Every kiss and movement was the redemption of good deeds left undone. Victor's arms were a safe haven, and she had wanted this to last beyond just the evening, past the nearly-set sun that had been peaking at their pleasures. It had cast a wash of golden light into the bedroom window, a metallic paintbrush that caught the gleaming sweat drops that traveled down their skin. Their breaths, hot and needful to breath each other in, fogged in the chill that was coming with nightfall, but the two had more than enough to keep each other warm. Beyond the rushing blood of their bodies, there was something else growing in the heat.

Skie's eyes, so darkly indigo, were filled with racing points of stardust as she closed them. It was not to imagine any other that she did so, no face or form but the boxer's danced behind her eyelids. Instead, it was to keep back the tears that threatened to fall as each stroke of their hips was like a prod to a fire already threatening to spill out of the hearth. It was beautiful, these moments, and she knew why the Moontae now called themselves the Beauty. Nothing like this could be evil or demonic. It was true that they had only known each other for this one day, but the connection felt so much heavier. It was beyond the feeble grasp of desire but the sheer weight of what this man had come to mean to her in such a short time that pulled against her heart.

The difference between Skie and the rest of the Beauty was the blood of Devon dan Sabriel.

It broke all the rules, connections like this. The Beauty didn't get attached. They came together for pleasure; love was unimportant because they had love for all. Skie, however, and her heart, held something human. It was Devon's greatest gift, the ability to know true hate or love. In his embrace, kept safe and needed, Skie let every movement of her body say everything that was needed. As she pulled him closer, her fingers lacing through the thick, short locks of his hair, she found her voice rising with the tension in her body.

"Victor, please." she begged, her voice breathy, her eyes opening to behold him. Her pleas turned his eyes upwards, his lips still locked around the fleshy nub he had claimed as a prize, his teeth barely grazing the tip as if to ask 'Yes?'

"Please," she repeated, bending her neck so that her lips could brush against his forehead along the hairline. "Please don't stop." Her words seemed to throw oil on the already raging flames, and his hands slid from her back where they had been cradling her to her hips so that he could hold her in his muscular grasp and control the motion of their bodies. They worked together, their movements slowing but his strokes coming deeper, grinding and rocking as she sobbed and moaned against him. They held each other so close that Skie began to wonder if they really could be one person, that if her cheek against his might just melt through the skin and she could see everything inside him. She knew she would love it, that in the last hours she loved him. The blossom of knowledge unfolded in her mind, and she tried to slow their fall into the deep white light of orgasm, because when it was all over she would lose him as their daily currents ripped them apart to different lives.

Out the window, the first stars of the night had begun to twinkle feverishly in the dusky cloak of the sky. A single pinprick of pure white slowed in it's flicker. As Skie began to gasp, her body tensing and then unfurling in the force of her climax, she called a single name. "Victor." Her eyes opened, meeting his, and the sputtering star outside began to fall. The answering lights in her cobalt gaze started to fall and fade, leaving nothing but the matte expanse of blue, flecked here and there with earthly brown. It was Devon's greatest curse, the Slaying of Stars, the taking of souls. As she shuddered against him, her voice ripped from her throat as everything seemed to contract and explode in a dizzying burst, he took the back of her head in one hand and pulled her lips to meet his.

That simple kiss was the Architect of her Destruction, and somehow some of his.

In a flash, she saw inside him. Shadows pulled against his heart, a solid man with solid Faith, brought down by a small collection of cursed cells pulled the darkness around the prizefighter's soul. The pain and suffering of a struggling woman, of three struggling women to maintain their feeble family had scored itself in him, and there, the great background of it all was a fourth woman. Her words had been so powerful, especially her goodbye. The very absence of her had turned Victor's heart upon itself, drenched it with something dark and terrible. The thoughts that had lingered in his mind a thousand lonely nights before assaulted her, and she tried to save herself against the storm of truly tasting Victor's soul. She tried not to look too deep, the more she saw, the more she was threatened with actually seeing what he felt for her, and she was sure it would come up lacking with this special love she had for him.

She'd taken a soul before, slain Seth Dahlios' star in a moment of passion, but a moment of rage. It had been so different. She knew the terrible things that the Hex Mage had done, and was, and the loving things he'd done them for. She'd taken his star in hate, but somehow walked away a shaky ally. Now she had tasted the very core of someone in love, and found it was far more terrifying than the rage she'd felt for Dahlios.

And with that fear permeating, she was out of his soul, her gaze again to the room, where he still held her tight. It had been the fraction of a moment that she'd been gone within the confines of his memories and intentions. She lowered her face to his again in a kiss, this time breathing out, letting him take back what was his. She didn't want his soul, didn't want to Slay him. It was less violent this time than when she'd returned Seth's soul to him. She didn't vomit it, but kissed it into him. Exhaustion from their lovemaking and from the sheer depth of what she'd seen within him was draining her, and she let her body relax against his. She buried her head in his shoulder, grasping him with the intensity that she'd hold to a life raft that was bringing her out of the fearsome deep, and kissed and nibbled her way up his neck and to his lips. There, with the brush of her mouth on his, she whispered the only thing she could find to say in all the weighted emotions of her heart.

"You're a good man, Victor."