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Crowley was reasonably sure that Maurice’s text had been meant as a sort of peace offering. The last time he’d been at the Tartarus Club had been fairly disastrous, if fairly covers property damage and defenestration, but Maurice apparently hadn’t held it against him. At least, not to the point of dropping him from the list of patrons who got irregular texts from the doorkeeper when management booked a really promising band. Nevertheless, Crowley arrived with a respectable check in his jacket pocket made out to the club. They’d undoubtedly had to replace the door of the ladies’ toilet; Crowley vividly remembered seeing the top panel split under the impact of Maurice’s shoulder.
“They’ll be up later,” he said, greeting Crowley as if nothing had ever happened and brushing off his apology. “Warmup band’s about ready to go on. Nah, mate, it was worth it to bust up that prick boyfriend of hers a little. Firecracker like that’s better off without some loud wanker thinks he owns her.” He did, however, discreetly pocket the check.
Maurice was under the fond impression that Crowley had cut out Hastur, Duke of Hell, known to Maurice and the club patrons only as “The Arsehole In The Porkpie Hat,” for the affections of a young lady who, truth be known, was neither young, nor affectionately inclined toward him, nor a lady, at least not in any conventional sense. Crowley saw no reason to enlighten him further.
“Did well for yourself,” Maurice went on with a literal nudge and wink. “She’s here already. Over there.”
He nodded towards a table in the corner. She is? Crowley, who had plans to meet exactly nobody tonight, felt a little flutter of the sense that tells a demon there’s another of his kind within range. She could only mean the demon Beelzebub – who’d set out one day not too long ago to see what Crowley had learned to cherish about life among mortals, gone in for a crash course in dancing and club drugs, and ended by leaving Tartarus through the window of the Ladies’ – propelled by Crowley’s hand on her bottom, with a thwarted, raging Hastur in close pursuit.
She’d seen him, and was waving.
Oh, shit.
He’d not meant to make a long evening of it. Showing up was more about mending fences with Maurice, who’d always treated “Anthony” as a friend, and – well, making a little space for the angel, whom Crowley knew loved the solitude of the bookshop in the evenings, thrived on the dusty dimness and the sound from the near-antique turntable which still rendered his lovingly curated collection of old vinyl albums. Crowley despaired of showing him how to download music onto the phone that had been a no-particular-reason gift from the demon.
The strains of the Schubert Piano Quintet had been delicately filling the little illuminated bubble that was Aziraphale’s private space within the shop as Crowley readied to leave. The angel had kissed his offered cheek with the comfortable, domestic fondness that they had slipped into as if it had always existed between them. “Don’t be out too late, dear boy,” he’d said. They’d once gone decades, even centuries without seeing each other. Now, days seemed unimaginable.
Aziraphale would not be happy to know that his demon was now pulling out a chair across from the Viceroy of Hell, whose mortal adventure was, so far, a secret Downstairs, or so Crowley devoutly hoped. Hastur, suspecting only that someone was moving in on one of his temptations, had just missed rumbling who exactly had set off his own demon radar. If it got around Below that Beelzebub, after millennia supervising terrors and torments the way a dowager countess manages garden shows, was going soft in some unaccountable way, it would not be a good look-out.
“What are you doing here?” hissed Crowley under the noise of the recorded music that was marking time on the audio system while the first band set up. Last time she’d been sporting vinyl fetish wear and a nailhead-studded jacket; tonight it was a sleek, short black dress with bare shoulders and a complicated arrangement of straps. Her hair was held back on either side of a girlish center part with two red-glass faceted barrettes. The slightly snub-nosed, pointed-chinned face whose scowl struck fear into every skittering minion of Hell now seemed positively waiflike. She looked like absolute jailbait.
“I wanted some of the toner the spa woman used on me. I like many things about this place. I had not realized how the fumes Below damage skin…”
“Toner?”
“…And it seemed foolish to come all this way just to pop into Boots,” she said, “so I thought…”
“Thought you’d come up and start another riot in a dance club?” Crowley couldn’t help his mouth quirking into the start of a grin. It had been something to watch.
“It was very – instructive.” She’d called it amazing and brilliant when she was full of gin and Ecstasy. She drew a phone out of the string-strapped, sequined bag that looked like she’d picked it up in Carnaby Row. “I found that you can get updates – “
“You can keep that charged Downstairs?”
“It takes a little miracling, but no one has noticed.”
“Right, then. You on Instagram yet? Can’t wait to see some selfies.”
“No, but I have been Tweeting as @Bad_Bella.”
Crowley facepalmed. “Oh!” He heard Beelzebub rise, and took his hand down from his eyes in time to see Maurice stamping the hand of a young man with slightly punked hair and a single stud earring. Beelzebub was waving her handbag overhead. “Chaz!”
The newcomer edged around the patrons that were now filling the venue and queueing up at the bar, making as straight for their table as he could.
“Oh, I see,” said Crowley. “You had a date.”
The broad smile on Chaz’s face faded distinctly as he neared the table and fully took in Crowley sitting there. Crowley scooted his chair around, closer to the wall, so the newcomer could hook one away from a nearby empty table and pull it up. He didn’t look happy about having to do it.
Beelzebub introduced them before the silence became absolutely stifling. “Anthony,” said Crowley when she gave only the single name. Chaz shook his hand as if he were picking up a dead squirrel that had been lying in the grass a while.
“Well, I s’pose I’m gooseberry,” said Crowley, though it was hard to rise and leave them smoothly after the way he had boxed his chair into the corner. “I’ll just – “
“Oh now, Crowley, you need not leave us,” said Beelzebub. Crowley sensed that if looks could maim, he would already be wearing a body cast. Maurice, on the way back to some errand at the bar, chose the moment to make things worse.
“Hey, you know Anthony and Bella?” he said, clapping a hand on Chaz’s shoulder. “Any friend of Anthony’s is okay in here.” He turned to Crowley, grinning rather obscenely. “You guys gonna keep it clean this time?” Turning back to Chaz he continued, “This is one wild pair – really know how to light the place up. You’re in good company.”
And off he walked, a wrecking ball in a straining gabardine jacket.
Chaz was looking at Beelzebub.
“I guess I didn’t – “
Crowley cut in before things could degenerate further. “Not a couple,” he said. “Never been a couple. It’s just that there was some wild dancing the last time we were in here. Maurice had to throw a bloke out, too.”
Chaz looked at him unsmiling, and not seeming very mollified.
“And here I’d have said you looked a little old for wild dancing.”
If you knew, thought Crowley, and tried for the simplest words possible. “I’m not your competition, mate. We just know each other from work. My date’s not here yet.” If the interest of this mortal had been enough to bring Beelzebub back up on walkabout in a deliberate dereliction from Hell, he wanted to encourage the apostasy at all costs. “I should just phone and find out what’s keeping him.”
He knew the idea was insane even before the words had finished leaving his lips, but then, that had never stopped him before.
He could feel Maurice’s eyes on him as he stood far enough away from the door to carry on a conversation over the opening bars of the band’s first number. “Angel? Need a favour… Can you miracle yourself down here just for a short while? Half an hour maybe? I’ve got a little bit of a situation. No, I’m safe. Just something that’s gotten a little awkward.” He paced up and down the pavement. “Brilliant. Can’t thank you enough. Oh, and I’ve got a surprise for you later… Well, yes, it really will be a surprise. I hope.” It was amazing how lubricious an angel’s wordless murmur could sound over a tinny cellular connection. “I know, love you too, angel. See you in a minute?”
He became aware that his pacing had taken him back in earshot of Maurice, whose grin had become more admiring and puzzled in equal parts. As he moved back toward the door Maurice delivered a two-fingered, smart salute. “Anthony Crowley,” he said, “you are playing with fire.”
“You can’t imagine,” said Crowley.
The doorkeeper didn’t know exactly who he expected to see show up, but it was definitely not the slightly plump, fretful-looking, remarkably attired man who came around the corner moments later to be embraced warmly by Anthony and told “A thousand thanks, angel.”
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” Angel replied as Anthony steered him toward Maurice to have his hand stamped.
Maurice was now officially perplexed.
“Ink stamps! Really!” Aziraphale huffed as Crowley steered him through the vestibule. “This – Crowley! You didn’t say there was going to be bebop!”
“Just long enough for one drink, angel,” Crowley said soothingly. “I just need to be seen with you – it’s kind of political – “ He caught Beelzebub’s eye, waved, started edging through the growing crowd. She and Chaz already seemed to be on more relaxed terms.
“Crowley – that’s the Demon Beelzebub. Impossible to miss. You can’t expect me to – “
“Yup,” said Crowley, drawing out the last consonant with a sound like a popped cork.
“What ever are you playing at?”
“We’re just going to show some nice friendliness to a cute couple for a short while so her young man can calm down and realize I’m not about to nick her out from under his nose. Please? For me? It’s all under the banner of truce.”
“May I introduce my partner Ezra Fell,” said Crowley with a flourish. “Otherwise known as the Notorious A. Z. “ He had Aziraphale’s fingers clamped between his in a grip of iron, and only released them to discreetly make another chair appear where there hadn’t been one before while Chaz and Bella were performing polite handshakes. Aziraphale looked at “Bella” wide-eyed and pale – Crowley was forced to remember then that it was she who had presided over drenching him in holy water, in Crowley’s place – and then surprised his demon by bowing formally and sketching a kiss in the air just above her beringed knuckles.
“Charmed,” he said, “I’m sure.”
“I owe you anything you could ever want,” whispered Crowley under cover of a cheek kiss.
“You certainly do.”
Crowley, in fact, was being remarkably, publicly attentive. Chatty niceties were exchanged, no Chaz hadn’t been here before, yes Bella had only been the once, and the entire time Crowley’s arm was around the angel’s shoulder, or his knuckles brushing Aziraphale’s cheek when he said we’ve been together I can’t think how long, or his hand on the angel's knee under the table. Crowley caught his eyes widening a few times. Never mind. There was a point to make.
“You are pawing me, dear boy,” the angel said when Chaz and “Bella” offered to bring drinks and sidled away to the bar.
“You like it.” Crowley rocked his chair precariously back on two legs against the wall, not looking at the angel directly but toying with the ends of his hair.
“It’s indiscreet.”
“Can’t have people thinking they can move in on you, can I?” said Crowley. “Look at that chancer over there, he’s been checking you out since you came in.” (The chancer in question was actually trying to make sense of Aziraphale’s sartorial ensemble, which had not been in fashion for several generations.)
“I haven’t been in surroundings like this since the orgies under Caligula.”
“You liked those too.”
“I did not. I was there on business. Well, I liked the food.”
“Oh, I remember you eyeing up a few Ganymedes. Just calm down, angel. Hold my hand. I’m helping a friend here.”
“When exactly did she become a friend?”
“When she started to think that maybe Hell could stuff it,” said Crowley. “For me, that’s personal.”
Chaz gave the order for two G and Ts, one neat Scotch, one shot of brandy, and turned to admire Beelzebub’s bare arms. The sigils tattooed on them were a runic seam of script from shoulder to wrist.
“I’m sorry, I was about to show my arse back there,” he said. “I get it now, no one can dance and flirt like a gay bloke.”
“Crowley has never been particularly cheerful,” she said.
“See, that’s what I like about you. Absolute deadpan. Cracks me up.” He paid the barkeep and picked up two of the drinks. “I’m cool with it, my best mate at Uni’s gay. You know his friend?”
“Largely by reputation. We met once or twice.”
“You can tell he’s an original. Crikey, where’d he get that coat?”
“So how do you know each other?” asked Chaz, distinctly better disposed towards Crowley now that he was half way through his G and T and Crowley was absently stroking the back of the angel’s wrist off and on. Aziraphale did not look impressed by the quality of the club’s brandy.
“She interned for me at my old job,” said Crowley. Beelzebub looked daggers at him for a moment. He kicked her lightly under the table; somehow, her earthly corporation had settled into a youthful look that made anything else seem improbable. “Contract with the Underground. You still there?” he asked her directly. “They hire you on?”
“I have been helping in the Head Office,” she said, getting the drift.
“You’ll have to fill me in on the latest workplace politics. Not now. Bloody boring if you don’t work there,” Crowley said aside to the others.. It would have been difficult to do without making it into a general broadcast anyway; the warmup band seemed to have little going for it but volume, and they were leaning into that with everything they had. Determined patrons were dancing, but there was a distinct lack of the brio that would take over later. “How’d you two meet?” Crowley nodded at Chaz, though he knew the general outline.
“Bunch of me mates from school met up to go clubbing and there she was all lonely in the park,” said Chaz. “Had to save her. Gentleman’s duty.” The look he gave Beelzebub was protective mixed with hopeful. Crowley wondered if his head could actually explode. “I’m in my second year at Uni,” Chaz elucidated. “Business Law, but I take all the poetry classes I can. Write you an ode, love,” he winked at “Bella.”
Now Aziraphale had something to think about other than bad brandy and Crowley’s newfound bent for public display. Chaz was in a Visionary Poets class, he elicited. They were a few weeks into a unit on Blake. They were reading the Marriage Of Heaven And Hell. Either gin or enthusiasm began to physically animate the young man. “The energy of those drawings – “
“Oh, you should have seen some of the alternative plates. He remade some of them several times.”
“You know it – ?”
“Oh, as soon as it was published – “ Aziraphale caught himself. “In the bicentennial facsimile edition I snatched up a copy from the first press run. A very personal theme for me – “
“Yes! It was so over the top – even for the time – God only Acts & Is, in existing beings or Men – “
Chaz was off to the races, with the incandescent enthusiasm of a fundamentally clever person who’s nonetheless only recently discovered thinking. “You sell rare books?” “Only when I can’t avoid it.” Chaz thought that was hilarious. “You ever hear the Virgin Steele albums? Totally based on the poem. You could dance out to that,” Chaz asided to “Bella.” He had finished his drink. “Speak of that, do we all agree that this band is shite? What about we all go get a bite and come back when the good music’s on? We’re all stamped.” He glanced at “Bella” and Crowley. “Can’t talk in here anyhow. Where’s good – ?”
Beelzebub already had her phone out and was opening Where to Eat.
“My professor said Blake is a young person’s passion and I’d grow out of it,” Chaz was banging on as the fish and chips arrived.
“Oddly, I seem to come round more and more to Blake's point of view as I get older,” said Aziraphale. “I’ve wrestled with so many of the same ideas for -- well, a long time.”
It gave Crowley and Beelzebub cover for their own conversation. “Is he often like this?”
“Oh yeah, yeah. He can go on for hours.”
Any lingering hostility Chaz might have had was dissolved in the discovery that Crowley’s friend shared his zeal for literature.
"For the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded to leave his guard at the tree of life, and when he does, the whole creation will be consumed and appear infinite and holy whereas it now appears finite & corrupt," Aziraphale was declaiming in a lilting tone that drew a couple of stares toward their table.
“This is very messy,” said Beelzebub, who was trying to look as if she might have eaten chips at some time in the last six millennia.
“It’s meant to be. Here, you put some of this on it.” Crowley splashed her chips with the vinegar bottle. “So – what’s going on down there?”
“Uneasy. Others have been slipping out. One of the demons from Finance was caught last week smuggling in a Kindle loaded with romance novels.”
“You working on one of your own here?” Crowley tilted his head at Chaz, who was now intoning “Now the sneaking serpent walks/In mild humility. – he slips it by, the serpent’s been raised up again, that’s how I read it – “
“I am learning, Crowley.”
“Boss have anything to say about what’s going on?”
“No one hears from him. But some of the higher demons are on watch. They do not like the murmuring. Hastur broke several cacodemons down to salamander stable duty last week.”
“Be careful,” said Crowley with a concern he could never have imagined himself experiencing. He knew how many Below, stung and envious, had slavered at the thought of making an example of him.
" -- Eastern philosophy and Native American -- "
“– Swedenborg – “
“ – The French Revolution, for example, ideals of good that produced so much evil – “
“Oh, don’t I know – “
The chipper was upscale, on the far side of the canal from the rowdier district of the clubs, and served a decent wine. Aziraphale and Chaz had about emptied a carafe between them – “I prefer a good Pinot Gris with fish but this is passable.”
Crowley thumbed his phone to check the time. “Good band ought to be up by the time we get back,” he said.
“Oh, dear boy, so soon? Time flies when you’re having a good discussion.”
“As I was walking among the fires of hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius,” quoted Chaz who was now definitively on a roll.
Crowley paid the tab.
They were halfway across the canal bridge. Crowley had noticed Chaz's hand brushing "Bella" 's with intent twice, and her expression was unreadable, anything from stark alarm to the distant look she'd had while dancing. That was not why he bent to speak softly in Beelzebub’s ear. “Are you picking up something?”
“I think we are just sensing one another. No one – “
“Not just that. Are you still smelling fish?”
“I did get some on – “
That was when a hand closed on Crowley’s shoulder, whirled him around and shoved roughly, slamming him to the pavement. “Well, whoo have wee here?”
They'd been tripped up by the same mistake that Hell made when it came for Crowley and took Aziraphale in his form; there'd been enough demons around that no one had noticed that he didn't register. White noise can hide a presence or an absence. Who'd caught him napping? He rolled over.
Dagon. Oh, fuck.
Chaz took a run at the scaly-faced, Protean fish-demon, who was presenting male tonight, slicked back hair and acne-like ichthyosis making him a Central Casting shoo-in for the role of “London street punk.” Bad idea. The poetry enthusiast flew against the railing and yelped, slumped, stunned.
“Well, well,” said Dagon. “I’d been smelling demon, and who do I find? The outcast Crowley.” He stank like the docks at low tide. “Recruiting another little traitor to Hell? You reek of demon, little girl.” “You’re one to talk about reeking,” snarled Crowley, mind racing. Dagon reached for Beelzebub’s chin, tipping up her face. “Junior demons slipping up here not to do their jobs but to fraternize and canoodle. Who do you report to, little demon? Tell me your name – “
The air around Beelzebub exploded. A dark brilliance pulsed from her. The red crystals in her hair began to glow dimly; great veined glistening wings, fly’s wings, unfurled to beat behind her as she pointed at the astonished Dagon in a j’accuse that seemed to transmit enough force to make the water demon actually stagger.
“ON YOUR KNEESZZZ, ZZZCUM OF HELL,” she cried. Crowley snapped his head from side to side, taking in that foot and even car traffic on the canal bridge had suddenly disappeared. Stopping time must have caught on Downstairs. “ ZZPEAK TO ME THUS AT YOUR PERIL. YOU DO NOT QUEZZTION ME.”
A kaleidoscope of expressions crossed the pockmarked face: astonishment, rage, hurt; something like jealous fury as he looked from demon to mortal. For all Beelzebub’s bombast, Dagon was a Prince Of Hell, not to be easily disposed of, and he had a home advantage here – proximity to water. Smirking, he turned his stumble into a spring, seizing up Chaz, who was rambling in a high panicky voice “Did I get some bad acid? What was in that drink? Oh jesus mama mamamama – “
“Cry for Mummy, little mortal,” said Dagon. “Are you friends with this little mortal, Lord Beelzebub?” Crowley sensed her hesitation. “I could tear him in two before you reach me. Are you still a demon or a filthy traitor?”
“ –jesusimsorry, mama mama mama – help, I need to go to Casualty –“
Dagon seized Chaz by one shoulder and hip, as if he were really preparing to tear him across like a crisp packet. Crowley could suddenly see them more distinctly. There was a light behind him. Within a heartbeat, a blinding light, a thump in the air like propwash.
Demons, as has been mentioned, have a form of echolocation that tells them another demon is near. Dagon, however, was angel-deaf, focused on his apostate peers, and never saw it coming. Aziraphale was six feet off the ground, a sweet violence of white radiance and sound. The fussy bowtie and morning coat were nowhere to be seen -– only an envelope of light around him, beating and dazzling with the rhythm of enormous wings. He was diamonds in the blaze of morning and the pounding fire at the heart of stars, and in the breathless second before he smote Crowley’s heart cracked all over again, filling his throat, spilling through him, making him tremble. His joints turned to oil and putty, he was –
A shock went through his bones, burned the backs of his eyes. Dagon went down like a limp sack, head lolling from side to side, hands twitching feebly; Chaz clung to the railing, pulling himself up, still whimpering and gasping. Crowley found he too was on the pavement, but moving sinuously and swiftly.
In all the Scriptural references to crawling on the belly, et cetera, it is forgotten sometimes that Crowley could be a damned impressive serpent. Thicker through than a firehose, glistening with iridescent black scales, he was a bastard to be reckoned with as he arrowed over to Dagon in one long movement and wound around him like a whip, binding his arms to his body. The demon prince struggled feebly. Crowley squeezed. He hissed, with positive relish.
There was a thud behind him. Chaz had simply fainted.
“Where,” muttered Dagon like a barely conscious drunk. “Send you to the salamanders – “
And Aziraphale, his dear angel, fussy and rumpled again, looking a little shocked at himself, was kneeling beside them both.
“Haven’t done that in centuries,” he said. “I mean, you can’t believe how much paperwork you have to file. No need now, I suppose.”
He extended a hand close to where Crowley had made a loop around Dagon’s neck, and was periodically squeezing like a masseur getting into his stride. He felt an odd hum from the angel’s palm.
“I can take his memory,” said Aziraphale. “It was – a blessing I got fond of doing for people who had – well, seen horrors. When I could.” Crowley faded back into human form, finding that he had his long arms and legs twined around Dagon, which was sort of disgusting.
"I sometimes forget what you can do," he said, untangling himself.
"Well, I owe you for -- a lot of occasions, Crowley. And I owed him for the shackles."
“Help him, too,” said Beelzebub behind them. Not a request. She had lifted Chaz’s head off the pavement and was resting it against one knee. Don’t they make a cute picture, Crowley thought.
“Why, certainly,” said Aziraphale. “Goes without saying.” The terrified look that had persisted even into Chaz’s swoon softened to the awakening look of someone who’s had a curious dream.
“What d’we do with him?” said Crowley, flipping his thumb toward Dagon. “Before he wakes up and we have to do this all over again.”
“In his element he will transform,” said Beelzebub. “He will think only of swimming away.”
The canal was right there. Aziraphale, Crowley remembered, was stronger than he looked. “Dip him in the river who loves water,” he quoted as he put his back into it. The splash was already smaller than Dagon’s body could account for, as if fish replaced four-limbed shape on the way down.
Crowley sensed the bubble of stillness around them fading with Dagon's departure. Voices were approaching; a car’s lights sliced the night up ahead.
“You all right up there?” someone called.
Chaz was sitting up with his hand to his head.
“You just fell down,” said Beelzebub helpfully.
“Agh. Must have had too much to drink,” he said.
“ ‘S’happened to me, mate,” said one of the passersby. “Gotta pace it.”
“I didn’t really sleep last night. I was up late with the books,” Chaz said. “And it’s – it was like I had a dream – these huge winged shapes and lights – there was a stonking big snake -- “
“Reading Blake will do that to you,” said Aziraphale soothingly. “I’ve experienced the effect myself.”
Chaz was testing his legs. “Think I’m all right.” He took a few steps. “Not really up for the club now though.”
“Early night suits me,” said Crowley. “Old people need to get to bed.”
Chaz looked hopefully at "Bella." “Come with me for a little coffee? I think I need it.”
“I have had coffee before,” said Beelzebub. “I liked it.”
“She’s something, ent she?” said Chaz, more or less to Crowley.
There was a moment of fuss as Aziraphale dug through his multiple pockets for a business card and futilely tried to figure out how to record Chaz’s contact information on his new phone, which Crowley was touched to see he was at least carrying.
“Can you afford to go back now?” he asked Beelzebub, who had shed all trace of dark radiance or crimson glow.
“I can’t afford not to. But not just yet.” She looked up and seemed to be trying to remember how to smile. “Chaz said the night is young.” She glanced over at the other two, who were bidding each other goodnight in a flurry of quotations. “I think he is drawn to me. As they are attracted to each other. What should I do about that?”
“What makes sense to you,” said Crowley.
She seemed to be struggling with the idea. “You wanted to see what it’s like to live the way mortals do. You choose. You’re not always going to get it right, but you choose. It’s what they’ve been doing since… you know. It’s hard to forget. I was there.”
She said nothing. It was a lot to process.
“And if you make a choice that doesn’t work, that turns out to be wrong, you can make another. You don’t have to be one of the Hosts Of Hell forever, just… as one example. Little overwhelming, starting out every day with choices, but… you get used to it.”
She glanced over at Aziraphale then. “I think you have made a choice for eternity,” she said.
“Yeah, well. You get to make those, too.”
“I’m quite glad to be spared more of your bebop, Crowley,” said the angel as they watched the pair recede into the night hubbub of Camden Town. “After everything else it would have been simply too exhausting.” He looked at Crowley a little askance. “Old people?” he said.
“Well – ‘strooth.” Crowley was surprised to find Aziraphale slipping an arm into his as they walked along. “D'ye know, tonight you blessed a demon and I think I just tempted one? I have to think that’s a first.”
"What about the first time she came up? I thought you said -- "
"Seriously this time. Not just with a packet of fries." Crowley took a deep, unnecessary breath. Hold your nose, jump. “And speaking of the marriage of Heaven and Hell…”
He paused. Aziraphale looked up at him curiously.
“Got something here for you,” he said, digging in the inner pocket of his jacket. “If you’d wear it. Had it made by a jeweler in Hatton Garden. I mean, if you like it.” Crowley’s casual don’t-give-a-fuck program went hopelessly offline as he opened a small flocked box with suddenly clumsy hands, nearly throwing it and barely keeping his grip, to hold it into the circle of the streetlamp.
The ring was rose gold, with a chased design around it suggesting wings, a line of tiny yellow citrines and jet alternating along a third of its circumference. “Don’t have to wear it if you don’t like it. Wanted it to be a – “
“My dear." Aziraphale was softness and benediction. "I'd love to. Will you put it on me?”
Crowley discovered that a wholly unnecessary heart could pound until it deafened him. The ring fit perfectly, as if it had always been on the plump, manicured finger.
“I’ve nothing for you,” said Aziraphale. “Though I suppose…”
The fingers of his other hand closed, opened.
“We’ll get one properly made by a human artisan later,” he said. ”As she said, learning how they live…”
Crowley felt weightless as the angel lifted his hand and put the white-gold circlet barely over the tip of his third finger.
“This Angel, who is now become a Devil, is my particular friend,” quoted Aziraphale. “...Or would you prefer ‘With this ring I thee wed?’ I believe that’s the current fashion with the mortals hereabouts… Crowley, are you crying?"
For the streetlamp glistened on two moist tracks below the dark glasses, slowly trickling along the demon’s cheeks. “ ‘S the wind,” said Crowley, who for a demon could be an absolutely crappy liar. Aziraphale seated the ring on Crowley’s hand, and reached to cup his cheeks, fingers soft on his temples, gently as sleep drawing the glasses away and exposing the glimmer of tears spilling below the slitted amber behind them. The eyes closed; he kissed the lids, then the tracks down the cheeks, soft tongue barely brushing to taste the salt.
“I had always assumed that demons don’t weep,” he said.
“Learn something new every day, don’t you?”
Crowley clung, unnecessary breath unnecessarily hitching, as if letting go had been permanently eliminated from the list of options. Aziraphale had to speak into his lapel.
“I think we ought to go home, don’t you?”
“Bentley’s this way,” Crowley said.
finis