“So, why didn’t we get sucked into the ritual?” Hero asked as they sat on the cliffside. Hawk was sitting behind him, arms wrapped around Hero’s chest, his chin on his shoulder.

“We weren’t in the right place,” Hawk said, simply. “According to my source, there’s a lot of factors that have to be in place for it to work. We stumbled into it by accident the first time because we didn’t know anything about it.”

“Still won’t tell me your source, huh?”

“Not yet,” Hawk chuckled. “One weird thing at a time.”

“Like telekinesis and barriers,” Hero said, turning his head to look at his new boyfriend. Hawk smiled.

“Yeah, like that.” He rubbed the tip of his nose against Hero’s. He took a deep breath and went on. “It’s not telekinesis. To put it simply, and also vaguely for the time being, it’s core energy. Manipulation of the world around me, so to speak. It’s just one of about a dozen or so things I can do.”

“What else can you do?”

Hawk smiled and put a finger to his lips.

Hero rolled his eyes. “One thing at a time.” He turned his head back, resting it against Hawk’s shoulder. 

“The barrier is also from core energy,” Hawk said. “That one actually took me ages to perfect. It’s gotten weaker since I haven’t been able to use it for a while, that’s why we only had ten minutes.” He flexed his hand. “I spend a lot of time training with my powers, seeing how far I can go now that it’s finally under control.”

“Because of me?”

“Because of you. Again, it wasn’t like you knew it was happening, and neither did I.” He leaned back, gazing out over the horizon. 

When they had made it back to Hawk’s house after work, Hawk agreed to give only the basics of what made him different from humans. He didn’t say he wasn’t human, only that he was different. Hero agreed not to press on anything when Hawk stopped talking about it. This was one of those things. They both were noticing the change in their connection since the first chain broke, the second one beginning to sway, but they hadn’t gone into the Veil yet. They were still experiencing their interactions on the outside, reveling in how different it was to touch each other in this way. 

Their souls, they realized, while solid, also held a strange fuzzy sensation they hadn’t noticed until Hero had Hawk pinned up against the steel racks in the freezer. They hadn’t kissed since arriving home. Instead, Hawk had insisted on just being close, on being able to hold Hero since he had held back for so long. It hadn’t just been their lack of control over the Veil, it had also been out of fear. What if his marks appeared? What if he changed? Mostly, he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to let go.

The first time they had touched, it was just their hands, and he had been shaking. When their palms met, he thought his body would fall apart from the tension. They had felt the shift that came with the fall, but managed to maintain their grip on the outside, however tenuous it had been at the time. When they had felt they were stabilized, Hero had gently laced his fingers in between Hawk’s, his heat rising. Feeling it, Hawk had nearly pounced on him right then and there. They realized it was more than just the power they had to control, but the sexual desire that came with even the briefest physical touch.

Now, as Hawk held him close, he felt safe, stable, more in control than he ever had before. Hero was solid and warm; he was real and an absolute certainty to his existence. He was why Hawk was here, why he was still sane. He could have lost it decades ago, almost had. He had periods where he did lose control and go berserk, causing death and destruction wherever he was, but he had always managed to come back to himself.

“You were always my missing piece,” Hawk murmured. 

“Hm?”

Hawk shook his head, kissing his neck. “Nothing,” he said. He smiled and a soft chuckle vibrated through Hero’s veins. “That wasn’t how I imagined our first time to be.”

“It was supposed to be right here,” Hero said, smiling. “Guess I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t realize shutting you out like I did would make me crave you that badly.”

“Don’t do it again,” Hawk said, his voice low. “That really did hurt, in more ways than I can tell you.” He moved his arms around Hero’s middle, bringing him in closer. “You remember when you told me how you had felt completely disconnected and lost that first night our connection was made?”

Hero nodded. 

“That’s how I felt, and all you had done was block me. I felt completely lost, weak, unable to stand on my own. I’ve never felt like that, not ever, and it scared the living hell out of me. What if something had happened to you and I couldn’t get to you because I couldn’t find you?”

Hero’s shoulders slumped and he turned in Hawk’s arms until he was sitting with his legs on either side of Hawk, his arms loosely around his neck as he gazed into his amber eyes.

“You weren’t the only one who felt that way, Hawk,” he said. “I’ve experienced heart ache, but what I did to you was worse. My heart was broken, my soul felt cracked and bleeding, my entire being drifting in some empty void. I didn’t realize just how much I need you to keep me grounded.” He absently began playing with a lock of Hero’s hair. “You say I’ve never been traumatized, and you’re right. But that was just as traumatic for me as it was for you. I can’t apologize enough.”

“You can try,” Hawk said with a sly grin. He leaned in and kissed him gently, moving slowly, savoring him. “Maybe later, though. I don’t want to stop this just yet.”

Hero nodded. “Fair.”

“There is something I want to ask you, though,” Hawk said. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I’m curious. I didn’t exactly catch all the details that day.”

Hero knew what Hawk was referring to and he sighed, averting his gaze, his fingers releasing Hawk’s hair and sliding to his shoulder. “It’s not exactly something I ever want to remember,” he said. “It fucked me up pretty badly.”

“I know. Like I said, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“I want to. It’s the only secret I have left, anyway.” He gazed off into the distance, gathering his thoughts and memories, his wave slowing as the sadness of what he had gone through drifted over him. “It was in college,” he finally said. “And he was my music theory professor.”

Hawk watched him as Hero’s eyes dimmed and he bit the corner of his lower lip.

“He was charming, funny, intelligent, sexy, knew all the right things to say and how to make me feel.” He looked back at Hawk. “You would have liked him.”

“Not funny.”

“He took me out to lunch or coffee sometimes, and we would have long conversations about music, life, philosophy, things like that. Deep conversations that made me see things in a new perspective. I fell in love with him, hard.” He shook his head. “He invited me to his house one day and told me he had fallen for me, too. That I meant everything to him and that we had a connection.” His chin began to tremble. “I was so stupid…”

He hesitated, his body shaking slightly. Hawk wrapped his arms tighter around him, surrounding him with a wave of energy.

“He was my first,” Hero said. “It hurt like hell, of course, but he was gentle and thoughtful. At least, at first. After that, it was like he was becoming more demanding, wanting more than I could give. I didn’t care, I just wanted to be with him. I loved him so I was willing to do anything to please him.

“No one knew, of course, they couldn’t. A teacher sleeping with his student is not something that was taken lightly. Elaine caught on pretty quickly, though. She tried to warn me away from him, telling me he wasn’t who I thought he was. I didn’t listen, I just ignored her, telling her to fuck off and mind her own business. For how chatty she can be, she’s also really good at keeping secrets. She never told anyone that she knew about us, not one single person. Now, I wish she had…I wish I’d listened…”

His hands began to shake and he clutched Hawk’s shirt as he swallowed back tears. “I went to his office one morning, needing to discuss my essay, an actual legitimate excuse to be there. He had an open door policy and it was never locked, something I had never really been comfortable with but he always assured me it was fine. I walked in on him fucking another student on his couch, a girl. He didn’t even bother to stop when he saw me. If anything, it excited him more. I dropped the paper and ran out of there as quickly as I could, my heart breaking.

“He brought me into that same office after class, apologizing, but it was so insincere, it made me sick. He gave up when he saw it wasn’t working, and confessed that I had never been the only one. I was just another toy to play with. He was about to dump me, anyway.” He snickered, rolling his eyes to the sky. “He was sleeping with three other people at the same time he was with me. Thank god we used condoms, right? What was worse, he was married and had kids.”

Hawk’s eyes widened. He wasn’t a stranger to this sort of thing, but the fact that it happened to Hero seemed to make a huge difference to him.

“He would wait till they were out of the house to bring one of us over to have some fun. He would tell us all the same things, take us to the same places, the whole bit. I’d never felt so used up and broken in my entire life. How I ever thought we could be together, I have no idea. 

“Elaine spent a long time at my side, trying to comfort me and bringing me out of my depression. When we graduated, she tried to convince me we should move back here. I wasn’t ready, though. There was so much other shit going on and I felt like I couldn’t leave yet. Finally, she told me that she wasn’t willing to watch me continue to suffer over some scumbag and I could either continue to wallow in my misery or move away with her. I didn’t argue; there was no point. It took me a long time to get over him, to get over the pain he caused me. If I hadn’t met you, if we hadn’t found our place in the Veil, I’d probably still be a miserable excuse of a human being.

“I don’t know everything about you, but I know in my soul you would never treat me that way.”

“Is that why you asked me not to sleep around anymore?”

“Partly,” Hero said. “And partly because I had already fallen in love with you by then and I wasn’t going to share you with anyone. You were mine even then.”

Hawk smiled softly, gently brushing hair from Hero’s eyes. “I’ve been yours since the beginning of time, Hero. Just as you’ve always been mine. It took a lot to get here but I’m not letting you go. Not ever.”

He placed his thumb and finger on Hero’s chin, dipping his head toward him, kissing him more gently than he realized he was capable of. Their first time hadn’t gone exactly the way they had planned, but it still left him wanting more. He wanted to take his time, to explore and to learn every inch and detail of Hero’s body. 

He also knew he had to let another chain fall. He had to share a part of him he had been terrified would frighten Hero, that would drive him away. But if they were going to be together, truly bound together as they should be, then Hero had to know everything. 

“What is it?” Hero asked, sensing the shift.

“You promised you’d trust me, right?”

“With everything.”

He swallowed and gazed out over the horizon. “I love you, Hero. No matter what I’ve done or who I’ve been before, I’m yours now. I belong to you and no one else. You literally hold my soul in your hands.”

A chink appeared in the second chain.

Hawk put his head to Hero’s and closed his eyes. “Say it again…”

Hero’s hands went to his neck. “I love you, Hawk.” He took Hawk’s lips with his own, moving slowly, the fire he held spreading into Hawk’s body, catching his breath and boiling his blood.

“Let’s go upstairs.”

-*-