Blood Bonds: An Angel's Love

A/N: Hi 123, glad you liked the KvarLloyd fic^_^ If you have any other challenge requests, let me know. Hi ArtemisSensei, thank you for your review and support:D Long live Kratos x Lloyd. They look so wonderful in the new OVA, Kratos is sexy, Lloyd is hot, I'm such a fangirl...

/.../ are thoughts.


Chapter 3

“I’m slipping!” cried Lloyd, loosing his footing. Eyes wide, fear writhed in the black pits of his orbs. He felt his stomach sink beyond his body crashing down into the bottomless gully below. The thin silver chain wound around his neck Kratos gave him came undone, locket dangling on end plunging far beneath. “NOOO!” cried Lloyd, reaching helplessly with splayed hands, grasping empty air.

Suddenly, his entire weight hurled from the cliff edge, he spiraled down, screaming from bottom of his lungs, cry echoing off the vertical rock face, hollering with every ounce of strength his mortal fiber could bear, “KRATOS!”

/Know that he would always protect you, with wings unseen but there/, Kratos said, referring to Lloyd’s guardian angel in his nightmare with raining blood.

Lloyd’s life flashed before his very eyes, a mirage twisting in and out of reality in normal time and space. He wanted to journey with Genis on Collete’s journey of world regeneration. He wanted to give her a present, but greatest of all to tell the angel he treasured with all his heart and soul, “Kratos, I love you.”

/I don’t want to die! There’s so much I have left/, Lloyd wept inwardly.

The fear of death, mankind’s existential question if his soul exists after physical death sent so much terror through Lloyd, he passed out completely loosing all conscious. Yes, if he had to die, it would be better not feeling his body crushed alive on the cruel rocks below.

A brilliant stream of transparent blue light spilled out from some unknown point in space. From the source of effulgence, aqua light spiraled out in a dazzling display of ethereal color. White orbs of light circled about the glowing form like fireflies. The violet aura of this being suspended in space radiated godly power, gold sparkles bursting from his magical fairy like wings, showering all the land in radiance. Beating his wings gently, the sheer amount of light made his pale skin glow from the inside out as though illuminated. His narrow eyes glowed like living ruby that paved the streets of Heaven, divine fire burning in their clear bright pools. His dark auburn hair swept away by the wind revealed the entirety of his face.

“My son, Dad is here,” whispered Kratos tenderly, his musical base voice barely audible above rushing wind whipping Lloyd’s ears. “In an eternal existence that holds no meaning, which fate condemns me to live, you are everything.”

Kratos’s strong arms, made of flesh and blood, still human and warm reached out cradling his precious mortal son. His love healing the boy’s conscious trapped in fear, his mahogany eyes framed by dark lashes slowly fluttered open, reflecting Kratos’s luminescent image. Blinking, he murmured, “Am I…in heaven?”

“…Hmm, perhaps you are dreaming, Lloyd,” replied Kratos in hushed tones. Inclining his head, he placed a sweet kiss on Lloyd’s forehead, his lips tracing a path down to the tip of Lloyd’s nose, claiming his lips in a final searing kiss.

“I…am?” Shifting in Kratos’s grasp, Lloyd’s visage spun from the horizon to chasm below, unsure where dreams ended and reality in the collision of two worlds, one sleeping the other waking.

“I am sure when you awaken, you’ll come to understand.”

Senses overwhelmed, Lloyd buried his face in Kratos’s chest, his heart beating tenderly through his clothes against his son’s temple. His father kissed him, he yielded as he always did, and he lost himself in the fire kindled between them. Lloyd’s sleeves tightened as he raised his arms around Kratos’s neck, resting his head on his father’s supportive shoulder.

Laid on solid ground, back up on the cliff, Lloyd felt every curve and hallow of Kratos’s body above with agonizing sweetness. He raised himself from his son, allowing Lloyd to see the hard decision brewing in his eyes, glinting a deep wine red. His wings faded back into his fleshly form, resuming the guise of a physical human creature.

“You told me to trust my feelings, Kratos.” Lloyd touched a loosing blowing tendril of Kratos’s hair, brushing it behind his ear. “And I do, with all my heart.”

Tearing himself away the seraph sat up, clutching the locket he happened to catch. “If the same blood flowed in my veins as yours, would you still…trust it?” his last word trapped in his throat.

Holding his hand to his forehead, then chest, symbolizing the struggle between the head and heart, Lloyd asked, “Where are our feelings, but here?” He suspected for a long time something innate linked him to Kratos, familial bonds finally brought to light.

“…I understand, Lloyd. You will speak neither of our relationship, nor my wings to the others, is that clear?” His stern expression bore down, a command more than a question.

“Yes…” Fear rippled through the brunette haired boy’s youthful frame. The low hiss in Kratos’s voice told him the older man might brandish his sword, if Lloyd dare jeopardize his secret mission for Cruxis.

Hearing far beyond the average human’s range of hearing, the hum of insects in the plains below, travelers idling a mile away with the senses bestowed on angels, Kratos froze. “…They’re coming.” Standing up, his wavering glance flickered over to the trees right behind, regarding the Chosen’s entourage with coolness, nearly indifferent.

They made camp that night in lands bordering the barren Triet desert. The Ossa mountain range towered in jagged edges, cutting the diamond blanketed sky. Prairie grass shortened to arid vegetation and cacti. Soon only an endless sea of sand dunes would await them. From sparse small trees gathered, Lloyd’s group set up a fire ring rimmed with stones. Flames crackled, embers darted up extinguished, their half-life casting scintillating shadows around the travelers resting. Coyotes howled at the full moon some distance away. Kratos took the night watch to guard against marauding bandits and wild animals.

Lloyd’s wandering eye traced the contours of his father’s handsome profile, silhouetted against the moonlight, its silver aura a halo around his head and stars twinkling like jewels that adorned him.

Is that where you come from, up there in Heaven? Lloyd asked Kratos in his thoughts, his dreamy gaze lost in the starry sky above. Lloyd imagined the divine being with blue and violet wings radiating gold light ascending up to Heaven where Martel might dwell.

“You’re so…beautiful,” Lloyd’s breath escaped him.

The seraphim’s thin spiky hair fell in uneven layers about his face, ruffled slightly in the wind. His dark cape cut in two long coattails fluttered out behind, his posture tall and erect stood straight, his noble warrior’s gaze aware of his rough surroundings.

“So you really like him, Lloyd,” observed a young boy’s voice from behind.

“G-Genis!” Blushing fiercely, Lloyd stepped fully out of the firelight. Thankfully Colette and Raine sat far enough away not to hear. He shook his head, sighing regretfully. “It’s worse. I love him, and the same blood flows through us.”

Genis’s large stormy gray eyes widened, blue in their center. He laid a warm hand on Lloyd’s dangling arm. “H…how so?” he replied, his youthful voice mature beyond his years.

“He didn’t say, but I saw him looking at Mom’s grave outside Dirk’s house before.” Tears threatened to spill at the mention of his dear mother’s name. “Surely he must of known her.” He desperately searched Genis’s tender face. “Could you love your sister, in that…special way, knowing the same blood joined you?”

“My conscious would say it’s morally wrong. Almost all human societies universally detest incest. Nee-san would say its because the organisms at hand are subconsciously driven by natural selection to engage in genetic variation,” came his rather dry textbook explanation.

“…Uh…that means?” Lloyd shrugged, feeling stupid.

“Haha,” the prodigal boy laughed. His expression sober, he confessed, “But if my heart said yes, I couldn’t refuse.” Genis clasped Lloyd’s hands between his sympathetically.

“No matter what?” Lloyd squeezed back desperately, drawing the half elf closer.

Genis nodded, pulling him in a hug. “The more people would say its wrong, the more my heart would want it. Reverse psychology, that’s how the human mind works. I won’t tell anyone, I swear, Lloyd. Your secret’s safe with me.”

“I…I don’t know what I’d do without you, Genis.”

“What are best friends for?” Genis winked, smiling.

Returning the smile, almost forced, he tiptoed off under cover of dark. Sand lizards scurried past his boot steps. Kicking loose some tightly packed gravel beneath his feet, he spied Kratos in silent contemplation.

“Hey!” Lloyd called, running over.

Arms crossed, sword sheathed by his side, the seraph said nothing, his only reply his cape blowing out behind. Glancing at Lloyd, he commented, “Hmm, it seems you were discussing the morality of your feelings. You used your faculties of reason. That is very adult of you, Lloyd. I commend you for that.”

“Faculties? What the heck!? What’s with everyone being so intellectual tonight?” Lloyd muttered, frowning at his father.

Ignoring the prattle, Kratos’s visage fell on Lloyd, his solid demeanor unperturbed. “Did you not ask before, what’s heaven like up there?”

“H-how…did you read my thoughts?” He jumped back, fear racing through.

Sighing, Kratos lowered his head, arms still crossed, posture stiff as stone. “…I did no such thing,” he replied softly, his rich base soothing to Lloyd’s open ears. “You saw my wings, which I had not intended. You gazed up at the stars, wonderment deep in your eye. Naturally, you would ask that kind of question.”

Lloyd gasped at Kratos’s reasoning based on pure undeniable logic.

“…You wish to know, my boy, I will tell you.” Parental love brimmed in Kratos’s voice when he said ‘my boy.’ Traces of fatherly affection slipped through at times, though the seraph found his son undeniably attractive. “Crowds of soulless beings eons old wander through technological cities, who’ve forgotten how to laugh, cry, smile, or feel pain, answer their supreme master’s bidding.” He referred to Derris-Kharlan and Lord Yddraysil in place of Martel.

“Laugh? Cry? Smile? Were angels once…human?” Lloyd probed further, amazed at the depth of Kratos’s wisdom and knowledge. He’d never met anyone with such a vast encyclopedic knowing.

Kratos paused, pondering how to answer Lloyd’s question without betraying his secret mission for Cruxis. “…You could say, they evolved,” he inferred enigmatically, adding in lowered tones, “Martel sent me to protect the Chosen in her journey.”

“Kratos, if other angels don’t feel pain, why do you?” Lloyd questioned, weaving his fingers together around Kratos’s sculpted arm.

A rare expression of pain crossed the stoic seraph’s features.
“…You remind of some I lost, very dear. Angels…don’t die, humans do,” he murmured into the thick locks of Lloyd’s spiked hair, smelling fresh from the day’s hot sunshine. He lifted Lloyd’s hand up, kissing the back of it, he whispered intimately, “And it hurts me here…” Kratos pressed his free hand over his heart, seizing Lloyd’s wrist in his other. “Because in ways I shouldn’t…”

Lloyd melted in his startling ruby red gaze, mysterious and deep.

Grapping both his son’s wrists like a captor, his auburn strands bouncing in excitement, orange flecks alight in his eyes shinning through, he uttered soulfully, “…I love you, Lloyd.”

“…K…Kratos…” Lloyd lost his breath in his father’s iron hold, inhaling the scent of roses that lingered on him throughout the day from his stroll that morning outside Dirk’s garden. Senses intoxicated, his entire body tinged, his mind swam a dream within a dream too good to be real under the starry sky.

TBC