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Wire in the Blood

Summary:

Mephistopheles sneered. "You have nothing of worth to offer me. You are nothing."
Snapping back at the Lord of Hellfire, Raphael knew, was an indescribably foolish idea. Yet he could not hold back. "Your ichor must be unimpressive indeed," he bit, "for some mortal blood to make it so worthless."
It was a mistake, of course, and one that would cost him dearly.

[It's not often that Haarlep regrets indulging Raphael. This is one of those times.]

Notes:

I asked myself, 'here's a devil who fucks a copy of himself, can it get more messed up?' and I found the answer. It's 'hold my beer'.

Anyway, read the tags. Read them again. This isn't incest on a sheer technicality but it's still plenty fucked up. The dove is dead and in full rigor mortis.

Work Text:

Hell, as Raphael was fond of saying, had its rules. Many of them written, quite literally in blood, and others unwritten but no less important. Of these, most were easily understood by anybody with two brain cells left to rub together. No need to ask how they came to be, either.

‘If Mephistopheles looks angry, run’ was one such rule.

The vast majority of the servants and souls at the House of Hope had never gazed upon the visage of the Lord of the Eighth, who truth be told was prone to change said visage when the whim took him. Still, when a blast rang out in the room of the Outer Portals and a towering devil with thick curved horns clad in red robes strode out of the portal to Mephistar, all of them knew there was no stopping him, and recognized the only reasonable course of action. 

Run.  

Mephistopheles deigned none of them of even a passing glance as they scrambled out of the way and went to cower as far as they could get, all the way into the foyer. He stepped past, leaving a scorched-black line on the carpet. He was there to seek one being, and one being only.

And it didn’t take long to find him.

“What in the blazes was--”

That, Raphael had meant to say, but words turned to ash in his mouth the second he turned and saw the Lord of Hellfire striding towards him, fury looming behind his eyes like thunderclouds. He tried to step back and stumbled against the doorway, trying to think, to remember what specific scheme of his may have angered him and what he could say for himself. Quickly. Before utter annihilation or, at the very least, a very painful dismemberment. 

“My Lord,” he heard himself saying, and didn’t get to utter anything more. The next moment Mephistopheles had grabbed him by the throat and pushed him back inside the boudoir, slamming him against one of the columns around the Restoration Pool. The back of Raphael’s head hit the marble, and something cracked. Panic rising, Raphael had no time to wonder whether that had come from the column or from his own skull.

“You,” Lord Mephistopheles snarled, baring his teeth, a flash of white in the trimmed black beard. His eyes were pearls of malice, something like mist swirling in them, ever swirling, and looking at them made Raphael feel colder than the howling winds of Cania ever could. His voice was a low, guttural sound. “Of all the rotten fruit my seed has borne, you fester worse than most. I have allowed you to fester for far too long. But no more.”

“My liege, I don’t understand--”

“There is much you don’t understand, halfbreed, even when your arrogance tells you otherwise.” The Archmage of the Hells sneered, the malevolence seeping off him almost tangible enough for Raphael to choke on it. “Did you truly think I would not notice you asking questions, circling my vault like the scavenger you are?”

Raphael swallowed, throat bobbing against the steel-trap grasp of the hand threatening to crush his neck. The thought of trying to fight was there one moment, and gone from his mind the next. The Lord of the Eighth could destroy him, body and soul, with little more than the lifting of a finger. “Lord Mephistopheles, my intentions--”

“Don’t you deny it, or I’ll make a meal out of your soul here and now,” Mephistopheles cut him off. “Meager as that meal would be, it would be preferable by far to the chore that it is to listen to your excuses.” A pause, those cold eyes turning to the rest of the boudoir, the portraits on the walls. He sneered. “You still like to pretend you’re a proper devil, I see. It was amusing enough, I suppose, when you were but a child. Now it’s only pathetic. Do you think I do not know what your incubus does to you? What you beg them to do to you?”

“I…” Raphael tried to speak, but his tongue felt heavy as lead, all his eloquence gone.

A hand ripped open his collar and there they were, the marks Haarlep had left on him the previous night, plain for the Cold Lord to see. They could have been made to disappear with a dip in the Restoration Pool, but Haarlep had told him to keep them - like a collar, they’d said, and such a pretty collar it makes - and he had. He’d kept that reminder on his skin because… because…

“You fancy yourself worthy of the highest seat of all,” his sire sneered, “and yet you debase yourself to an incubus, because you know that’s where you belong.” 

Shame rose like bile up his throat, dwarfing even the fear. He swallowed again and lowered his gaze, struggling not to crumble.

“A waste of a perfectly good incubus, sending them to you. I should have kept them in Mephistar, to keep pit fiends amused. Or perhaps I should have given that task to you, delivered you to the pit fiends as a gift and let them have their way with you. I may yet do so. Your looks are passable enough you may entertain them for a time.” 

The hand let go of his throat to grasp his chin, forcing him to look up at the Archmage of the Hells, towering over him. Raphael couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. His limbs were cold as ice and just as heavy. 

“Give me a good reason why I shouldn’t destroy you, or make you a whore for pit fiends and their appetites.”

“I-- my Lord, I have served you--”

“You have served me little, and poorly.”

“I can serve you well. It is all I wish to do.”

“Hmph. Is it the human blood in you that makes you such a poor liar?” A sharp claw cut across his throat, shallowly, and it was enough to draw blood. It ran down his neck, turning the torn collar of his doublet red, and he shuddered, biting back a cry. 

“My liege,” Raphael finally managed, voice shakier than he’d ever heard it. Any notion of pride, any thought of trying to protest or even fight, fled his body along with that blood. “I have your blood, too. You know I can serve you well.”

“I have legions at my beck and call, each of them many times the fighters that you are. I have counselors, far wiser and more insightful than yourself. A High Cantor to sing my praises, far more skilled in words and music than you may ever hope to be for all your mediocre efforts. I have spies more shrewd than yourself, and other halfbreeds who show twice the promise you once did.” Mephistopheles sneered. “You have nothing of worth to offer me. You are nothing.”

Snapping back at the Lord of Hellfire, Raphael knew, was an indescribably foolish idea. Yet he could not hold back: through the terror, through the shame, pride reared its head for a moment - and, with it, anger. 

I’m more than your spawn, more than you know. How dare you, how dare you, how dare you.

“Your ichor must be unimpressive indeed,” he bit, “for some mortal blood to make it so worthless.”

It was a mistake, of course, and one that would cost him dearly. The hand squeezed his neck again, almost hard enough to crush Raphael’s windpipe, and the heat of it made him still, terror winning over any other thought again. He looked up, eyes wide, struggling to force out an apology he couldn’t speak. Above him, Mephistopheles glowered. 

“Stoking my fury,” he growled, “is no desirable skill either, nor a wise course of action. I have no need for a rash child in my court--”

“P-please--”

The hand against Raphael’s skin grew warmer, hot, and he knew that if Mephistopheles chose to unleash hellfire upon him now, he may not survive even the first onslaught. “Quiet,” Mephistopheles snapped, and Raphael fell silent, trembling in his grasp. Those white, cold eyes narrowed. “If you cannot appreciate my blood, you have no claim on this body. Go on, be a worthless human like your mother. Do you think I don’t know how you favor that form?”

“I-- I don’t, it’s for mortals to--”

“Change, or I’ll separate your head from your neck to mount it on my wall!”

A shaky breath, then Raphael closed his eyes and did as he was told. His human form had always served him well, but now it felt so frail, and so small, standing next to the Archdevil of Cania. Mephistopheles had to lean down to speak against his ear. 

“Worthless wretch,” he muttered. “I should never have taken you to my court, much less recognized you as my own. You have always been troublesome. You’re not worth the seed wasted on your conception, or even the meaningless mortal life extinguished to give you your first breath.”

Raphael’s vision blurred, his eyes burned, and he squeezed them shut. A shuddering breath left his chest before he made himself speak. “I can be worthy,” he managed, hating how faint his own voice sounded, how childish the words. He heard Mephistopheles let out a hum, felt the hand holding onto his chin let go to cup the side of his face.

“... I suppose it cannot be helped,” he finally said. “Your infernal heritage means you crave that which cannot be yours. Your mortal one means you crave that which cannot be found in Baator. It is the fatal flaw of every halfbreed.”

Raphael squeezed his eyelids tighter. He focused on the palm against his face, on the sound of water running from faucets - anything to ignore the knot in his throat, the burning wetness beneath his eyelids. 

“Don’t call me that,” he ground out.

“It’s what you are. What else would I call you? What is it you hope to hear?”

Son. This once, only once, can’t you call me your son?

His lips parted, but he couldn’t force out the words; they remained stuck painfully in his chest, shards of ice that burned cold as Cania’s glaciers. There was no point in uttering them. There was no hope to hear that wish granted. “I hate you,” he choked out instead.

Mephistopheles, Lord of the Eighth, laughed. 

“You think yourself the first to say as much? Many do. Enemies are the mark of greatness. Many of my enemies are dead and many more will die. But I have given you everything, ungrateful brat - anything you own, you owe me. What do you have to hate me for?”

“For making me,” Raphael whispered, and was only met with silence. Something wet slid past his eyelids, down his cheeks, and he knew that whatever battle he was still trying to fight was already lost. Mephistopheles pulled his hand away with a noise of disgust as though the tears had burned him.

“Pathetic,” he bit out. “If you wish me to unmake you, you only have to say so.”

Raphael said nothing, but it made no difference. He was grabbed by the throat, dragged across the room, towards the bed. His hands grasped his sire’s, but he made no real attempt at releasing its grip, mind reeling and stomach churning. Mephistopheles paused, gaze falling on the single goblet of wine on the footstool by the bed. He took the goblet, sniffed at it, and scoffed.

“Incubus spittle. Of course,” he muttered, and held it to Raphael’s mouth. “Drink.”

One last, weak attempt at pushing away. “My Lord--”

“That is an order, whelp, lest you truly wish me to tear you to pieces, body and soul.”

Lord of No Mercy, many called him, and not without reason; Raphael knew that was no empty threat, not coming from him, and he found he did not wish to die after all. He parted his lips, and nearly choked on the wine that was poured in his mouth. The effects hit him almost as soon as he swallowed, the shudder up his spine and the heat in his loins, in his face.

A low chuckle. “Empty words, I see, like everything that leaves your mouth. If you don’t wish to be unmade, so be it. I can be merciful. But you will learn your place.”

A gesture of the Cold Lord, and Raphael’s clothes burned off him, leaving him bare; throwing him face down on the bed took little more than a flick of his wrist. Raphael groaned against the pillow, skin breaking into goosebumps and already hard against the mattress. He tried to curl up, but that hand was on the back of his neck, burning hot and cold at the same time, pinning him down. Over his own thumping heart he heard another snap of fingers, the whooshing sound of red silken robes disappearing in flames.

“My Lord--” he choked out, only for words to die in his mouth when he felt the mattress dip. He tried to push himself up, but the grip on his neck kept him in place.

Oh, only that? Something whispered in the back of his mind. A small, mirthful, sneering voice, almost child-like in its glee. You could put up more of a fight than this. You don’t want to get up. You never do. You were made to be ground in the dirt.

“You will serve me,” the Lord of the Eighth was saying above him, and Raphael tried to tell himself the shudder that ran through him was one of disgust. Claws raked across his back and he keened in need, heedless to the blood it was drawing. He squeezed his eyes shut against the pillow, knowing full well that above him Mephistopheles was a towering presence, dwarfing that measly human form of his.

Then the clawed touch went lower, and Mephistopheles laughed. It was cutting as ice, reverberating through the room, out of the terrace until it seemed to fill the skies of Avernus, too. It seemed to Raphael that all would hear it, all would know, all would come to see him disgraced. The shudder that passed through him at the thought was more difficult to label as disgust now, with his cock hard and leaking against silk sheets.

“Oiled and ready - were you waiting for someone, or are you always ready to be somebody’s plaything?” A click of the tongue, and he let go of his neck to grab his hips, lift them until he was on his knees, legs spread, face buried in the sheets. Raphael trembled, choking back a sob, and made no attempt to rebel, to pull away. “Perhaps giving you to pit fiends in Cania would be a gift to you, after all.”

“Please,” Raphael keened, not quite knowing what he was pleading for - for it all to end, for it all to continue, for oblivion, to be released, to be made a whore, to be embraced as a son - but knowing full well the plea would go unheeded either way.

The only answer was that cold laugh, the unyielding grip on his hips and the press of something against his oiled hole, blunt and broad, cold and hot at the same time like everything else about the Archdevil of Contradictions. Raphael cried out, hands gripping sheets, ripping the silk. Something ripped in him too, the pain blinding even with the effects of the incubus spittle to blunt it, and the cry turned into a wail at the breaching, the stretch, the burn of it. Somewhere above, Mephistopheles chuckled.

“Bleeding already,” he murmured, and gripped his hips harder. He didn’t push in as much as he pulled Raphael flush against him, forcing him to take it inch by inch, ridge by ridge. By the time he bottomed out Raphael was a shivering mass of pain, limp in Mephistopheles’ grasp, blood running down his thighs and cock still hard, still leaking onto the bed. “Yet you wanted my attention. You have it now, halfbreed.” He snapped his hips forward. “Are you satisfied?”

Raphael tried to work his jaw, cheek pressed on the sheets, but all that left him was a strangled sound. His vision was blurred, his face wet; he knew it was tears as much as sweat. Whether it was sweat or blood coating his back and thighs, he did not know or care. Slowly, the pain faded, the power of incubus spittle taking the edge off even that.

“Are you?” Mephistopheles growled with another sharp thrust that tore a moan from Raphael's throat. “Or is it not yet enough to sate you?”

A whimper, shamefully weak, and Raphael licked his lips. “No,” he rasped through ragged breaths, trembling, helpless in his grasp and in the face of his own desires. Shame burned in his stomach, want burned in his loins, and in his mind and heart he knew that if Mephistopheles left him empty now, he'd break. All that kept the jagged pieces of him together was the grasp on his hips, the cock within him, the contempt he could feel with every breath. “More,” he managed to choke out in the end. He felt so very small.

“That sounds much like a demand. You're in no position--”

“Please. ”

The words left him in a broken sob, and for several long moments his sire fell quiet. Then a hand came to rest on the back of his head, large enough to cup all of it. The cold of it was gone, leaving only warmth.

“You plead well. Perhaps we have found your true talent at last,” Mephistopheles said, a note of something in his voice that sounded almost like kindness. Raphael clung to that, to the uncharacteristic gentleness of the touch before the Lord of the Eighth began to move again, smoother, a steady rock of his hips. “Let me hear you plead some more.”

And plead Raphael did, through gasping sobs and shuddering moans. Pleading for more, faster, deeper - and all he asked he got, a hand still holding up his hips and the other pressing down on his head while the Lord of Cania made use of his limp body. Only when he knew he was close, cock painfully hard, did he try to move.

Part of him knew he may break if he gazed up at his sire’s face now. He did not care, or perhaps he wanted to break. Let it all come undone and leave behind nothing, no one. So he tried to lift himself on shaky arms, to turn back.

“Please,” he breathed, unable to add more, but Mephistopheles understood, somehow, as though reading his mind. He pulled out, causing Raphael to almost wail at the emptiness, and turned him on his back as easily as one may turn one of Haarlep’s mindless, soulless dolls. If he chose that fate for him now, Raphael wouldn't have it in him to protest.

But he did not choose such a fate, or any fate yet. He only gripped Raphael's hips and pulled him on his cock again, almost bent over him, large enough to blot out all light. The archdevil’s long, black hair fell around him like a curtain, hiding all but his face from sight.

“Look at me, boy.”

For a moment, despite being the one who’d wanted to turn, Raphael couldn’t bring himself to look. He squeezed his eyes shut, unable to bite back a moan, hands gripping the sheets and a nameless fear gripping his throat just as firmly as he waited for the punishment that was sure to follow, for defying an order.

“... Raphael.”

It was a rare thing for Mephistopheles to call him by name. It made Raphael open his eyes at last, a shuddering breath in his chest, and look up. Amidst the blackness of his hair, Mephistopheles’ pearly white eyes seemed to glow of a light of their own, and one that didn’t seem so cold anymore. His breathing was faster, too, sweat on his brow, glistening on red skin the same shade as Raphael’s own. Amidst the trimmed black beard, his teeth showed again in a smile. 

Raphael shuddered, a jolt of pleasure straight to his groin. He tried to tilt his hips, to meet the thrusts, but Mephistopheles’ grip was unyielding so that he alone could control the pace. He was close, so very close, and yet release evaded him.

Raphael groaned and clenched around him instead, the heat in his groin almost unbearable. It got a hiss out of the Lord of Hellfire and then, at last, a low throaty laugh. “Good,” he rasped, thrusting in sharply, sinking his claws into Raphael’s hips, breaking skin - and that, love, was that.

Raphael came across his own stomach with a low, keening sound, mind blank of all thought. His back arched and his mouth fell open as he almost seized in his sire’s grasp. In the throes of release he heard a low grunt, felt a harsher thrust, and the warmth of come spilling inside him. It turned his last moan into a whimper, the whimper into a word.

“Father,” Raphael breathed, without thinking, and it was the last of his strength. His head fell back onto the mattress and he shut his eyes, trembling, drawing in ragged breaths. There were a few more thrusts before the grip on his hips relented, the cock was pulled out, and suddenly Raphael was alone in the middle of the bed, leaking blood and come and tears. 

He swallowed, trying to regain the bearings of his surroundings. He let go of the sheets to press an arm against his eyes, biting the traitorous tongue that had spoken the one word he’d sworn would never leave his lips. He felt someone sit up on the side of the bed, and suddenly the weight on it wasn’t so great anymore, the mattress no longer dipping quite as much.

The weight on his chest however was only growing greater, shame and something much like grief gripping his throat. Raphael pulled the arm from his face and blinked up at the ceiling, not daring a look to the side, drawing in another shaky breath. His eyes burned, tears already spilling down his temples. “Haarlep,” he called out, voice hoarse. “Is it you?”

A chuckle, familiar as his own. “Who else would it be, lordling?” Haarlep asked, a lilt to their voice. “So, how did I do?”

Raphael didn’t reply, didn’t move: he just closed his eyes, and burst into sobs.

This wasn’t good.

It wasn’t that Haarlep had not been good. They always were, despite a painful lack of practice using any form other than Raphael’s own over the past… ah, best not to think of how long it had been. Either way, their impression of Mephistopheles - how they got that form was a tale best left for another time - had been nothing short of perfect.

And maybe that was exactly the problem.

When Raphael had made the request, Haarlep had been too delighted by the notion of a change in routine to really question whether bedding him while wearing Mephistopheles’ likeness was a good idea. It was not their role to question Raphael’s wishes, as their master made sure to tell them often, so they hadn’t. They played their part, did it well, and got some pleasure out of it. So far, so good. 

Even when Raphael began to sob, they hadn’t worried too much at first; it was far from the first time having his wants fulfilled reduced him to tears. But this, they quickly realized, was different. Most times they could taste the relief coming off him in waves along with the tears, something within him finally sated through Haarlep’s services. Now there was no such thing: only those choked-back wails, those sobs tearing all air from his lungs while he curled up on the bed, hands covering his face. 

Whatever he’d wanted to sate this time, it hadn’t worked. He’d only ripped open something that would take a long, long time to scab over again. The little change in routine didn’t seem all that funny anymore. Actually, it wasn’t funny at all. The wound it opened would bleed something ugly for a while, Haarlep could tell. 

… Perhaps they should start doing something for the wounds that were literally, actively bleeding. Haarlep sighed, once again wearing Raphael’s likeness, and went to help him up. 

They were not nearly as strong as the form they wore suggested - their true form was, truth be told, a fair deal smaller than the cambion’s - but they could still lift Raphael’s human body with relative ease. “Come, my pet,” Haarlep said, not unkindly. “You need a bath.”

Raphael’s sobs did not subside, but he did hold onto the incubus, letting them help him up on shaky legs and guide him to the Restoration Pool. The pool could only heal physical ailments, but the warm water did help soothe deeper wounds. Sitting in the water and breathing in the perfumes while Haarlep silently washed his back, Raphael finally stopped weeping, and fell quiet. He said nothing as Haarlep tilted back his head and rinsed his hair one more time before breaking the silence.

“Better?”

There was no reply. A little unnerved by the silence and by the uncharacteristic slump of Raphael’s back, Haarlep moved to crouch before him in the water. His eyes were still shut, but he was clearly not asleep. They reached to cup his face. “Master,” they called out, not allowing the barest hint of the usual irony into the word. “Look at me.”

Raphael didn’t open his eyes, but he did swallow. “I can’t,” he whispered, voice like old paper.

Of course. Can’t even stand to look at his own face now. Too much of Mephistopheles in it. 

That would pass, eventually, but until then there was an easy solution. Haarlep held back a sigh, and allowed themself to change. Raphael’s form shimmered and faded, leaving behind a smaller, slender devil with simple dagger-like horns, cinnamon skin, and long hair that fell down their back, deep red as their eyes. “It’s me. You may look now,” Haarlep said with their own voice, and Raphael finally opened his eyes.

It was hard to tell if he was looking at them. His eyes were empty, as though he wasn’t truly looking at anything. “... You may go,” he rasped. “I have no further need of you tonight.”

“I will go if you wish. But first, I must make one thing plain,” Haarlep replied. Their hands dipped under the water to take Raphael’s own, thumbs brushing over his palms, and they looked him in the eye. They knew Raphael better than they’d ever gotten to know anyone; they knew all his wants, all his needs. While they may tease him, make him beg more often than not, they never denied him anything, in the end. Now that would have to change. Because he would ask for this again and, for the first time, Haarlep would have to refuse.

Raphael blinked, taken aback, and finally met their gaze. He seemed a little more aware, more present. “What is it?”

Haarlep set their jaw. “I’ll never take that form again. Even if you ask, if you order, if you rage. Even if you beg, Raphael. It happened today, and it shall never happen again.”

For a moment, there was no response. Raphael stared, still as a statue, and Haarlep was starting to question whether he’d heard their words when he worked his jaw and spoke, his voice strained. He sounded incredulous. “You would deny me? Refuse to obey?”

“Yes.”

A flash of something close to anger on Raphael’s face. “I could have you flayed for it.”

“You could.”

“And you’d still refuse?”

“Steadfastly.”

“Is my ire no concern for you!” Raphael snapped, as though insulted, as though they didn’t both know he could never truly punish Haarlep for any refusal, for any insolence. Even as he scowled, his hands held onto the incubus’. Haarlep squeezed them before speaking again.

“Your ire is a fearsome thing,” they said. “I’ll bear the brunt of it before I do this to you again.”

The words were barely out of their mouth, and all of Raphael’s anger melted away like wax to a flame. His lips trembled, and his eyes filled with tears. When a gut-wrenching wail bubbled up from his chest, Haarlep was there to catch him, letting him hold onto them. They let him press his face against the crook of their neck, rubbed his back until the sobs subsided and he went limp, still weeping softly. This time they could taste it again, coming off him along with the tears - relief. And maybe, just maybe, it was met with some relief of their own. 

Haarlep sighed, brushing back his hair, and leaned with him against the side of the pool. “Come now, little brat,” they murmured against his temple. “Get some sleep.”

Raphael got no sleep that night, but he did hold onto them. 

He held onto them for a very, very long time.