I sat in my room early in the morning, trying to ignore the heat and needles that covered me from James' presence next door. He had been there all night, not sleeping - I wasn't even sure he did anymore - just there. And so I had stayed too, osculating between enjoying and despising the feeling of him near, our connection that smoldered sometimes and burned me others, the current that was sometimes just a buzz, a vibration, and others a shake that made me grit my teeth like I was touching a live wire. But that wasn't the worst of it, that was nothing compared to the ice that touched my veins ever-so-often, so cold it almost felt the same as the fire. It had taken me a few times to even place it, to recognize it as cold.

I hadn't used my Sight, I didn't want to, or I did but I didn't let myself. It seemed an invasion, or too intimate. I feared he would somehow know, along with what I would see. So instead, I sat torturing myself, feeling him torture himself. Finally, I gave up and laid back, deciding to pretend to be asleep until I actually was. But then the headache started and I allowed myself to slip into the oncoming vision.

James sat at the end of his bed, leaning forward, his forearms resting on his knees. He looked straight ahead, his brow furrowed. Then his jaw tensed and he winced, just slightly, his hands shaking where they hung between his knees. I shivered as the familiar cold crept down my spine.

I stood watching him for a few minutes. It was like he was in a trance, or meditating, just staring ahead, a line between his eyebrows. Then it happened again, and he squeezed his eyes shut, clasping his hands to stop their tremor. Cold rushed down my body, and I hugged my arms around myself. I heard a soft rumble come from James, but it wasn't like his usual ones, this one wasn't angry or pleased, it was pained, more of a soft groan than a growl. When his eyes opened, he let go of his hands and stared forward again, preparing for the next.

I waited and watched and saw more, so many more, and I hated each one. Why couldn't he control his feral mind? And why could I feel the collar's punishments now? I never had before, back when we were closer, more connected. There was no reason it should be stronger now - unless our Fallen blood was directly linked to our connection and where before it had been his half connected to my half, now it was all of him connected to mine. But that would mean we were more joined now, and I didn't want to consider that.

I continued to watch, because there was nothing else I could do, and I felt the death-like cold creep over me each time, saw his reaction each time, the little movements that showed me he felt it, felt something that had made Malachi writhe screaming on the floor, that had made the old James collapse, his forehead pressed to the floorboards of the gym.

Now he just closed his eyes.

That alone was enough to make me feel sick to my stomach, but the vision didn't waver, didn't thin, and so I sat crosslegged on the floor before him, my chin in my hands, waiting for it to end. I already knew the purpose: he was still my Pair, and he was trying. He was suffering to do the right thing, just the same as he used to, just like I had wished he would.

He had been sitting here nearly all night, trying to direct his mind away from the bloody thoughts I assumed were commonplace for a Fallen. He had asked Abby to give him the means to train himself away from his nature. He had even been open with me about what he needed - I just hadn't believed him. And now my vision was the cherry on top, the exclamation point shouting that I was wrong, and that my distrust was hurting those around me.

Instincts be damned. I took the plunge.

"Fine!" I yelled at the phantom James' ceiling. "You win, now let me wake up!"

I sat bolt upright in my bed, gasping like I had been held underwater. I was cold, my muscles tensed, and everything hurt...but I knew why. James was hurting himself again.

I sprang up and marched across my room, throwing open the door, a few more strides and I was at his. I considered knocking, but only for a second. I opened his door and walked in.

"Stop whatever you think you're doing and take that damn collar off. You don't need it. I'll help you."

His beautiful, deep eyes looked tired. But other signs of his practice were apparent too - the slight shake of his hand as he tried to casually push his hair back, how it stayed there, slicked with sweat, his shirt stuck to his broad shoulders, a body so different from the last time he was at the Vault. He had to swallow hard before he could get a reply out.

"I don't want your pity. I can do this on my own."

His voice was rough, dry, and I hated it like I hated his dismissal. I turned, getting him a water from his bathroom sink and a clean towel. Being within arm's length of him still set off every alarm in my body, which clearly did not agree with the decision I had already made, but he took the glass and drained it, and accepted the towel, scrubbing at his face and hair. I sat next to him, waiting for him to say something. To make him concede, but also because I certainly didn't know what should come next.

"Being light seems a losing battle," he finally muttered, annoyance clear in his voice.

"Where are the good parts of you?"

"If I knew, would I be sitting here subjugating myself to this? As much as you don't want to hear it, I'm not holding the good hostage somewhere, I simply can't find it."

"But do you remember it being there after you came back? When you were a full Fallen?"

He nodded, a ledge in his cheek showing as he clenched his teeth, reaching for control of his emotions. I found the familiarity strangely comforting.

"Yes. I woke three days later in a box of stone veined with electrum, freezing, naked, and alone, but whole again, alive. That coffin used to be one of my father's favorite punishments. No power, no escape, no end, slowing losing track of time as you realized you were helpless, and that every comfort you had was only because he had allowed it. Knowing that he could leave you in there forever if he chose to. Nothing matters in that cold, dark place, you could be trapped for hours or days or weeks and it feels nearly the same. It was terrifying. I think I passed out from it, the fear, I don't fully remember. Then he was there and I was chained. I couldn't do anything. I couldn't reach my Shift, I couldn't fight him, I couldn't even move without him allowing it. And I didn't know why I was back, what I was, even then.

And then Ambriel arrived and I knew what was coming, how she would never tire, how I had to get out before you learned I was alive and foolishly came for me or made a deal. So I waited as long as I could, until she nearly broke me, then I broke myself instead, locking away what I hoped I would one day need, burying all my good to try to protect it. But I don't think it survived. Maybe because of...everything they did to me, or maybe it was simply a matter of time. Maybe anything light cannot last in a Fallen and it slowly withered and died wherever it was locked. Maybe I can't find it because it's not there anymore, just it's desiccated remains."

"Is that why your only desire now is revenge?"

He shrugged.

"I take what I'm owed. I take what's mine."

"That's worrisome considering you've said I'm yours," I tried to sound teasing, to lighten our conversation of souls and all he had lost to Ambriel and his father.

"What a villain you paint me to be." He replied just the same, pretending to be at the cross of hurt and offended, though his eyes sparkled.

"Can you blame me? You're Fallen - it's fate." I smirked back.

"No fate is so immovable that we cannot change it."

"I guess we'll see if you're right."

Our eyes met for a long moment, and I almost felt something, something beyond my instincts telling me to run.

"I have been so far. And revenge is my driver, but not my only desire."

The look he gave me made his other desires crystal clear.

"Is that supposed to ease my mind?"

"It's supposed to show you that I have considerable control over the monster you're so convinced I am. I have the same self-discipline, the same restraint I always have. Maybe more now."

He wasn't watching me anymore, and instead stared at the towel in his hands. But even before he spoke, I knew what he was going to do from the sinking feeling in my stomach.

"This is the best I can do."

His fists tightened, his fingers digging into the plush towel and his eyes squeezing shut. Now that I was closer, I saw the slight twitches in the muscles of his shoulder, his chest, as he tried to hold the feeling in, to not make a sound or movement. The cold swept over me and I felt it like icy water, stronger than in my vision, but I didn't shy away, I didn't curl in. I did the opposite. I reached out for James and as soon as my fingertips grazed the fabric of his shirt, I took half of the punishment, drawing the electricity and ice into myself.

I gasped, a strangled cry finding its way out even as my lungs locked and I couldn't move air in or out anymore. My body went ridged, the volts and ice the most horrendous mixture I could imagine. After another moment, it was over and the agony disappeared just as quickly as it had come on. I saw black bursts at the edges of my vision and my head felt light, my eyelids heavy. And then I was falling, though I was conscious, I thought, or mainly.

I opened eyes I didn't realize had closed and felt something hot against my cheek, something hard around my shoulders. The warm ground beneath me took a breath. Oh, Hell. I focused on where I was as my vision cleared and immediately saw James watching me, just a few inches away.

"Like I said, I don't need your help."

He uprighted me and unwound his arms, though he stayed close.

"Yes, you do. Even if your pride won't admit it - you've always needed me."

His mouth curved into a coy smile, his gaze shifting between my eyes and lips. "And you me?"

I straightened and pulled away further, clearing my throat.

"You're insufferable."

"You mean insatiable? That's the thing about royalty, we love to feast." He gave a suggestive smirk, or maybe all of his smiles seemed suggestive to me now.

I scoffed to break the intimacy of his eyes locked on mine. "And what makes you think you're royalty?"

He continued to watch me with dark eyes, that same little lift to his lips, as his tongue slid over his teeth.

"You're right. Irin are royalty in Heaven, which means we're something more on Earth. Gods - that's what we are here."

"Good to know your arrogance is still in tact."

"You see ego, I see soul."

His teasing grin was full-on cocky now.

I paused, wondering how to ask the question that had been haunting me ever since I learned he was alive, a Full, ever since we found him. I wondered if he would have an answer.

"Do you have a soul?"

He paused, then shrugged.

"Do you?"

My silence prompted him to continue.

"Does your brother? What about weaker blood? Kael or Chi? Do any of us? How much Angel blood can a soul survive? Maybe we all have one, maybe not, maybe Angels have something different but equivalent. I've never known, not even before I became...what I am now."

There was a strange emotion in his voice at the end, in his last words. He sounded almost disappointed in himself and it reminded me of the James I had known, of the shame and contempt he used to hold for himself, his desires and nature and past and the mistakes he had made in it. He wasn't smiling anymore, and his face looked different without the cover of his smirk.

I began to reach for him before I realized it and stopped myself, snatching my hand back. He tracked the stuttered motion and retreat, his dark, ocean eyes serious as they rose to search mine.

"You can touch me," he spoke softly, his chest filling and falling faster, deeper, though he remained otherwise unmoving.

I didn't move either. I stayed frozen, the same push and pull that I always felt around him stretching me in both directions, pulling me apart just as it had been doing for days. But then I didn't have to decide which to listen to or what to do. He did for me.

He reached down and took my hand in his. His skin still felt like fire to me. The touch sent quivering vibrations up my arm, almost like his newest power was leaking from him. Maybe that's where our current had always come from, why it had always felt like electricity to me. He placed my hand on his damp chest and covered it with his own.

"You don't need to be afraid of me," he still spoke soft, low and calm, but something in me fought to stay alert, not from fear, I didn't think he was a physical danger to me, but that didn't mean he wasn't dangerous.

"I'm not afraid, I'm just -"

"Keeping your distance. I know."

His words sounded like he understood, like he should be backing away and letting me keep the distance I was fighting so hard for - the distance I was using to protect myself from a Fallen wearing the face of the one I had loved and lost. But his actions so rarely matched his words, yet another reason for my caution. He was impossible to read, to know, really know. And that was scary. I couldn't tell what was real with him; who he was, what he wanted, how he felt. He looked familiar, he had the same memories even, but he was a stranger to me, to himself. He was something new, something even he didn't fully understand. But he was trying, I reminded myself for what seemed the tenth time since my vision.

He shocked me when he lifted my hand to his cheek and leaned his face into my palm, his eyes closing in peaceful bliss. I saw the muscles in his whole body relax as he breathed out. I liked seeing him so visibly soothed, and I liked being the one to make him feel that way. Which is why, without really considering what I was doing, I moved my hand behind his head and up his neck, letting my fingers wind through his midnight hair.

I watched him melt further into my touch. His shoulders loosening, his muscles relaxing. He sighed just quiet enough to not really be audible, to not be a growl or purr or groan, just a heavy breath. He nuzzled his head to the side, exposing his scarred and tattooed neck with his eyes still closed, and I thought of the trust it took to do something like that on instincts alone.

If he could trust me after everything he had been through, then the least I could do was try, even if I had to fake it for awhile. Maybe it would grow, maybe I could make it grow.

I slowly guided his head down into my lap and stroked his hair, letting it fall through my fingers before running my nails up his neck gently. My heart was thundering, but I continued in silence, trying for peace as I fought back painful memories and how much had changed, how much was broken. When he was completely eased against me, I ran the tips of my fingers over the edge of his tattooed collar that showed above Abby's.

"I hate this mark," I murmured.

His breathing was slow, and I didn't expect an answer, wondering if he was asleep - or whatever Fallen called their rest.

"Me too."