Breaking the Rules...

      They were enemies. Worse than enemies. She was the leading warrior of the angelic forces while he was trained as the top general of the demon realm; both were stationed as the one to take the other down. It was that very responsibility that landed them in the present situation. Suspicion glittered through her silvery irises as she located no answer in the blood red colour of his. The lack of hostility crackling between them was unnatural, though it did suit his earlier behaviour. Her bottom lip became subject of abuse as she chewed it to keep her heart from getting excited. He looked bored, seemingly uninterested in the rules he had broken.
      After a few more minutes of silence, Amaranth could not restrain her tongue any longer.
      "Why did you save me?"
                                                            ~~~
      Her mission was simple, no different than most of the tasks she was given daily – guard the neutral territory, labelled "Earth", from the demon enemy. It was a common mission, either primary or unconsciously included, so it wasn't that Amaranth was unprepared for the battle that fell into her hands. But...
      She had not expected her enemy to be the one she was being trained to fight.
      Their blades clashed with an explosion of Radiance and Dark that shook the ground beneath them. Lightning split the sky, stopped by clouds of black mist that sharpened into spikes aimed to spill her blood. The angelic warrior held nothing back, even at the expense of the innocent environment around them; if she hesitated to protect anything but herself, her blood would become his.
      Assistance soon flooded the fields, a demon to match the angel guard, soldiers refusing to let a low class touch their key to victory. Amaranth and her target were isolated, continuing their chase for a life or death amidst the war around them.
      Her thoughts then lost the narrative. Both had retreated to the ground, wings in bad shape, the ground became unstable and then... darkness.
      And the distinct smell of cold rain and a pulse pressed against her face.
                                                            ~~~
      She repeated her question to the devil across from her, squaring her shoulders through the damning flush of her cheeks.
      He only shrugged, firelight glinting off the carmine hue of his bared shoulders. Amaranth glared into the blood crimson of his irises, terrified and drawn to the cold disinterest she saw there, but also perusing the physical details she failed to care about while fighting him. His hair was obsidian, though any smattering of light seemed to place twilight snowflakes within the spiky layout. There were horns peeking out of the black mop, both a penumbra shade of his hair, and with a small squiggle between the base and the tip, like two tildes from printed text. Amaranth refused to let her eyes wander down his near naked form, to trace the careful structure of his muscles right down to the indigo cloth that covered below his hips to his thighs...lest her embarrassment flush deeper still.
      "Azazel."
      Amaranth's eyes darted up to his lips, trying to process the sound that grazed her ears. Her lips let go of a confused gasp, earning her a fresh smirk from the mouth she fell victim to.
      "My name, Azazel."
      She didn't know what to make of this devil. He had so many chances to kill her, yet he chose to... Her fingers shivered against the mending bruises of her no longer broken ribs.
      "Amaranth" whispered from her lips; she barely heard the syllables over the breathless fear of her heart.  

                                                            ~~~
      This wasn't what Azazel had planned. At all. He figured his actions would draw out heaven's choice warrior, prepared to finally do away with their "real" defence once and for all.
      He'd suspected the warrior to be a woman, but actually clashing powers with her was still unlike thoughts of "like it matters". She moved like water, air, water in air, he couldn't determine while she slipped out of his clutches and almost tore his heart in two with violent strokes of her hand and the lightning that emblazoned her feminine dance. Fascination. The firecracker that continued to spark while the rest glittered away, she brought his heart into the battle, made him want to be the one to finally crush that taunting light before some lowlife took hold of her.
      He had been trying to kill her...
      Azazel knew her wings were exhausted, singed with his darkness and ready to lose their feathers should she dare to use them again. His were the same, but she was the one just ahead of the shattering, collapsing earth. He rushed forward to shove her towards her grave, hands to slam into her chest and ensure her descent.
      He still didn't know what happened. It felt like she'd grabbed onto him, thwarting his victory the way she'd done since their energies gnashed at the other's throat in search of blood. But that made no sense, not according to the burns on his skin. An angel's feathers were corrosive to their flesh, and the only way to receive the patterns now tattooed onto his back was for her to be his shield.
      But why?
      He wanted to kill her. It would have been easy. Unconscious. Struggling to breathe with glistening trails of crimson drooling from her temple and stains of indigo spreading over her torso.
                                                            ~~~
      Her hands were cold. Pain twitched along his cheekbone as her slender fingers, still soft in appearance in spite of the sparks that could jolt from them, caressed over his swollen ankle. He'd ignored any words that appeared after her name touched his ears, but that left him uncertain why she left her guarded position to test his injury. Light soon glowed from her limbs, the chill in her fingers being replaced by a tingling warmth that set his heart on edge.
      "You c—"
      "Don't worry." Her smile stabbed an unrefined arrowhead into his breastbone. Curved coral temptation. Not once did he believe her naive or too confident in her abilities, and the gentle tilt of her head, platinum blonde strands, dirtied from their tumble into the rifts of the earth, pattering against her ecru skin...
      He wanted to know what in all of hell was wrong with him.
      "They assign me to the battle front to keep me from developing my healing abilities." Azazel shivered underneath the heat spreading from her to him, struggling against his desire to let that energy spread.  "I can heal either side. It...worries my superiors."
      She was nothing like he'd imagined his enemy to be. Soft and gentle, and in a flash, could be fierce, almost deadly to any threat in her path. Her eyes were a lure he feared; clouded crystal he saw when their hearts cried for blood, yet now, in the calm, they carried a scraping of blue, like ice that carried no chill inside. Her chest still held onto the bandages he'd wrapped her in, and yet she hadn't asked him about it with her crystalline gaze. He wondered about that, about their compromised behaviour.
      About her...
      Her hands lightened their pressure on his achy, but no longer pained ankle; Azazel clutched at the ground to keep her from wondering why he needed to grab his chest as if his heart would leap straight out, and it felt like it would, but physical restraint prevailed.
      "Could you—" He glanced from the smooth arc of her exposed, cut shoulders, afraid eye contact would betray him, "—do that for my collarbone?"
      It seemed verbal restraints were not taking calls today.
      "S-Sure." The hesitation in her voice excited his nerves and muscles and organs in-between. She broke the rules anew, much like the throb of his unstable heartbeat. She was an angel; pity was part of the job description, he muttered into his ribs as she shuffled closer, dirt marking up her knees all the more, yet his ribs seemed to let the words go between their bars and not return.
      Amaranth...
      He knew she would have to lay her hands on his body to complete his request, and would need to come close to do so. He waited until the warmth began its spread. Noses stroked against the other, guiding the kiss to completion before she could test his name on her tongue.
      Seconds. Minutes. Who could be certain? They knew it was wrong, beyond misconduct and dared to leave them in the clutches of imprisonment.
     
      As fast as the moment came, it blinked into air still left between them.

      Amaranth slapped him, leaving a dark blotch on his naturally red skin. She fled back to her corner, clutching her arms over her breasts to shut her heart's panic up inside, while the taste of rain and saline danced alive on her lips. Azazel said nothing more, glazed crimson eyes watching her shoulders shake and tracing the hands that left their mark on his body.
     
      What have we done...? echoed through the closing fissure.