"Carefully," Ezra replied with a smug expression. "I observe, sometimes for months. Looking for specific qualities that will translate into the work. This one," he gestured to the partiallytransformed young man, "had remarkable bone structure. A dancer. The way his body moves, even in stillness, carries a rhythm most can't perceive."
His explanation shouldn't have made sense. Shouldn't have calmed the last tremors of conscience rattling inside me. Yet somehow it did. I found myself nodding, understanding the artistic logic if not the moral justification.
"Come," he said. "There's more I want to show you."
He led me through another door into an adjacent room, smaller and more intimate. Unlike the clinical preparation area we'd just left, this space felt consecrated, a private chapel devoted to artistic revelation. The lighting was softer, walls painted deep burgundy, the air infused with subtle incense.
"My private collection," Ezra explained. "Works too honest for public exhibition."
Display cases lined the walls, each holding a part of the human body on display. A heart preserved and transformed into a ticking clock, brass gears exposed. A pair of praying hands covered with microscopic script like a clay tablet. A face, removed whole and stretched across a frame like canvas, the lips stretched into a smile.
Other pieces defied easy classification. Sculptures composed of bone and preserved tissue. Paintings created with pigments clearly derived from human sources, their glow unlike anything achievable with commercial products.
I unconsciously raised my maimed hand to my mouth, teeth worrying at the bandage. My grandmother's voice rose unbidden: "The wages of sin is death." Yet here, death had been transformed into wages of another kind, currency in a spiritual economy my grandmother could never comprehend.
"They would call me a monster if they knew," Ezra said quietly, watching my reaction. "They lack the vision to understandthat true art requires breaking boundaries, transcending conventional limitations."
"They wouldn't understand," I agreed, moving slowly around the room, absorbing each piece. Every creation spoke to my shadow self in a language that transcended anything I could speak aloud.
"But you do," Ezra observed. "You always have, from the first moment I saw your work. The darkness others tried to exorcise from you isn't sickness, Micah. It's clarity. The capacity to see beauty where others see only horror."
His arms wrapped around me from behind, drawing me against his chest. The contact felt both comforting and dangerous, like finding safety in the eye of a storm. My moth glowed softly in the dim light.
"You stand at a threshold, Micah," he murmured against my hair. "You've seen the truth of my work. Now you must decide: will you retreat to the safe confines of conventional morality, or step forward into authentic vision?"
The question wasn't really a question at all. We both knew I had crossed that threshold the moment I descended the stairs, perhaps even before that. Last night when we collected materials from the pianist's hands. The day Ezra first claimed my body. The moment I offered my finger to his blade. The day I first sat in his office and admitted to the darkness inside me. The moment as a child when I watched my mother's suspended body transform day by day and found beauty in her dissolution.
I turned in his arms to face him, the moth pressed between our bodies. "I want to help you, Daddy. To learn from you. To create with you."
For the first time, his breath caught—not with the control I'd come to expect, but something closer to awe. Something too human for a god. His smile spread slowly, satisfaction evident in every line of his face. "You understand what that means? Thecommitment it requires? There's no partial participation in this work, no spectator role. To truly understand, you must fully engage."
The world had always asked me to deny this part of myself. Ezra simply named it art.
"I know," I said with certainty. "I'm ready."
The kiss he gave me then felt like a sacred promise, a ritual sealing of vows more binding than any religious ceremony. His hands gripped my face, holding me steady as his mouth claimed mine. When he pulled away, his eyes had darkened to stormy gray.
"My beautiful boy," he murmured, then gestured to the waiting art. “Shall we begin?”
Ezra
Perfection couldn't be rushed.
I stood silently in the doorway, observing Micah without announcing my presence. He bent over the worktable, applying the specialized mixture to the canvas with newfound confidence. The glowing moth toy sat beside his materials, casting a soft blue light across his workspace. His body moved with a grace that hadn't existed two weeks ago when I'd first led him down to my private collection. When he'd stood before the transformed bodies and chosen to stay rather than flee.
The bone ash from the pianist's hands gleamed across the canvas, catching light in that unmistakable way—ghostly, luminous, uniquely mine. His technical skill had advanced remarkably. There was no hesitation in his movements, no reservation in handling materials that would horrify ordinary people. Even the stump of his amputated finger—the first jointhe'd sacrificed to our art—had become an asset rather than a liability. He'd adapted his grip on the specialized brush, using the healed wound to create unique pressure patterns impossible with conventional technique.
His body had changed too. He looked leaner, more defined from our rigorous schedule and the specialized diet I'd prescribed. Zinc, selenium, L-arginine—each chosen to coax his body toward the next phase of creation.
Micah was fully aware of the purpose behind his regimen. I'd explained it to him a week ago.
"My cum?" He’d tilted his head, eyes wide. "As a medium for the next series?"
"The most intimate contribution possible," I'd confirmed. "Your essence literally becoming part of the work. The proteins and minerals, properly prepared, create a binding agent with unique properties."
Rather than disgust, his expression had shown wonder, followed quickly by determination. "How long must I wait to produce the proper amount?"
"Three weeks minimum. The concentration increases significantly after prolonged abstinence."
