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In the evening hours she walked, a breeze of autumn kind weaving through the pink of her hair, that faint chill a crisp bite against her reddened cheeks. Across the dark blue sky, amongst the bruised and nightly colors, a faint red still bled through where the sun fell behind the city scene.
Attired in warmer garb, thick cotton and fur, a scarf the color of fallen leaves coiled around her neck, the cold had no hold of her. Alone she walked, for the people of the city had taken to their houses for warmth and for comfort, with but the sound of wind and birdsong to lend her their company. Ravens, a pair of them, hopped along, perching atop streetlamp after another, trilling their throaty call in tune with the absentminded humming of the girl they trailed. Yet normal ravens they were not, made of plush and string and button as they were. These things surmised their flesh, feathers a dull, darkened matte that would not sheen under the fading light. They would always match her steps, following the girl as a dog would its owner, yet never would they step near the house she called her own—the home of their old master, the house of two gods.
She carried cloth bags in her gloved hands, full and brimming with provisions to last her another week’s waning, yet the weight was naught an issue for her. She was to carry the world in those arms, hold it safe from the despair of things unnamed, and so no burden of the physical world could shake her legs.
When at last she made her final turn, and the ravens of no animal kind hopped their last before spreading wings of felt, the shadowed street gave way to a building with no compare. Darker than even the evening dark, brick upon brick of a hazy black, it stood in contempt of color—in contempt of light—in contempt of even daybreak itself, so devoid of life was the structure. Even in its age, rustic and beyond a mere number to herald its years, it stood unfading, never to die or wither away. Dark of make, so too was it massive. A towering thing, tall beyond sight—it stretched into the sky and further still, up towards the heavens that had birthed its dwellers, up again, nigh towards the night with which it shared its color. No mortal man’s architecture could account for its existence, so grand it was. A castle, a stronghold, a house of two gods. Among its brethren of concrete and steel, materials of a newer century, no person could contend its perplexing nature. And yet, no explanation for its existence would ever come. It simply stood as another curious artefact in a city already thick with questions unanswered—a place that confounded all who wandered within its bounds.
She reached the threshold of this strange house, set aside the bags she held, and unlocked the door. What little light the outside could spare died only a few paces in, a crawling pitch black as dark as the house itself swallowing the shape of the indoors. When she closed the door behind her, leaving the howling wind behind, it was the tranquil quiet of the space that welcomed her first. A click of a light switch, and the house revealed itself: black walnut, colored a light cocoa, laid in thin planks across the floor; walls of stone masonry, roughly tiled as if to resemble a cavern of some alien geometry; windows that reached to the ceiling and curtains drawn to hide from the pale eye of the moon things that were hers to keep.
The vestibule was tiled in marble, echoing the harsh clacks of her boots throughout. It was a small space, housing merely a mirror wardrobe and a cabinet of black walnut make—a gold-framed painting hung above, its surface already cracked and clouded with age. The frame nestled within itself a canvas of obsidian shade, two painted handprints its only touch of color: one petite, a rosy pink, the other of a similar size, purple, yet scored at the ends, where the paint thinned into tapering, faint streaks. She gazed upon it, shedding herself of the thick coat, and smiled.
After being rid of her coat, her scarf, and her shoes and gloves, she approached the cabinet—on top of which a single potted plant remained, thick leaves dangling off the edge as if to defy its housing. She drew open a drawer and returned her keys to it, exchanging them for another set.
With her bags once more in tow, she moved deeper still, deeper into the house. The air carried a faint scent of woodsmoke and old varnish, faintly sweet with tones of beeswax, a fragrance of warmth long spent yet never truly gone, even with time. The first floor was a quaint area, perhaps her second favorite, were she to be queried. Beyond the vestibule, it split in twain, divided by a marble-tiled pathway that led straight forwards—towards the stairwell. To her right, what spanned a fifth of the entire floor, was the living room. Along the far wall were windows, again, extending up as high as the room allowed. In the midst of them, between two great panes of glass, stood a mighty fireplace of rounder stone than the walls and it too reached the ceiling. An eternal fire flickered within, never to grow, never to wane. Another wall—the one opposite to the entrance—had upon it a large, flat-screen television which swallowed much of the stone behind it. Sofas and recliners occupied the rest of the space, encircled around a coffee table set upon a white fur carpet, its craft of dull marble. Lights dangled from the ceiling, crystal bulbs like rain held mid-fall—sunlight caught in the droplets.
To her left, where she was to go, first came the dining room—a thin, tapering space that paralleled the marble walkway, elegant yet strangely confined, its long table running the full length as though the room had grown around it. This table, black stone base and wood atop, held around it sixteen chairs—seven on each side, and one on both ends. Paintings adorned the wall, each confined within a gilt frame, no two alike in size or depiction, their subjects ranging from placid fields to nameless abstraction. Furthest down hung a single canvas of black, small enough to be fit in the palm—a work which she found herself drawn to most. Yet it was the central painting, a portrait of her image, that crowned the space. Set above the table’s heart, presiding over those who feasted, blessing them all in quiet benefaction. It was a peculiar painting; the hand that painted the eyes was not the one that shaped the mouth, nor the one that gave color to the skin—a mismatch of many a brush, all unified to bring her to life.
She moved past this area and further towards the kitchen. Marble tile covered the floor once again, gold inlay veined across the texturing. The kitchen was of wenge, the color of it a bitter chocolate, countertops and the aisle they surrounded topped with stone. Among more modern appliances, ovens and fridges of steel, stood others of an older craft. A wood-fired oven had been built to extend out of the wall, thick with the scent of bread and dusted with the remnants of embers and smoke. Many a night had it been lit, and many a night had the flames within seen dough rise until crisp and fluffy, cheese melted into a golden brown, and pizza come to life. A delightful little tradition, one to gather their make-believe kin for a night to be shared—shared by all but one, a seat thus far untaken.
…Soon.
A reminder it did strike within her, however, to prepare more sauce, that none might go wanting when next they gathered. After dinner, perhaps. She set about the kitchen, placing her bags by the fridge. Perishable things were stored away first: meat and dairy, fresh fruits and vegetables. Much of this had become routine for her, so often was it required of her to make errands. A steady rhythm guided her steps from one cabinet to another, humming some non-existent tune to match her pace. Soon it was that, in the silence, her little song came about a partner in the form of footsteps soft on wood. A figure rounded the kitchen corner when she turned, a thing of black and white—a thing of paper and nothing more. A doll adorned in black—a sweater, a skirt, knee-high socks pulled smooth, and a white collar framing her throat. Short curls of dim color crowned her head; a child fashioned of her lover’s soul. A short child this was, one whose head might rise no higher than the girl’s heart, were they to stand side by side.
The doll took a hesitant step further, hands drawn behind her back. “Willkommen zurück, Mutter,” she murmured, voice just present enough to break the hush.
“Thank you,” the girl replied, smiling upon the child, and placed bread within the pantry. “Have you eaten today?”
The doll nodded. Then, after a moment, “Aber ich hörte Kratzen von unten. Ich glaube, der Meister hat Hunger.”
The girl was not confounded by such a statement, but it left her with pause nonetheless. The loaf remained in her hand for but a second more before she gathered herself and set it down, a sigh slipping past her lips. “I know,” she said at length, her voice low, almost apologetic. “It’s later than I’d have liked. There was a line at the grocer’s—the mall was brimming with people again. The season always does that, I suppose.” She smiled again, small and faintly tired. “But I’m home now. I’ll make her something warm.”
The doll gave a slow nod, her blue eyes reflecting the amber of the hanging lights. “Sie ist unruhig,” she murmured, “seit der Dämmerung.”
“I’m sure she is,” the girl said, softening, wiping her hands on a cloth. “She gets restless late in the day. But it’s only hunger—nothing more.”
The doll hesitated, her weight shifting from one foot to the other. “Soll ich helfen, Mutter?”
The girl looked up from the counter, smiling wider this time—too kindly, perhaps. “No, little one. You’ve done enough for today. Go on now. Rest with the others.”
A short bow. “Wie Sie wünschen.”
And with that, the doll turned and left, her paper-thin steps fading down the hall until only the hum of the refrigerator remained. By her lonesome, it was but the only sound left to make home in the room; to the silence it too returned, gone unto the same oblivion to which errand thoughts wandered. For a moment more she remained, utterly and completely still as if some statuesque depiction of her likeness, accompanied by a simple worry. It was a regrettable thing to leave her lover hungering for longer than was right, and it pained the girl as much as it must have pained her lover, yet all was to be right—soon enough, soon enough.
The last of her supplies were promptly stowed away, a new haste to move her feet. Even amidst the quiet rustle of her hands at work—drawers sliding open, the thud of cans, plastic wrinkling, fabric against fabric—were she to prickle her ears and focus her mind, she could hear the sound.
scritchscritchscritch
Down, down, further below.
scritchscritchscritch
The raking of stone and wood.
scritchscritchscritch
Yes, it seemed to be true. Her lover, deep beneath the house, forced to claw at the foundations to make her agony known—begging, pleading not to be forgotten. The thought seized the girl’s chest in its despair. The tremor of those unseen hands could nigh be felt through the very marble itself. Of course she was agitated—nay, starving—nay, suffering, pained by a twisting stomach that had been denied meat far too long, all by the fault of the girl and her dereliction. This was an issue to be fixed, and thereafter compensated two-fold.
The girl knew already what she was to do. Her bags had been emptied, and thusly stored to a lower cabinet. From another she retrieved steel: a larger kitchen knife—a serrated thing with much of its bite already lost to use. After it had been placed upon the aisle—atop a wooden cutting board—she took to undressing. The woollen jumper was to be removed first, its warmth and softness to be missed, and then her shirt beneath, leaving the girl in but the fabric of her brassiere. Knife again in hand, she edged close to the kitchen aisle until the wood pressed against her side. A small bend at the knees brought her halfway down—neither standing nor crouched, an awkward stance that held her weight atop her toes. The edge of the counter met her armpit; from there, her arm slid onto the cutting board—her left arm, the very same that bore a red ring around the bicep, just below the shoulder. This mark was jagged and uneven; raised, frayed without fraying; an angry color that seemed fresher than the skin around it would have suggested—and to this mark she set her blade.
With but one breath and no hesitation, she pressed. The skin gave first, breaking in much the same way fabric did as it was torn apart, welling already with enough crimson to hide away her scar. A hiss rose next, the sound of water on a stove as the blade sunk deeper in. The metal was colored in dull red that might have been the blood, until it gave way to orange, and then yellow, and then white—burned by the divinity of her form. Then came the warmth, growing with every drop spilled from that wound down the curve of her bicep. Red had soaked through the grain of the cutting board, pooling, then dripping when it reached the edge.
drip, drip, drip
The air wrinkled her nose, a faint scent of copper that now permeated the room in one thick layer—strong to the senses, even if meagre in presence. It had a subtle sweetness underneath, of metallic or sugary kind she was not sure.
drip drip drip
The hiss had waned, and to this extent, given space to make the wet sounds of her work known. Low and splotchy, the meat in her arm squelched all but identically to raw beef or venison. In the end, meat was meat, its kind made no difference to a butcher and assuredly not to his cleaver—and a butcher’s boutique this was, by her very own hand. One of a closed loop: one customer, one merchant, one carcass. She was the purveyor and the product; the supplier and the supply; the shepherd and the lamb, one and the same.
dripdripdrip
It was, when the blade touched bone, that the fingers she had previously balled into a fist came loose, as did the rest. Her arm fell heavy, obedient to gravity, no longer hers. Something vital had snapped, rendering the limb nothing more than a weight to be carried. The pain ceased in tandem, if there ever had been any.
dripdripdrip
She worked and she worked, carving through marrow and flesh alike, a solemn sigh slipping past whenever the blade snagged in bone. Wedged it had become, stuck in some angled dent within the ivory, the metal caught without an angle to move. For a moment more she struggled with it, jimmying the knife this way and that, eliciting with every movement a cacophony of sounds: the crackle of frosted leaves under boot, and another more grating thing, like metal against coarse stone—but refuse to move it did. Indeed, it was stuck. She did not curse or yield, only hummed a little louder, the same forgotten tune she always found herself drawn to, and carried on with the task—working away as if this was to be some common Sunday feast. And perhaps it would have been, were the days to match.
dripdripdripdripdripdripdripdripdrip
Harder she pressed, harder and harder still, hoping to force the knife through whatever crevice had trapped it. The metal creaked and groaned like a terribly rusted gate against her bone, building and building in pressure, until something finally gave. Loud, very loud; a wet crackle, as though snapping a bundle of damp branches in twain. A stifled gasp pushed itself through gritted teeth, not of pain, but of satisfaction—the relief in cessation of exertion as the blade found its passage at last. Were the girl now to shift her shoulder, she would find her arm no longer following it. Only the mass of her triceps and other inane flesh kept the thing attached to her, yet only barely. These again were to be severed with ease, metal sinking through them like steak, until even the last vestiges of skin snapped away.
With her work at last finished, she started to her feet, finding the tiling beneath warm and slick, crimson soaking through the cotton of her socks. It was perhaps this sensation she found most bothersome, humorously so, as she stood currently with but a bleeding stump in place of her arm. But these were all to be dealt with. She gave an ample stretch to both legs and then her back, much to the gratitude of her knees, and subsequently let magic of a divine sort course through to her arm. Flesh bubbled at once, extending into shape like pink foam around the growing length of her humerus. Cartilage and sinew followed beneath in one congealed mass, coming to life with the frantic throbs of a still-twitching carcass, squelching like fresh fruit squeezed into pulp. Every bit of this growing arm writhed as if alive, contorting from one shape to another like a blood-filled skin-balloon being kneaded, flesh bulging under its own pressure. And then, at last, with the fingers set and the pink froth of liquid meat settling into the shape of skin, her arm was whole once more. The mark that rounded her bicep had now grown more jagged and uneven, more frayed than before, its color an angrier pink than even the muscle beneath.
She gave an experimental flex of her fingers, and found them to be no different than the last. Sensitive to the air, perhaps, and to the friction of them rubbing together, certainly, but a hand it was. She rolled her wrist, and her elbow, and even her shoulder—all moving as they ought to have. What remained, then, was her severed arm and the mess it had wrought. The cutting board was more crimson now than brown, as if its grain had been sourced from a rich mahogany, and beneath it sat a pool of similar color, staining the aisle in deep red and black. Much the same could be observed of the floor, more and more of the marble white disappearing beneath a puddle that grew with each steady drip drip drip of blood drizzling from the aisle. This always proved to be a rather messy affair, one to paint the interiors of her home with the hues of her own interior—a nuisance that could hardly be avoided without hassle, and one she had long since ceased to contest. A mop and water were a fool’s implements, and she had no need of them now. With but a flick of her wrist, a snap of her fingers, and an inkling of magic, the mess vanished without a trace to remember it by.
Now, she thought—or rather, knew—everything was ready. Dinner had been prepared, and what remained was for it to be delivered. She took the arm in both hands, carrying it as one would anything precious, cradling it close. It was a light thing, barely a weight upon her at all, but it was not her arm’s miniscule heft that proved a burden. No, the limb folded and bent at the joints as if it possessed a mind of its own—one that wished to wriggle out of her grasp. She held it tight to her chest, clutching it by the forearm to keep it steady. Despite all the blood that had already been drained, a warmth still lingered. It was pliant as well, and she was reminded of what it felt like to hold her brother in her arms when he was yet but a baby. Both things partly her.
The girl stepped out of the kitchen, making sure to keep the arm from marking her steps with a trail of crimson-colored droplets. This proved rather painless, as anything that still remained in those veins had clotted at the wound. Upon finding herself back in the main area, she walked the marble-tiled path towards the stairwell door. This wall, unlike so many others of the house, remained empty. The door followed a silent command, opening by itself in response to her will. An inky blackness welcomed her, one that latched to the walls as if a slimy moss. The room, if it could even be considered one, resembled at most a well. A descent down, into the oppressive darkness, was heralded only by a spiral staircase rounding the walls. Stone upon stone, and nothing more. She took a step in, and the door behind her closed.
With feet careful of the edge, she began her trek down. The sound of her feet padding against stone echoed into the pit, falling and falling into the depths, lost, akin to all light. To her sides, torches lined the way. One by one, as she neared them, they were lit aflame.
fwoosh!
Flickering flames came to life, burning in orange and yellow, casting upon the wall a doppelgänger of herself, its shape contorting and writhing against the rough stone. Step by step, she traversed down the length of the stairs, holding tight a piece of her that was no longer her. A simple warmth, born of the sconces, was little against the chill of this pit. Down, down, and down—down steps too many to count. Her home had many a floor to house many a thing, but only the lowest level held her lover.
At last, deep beneath the earth, she reached the end. Stone gave way to more stone, but the masonry here was of a more delicate craft. The walls seemed of the same rough texture as above, but it had been sanded to be gentler for the hands. Smooth slabs tiled the floor, set together with the measure of a king’s chessboard. Gold lined the divisions as if to trace a more deliberate kintsugi. The sconces here were already aflame, more than just mere torches—bronze statuettes of angels holding aloft candles, oxidized an almost luminescent turquoise. Yes, this place was her most treasured secret of all. It deserved more decor, yet she hadn’t the eye to place upon the room anything to truly honor it in the way she had the mind to. But, such things were not of importance in this moment. Decor was auxiliary. Her lover had never been swayed by the superficial, and would likely have waved her hand at the notion of being flattered in that way—even if, by all accounts, she deserved every bit of praise and more.
She reached the final door, the one to lead to her lover’s room. It was a simple wooden door, one she could already imagine to be riddled with scratch marks on the other side—as though the mere sound had not been enough proof of her negligence; so too must it be immortalized within these confines. But there was naught to fear, for wood could be mended anew.
Ah, what loathsome thoughts! Her lover continued in agony, yet the girl remained lost within the plains of her mind—led astray by things of no import. How careless.
With a shake of her head to clear it, she grasped the handle and turned it down, opening the door. Once more, a darkness strangled much of the space, thwarted only by a brittle lustre cast by the fireplace to her left—its ember crackling in the quiet. It was in that darkness that a lone figure sat, her form swallowed almost to its fullness by the shadows, only the dots of her eyes reflecting the flames to mark its presence. The girl stepped inside, pulling the door shut behind her, dissolving the outside light. It was in reflex that she swallowed the empty air filling her throat, watching the figure manoeuvre and shift where it remained—near the ground; watching, staring. The girl, with but a thought, cast flames upon the torches. These flames flickered once with the thrum of magic, then settled, bringing about light to the room that had seen little for the day. In this light, the figure became clear, revealing the shape of her lover—of a fallen angel—of Akemi Homura.
Homura stared intently, eyes wide, though not in fear—never in fear of her caretaker—and head angled a handful of degrees to the side. Her obsidian-dark hair flowed down the length of her back, spilling to the sides and draped across her shoulders and collar, frayed ends reaching the stone floor. Much of it had matted into errant strands, tangled and far removed from its usual perfection—no longer the singular, silken wave it ought to have been, but fractured into snarls and twists that spoke of hunger and clawing—but dirty it was not, at least.
Madoka stepped closer, arm held tight to her chest—the sight of which now brought her lover to attention.
Homura’s frame was slight, a body whittled down only to its essentials. The forearms were narrow enough that one could encircle them with thumb and forefinger, skin drawn fine over bone. Her ribs pressed faintly against her sides, pale lines of shadow beneath beneath the chest, rising and falling with every little breath. Yet her stomach held a strange fullness, not plump, not round, but merely present, as though the thinness elsewhere exaggerated its gentle swell. And her legs, though still slender, carried more shape than the rest of her—muscle clinging stubbornly to bone, seemingly where all fat and protein from her food had gone.
Oh, how thin she was becoming. Madoka would have to make dinner of her leg next—perhaps even both of them, were Homura to sink unto herself any further.
There was more, of course. Skin and bone and human things were not all she was made of. Homura’s fingers were blackened at the ends, torn open to push out even darker claws—and the same could be noted of her toes. These claws, curved as they were, extended out only a fourth knuckle’s worth and no more. But sharp they were, enough to gouge lines into wood and stone and even skin, were Madoka not careful. And above these small violences lay the evidence of a greater unmaking: the feathers. They sprouted along the line of her spine and shoulder-blades in uneven rows, some long, some stunted, all a soot-dark matte that drank the light. A few clung stubbornly to her collarbones or ribs, lying flat against the skin like wet leaves; others stood at odd angles, trembling with each breath she took. Small ones, barely different from scales, lined the curve of her cheekbones—growing, spreading into fuller ones to jut out of her temples. More lined her knuckles and wrists and the rest of her joints, coloring her skin with spots of charcoal against sickly white.
Madoka noted the dull color of them, the way they almost resembled withering flowers—moulting little things, frayed and brittle. Good, that was very good. Perhaps her lover was soon to be shed of them. And indeed, a few larger ones gathered in the corners of the room, a scatter of droplets marking the floor beside them—irregular and dried—as though the feathers had not fallen by nature’s course, but been clawed out. That, then, was not good. Perhaps Madoka would have to help her lover moult.
And then, the greatest of Homura’s inhumanities: the tail. When last she measured it, it had stretched close to two meters when coaxed straight, and she suspected no further growth since—but no shrinkage, either. It emerged narrow at the small of Homura’s back, no wider than a thigh, before swelling into a thicker, muscular span along its middle—big enough to eclipse even her hips—and tapering once more to a fine, sinuous point. A reptilian thing, smooth and dark as wet stone, it curled and uncurled with a mind of its own.
Madoka assured herself that these things happened in steps. Stripping Homura of her devilhood—of the beast she had unwillingly become—was not a task to be achieved within a day, or a moon, or perhaps even a year. To make them more one than separate could not be rushed, no matter the ecstasy such a thought incurred. Patience, she reminded herself, was the virtue required of divinity. Every change, no matter how small—the softening of a claw’s edge, the fading of a feather’s black—was proof that the world still answered her will. Homura would be safe, one day—truly safe. No worry would rise to trouble her, no grief would slip in to hollow her out again. As part of Madoka, there would be no battles left to wage, no wounds left to bear, nothing for her to fear or resist. Her mind would hold no room for sorrow when filled so completely with devotion; no space for darkness when suffused with pink upon pink. All she would require—indeed, all she would ever desire—was the ambrosia of her caretaker’s love to quiet every storm within her.
Madoka reached her lover, who had in turn scuttled closer. Homura’s clawed hands extended forward, like a child yearning for the bottle, gaze locked and hungering for the flesh that was soon to be hers. Madoka withheld it no longer, placing the arm upon her lover’s needy grasp.
Teeth, though what more resembled fangs, sunk into the bicep without even the slightest delay. Blood welled there, rivulets dribbling down Homura’s chin, all the way to the dip of her throat. The meat squelched beneath fang, wet and visceral in no manner of animal flesh. When she pulled away, the flesh caught in her teeth stretched, muscle fibers clinging desperately from bone to bite like pulled pork—until at last snapping away, leaving pinken strings hanging from her lips. Homura’s throat bobbed up and down when she swallowed, the mass moving down the length of her esophagus. The sight was beyond words, eliciting a delight without compare deep in Madoka’s core. She had savored nothing more in her life than this: the feeling of herself settle in Homura’s belly; grow there, spread there, break apart into the smallest pieces—protein, fat, minerals, vitamins—the building blocks of life coursing through her lover’s veins to be consumed and spent in the growth of her flesh. Oh, what a pleasure.
Homura bit more and more, stubborn skin peeling off with every piece she tore apart. Her hands were stained completely in crimson, and so too was much of her face. The blood glistened in the torchlight, splotchy and black where it clung thickest. She had all but consumed the upper arm: feasted on the bicep, rended the triceps, eviscerated the auxiliary muscle. Only the humerus remained, jutting out of the limb and slick with gore. Homura licked her lips once—managing not to clear them of blood but to smear the liquid further—before sealing her mouth around the ivory. She suckled out the marrow with rough, eager pulls as if nursing from a teat, breath huffing hot against the arm. The sound of it was so terribly, delightfully loud in the confines of the room—wet, rasping draws, accompanied by little growls of satisfaction as she worked at the bone for its sweetness. A scrap of gristle clung to the tip of the humerus; Homura gnawed at it for several seconds more, then moved on to the elbow, rending flesh from tendon with the efficiency of a predatory thing.
A faint euphoria, deeper than warmth but lighter than true intoxication, crept up the back of Madoka’s neck and fanned out along her scalp as she watched Homura’s jaw flex, watched the splinters of pale bone emerge from wet meat and clatter to the floor, saw with private satisfaction how bits of herself now adorned the other’s teeth and tongue. Every frenzied gulp and spasm of her lover’s throat was nothing short of utter devotion.
Madoka released a breath that had caught in her lungs too long, thumb running betwixt her fingers on instinct. It was always a curious experience, watching oneself be consumed. To be the fuel that drove another, was there a love more true? If there was, she wished deeply to find it—to shower upon her lover more than just simple flesh. Nothing short of everything could satisfy the indebtedness she had for Homura—for all that had been given. This life… it was perhaps selfish of her to treasure it so, but… an eternity was a long time, after all.
She wished to leave Homura to her meal, to give even a little peace before what was to come. And so, stepped aside to watch for any faults within the room. The stone beneath her feet was warm, warm to the extent of as if some living thing lay beneath the ground. This was, of course, of the simplest comforts that could be afforded for her lover—to cast upon the surface a heat to remind her of a warm body when there was none. Then, to the wall upon the left stood the fireplace, its flames held safe behind glass—eternally aflame and flickering, an ambiance she knew her lover to cherish. It was true—in memories past, in timelines no longer traversed, she could recall the times Homura spared for her: huddled together before dancing flames, fingers intertwined beneath wool as steam rose from mugs, the sweet chocolate leaving twin crescents above their smiles. It had been the first time they held hands as something just a little more than friends. Those moments… their number scarcely approached ten before her lover had taken to solitude—and then never had it happened again. But one day. One day they would sit by the fire again.
Ah, memories. Theirs was a habit of rolling in cascade, one after another. How unfair it was to be blessed by these fleeting things, drifting from her grasp like sand in the wind. Their first kiss… a memory to cherish, truly. It was but a fragment, second-hand and half-remembered, blurred by the passage of lives and deaths and rebirths under other skies. Yet Madoka could still taste the lip gloss atop her lips, faint as it was. They’d been behind school, sitting beneath the great big sakura tree as it blossomed a candied pink. Homura had been trembling, not for cold, not for hunger, but for fear—fear of wanting too much, fear of taking Madoka’s first, fear of not being good enough, or the fear of so many other things Madoka could never truly aspire a name to. But she had leaned in first despite it all, just a girl kissing the girl she loved. Of course, her glasses had gotten in the way—for which Homura had profusely apologized. But it had only made Madoka want to kiss her all the more. She wondered, now and then, if Homura still remembered how it felt, or if the memory had been scoured from her after so many years.
Homura paused, the arm’s hand twitching faintly as she clamped down on the wrist and worried the bone free. The crack of it, splintering under those monstrous jaws, sent a ripple up Madoka’s spine—almost ticklish, an echo in the nerves of her freshly grown limb. She watched the tendon snap back like a violin string. She watched her own pretty fingers pop off with barely a gulp.
Madoka drifted her hand along the polished mantle, trailing a line through the patina of warmth. The urge to tidy up those scatterings of black feathers, to bring order to the corners, drained out of her as quickly as it arrived. Let them pile as they would. The girl she loved was still clawing her way out of this darkness: a slow extrication, one lost feather at a time.
Along the back wall was a water trough. Its rim had been polished to a dull lustre by the frequency of… use, Madoka supposed. It was often full, or nearly so; she’d enchanted it once to refill itself whenever needed. Having her lover drink from such a thing inspired little dignity, but the bestial nature that so enveloped her allowed no other solution. Glasses and mugs were, unfortunately, tools too civilized for claws.
Then, at the corner of that back wall, on the side where the fireplace was closest, sat Homura’s nest—her bedding. It was far removed from the sleeping place of the average person, for it resembled nothing so much as a den rather than a bed—a broad, sunken mound of futons and mattresses compressed into one mass. Heavy fabrics of fur and wool lay draped across the topmost layer, their folds gathered and curled until the whole structure formed a shallow bowl shape. Pillows of every size and make littered the space: the outer ones firm, lined against its low walls; the inner ones soft and shapeless, collapsed from long use—handled roughly and with a certain kind of affection that left their forms forever altered. It was a fascinating sight indeed. Homura herself had arranged it, driven to this shape by some baser instinct. It resembled an animal’s nest, that much was true, but with a certain… human touch. Comfortable it was, that much Madoka knew. The times she had slept there, Homura held securely in her arms, was a number not insignificant. It almost beckoned her to stay—to spend her days here and never leave. But such was impossible, unfortunately. Someone had to take care of them all.
Next to the bedding was a scratching post, closely akin to a cat’s, though only greater in size. Much of the lower half of it had been torn to shreds, strands of frayed sisal jutting out like hair alive with static. Claw marks littered the upper half, deep gouges in the material where Homura had taken to when the rest hadn’t survived her needs. It would need fixing soon. That, or a replacement.
On the other side of the bedding stood something of a salt lick, a pale block carved smooth by her lover’s teeth. It rose from the stone, a smooth, pale monolith that glimmered faintly in the firelight. Homura sought it often, running tongue and claw alike across its surface, drawing from it the nutrients her diet lacked most. Sometimes she’d sit in front of it and stare deep into the pink mineral, utterly fascinated by something Madoka herself couldn’t see. What was within that stone, if anything?
There were toys as well, of course. Plushies, mostly, things of felt and fake fur shaped into animals. They inspired Homura’s more predatory instincts, being passable depictions of vulnerable prey to hunt. None had been spared from teeth nor claw, torn apart so thoroughly it was a wonder anything remained. The smaller ones—the lucky ones, at least—had their stuffing forcibly removed from their plush confines, tufts of wool littering the floor near the girl’s bedding like snow. The larger toys had survived, albeit maimed—limbs torn off and lost to hunger. Their fur bore damp, matted patches where Homura had gnawed and chewed at them—and it remained a surprise she hadn’t found the taste or texture of them off-putting. Only one toy had been spared from the carnage: a little plush doll of Madoka. One of the dolls had made it, and Madoka herself had seen it fit to be given to her lover. Now it lay in Homura’s den, nestled amongst the pillows.
Behind her, the chewing and crunching had finally come to an end. Her lover, at last sated, slouched and lolled her head, lax in the satiation of post-gluttony. Homura ran her tongue over the bowl of her palm, cleaning the mess Madoka anticipated would follow such a meal—though this effort was little more than symbolic, the entire lower half of her face streaked with gore. There was even a small clot dangling from her lip—lovely, in the way all of Homura's smallest indignities were lovely. Madoka approached then, and summoned a handkerchief to her hand, its fabric pink and spotted with hearts. She set herself down cross-legged on the stone, just in front of Homura, and took the girl’s chin in her hand. The blood beneath her fingers was slick, but she managed to hold Homura still long enough to clean her. It was a procedure the same as always: up the jawline, in gentle circles near the mouth, under the nose where droplets tended to collect. The fabric turned from pink to claret in a single pass.
“Messy girl,” she murmured, but it was all affection. She wondered, as always, what fraction of the joke Homura caught, how much lived beyond the reach of teeth and instinct.
Madoka ran the cloth along the line of her jaw, then up to the cheekbones, careful of the softened patches of growing feather. Once, she had made the mistake of brushing against the grain, and Homura had spent nearly two days picking at the spot, raw and unquiet, until it bled anew. And so, now, she worked with the grain with the softest pressure.
The blood on Homura’s hands was another matter. Each had soaked well past the knuckles, pooling at the webbing between finger and claw. Madoka thought to use the handkerchief, but instead set it aside and snapped her fingers. The crimson stains turned to blackened flakes before vanishing into the air.
The check-up came next.
Madoka drew Homura’s left hand into her lap, unfurling the fingers one by one. The claws were, in her judgment, no duller nor shorter than last week. The quicks were intact. No new cracks in the nails. She squeezed the knuckles, feeling the tiny crepitus of joints working themselves back into joint after the violence of the meal. Homura watched the process with flat curiosity, head listing to the side. The right hand was much the same.
Satisfied, Madoka took Homura’s chin once more in her hand. At a glance, the girl’s eyes seemed unchanged: the sclera clear, unreddened, a healthy white unmarred by strain. But a proper assessment required a closer look. With thumb and forefinger she eased the eyelids apart, drawing the eye wide. Homura, mercifully, kept still. She had not always; in earlier days she writhed at the slightest touch to the delicate skin around her eyes, flinching and twisting away as though the contact pained her. Now, at least, she had become accustomed to it. A point of light blossomed in the space between them—no larger than a candle’s flame, wavering faintly. Homura’s pupils reacted, contracting and blooming with each flicker. Only they did not narrow into a perfect circle, but into a thin, vertical slit, lizard-like. Expected, Madoka noted. She let the flame gutter and fade, then studied the iris. Magenta—no longer the stark red of her feral days, yet not the soft purple it should return to. Still, the shift was apparent. Progress, she told herself.
Madoka let go, then gave a few light scritches to the underside of Homura’s chin for exhibiting such good behavior. The girl’s eyes fluttered shut as she melted into the touch, hands already drawing a path across thigh and hip to rest at the small of Madoka’s back. At the first press of claw to her skin, Madoka—unfortunately—had to let go. They had time for this later, after she had inspected Homura more fully. She eased back, breaking the contact with reluctance, and Homura’s hands slipped away at once. The girl blinked up at her, pupils wide, the soft rumble in her throat tapering into silence. Her lips pressed into a faint pout, shoulders drawing inward as though the absence of touch were a sudden chill. She shifted in place, claws curling and uncurling where they sat atop her legs.
Madoka offered a quiet pat to her temple in apology. “Not yet,” she murmured. “In a moment.”
Homura’s tail thumped once against the stone, a slow, sulky rhythm, before she settled herself to wait. Her feathers, as Madoka had observed earlier, had about them a pale complexion. The color could no longer be described as the rich onyx, but as a dull, dark grayish tone. Some were brittle, the vanes frayed and without proper shape; others still held smooth, a waxy sheen caught in them under the firelight. Madoka swept aside one of Homura’s side locks, tucking the dark strand behind her ear to bare the curve of her cheekbone. The small line of feathers there—delicate things tracing upward toward her temple—showed nothing new. They remained sleek, untroubled, intact. These, it seemed, would be the last to moult.
The tail, then—already beginning to wind around Madoka’s waist in what could only be a protest at being denied further affection—was next. In all the time Homura had been hers to tend, it had never once shown a hint of change. No shift in color, no alteration of shape or length. It behaved as though it were a limb she had been born with, moving in a way that suggested its own small mind. Madoka expected as much; the tail remained the strongest remnant of Homura’s devilhood, the part that, in contempt of its origin, refused to be shed. Yet she still hoped that, when every other mark of that past life had fallen away, the tail might finally follow suit. And if it did not—if it proved too stubborn, too deeply rooted in flesh—then perhaps Madoka would have to sever it herself. The mere thought, even half-formed, ached like a bruise deep within the chest, but she did not look away from it. Love sometimes demanded pain, and the path back to humanity was seldom gentle.
She reached next to check Homura’s scalp, which was never an easy task. The girl had never cared for having her hair handled—save when it was being washed or brushed—making this particular inspection a hassle. It was manageable only because Homura, for all her ficklety, could be bribed into stillness. She was fond of touch, especially when she was the one to initiate it. Though, her claws made such affection… less than ideal. Madoka was not averse to pain, nor did she resent it—not when it was inflicted by her lover’s hands—but the aftermath was another matter entirely. When those claws tore into her back as they cuddled atop her lover’s bedding, it was not Homura who scrubbed the blood from the sheets.
There was, however, a certain workaround. As much as Homura liked to hold things, she loved pressing her face to them even more. She was much like a cat, in that way. That was to say, she was at her most content only when her cheeks were rubbing against whatever skin Madoka’s pajamas left bare—the backs of her hands, her face, and on occasion her stomach when the hem rode too high. Most of all, though, she adored burying herself against Madoka’s sternum. And so, to bribe her lover into compliance, Madoka cupped the back of Homura’s head and guided her gently downward, settling the girl against her chest. Homura melted there at once, and with her held so close and so still, Madoka had all the view she required of the dark roots beneath her hair.
Madoka parted the strands with care, letting the strands slip through her fingers. Her lover remained pliant against her chest, little more than a warm, breathing weight; a faint rumble trembled low in her throat, the contented sound she made only when her face was pressed precisely here. The claws, tucked against Madoka’s sides, flexed once in a half-dreaming gesture before going still. It was only when Madoka lifted another lock aside that she saw it.
Pink.
Faint as dawn behind storm clouds, pink was threading its way out of the darkness of her lover’s hair. Not the red of fevered hunger, not the pale white of regrowth—but her pink. The very same color crowning Madoka’s head. For a heartbeat she went still herself, hand hovering in Homura’s hair, breath caught somewhere between ecstasy and dread. All was quiet. Even the fire seemed astute of the situation and dimmed its flames in response. Homura had taken to the flesh that fueled her in a way Madoka had never suspected to be possible. She wanted unity, yes. She had prayed for it, worked for it, bled for it. But there, nestled at the center of Homura’s scalp, was not a sign of unity, but of assimilation. How thin was already the border between them? Had the edges between Kaname Madoka and Akemi Homura blurred to a shade neither pink nor purple?
Homura nuzzled deeper into her chest, oblivious, a soft huff of breath warming Madoka’s sternum. The tail curled loosely around her hip. Her lover knew nothing of the change—nothing of what already took hold within her.
Madoka exhaled at last, the sound of it shallow amongst even the silence. A strange numbness had taken root within her fingers, as if the blood had been drained of them completely, even as she held the girl closer—tighter. It mattered not that sharp claws pierced the delicate yield of her skin, tore through the fabric of her shirt, dug into the mass of her muscle and let blood well and drip down the length of her back in thick, hot rivulets. She was already inside Homura, deep within the confines of her flesh—so let her lover tear her asunder and make home of her flesh, split her ribs and crawl inside the cavern of her chest and become another passenger for the vessel of hope. It was impossible to quantify the fullness of such a thought. Where else would her lover find such safety? Such protection from the grief and despair of a world that had poured so much misery into her? Homura deserved to be happy.
Madoka’s head trembled just above her lover’s, cheek nestled in the crown of tangled hair, and for a moment she let herself hang precarious there, suspended, neither breathing out nor wholly breathing in. For a time she focused only on sensation. The slightly damp, animal warmth of Homura against her chest. The faint percussion of her own heartbeat, strange in its velocity and made stranger still by the offbeat echo that seemed to pulse through the other’s chest; two hearts, she thought, and if not that, then certainly some perfect twin. Beneath that pale skin, what lay there? Genes subsumed by hers? Under her thumb, Madoka could feel the new growth of hair at her lover’s nape—delicate yet undeniably coarse, and yes, again the pink, so subtle as to be almost transparent, but present nonetheless. This change, a thing to discolor the surface of her lover’s form, how deep did it run? The pink had taken to her roots as a sapling grew from soil, but how long had the seed remained beneath? Had it not been that she still thought herself keeper and not kept, Madoka might have considered the question a terrible one: was she saving Homura, or replacing her? Each evening, pressed in the delirium of their togetherness, she swore by the first—stood by it with every slice and stitch, every meal made—yet tonight, with the arm barely a memory and the pink a living testament, the second possibility loitered just under the gentle hum of her skull. How much of her lover was truly left, if any?
She pressed a thumb to the th-thump of Homura’s carotid, feeling the pulse reverberate across her bone. That warmth, was it hers? The blood she felt rush through vein, was it hers? The skin-to-skin they shared, was that, too, hers?
Homura licked at the seam of Madoka’s shirt through the fabric, the heat of her tongue shining through the cotton. The animal warmth of her face, pressed to Madoka’s breast, was its own kind of joy—a signal that whatever change was underway, however deep it might go, her lover still sought comfort in her, still needed the press of her skin and scent and the slow, measured hum she could offer. Madoka carded her fingers through the mess of her hair, thumb grazing the newly-sprung pink.
Was this not what she had wanted? To be woven into someone, to be made more than the boundary of her skin and what that skin contained? Hadn’t every self before this one been a rehearsal for the moment at hand? Madoka had lived a hundred spirals with Homura, a thousand tangled timelines drawn tight and then allowed to slack and fall apart; and in every life, at every ending, there had been this moment to look forward to: a union—a devastating union that could only be satiated by the mingling of blood. Had they not been their most one in death? In memory? When all that had been left of her was a cold, silent corpse and the image of herself made just a fraction clearer within her lover’s mind? She laughed, softly, because what else was left to do? The sound of it fluttered up through Homura’s hair, caught there until it faded into the feathery down.
What could be more whole than this? To be known, to be ingested, to be all that another required for sustenance? Madoka felt the trembling resolve of her purpose knit itself anew, latching like another limb onto her body, filling her hollows with the certainty that it was not vanity nor pride that made her do these things, but devotion—a love as absolute as a law of nature. She would inhabit Homura in this way as long as time allowed, or until one absorbed the other in finality, content that their border had at least blurred in the trying. She let her lover rest against her, stroking the hair at her nape slow and steady, counting each thread of pink as it curled up from the roots to be caught in her hand. There would be more tomorrow, and more the next day, she knew—this was a process, not a miracle. She need only feed and tend and love enough, and in time, the balance might even itself out, find its own shape. Madoka pressed her lips to the top of Homura’s head, an old instinct, and breathed in the scent—copper and sweat and the faintest trace of vanilla from her own shampoo. The appointment over, she let herself slacken, let the silence creep back into every corner of the room. Homura’s breathing slowed, shoulders dipping with each exhale, and the grip around Madoka’s waist loosened as the beast of hunger was, for now, at rest.
Yes.
This was good.
If it was selfish to want her lover to be hers all the way to the roots, then so be it. She would rather be selfish than untrue.
The unity of two gods was a beautiful thing.