” Daphne squealed piercingly, shocking Thanatos, as her climax spiked and flooded her. 

Thanatos held her secure, whipping aftershocks through her with his tongue as she wriggled in his grasp and gripped his hair so hard it stung. She panted roughly, and dropped to her knees astride Thanatos. He caught her and held her close, her hibiscus taste lacing his mouth and filling his nose. He gazed at her, dazed, her eyes bright and playful in the candlelight. He kissed her softly. She rubbed his shoulders and he felt himself shape to her touch. The heat of her pussy was so close to his cock that it hurt. Her breasts padded to his chest, warming him and misting him with sweat. The shadows cast by his wings made her look like a jungle creature in the undergrowth. 

“If you can't be tempted, Angel Boy,” she whispered, her hands stroking up the back of his neck, “then I suppose you don’t want to slip inside me, and make me feel that pleasure again?” 

Thanatos shivered. His cock ached brutally. Her thighs around his hips cushioned him like a pearl. He ran his hands up and down her back. He couldn’t speak.

“Are you really going to resist her?” Hermes’ clever, coaxing voice snaked from the shadow. “When she's so wet, so soft.”

“God, fuck, you are…” Thanatos dropped his temple helplessly to Daphne’s cheek.

“Oh, yeah…” Hermes’ cock tented his trousers, his hand still stroking in a steady pace. “The way she moans when you move in her.”

Daphne moaned into Thanatos’ ear. It coursed in his blood.

“The way she clings to you.” Hermes murmured.

Daphne curled her fingers on the back of Thanatos’ neck. His wings rifled.

“Go on,” Hermes hissed, “It feels good being bad. I promise.” 

“I…” Thanatos choked, “I am a creature of Heaven.”

“But you’re not in Heaven right now.” Hermes’ husk was filled with hot smoke. “Are you?”

Thanatos melted. His lips fell to Daphne’s, stifling a mutual moan. He kissed her ardently, as they writhed together to connect. Her hot, slick pussy slid down and engulfed his cock. He was wrapped in pleasure. He groaned hoarsely and threw his head back, quaking and thrusting heatedly upwards to fill her. Daphne gasped and kissed him, sending his senses headlong. They almost toppled, Thanatos batting his wings back for balance, sending a gust through the candles that made the light pulse like his blood.

“Give into her, Pretty One,” Hermes whispered.

Thanatos and Daphne began to move. They flowed easily into a hot, needy rhythm, connected unbreakably at the core and between their startling eyes. Thanatos looped his arms around her and pulled her to his body to feel her grind against him. She twisted in the bonds of his arms, like a python, pumping his cock with pleasure. Her wetness gushed over him, clouding the air with her scent. Thanatos buried his face in her neck and let her wild hair whirl around him, the heat and softness and surge of her body bringing him to life. The leaping, red light poured over them, undulating with their motion, slivered by the bars of the cage and his fluttering feathers, stretching out and shaking. 

“God…” Hermes’ hungry husk came to Thanatos through the dark and spurred him on. “Wow… Fuck… You two…”

Daphne’s thighs pistoned around Thanatos’ hips, smouldering on his skin. The studs of her leather garter pushed into his flesh. He peeled back and hoisted her up to suck her nipples, thrusting faster.

Daphne moaned high and longing, thrilling him. She dug her fingernails into his shoulders, the pain elating. Her words came breathless. “You feel… Ah!… Baby, you feel so good…”

“Do you like it, Angel Boy?” Hermes’ voice was like a revving engine in Thanatos’ abdomen, pulsing in his cock. “Do you like fucking a succubus?”

Thanatos moaned around Daphne’s nipple and sucked her harder. His cock thumped with blood. The glow of his turquoise blush spilled over Daphne and blended even more hues into her palette. She clenched around his cock, sending bolts of pleasure through him. 

“Make me come, Baby…” She was half begging, but all commanding. Thanatos ached with the need to obey her. He gripped her hip with one hand to urge their thrusts, and with the other slipped his thumb to her clit and circled, matching the motion with his tongue on her nipples.

“Oh, like that!” Daphne clamped him hard between her thighs and drove tempestuously, the studs biting.

She spasmed around him and he spasmed in answer. Her fingers flew to his hair and clutched, his scalp fizzing. She ducked to his ear and whispered in that same irresistible command. “Don't come, we want you desperate.”

Thanatos moaned in a mixture of lust and grief. “You’ve gotta be kidding me,” he laughed ruefully.

Daphne giggled breathlessly and twisted his nipples, gripping him with pleasure and pain. “Not one bit, Mister.”

Thanatos groaned, wrapped her tight, and threw all his thwarted desire into his thrusts. He bucked harder, deeper, faster, Daphne bouncing in his lap and slick as nectar on his shaft, spinning sensation around his cock like a spindle. His wings felt like they were on fire, his muscles and knees ached from the hard grinding kneeling on the floor. His climax surged. He fought it back. It surged again. He grit his teeth and crushed his face into Daphne’s neck and cast it back again.

Fuck, if she doesn’t come soon…

“Oh! Thanatos!” Daphne shrieked and flung herself forward, her body twisting and flailing, her core seizing him ruthlessly in tight pulses. 

“Fuck, Daph! I can’t!”

“Oh, yes you can, you naughty cherub! Wanna be in trouble?”

Thanatos half cackled, half whimpered. “Trick question?” But he went rigid as granite holding himself back and just managed to inch himself from the brink, as Daphne unravelled in his arms. 

She slid from his cock. She brought him into an adoring kiss, which he only half returned, still gritting his teeth, his need roaring in his ears.

He collapsed onto all fours and ploughed his focus into controlling his breathing, into how much he wanted to please them, how much he wanted to stay hard and ready for them. He gulped in the air. Daphne soothingly stroked his back and wings, but even that gentle touch threatened to send him over the edge. He coughed and moaned and shuddered, his feathers fanning the light again.

After a few long moments reining his body in, he raised his eyes. Everything came to him with a rim of turquoise, his blush must be blinding. He gazed at Daphne, lounging on her side on his strewn clothes, the cute, silly horns lost in her hair cascading over her shoulder and breasts, her eyes glassy and sparkling, her smile wide and impressed. Thanatos grinned at her. He turned his eyes to the walls of the cage. Hermes stood over them, his thickness wreathed in glimmering shadow, drawing Thanatos’ eye instantly. Hermes’ face was flushed dark, his black eyebrows low and his mouth slack. He was chewing his lip raw.

“Alright up there?” Thanatos chuckled.

Hermes flashed him a blinding grin. “Why am I sensing attitude from the guy in the cage?”

“Please,” Thanatos bounced his eyebrow. “You love attitude.”

Hermes laughed. The sound danced around the room, like a pixie. He sighed heavily and drew his fingers through his fiery hair, nudging the horns. He rested his hand up on the top of the cage wall again and loomed over Thanatos, still on all fours, wings swept back, as if ascending. Hermes’ chest pumped, his tie had been loosened and Thanatos could see his larynx springing up and down, as his breath came fast. His keen eyes were alight with mischief and want. Thanatos adored the sight of Hermes like this, chaotically excited, barely holding in his desire and energy. It had used to nettle him to the point of furious distraction, until he’d realised what that feeling was; then he’d chased it like it was a will o’ the wisp. He chased it now, crawling to Hermes slowly, his shoulder blades and his spine rolling alluringly, smiling at how Hermes’ gaze hurried over his body. He stopped at Hermes’ feet, the bars the only distance between them. Thanatos raised to kneel. His cock straining up to Hermes, his blue glow trickling over Hermes’ shoes and flickering in his eyes.

Thanatos let his blazing eyes fall visibly to the bulge behind Hermes’ zipper. He felt a swell of pride and attraction, as he noticed Hermes’ hips tilt.

Hermes licked his lip and chuckled breathlessly. “Still want to go to Heaven?”

Thanatos flicked his eyes back up to Hermes’, ice meeting fire. Then he gazed again at his hard mound. His hands floated up to Hermes’ belt buckle, just poking through the bars. “Oh, so much,” he said worshipfully. “Take me there.”

Chapter Text

Thanatos gazed up Hermes’ body. The Trickster had both his hands up on the bars overhead, his biceps rising through his fitted shirt, shadow flurrying around his bowed, pumping torso and etching the definition of his pecs and abs, his waistcoat and shirt hanging open, his tie draped rakishly around his collar. His hair swept into his eyes like the windblown branches of an apple tree, the black spiral earring winking in the candlelight. He loomed over the cage; Thanatos felt half trapped and half like a little boy at a zoo, seeing a coyote through the bars. Thanatos’ eyes travelled down. Hermes’ trousers peeled open like leaves and his cock protruded through the bars like the hard bract of a heliconia, red and ripe, the tip glistening with his arousal. Thanatos’ mouth watered. Hermes’ cock hovered level with his lips, making them tingle with temptation. Thanatos rocked forward like a somnambulist, and pressed a kiss to Hermes’ shining head. Hermes groaned, swinging forward, hanging on the bars. He slid into Thanatos’ mouth. The sudden lunge startled Thanatos and he gagged, but his hunger quickly took over. He moulded his mouth to Hermes’ thick, smooth cock, coiling his tongue and sucking desirously. His lips strummed over the tracery of full veins. His jaw strained with the need to take all of Hermes in. Salt and chilli pepper overwhelmed his senses and made his mouth gush wet, drenching Hermes’ cock so he could slide easily and sloppily back and forth, taking him deep, then padding his lips and tongue around the head.

Hermes moaned and panted, gripping the bars and pressing his misty forehead to them, his fringe scrunching and his brow creased. “Fuck… Oh yeah… Oh, you are so fucking good at that…”

Thanatos smiled around Hermes’ cock. Hermes knew Thanatos was malleable and he played with him daily, like a kid with plasticine, seeing what new shapes and colours he could create from Thanatos’ want. But the Trickster had his weaknesses too. He was a creature of the present moment, and Thanatos loved being able to capture his bounding energy and pin it in place with a slow, indulgent gift of pleasure. He felt this powerful, unruly god crumple under the weight of his own desire, under the spell of Thanatos’ rare talent for service. 

Thanatos reached up and cupped Hermes’ balls, jostling and rolling them, drumming his fingers on them, then slipping to Hermes’ perineum and massaging rhythmically. With his other hand he ringed the base of Hermes’ tense, pulsing cock and matched the rhythm, stirring his blood into the straining tip, then dancing his tongue over the swell of sensitivity. Hermes made a thick, croaking sound in his throat. He writhed against the bars and dragged his teeth on the cold metal, his eyes screwing shut, his fists twisting. 

“Fuck… OK, Handsome, that’s too much.” He snatched his tie from round his collar and chucked it over Thanatos’ shoulder into the cage. “Ease him off, would you, Glitterbug?”

Daphne was reclining in a pink glow of pleasure behind Thanatos, combing her fingers softly through her hair and watching the boys with a smile. She caught the tie and giggled. “You got it, Pepper.”

She slid onto her knees and crawled to Thanatos’ back. Thanatos felt her warmth steal over his wings. He intensified his touch on Hermes, knowing he was about to be stopped and wanting to draw every drop of sensation from the pretty fidget before that happened. Hermes bucked and whined, the bars chinking as he scraped on them. Daphne’s gentle hands stroked down over Thanatos’ bare arms, her warmth coating his back, as she leaned against him to pluck his wrists. He offered no resistance. She drew his wrists to the small of his back. His blood raced as he felt the stroke of the tie winding round them and securing them in place with a tight tug. Thanatos eased into the cradled feeling of bondage.

“Comfy?” Daphne whispered.

Thanatos nodded and hummed on Hermes’ cock, licking up and down the shaft with a crystalline cobweb of saliva gluing his tongue to the cherry length. Daphne dipped away, cooling Thanatos. Her warmth returned to his back, thrumming in his cock. And then he was webbed in sensation. Daphne had retrieved her toasting fork. She began to softly preen his long, splayed feathers with it. The refined points grazed over the tender bones of his wings, going with the grain, so his wings spread wider and fanned like moonbeams, incandescent and pale in the hot glow of the room. The tingling, tickling sensation bled through his feathers and out across his skin, like mercury being poured into a mould. He felt it in his hair and his fingertips and the pulse in his bound wrists, in his toes and his shoulders and his lips, circling Hermes’ cock. He felt it in his own cock, aching and prickling and hardening. His body became unstill, tilting the pleasure around himself, his knees scuffing in the chalk, his feathers bristling and smoothing in turns. He drove his bubbling desire into his mouth and sucked Hermes fiercely, sighing around his sharp taste and the harsh, twisting motions that dragged his cock over his tongue.

“Mmmm…” Daphne sighed softly, still grooming his feathers with a lazy, flowing pace, sinking into the satisfying repetition and the joy of Thanatos’ entranced response. “Angel Boy, you’re so pretty. You’re so good on your knees and your body has such a special beauty.” Stroke, stroke, stroke. “You’re really holding up your end of the deal, but it’s going to be so hard to let you go.”

Thanatos shivered at the sultry tease in her voice. He glanced up. Hermes was shivering too, his eyes darting between Thanatos and Daphne, the corner of his mouth tantalisingly pulling up. There was a dark compression on his brow from where he’d pressed desperately to the bars. His hair was a mess. The hollow of his throat quivered with panting.

“Just look at the two of you,” Daphne crooned, “Heaven and Hell. Peace and Wildness. Totally at the mercy of each other. I am one lucky succubus.”

“Luckubus.” Hermes breathed.

Thanatos popped free of his cock, slurping a pool of salted saliva down and glaring at Hermes, disgruntled. “Seriously? Puns? At this moment?”

Hermes broke into a high laugh. “We’ve met, right?”

“Deal’s off.” Thanatos stuck his nose in the air, like an indignant poodle. “I endured your devils’ games, but I have my limits.”

Daphne laughed and nuzzled the furrow down the centre of his back. “Aw, but weren’t you enjoying yourself even a little bit?”

“Never!” Thanatos ruffled his wings and puffed up like a goose. “I thought I was ashamed to be cavorting with demons, but now I know there’s wordplay? Ugh, it will be a miracle if the other angels even let me back.”

Hermes’ delighted grin blazed at the tease. He ground his molars and wriggled sulkily, snarling. “Well, you won’t have to worry about what any angels think, because I’m sure as shit not unlocking this cage if you plan to cut me off this far along.”

Thanatos scowled at him, but couldn’t keep his smile from twisting. 

Hermes’ eyes flashed. He spoke with gleeful menace. “Finish what you started, or you’re stuck here. Forever.”

Daphne dragged her lips down Thanatos’ spine. He arched his back. His cock jabbed up towards Hermes, pulsing aquamarine. 

Hermes licked his teeth. “OK. I’ll just stay here. I’m sure I can finish myself. You keep sitting pretty.” He lowered one hand and curled it around his thick, straining cock. He began to work himself, holding Thanatos’ eye. His hand stroked slowly up and down his shaft, squeezing diamond droplets from the tip, framing it, sculpting it. Thanatos sucked on his lip and the lingering taste of that cock. He fidgeted, the silk around his wrists snagging. Daphne took up her preening again, the sensations shimmering through his body and making his tongue even more restless. Hermes heaved in his breath, husking a little, staring Thanatos down with his wicked, provocative smile. Thanatos’ jaw shifted about. His gaze flickered between Hermes’ glistening cock, catching the orange flames on the tip, and his irresistible, rousing eyes. 

“If I let my eyes blur, I can almost still feel you,” Hermes whispered, “Fuck, I wish you would put your mouth back on me, my little slice of Heaven.”

Thanatos clamped his lips together, but his brow buckled.

“I’m so fucking close. God, it would feel so good to come in that hot, little mouth.”

Thanatos' chest flushed so brightly that it spread to his neck and trickled down his abs.

Hermes eased his cock a little closer through the bars. “Mmm, I'm aching so bad for you, Angel Boy. I’ll be thinking about that tongue long after we let you go.”

Thanatos’ smile escaped him. He grappled it into an innocent, hopeful look, gazing up at Hermes, like a lost kitten, slinking his shoulders so his arms flexed in their restraints. “So, you promise you really will let me go, if I let you come in my mouth?”

Hermes bit his lip. “Deal’s a deal down here.”

Thanatos tucked his chin down and let his hair fall softly over his cheek. “How do I know I can trust you?”

Hermes writhed, the shadows of the bars turning into a nest of snakes on his chest. He coughed a laugh. Daphne chuckled and scraped the fork down Thanatos’ spine. He shivered, his wings whispering.

“Let me put it this way,” Hermes said, laughter still playing in his voice, “What choice do you have?”

“I’m…” Thanatos sighed romantically. “I’m just so afraid of… Of being…” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Corrupted.”

Hermes pursed his lips, visibly torn between loving Thanatos getting into the game, and being extremely frustrated by his coyness. Thanatos flashed him a grin. Hermes laughed and growled, like a cat tangled in wool. He leaned heavily against the bars, the shadows sinking into his cheeks, sharpening his face. “A little corruption never hurt anyone.”

“A little corruption can go a long way.”

“I promise you, Pretty One: I don’t have a long way to go.” 

Hermes spoke through his teeth. He sped up his stroking on his cock, Thanatos’ eyes shot to it. His body filled with Daphne’s caresses and Hermes’ wild want. His resolve snapped. He lunged forward and bit Hermes’ flashing hand. Hermes yelped and cackled, flinging his hand up and plunging it into Thanatos’ hair. Thanatos swallowed Hermes’ cock. He sucked ravenously, his tongue flailing, his head jerking back and forth so fast his neck ached. Hermes pumped into his mouth, groaning and panting, his grip screeching on the cage. His tail lashed out and coiled tight around a bar to hold him up.

Daphne ducked between Thanatos’ wings and drew the tines of the fork over his throat. “Take him down, Baby,” she murmured in his ear.

Thanatos moaned. He tightened his lips on Hermes, sucking down and up his length, torturing the tip. Hermes cried out hoarsely and gripped the bars.

He erupted into Thanatos’ kiss. 

Heat coursed over Thanatos’ tongue, salt and silver filling his mouth, flooding his senses. His tongue gummed to the root of his mouth. Warmth trickled down his throat. He whipped backwards hastily and opened his torso, spread his wings, grasped the ends of the ties round his wrists, and let the final surge of Hermes’ climax shower his chest, encrusting him with pearls, holy water sprinkling over a devotee. 

Hermes slumped against the cage, catching his breath and grinning like a drunk. Thanatos’ chest pumped, the spray from Hermes twinkling in the restless light. He rocked backwards. Daphne caught him, cuddling to his back, kissing his hair. He folded his wings backwards around her and caught his breath, sucking Hermes’ flavour from his lips and tongue, his mind muffled and spinning. 

He was excruciatingly turned on, he could barely think. His skin was so alive that even the light touching it felt like fingertips. His gaze roved blankly around the room. The ruby eyes of the plastic skulls winked at him. The oozing of flame down the smears of fake blood made him dizzy. The silliness of the setting drifted away. He felt himself sink into the fiction, sacrificing himself to these two evil, irresistible spirits.

The silk slipped from his wrists. Daphne lowered him tenderly to lie back in her lap. His paper-white wings spread across the dark floor, inked in spindly threads of shadow, so he looked like a heap of discarded, handwritten letters. The cage squeaked and clicked. Hermes’ shiny, red, batwing shoes hove into view. His long legs bent and he crouched by Thanatos’ crooked knees, scuffed with chalk and a little blued from kneeling. Thanatos’ dreamy eyes wandered to Daphne’s sweet, mixed berry face, the glitter in her tangled hair twinkling. She smiled down at him and stroked his cheek. Her lap was soft; he relaxed easily into it. His eyes wandered again and met Hermes’. A golden flame pranced chaotically in his pupils. Thanatos realised he was holding up a crimson, soy candle.

Thanatos swallowed. His skin prickled. 

Hermes raised his eyebrows in a silent question.

Thanatos nodded quickly.

Hermes winked. His eyes flicked to Daphne. 

“Do the honours?” Hermes asked with a smile.

“Gladly.” Daphne beamed. 

She took the candle carefully. She kept caressing Thanatos’ jaw as she held it over him, letting the wax form a dark red pool in the cup of the tip. Hermes ducked to Thanatos’ supine body. He kissed him softly, humming against his lips. Thanatos sighed. His body tingled under Hermes’ shadow. Hermes slowly drifted down him, tracing his lips over him. He kissed his neck, his collar, across his chest. He nicked his nipples between his teeth, and Thanatos gasped. Hermes nuzzled around his belly button. He lapped the tip of his cock. Thanatos sucked in through his teeth. The nearness of Hermes’ mouth seized him. Hermes grinned. He settled onto his front, propped on his forearms, and trailed his lips around Thanatos’ hand, flung by his side, nibbling his fingertips and licking along the pulse in his wrists.

Daphne tipped the candle. A fine, viscous thread of hot wax drizzled from the tip. It drummed onto Thanatos’ sternum. The sting was deep and delicious. He flinched and tensed, then let himself go. As she poured the wax again, he poured into the feeling. She drizzled the wax in a series of serpentines, patterning his torso with a carefully controlled, continuous stream of red, as if she was draping him in silk ribbon. The sting webbed him, biting into his skin. Hermes soothed him with soft kisses, the two of them passing his body from one to the other, sliding him between sensations. The shine of the wax bled into Thanatos’ propane glow, its crimson flicks and spirals looping around the flecks of opal white from Hermes and standing out stark against his pallor. He nestled his cheek into Daphne’s lap, nuzzled her thigh, and kissed her palm cupping his jaw. His fingers curled and stroked Hermes’ hair, as Hermes kissed around his hip. He fell into a deep trance, the musical balancing act of hot pain and tender comfort pulling every thought from his mind, leaving him an empty vessel to be filled with their attention. 

He mumbled into Daphne’s flesh.

“Hmmm?” she prompted, stroking his hair.

“What…” Thanatos spoke thickly, eyes half closed. “What are you drawing? You sometimes do… Something…”

Daphne giggled low and dripped the wax onto his nipple. He moaned and slinked. 

“It’s the alchemical symbol for Hell,” Daphne explained, “to mark you as one of us.”

“Never…” Thanatos sighed extremely weakly.

Hermes sucked his index finger and spoke around it. “There’s other things we can do to claim you.”

“Mmmm…” Thanatos purred and settled deeper into the pillow of Daphne, running his thumb over Hermes’ lips, his singed skin tugging under the drying wax. “Never.”

Daphne shifted under him, puffing out the candle and setting it down. “We’ll just see about that.”

She shimmied out from underneath him, replacing her thighs with his balled up clothes to cushion his head. He whimpered irritably, as her warmth left him. Then his hazy eyes widened, as he saw her seat hover over his face. Her pussy gleamed over him, her hibiscus scent drifting down to him, her taste fogging the air in the inches between them. The quiet sting around his body was engulfed in a hard ache. 

Hermes kissed his stomach.

Daphne sank onto his face. 

Thanatos was enveloped in her humidity and her flavour. He opened his mouth instantly. Her juices dripped onto his tongue. He moaned and she quivered, trembling around his ears and on his cheeks and brow, sending earthquakes through him. His tongue uncoiled and wrapped her, chasing her sumptuous juices, sawing up and down her clit to make her rain into his mouth. Her swelling labia ground against his lips, her thighs clamped his ears, the blood roared in his skull. He lost all sense of reality outside of Daphne’s body. He burrowed into her and swam, drowning in a woodland stream, swept in the current of her surging as she rode his face, crushing her flesh into his mouth. He gulped the sweet air in brief flashes of unwanted relief, as she scooped her hips, the scent of honey from the candles misting into her powerful perfume. 

Then another ecstasy pierced this rolling reverie: Hermes’ warm, dexterous touch on his cock. Thanatos moaned deeply into Daphne’s folds. She shivered around him, like a rainstorm. Hermes began to firmly, rhythmically stroke Thanatos, kneading him with his hand, while swirling his tongue over the tender tip. Pleasure crashed through Thanatos’ body. He’d been so hard for so long, enraptured by the sweet tease of these demons. Hermes’ touch set him ablaze. 

He writhed beneath Daphne, losing his control, glugging her down in a desperate attempt to pull his awareness away from the punishing pleasure of Hermes speeding up. But that only overwhelmed him further. Delving into Daphne was like tumbling through a meadow. He was dizzy and drunk and delighted. Hermes pumped him hard, his cry muffled in Daphne’s folds. Hermes mercilessly worked him, flooding his body with heat, bringing him to the boil. He eased off, he cooled him down, he stroked him softly. He sped up again, tightened his grip, flickered his tongue, again brought him to the brink. Thanatos’ tongue trembled in Daphne’s flesh, her juices broke over him. Once more Hermes pulled him back. Once more he urged him to the edge.

Thanatos twisted desperately, his wings battering on the floorboards. Daphne ground on his face, pinning him. She fell heavily forward and pinched and rubbed his nipples. The pleasure welled in his centre. Through the storm of her body, he could just hear her moaning and Hermes snickering. It crazed him. His fingernails scrabbled on the woodgrain. Hermes pumped him hard and he edged again. The pleasure coursed closer to release every time. He kept thinking it couldn’t burn any hotter without breaking, but Hermes inched out his limits again and again.

Daphne lifted in her seat, compressing his chest with her palms and catching her breath. Hermes darted up and kissed her. Thanatos gasped for air, stars bursting in his eyes.

“How are you doing, you bad, bad angel?” Hermes murmured to Thanatos against Daphne’s lips.

“I…” was all Thanatos could squeeze out of his throat.

Hermes kept kissing Daphne, his thumb circling on the aching tip of Thanatos’ rigid cock. “She’s so close. She’s biting my lip like a squirrel with an acorn.

Daphne made an indignant noise that gave way to a hungry moan into Hermes’ mouth.

“God, make her come, Feathers. It’s fucking mesmerising.”

Thanatos nodded hurriedly.

Daphne laughed wildly and stifled him again. The world was snuffed out. There was only the nymph’s nectar and the way she bucked and ground on his tongue and crushed him into the cushion of his clothes. Hermes lined himself along Thanatos’ body, working his cock in those cruel cycles of pleasure and restraint, and sucking the tender underside of Daphne’s breast. She rocked on Thanatos, using his mouth as an axis, using his tongue for her delight, using him, using him, using him. 

Hermes pumped him.

He moaned helplessly into her flesh. 

She gripped his ears with her thighs, stuck her fingernails into his nipples, and thrust hard into his mouth. 

Her orgasm raged around him. She shook violently, her trembling cacophonous in his body. He felt like the rockface of the earth during the Titanomachy, rent and rumbling. Her climax was tectonic; it would haunt his bones.

She collapsed off him. His face rushed cool, then intensely hot, his bright blush staining the firelight. He gulped in the air, his chest billowing, his wings trembling. He blinked furiously.

He reached out blindly for Daphne. She grasped his hand. Their fingers interlaced. Thanatos grinned wide and doped into the arcing criss-cross of steel above him. He fought for breath.

Hermes was suddenly over him. His heart leaped. 

Hermes was still in the ruins of his suit, horns askew. “That was maddeningly fucking hot,” he hissed, and pressed his mouth to Thanatos’.

Thanatos reacted instantly. He flung his arms around Hermes and embraced him fiercely, returning his kiss with intense passion, one wing fluttering up to cocoon them, while the other stretched out to stroke the sprawled Daphne. He forgot the game. Almost.

Hermes pulled from him, his delicious lips unsealing with a playful smack. He nudged his nose to Thanatos’ and grinned wickedly down at him. “Still want to be let go?”

Thanatos clutched Hermes like a life raft. “I want to come.”

Hermes chuckled smokily, stealing another kiss, his answer vibrating on Thanatos’ lips. “You only get one deal. You can come or we can let you go.”

“Come,” Thanatos wheezed, “I want to come. I need to come. Please.”

Hermes wriggled his shoulders with pleasure. He stole a deeper kiss. “Pledge us your soul.”

Daphne was teasing the tip of his wing. 

Thanatos pulled Hermes into a cloying kiss. He jabbered his reply between racing kisses around Hermes’ lips and cheek. “Yes. Have it. Have me. I’m yours, I'm totally yours. God, please, please. ”

Hermes breathed heavily, laughter and pleasure catching in his throat. “How do you want it, Angel Delight?”

“Fuck me.”

“Get on all fours.”

Thanatos scrambled to his knees, Hermes rolling off him with a victorious cackle. Thanatos hastened onto all fours, his fingers gripping the gaps in the floorboards, his knees spreading, pushing his ass out, his core already singing. His joints trembled with the effort of staying stable, as desperate need overtook him. Daphne lay nearby, her ears and lips perked up, glimmering as she watched. She blew him a kiss. He bit his lip, still tasting her. 

Hermes’ hands stroked over his ass. 

“Oh… Hell… Now…” Thanatos groaned.

He shivered, as the cool slick of lube traced around his entrance. His cock ached. His skin stung. His wings felt heavy. His back laced with sweat. 

“Please… I can’t wait any longer…”

Hermes massaged his opening, while rubbing the small of his back.

“Just fuck me, damn it. Hard.”

Hermes gave his ass a light slap, making him jump. “Would you just lemme take care of you properly?”

Thanatos whined unintelligibly, arching his back, his ass magnetically rising to Hermes.

“Mmmph, you’ve got a nice ass,” Hermes husked.

“Good, get in it! Fuck!”

Hermes and Daphne burst out laughing, Daphne rolling on the floor, like a kitten. 

Hermes mellowed and stroked his hands over Thanatos’ ass. 

His cock nudged between his cheeks.

He slid smoothly in.

Thanatos’ body soared. The pleasure was immediate and deep and intense. He buckled and sank and forced himself back up, writhing on all fours so Hermes’ cock moved inside him and teased his prostate. Hermes sighed and stroked up his spine and along his wings. He reached out and brushed his thumb over the charred wick of the candle. It flickered to life. He winked at Daphne. She winked back. Thanatos didn’t notice; his whole body was reordering around Hermes’ cock.

Hermes began to move, swaying his hips back and forth in sweeping, pendulum movements. He struck Thanatos like a bell, the pleasure ringing through him, resounding in his nerves. He moaned roughly, rocking in Hermes’ rhythm to pull him deeper. His wings drooped to the ground and streaked around them, his spine snaking, the muscles in his back rolling. His cock pounded with each slick slide forward.

“Yeah… Yes… God… Fuck me…”

“You’re Heaven…” Hermes murmured, gripping his hips, thrusting harder, “You’re Heaven…”

Thanatos’ heart swelled.

Daphne smiled mischievously and slipped out of sight. 

The next thing Thanatos felt was a harsh, smouldering sting down his spine. Daphne had levelled the relit candle much closer to his skin this time, and was glazing his back, like she was icing a cake.

Thanatos hissed and moaned loudly, bucking back into Hermes, pleasure clanging in his body as the burn seeped across his back.

“Honour?” Daphne whispered.

Thanatos shook his head. “No,” he panted, “This is good. This is really, really good.”

That spurred Hermes. His fingers dug into Thanatos’ hips, and he began to pound into Thanatos, rattling Thanatos’ body and ramming the pleasure up his core. 

“Yes! Oh, fuck, yes!” Thanatos’ cry rattled the bones of a suspended skeleton.

Hermes moaned wildly and threw himself into the motions. Daphne splashed the hot wax down Thanatos’ speedily undulating back. The bite of heat and the slam of Hermes’ hard cock ripped through Thanatos, pain and pleasure, softness and roughness. His wings felt like they might tear away, his cock pulsed and filled him with tremors. He whimpered and collapsed forward into his forearms, ass still in the air for Hermes, now driving him into the floor. His fingernails split the wood, his teeth sank into his own forearms. He pleaded for more around the bite, the pleasure mounting, filling him, crowding him, mummifying him. 

Daphne dropped the candle and seized his cock. Thanatos let loose a shocked wail, and thrust his hips frantically, fucking Daphne’s fist, as Hermes pistoned into him. He pressed his brow to his forearms and yelped and gasped. His spine was cracking, his core was melting, his cock was swelling so thick, Daphne could barely close her fingers. Their furious rhythm creaked in the floorboards and cast wild, whipping shadows through the candlelight; it sent clouds of chalk up around their knees. 

“God, yes, Hermes!”

Hermes spanked him.

“Ah! Whatever the fuck you are! Vassago, Orobas, Seir! I give ZERO fucks, just RUIN me.”

Hermes plunged into him. Daphne gripped.

“Yes!”

Rapture .

Light and pleasure stampeded through Thanatos, an army of demons galloping over him with gold-capped hooves. He cried coarsely out into the close room, his voice roaring in a rush of flame. His core became a column of white heat, pulsing with the feeling of Hermes releasing into him. He and Hermes’ moans knotted together. His cock beat hard, jetting onto the floor. 

Hermes withdrew softly and thunked back, running his hand through his hair, tangling his fingers in the horns and plucking them away, so he could grip the roots and groan. Thanatos’ wings wilted back into ether. He tumbled onto his side and loosed a trickle of blissful mumbling. His body filled with warm relief and satisfying exhaustion. 

The candlelight glimmered on their sweat, smudging Daphne’s fizzes of blue, braiding into Hermes’ hair, glinting on the caked wax and fluid on Thanatos’ wrecked body.

Thanatos’ light quivering was quelled, as he was enveloped in softness and warmth. Daphne furled along his back like a palm leaf, wrapping him and cuddling him, like a koala. Hermes closed them both in his strong arms and wiry tail, drawing them close against his chest, Thanatos snuggled between them, safe and cushioned, as he came slowly down from the high.

“Okay…” he murmured after a long, sleepy moment. “Halloween might be fine.”

“Just fine?” Daphne nipped his shoulder.

“Halloween might be…” Thanatos sighed, “my new favourite holiday.”

Daphne smiled against his shoulder and squeezed him. Hermes chuckled low and shuffled to Thanatos’ lips. He kissed him deeply, stirring his tongue lazily and pulling the embrace even closer, blanketing him in his enticing spiced rum scent. He dropped his brow to Thanatos’ and closed his eyes. 

“Oh, you bad, bad angel.” He smiled his devil smile into the darkness. “Welcome to Hell.”