Chapter Text
Though undoubtedly Norton's Point had seen all sorts of action since gaining a reputation as a hot spot for Coney Island's rougher element, the sight of a priest in full cassock shouting vulgar, drunken obscenities and stumbling after a smartly-dressed, sprightly young man—the latter laughing merrily as he practically danced his way down the pier—made for quite the unusual scene. There were no witnesses to this particular madness tonight, however; it was late enough that the swindlers had long since dispersed, leaving empty spaces where three-legged tables for skin games of thumblerig, chuck-a-luck and three card monte normally stood ready to draw in the gullible. Even the aggressively hospitable Bavarian lager house had stopped serving food to any lingering patrons, the smell of clam chowder no longer rendering more fetid odors palatable as the stench of decomposing garbage wafted over from the nearby dump whilst the remnants of fish guts left behind by untidy fishermen congealed on wooden planks.
"C'mere already, ya blasted fairy," the priest slurred, making another grab for the young man's waistcoat as he stood tauntingly within reach, smirking devilishly at the drunken man and twisting away again before the priest's hand could get a decent grip on the impeccably-tailored maroon and gold silk brocade. "Damn ye to hell!" the priest cursed, confounded by the ironic laugh that his words provoked.
Their little game of chase continued all along the pier as the priest rambled on confusedly about how he'd hardly even drank enough to be so terribly inebriated, baffled by his increasingly sluggish responses to the younger man's teasing. "What've ya done t'bewitch me so, ya infernal minx?!" the priest demanded, half-convinced that something supernatural was afoot. The young man only laughed at him again, though— positively sparkling in the man's blurry vision as his unearthly beauty continued to captivate the enthralled priest beyond all reason.
At the end of the pier there was nowhere left to run. The priest huffed out a sound of satisfaction as he pressed forward, effectively cornering the younger man as he used the predicament to his advantage, the little devil looking all the more appealing in his helplessness as he assumed a provocative posture against the wooden railing.
"So this is what ya want, is it?" the priest slurred as he crowded the younger man against the railing, reaching to grab him roughly by his thick head of dark brown hair and giving him a mean shake. The younger man's fiendish smile only stretched wider as his eyes narrowed, taking in the sweaty face of the frustrated older man as he hovered over him close enough to feel hot breath against his skin. The moment was charged not only with the presumption of sex, but with a danger of another kind that the priest was too distracted to perceive.
Dropping his voice to a raspy burr, the priest goaded, "Eh? Want me to take ya right 'ere, then? Gonna get on yer knees for me, boy? ...Or d'ya wanna feel the wrath of God someplace else?"
As the priest's other hand sneaked around to grope greedily at the younger man's decidedly pert ass, his quarry made no indication of being intimidated by such liberties. Like everything else the priest came at him with, he just seemed to eat it right up— as if every escalation only heightened his confounding amusement.
"Y'think that's funny?" the priest challenged, trying and failing to hide his scowl behind feigned superiority. "Well, now: we'll see who's laughing when I ram six inches of holy terror into this sinful little arse, won't we?"
"Six inches?" the younger man drolly repeated, his face lighting up in a way that gave the priest pause. "Oh, dear... do you really want that to be the last lie you tell before you're cast into the infernal pit? You do realize that during the final accounting, you're gonna have to answer for that one, too... Rather embarrassing, I'd imagine. But have it your way..."
"What're ya on about?" the priest huffed, his ruddy complexion scrunching into a look of confusion.
"Better say your last rites quick, father," the younger man coolly informed him. "Your days of sodomizing choir boys are well and truly over."
"Wha— ...how did you...?" the priest sputtered, losing his grip on the younger man as a sudden shock struck through him. Before he knew what was happening, the younger man ducked down and came up behind him in a flurry of motion that left him just as disoriented as the words the young man had imparted.
"Give my regards to the Prince of Darkness," the younger man lightly quipped before shoving the priest right over the side of the pier, easily toppling the larger man with surprising force. The sound of a startled yelp was followed by a splash, and the younger man folded his arms neatly against the railing as he leaned over to watch the priest thrashing about for a moment while he noisily gulped down seawater, before the strange lethargy overtaking his limbs won out. The last thing that the priest had seen was the sight of the younger man waggling his fingers at him in a dainty farewell as he watched him disappear below the surface, expelling the last of the air from his lungs in a gurgle of telltale bubbles before the dark water smoothed over as if he'd never been there at all.
For a moment the young man continued to lean casually against the railing, regarding the black water as it lapped softly at the barnacle-encrusted pilings before saying aloud, “I brought you some more company, dad.”
Somewhere down on that seafloor, the bones of one Howard Stark were strewn alongside those of the countless men that Antoni had led to their deaths. It was the young incubus' favorite graveyard, being that this was the very place where his dreaded mother had dispensed with his own father's life before discovering that she bore the doomed man's child. Antoni had begged her to tell him that story again and again when he was young, more curious about the human father he'd never known than was proper for one of his kind.
His kind.
Antoni was unlike most of his kind, as his stern mother never failed to remind him.
With a sigh, Antoni turned away to head back toward the peninsula. Considering what to do with the remainder of his evening, Antoni figured he could probably still find himself a pickpocket if he were so inclined; and devil knows that the saloon and casino were always chock full of damned souls at any hour... But instead he opted to linger along the moonlit shoreline with the skittering blue crabs, deciding that his quota had been met. Surely the Prince of Darkness would be pleased enough with what he'd delivered.
It wasn't until the grey light before dawn that Antoni's aimless wandering came to an abrupt halt. There, situated atop a secluded sand dune, he spotted his mother, Mara, standing in the sea mist— her long, black robe a hard contrast against the pale backdrop.
She was waiting for him, then.
Glancing down at his human garments, Antoni hoped he wouldn't be scolded again for preferring the earthbound folk’s flattering fashion sensibilities to that severe, overly formal style favored by beings of the demonic realm. As he made his approach, though, he was unsurprised to find that his mother had not lost her perpetually disapproving mien.
The mother and son performed a customary, if cold embrace as the incubus fledgling uncomfortably allowed the matronly succubus to examine his aura. As always, he knew what she would ask him before she spoke the familiar words.
"How many souls have you claimed since last we met?"
Suppressing a sigh at the continued formality, Antoni recounted them all by rote, telling his mother of the priest, and the countless drunkards and gamblers he'd made quick work of. Most were the typical variety of riff raff, the most interesting amongst them being a rich man who had made his fortune selling moldy beef and cheaply-made clothing to Civil War soldiers before happily retiring to more leisurely pursuits after the war had ended. His mother nodded along sagely, taking stock with the disaffected look of one who had seen it all before.
Mara had been something of a queen amongst succubi back in her day, offering up countless troves of corrupted souls for their insatiable Dark Lord before her advancing years had made her ready for motherhood. She had expected to bear a daughter when the time came, as was the usual way for the matrilineal, demonic clan of the succubi: mothers beget more succubi to further the reach of their Master, passing their knowledge of how best to exploit the corruption in men’s souls onto their young daughters as their own powers of seduction diminish with age. But when Mara's time to pass along her notorious mantle had come, she'd improbably given birth to a son... Her only offspring being male meant that her ancient lineage died with her, since incubi only begot more incubi through the impregnation of wayward women -- however, even this common fact was a moot point where Antoni was concerned...
“Are you not pleased?” Antoni asked, studying the harsh lines of his mother's once-beautiful face after he'd finished reciting his kill list.
“You have done well, Antoni, harvesting these souls for our Lord of Darkness," Mara formally acknowledged, before subtly shifting her tone to add, "—it is your attitude that discomfits me.”
"Do I not sound appropriately devout, mother?" Antoni deadpanned.
"You sound bored," Mara flatly retorted.
"...I am bored," Antoni admitted. At his mother's probing look, he sighed as he explained, “I tire of herding swine. They all start to taste the same, after a while; all these corrupted, filthy souls. My palate lacks variety!"
When his impassioned outburst only earned him an unimpressed stare, Antoni tried a different angle. Softening his tone, he entreated, "My formidable mother; with all your cleverness and beauty, surely you could've achieved greatness beyond merely... this," he frowned gesturing vaguely to the squalid city behind them. "Did you never hunger for something... more?"
Peering at her son with sharp eyes, Mara demanded, "Explain yourself."
Shuffling his feet in the sand for a beat, Antoni raised his eyes again once he'd worked up the nerve to insist, "You could sense it in my aura; you know that my powers grow greater by the day, mother; must I waste them guiding and tempting wicked mortals to their inevitable ends? Surely they’d find their way to the sewers of Hell without my influence...”
“When the wheat ripens, someone must harvest it," Mara sternly reminded him. "That is the way, Antoni.”
“But it’s such ugly work, mother!” he complained, getting increasingly resentful as he argued, “If the Lord of Darkness is so very fond of us, as you keep mentioning, then why does he make slaves of us? Why must he force us to toil like this day in and day out, when we both know that he could just as easily rise up from the infernal flames and slaughter a hundred wretched souls with the blink of an eye?!”
Her composure slipping, Mara's own eye began to twitch in the way that it often did when her son tried her patience. Tsking at him, she darkly intoned, “Your impertinence would astound me, Antoni— were it not yet another indication that you take after your father more than is proper for one of your kind.”
"So you've told me," he petulantly muttered. "You needn't remind me again."
"To the contrary: I shall remind you of your failings until you learn to overcome them," Mara snapped. "And as clever as you think you are, you have evidently forgotten what I've already imparted to you in your childhood lessons— though I shall remind you of this, too, so pay attention: a soul cannot be forced to join the Legions of Hell. Each one is given a choice that determines whether or not they'll fall into that pit. They can, however, be swayed, and so it is our task to push."
"And so we have done, countless times," Antoni bemoaned. "One after the other after the other. A ceaseless parade of boorish thugs and drunken buffoons, marching straight into the ever-gaping mouth of our Dark Lord. Surely even he must tire of their wretched flavor after so long."
There was a beat of silence that made Antoni think he had spoken too far out of turn, but when he lifted his eyes cautiously to his mother, he found her regarding him with a speculative sort of look.
"I believe I understand what troubles you."
"...You do?"
"You are not a child anymore, Antoni. For too long I've allowed you to follow in my own footsteps, but the time for playing games with wicked men has passed. Your powers have indeed grown, my son," Mara spoke with gravity, touching cool fingertips to Antoni's cheek as she considered the face looking back at her. "You've blossomed well. Now is the time for you to use your attractive prowess as it was meant to be used; to capture those souls that are most delectable to our Lord of Darkness: you must focus your attention on ensnaring the hearts of young ladies."
Reeling back from his mother's touch, Antoni's face formed a moue of distaste. "Oh, mother. Not this again."
"It is your true calling," Mara insisted. "Why must you be so contrarian?"
"I have tried, mother; you know that I have no appetite for them," Antoni complained.
"I fear that this is my own doing," Mara fretted, looking out to sea with an expression that never failed to make Antoni feel like a worthless disappointment. "I did not raise you properly. It was not my place to teach you. You ought to have been brought up by one of your own kind; instead I've taught you too much of the succubi's ways— I've confused your natural instincts."
"Mother, please—"
"It was my own want of a child that prevented me from sending you off to be tutored before it was too late; before you were already old enough to understand our ways... I should've sent you to your uncle Beelzebub when you were still small and impressionable. Now that I know better, I very much doubt that the occasional tutelage he offered you had been sufficient."
"I learned plenty from ol' Bubbie," Antoni murmured, earning a sharp look from his mother; she'd always found the diminutive moniker disrespectful.
"Perhaps I ought to summon him again," Mara considered aloud.
"Please don't," Antoni countered. Though his so-called "uncle" was a powerful demon in his own right -- a former incubus who had impressed the Prince of Darkness so greatly that he'd been appointed Lord of the Flies in his advanced years -- Beelzebub (or "Bubbie" as Antoni preferred to call him) was hardly likely to be able to change Antoni's mind. In fact, Antoni was quite sure he already knew exactly what the bald bastard would tell him: that he must stop wasting his time on the nastiest men he could find and fulfill his "true purpose," which of course meant turning his sights onto pretty young women.
"You have a talent for it, my boy!" Bubbie would say, eyeing him with a fervency that was downright malevolent as he slapped the younger man's back in that avuncular way of his. "Don't you see how the ladies fawn all over you? With a face like yours, and all of that charm— why, you've got them eating right out of your hand!"
Antoni was well aware of the effect he had on the fairer sex. Even so, it had always struck him as mind-numbingly effortless, seducing pretty virgins with pretenses of modesty; exploiting their secret fantasies as he'd learnt to, by entering their dreams as easy as you please and encouraging their hidden natures to emerge. He'd proven himself perfectly capable of it, sending a handful of young heiresses into a proper sexual hysteria after having his way with them (even notoriously inciting a full-on orgy in the garden at a debutante ball once). It might've been novel enough the first couple times, but Antoni soon found that exploiting the lust in such women's hearts brought him no particular joy.
It was the effect he had on the rougher sex that Antoni found more interesting. Men were funny creatures, the way they justified their sexual response to a being as mystifying as Antoni. Some were led astray as easily as a pig to a trough, while others gave in only in their darkest dreams. Of course, sex wasn't the only means of leading a soul down the path towards Hell; both the incubi and succubi had myriad ways of achieving their dark ends -- but it was certainly Antoni's weapon of choice; one which he wielded to masterful effect. The fact that he preferred to use it to ensnare men had made him a queer sort in the eyes of other demons, but having been born of a succubi mother, he had already been marked that way from birth. Wanting to rebel against the status quo seemed only natural to him.
"Indeed, mother, I have of late been considering the redirection of my focus— just not in that particular way -- I think I've a much better idea..."
Peering skeptically at her son, Mara drawled, "Dare I ask?"
"Just imagine: surely our Dark Lord would welcome the capture of a noble soul... One that were clean; free of that foul taint of sin, unshadowed by corruption?"
Antoni watched in confusion as his mother's face transformed into an expression he rarely saw from her: was she actually afraid?
"Be careful, son. You know not what you speak of."
"...Do you doubt me?" Antoni questioned, growing slightly indignant. "...You think I can't pull off such a feat?"
"You are young, Antoni—"
"You said yourself that my powers have grown strong!" Antoni vehemently interrupted. "Why shouldn't I test them??"
"Because you do not know the first thing about what goodness is!!" Mara shouted, startling her son with the force of her words.
"Well I want to know!" Antoni declared with a kind of mania in his eyes, raising his own voice even as he took a step backward, his hands becoming more expressive as his impassioned spiel escalated. "I want to find a saint and cut him down; corrupt him; make him cry and moan and beg; crush him beneath my foot and break him; make him abandon his pathetic God of Light and succumb to darkness!"
"Antoni, no!"
Ignoring his mother, he persisted, "I'm not afraid of holiness, mother— I spit on it! I've seen what evil the so-called 'men of the cloth' are capable of; I know how fallible all men are, and I want to prove it! Just imagine the look on uncle Bubbie's face when he learns that I delivered an actual saint to the mouth of Hell!"
"Son, I'm warning you -- you cannot persist in this deluded fantasy!" Mara harshly admonished, her expression fierce. "Vanity was your father's great sin -- it's what preceded his downfall; I'm telling you that downfall shall be yours, too, if you don't abandon this wild notion!"
"Why should I fear any human?" Antoni defiantly scowled. "They are nothing next to you or I!"
"You must keep away from the good ones," Mara solemnly contended, fixing a grave look on her son as she loomed over him from her higher vantage point, "—for they carry a power that rules the heart. A great power; one as mysterious as it is profound, and far beyond your naive understanding."
"Power? What power?" Antoni dismissively retorted, annoyed that his mother seemed to know something which he did not. Nobody had ever mentioned anything about such a power to him, before...
Mara's severe expression softened marginally as she intoned, "I speak of the power which they call 'love'."
Something in his mother's expression spooked Antoni, then; he took another step backward, only to slip on the slope of the dune behind him. He gasped as he fell and landed awkwardly in the sand, scrambling to prop himself up enough to glare up at his mother as if it were her fault before spitting out some of the sand that had gotten in his mouth.
"I'll do as I please!" he belligerently exclaimed before mulishly righting himself and swatting some of the sand off his fine clothing, then without a second look he sprinted off toward the ferry pier, hoping to catch the first steam train out of the depot before his mother could try to dissuade him further.
Mara stared after her son as she watched him flee, her long fingers held aloft to form an unholy gesture of devil-horns which she waved over her son's retreating form in a dark blessing, quietly incanting, "Oh Lord of Night, please forgive your foolish child. His ambitions may be great, but he still has so much to learn."
When Antoni's polished black Derby shoes stepped down onto the platform off his last railway connection, it was as if he'd entered some strange, new world. He'd never ventured so far upstate before...
Way out here in the open country, corrupt souls available to prey on were few and far between. The city made for prime hunting grounds for those of his ilk, but Antoni wasn't keen on potentially butting heads with any fellow demons by inadvertently infringing on another's territory. Demons were often feuding with one another, if not teaming up to work in concerted hoards; but for a misfit like Antoni, neither way suited him. He was more of a solitary creature, which was how he'd come to prefer the ever-expanding human development along the demonically underrated coast— a place where all sorts turned up in search of fun and games; a place where a man as wealthy, handsome and intelligent as the famous Howard Stark could fall prey to the charms of a cunning and mysterious lady before suddenly vanishing right off the face of the Earth, never to be seen or heard from again.
Antoni hadn't chosen the small hamlet of Miller's Crossing on account of its degenerate population, though. Quite the opposite, in fact: the area was known for its 'upright,' 'God-fearing' citizens; a friendly, wholesome place where nothing bad ever happens; where the people work hard and serve God and value their independence as much as they respect and honor their community. This wasn't the sort of place where harlots and sinister types lurked about on every other corner. There were no robberies or gang fights happening anywhere near these parts. Around here, a person would sooner try to feed and shelter a stranger than rob or molest them. This was the sort of place where people left their doors unlocked and the Sabbath was regularly observed— not even out of hum-drum routine, either, but out of genuine piety!
In short: this was just the sort of place Antoni's mother had warned him about when he was a child.
He could smell it as soon as he'd stepped off the train: people felt at ease here, unconcerned with class struggles or the sorts of wary, protective measures that city folk routinely employed when navigating their surroundings, and devoid also of that particular opportunistic, sybaritic thrum which characterized the Coney Island crowd. These humans moved like they were unhurried and smelled like they were well-fed— not on the luxurious, imported extravagances indulged in by the inhabitants of the Upper East Side, but on the hearty bounty of this very land; on home-cooked meals made out of a desire to nurture rather than out of want of a continued salary. It was a most disorienting environment for a young incubus like Antoni, who—despite being so very out of his own element—was nevertheless determined to endure. Surely if there was a living saint to be found anywhere, Antoni would find him here.
Given that the journey to Miller's Crossing had taken the better part of a day, upon arriving Antoni had spent the remaining daylight hours sniffing out the small settlement near the railway station. Apparently the sight of a well-dressed stranger was something of a novelty to these simple country folk; they were congenial enough, if not openly confused by Antoni's presence amongst them. He soon realized that his method of lingering about and quietly observing was peculiar in such small, intimate company, and found himself unable to maintain any measure of inconspicuousness. Around these parts, people made direct eye contact and readily exchanged pleasantries with anyone they encountered— there was simply no escaping it.
Before long, Antoni found himself being approached by a remarkably kind, plump woman of forty or so odd years, who—after checking that he hadn't misplaced any luggage—seemed overly concerned with whereabouts it was that he planned on retiring for the evening. He hardly knew how that was any of her business, though she was so plainly worried about him that he couldn't be curt with her. After she'd offered him a room in what appeared to be more of a family home than a proper inn, Antoni politely turned down the woman's generosity, easily lying about having 'business' to conduct elsewhere. Though she might've considered him rather young for a man of alleged importance, his excuse seemed to mollify the overly-charitable woman well enough. Thankfully she was not so nosy as to pry any further, merely assuring him that should he have need of it later on, the offer would still stand.
It was not lost on Antoni that he may well have encountered a veritable saint already, but the woman was not at all the type he'd had in mind for his great trophy. He was determined to have fun with his conquest, above all else— and that woman seemed to him more of a chore than an exciting challenge. So he continued onward, venturing out onto the open road in search of better prospects, all too glad to leave the small settlement and its discomfiting pleasantness behind him.
Night had fallen by the time that Antoni happened upon his first backcountry home. The little thatched-roof cottage was all aglow with warm light radiating from the leaded windowpanes, illuminating the well-tended rosebushes planted along the eastern wall. Antoni's heightened senses could smell their fragrant blooms all the way from where he stood on the road, mingled with the savory aroma of stew cooling in a stock pot that was drifting out into the night air along with the woodsmoke from the chimney. Beneath all of these scents the hungry incubus was searching for another: the precise flavors of the two souls who inhabited the cozy dwelling.
Being a demon meant that Antoni had no need of human necessities like food or sleep; in fact, to partake of human foodstuffs was strictly forbidden to demonkind, though Antoni had never quite understood the reasoning behind the prohibition... The only sustenance that demons required were the small tastes of the souls they fed on before consigning them over to the Prince of Darkness, whether by dispatching these straight to Hell—as was the modus operandi of the succubi—or by spoiling them with sin and thus securing them a future place in the Dark Prince's harem, which the incubi were best suited for. Antoni had dined on his fair share of souls via both methods, and found that he had a particular relish for those he was intent on murdering. He took after his mother in this way, to be sure; though he was also partial to toying with his meals beforehand in the manner that his uncle Beelzebub had taught him, finding them all the more succulent for harvest once they'd been suitably debauched.
Simply catching the scent of a soul was by no means a way of deriving actual nourishment, however; to partake of their sustenance, a demon needed to form a connection with his victim— to latch on to them and nurture whatever dark parts of their souls he could exploit most effectively. As he stood outside that cottage sniffing the air, it had been some time already since Antoni's last meal; even though the priest had made for quite the sinful feast for the young incubus, journeying to this faraway hamlet and enduring so much unprecedented wholesomeness and kindness since arriving had taken its toll, leaving Antoni rather queasy with hunger. It occurred to him that he didn't even know how long one of his kind might last without feeding; he'd never had cause to test such a thing before... In any case, for the first time since setting out on his great undertaking, a spike of doubt was needling at his stubborn resolve.
The pair of humans inside that cottage smelled soft and gentle; an elderly couple, happily married and content with their modest circumstances. Neither seemed amenable to the kind of dream inhabitation that incubi often employed in a pinch, since Antoni couldn't be certain that either of them dreamed of anything very interesting at all apart from vague impressions of their day-to-day lives. He sensed not a single thread of unfulfilled lust; no covetousness or festering resentments -- not even a hint of petty meanness whatsoever between them, which was downright disturbing... Was this what his mother meant to warn him about, when he was a child? —That there was no sustenance to be found amongst such simple folk; that a demon might perish of hunger if stranded in a place such as this?
Tamping down on these concerns, Antoni spat on the ground and bid good riddance to this devil-forsaken abode. How dull these people's lives must be, to live in such a state! It was a pity that dullness wasn't a sin— though after this troubling encounter, Antoni thought that it ought to be.
As the thin crescent of the moon waned higher in the starry sky, Antoni followed the road for miles before finally spotting the next dwelling. No lights could be seen in the windows of the farmhouse, indicating that its inhabitants had either already retired to their beds, or that the home was vacant. Antoni thought he smelled warm blood wafting over from the nearby barn, though, so he slunk closer to investigate.
Seeing through the darkness inside the old barn was no trouble at all for Antoni's demon eyes. Quietly he crept beside the livestock stalls, raising a challenging eyebrow at the dark-haired mare who had the audacity to nicker inquisitively at him. The horse just snorted softly in response before settling again, prompting a tiny smirk from the smug incubus. The ability to tame animals didn't come naturally to all demons; Antoni, however, already had quite the impressive repertoire of demonic talents at his young age, capable of putting most anything alive under his dazzling thrall, be it beast or man -- but only human souls were viable for feeding on, so he left the horses and cows alone.
There was another scent he'd picked up on as he'd entered the barn, thrumming beneath the dull pulse of the gathered livestock: somewhere high up the loft, young blood was pumping steadily through the healthy heart of a farmhand, fast asleep in the hay.
The lad was not the sort of quarry Antoni would ordinarily bother with, but he couldn't afford to be choosy tonight. He eagerly climbed up the wooden ladder to get a closer look at the sleeping boy, satisfied that he was old enough to have lost some of that irksome innocence that rendered most younger humans entirely inedible. Though the boy wasn't quite of age to be wed, he wasn't so young as to be unfamiliar with the lustful stirrings that oft besiege the postpubescent -- surely Antoni could find a sinful thought or two knocking about somewhere in that slumbering skull... All that he needed to tide him over was a little taste of sin before continuing along on his search for bigger game.
Finding a spot relatively free of the copious cobwebs that hung all about the hayloft, Antoni settled down as comfortably as he could manage before initiating the trance that allowed his own mind to slide unobtrusively into that of the young farmhand. Adjusting to the dreamscape as he reconnoitered its perimeter, Antoni was unsurprised to find the usual sort of drivel playing out before him: the boy seemed to be struggling to make a case for himself, trying to convince an authority figure that he hadn't made a mistake. Failure to take responsibility for one's misdeeds was not quite a sin in and of itself, but it often proved to be a serviceable back-door into parts of the soul where more compelling character defects could be found... Antoni was prepared to investigate this route further just before he overheard the boy's earnest argument that he hadn't, in fact, spoiled the batch of mortar he'd been tasked with mixing up, but had improved upon its flexible strength by adding a drizzle of linseed oil, which he insisted had not reduced the mixture's porosity in the slightest!
It was as if that back-door Antoni thought he'd located had firmly shut in his face. Drats. Apparently the boy's strength of conviction was better founded than the demon had given him credit for. But, ah— a know-it-all was another thing, entirely... If there was hubris lurking anywhere, Antoni would find it out...
The dream began to morph and shift as the farmhand's sleep became disturbed, causing him to toss and turn about in the hay the more that Antoni rifled around in his unconscious. The search for any indication of hubris came up empty, leaving Antoni teasing through all the insipid, small-minded boyhood aspirations he could dredge up looking for anything he might exploit. He was on the verge of giving up and abandoning the boy as a lost cause when he suddenly caught sight of the recollection of a pretty milkmaid by the name of Elizabeth Allan whom the young man had taken a liking to.
Thank Hell! Something useful, at last!
Antoni studied the memory just enough to get the gist of the roles, watching as the boy tried to work up the nerve to ask if he might escort the girl into town. Once he finally managed to make his approach, no sooner had the girl asked, "What is it, Peter?" that the boy was overcome with self-doubt, replying with some inane remark before retreating miserably to ruminate on his failings.
Pathetic as it was, there was nothing for it: Antoni was too famished to try elsewhere. Though it was hardly his typical sort of scene, Antoni didn't hesitate to take the form of the milkmaid as he refocused the dream into a new narrative, weaving in an undercurrent of intrigue to distract the boy from the shyness in his heart.
"Oh Peter? Is that you hiding over here?" Antoni teased in the girl's voice, taking on an overly demure posture as he made some last-minute adjustments to his costume; with a mere thought he managed to lower the neckline to his blouse and tighten the silhouette of his corset to better show off the ample bosom that he'd augmented to greater effect.
"Lizzy?" Peter squeaked, when he saw the pretty face Antoni wore peeking at him from around the corner of the barn. "Oh, um, hello!"
"I thought that was you," Antoni softly spoke, allowing a coy smile to spread through borrowed lips. "...I was hoping I'd find you here."
"...You were?" Peter replied, blinking owlishly at the pretty milkmaid as Antoni batted long eyelashes in a pretense of modesty.
In any other situation, Antoni might've prolonged the seduction routine, properly marinating his prey in a gluttonous excess of arousal, guilt, possessiveness, terror, and any other variety of seasonings to tenderize the soul to his liking before partaking of its succulence. In this particular instance, however, Antoni was too famished to bother with anything complicated. Besides: any nuance he might've employed seemed lost on this one, anyway -- Peter obviously required the blunt approach.
"Can you come with me?" Antoni tried, assuming an inviting expression as he caught Peter by the eyes, hooking him through the visual connection and taking a step backward as he bid the boy to follow along. "...There's something I want to show you in the barn..."
Peter gulped down his nervousness, but the hook held; with a distracted nod, he carefully reached out to touch light fingers to Antoni's outstretched hand, letting the demon guide him into the barn through the borrowed skin.
At the back of the barn, Antoni had constructed a private little nook in which an inviting, fluffy pile of hay was spread out in wait. He paused in front of the spot, turning to cast a coquettish look over his shoulder at Peter as he bit down on a plump feminine lip with sharp, pretty teeth.
The boy just blinked at him in plain confusion, awkwardly checking in a small voice, "...You... wanted to show me... some hay?"
Resisting the urge to roll his borrowed eyes, Antoni tamped down on his annoyance and smiled the most flirtatious smile he could muster, pretending as if Peter had just said something charmingly cute. "No, silly... come closer."
Though Peter looked about ready to bolt, he was brave enough to force himself to take a cautious step towards the seductress. He was holding himself so stiffly that even all the aphrodisiacal energy that Antoni was flooding the dream with wasn't loosening him up as it ought to... Frustrated by in ineffectiveness of his usual trick, Antoni attributed this to the fact that he was so damn peckish. Trying to speed things along, he reached out and gripped the boy by his shirt before shoving him backwards onto the pile of hay with more roughness than perhaps was fitting. Peter made a sound of surprise—likely not expecting his fair little milkmaid to have such demonic strength—but Antoni quickly distracted him by lifting his skirts and straddling the young farmhand before he could try to get away.
"Whoa, Lizzy, wha—" Peter tried to protest, before he was silenced with a dainty finger pressing against his mouth.
"Shhh... please, Peter; let me show you this," Antoni beseeched in a lusty plea, hiking his skirts up higher until he'd exposed the tops of creamy thighs above white stockings trimmed in blue ribbon.
"Oh, um, ah—" Peter babbled, wriggling nervously beneath his seducer. His stress response had ramped up considerably despite all of Antoni's attempts to mollify it, but beneath his fight-or-flight reflex was a growing arousal that Antoni was keen to latch onto.
"You think I'm pretty, don't you, Peter?" Antoni softly prompted, slowly rolling his hips against the lad's lap.
"Wha—? ...Y-yes, I, uh..."
"...I've seen how you look at me," Antoni breathed, simulating an overabundance of feminine lust.
"Y-you have?"
"I like it."
Not knowing how to reply to that, Peter just swallowed thickly as he gripped onto the hay beside him with tense fingers. Antoni let his small hands reach out to trail lightly down the boy's arms before wrapping long fingers around each of his wrists, coaxing him to lift his hands away from the hay until they were resting against the maid's exposed thighs.
"Touch me, Peter -- I want you to," Antoni begged, rolling his hips again as the dream-boy's arousal began to swell, mirroring the state that the actual dreamer was in. Antoni's own power was coursing through him more strongly now, as he started to feed off the response he was provoking.
Beneath him, Antoni watched as Peter licked his lips, tentatively allowing his hands to mold to the soft contours of the comely maid's body. Despite his arousal, the lad was being excessively polite about it. It vexed Antoni to witness such behavior in a dreamer, since usually by now his prey's hands would be all over him as the human tried to rut against the demon's dream-body like an animal in heat (which was exactly what they became under Antoni's influence). Peter's continued reticence baffled the young incubus, being that he was so accustomed to easily getting what he wanted out of humans -- what was this kid's problem??
Though Peter was hardly the first virgin that Antoni had ever debauched, he supposed that the boy's inexperience might be to blame, here; perhaps he really hadn't the first notion what to do with the milkmaid, now that she was clearly begging to be seen to... Taking pity on the kid, Antoni took one of his hands and guided it beneath the skirts, showing him what the boy was either too unconfident or too clueless to seek out on his own.
Peter made a strangled sound as soon as his fingers met with the hot, wet cunt, and to Antoni's own surprise, the dream immediately shattered. Back in the hayloft of the actual barn, Peter was crying out into his blanket as a climax overtook him.
Damn... damn!
The growl of frustration that Antoni had uttered startled Peter into groggy alertness. Blinking his eyes open, Peter went stock still as he took in the utterly stupefying vision of a young man dressed as a milkmaid seated atop him, straddling his waist and frowning down at him with a look of total contempt.
Blinking several more times in fast succession, Peter struggled to make sense of what, exactly, he was looking at. "...Am I dreaming?" he quietly asked aloud, warily regarding the scornful eyes of the nonsensical phantasm.
"I hope that was as disappointing for you as it was for me," Antoni groused, making the boy's eyes widen further before he reached down to flick Peter's forehead, sending him into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Antoni rolled off the unconscious farmhand before conjuring himself back into his preferred clothing, still stewing in annoyance. He hadn't meant for it to happen so quickly. Though the boy's orgasm offered him a modicum of nourishment, he hadn't fed long enough to sate the worst of his appetite yet; his intention had been to ride the boy for a sufficient duration, feeding off of his mounting agony as he exaggerated every sensation, turning the kid into a helpless wreck beneath him -- that, at least, would have provided enough energy for him to journey back to his former haunting grounds, should this place prove more of a challenge to him than he was prepared to take on...
Frowning down at the sleeping boy one last time, Antoni muttered a frustrated curse before descending the ladder. The only thing he could do now was continue onward, hoping to find the saintly man he'd been so intent on conquering -- though now that he was aware of the toll the journey had taken on his powers, the little needle of doubt he'd felt before was jabbing at him more insistently...
༻✴☾✴༺
Morning had broken over the countryside in a dazzling display of golden light and bustling wildlife, bringing with it renewed misgivings from the hungry incubus. Antoni was all out of sorts in this place. The people were different here—which of course had been the point of coming—but he'd not expected them to be so damnably decent all the way down to their heart of hearts... There was nothing special about any of them, from what he could discern; just common folk leading ordinary lives, as dull-minded as any of the humans he'd met before -- so why hadn't he even detected any of the typical, boring vices that he ordinarily turned up his nose at in lesser game? Even milking any usable lust out of that pathetic farmhand had been like drawing blood from a stone...
Conjuring a pair of ruby-lensed spectacles to shield his eyes from the oppressive daylight, Antoni indulged in a good sulk for several yards before straightening his back and pulling himself together. He was better than this. Better than this devil-forsaken place; better than its irritatingly respectable population. He was a ravenously attractive young demon in his prime; the son of Mara, Succubus Supreme— from whom he'd inherited great power and cunning, along with the striking features and sharp intellect of his late father, the famed Howard Stark; and— not that he was particularly thrilled about it, but Antoni was even the prospective heir-apparent to Beelzebub, the Lord of the Flies, himself! That had to count for something, dammit. What mere human could truly resist the influence of a creature such as he?
He'd capture his saint, soon enough. That soul was as good as his, already.
On a whim Antoni had decided to head off the main road when he'd spotted a smaller, well-trodden path leading in a direction that felt promising to him for some reason he couldn't articulate; some slant of light, perhaps, drawing his attention astray... Trusting the wayward instinct, Antoni followed the path as it wound alongside a dense grove of woodland for another mile or so before the terrain started to turn more hilly, taking him on an upward climb that paralleled the path of a mostly dry streambed before leveling out again. Thankfully there were more trees in this part of the country. Antoni appreciated the shade; even behind tinted spectacles, demon eyes saw much better in the dark than under the glare of a naked sun.
When at long last Antoni spotted the old stone church built in the center of a large clearing—it's towering belfry looming over the land with more stalwart functionality than ostentation—he thought his luck had finally turned. Surely this would be the place to find a real saint worthy of his undertaking... Though he was intimately familiar with the sorts of dark predilections that even clergymen (especially clergymen) were susceptible to, here in this country haven Antoni believed he stood a fine chance of finding one of those most tedious of clergymen that held themselves above such temptations; one whose ivory pedestal was in need of a thorough toppling...
With no small amount of glee, Antoni's gaze turned predatory as he stalked toward the church, scoping out the land as he tried to sniff out the sort of soul he felt convinced was lurking about somewhere. As he entered the church courtyard, however, his confidence faltered once he encountered a large stone cross on a raised dais.
There was a growl trapped in the back of Antoni's throat as he eyed the monolith, feeling as if it had been put there deliberately to offend him. Crucifixes, statuary of saints and angels, and other such religious trappings were of course repulsive to all of demonkind— it was an annoyance, to be sure; though one which could be circumvented easily enough... But for whatever reason Antoni was feeling distinctly uneasy as he side-stepped the weighty obstacle; an uneasiness which was only further aggravated the closer he came to the church, itself.
Despite the uniquely uncomfortable sensation, Antoni was determined to power through it. No hallowed ground or gaudy knickknacks had ever stopped him, before. Though he could not enter the actual church, he should at least be able to move about the grounds unhindered... Ignoring the intensely repellent vibrations that seemed to emanate from the stone edifice before him, Antoni set his jaw as he crept up to the open door, peering inside as he attempted to catch the scent of any occupants.
He wasn't getting anything. There was a possibility that, given his weakened state, the discomfort of standing so close to a church was distracting him. Taking a deep breath, he focused on his intention and tried again, averting his eyes from the basin of holy water that was too close for comfort, its unsubtle emanations making him rather nauseous. He was somewhat alarmed to find that his vision was swimming, making him feel as though he was inside of one of his own distorted dreamscapes instead of standing on firm ground -- when he reached out to steady himself against the stone wall outside the open doorway, the coolness of the unwelcoming stone was so cold that it burned, making him withdraw his hand with a pained gasp as a strange, blue light seemed to flash dangerously through his mind's eye. ...What sort of power was this, to affect him so??
"Are you alright there, sir?" a voice suddenly sounded behind him, startling Antoni into sharper awareness. He turned to find a stout, grey-haired woman regarding him with a concerned expression as he cradled his left hand, looking quite astonished.
Dropping his hand and affecting a more casual posture, Antoni attempted to recover himself. "Very well, thank you," he answered smoothly, suppressing his lingering queasiness. "Just admiring the construction."
The woman's face gave away her confusion, but she covered it with an easy politeness. "I see; you'll be a visitor, then? We don't get many of those all the way out here..."
"Just passing through," Antoni smiled with a small nod, eliciting more confusion from eyes too kind to pry.
"Well, you're most welcome," she smiled back. "Perhaps you'd like to come inside? I've come to pray for my dear sister, who's not been well of late."
"How unfortunate," Antoni replied, affecting a sympathetic moue.
"I'm hoping that she'll recover in time to come visit while the azaleas are in bloom," the woman confided— "we're both so fond of the flowering season..."
"Indeed, how lovely," Antoni suavely returned. "I was hoping to meet the minister, as it happens, but I can't seem to find him about..."
"Oh, well that'd be because it's Saturday," the woman helpfully supplied. "Father Coulson often enjoys long walks on Saturdays, to meditate in preparation for the Sunday service, you know."
"Is that so?"
"Oh yes, I'm sure he's somewhere about on one of his walks," she nodded, gesturing toward a winding path beyond the adjoining graveyard that led further up the hill. "Would you like to wait inside, where it's nice and cool? Who knows how long he'll be..."
"I think perhaps I'll go for a stroll myself," Antoni smiled, a spark of predatory glee lighting behind dark eyes as he nodded politely before moving in the direction the woman had indicated. "Good day..."
Though the church grounds were still radiating an effect that Antoni found almost as unaccountable as it was unpleasant, the incubus enjoyed a full-bodied sigh of relief as soon as he passed through the stone wall demarcating the bounds of the old graveyard. Contrary to popular belief, no church in all of existence could ever truly claim dominion over burial ground. A priest might invoke whatever powers he pleases to "sanctify" such lands, but the fact of the matter remains that death has no ruler. The only law that death abides by is its own. The graveyard, therefore, is the most neutral land on Earth; as welcome to the saintly as it is to the demonic; entirely indifferent to any conflict between either camp.
So it was that with a renewed spring in his step, Antoni headed off to hunt himself a backwoods pastor. It was very convenient for him that he wouldn't even have to wait for the man to exit the sanctity of his church; Father Coulson was already wandering somewhere out there like a wayward lamb— and Antoni was hungry as a wolf.
Following the path deeper into the woods, Antoni eventually came upon a wide meadow. It struck him as an uncommonly peaceful place; butterflies were fluttering about in the dappled sunlight and birdsong could be heard from the high branches of the sugar maples, but there was still no minister to be found. Though his sharp nose was ever alert, Antoni kept his eyes mostly to the ground as he crossed the meadow, following the desire path he'd spotted cutting across it at a slanted angle. There was no indication—either upon the too-fresh air or the inscrutable earth—that any clergyman had passed this way before him. He was fairly certain that he'd kept to the main path since leaving the church's courtyard, but having spotted what looked to be a half-dozen or so minor byways branching out in different directions along the way, he had no way of knowing if the minister favored any of those paths less-traveled-by...
To his continued dismay, he'd gone several paces into the woods beyond the meadow before losing sight of the trail, entirely. The ground here was covered in too many fallen leaves and criss-crossing branches to know precisely which way the trail led; so—after scanning the forest floor and wandering in what he imagined to most likely be the 'right way' for a time—Antoni had to concede that he was getting lost. There was nothing for him to do but turn back around, figuring he'd head back toward the meadow to follow the trail back to one of the other offshoots he'd seen earlier -- but after walking for longer than he should have without even encountering the meadow again, he realized that he must have taken a wrong turn someplace...
He tried not to let his rising frustration dampen his spirits. Hoping to emerge from the woods onto the wider path at some point, Antoni settled on a new direction that seemed promising and headed that way, peevishly wondering why on Earth anyone would choose to do this sort of thing for recreation. He could think of a hundred better ways to spend one's morning! (—though, admittedly, not many of his alternatives were suitable for country living...)
Optimism continuing to sour, Antoni had been in the midst of a particularly scathing mental diatribe against country folk and their idiotic ways when he heard it: a conspicuous sound, dull and resonant— repeating at irregular intervals... a hearty thwack ringing out across the wooded valley he'd wandered into, alerting him that something— almost certainly human— was nearby. After listening intently for a beat he determined that it was coming from somewhere lower down, not too far off from where he was stood knee-deep in cinnamon ferns.
Moving to investigate, Antoni followed the sounds as he awkwardly traipsed through the tangled underbrush, making a right mess of his fine clothing. He hoped that the sound would lead him to a proper road, at least, since he had no particular fondness for getting molested by nature. The lower he descended into the valley, the more dense the vegetation became -- he'd just emerged somewhat the worse for wear after getting swallowed up by a particularly nasty thicket when he heard a new sound intermingled with the first one; someone was whistling down below...
Antoni's eyes followed the sound down to where the trees parted, revealing a small cottage nestled at the foot of the hill. He could see smoke coming from the chimney, and a well-tended garden behind a crooked fence, and a line of freshly-laundered linens hung out to dry. More crucially, Antoni could see movement coming from somewhere on the far side of the home—partially obscured by the trees—so he crept closer for a better look at the whistling figure.
He recognized the tune as one popular amongst Union soldiers; a somewhat wistful melody, sung in recollection of a time gone past. He'd heard it sung in many a saloon after the war had ended, the moving lyricism tending to inspire reflective silence in otherwise robust crowds. Antoni supposed that anyone might know the tune by now; it wasn't necessarily a soldier down in that valley whose whistling he was audience to -- but as he rounded a shrubby cluster of birches, reaching out to steady himself against an obliging branch as he peered into the clearing, Antoni had no doubt that he'd just laid eyes on a natural-born fighter.
He'd never seen anything quite like him. The man was built strongly— perhaps stronger than any man Antoni had ever seen before— though for all that heaving musculature, he was no less ravishing to behold... The sight of his bare chest gleaming in the filtered sunlight was already sufficiently distracting— but when Antoni finally allowed his eyes to drift up long enough to get a proper look at the blond man's face, he was struck by features beauteous enough to rival even his own...
Still unaware of being watched, the man set a new log on the stump and moved gracefully into position, swinging his axe with an elegant kind of precision as he chopped wood as easily as if he were slicing a knife through butter. After tossing the last two cuts of wood onto a large pile, the uncommonly attractive man took a moment to adjust the set of his suspenders over bare shoulders, still unaware that he was being observed. Antoni was utterly transfixed by the sight of him even before he caught the man's heated scent on the air -- but once that scent hit his nose, all thoughts of tracking down the wandering minister were soon forgotten.
This was exactly the kind of man Antoni's mother had warned him about. His scent was intriguingly complex; sweet and strong-bodied, and teeming with emotional resonances that Antoni wasn't even familiar with. He could sense certain qualities well enough -- such as the fact that this man was very brave—heroic, even—and no stranger to combat. Despite his obvious competence, there wasn't the reek of overinflated pride or arrogance that was typically intermingled with such a commanding aroma; just the pure, unvarnished substance itself; bright, clean and clear as a summer's day.
Antoni had fed on a decent sampling of soldiers before, but this one was... different... from any of those he'd ever encountered -- In what way, precisely, he couldn't identify—it was more than just his lack of vanity—but some inexplicable peculiarity of the man's scent gave Antoni the impression that he was something quite unique, indeed... a rare and exotic treat, whose soul would be most delectable to the Prince of Darkness!
With hunger flaring up anew, Antoni covertly moved to a better vantage point and climbed up onto a wide, low tree branch that extended over the hillside, draping himself across the length of it like a cat so that he could watch as the man finished his task. Too soon, it seemed, there was no wood left to chop; the man wiped the back of his hand against his forehead as he surveyed his progress with a look of satisfaction, laying down his axe and moving toward a pail of water beside the house. He unwittingly made quite the spectacle of himself, then, as he squatted beside the pail to drink, cupping a hand in the cool water and bringing it to his lips before splashing more handfuls of it over his face, then giving his big arms and chest the same treatment. When he stood up to his full height again, the man efficiently sluiced the water off of his wet skin and smoothed back his cleanly-cut hair, looking refreshed and rather luminous— then promptly ruined the effect by reaching for the shirt he'd removed, turning his muscular back to his captive audience as he pushed his suspenders aside. What a shame, the incubus pouted as he watched the man re-dress himself, thinking that a man who looked that fine without his shirt on ought to be free to walk about like that all day long— modesty be damned.
Feeling uncharacteristically nervous about making his approach, Antoni stayed hidden even after the man had disappeared into the house, wondering how he ought to play this one. He didn't know enough about this man yet to gauge how receptive he'd be to the type of seduction he typically employed -- and given how depleted his reserves were, he wasn't certain that his powers would be able to lower the man's inhibitions effectively enough for a more aggressive strategy...
Before Antoni could consider his options further, the man suddenly reappeared with something stashed under one arm, having fetched whatever it was from the house before setting out along a path in the opposite direction.
Antoni couldn't let him out of his sight. He knew that he wanted this one, already. With an abundance of caution, the incubus followed after the man from a discreet distance, not intending to give himself away too soon. Though the man seemed for all the world to be out on a leisurely stroll, he still managed to outpace Antoni enough that the stealthy incubus was struggling to keep up with him as he stuck to the shadows, trying to make as little noise as possible as he kept track of his new quarry...
The man led Antoni up along the ridge high above the wooded valley, where at last he settled himself down in a shaded spot beneath a large maple tree. There were fewer places to hide up on the ridge, so Antoni kept to a discreet distance as he settled behind a large tree of his own to watch as the man unfolded what looked to be a notebook of some kind, before producing a stick of graphite from his pocket. Once he was comfortably situated, the man proceeded to sketch the view of the valley from the hilltop for a time, radiating an ease and quietude that Antoni's attentive senses could pick up on from his hiding place, though the man's face was mostly turned away from him. In profile that face was even more striking, Antoni observed whenever the man turned enough for him to catch a better glimpse; he was still marveling at the wonder of it, happening across such a stunning specimen of manhood all the way out here in this nowhere place.
Fortune, it seemed, was smiling upon him. He chose to interpret this as a sign from Satan, affirming that he was truly meant for greatness, after all.
After a time the man set his notebook aside and settled himself more comfortably, leaning back against the tree trunk in a way that suggested his eyes were closed. The incubus waited with baited breath until he felt the frequency of slumber in the air, making him tingle with excitement for being granted such a perfect opportunity; the dream realm was familiar turf to him, affording a distinct advantage over his prey -- he need only slip into the man's dream to find out anything he wished to know about him, while leaving him none the wiser...
Creeping over to the maple tree, Antoni was thrumming with eagerness as he sat down gingerly on the opposite side, positioning himself directly behind the slumbering soldier. He needn't ordinarily get so close to his target to use this particular gift— in some circumstances, an incubus could dreamwalk alongside their prey from a great distance, even -- but Antoni's powers were stretched thin enough that he felt no need to exert himself more than necessary. And if being in such close proximity to the attractive soldier gave him a unique thrill, well... that was merely an added boon.
Slipping into the man's dream was simple enough -- but once inside, the half-formed dreamscape that Antoni found himself mired in was not at all what he might've expected.
This place was... bleak, for one thing; full of an awful emptiness, the like of which Antoni had never encountered. He felt as though he'd been gutted, reeling back from the heavy emotional undercurrent that permeated the entire dream. Whatever lurked in this man's unconscious was quite the beast— though not any kind that Antoni was familiar with. It felt as permeating and as deeply-rooted as guilt, though it was lacking the heat of shame or the ponderousness of a heavy conscience. This was something more cold; more hollow... something whose silence was more unsettling than the constant howling he'd heard in many a troubled soul, before. There was great sorrow, here—that much was certain—but none of the indulgent self-pity that oft accompanied misery of this magnitude. Where regret ought to have been, there was stoic resignation in its place. If this man was guilty of anything, it certainly wasn't the sin of allowing one's pain to consume him -- if anything, this guy didn't surrender to his pain enough...
There was something there, Antoni realized— a thread he might follow, more promising than anything else he might rifle through in this desolate place. He seized on it, encouraging the dreamscape to show him more along those lines.
Dredging up the man's memories, Antoni was presented with multiple instances that were charged with the kinds of resonances he was after, but one of them stood out amongst the others: it was a memory that seemed set apart from the rest, as if it had been stowed away in the back of a cupboard, like the kept but forgotten bone of a beloved dog, now buried.
Intrigued, Antoni brought the memory up for his examination, finding that it contained the clearly-recalled face of a lovely young woman with dark hair and warm, brown eyes like his, smiling up at the soldier with happiness as she agreed to marry him.
There were too many emotions attached to this particular memory for Antoni to even begin to parse. He didn't enjoy feeling these things. He didn't like how the woman was looking at the man, or the tender way that he held her hand in his.
He didn't much care for her at all, if he was honest...
Married. Ugh.
It figured that such a man would have taken a wife. It didn't mean that Antoni's plans had changed -- he'd seduced plenty of 'married' men, before; this was an added challenge, to be sure, though not one that he was incapable of rising to...
Annoyed with this scene, Antoni abandoned it by reaching blindly into the man's adjacent memories, impatient to feel something different.
He realized too late that he wasn't quite prepared for the impact of the results that followed...
Relentlessness.
Tenacity.
Stubbornness like no other.
The impressions battered against the incubus' consciousness with blunt force, catching him completely off-guard with the strength of all that sheer conviction. It was all hard-headed grit-teeth and fighting stance; an immovability that was bone-deep and utterly unwilling to compromise.
What was this?
Why was this??
Antoni couldn't fathom why he was being bombarded with these feelings, or from whence they originated -- curious despite himself, he slid even deeper into the man's unconscious mind to try to connect these impressions to something he might make better sense of—
—and suddenly found that he'd landed right in the middle of a raging battle scene, already dressed in muddied uniform and holding a loaded musket as he blinked with perplexity at the mayhem unfolding all around him.
"Look alive, private!"
Antoni started at the command, turning toward the source of the voice— then in the next moment he was being thrown clear of the path of a fired cannonball and landing gawkily in a trench with a large body covering his, shielding him from the blast as dirt and rocks rained down on both of them, pelting the side of his face with stinging grit.
What in Satan's name—?!
Looking up with stunned eyes Antoni saw the man he'd been following was now costumed in officer's insignia and staring down at him with an intent expression, his broad hand landing on Antoni's shoulder and giving him a rousing shake.
"You're all right, son; just try not to stand in the way of anymore cannonballs, huh?"
Those blue eyes were unlike anything Antoni had ever been subjected to before, in dreams or otherwise.
Charming. The man was simply charming.
...How?
"...Time to snap out of it, private," the man insisted, his deep, authoritative voice just as compelling as those eyes of his. "We've got a battle to win."
When Antoni just continued to stare up at him like a besotted fool— still wondering how it was that he'd ended up dragged into the man's battlefield dream-play unwittingly, but not exactly complaining about it when the blue-eyed blond looked so good in uniform— the man looked concerned.
"You didn't hit your head, did you?" he asked, reaching behind Antoni's mussed and muddied hair to gently check for signs of injury.
At that Antoni let his eyes drift closed, reveling in all the lovely attentiveness as that big hand continued to softly pet at him. His lips had begun to curve into the shape of a seductive little smile when he opened heavy-lidded eyes to gaze up at the man, his voice a low purr as he greeted, "Why, hello there, soldier...... come here often?"
The man's eyes narrowed in plain confusion, looking down at Antoni like he didn't know what to make of him. It wasn't overt repulsion, at least, which was all the opening that Antoni needed to up the ante and tilt his head back into the palm still supporting it, exposing his neck as his smile stretched into something even more becoming. Unleashing his powers, Antoni allowed a haze of aphrodisiacal splendor to permeate the scene, watching closely for the tell-tale dilation of his victim's pupils—
—But too soon his little flirtation was rudely interrupted by another soldier calling out, "CAPTAIN ROGERS! WE CAN'T HOLD THE LINE!"
All the confusion on that handsome face fell away in an instant, replaced with the resolve of a born leader.
"TELL PINKERTON TO RETREAT!" the man—'Captain Rogers'—ordered, abandoning Antoni as he hurried off to deal with more urgent concerns.
Well, damn.
Even in the dreamworld, rejection could still sting.
Antoni sat up and watched from the dubious safety of his would-be love nest as the scene escalated, turning into something more bloody and violent than even his demonic sensibilities were accustomed to... He could still feel the captain's emotional resonances throughout the drama, as fear and tremendous responsibility for the lives of his men warred with a deep-seated need to keep fighting; don't give up; never surrender...
The brutal spectacle of it all was becoming rather unbearable as the chaos amplified beyond proportion, turning the scene into one of blood-drenched, absolute bedlam as an overwhelming sense of agonized futility started to prevail over the flagging determination to fight on, no matter the cost. It wrenched at Antoni, that feeling, snaring something within him that didn't want to be prodded into awareness at all, and that had to stop right now, thank you—
But just as Antoni was about to redirect the dream into a scene of his own design—one that was in desperate need of a lot less gore and a lot more seduction potential—his senses detected something foreign approaching— a scent on the air that didn't belong there...
Easing out of the dreamscape gently so as not to wake the slumbering captain, Antoni's eyes adjusted to true daylight as his ears picked up on the soft sound of approaching footfalls. He turned to see the figure of a woman making her way up the path, carrying a couple of empty pails in one hand and gathering her skirt higher in the other as she traipsed over a section of weathered boulders.
Blast! — Was that who he thought it was??!
Quickly scampering away before he could be spotted, Antoni retreated to his former hiding place to watch with wary eyes as the brown-haired beauty came closer, scanning the ridgeline until she recognized the person she had obviously come in search of.
There was an unfamiliar sensation curdling in Antoni's breast as he watched the woman approach the sleeping captain, peering down at him with concern as she saw the way that he flinched and rolled his head against the tree trunk, mumbling soft sounds of agitation. Antoni's own agitation became more pronounced as the woman knelt beside the man, reaching toward him as if she had a right to touch him...
That was indeed the same woman that Antoni had seen in the man's earlier memory. She wasn't quite so youthful anymore, but was still annoyingly pretty. Antoni disliked her at once. Though the incubus was hunkered down at too far a distance to make out what was being spoken, there was a certain pertness to the woman's voice that indicated a strong character, further evinced by the brightness of her eyes and the confident way that she carried herself -- Antoni worried at his bottom lip while he observed her from a distance, considering how a wife such as this might be difficult to surmount...
"Wake up, Steve," Peggy entreated, gently rousing him from his slumber.
"...Peg?"
"At ease, soldier," Peggy teased when Steve went rigid with alertness, as he often did when woken from one of his war dreams.
"I thought I'd find you up here," Peggy smiled, glancing down at the open notebook and tilting her head for a better view as she regarded the sketch appreciatively.
"It's so peaceful that I must've drifted off," Steve admitted with a bashful little laugh, sitting up straighter to stretch out his back.
Peggy looked up at him then, voice softening as she mentioned, "You didn't seem at peace when I roused you... Are you still having the nightmares?"
Of course she'd ask him about that. She'd always been unapologetically direct. Not meeting her eyes, Steve rubbed at his mouth and shrugged, murmuring, "Comes with the job."
He glanced up in time to notice Peggy pursing her lips in a way that meant she wasn't satisfied with his response. "The war is over, Steve. For most of us, that is; I do wish it were the same for you as well."
"And I wish you wouldn't worry about me so much," Steve warmly retorted, looking at her in a way he hoped was reassuring before folding up his notebook. "I came back. That's more than can be said of far too many others."
"Yes, and for that you know I'm immensely grateful," Peggy reminded him, straightening up from her crouch as Steve moved to stand. "Though I often suspect that some parts of you still haven't come back, yet."
Breathing out a deep sigh, Steve rested his hands on his hips and favored her with a critical look as he mentioned, "Did you really climb all the way up here to give me a hard time?"
Peggy's expression turned apologetic, smiling gently as she replied, "Actually I was hoping you might walk with me to fetch more water from the well; I brought an extra bucket for you to carry, if you'd be so kind."
"Still putting me to work, huh?" Steve teased, adjusting the fit of his suspenders over his shirt. "After I went ahead and chopped all that wood for you?"
"Yes, about that," Peggy dryly retorted, "—you do know that I'm perfectly capable of chopping my own wood, don't you? You needn't make such a spectacle of yourself all the time, especially not on my account... but if you insist on playing the man of the house while James is away, I'll leave you to it."
"I promised him that I'd look after you until he got back," Steve reminded her, unbothered by her pointless protests.
"Funny: I promised him the same thing," Peggy smirked, offering Steve one of the empty pails.
"...Tell you what— I'll carry both buckets myself if you'll hold on to my notebook for me," Steve suggested.
"See? This is precisely the kind of showing-off I was referring to," Peggy pointedly remarked, eyes sparkling with amusement. "But you're in luck: after lugging all that milk and eggs back from the Leeds' farm, I'm not about to argue. You eat even more than James does, you know— have I mentioned that, already?"
"Only a few dozen times now," Steve quipped.
As the pair headed off arm in arm in the direction of the well, making companionable conversation as they went, neither were privy to the fact that they were being followed.
Trailing them from a distance, Antoni stared daggers into the woman's back as he watched her make off with his prized soldier, soothing his ire by imagining all the wonderful ways that he might steal away the good captain once and for all.
Go ahead and laugh it up, lady, Antoni glowered as another musical little laugh bubbled out of the woman in response to something the man had confided. Enjoy him while you still have him -- he won't be yours for much longer...
One way or another, Antoni would make sure of it.
That soul was his.