No. 10: Without Consent | Secrets
Their connection is built on secrets.
Grace speaks to no one about Vespiel, about his golden wings, or the light of his halo around his neck.
He speaks to no one about her visits.
It hadn’t been easy, explaining the concept of secrecy to the angel. It hadn’t been easy explaining anything at all, truly. He had descended from the heavens without knowing the King’s English, and his words had been beautiful, but beyond comprehension.
She had helped him stumble through his first words, not quite believing she was blessed with such a task. She had been chosen, she was sure of it. She was teaching him, guiding him. This divine being, the Lord’s messenger. Grace thanked God every day as she prayed before bed, that He had sent her one of His children to help.
Vespiel had taken residence in an abandoned cottage deep in her father’s lands. With the war, much of the help had gone to serve, leaving large swatches of the forest unattended. Providence. As long as Grace attended to her duties first and remained within the walls, she was free to do as she pleased.
And so she takes book after book to the cottage, where her angel remains.
His English is much improved, and they can converse more freely now. He still does not tell her much about Heaven or the Holy Father, avoids the subject whenever she presses him, but she knows that one day, if she persists, he will tell her everything.
“Good afternoon, Vespiel,” she greets him as she enters the cottage, a new book in her arms, and her angel drops down from the high rafters near the roof. It’s safer for him to wait for her voice, just in case someone else stumbles into the old building. “How are you?”
“I am good… well. I am well,” he answers her, and his voice still fills her with awe. There is a strange echo beneath it, something melodic that fades more each day as he tries to hide it. “I was waiting for you.”
“You always are,” Grace murmurs with a smile, heart fluttering in her chest. Her angel. “Come, let me brush your hair.”
It’s a ritual she had cajoled him into. His hair is long, fiery red, warm to the touch like the rest of him. When she takes a brush to it, she feels connected to him, closer to the divine. Vespiel had not been eager to let her touch him, and at first she had worried he thought her unclean. When he had learned the words for it, he had told her being touched in Heaven feels much different than on Earth.
And so she persisted, until he accepted her touch with nary a flinch.
She sits on the edge of the bed, brush in hand, and he settles before her, back turned to her. A simple cloak covers his body, though it could never hope to hide the shape of his wings. His beautiful wings.
“I’ve told you to take the cloak off when I’m here,” she says as she takes some of his hair to brush. “Do you not trust me?” She longs to see his wings again, to run her fingers through the feathers. He hadn’t liked that either, at first.
His wings twitch and she knows it’s because he regrets not doing as she told him.
“Yes,” Vespiel murmurs, undoing the ties and letting the fabric pool around his waist. “I trust you. I apogi—am sorry.” Grace can’t see his face, but she imagines it, penitent and remorseful.
The first time he had told her he thought about leaving and exploring more of the world, she had screamed and cried and told him her life would be ended without him. He has never spoken of leaving again. Vespiel does as she tells him, because she’s been chosen to guide him. Her angel.
The silence stretches, heavy, and for a moment she fears he must have grown tired of her.
“Do you love me?” Grace asks, and her angel twitches, looking back at her with his pretty eyes. That word had been one of the hardest to explain, and she’s still not certain he truly understands it.
The sun has begun to set, the cottage darkening by the minute. The only source of light is her angel’s halo, and his eyes.
“Yes,” he answers, opening his mouth to continue, before furrowing his brow and closing it. Something he does when he’s trying to find the right words. But all Graces cares about is his answer. Yes. Her angel loves her. “I—”
“Do you know how humans love?”
Another question that leaves him stumped, and he shakes his head slowly, before pausing and shrugging his shoulders, looking helpless. Grace has never asked him these sorts of questions before. He has no answers to them.
“Stand up for a moment,” she tells him, and as he obeys, she gets to her feet. Her fingers find the buttons on her dress, undoing them one by one, while keeping her gaze on his face. Vespiel seems confused, but she knows he’ll understand when they become one. He’s her angel, she was chosen for him. “You’re learning our words and our customs… but not this. You can’t understand humanity until you’ve known this.”
Vespiel’s eyes widen and he looks away as her dress hits the floor, nothing beneath it. She had come prepared for this, for their union. He tries to step away, turn his back to her, but her hands find his face and twist it to look at her. “Adam and Even were naked in the garden before there was sin, were they not?” She whispers, drawing closer until she can feel the heat of him. He is so very warm to the touch.
The angel offers some resistance, never enough to stop her, but she cuts him off before he can say anything. “The Lord sent you to me, Vespiel. If this were wrong, He would strike us down, and He has not.”
His shoulders and wings drop at her words, and he makes a wordless noise. A beautiful sound, one he makes when he cannot find the words he wants. Grace reaches down to rid him of the fabric still clinging stubbornly to his waist. “G-Grace—”
“This is how humans show love, how we share our souls,” she says quickly. “You love me, and I, you.” He will understand. He loves her. They’ll become one, and she will love him, and be loved, and he will never leave her. “Please, Vespiel, I will not survive another moment without you.”
Vespiel looks frightened, but Grace hushes him and pulls him towards the bed. Her hands seek his, guiding his touch, guiding his every move. In the dark, his halo’s light shines upon them both.
Grace tells him this is love.
She leaves before her family comes looking for her, dress quickly buttoned up, hair undone. She feels his burning warmth everywhere she’d told him to touch her. Her heart is light, because she is loved by a divine creature, and he is hers.
When she next visits the cottage, Vespiel is gone.
