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The day had been endless.
Not in hours—those had passed the same as they always did, sixty minutes at a time, relentless and indifferent—but in weight. Every conversation had carried an undercurrent of something unsaid. Every decision had sprouted three more questions behind it. Perpetua had spent the morning reviewing budget allocations with Sister Imperator, the afternoon mediating a dispute between two choir members that had apparently been simmering for weeks before either of them thought to mention it, and the early evening writing three separate letters to clergy members who expected responses within the week.
Now it was nearly nine, and his brain refused to stop spinning.
The day replayed in fragments. That pause before Imperator had agreed to his proposal—had it been hesitation, or had she simply been thinking? The way Brother Marcus had looked at the floor instead of meeting his eyes during their conversation about the upcoming tour schedule. The third letter, the one to Bishop Laurent, which he'd rewritten twice because the tone never came out quite right. Too formal. Too familiar. Too something.
His cassock hung in the wardrobe now, replaced by a simple black sweater and soft trousers. The formality of the day shed, but not the tension. That clung to his shoulders like damp wool.
Perpetua sat on the edge of his bed and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes until phosphenes bloomed in the darkness. His room was quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that left space for his thoughts to ricochet off the walls and come back louder.
He needed to stop. Just for an hour. Just long enough that the tightness behind his sternum loosened its grip and let him breathe without feeling every rib protest.
Mountain.
The thought surfaced without ceremony. Of course. Mountain would be in his room at this hour, or perhaps still in the greenhouse—no, it was late enough that the earth ghoul would have retreated indoors. Perpetua stood before he could talk himself out of it, pulled on a pair of house slippers, and slipped into the corridor.
The Ministry at night was a different creature. During the day, the hallways hummed with activity—Siblings of Sin hurrying to their duties, doors opening and closing, voices carrying through the stone passages. Now the corridors lay still, lit by the warm glow of sconces spaced at intervals along the walls. Perpetua's footsteps made almost no sound. He'd learned years ago how to move quietly through these halls, a habit born of not wanting to disturb anyone, not wanting to be a burden.
Mountain's room was on the lower level, near the greenhouse access. The earth ghoul preferred to be close to his plants, close to the soil, close to the things that grounded him. Perpetua descended the spiral staircase at the east end of the wing, one hand trailing along the cool stone wall.
The scent reached him before he saw the door.
Cedar and earth. That faint herbal undertone that always clung to Mountain's clothes, his hair, his very presence. Perpetua felt something in his chest loosen just slightly, just enough that he noticed.
He knocked. Two soft raps, knuckles against wood.
A pause. Then heavy footsteps, deliberate and unhurried. The door swung open.
Mountain filled the frame. He always did—not intimidatingly, but inevitably, the way a mountain fills a horizon. He'd let his hair down for the evening, the thick dark brown waves falling past his shoulders, and he'd traded his usual work clothes for a loose linen shirt and worn trousers. His tail swept once across the floor behind him, the lion-like tuft at its end twitching in what Perpetua had learned to recognize as greeting.
“Papa.” That deep voice, steady as bedrock. Mountain's olive green eyes moved over Perpetua's face, taking in whatever he found there. “You're still dressed.”
It wasn't a question. Perpetua glanced down at his sweater as if surprised to find it still on his body. “I couldn't settle.”
“I can see that.” Mountain stepped back, opening the door wider. “Come in.”
The room smelled exactly like Mountain. Fresh soil from the potted plants lining the windowsill, dried herbs hanging from a rack near the ceiling, cedar from the small chest at the foot of the bed, and beneath it all that particular note of cannabis that never quite dissipated no matter how many times Mountain aired out the space. A drum kit sat in one corner, cymbals gleaming faintly in the lamplight. Books were stacked on every available surface—botanical guides, drum notation, a few worn novels with cracked spines.
Perpetua stood just inside the doorway, suddenly uncertain. He'd come here with a purpose, but now that he was standing in Mountain's space, the request felt... awkward. Selfish. He was Papa. He should be able to manage his own racing thoughts without imposing on someone else's evening.
“Sit,” Mountain said. It wasn't a command exactly. More like an observation that sitting would happen regardless, so it might as well happen now.
Perpetua sat on the edge of the armchair near the window. His fingers found a loose thread on the cushion and worried at it.
Mountain lowered himself onto the bed opposite, the frame creaking under his substantial weight. He didn't speak. Didn't prompt. Just waited, his tail curling absently around one of the bedposts, his expression open and patient.
The silence stretched. Perpetua stared at the thread.
“I can't stop thinking,” he said finally. The words came out quieter than he'd intended. “About everything. The tour. The budget. Whether I handled the choir situation properly. Whether Imperator is satisfied with my performance. Whether I'm—” He stopped, jaw tightening. “It's too much tonight.”
Mountain nodded slowly. His hands rested on his knees, those massive hands that could wrench stones from the earth or cradle a newborn seedling with equal precision. “You've been holding your shoulders tight all week. I noticed during dinner.”
“You noticed my shoulders?”
“I notice a lot of things.”
Perpetua looked up. Mountain's gaze was steady, unblinking, entirely without judgment. The earth ghoul's face was broad and calm, his horns curving outward and then sweeping forward in a way that framed his features like parentheses. He looked like someone who had never had an anxious thought in his life. Perpetua knew that wasn't true—Mountain felt things deeply, just differently—but the illusion was comforting nonetheless.
“I came to ask,” Perpetua said, and then paused. The thread had come loose in his fingers. He let it drop. “You have some. Don't you.”
Mountain's tail gave a single slow sweep across the floor. “I do.”
“Could I...”
He couldn't finish the sentence. It felt too direct. Too needy. He'd been Papa for months now, and he still struggled with asking for things, with admitting that he needed help, that the weight of the role sometimes pressed down on him until he couldn't draw a full breath.
Mountain rose without a word. He crossed to the small chest at the foot of his bed, lifted the lid, and retrieved a wooden box no larger than his palm. The box was simple, carved from dark wood with a sliding lid that moved smoothly under his thumb. From within, he withdrew three neatly rolled blunts.
Three.
He held them out.
Perpetua stared at the offering. “I only asked for one.”
“You asked for what you thought you could ask for.” Mountain's voice carried no judgment. “Take them. If you only need one, good. If you need more, they're there. I'd rather you have them and not need them than the other way around.”
The earth ghoul's tail nudged gently against Perpetua's ankle. An absent gesture, the kind Mountain did without thinking—curling around doorframes, sweeping against the legs of chairs, wrapping loosely around the people he cared about. Perpetua felt his throat tighten.
He took the three blunts.
“Thank you.” The words felt inadequate. He tried to pour more into them, to make them carry the weight of everything he couldn't say—gratitude, exhaustion, the quiet relief of being seen without having to explain himself.
Mountain inclined his head. “You know where to find me if you need more than that.”
“I do.” Perpetua stood, the blunts held carefully in his palm. They were rolled perfectly, neat and tight, the paper smooth against his skin. Mountain had clearly taken his time with them. Everything Mountain did carried that same patient attention—drumming, gardening, rolling blunts, being present for someone who didn't know how to ask for company.
At the door, Perpetua paused. “Mountain.”
“Hmm?”
“The choir situation. I handled it correctly, didn't I? Marcellus needed to hear that his behaviour was affecting the group, but I—” He stopped. The words were spiraling again. He could feel them, rising like water behind a dam.
“You handled it well,” Moutain said. That deep voice, as steady as ever. “You listened more than you spoke. That's rare. That's good.”
Perpetua nodded once. Twice. Let the reassurance settle somewhere beneath his ribs.
Back through the corridors. The Ministry was even quieter now, the sconces dimmed slightly as the night wore on. Perpetua's slippers whispered against the stone floors. He passed no one. The blunts felt heavier than they should in his hand, weighted with something beyond their physical mass—the kindness of being given more than he'd asked for, the quiet understanding in Moutain's green eyes, the tail against his ankle like an anchor.
His room, when he reached it, was exactly as he'd left it. The bedcovers still rumpled where he'd been sitting. The three letters still laid out on his desk, waiting for his final approval. The window was cracked open slightly, letting in the cool night air, and the curtains stirred gently in the breeze.
Perpetua closed the door behind him. Locked it. Stood there for a moment with his forehead pressed against the wood.
He could do this. He was allowed to do this. He was Papa, yes, and Papa carried responsibilities and worries and the endless churn of decisions, but Papa was also a person. A person whose brain wouldn't stop spinning, whose shoulders had been tight for so long he'd forgotten what relaxed felt like.
He pushed away from the door.
The balcony. That was where he wanted to be. The small terrace off his bedroom looked out over the Ministry grounds, the dark expanse of gardens and the line of trees beyond. On clear nights, the stars were visible, scattered across the sky like salt on black velvet.
Perpetua retrieved his lighter from the nightstand drawer—a simple silver Zippo that Copia had given him years ago, back when he was still just a cardinal and Perpetua was still just a brother and the world was a simpler place—and slid open the balcony door.
The night air hit his face, cool and clean. He stepped outside, bare feet now—he'd kicked off the slippers somewhere between the door and the bed—and felt the stone of the balcony cool beneath his soles. A wrought-iron chair sat near the railing, and he lowered himself into it, setting two of the three blunts on the small table beside him.
One. He'd start with one.
The lighter sparked. The flame caught, flickering gold in the darkness, and Perpetua brought it to the tip of the blunt, rotating it slowly the way he'd watched Copia do a hundred times. The paper caught. The end glowed orange. He inhaled.
The smoke hit his lungs, warm and familiar, and he held it for a count of three before exhaling into the night.
The first breath of relief came almost immediately, though he knew that was partly psychological. Just the act of doing something—purposefully, deliberately, something meant only to soothe—already began to quiet the noise in his head. He took another drag. Longer this time. Let the smoke curl through him.
The second exhale brought a loosening in his jaw that he hadn't realized he'd been clenching. His molars, which had been pressed together for what must have been hours, released. The hinge of his jaw ached faintly with the relief.
He smoked.
The stars above him blurred slightly at the edges. Not in a concerning way—just in the way that meant the weed was beginning its work, softening the sharp lines of the world, blurring the edges of his thoughts until they didn't catch against each other quite so painfully. The budget numbers that had been marching through his head began to slow, their rhythm faltering, their insistence fading.
Another drag. Another exhale, the smoke drifting up and disappearing into the dark.
Perpetua's shoulders dropped. Actually dropped, the way they hadn't in days. His spine curved slightly, his posture relaxing from its usual careful alignment into something softer, more human. The chair, which had seemed merely functional when he'd sat down, now cradled him like it had been built specifically for this purpose.
He thought about Mountain. About the way the earth ghoul had offered three blunts instead of one, as if generosity was the most natural thing in the world. About the tail against his ankle, that small absent gesture that meant I see you, I'm here, you're not alone. About the deep steady voice saying, You listened more than you spoke.
The blunt had burned down by a third now. Pe
rpetua took another drag and let his head fall back against the chair, his eyes closing.
The world softened further.
His thoughts, which had been a tangled knot of worry and planning and second-guessing, began to unwind. Not all at once—the knot didn't disappear—but it loosened. The individual strands became visible. Each worry was still there, but it no longer felt like they were strangling him. He could look at them from a slight distance, acknowledge their existence, and let them drift.
The tour. It would happen or it wouldn't. He would plan for it, and then he would adapt to whatever reality presented itself. Worrying wouldn't change the outcome.
The budget. Sister Imperator would tell him if there was a problem. She always did.
The choir. Marcelus and Thomas would work it out, or they wouldn't. He'd done what he could by listening more than he spoke. Moutain had said that was good. Moutain was rarely wrong about such things.
The third letter to Bishop Lureent. Perpetua opened his eyes and looked at the blunt in his hand, now nearly half gone. The letter would still be there tomorrow. It didn't need to be perfect. It just needed to be sent.
He took one more drag, held it, exhaled.
His limbs felt loose. Floaty. The word bobbed up from somewhere in his memory—Copia had used it once, after a particularly long day, when Perpetua had found him on this very balcony smoking his own blunt and staring at the stars with a hazy smile. 'M floaty, Copia had said, and Perpetua had laughed and brought him a glass of water and a blanket.
Now he understood.
He felt floaty.
The stone beneath his feet. The wrought iron of the chair against his back. The stars scattered across the sky like they'd been thrown there by a careless hand. His own hand, holding the blunt, which he brought to his lips with a deliberateness that felt almost ceremonial.
Smoke. Inhale. Hold. Exhale.
The tightness behind his sternum had dissolved. In its place was a warmth that spread outward from his chest, reaching into his fingers and toes, softening every edge of him. Perpetua looked at the blunt in his hand—barely a third left now—and decided to finish it.
The last few drags were the best. The smoke was slightly hotter, the ember closer to his fingers, but the warmth in his body had deepened into something almost liquid, a gentle current that moved through him with each breath. When the blunt was too short to hold comfortably, he stubbed it out in the small ceramic dish he kept on the balcony table for exactly this purpose.
Then he sat there.
Sat and breathed.
Sat and felt the night air on his skin, the faint breeze that carried the scent of the gardens below. Sat and watched the stars, which had become slightly more interesting than they'd been a half hour ago. Sat and let the quiet fill him, not the anxious quiet of his room but the real quiet, the peaceful quiet, the quiet that came from a brain that had finally, mercifully, stopped spinning.
He didn't know how long he sat there. Time had become a suggestion rather than a rule, its passing marked only by the slow drift of the stars and the growing heaviness in his eyelids.
When he finally stood, his body moved differently. His joints were soft, his muscles relaxed. He'd forgotten what this felt like. The tension that had become so constant he'd stopped noticing it was gone, and its absence left space for something else. Something gentler.
The two remaining blunts on the table caught his eye. Perpetua looked at them for a long moment, Moutain's voice echoing in his memory: 'If you only need one, good. If you need more, they're there.
He picked them up.
Back inside, the room was warm and dim. Perpetua placed the two blunts on his nightstand, next to the silver Zippo and the glass of water he'd pour in a moment. His reflection in the window caught his eye—a man in a black sweater, hair slightly mussed, pupils dilated, shoulders soft. He looked younger. He looked peaceful.
He looked like someone who might actually sleep tonight.
The glass of water was cool in his hand. He drank it slowly, feeling it soothe his throat, feeling it anchor him to his body. The floatiness was still there, but it had gentled into something manageable, something pleasant. Something that would carry him gently into sleep instead of the usual hours of staring at the ceiling while his brain replayed every interaction of the day.
Perpetua set the glass down.
Looked at the two remaining blunts.
Reached for one.
Mountain had given him three, after all. And Mountain knew things. Mountain had seen the tension in his shoulders at dinner, had noticed before Perpetua had even fully admitted it to himself. If Mountain thought he might need more than one, who was he to argue?
The lighter sparked. The second blunt caught. Perpetua settled back against his pillows, the window still cracked open, the night air still drifting through.
He smoked.
The second hit different than the first. Deeper. The floatiness intensified, spreading from his limbs into his thoughts, softening them until they moved like honey, slow and golden and sweet. He stared at the ceiling and traced the cracks in the plaster with his eyes, each one a tiny river that led nowhere and everywhere.
Copia had sat here. Before. Copia had been the one on this bed, in this room, smoking on this balcony. Copia had carried the same weight that Perpetua now carried, and he'd carried it with a grace that Perpetua still wasn't sure he'd ever match.
But he was trying.
He took another drag.
That was the thing, wasn't it? He was trying. Every day, he showed up and he tried. The letters, the budget, the choir, the endless decisions—he was doing his best. His best wasn't always perfect, but it was his best.
The thought, which would have sent him spiraling an hour ago, now settled into him like a stone dropping into still water. Ripples spread outward. Then stillness.
Perpetua smiled at the ceiling. Just a small one. The slightest curve of his lips.
He finished the second blunt slower than the first, taking his time, letting each drag roll through him. By the time it was done—stubbed out beside the first in the ceramic dish he'd brought to the nightstand—the floatiness had become something almost tidal. It ebbed and flowed through him, a rhythm that matched his breathing, that matched his heartbeat, that matched something older and deeper than either.
His limbs were no longer his own. They were borrowed, or shared, or simply on loan from the universe until morning. His head was full of cotton and starlight. His eyes, half-closed, saw the room in soft focus, every edge blurred gently, every shadow benevolent.
One blunt left.
Perpetua looked at it.
Three, Mountain had said. Three was the number.
His fingers found the lighter before his brain fully caught up. The spark. The glow. The inhale.
This one was different still. The third blunt, on top of the other two, pushed him past floaty into something else. Something quieter. Something where the voice in his head that never stopped talking—the one that planned and worried and rehearsed and replayed—finally, finally, shut up.
The silence inside his skull was the most beautiful thing he'd ever heard.
Perpetua smoked the third blunt in a haze, barely aware of his own movements. The ember glowed. The smoke curled. The stars outside his window watched impassively, ancient and indifferent and comforting in their permanence.
Somewhere in the distance, an owl called.
Somewhere closer, a door closed softly.
Perpetua heard neither. He was somewhere else entirely now, somewhere soft and warm and quiet, somewhere the weight of being Papa couldn't reach. Tomorrow it would return. Tomorrow he would put on his cassock and button every button and face the budget and the tour and the choir and the letters.
But tonight.
Tonight he was just a person. A person who had asked for help and received three blunts instead of one. A person who had been seen, really seen, by a massive earth ghoul with gentle hands and a tail that curled around the people he loved.
A person who was floaty.
The third blunt burned down. Then the ember died. The ceramic dish held three stubs now, neat in their row.
The knock came soft. Three taps, gentle enough that if Perpetua had already been asleep, they wouldn't have woken him.
Copia stood in the corridor with a small paper bag in one hand and three perfectly rolled blunts in the other. The bag held a croissant from the kitchen—he'd wrapped it in a napkin, still warm from the evening batch. Comfort food. The kind of thing you brought someone who'd had a long day.
He'd noticed.
Of course he'd noticed.
The way Perpetua's shoulders had been climbing toward his ears all through dinner. The careful precision of his movements, like a man who was thinking about every step before he took it. The silence that wasn't calm but contained—pressure held behind a dam. Copia recognized that silence intimately. He'd lived inside it for years.
So after dinner, he'd made his way to Moutain's room, same as Perpetua had done an hour earlier. The earth ghoul had opened the door with that knowing look in his warm olive eyes and said, "You're the second Papa to knock on my door tonight."
Copia had blinked. "Perpetua?"
"Already taken care of." Mountain's tail swept across the floor. "Three."
"Then I'll take three as well."
Moutain had raised an eyebrow but said nothing. Just retrieved the wooden box, slid it open, and placed three more blunts in Copia's outstretched palm. "He's probably still awake. If you're headed that way."
"I am."
"Good."
And here he was. Standing outside Perpetua's door at—he checked his watch—ten forty-seven at night, holding breakfast pastries and enough cannabis to tranquilize a horse. The corridor behind him was empty, the sconces dimmed to their nighttime glow, the Ministry settling into its nightly quiet.
Copia knocked again. Louder this time. "Perpetua? It's me."
A long pause. Then a sound that might have been words but came out more like a vowel stretched thin. Copia took that as invitation enough and tried the handle.
Unlocked.
He pushed the door open.
The room was dark except for the moonlight spilling through the cracked balcony door and the small lamp on the nightstand that Perpetua must have forgotten to turn off. Its glow painted the scene in soft amber: the rumpled bedcovers, the half-empty glass of water, the ceramic dish with three stubs lined up like soldiers at rest.
And Perpetua.
Propped against his pillows at an angle that couldn't possibly be comfortable, wearing a black sweater that had ridden up to expose a strip of his stomach, his hair a dark halo of chaos against the white pillowcase. His eyes were open but barely—just slits of blue and brown, unfocused and dreamy. The small smile from earlier still curved his lips.
"Copia." The word came out slow. Deliberate. As if each syllable required careful navigation. "You're... here."
"I'm here." Copia closed the door behind him and set the paper bag on the nightstand. The croissant crinkled softly in its napkin. "Brought you something. Though I think Mountain already took care of the important bit."
Perpetua's smile widened fractionally. "Moutain. Yes. Three."
"I know. He told me." Copia settled onto the edge of the bed, the matress diping under his weight. Up close, Perpetua looked even more gone—ppils blown wide, eyelids heavy, every muscle in his face loosened into something soft and young and unguarded. He looked like a man who'd finally set down a weight he'd been carrying for years. "You're very high, aren't you?"
"Floaty."
The word came out on an exhale, shaped with relish. Copia felt something in his chest squeeze—affection, recognition, the particular ache of seeing someone you love finally at peace. He'd been here himself. This room, this bed, this very balcony. He knew exactly what Perpetua was feeling, the way the world had softened at its edges, the way thoughts moved like honey, the way everything that had seemed urgent and crushing just a few hours ago now felt... manageable. Distant. Safe.
"You brought..." Perpetua's hand lifted from the covers and gestured vaguely toward the nightstand. "Croissant?"
"And other things." Copia opened his palm to show the three blunts.
Perpetua's mismatched eyes focused with visible effort. "Three."
"Three."
"Moutain gave you three."
"Moutain gave me three."
A pause. Then Perpetua's smile widened into something that was almost a grin, the expression transforming his face, making him look younger, lighter, like the version of himself that existed before the weight of the papacy had settled onto his shoulders. "That means... six."
"That is, in fact, what three plus three equals," Copia said. His own smile was tugging at the corners of his mouth. "I'm very proud of you for doing that math in your current state."
"Fuck off." But there was no heat in it. Just affection, lazy and warm, drifting through the words like smoke. "You're going to... stay?"
The question hung in the dim lamplit air. Copia looked at Perpetua—really looked. At the man who'd inherited everything Copia had once carried. The tour, the budget, the clergy, the endless decisions. He'd watched Perpetua shoulder it all with a grace that Copia himself had never quite managed, but he'd also watched the cost. The tension in those shoulders. The careful control. The way Perpetua held himself together so tightly that something was bound to crack eventually.
Tonight, something had cracked. But not in the way Copia had feared. In the way he'd hoped—a release, not a breaking.
"Yeah," Copia said. "I'm staying."
He toed off his shoes. Shed his jacket and draped it over the back of the chair near the window. The room was warm, the spring night mild, and the balcony door was still cracked open just enough to let the breeze drift through. Copia settled himself against the headboard beside Perpetua, their shoulders not quite touching, and pulled the lighter from his pocket—his own, an old silver Zippo nearly identical to the one he'd given Perpetua years ago.
The first blunt caught with a familiar hiss. Copia inhaled, held it, exhaled toward the ceiling.
The smoke curled upward, caught the lamplight, disappeared.
"How was your day?" Copia asked.
Perpetua made a sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a groan. "Budget. Imperator. Choir. Letters."
"That bad?"
"Not bad. Just..." His hand waved vaguely in the air, tracing a shape that might have been a circle or might have been nothing. "Much. Everything was much."
"I noticed." Copia took another drag. Passed the blunt to Perpetua, who accepted it with the careful concentration of someone performing brain surgery. "Your shoulders were up around your ears all through dinner. You barely touched your pasta."
"You noticed my pasta."
"I notice a lot of things." The words echoed Mountain's from earlier, and Copia felt the resonance of it—the web of care that surrounded Perpetua, even when he couldn't feel it. "Your pasta, your shoulders, the way you blinked too fast when Imperator asked about the tour schedule. You're not as opaque as you think you are, tesoro."
Perpetua exhaled smoke. His eyes had gone even softer, if that was possible. "Everyone keeps... noticing me today.'
"That's what happens when people love you."
The words landed. Copia watched them land—watched Perpetua's expression shift, the slight parting of his lips, the way his gaze dropped to the blunt in his fingers. He didn't say anything. But his free hand, resting on the covers between them, turned palm-up. An invitation.
Copia took it.
Their fingers interlaced. Perpetua's palm was warm and slightly damp, the way hands got when you'd been holding tension all day and finally released it.
They smoked.
The first blunt became the second, passed back and forth in comfortable silence. Copia felt the weed begin its work—the tightening in his own jaw releasing, the thoughts that had been churning in the back of his mind slowing to a gentle drift. He hadn't realized he'd been carrying tension too. Not the same weight as Perpetua, but a weight nonetheless. The quiet concern of watching someone you love struggle. The helplessness of not knowing how to help. The hope that showing up would be enough.
The second blunt burned down. Copia reached for the third without hesitation.
"We're going to be very, very high," Perpetua observed. His voice had taken on a dreamy quality, the words running together at the edges.
"We're already very, very high."
"True." Perpetua turned his head against the pillow to look at Copia. The movement was slow, deliberate, like a ship changing course. "I've never... we've never..."
"Never what?"
"Done this. High." The words came out with effort, each one placed carefully in sequence. "We've done drunk. And we've done sober. But never..."
Copia finished the thought for him. "Never high off our arses."
"Exactly."
A third blunt sparked into life between Copia's fingers. The ember glowed orange in the dim room. He inhaled—deeper this time, holding the smoke until his lungs ached, then let it stream out through his nose. The world was starting to go soft at the edges now, the lamplight blurring into halos, the shadows in the corners of the room deepening into something benevolent and warm.
He passed the blunt to Perpetua.
Their fingers brushed. The contact lingered longer than necessary.
"Perpetua."
"Hmm?"
"I'm glad I came."
Perpetua's smile returned, that small curved thing that transformed his face. "Me too." He took a drag, held it, exhaled. "Me... too."
Time dissolved.
It did that, Copia had learned, when you were high enough. Minutes stopped marching in their orderly rows and instead began to drift, overlapping and merging, stretching into something elastic. He couldn't have said how long they lay there, passing the third blunt back and forth, watching the smoke curl toward the ceiling. Long enough that the blunt burned down to a stub. Long enough that Copia's limbs began to feel detached from his body, floating somewhere above the bed, connected only by the thinnest threads.
Long enough that Perpetua's hand, still interlaced with his, began to feel like the only solid thing in the universe.
"Coia." Perpetua's voice was barely above a whisper. "I'm very... very high."
"I know."
"No, I mean..." He turned his head again, and this time the movement brought their faces closer. Closer than Copia had expected. Close enough that he could see the individual lashes framing Perpetua's mismatched eyes, the way his pupils had swallowed almost all the color, the faint sheen of moisture on his lower lip. "I'm floaty."
"You said that already."
"Did I?"
"About an hour ago." Probably. Or maybe twenty minutes. Time was meaningless.
Perpetua considered this. His brow furrowed slightly, the expression of a man trying to solve a puzzle with half his brain tied behind his back. "Well. I'm still floaty."
"Good." Copia squeezed his hand. "You should be floaty. You've been wound too tight for weeks."
"You noticed that too."
"I notice everything about you." The words came out before Copia could stop them, unfiltered, the weed stripping away the usual careful layers. "Always have. The way you tap your fingers when you're anxious. The way you straighten your cassock when you're about to say something difficult. The way you look at me across the dinner table like you're checking to make sure I'm still there."
Perpetua's breath caught. A tiny hitch, barely audible. "You... you do that too. Look at me. Across the table."
"I know."
"Why?"
Because I love you. Because I've loved you for years. Because watching you shoulder the weight I used to carry makes me want to reach across the table and take your hand and tell you you're doing better than I ever did.
But the words were too big for his mouth. Too heavy for his drug-softened tongue. So instead, Copia lifted their interlaced fingers and pressed a kiss to Perpetua's knuckles.
Perpetua made a sound. Small. Wanting. His fingers tightened around Copia's.
"Can I—" He stopped. Swallowed. Tried again. "I want..."
"Tell me."
But Perpetua didn't tell him. Instead, he leaned forward—slow, so slow, as if moving through water—and pressed his lips to Copia's.
The kiss was soft at first. Tentative. The barest brush of mouth against mouth, dry and warm and tasting faintly of cannabis smoke. Copia's eyes fluttered closed. The world narrowed to this single point of contact: Perpetua's lips on his, Perpetua's hand gripping his like an anchor, Perpetua's breath warm against his cheek.
Then Perpetua made another sound—needier this time, a tiny whimper that vibrated against Copia's mouth—and the kiss deepened.
Copia's free hand came up to cup Perpetua's jaw. The stubble was rough against his palm, a day's worth of growth that Perpetua hadn't bothered to shave. He tilted Perpetua's head, changing the angle, and Perpetua opened for him immediately, eagerly, his tongue sliding against Copia's with an urgency that made Copia's stomach flip.
Oh.
Oh, this was happening.
They'd kissed before. Of course they had. Drunk kisses, sober kisses, casual kisses, desperate kisses. But this was different. The weed had stripped away everything that usually got in the way—the worry, the self-consciousness, the constant churning awareness of everything that could go wrong. What remained was pure sensation. The heat of Perpetua's mouth. The taste of him. The soft sounds he made when Copia's tongue slid against his.
"I want," Perpetua said again, pulling back just far enough to speak. His eyes were dark, pupils blown so wide they'd nearly swallowed the blue and brown entirely. "I want... Copia. Please."
Plesae.
The word hit Copia low in his gut. Perpetua never begged. Perpetua was composed, controlled, deliberate. Perpetua thought about everything before he did it. To hear please falling from those lips, soft and desperate and utterly unguarded—
His cock, which had been half-hard since the second blunt, throbbed to full attention.
"Yeah," Copia breathed. "Yeah, tesoro. Whatever you want."
What Perpetua wanted, apparently, was to be touched.
He surged forward, capturing Copia's mouth again, one hand releasing its grip on Copia's fingers to clutch at his shirt instead. The fabric bunched in Perpetua's fist. His legs shifted beneath the covers, tangling with Copia's, and Copia could feel the heat of him even through their clothes—a furnace of a man, always running warm, his skin almost feverish now with the combination of weed and want.
Copia's hands moved. They seemed to know where to go without his brain's input. One slid into Perpetua's hair, fingers threading through the dark curls, tugging gently. The other found the hem of Perpetua's sweater and slipped beneath it.
The skin of Perpetua's stomach was hot. Silky. Copia's fingers traced the faint trail of hair below his navel, and Perpetua's whole body shuddered.
"Sensitive," Perpetua gasped against his mouth.
"Good sensitive?"
"Yes."
The weed was amplifying everything. Copia could feel it—every touch electric, every brush of skin sending sparks cascading through his nervous system. The drag of Perpetua's fingers through his hair. The scratch of stubble against his chin. The heat pooling in his groin, heavier than usual, more insistent. And beneath it all, a floaty, drifting sensation that made everything feel like a dream.
No. Better than a dream. Dreams faded. This was real.
"Off," Perpetua managed, tugging at Copia's shirt. "Want this... off."
Copia pulled back just long enough to yank the shirt over his head. The cool air hit his chest, raising goosebumps, but Perpetua's hands were on him immediately—palms flat against his pectorals, sliding down his ribs, mapping the contours of his torso with a focus that bordered on reverence.
"You're beautiful." Perpetua's voice was slurred with more than just arousal. "Always thought... always wanted to tell you..."
"You're telling me now."
"Now. Yes. Now is good." His thumbs found Copia's nipples, brushing over them with featherlight pressure. Copia's breath hitched. "You like that."
It wasn't a question. Perpetua's mismatched eyes, unfocused as they were, watched Copia's face with unsettling intensity.
"I like everything you do to me." The confession came easily, the words slipping out before Copia's usual filters could catch them. He wasn't sure he'd ever said that out loud before. Wasn't sure he'd ever admitted it even to himself.
But it was true. Every touch Perpetua gave him, every kiss, every whispered word—Copia had been storing them up for years, tucking them away in the hollow of his chest. And tonight, with the weed softening all his edges and Perpetua warm and wanting beneath his hands, there was no reason to hide it.
Perpetua's response was to pull Copia down into another kiss. This one was hungrier. Messier. Perpetua's tongue pressed into Copia's mouth with an urgency that brooked no argument, and his hands were everywhere—Copia's shoulders, Copia's back, Copia's waist, fingers digging into the soft flesh above his hips.
"Yours too," Copia managed between kisses. "Your shirt. Off. Now."
Getting Perpetua's sweater off was a production. The man was so high that his coordination had abandoned him entirely, and every time Copia tried to pull the garment upward, Perpetua would get distracted by some new point of contact—the brush of Copia's wrist against his ribs, the drag of fabric over his nipple, the way Copia's breath hitched when Perpetua's hip pressed against his erection. Eventually, through teamwork and considerable laughter, they managed to wrestle the sweater over his head and toss it somewhere in the direction of the floor.
Then Perpetua's bare chest was pressed against Copia's, and the laughter faded into something else.
Skin on skin. Perpetua was warmer than Copia had expected, his lean frame radiating heat like a banked fire. The faint dusting of hair on his chest tickled against Copia's own. Their hearts were beating so hard Copia could feel both rhythms—his own, fast and eager, and Perpetua's, matching it beat for beat.
"Copia." The way Perpetua said his name—breathless, reverent, almost prayerful—made Copia's cock throb. "Need you. Need..."
"I know. I've got you." Copia pressed a kiss to Perpetua's throat, feeling the pulse jumping beneath the skin. "Tell me what you need."
"You. Inside. Please."
The begging again. Copia would never get tired of it.
He slid downward, pressing kisses along Perpetua's collarbone, his sternum, the dip between his ribs. Perpetua's chest was heaving, his breath coming in short gasps. By the time Copia reached his waistband, Perpetua's fingers were tangled in his hair, tugging with a desperation that bordered on pain.
"These," Copia murmured against Perpetua's hip, "need to come off."
"Then take them off."
Copia did. The soft trousers slid down Perpetua's legs easily, taking his underwear with them. And then Perpetua was naked beneath him, sprawled against the rumpled sheets, his cock hard and curving toward his belly, the tip already glistening.
Copia's mouth went dry.
He'd seen Perpetua naked before. They'd been lovers for years. But something about this moment—the lamplight, the haze of the weed, the way Perpetua was looking at him like Copia was the only solid thing in a dissolving universe—made it feel entirely new.
"You're staring," Perpetua said. His voice had gone rough.
"I'm appreciating. There's a difference."
"Appreciate faster."
Copia laughed, the sound startling out of him. Even here, even now, Perpetua's dry humor persisted. "Bossy."
"Papa's prerogative."
"Former Papa."
"Still counts."
He was still smiling when he leaned down to kiss the jut of Perpetua's hip bone. The skin was salt-sweet under his tongue. Perpetua's fingers tightened in his hair, and the tiny sting of it went straight to Copia's groin.
"Lube," Copia remembered, pulling back. "Where—"
"Nightstand. Drawer."
Of course. Copia stretched over Perpetua to reach it, their bodies pressing together in a long, deliberate slide. Perpetua moaned—an actual moan, low and throaty, the sound vibrating through his chest into Copia's.
"Sorry," Copia murmured.
"Don't be."
The drawer yielded a half-empty bottle of lube and—Copia's heart squeezed—the silver Zippo he'd given Perpetua years ago. He'd known Perpetua kept it. He hadn't known Perpetua kept it there, within arm's reach of his bed, close enough to touch every night.
He didn't comment on it. Just closed the drawer and turned his attention back to the man beneath him.
Perpetua's legs fell open without prompting. The gesture was so trusting, so vulnerable, that Copia had to stop for a moment and just breathe. Perpetua, who never let his guard down. Perpetua, who kept everything close to his chest. Perpetua, who was looking up at him with unfocused eyes and parted lips and absolutely no walls left.
"You're so..." Copia didn't know how to finish the sentence. There weren't words big enough.
"I know." Perpetua's hand found his, squeezed. "Me too."
The lube was cool on Copia's fingers. He warmed it between his palms before touching Perpetua, drawing a slow circle around his entrance that made Perpetua's breath catch. Then one finger, pressing in gently, and Perpetua made a sound that was almost a sob.
"Okay?"
"More than okay. Keep going."
Copia kept going. One finger became two, working in slowly, carefully, the way he knew Perpetua liked. The way he'd learned over years of nights like this—though never quite like this, never with the weed turning every sensation up to eleven, never with Perpetua so loose and vocal and present beneath him.
"A third," Perpetua gasped. "Now. Please."
"Bossy," Copia said again, but he obliged, adding a third finger and crooking them just so—
Perpetua cried out. His hips bucked. His cock, which had flagged slightly during the preparation, jerked back to full hardness against his belly.
"There." The word was barely intelligible. "There, there, there."
Copia worked that spot mercilessly, fingers pressing and circling, watching Perpetua come apart beneath him. The composed Papa of the Ghost project, vanished. The man who worried about budgets and tour schedules and letters to bishops, gone. In his place was someone stripped down to pure sensation—mouth open, eyes squeezed shut, hips rolling into Copia's hand with an abandon that made Copia's own neglected cock ache.
"Now," Perpetua managed. "I'm ready. Copia. I need you inside me. Now."
How could he refuse?
Copia withdrew his fingers—Perpetua whimpered at the loss—and reached for the lube again. His own cock was so hard it hurt, the head dark and slick with precum. He slicked himself up with shaking hands, the sensation of his own grip almost too much. The weed had sensitized everything. Every nerve ending was firing at full volume.
Then he was positioning himself, the head of his cock pressing against Perpetua's entrance, and Perpetua was looking up at him with those mismatched eyes—one brown, one blue, both nearly black with desire—and whispering, "Please."
Copia pushed in.
The heat. The tightness. The way Perpetua's body opened for him, accepting him inch by inch. Copia had to stop halfway, forehead dropping to Perpetua's shoulder, breath coming in ragged gasps.
"Okay?" Perpetua's hand found the back of his neck. Grounding. Steadying.
"Yeah. Just—you feel—" Words failed. Copia pressed a kiss to Perpetua's collarbone. "Incredible. You feel incredible."
"More. Give me more."
Copia gave him more. He sank in to the hilt, their hips flush, and for a long moment they simply stayed there, breathing together, adjusting to the sensation of being joined. Copia could feel every ridge and fold of Perpetua's inner walls gripping him, the velvety heat so intense it was almost overwhelming. He could feel Perpetua's heartbeat, racing alongside his own. He could feel the way Perpetua's legs tightened around his waist, pulling him deeper.
"Move," Perpetua said. "Please. Move."
Copia moved.
The first thrust drew a groan from both of them. The second had Perpetua's nails raking down Copia's back. By the third, they'd found a rhythm—slow at first, deep, Copia pulling almost all the way out before sinking back in—and Perpetua was making sounds Copia had never heard from him before. High, breathy, desperate sounds that vibrated against Copia's throat.
"Harder." Perpetua's voice cracked on the word. "Don't hold back. I won't break."
So Copia didn't hold back.
He fucked into Perpetua with steady, pounding strokes, the headboard knocking against the wall in counterpoint to their gasping breaths. The weed made everything feel amplified—the slick heat of Perpetua around him, the slap of skin on skin, the way his own pleasure was building at the base of his spine like pressure behind a dam. But it also made everything dreamy, distant, like he was watching himself from somewhere outside his body.
Perpetua was the anchor. Perpetua's hands on his back. Perpetua's voice in his ear. Perpetua's body, hot and tight and perfect.
"Touch yourself," Copia managed. "Want to see you come. Want to feel it."
Perpetua's hand found his cock between their bodies. His strokes were clumsy, uncoordinated, his usual dexterity stolen by the drugs. But it didn't seem to matter. His breathing was speeding up, his moans rising in pitch, his inner walls starting to flutter around Copia's cock.
"Close," he gasped. "Copia, I'm—"
"Yeah. Let go. I've got you."
Perpetua came with a cry that was almost a wail. His body arched off the bed, hips jerking, cock pulsing in his own grip as stripes of white painted his chest. Copia felt every spasm around his own shaft, the rhythmic clench of muscle milking him, and it was enough to push him right to the edge.
"Inside," Perpetua gasped, even as he was still shaking through his own orgasm. "Come inside me. Please. Don't pull out."
The words were what did it.
Copia's orgasm hit him like a freight train—so much stronger than usual, the weed amplifying every pulse of pleasure. He buried himself deep and came, feeling his cock jerk and throb as he spilled inside Perpetua, hot and thick, pulse after pulse. He felt every spurt as a distinct shock of pleasure, his whole body shaking with the force of it, and Perpetua's inner walls were still fluttering around him, milking him, drawing out every last drop.
It went on longer than usual. Or maybe time was just broken. Copia couldn't tell. All he knew was the heat, the wetness, the way Perpetua's body gripped him like it never wanted to let go.
Eventually, the pulses slowed. Stopped. Copia collapsed onto Perpetua's chest, heedless of the mess between them, his breath coming in ragged gasps.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke.
Copia's softening cock was still buried inside Perpetua, and he could feel his own cum, warm and slick, beginning to leak out around the seal of their bodies. The sensation was filthy and intimate and perfect.
"Fuck," Perpetua breathed.
"Mmm." Copia's voice wasn't working properly. "Yeah."
"We should... do that more often."
"High sex?"
"High sex."
Copia pressed a kiss to Perpetua's chest, just above his heart. "Agreed."
He should pull out. He should get a cloth and clean them up. He should check that the balcony door was properly closed and the lamp was off and the croissant wasn't getting crushed on the nightstand.
He didn't do any of those things.
Instead, he stayed exactly where he was, still joined with Perpetua, feeling the slow trickle of his own release between their bodies. Perpetua's fingers were tracing lazy patterns on his back. Perpetua's heartbeat was gradually slowing beneath his ear.
"Stay inside," Perpetua murmured. "Just... a little longer."
"Okay."
The word drifted into the quiet of the room.
The lamplight burned soft and gold. The moon hung outside the window, fat and silver. The Ministry slept around them, ancient stone walls holding centuries of secrets and sins and silent benedictions.
And Copia, for the first time in longer than he could remember, didn't think about anything at all.
His world had narrowed to this: the man beneath him, the mess between them, the slow drift of post-orgasmic bliss mingling with the lingering haze of the weed.
Floaty.
Yeah. He understood now.
"I love you," he said. The words came out muffled against Perpetua's skin.
Perpetua's hand stilled on his back. Then resumed its gentle tracing. "I know."
"Good."
"I love you too. Obviously."
"Obviously."
Perpetua huffed a laugh. The motion jostled Copia slightly, and the shift made Copia hiss as his oversensitive cock slid a fraction of an inch deeper. "Sorry."
"Don't be."
A comfortable silence settled over them. The kind of silence that only existed between two people who'd known each other for years, who'd seen each other at their best and their worst, who loved each other without reservation.
Perpetua's fingers found Copia's hair and began to card through it.
"I'm still floaty,"he murmured.
"Me too."
"Good. We can be floaty together."
"Together," Copia agreed. His eyes had fallen closed. His body felt heavy and warm and utterly, perfectly at peace. "That's the best way to be."
He was half asleep when Perpetua spoke again, so quietly he almost missed it.
"Copia."
"Hmm?"
"Thank you. For...noticing."
"Always, tesoro."
"Always," Perpetua echoed, and the word hung in the air like smoke, drifting, settling, becoming part of the quiet of the room.