Father Beresaad considered himself a dedicated man. He'd not so much chosen to be a priest as he had the door opened for him, and it led from his purposeless, empty existence into something worthy of his time and loyalty. He let God teach him his path for him. He'd had times when he questioned it, but nothing had ever come close to throwing him from this path. 

Except today, when he looked up from his bible, ready to start his sermon, and there was a demon. 

She was sitting in a pew towards the back, dressed demurely and looking for all the world like a curious 20-something, but that glint in her blood-red eyes could not be denied. She was hungry. Father Beresaad felt his hands shake slightly. This was a test. This is what all those doubting moments had led towards. 

Taking a gulping breath, Father Beresaad centred himself, focusing on the lovely old lady in the front row, and started his sermon. He tried to keep focus, leading them through prayers and hymns, but his eye was constantly drawn back to the demon. At one stage, light broke across her face, and Father Beresaad questioned his sanity as it looked like her skin turned to diamonds. Was he going mad?

Once mass was done, and Father Beresaad was greeting the members of his flock, he looked over. The she-demon hadn't moved, except to turn her face to the cloud-covered sun. Even in the weak light her red hair shone the colour of fire. She turned to look at him, and her lip curled in a smirk. She nodded slowly, gesturing for him to come over. 

God save me, thought Father Beresaad, but he wished Mr and Mrs Lewis good health, and made his way over to the demon, forcing himself not to adjust his collar. 

Once he was before her, she stood. She barely came up to his chest, and Father Beresaad had the strangest urge to kneel down, like it wasn't right for him to be taller than her. 

"That was a lovely sermon. I hope I didn't disrupt you," the demon said, and her smile told him she hoped the exact opposite. 
"Of course not. All are welcome," Father Beresaad replied, his voice even gruffer than usual. Was he already falling prey to her charms? "I hope to see you here again."

Her eyes widened in shock, and her smile became something wider and more genuine, bafflingly enough. "Do you really hope that?" she said, and the hope in her voice was so pure that Father Beresaad began to doubt she was a demon. 

"Of course. God's light welcomes everyone," he said. Her face fell, first in disappointment enough to make his heart sink, then into anger that seemed directed more at herself than anyone else. 

"I should've known. But I hoped anyway. Foolishly," she muttered, running a hand through that firey red hair, then looking up at him imploringly with those red, red eyes. "Would you come with me anyway?"

"...come with you?" Father Beresaad said dumbly. The idea that she was any kind of evil was slipping through his mind, and even with her eyes that terrible colour, the sadness, the desperation in them was enough to make his heart ache. He wanted to give her anything so that she would stop looking like that. "I can't. I don't make deals with demons," he said, unsure of what else to say.

"Demon?" She laughed, and what a lovely rich sound it was. "That's very flattering." She took one of his hands in her own, and he let her. Her hands were so small and so pale, the white skin nearly translucent. "No, I'm not a demon. If I was, I'd twist your mind and make you come with me. I would force you to," she said. It wasn't a threat, more a statement of fact. And even more bizzarely, Father Beresaad believed her, and wasn't scared. "But I can't. You have to choose me, and there is a part of me that wants it to be a choice. I want you to love me," she said, bringing their hands over her heart, and the squeeze of her fingers was as desperate as her look. "I need you to love me."

Go, said an insidious voice inside of Father Beresaad. Be with her, live in the unknown wildness you can see in her eyes. Find out who she is. What she is. His heart thudded in his chest, imploring him to follow her, anywhere and anytime she wanted. 

"I can't," he said instead, because he had given himself to God first. "Not today," he said, because he couldn't bear her sadness.

"Oh," she said. She dropped their hands, and dipped her head. He wanted to hold her, to comfort her. But not like a priest should, and that frightened him. 

Not enough, though.

"But, perhaps, if you were to return, my mind would change. God works in mysterious ways, after all," he said, and couldn't help a smirk of his own. 

She looked up, more hope and delight in that look than Father Beresaad had felt in his whole life. She took his hand again, and kissed his palm. Her lips were soft on his skin. 

"What's your name?" She asked.
"Father Sean Beresaad."
"Sean," she said on a breath, and Sean's own caught in his throat. 

She gave his palm another kiss, like she wanted to memorise the feeling, and squeezed his hand between hers. "Till next time, Sean." 

She turned to go, the sway of her hips hypnotising. 

"Wait!" Sean found himself calling out to her. She stopped, turned around. "You never told me your name."

"Wildling," she said, and winked. Then she was gone. One second there, next like she was never there. 

With a shaky breath, Sean turned back to the front of his church, and looked imploringly at Jesus' face for answers. The statue, as ever, was silent. 

Sean ran a hand through his hair, adjusting his collar with the other one, and tried to quell the urge to run out of the church, chasing Wildling wherever she led him.