"How old is he, Ian?" Julian Hart, my once-lover and now friend, asks cautiously.

We're leaning against the low wooden rail that encircles the little training arena, watching my cousin introduce Sam to her two newest horses—Olive and Pits. Apparently, Olive is a sweetheart and Pits is...not.

Sam is entranced.

"Twenty-one," I say, answering his question.

"Jesus, Ian..."

"And also, like, four thousand or something," I add.

"What?"

He'll explain it," I say, shrugging. "You'll probably understand better than I do, anyway."

Julian watches Sam pet the horses, frowning slightly. "He's not human," he says at last, as though reaching a decision on the matter.

"He is, and he isn't," I agree. "Kind of like you, actually."

A reluctant smile twists his mouth. "Fair enough."

He turns towards me, studying my damaged face.

"I'm happy for you, Ian," he says. "Sorry you got hurt, but happy you found what you needed. You look...better. On the inside, I mean."

"Not on the outside, though, eh?" My laugh carries a hint of regret.

"The outside's not so bad," Julian says. "You're like a pirate—it's kinda sexy, matter of fact." He winks playfully and reaches over to gently trace the scars marring my face.

"Hey! No touching! That's mine!" Sam storms over, all puffed up with angry kitten vibes, and Julian backs away with a laugh.

"No worries, kid. I got my own. This one's all yours."

"I'm not a kid, fairy-boy," Sam retorts, and I sigh.

Sam had taken one look at Julian and decided to be a jealous little shit ("He's too pretty," he'd complained. "It shouldn't be allowed.").

Even after I'd assured him that Julian had only quite recently stopped hating my guts, and that his mate would happily eviscerate anyone that got too close, he'd maintained his unfriendly suspicions.

It was only after he'd met Dane Hunter that he'd realized he had no reason to be jealous—a fact I was both grateful for and a little offended by.

Still, he was fiercely territorial, and seemed frequently compelled to remind everyone just who, exactly, belonged to whom. Unfortunately, Julian thought it was cute, and provoked him on purpose now and then.

"'Fairy-boy?'" he repeats now, eyebrows raised. "That's rich, coming from you...demon-spawn."

Sam's dark eyes widen in surprise, and Julian laughs.

"So I'm right?" he asks, grinning.

We hadn't quite gotten around to the whole "Sam's a demon" thing just yet, but nothing stayed hidden from Julian for long.

When we take too long to answer, he grins and hits me lightly on the arm. "Shit, Ian. Looks like you've got your hands full with this one."

He has no idea.

~✬~

"Are you sure you'll be okay, driving all that way by yourself?" Sam asks, as Carlos prepares to depart in his rented car.

He's going home for a bit, to finish patching things up with Toni and arrange for a more permanent move.

"Should be," he says, fingering the amulet at his throat. "Actually, nothing's really bothered me since the death-bringer. It was so powerful, I think maybe it did something to me—made it so not every key fits my lock, so to speak."

"You're talking about your soul, right?" Sam asks, making a face.

Carlos flips him off, and I intervene before they can get too far into it. "You don't think it'll come back, do you? The death-bringer, I mean?"

He'd explained how he'd had the idea to use the death-mark after my heart had stopped the first time, in the Walkers' house. The mark had been tangled in the shreds of shirt Sam had used as bandages, and fallen out when Cass changed them. Gambling on the idea that I'd been basically dead for a moment, and that this would have severed the bond—if not satisfied the demon—he'd picked it up and offered the death-bringer a deal.

The life of Karinius Locke, enslaver of demons and breaker of countless spiritual laws, in exchange for letting me keep mine. The death-bringer had agreed, and in the end it had worked out rather well.

"It's a powerful demon, but it got it's deal," Carlos says now. "It won't come back. Unless you find another death-mark, that is."

"Are they, uh, very common?"

"Not really," Carlos says. "But I wouldn't buy a lot of weird stuff off eBay if I were you."

"Oh dang," I say with pretend disappointment. "There go my weekend plans."

A few minutes later, we watch as Carlos backs out of the short driveway and departs, at least for the moment, headed home. And at last, for the first time since we returned—since long before that, actually—we are really, truly, finally alone.

~✬~

It takes a while for things to really settle down, but once they do I begin to understand just how much it means to Sam to have a safe, stable home. Despite his demonic aplomb—which I was grateful he could fall back on when needed—he'd also been a human boy who'd suffered through some fucked-up shit and been deprived of a normal life.

Maybe he had centuries worth of memories, but there were still a lot of things he'd never done, never seen, and never been allowed to have.

Shortly after our return, I hire a lawyer to track down his mom and collect his (or at least Sam Asato's) legal documents and papers. With these in hand, he'll be able to get a job, take a high school equivalency exam, and—most importantly, at least in Sam's view—get a driver's license.

"You're a demon, with wings," I pointed out once. "What does it matter if you can drive?"

"It matters," was all he'd say.

Eventually, he wants to attend the nearby junior college and study horticulture, or flower-arranging or something. I guess some of Samasa's best memories are of 'Ainasyan love gardens,' and Sam wants to recreate them on earth. From his descriptions, I think some features are probably illegal, at least in this state, but he can cross that bridge when he comes to it.

Then there are all the little things—the things that break my heart, which I try my best not to let him see.

Best, or perhaps worst, of all is the way he loves my—now our—little house.

He goes from room to room, touching things, picking things up and setting them down, rearranging things at will. Because he can as he explains.

I bought him a phone, convincing him it's a late birthday present, and he uses it to take a million pictures of us. Then he has them printed out and framed, and puts them up all over the place.

"Just like a real family!" he says.

I don't have the heart to point out that most couples don't reach the 'framed family photo' phase after less than three months. Whether he knows this or not, he doesn't seem to care, and I realize I don't care either. No one had taken a picture of me in years, and I barely recognize myself in these. Not only because I'm patched and scarred, but because no matter where we are or what we're doing, I'm always looking at Sam, and I'm always smiling.

The more he learns and grows into his natural power, though, the more I worry he doesn't really understand the scope of his freedom, and that once he does, he won't be content with the limited sphere of my simple life. I mean, despite the occasional run-in with serial-killer uncles and murder-cult families, I'm a pretty boring guy. A guy who can turn into a bear, sure, but also a guy who thinks a fun weekend involves a trip to the hardware store and a few hours spent working on my truck. Not exactly busting up the party scene. I worry that, someday, Sam will realize this, spread his golden wings (maybe even literally), and fly off to bigger and better things.

I wouldn't try to stop him if he did, and the thought keeps me up at night more than I want to admit.

Another thing that keeps me up at night is Sam himself. I quickly learn that he's both tireless and endlessly inventive, and my other worry is that I won't be able to keep up with him for very long.

One night as he looks down at me from where he straddles my hips, my hands on his waist and his on my chest, both of us a little out of breath, he proposes something new.

"Will you let me, Ian?" he asks. "I know you like my demon shape, and...well, I want to try it."

I stare up at him, already feeling sweat prickle across my brow. 

I'd only bottomed once, when I was barely out of high school, and it had been a bad experience for me. It had hurt, it was the result of a string of bad decisions, and it left me feeling used and unloved in a way I'd internalized and that—I realized in retrospect—had affected my subsequent relationships in unhealthy ways.

Still, Sam was right. I liked his demon form, though not the way I loved his human one, and I was more than willing to try it on. It just felt like he was throwing new things at me a little too fast for me to catch.

"Sam, I...I trust you," I say, hearing the vulnerability in my own voice. "But, um..."

"You don't want to," he states, sounding hurt.

"No, it's not that. It's just..." I sigh and sit up. "Are you bored with me?"

"What? No! Why would you think that?" he demands, going still.

I sigh. "Well, it's like you never want to do the same thing twice. I'm worried I'm not enough for you."

He stares at me, and I'm alarmed to see that his eyes shine with the sparkle of sudden tears.

"You're more than enough for me," he says. "I just don't want you to get bored. That's all."

I reach up to touch his face. "Sweetheart, I wouldn't get bored if we did the same thing every time for the next fifty years. All you have to do is touch me. You know that."

"Yeah but...what if you get bored of me?"

I sit up all the way and he lifts himself off me. "What are you talking about, Sam? You know how much I love you." I lay my hand over his heart where he told me he could sometimes see our bond.

"I do," he nods. "It's just that...well...in my memories, Samasa had so many lovers, but none of them really wanted him to stick around after...you know."

"Did he want to stick around after 'you know?'" I ask.

He smiles sheepishly. "Not really. It was just food to him. You enjoy a meal and you move on. You don't hang around and make friends with the dirty dishes."

"What a romantic analogy," I say drily. "Lucky for both of us, you're not Samasa, and I very much do want you to stay. For as long as you can," I add quietly as I stroke his arms, shoulders to fingertips, feeling the velvety smoothness of his skin beneath my hands.

"What do you mean, 'as long as I can,'?" he asks, his face pinched with confusion and concern.

I shrug, taking his hands in mine. "You're not the only one with worries, babe. I'm one guy. Worse, I'm literally the first guy you happened to meet—like some kind of bad fairy-tale romance. I'm afraid that someday you'll realize that. You'll realize the world is yours, and...well, I—oof!"

The air rushes out of me as he pounces, tackling me into the pillows at my back.

"I will never let you go—never, never, never," he insists through rapidly lengthening teeth. 

If anyone else said that to me—especially if they were on top of me, growing rapidly heavier and making it impossible for me to move—I'd probably be a little alarmed. When Sam says it, though, I just feel relief.

"Well then, I guess I won't let you go either," I say, smiling into red eyes ringed in darkness, his suddenly long hair spilling in a silky black wave over my chest.

He looks down at me, still breathing hard, and I remember the way he'd first revealed himself to me, when he formed that little pact with me in my truck, pressing his lips to mine and forcing me to speak his name.

"Sam," I say now, touching his gold-skinned face, "I claim you, Sam, my little demon, my love. You're all mine, my sweet Sam, now and forever. But more than that..." I swallow, already feeling my heart beginning to accelerate in my chest. "I'm yours, and I always will be. That's my claim. Now, how 'bout you stake yours?"

He blinks, and then his pretty lips, bronze against the golden skin of his face, spread slowly in a dangerous, sharp-toothed grin. "Oh I'll stake it, alright," he laughs, and leans so he can kiss me, his mouth hot and sweet against mine. "I claim you, Ian Foley, now and forever: to love and to be loved, as my own—my heart, my life, my very soul."

And just like I'd known since the moment I first met him, when he'd looked up at me with those dark, innocent (or so I'd thought) eyes, I am completely, undeniably, and quite contentedly, fucked.

~ THE END ~

A/N: ♡〜٩(^▿^)۶〜♡ Thank you so much for reading! I hope you found Ian's story enjoyable. I think if I re-write it someday, I will try to develop Carlos's character more...I like him, but sometimes I was like, what the heck is he doing here? Anyway, thank you for reading, and please share your thoughts if you care to! Until next time... (◍•ᴗ•◍)♡ ✧*。