“Old man!”
“I’m Iris’ grandfather. I’m old. Like you. You’re old. Like me. We should have a drink.”
The logic was impeccable. Brimsley shrugged at Smithers, who shrugged right back at him.
And then they all had a drink.
Iris sat, beaming at the upper table where she was perched on a throne which was a slightly smaller version of the one Archon was sitting in, looking thoroughly massive, utterly sexy, and entirely immoral.
It was wrong what he had done to her. In the beginning, and then in the end. At every turn, Archon used his power to subdue and destroy her - right up until the moment where he realized that destroying her meant destroying himself. She could judge his love selfish, and perhaps she would have been right to do so, but she did not know that her love was any more pure.
It seemed to Iris that all love was inherently selfish, the attempt at preserving adored connections. Did that make it bad? No. It made it, like everything else human, and alien… flawed.
“What are you thinking?” Archon caressed the back of her neck lovingly as they watched jugglers entertaining the gathered nobles.
“You’re an utter bastard,” she smirked at him.
“Well, that’s true,” he smiled. “Anything else?”
“That I love you very, very much.”
“What a coincidence. I was just thinking how much I love you too,” Archon replied, giving her a very sweet and loving kiss. Sweet because it was a wish for her happiness, and loving because it was laced with all the unending carnal desire of the alien king.
* * *