
By Rachel Haimowitz
Copyright 2010 Rachel Haimowitz
Smashwords Edition
Discover other titles by Rachel Haimowitz at her website:
Counterpoint: Book I of Song of the Fallen, from Guiltless Pleasure Publishing
Crescendo, Book II of Song of the Fallen (Coming Fall 2011 from GPP)
Anchored: Belonging, Book One (Coming January 17, 2011 from Noble Romance Press)
Thank you, L.C., for your drop-dead gorgeous work!
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the online retailer of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This collection of short stories examines and celebrates the pinnacle of trust between lovers: complete domination and submission. Nicky and Devon don't engage in 24/7 total power exchange, but they certainly do have their moments---and plenty of them. Each "moment" is marked below with stars, and the more stars you see, the less faint of heart you need be. One-star stories are sweet and often humorous. Two-star stories are graphic and may contain elements like pain and humiliation. Three-star stories are hardcore, and explore such boundaries as knife-play and mummification. Explored kinks are listed beside each story; please take heed if you have triggers.
All-Nighter \* (Patience training)
Down in the Woodshop \*\* (Improvisational bondage)
Stainless Steel \*\*\* (Knife play)
Pretty \* (Cross-dressing)
Milk Run \*\* (Insertion)
Too Much \*\*\* (Rope bondage, heavy pain play)
A Hairy Situation \* (Bondage)
Wrapped Up \*\*\* (Mummification, breath play)
One for the Road \*\* (Impact play, marking)
Pony Up \*\* (Pony play, group play [not ménage])
Sample Chapter of Counterpoint: Book I of Song of the Fallen
I have pulled all-nighters more times in my life than I can count---study sessions in college, night shoots through five seasons of Prey, a few too many after-parties. I'm used to it, occasionally thrive on it. I'm even good at it, one of the few of my contemporaries who can still go five or six days on just a few hours' sleep.
But never until tonight had I looked forward to it with quite such . . . zeal.
Sir had been warning---promising, teasing---the whole damn week that I'd better get my sleep, because once Friday night rolled around, there'd be no time for such frivolities. I finished rehearsal a few hours after him, came home to a note on the door that said simply, "Strip." So I shed my clothes right there in the foyer, settled on my heels, hands resting palms-up on my widespread knees, and waited.
And waited. And waited.
I'm still waiting, but that's okay. I know he'll come soon. In the meantime, I distract myself with the chill of the apartment, with the hardness of the tile floor beneath my knees, with delicious thoughts of what he will do to me---or, if I'm a very lucky slave, what he will allow me to do to him---when finally he deigns me worthy of his attention. I know I mustn't fall asleep, though the pull grows strong as the hours stretch. I know I mustn't touch myself, though my cock aches with need at the slightest thought of him.
When at last he comes, I do not hear him. I do not even see him. One moment there is cold and hardness and a world filled with him inside my head, and the next there is warmth and softness and the real world filled with his chest to my back, his arms around my waist, his lips on my neck and his breath in my ear. I gasp my surprise, moan my pleasure, melt back into him and shudder with the force of my desire.
"What a good boy you are," he rumbles near my shoulder, follows it with a bite that makes me hiss even as the knowledge that he's praising me, marking me, claiming me makes me glow. "Do you know how long you waited for me?" Another bite, gentler, soothed immediately after by a lick, a suck, a kiss. "Do you know how long you kneeled there, naked, cold, resisting sleep?"
"No Sir," I breathe, unable to find my voice as one of his hands presses flat and tight to my stomach and the other snakes down between my legs. His lips work my shoulder, my neck, my ear, while his hand works my balls, my cock, spreading tingling warmth and bright white sparks of pleasure from my toes to the tips of my hair. The sensations meet in the middle, coil tight in my belly beneath his hand. I moan again, bite down on my lip and clutch at my thighs to keep them still, to stop myself from thrusting into his fist.
"Five hours," he whispers, his tongue following the words, making its own vibrations across the shell of my left ear. "You waited five hours for this"---he squeezes my cock and pulls, just the way he knows will drive me crazy---"and this"---a soft bite to the corded tendon of my neck, a hot sweep of tongue across the skin pinched between his teeth---"and this"---a jut of hips, his hard cock pressing into my ass, promising the wild heights of pleasure to which only he can take me. "You waited all night for me. Such a good boy," he purrs, "such a good boy."
He stands then, his cloak of warmth falling away, and it's all I can do not to follow him, to cling to his leg, to whimper my protest at the loss. But then he puts his hand out and says, "Two hours 'til daybreak. And I plan to break you at least three times between now and then."
This time I cannot hold back the whimper as I take his hand and let him pull me to my feet. For a moment he has to hold me there, my knees weak from my long night of immobility and the mere thought of so many orgasms.
As he guides me to our bedroom, binds my hands and feet to the bedposts with soft well-worn leather and thoughtfully fingers his selection of favorite paddles and crops, I squirm a little with anticipation and habitual mischief---has there ever been a bond I haven't tested, even when the last thing I want is to escape?---and think to myself, Best. All-nighter. Ever.
Nicky pressed his ear to the door of the storage unit Devon had rented in Park Slope, trying to hear what was going on inside. Nothing, as far as he could tell. But he knew Devon was in there---Devon had said he'd be there, and the man had never once lied to him.
He decided to knock, but didn't wait for a reply before entering. The first thing to hit him was the smell: sawdust and metal. The next was the sight of a very startled Devon, blinking toward the open door and looking as if Nicky had just snuck up behind him with an air horn.
"What are you doing here?" Devon asked, clearly surprised but also, Nicky thought, kind of pleased to see him.
Nicky closed the door and looked around the little storage space Devon had turned into a wood shop. "Thought I'd come by and see what you were doing down here that you obviously love more than me, what with the constantly leaving me for it."
Devon chuckled at Nicky's fake pout and held his arms out for a hug, but Nicky folded his arms across his chest and put on his best spoiled sulk.
"Uh uh," Devon warned, stepping forward and hugging Nicky anyway, right around his crossed arms. "Don't you make that face at me. What if I said I was making something for you?"
Damn the man for playing him so well; that was all it took for Nicky to forget he was supposed to be mad at Devon. "Really?"
"Well," Devon hedged, kissing Nicky on the nose, "No, not really."
Nicky muttered "Figures" in a good-natured grumble and pushed Devon away, heading toward the workbench along the back wall to see what was really going on over there.
But he only made it one step before Devon grabbed him by the elbow and said, "Uh uh. Off limits."
"You're so full of shit," Nicky laughed, pulling his arm free and heading toward the bench again. "Lemme see."
He got two steps closer this time---halfway there, as small as the room was---before Devon stopped him again. "You don't know how to listen, do you?"
"I---" Nicky's snarky comment died on his lips when he saw the look on Devon's face. No, not Devon's face; Sir's face.
"You want to be over there so bad? Fine. But you'll at least be useful." He grabbed Nicky by the wrist and dragged him the last few feet to the workbench, which was so cluttered with tools and scraps and things Nicky couldn't make heads or tails of that he didn't even know where to begin. Beside the bench was half a shelving unit; even in its infancy, Nicky could tell it would be stunning. He couldn't possibly help with something like that.
"I don't know how---"
"I know," Sir said. He gave Nicky a hard shove against the bench and gathered the hem of Nicky's shirt in his hands. Nicky lifted his arms without thought or instruction, letting Sir strip him. "So shut up and be pretty while I work."
Sir perched himself on a stool, picked up a tiny file and an intricately cut wood panel, and set to work.
Nicky waited for Sir to touch him, to turn eyes to him, to pay him even the slightest mind. Alas, he did not. Not that Nicky had really expected him to, though, not after he'd barged into Sir's private space like a spoiled child demanding attention. Besides, this wasn't the first time Sir had ignored him, and surely would not be the last.
But in all their time together, Nicky had never quite learned how to endure that. Or maybe he just didn't feel like behaving today . . . at least not without a little discipline first.
When he grew tired of watching Sir work (a whole ninety seconds in, maybe ninety-five), Nicky let his eyes, and then his hands, stray back to the workbench. He fiddled with a rasp, then something he thought might be an awl, and then ran a piece of sandpaper lightly over the back of his hand.
Without looking up from his work, Sir snatched it from Nicky and said, "Stop touching things."
Nicky mumbled an apology and scratched at his hand, which itched a little now where he'd rubbed it with the sandpaper.
Sir slapped his fingers. "Hold still."
"Sorry," he said again, folding his hands in front of him. He'd yet to say "Sir," and so far he'd not been called on that. Maybe Devon really didn't want to play. Or maybe he'd been Sir from the moment Nicky walked in, and simply didn't feel like Nicky deserved the spanking he was after. Maybe he was just letting Nicky dig a hole too deep to climb out of.
Nicky had to admit, that thought had appeal.
He grabbed onto the edge of the workbench, leaned his weight on his arms, and dug yet deeper still. "Is there another stool?" he asked.
Sir turned the piece of wood in his hand, filing down the edge of a curlicue that didn't seem, to Nicky, to need filing. "No."
"Oh."
Sir finished with the piece he was holding and swapped it for another one. Nicky's fingers flexed on the bench, and he shifted his weight from his left foot to his right. The quiet, broken only by the swwf swwf swwf of Sir's meticulous filing, was killing him.
"Got a radio in here?"
Swwf swwf swwf. "Yes."
But Sir made no move to turn it on or show Nicky where it was. Swwf swwf swwf. Nicky focused on Sir's fingers, on those giant, powerful hands doing such tiny, delicate work. His own hands itched to move, and when he couldn't hold them back any more, he reached for the curlicued panel that Sir had just finished working.
Sir's response was violent and unexpected: he threw down the wood and the file in his hand, sprang to his feet, and grabbed Nicky's wrist, squeezing until Nicky dropped the panel. "Damn it!" he growled, "Haven't you learned yet to hold still?"
Nicky knew better than to answer. He dropped his eyes to the floor and waited for whatever would come next, hissed as Sir slammed his hand against the workbench.
"I can't believe I have to restrain you," Sir growled, grabbing a staining rag with his free hand and balling it into Nicky's upturned palm, which he still had pinned to the workbench. "I can't take you anywhere, can I!"
For a moment, Nicky resented that. Just because he was being bad on purpose now didn't mean he couldn't behave. But of course Sir knew that; he was just playing the game Nicky wanted. Nicky should be grateful---was grateful---that Sir was a considerate enough master to do that for him.
God, how Nicky loved him.
Sir let go of Nicky's wrist and snapped, "Don't move. Think you can handle that for five seconds?"
Nicky froze. He even held his breath, determined to do what Sir had asked of him to the very best of his ability. Yet inside, his thoughts were whirring; what a marvel it was that just moments ago he'd been goading Sir, but now his whole world was filled with the desire to please. How did the man do that to him?
Nicky decided he didn't care. Thinking was entirely too much work now, anyway. He'd just sit back, relax, let Sir do whatever he---
Sir picked up a c-clamp and stuck it over Nicky's hand.
"Wh---what are you doing?"
Sir ignored him, continued to wind the clamp closed. He didn't really intend to . . .? "Sir?" Nicky asked, unable to hide the fear in his voice.
"Be quiet," Sir said, calm as a breezeless day. The clamp touched the rag in Nicky's palm. Nicky couldn't help it---he pulled his hand away.
Sir looked down at him, mouth open in what Nicky presumed was outrage, and said, "Put. It. Back."
Nicky wanted to, he really did. Anything to get Sir to stop looking at him like that, like he'd let him down, like he'd failed. But . . .
Sir put down the clamp, grabbed Nicky's head in both hands, and kissed him hard. "I love you," he whispered in one ear. Another breath-stealing, blood-rushing kiss, and then, "Trust me," he whispered in the other.
Though Nicky couldn't stop his hand from trembling, he slid it back onto the table, palm up, just like before. Sir replaced the rag and began to turn the clamp again. He watched Nicky carefully, his eyes darting between the clamp and Nicky's face.
At first there was only pressure. Then pain, but not too much. Nicky tugged and discovered he could pull away if he tried. He turned his eyes up to Sir's and then back down again, and Sir tightened the clamp some more, until he forced a little whimper from Nicky.
Nicky grimaced and tried to flex his fingers, found he could barely move them and only at great expense. One hard, gasp-inducing tug made it clear that he was well and truly stuck.
"Good," Sir whispered, drawing the word out into a caress, bending down and sucking one of Nicky's trapped knuckles into his mouth. Nicky groaned, found his free hand wandering to Sir's hair.
"Ah ah ah," Sir said through a smile, bringing one hand up to the bulge forming in Nicky's jeans and wrapping the other around Nicky's wrist. "Sit perfectly still; only I may dance."
Nicky laughed---only Sir would quote the Simpsons at a time like this---then moaned as Sir squeezed his erection before freeing it from the confines of his pants. No skin-to-skin contact, though; Sir let it bob there in the air, grinning as Nicky groaned again. He grabbed another rag and another c-clamp off the workbench and secured Nicky's other hand.
"There," Sir sighed, stepping back and taking in the picture he'd made: Nicky topless, his cock hanging out his pants, both hands pinned to the table, the strain of constant but endurable pain creasing his brows and parting his lips. Sir flicked the tip of Nicky's cock with his thumb and forefinger and leaned forward to kiss him again. Then he grabbed his little file and the piece of sandpaper Nicky had played with earlier and said, "Well, I guess you're my new project, after all."
The table is hard and cold against Nicky's bare skin. Stainless steel, like an operating room. The mirror on the ceiling bounces light, too bright, as cold and hard as the table beneath him. He could probably move his head if he tried, but he doesn't.
Stainless steel around his ankles and wrists, binding his legs straight, his arms above his head. His limbs are stretched too far, too tight; the cuffs bite into the tops of his feet, the bones beneath his thumbs. It is a cold, hard pain. The mirror reflects this, too.
When Sir finally enters the room---quiet, so quiet that Nicky doesn't notice until he sees Sir in the mirror, standing by his head---Nicky is shivering and sore, struggling a little, so far lost in the hard and the cold, in the shine of stainless steel, that he can hardly be bothered to remember his own name. No matter---he doesn't need one here anyway.
"Good," Sir whispers, his hand coming up to stroke a line down Nicky's jaw, Nicky's neck, across one shoulder and to his chest. Even Sir's hand gleams, his finger--- No, not his flesh. A knife. Stainless steel. Sir holds it before him, and in the flat of the blade Nicky sees the stark reflection of his own fear.
The knife disappears from view, and its edge scrapes like a shaving razor across Nicky's chest, tugging at hairs, skimming a nipple. He arches and gasps, steel biting into his ankles and wrists, his pulse pounding against those gleaming restraints.
Sir's free hand presses into Nicky's sternum. "Be still," he orders. The tip of the knife digs in next to Sir's hand, a stainless steel compliment to his flesh, his power.
Nicky closes his eyes against the thrill, the pain, funneling his urge to move into his fingers, which curl into fists. When he opens his eyes again, he sees a single bead of blood reflected in the mirror. He sees his cock, long hard, twitch against his thigh.
"No," Sir says. His hands reach between Nicky's legs, pinch his scrotum hard. Nicky wills his erection to fade. Sir helps, pinching harder. A gleam of steel at his groin, and Nicky holds his breath, bites back a whimper. He cannot stop it from escaping when he feels the chill of steel against his softening cock, but Sir shushes him, strokes his thigh. "Open your eyes," he says. "Look," he says.
Nicky obeys, seeking his reflection in the mirror. Sees a glint of steel between his legs, but not the knife. Just a gates of hell, cold and hard, and Sir's deft fingers strapping it in place. He's filling it already. A different kind of pleasure-pain. Another whimper.
Then Sir's hand strokes low on his belly, pressing hard, holding him down. Soft and warm and nothing at all like the knife that follows, scraping a shallow pattern into his flesh. Hot, burning, like Sir's eyes, hard steel flashing in the light. He knows what Sir etches into him even without looking, knows what Sir has written. One single word in stainless steel:
Mine.
"Pretty," they tell me. It's always fucking "pretty." The prettyboy actor, the pretty lips, the pretty cheekbones. Sir doesn't mind this, of course, when it's the media, an article, a fan site. Takes pride in it, even, when it's some nameless, faceless voice that will never, as he says, get to see the Pretty up close. But in this Vegas club, where at least a dozen men approached in the span of an hour with the expert pick-up line "Well hey there, Pretty" (or some minor variation) while we were trying to get smashed in peace, when half of them stole a touch and one even tried to drag me to the dance floor before Sir laid a heavy, unmistakably menacing hand on the guy's arm, it really began to get under his skin. Never mind that he was being hit on just as often as I was, that people were even asking him for pictures and autographs. He wasn't the one who belonged to me, after all; I belonged to him.
He transferred that menacing hand to my own arm and plucked my half-finished drink from my fingers. "Time to go," he said in a tone that brooked no argument. I nodded mutely and dropped my eyes as excitement coiled in my belly. Clearly he wanted to play, and I . . . well, I just wanted.
Out into the street, one of Sir's hands still clutching his drink, the other clutching my wrist hard enough to bruise. He dragged me behind him as I hustled to keep up with his larger, more decisive, considerably less drunken steps. Through a lobby, into an elevator, down a hall . . . I didn't know where we were, didn't care. All that mattered was getting to our room or, hell, any room.
"Strip," Sir ordered the instant we got inside. I obeyed with all the eagerness I could manage in my current uncoordinated state and waited to be told to kneel, or bend, or---
"Wait."
Well, that was different.
"Stand there. Don't move. I'll be back."
And then he was gone, and I stood naked and alone, flush and aroused, waiting patiently the way only subs really could.
Sir was gone for an hour, and I never moved from the spot he'd placed me in. I hadn't even touched myself. Not once. I was tired and I was tipsy and I'd gone soft, but when Sir returned with a plastic shopping bag and saw the smile on my face, I knew he knew right away that I'd behaved.
"Very good, Pretty." The "good" was full of approval and love, but he spat the "Pretty" like an expletive, jealous and lustful. "I bought you something. Hate for all that pretty to go to waste." He thrust the bag at my chest and said, "Take it. Put it on." Slapped me once, lightly, across the face---painless, a warning---and added, "Don't even think of arguing."
My pulse was pounding in my buzzing ears as I opened the bag, my cock raging hard again, my mind tripping with possibilities. It was too big and soft to be a new toy, but maybe it was a pair of leather pants, or one of those bondage shirts, or . . .
. . . Or a dress, apparently.
Pink.
Chiffon.
"Go on, Pretty," Sir said again. And though surely I was flushing as pink as the dress, I pulled it over my head and turned so that Sir could zip me. The arms were too tight, not meant for muscle like mine. I couldn't quite fill out the bust. Lace dangled from the sleeve cuffs and tickled my thumbs.
I wondered if I was the first person in history to tent this particular dress with a raging hard-on.
Sir eyed me like a predator. His gaze dropped to my cock and he snatched out a hand, grabbed the skirt and yanked it up past my waist. He covered my face with a mass of pink chiffon and pushed me back until I fell onto the bed.
"Pretty," he growled again, shoving two fingers in his mouth and then in my ass, bending over to mash a biting kiss against my lips as he prepped me with one stroke, two, before pulling out his hand and replacing it with his cock. It hurt in all the right ways and I arched and writhed beneath him as he cried, "Pretty, pretty, pretty!" in time to his thrusts: half drunken sneer, half growl, all pure animal lust. "But you're my pretty, Nicky. Say it!"
"Your pretty, Sir."
"Again!"
"I'm your pretty, Sir!"
He nudged the lace collar aside and bit down hard on my collarbone, shoved the skirt up to wrap a hand around my cock and pump. He was close already, his hips snapping hard and out of synch, his eyes boring in to mine and brimming with possessive need. "Come for me, Pretty," he growled. "Now."
And really, who was I to argue with my master? But I think I might have ruined my pretty new dress.
"Honey, I'm home!" Nicky shouted in an eye-rolling singsong as he tossed his coat and messenger bag on the couch and locked the door behind him. Sir emerged from his study a moment later to give Nicky a kiss and a hug; he didn't know he was Sir yet, but he would soon.
Sir stepped back, hands still resting loose and affectionate on Nicky's arms, and said, "Hey, I thought you were stopping for milk."
Nicky feigned surprise, then contrition. "Oh! I forgot." He pasted on his best "I'm too cute to stay angry at" face and said, "Oops?"
Sir pouted, actually pouted---and didn't that just kill Nicky every time---and folded his arms across his chest with a distinct air of petulance. "What am I supposed to put in my corn flakes in the morning?"
Nicky had a few choice (and salty, ha ha) words on that subject, but rather than voice them, he let them gleam in his eyes. Said instead, "I'm sorry, Sir," through a smile he had to drop his head to hide.
Sir caught the cue instantly, his disappointment blinking away, anger taking its place. His big hands returned to Nicky's arms and squeezed, painfully tight. "Too stupid to remember, or just too lazy?" he asked, though Nicky knew it wasn't a question he was expected to answer. Sir shook him hard and pushed him to the floor. Once Nicky was down, Sir stepped on him.
Nicky was still grinning like an idiot, but luckily Sir had turned without noticing and left for the dungeon. By the time he returned, Nicky had managed to wipe the smile off his face, despite having had the audacity to pick himself up off the floor and sprawl across the much more comfortable couch.
Sir stopped short when he realized what Nicky had done, anger darkening and hardening his face. He came at Nicky with such an air of menace that Nicky actually found himself thinking Oh shit! and shrank back against the couch. But he wasn't fast enough to avoid Sir's hand, which connected with Nicky's cheek hard enough to knock him back to the floor.
Through lips that suddenly felt three sizes too big (though Nicky knew they were not---Sir would never harm him), Nicky smiled.
His jeans suddenly felt three sizes too small.
Sir yanked Nicky's head up by the hair and shoved a large black rubber strap-on against his lips. "Open," Sir said, so of course Nicky did, and Sir thrust the cock straight down Nicky's throat. He was still holding Nicky's hair, so Nicky couldn't get away, not even as his gag reflex brought tears to his eyes.
Sir murmured, "Through your nose, Nicky. That's it . . . breathe," as Nicky gagged and whimpered around the dildo, tears streaming down his cheeks. "Breathe, Nicky," he said again, much sterner this time, and Nicky realized that he had not been; he forced himself still and sucked a wet, shaky breath in through his nose.
Sir nodded at him, released his hold on Nicky's hair and petted him. He didn't fasten the straps, but let go of the dildo only after warning, "Don't drop it."
The urge to spit it out or, heck, throw it up, was nearly overwhelming, but Sir was watching Nicky, eyes narrowed, just daring him to disobey, to disappoint. Nicky would not. He nodded once and peeled his lips back from his teeth so Sir could see that he was using them to keep the cock in place.
"Good boy. That's good," Sir said. And then, "Chin up." Nicky tilted his head back, and Sir fastened a collar around his neck. By the feel of it, it wasn't the one Nicky usually wore, the one he'd worked so hard to earn. This one was smaller, lighter, more discreet. When Sir was done buckling it on, Nicky heard a little padlock being clicked into place. Then Sir's hand was back in front of Nicky's mouth, and he said, "Give it to me."
Nicky didn't need to be told twice to spit that massive cock out. He coughed, ran his tongue over numb lips as Sir held the dildo by the straps, the thick black cock dangling before him, glistening with Nicky's saliva.
Sir turned his eyes from the dildo to Nicky and said, "Ass up, boy."
That damn sneaky smile returned as Nicky dropped his pants and bent over, spread his legs and grabbed his ankles just like Sir had taught him. But this time, he forgot to hide the grin before he turned his back.
"You dirty little whore," Sir drawled, clearly amused, landing a heavy smack on Nicky's ass as Nicky presented it to him. "Look how eager you are. You want this cock, don't you?"
"Yes, Sir." Nicky couldn't help it; Sir could probably hear the damn smile in his voice.
"You won't be smiling in a minute, boy."
Sir slapped Nicky again, a dozen times in rapid succession, stopping only to wrap an arm around Nicky's waist when Nicky's squirming yelps made it hard for Sir to aim.
"Don't fight me," Sir warned, starting up again, his heavy hand landing over and over on the same patch of burning skin.
When Nicky started yelling for real, Sir let up but did not let Nicky go, and a moment later that big black dildo was being buried in Nicky's ass.
Nicky cried out, arched up against Sir with such force that Sir nearly dropped him. They both ended up on the floor, Nicky on his elbows and knees, forehead pressed to his clenched fists, Sir squatting beside him with one arm around Nicky's waist and the other forcing the dildo in deep. Nicky couldn't stop himself from trying to push it out; with no warning, no preparation, and already tense from the spanking, the pain was just as big as the cock itself.
"No," Sir said softly but with unarguable force, his hands equally commanding and gentle as they caressed Nicky's ass, the corded muscles in his back. "Just relax. Breathe."
For the second time tonight, Nicky realized he'd forgotten that most basic of necessities. He sucked in a shuddering breath, then another, trying to relax around that invading rubber force. Sir's hands left his body and he whimpered, pushed himself back seeking contact, but Sir said, "No. Hold still."
Sir's hands returned, fastening the dildo in place by wending its straps around Nicky's waist and thighs. Again, Nicky heard the click of a little padlock.
Sir rocked up on his heels and deposited himself on the couch, resting his arms along the back. Now it was his turn to smile, if one could give such a title to that self-satisfied smirk. "Get dressed, Nicky."
Nicky stood carefully, wincing the whole time, not yet used to the new weight and fullness. Bending over to pull his jeans up made the cock shift. It bumped him just right and his own cock jumped, heedless of---or more likely because of---the pain. The dildo was buried all the way to the narrow little flange at the end, so Nicky's jeans pulled on smooth.
Sir was eyeing Nicky like he wished it were his cock splitting Nicky in half. But he sat perfectly still as he asked, "Why'd I do this to you, Nicky?"
"Because I forgot your milk, Sir?"
Sir shrugged and said, "Sure, why not." They both know the real answer was Because I can, or Because it pleases me, or even Because you wanted it, but an excuse never hurt. "You want to please me, don't you, Nicky?"
Nicky nodded so fast he felt like a bobble head. He hoped he already had pleased Sir, wondered how else Sir might let him atone for his mistake. "Oh yes, Sir. More than anything."
"Good. Go get me my milk, then."
"L---like this, Sir?"
Sir nodded, his smirk growing wider by the second. Nicky took a tentative step toward the couch, where his coat still lay, and gasped again, this time with a little more pleasure than pain. His arousal was obvious through his skin-hugging jeans. Another step. He began to think he might almost be able to walk normally, as if he didn't have a giant dick shoved up his ass, though even the slightest motion sent little jolts from the fake cock to his real one.
When Nicky reached out for his coat, Sir caught his wrist in one big hand. "No," he said again. He'd been saying that a lot tonight. He reached up to adjust Nicky's slave collar, tucking it mostly beneath his shirt collar. "Go without it."
Nicky nodded and Sir released him. As Nicky fished his keys from his pocket and walked-shuffled-waddled through the door, the smile crept back onto his face. This time, he didn't care who saw it.
Nicky could no longer distinguish his left hand from his right. They were tied behind his back, snug together, wrapped in several coils of nylon rope that snaked their way up his forearms and pinned his elbows nearly together just below his shoulder blades. They weren't numb, no . . . that would be too easy. Not cold but hot, two burning lumps of flame twined into one, pulsing and writhing up his arms.
It would be even worse later, of course, when Sir would tug that one magic end on his rigging and send the whole of it spilling to the floor, restoring full circulation. Nicky would be free of his bindings then, but still trapped---by the weakness of his oxygen-starved limbs, by the pain of fresh perfusion, by Sir's foot on his chest or the weight of Sir's stare or Sir's simple, unspoken command: be still until I say otherwise.
Now, though, Nicky couldn't move if he wanted to. He'd tried, of course, tried for the better part of . . . of . . . How long had Sir left him here, the balls of his feet barely touching the floor, the spreader bar clipped to the shackles on his ankles forcing his stance too wide for either balance or comfort, his chest and shoulders and arms nearly shrieking with the strain of their bondage. He was flexible, but this . . . Sir had set out to make him sweat, and Sir was never, ever less than perfect at that sort of thing. At anything, Nicky mentally corrected. Never less than perfect at anything.
Time passed funny when you were blindfolded and gagged. Sir had even made him wear earplugs. Nicky didn't mind; he liked them, in fact. Liked that Sir had found a way to own even those orifices too small for anything else. Wished only that Sir were here to claim him in person, to bear witness to the suffering Nicky was enduring for him. Not, of course, that Sir didn't wholly own him even when he wasn't here.
Nicky bit down hard on the leather gag between his teeth and let the muscles in his calves relax ("let" being perhaps too strong a word; he was in control of nothing here, not even himself, and certainly not the burning muscles in his legs). The rope tied above his elbows took his weight. It was attached to the hoist in the ceiling, but also to the coil of rope around his neck, which pulled just tight enough for discomfort when his feet gave out. That pain was nearly lost, though, beneath the cramping agony in his shoulders, and he whimpered through the gag, squeezed his eyes closed behind the blindfold and struggled to make his toes take his weight once again.
His feet obliged, but only for half a minute or so. And then he was suspended from Sir's rigging again, pain ripping through him in waves he could taste, like sweat and cum and well-oiled leather. Too much, he thought, and Sir hadn't even touched him yet.
Sir. Nicky wished he were here to see this. What a picture he would make for Sir now, straining and whimpering, naked and sweat-damp and trapped in a web so intricate that even he knew it turned him into art. A sculpture, a fresco for Sir. A cherished possession, coveted and loved even when Sir wasn't there to admire it. Yes. Cherished and loved. Nicky ceased his struggling and let the pain wash through him. Pushed through the first wall and felt that familiar rush, that high unlike anything else in the world. Sir would be pleased.
Nicky was getting hard.
Back onto his toes. Ten seconds, fifteen. He counted to the rhythm of his heart, beating faster than normal but not yet pounding. Only Sir could set his heart pounding. Twenty seconds, twenty-one, and his toes gave out again. He slumped against the rigging with a harsh cry. Too much . . . too much. He needed Sir. He needed---
No. He would not call for him. Not yet. Now was not the time to give in or misbehave, though he'd done much of that in the past. Far too much. Now was the time to prove himself worthy to be owned by such a man. He would endure this for Sir. Back on his toes.
Ten seconds. Twelve. Thirteen before he slipped again, this time screaming around the gag, panting furiously through his nose and squeezing tears from his eyes. He couldn't do it; he couldn't get up again, and hanging here would kill him. He needed . . . He needed---
Fingers plucked the plugs from his ears and he startled at the unexpected touch, screamed again as it jarred his shoulders.
"Shhh, it's all right," Sir whispered, stroking his hair, the side of his face, reaching strong hands beneath his arms and hauling him upright. He no longer had the strength to stand, couldn't think around the pain, and when those warm arms cradled him he drooped against Sir's chest gratefully, weeping onto Sir's shoulder. Too much, he whimpered into the gag, but it came out muffled, nothing but another moan. And then, For you. Anything for you.
That came out muffled too, but Sir said, "I know, Nicky, I know," as deft fingers unbuckled the gag. Before he could draw his first real breath in what must have been at least half an hour, Sir was claiming his mouth for himself, driving his tongue where the gag had been just moments before, his taste swirling with the agony of Nicky's bondage, sweetening it through and through. When Sir breathed into his lips, Nicky inhaled deep, accepting the gift he'd been given.
Then Sir gave him a second gift, just as precious as the first: he stepped back, removed the blindfold, and let Nicky see him. The lights were dim---a kindness to his hypersensitive eyes---but not nearly so much that Nicky couldn't drink in the sight of Sir's naked flesh.
"Thank you, Sir," he whispered, tight and teary, his voice wet with worship and pain. Sir unhanded him, and his weight fell back on the rope again, but this time he bore it quietly and proud, silent tears mingling with cold sweat, eyes locked on Sir's feet. He could feel Sir's gaze dancing up and down his body like caressing fingers, Sir's pleasure at the artwork he'd created. Even, dare Nicky think it, Sir's pride at his service.
Yet still, the word "Please" escaped from the weakness of Nicky's flesh and hung out there between them, too late to take it back.
Toes scraping the ground, Nicky chanced one horrified, shameful glance at Sir's face, and was shocked to discover him smiling.
"I'm sorry, Sir," he whispered, though the effort to grit the words out through the pain took almost more than he had to give.
A touch then, a hand cupping the side of his face. He pressed his cheek into Sir's palm and closed his eyes.
"Don't be, Nicky. You've done so well." And then, the ultimate prize, gifted by a silver tongue on a stream of silver breath, "You've pleased me."
The hand stayed at his cheek, stroking gently, but Sir made no move to free him.
"Look at me," Sir said instead. Nicky obliged, holding his breath as he raised his eyes to Sir's. For a moment, all else was forgotten. For a moment, there was no pain. "Where are you now, Nicky. Tell me."
"In . . ." Nicky licked his quivering lips. "In you."
Sir smiled---a hungry, predatory thing, smug and owning. He stepped closer, pressing his body to Nicky's, and the hand on Nicky's face snaked down his neck and over his shoulder to give the rigging holding him upright a little tug. Nicky threw his head back and sobbed out a cry.
"Should I free you of me, then?" Another tug, another cry. Nicky knew that Sir's hand was on that magic end, that one hard pull would end it all.
"N---no," he panted. "P---please, no Sir."
Nicky's head was still back, so it caught him by surprise when Sir's teeth latched onto the exposed tendon of his neck. Wet lips, hard suction, hot tongue . . . Nicky's moan this time was at least half pleasure, made all the sweeter and sharper by the contrasting pain. A stirring, then, his cock twitching, hardening against Sir's thigh. He pushed surreptitiously, wanting more contact; he might not grow fully erect now, not while the pain was this bad, but he could seek to temper it, to give it some balance.
"Ah ah ah," Sir rumbled against his neck, giving the rope in his hand another jerk.
Nicky barked a harsh, teary "Please!" and his feet gave out beneath him.
"Please what?" Sir asked---nay, demanded---grabbing Nicky by the chin and jerking his head up. Nicky had nothing to say to that; it was a slip, his second in as many minutes, so he hung there silently, lips quivering, eyes on Sir's chest.
Sir stepped back and studied him in silence. Nicky fell and stood and fell and stood again as he watched.
"You look tired," Sir finally said.
"Yes Sir."
Nicky fell once more and Sir asked again, "Where are you now, Nicky?" When Nicky didn't answer right away, Sir slapped him hard enough to redden his cheek and said, calm as ever, "Look at me. Where are you now? Tell me."
Nicky dredged up the strength to bring his eyes to Sir's, and found in them a kernel of concern surrounded on all sides by hunger, by poise, by possession.
"I . . ."
Sir's eyes hardened. He took Nicky by the chin again and barked, "Say it if you need to say it, boy! There's no shame in it, you know that."
Nicky did know that. He hadn't always, but he knew it now; it was the very first lesson Sir had taught him, and Nicky owed him more for that than he could say. Still, he wasn't ready for this to end yet. He shook his head. "No Sir!"
"Then I think I'd like to decorate you, if you don't mind. Or," Sir said, eyebrow quirking, "even if you do mind. You are a lovely thing, you know. Truly exquisite," he added, turning toward a shelf full of toys as Nicky flushed warm at the praise. "But you'd be lovelier still in these, don't you think?"
Sir held up a thirty-clothespin zipper, each one black and rubber-tipped and tightened special just for this. Nicky whimpered and squirmed and closed his eyes, thinking Too much, too much. Wondering where he'd find the next high, the key to the next wall, the strength that would stop him from falling.
And knew the instant Sir touched him that everything he needed---everything he'd ever need---was in those talented, loving, perfect hands.
"Ow, damn it!"
Nicky squirmed on the St. Andrews cross, pulling at his bonds but getting nowhere, of course. He'd have been disappointed if he had.
"You just keep talking, Nicky," Sir said through a smirk, grabbing another pubic hair (this one on Nicky's left nut) between thumb and forefinger and yanking it out. Nicky's hips jumped as far as the rope around his waist would let them.
"Ow!"
"What's the matter, baby?" Yoink. "You don't like this?" Yoink again---two at once this time. Nicky's balls tried to crawl up into his belly and his hands curled into fists. He struggled to close his legs, couldn't.
"You know I don't, S---ow!---Sir." He spat the name like an invective. Of course, that earned him . . . "Aah!" This time near the cleft of his ass, three in rapid succession. "Please!"
Sir straightened up, found a single gray hair near Nicky's nipple, and yanked it free. "Would you rather I spanked you, instead?"
"Yes!"
"Whipped you?"
"Yes!"
"Caned you?"
"Yes!" Oh god, yes.
Another hair, this time from Nicky's armpit, and then Sir walked over to a nearby shelf, his fingers trailing lovingly over a collection of toys. Nicky followed with his eyes, holding his breath. Hoping.
"What about this?" Sir asked, his fingers settling on a violet wand.
Nicky had to think about that one for a second, but he finally said, "Yes Sir."
Sir picked it up, turned it on . . .
And put it back down. "Too bad!" he chirped, downright gleeful, stepping back in front of Nicky and spinning the cross until Nicky was upside down. "You know, I hear that if you rip the hair from the follicle"---and here he paused to demonstrate by pulling two from Nicky's inner thigh---"it won't grow back for weeks. I wonder"---another hair, and another, this time from his ankle---"how long it will take people to notice that you've got no" pluck "hair below the neck" pluck "at all."
Devon imagined it was like being buried alive. Damp and stifling, eight solid feet of impenetrable fear pressing down until it crushed you.
In the background, the shortstop fumbled the ball, and somebody stole third base. He wasn't even sure which teams were playing. His focus was on his pet. His little Houdini. Mummified. Buried alive.
The poor thing could struggle all he wanted; there was no getting out of this one.
And just to remind him of exactly that, Devon reached down and stuck the pad of his thumb over the little length of tube jutting from Nicky's duct-tape shroud, cutting off the boy's only source of air. He felt suction against his thumb, a futile struggle to suck in oxygen. In a moment, a whole new struggle would begin. That beautiful body, second-skinned with saran wrap and duct tape from head to toe, would buck and heave, expending oxygen it didn't have. And for what? The boy couldn't even wiggle a finger. He was wrapped too hard, taped too close, palms bound flat against the tops of his thighs (and how miserably uncomfortable that must be by now!), body straight and taut. A pretty pale Tutankhamen wrapped in silver instead of gold.
It had to be a hundred degrees in there. Nicky was no doubt baking in all that tape and plastic. Stewing in his own juices. He was managing tiny little squirming motions---half an inch here, half an inch there---that were surely costing him most of his air and all of his strength. A desperate, starving whisper of a moan floated up through the tube and bumped against Devon's thumb; Devon lifted his hand and allowed the sound to escape, allowed air to return in exchange. The body lying beside him stilled, the head now simply resting on his lap instead of pushing against it. The moaning ceased.
Foul ball. Strike. Third out. On the screen, the teams switched places. But the real show was next to him on the couch. He'd never done this before. Hadn't realized how enthralling it could be. He waited until Nicky's chest fell and rose, fell and rose---the only hint of motion that bound body could achieve without considerable effort---and then on the crest of the next rise stuck his thumb over the tube again. For a moment he wished he hadn't taped Nicky's face; he wanted to see it, pink and panicked, creased with triumph and submission and pain, those bright blue eyes opening on a high as he tripped, flew, soared right over and through the ties that bound him. The inning ended. Nobody scored. He let Nicky breathe for a while.
Thirty-nine minutes. How long could you leave someone in there? Nicky could safeword through the tube if he'd had enough, Devon had made sure of that. But still . . .
He worried too much, he knew; Nicky rarely had enough. If he hadn't wanted his boundaries pushed, he wouldn't have escaped from the comparatively palace-like puppy cage that Devon had left him in to sleep. How he'd done it, Devon had no idea; he would beat the answer out of the boy later, or maybe fuck it out of him. Probably both at once. But for now it was a mystery; when he'd come into the dungeon to find his pet loose, Nicky had simply smirked and shrugged.
He'd kept quiet even when Devon fished out a roll of plastic wrap and a triple-pack of duct tape. Get out of this, Houdini, Devon had said. Yet still Nicky stood with that same shit-eating smile on his face as Devon had wrapped him, slowly and with the utmost attention, neck to toe. The smile finally faltered when Devon pulled a clear plastic bag over Nicky's head, gathering it taut and taping off the neck before bothering to poke a breathing hole.
Devon had let Nicky watch the whole thing, right up until the very last strip of tape had gone over his eyes and cut off his sun. Nicky had struggled for almost twenty minutes before exhausting himself and going still. He hadn't knocked loose a single strip of tape the whole time. He hadn't even been able to lift his head from Devon's thigh. But Devon liked it when Nicky squirmed. Another thumb over Nicky's air tube, and Devon got what he wanted.
Forty-seven minutes. Things were starting to feel an awful lot like a test of wills, and Devon hated those, because in the end Nicky always won. The boy could take much more pain than Devon could take risks with Nicky's safety. The only way to beat him was as it had been since the beginning: leaving him alone, tied and ignored. But Devon couldn't very well leave him alone like this. When the game ends, he told himself. He'd free him when the game ends. They were already in the top of the ninth.
But the score was tied.
Devon covered the tube with his entire hand, fingers and thumb digging into Nicky's tape-covered cheeks as the boy struggled. God, it went straight to Devon's cock when Nicky whimpered like that. He took his palm off the tube and used it instead to slap Nicky in the head. A second time, and Nicky grunted. Devon wondered if he'd just yanked him from his free-fly, made him lose his focus. He listened for so much as a whispered hint of a safeword. Heard nothing. Unzipped his pants and grabbed himself.
"You hear that, Nicky?" No response. Devon began to stroke himself, moaning loudly. With his free hand, he slapped Nicky again. "You hear that?" A hum, vaguely affirmative, very needy. "Yeah . . . you wish that was your hand on my cock now, don't you, Nicky." Another hum, louder this time.
Devon groped roughly at Nicky's crotch. Even through the layers and layers of plastic wrap and tape, he could see a bulge trying to form. Little puffs of air, hot and fast, came out the end of the tube as Nicky tried to press his hips into Devon's hand. He got about a quarter inch off the couch before he exhausted himself and fell back.
Devon jerked off hard and loud. Neither one of them got to breathe through his climax. He shot all over Nicky's tape-covered chest, and when the last of the tremors stopped and his heart rate returned to normal, he plucked the bandage shears off the coffee table and set Nicky free.
The boy looked wrecked, panting and flush and soaked in his own sweat. The wrapping was stiff, unpleasantly damp and slippery. Devon cracked Nicky out of it like a lobster from its shell. Nicky lay there---lost, insensate, eyelids half closed and mind still flying high---as Devon manhandled him free. He didn't help at all. Devon suspected he couldn't.
He stroked Nicky's sweaty hair off his forehead, leaned down and kissed him on the corner of the mouth. Nicky tried to kiss back, but seemed to possess neither the energy nor the coordination for a proper effort. Devon chuckled, nipped at the boy's lower lip. "Come on," he said. "Let's get you cleaned up."
Nicky's head rolled ever-so-slowly toward Devon. "Huh?" he breathed. Devon chuckled again; the boy wasn't tracking, probably hadn't been for the last twenty minutes.
"I said it's bath time, babe. Come on."
But Devon didn't wait for Nicky to sit up---he'd have been here for hours if he did. He just tucked one arm under Nicky's shoulders and the other under Nicky's knees and hefted the boy against his chest.
Nicky was a wiry little thing, but six feet of lean muscle was still an armful and a half, so their trip to the bathroom was a bit stumbly, a bit rushed. Nicky didn't seem to notice; he just clung to Devon's neck and pressed his sweaty face to Devon's chest, mouthing absently at whatever skin he found there. Still gone, then. Devon smiled as he lowered Nicky into the empty tub; he'd done good for his boy today.
The shock of cold enamel seemed to wake Nicky a little. He gasped, flailed upright with a breathy "Whu---?" but then caught sight of Devon's smiling face and leaned back again, shut his eyes and mumbled, "Thank you, Sir," half under his breath.
Devon kissed him again, this time on the top of the head (no pressure for the boy to work up the ability to kiss him back, that way), and whispered in Nicky's ear, "You're welcome, love. Any time."
And damn if he wasn't the luckiest fucking guy in the world to be able to say that.
Sir is usually home well before I am, but today they've sent me off early to pack and catch a nap before leaving for LA. I've packed, but I've not bothered with sleeping; Sir will be home any minute, and before I lead the charge on a week-long promotional blitz from one end of Hollywood to the other, I want someone to take charge of me.
So I wait for him in the foyer by the front door, where he will see me the moment he walks in. Sitting on my heels, legs spread, hands lying limp on my knees. Naked but for collar and cuffs. The marble tiles are cold and hard beneath me; I could wait on the runner, plush and warm, but there are no runners in the space I wish to occupy for the next little while.
The door bangs open some time later and Sir blusters through, hands full and keys dangling from his mouth. He catches sight of me and I detect a moment of surprise, then amusement, then lust, and then a hard shell of irritation and command. He spits his keys at me and says, "Don't just sit there; help me."
I rise fluidly to my feet without using my hands---just how he likes---and take two bags of groceries and his courier bag from his arms. Thus freed, he closes the door and locks it, then follows me to the kitchen. I unpack the groceries in silence, noting the makings of one of Sir's elaborate suppers he loves to cook for me when he finally can't stand to watch me eat TV dinners for the tenth day in a row. My heart sinks---I won't be here long enough to enjoy it. Well, I will simply have to make it up to him, find another way to please him instead.
When I bend to place the lettuce in the crisper, he smacks my upturned ass with a heavy, open palm. I yelp and bang my head on a plastic shelf, but I barely notice over the stinging tingles racing from the back of my pelvis to the front.
"Come here," he says. I oblige and am rewarded with a bruising kiss, both his hands wrapped around my head, his hips grinding me into the refrigerator door. He uses his cheek to mush my nostrils shut, starving me of air as the kiss draws on.
I make a faint little noise as my lungs begin to burn and my cock stiffens against his clothed hip, bang my fists against the fridge as the world starts to gray. At last he lets up, pulls his tongue from my mouth and his face from mine. His body stays pressed to me, supporting me against the door as I gulp air through swollen, tingling lips; his hands stay firm on my head, spinning dizzy with arousal and oxygen.
Sir licks his lips and asks, in that thrillingly familiar tone that demands replies of the utmost speed and brevity, "Why are you home so early?"
I am still panting a little, but I answer quickly. "First interview got pushed up to 7 tomorrow morning."
Sadness flits across his face, then disappointment, then anger. He pushes me harder against the fridge---the chrome doors are shocking cold against my bare back---and says, "I was going to make you dinner."
"I know, Sir. I'm sorry, but I leave in . . ." A quick glance at the clock over the stove before turning my eyes back to Sir's chest, "87 minutes." I allow my hands to wander to Sir's hips, barely touching. "Please let me make it up to you."
He steps back and slaps my hands away, then delivers twin stinging slaps to my nipples. "Did I say you could touch me, Nicky?"
I hang my head and mumble, "No, Sir," trying not to let my disappointment show.
"I'll use you when I'm good and ready, understand?"
"Yes, Sir."
He snaps his fingers and says, "Come," then ambles off toward the bedroom. Adds, "Crawl," before I can take a single upright step. I drop happily to my hands and knees and race to catch up with his feet, which I have an overwhelming desire to kiss, to touch, to worship if he'll let me. We enter the bedroom together and he stops near the bed, spreading his arms and legs and waiting.
I take my cue to undress him, beginning with his shoes and socks, placing a loving, lingering kiss on each ankle, instep, and toe as I expose them. I steal a touch by dragging my hands up his thighs before unbuckling his belt; he chuckles and pets me atop the head, but still holds his hand out for the belt once I have pulled it through its loops. It's with a mix of trepidation and thrill that I turn it over to him, eager for what might come next.
When nothing does, I attack the button of his pants with my tongue and teeth, unhooking and then unzipping him without using my hands---a promise of my skills, of how I will worship him if he lets me. Another chuckle from Sir, another head pat, and then his belt is being looped beneath my chin and used to tilt my head back until I'm looking into his smiling eyes.
"Well, well, someone's eager today, huh?" The belt disappears from my chin, reappears with a teasing flop against my left shoulder. I nod vigorously---yes to my eagerness, yes to his belt on my skin, yes to everything he has the power to give and take.
The belt connects again, much harder this time, makes a delicious thwapping noise against my skin. I allow my eyes to close briefly, just long enough to sink into the sensation, before returning my gaze to him, as adoring as I know how to make it.
"Will you still be gone five days?" he asks. "Speak."
"Yes, Sir."
He hits me again. Again. Then thrice more. Once for each day I will be taking myself from him. The fifth one leaves me gasping, knocks me onto my hands. My cock bumps against my thigh, and I have to curl my fingers into the carpet to stop from touching myself. I roll my shoulders instead, relishing the burn, imagining the welts rising on my pale skin. Imagining, just for a moment, what people might say if one showed on camera.
"Well then," he says, pushing his unfastened pants down and kicking them behind him. "Looks like you've got five days' worth of cock to suck in the next sixty minutes."
I near dive for him but he steps away, props some pillows up against the headboard and arranges himself on the bed so that he can watch me work. After an achingly protracted settling in, he nods me over. I climb up between his spread legs and set myself fully to the task, gently grasping his balls in one hand and the base of his cock in the other before sucking the head into my mouth. I know exactly how he likes it, slow and rhythmic, a little twist of the hand on each upstroke, a hard suck followed by a swipe of the tongue on each downstroke. He is quiet, as he always is, but his breathing picks up fast and one of his hands tangles tight and painful in my hair.
When at last he loses patience with my pacing (but really, he can't possibly blame me for wishing to prolong this, to make the taste and feel and joy of him last as long as possible), he uses that hand to shove my nose down to his pubic hair. I take the message and am more than happy to deep-throat him on my own, but am happier yet when he decides to guide me, holding my head still and using my mouth at his own speed.
When Sir freezes in place, arched up off the bed with his cock shoved so far down my throat that I cannot breathe even through my nose, I'm sure he's about to come, feel the swelling pride of accomplishment and the keen anticipation of his taste on my tongue. But he simply holds there, perfectly still and rock hard, depriving me of oxygen in a frankly remarkable show of self-control. My hands tighten on his thighs and my throat begins to convulse around him, my overstressed gag reflex sending tears down my face.
"Aaaah," he purrs, swiping at a tear with his free hand. "That's what I wanted to see." He wipes away another tear and pops his damp finger into his mouth. The sight of him sucking anything like that makes me waste what little air I have left moaning desperately around his cock. I think I mumble "Please," but I'm too far gone to be certain. My head is swimming. I'm seeing spots. And at the rate we're going, I might come all over the comforter before he ever even touches me. Or worse, before he gives me permission.
"Poor little thing," Sir says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Poor, hungry little thing." He thrusts once in and out of my mouth; I gulp air desperately in the fraction of a second I have before his cock lodges itself back in my throat. "You want so much, don't you."
Another thrust, another gulp of air. I nod as much as his cock and hand will allow me and mumble "Yes Sir!," though it comes out completely unintelligible.
"You want this, don't you." Another thrust, hard enough to set me gagging. I nod again, fighting his hand and my shuddering throat to make myself clear---I want it. I want it so bad. "Bet you want to breathe, too, don't you."
I eye him over his cock but do not nod; though my hitching, burning chest wants air right now, my straining cock and swimming head have other, better ideas.
"Well," Sir drawls, "I can solve both your problems at once. I'm a generous master, after all." The hand tangled in my hair yanks sharply to the left, pulling me off his cock and out from between his legs. I take the hint and roll onto my stomach beside him, heart pounding, body tingling from my toes to my teeth, panting like a dog in the hot sun. He is on me before I have taken three breaths, in me before I have taken four, penetrating hard without warning or prep and using only my copious spittle as lube.
I shout with the shock of it, the searing pleasure inseparable from the pain, and work my way up onto my knees to make his thrusting easier. His hand snakes around my hip, and once more, I'm afraid that I will explode if he touches me, that I will come far too soon and without permission. But he knows me so well; he pinches two strong fingers around the base of my cock and cuts off any chance of that happening at all. The touch drives me even crazier despite that---pushes me to the bleeding edge without letting me fall over it. I moan out my frustration, my pleasure so sharp I can hear it, smell it, taste it like cum in the back of my throat, so enveloping it drowns out everything but him, but Sir, and I am calling his name over and over as he pounds into me, uses me, owns me completely.
Awash in him as I am, I fail to notice his rising grunts, his quickening pace, until he grits out "Come for me, Nicky!" and removes those two pinching fingers from the base of my cock. He strokes me once, twice, before I shoot over his hand and up my stomach with a cry. His own cry follows a second later as he buries himself deep and stills his hips against my ass, riding out the last of his orgasm, his hands stroking warm and gentle over the welts on my back.
"Good boy," he whispers, leaning over to trail kisses across my shoulders, down my neck. "My good boy." He disentangles from me and turns me over gently, lays atop me and kisses me deep. "I'll miss you," he says between kisses. His lips trail down my chin, my neck, stop just below my collarbone and set to work on a patch of skin there. Teeth follow lips, and he bites me so hard I gasp, try to squirm away. But he pins my body with his own and doesn't let up with his teeth until I'm whimpering like a child, batting my fists against the bed and squeezing my eyes closed against tears. But he knows me perfectly, stops just before it becomes too much, and soothes the mark with a skilled, gentle tongue.
"To remember me by," he says, lapping once more at the already-bruising bite. "While you're gone."
I cannot help it---I snort out a laugh. As if I could ever forget him.
I've never liked holiday parties. The crowds, the noise, the strangers, the acquaintances you haven't seen in ten years whose names you're somehow supposed to remember, the open-bar abuse, the terrible music, the stupid games, the mistletoe that everyone thinks it's so funny to maneuver you beneath . . .
I don't like weddings either, pretty much for all the same reasons, nor am I a fan of the wrath-of-nature-tempting elitism that are gated beach communities. Which makes a Christmas wedding in Boca Raton a whole new level of hell, even if it is a total kinkfest---just as much a collaring, really, as a marriage under God.
So what, you may ask, am I doing here?
Well, for starters, I didn't exactly have a choice. At least I can't hear the music, and I'm well away from the drunken crowd and the mistletoe. Fuck, I'm not even in the house. Which is probably for the best, because the only thing I'm wearing is a Santa hat . . . unless you count the big red bow tied around my cock and balls.
I guess that makes me a wedding present. Not sure why Sir stowed me in the barn, then, instead of drafting me into wait-service like the rest of the Santa-hatted slaves I saw on my way past the party, but I guess I shouldn't complain. They're all working their naked little butts off, while I get to lounge in the climate-controlled barn and nap. Which, admittedly, would be easier if my own naked little butt weren't half buried in itchy straw.
On the other hand, I'd rather be serving Sir---even serving Sir's friends---than be sitting here alone. I wonder who's bringing him drinks, bringing him food, licking his fingers clean and following him round the dance floor. I wonder if he's thinking of me as he sips one of those girly drinks he loves so much, dancing and laughing and maybe even taking his turn at reddening the slave-groom's ass when the boy's master puts his prize on display.
I wonder, briefly, what Sir's intent was in gifting me. The happy couple already comprised a slave; wouldn't my presence just make the poor boy jealous? Or was he a switch, interested in playing for a night alongside his master instead of beneath him? That thought excites me more than I care to admit; the red bow around my cock and balls tightens like Sir's talented fingers as my body responds. I reach down to touch myself, just once, then curl my fingers into fists and tuck them back beneath my head before I can break Sir's rules. But it aches, god, like a hunger, an unreachable itch. And it won't get better anytime soon; the blood is trapped by the ribbon-cum-cock ring, and my thoughts have turned to dangerous places, to threesomes, to foursomes, serving the new couple and Sir all at once, all night long, never allowed to touch myself, never allowed to come . . .
Shit. Enough of that. Truth is, I'm probably just the new dishwasher or something. The thought makes me laugh until I'm breathless. If all they use me for is chores, it would be a sad, sad waste of a gift.
\*
I fall asleep, wake up some time later feeling stiff and colder than before. The hay prickles and pokes as I stretch, but I don't get up. I kind of like it, for one thing, especially where it scratches against the fading welts that Sir left on my back and ass the night before. Plus, I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to move, that this is a test, even though Sir said no such thing. Why else would he have left me here unbound, if not to see whether I'd stay put on my own? I've no intention of displeasing or shaming him or myself in front of a whole wedding full of Doms and subs.
Which is why I am most definitely not in any way even beginning to contemplate thinking about touching myself without permission, despite my erection having turned nearly the same shade of red as the big velvet bow that's framing it.
It's also why I'm so damn relieved when Sir at last comes to get me that I'm kneeling at his feet and pressing kisses to his dress shoes without even knowing how I got there. He'll rescue me from myself, I know he will.
He always does.
He smiles at me, reaches down to pet my hair, then cups my chin and tugs me to my feet. The kiss he gives me nearly unhinges my knees again, but he's holding on tight.
He always does.
"Good boy," he murmurs against my ear, glancing approvingly at my cock, now weeping hard against his thigh. He says it like maybe he's a little surprised I behaved all this time without the aid of bindings or his watchful eye, and I glow with the knowledge that I've pleased him, impressed him, maybe even exceeded his expectations.
"Stand up straight now," he says. "Arms out."
Someone's boy is at his heel, I realize now, only a little surprised that I'd failed to notice the slave earlier over Sir's commanding presence. Yet he's a lovely thing, truly, perhaps five years my junior, just as fit, a face made just as surely for television as I've been told my own is so many times. My jealousy takes me by surprise---no one should be at Sir's heel but me---and I have to squash it down with clenched fists and jaw when Sir waves him forward a step and takes two bundles from his outstretched hands.
Said bundles do help a bit, though. One is a rope, and the other a jingle of leather and metal. Sir passes the rope back to the boy, who takes it willingly, head down and cock erect. The leather Sir shakes out and fits over my bare shoulders. It's a harness of sorts, wide padded straps crossing over my chest and around my waist and buckling at my back. More straps wend between my legs, a built-in leather cock ring fitting snug beside the velvet bow, a long thin strap of leather dangling down from it and brushing the barn floor. Sir finishes his buckling and reaches into the pocket of his tuxedo jacket, pulls out . . .
A horse tail?
Oh, fuck. The barn, the harness . . . How did I not see this coming?
The grin he tosses me when realization dawns across my face is positively evil.
"Ass up, boy," he says through that wicked grin, and I spread my legs wide, bend over, and grab my ankles. Cold lube squirts against my hole---he must have had a little packet in there along with the horse tail---and then a plug that must be the size of Sir's wrist is being worked inside me. I haven't been fucked in three days and I'm way too tight now for something that big to go in easy---assuming a plug that big could ever go in easy. It hurts; my fingers are making dents at my ankles and my poor neglected cock is standing up taller than ever, shouting Pay attention to me! to anyone who will listen.
Sadly, no one is. At least not now. Possibly not at all tonight.
Which, of course, just makes it stand up taller yet.
"Almost there, Nicky," Sir says, his free hand resting warm and firm in the small of my back to comfort me, or perhaps just to stop me from falling over. But he is true to his word; with one last hot flash of pain the flare pops inside me, and my muscles clench tight around the neck of the plug, drawing it in even deeper. Horsehair tickles at my asscheeks and all the way down to the backs of my knees. I feel so full it's like his whole fucking fist is inside me. Fuck, if so much as the breeze blows too strong across my cock, I might well shoot my load, permission or no.
"Stand up now, boy," Sir says, the unmistakable pride in his voice flushing me head to toe. My eyes catch the other slave's for a moment as I straighten, and this time, it's him that's jealous of me.
Sir reaches for the long thin strap of leather still dangling from the harness cock ring and runs it up my asscrack over the horse tail, then buckles it tight to the harness near my shoulders. My hands get buckled into the harness next, resting comfortably at the small of my back, no strain at all on my shoulders or wrists.
Done binding me, Sir takes the rope from the silent slave behind him---actually two ropes; reins, to be specific---clips them to a ring down near my balls, and runs them out behind me. A sharp tug on one pulls my bound cock and balls to the left with a bright spark of pleasure-pain; a tug on the other pulls my junk to the right. I suppose I won't be needing a bridle, then.
Sir seems satisfied. He gathers up the reins in one hand, cups my arm in the other, and leads me outside into the cold.
Well, more like into the lukewarm and sticky---your average cloying Florida night. A light breeze blows against my bare skin, raising goose bumps in its wake. Walking is . . . difficult with this plug inside me, every step jostling and turning it, rubbing it along my prostate (and possibly the back of my fucking throat), making the horsetail swish and sway. A bug buzzes nearby and, denied my hands, I find myself wishing the tail were real so I could swat the damn thing away. But then Sir leans in and does it for me.
He guides me around the massive home, clumps of partygoers with drinks in hand watching appreciatively as I pass them by. I duck my eyes like a good boy, but not too soon to miss more jealous looks from naked boys and girls stuck carrying trays of food and drink. Fierce pride gathers low in my belly (or maybe that's just my looming orgasm?); any one of these pets could have been chosen to pull the wedding carriage, but the grooms picked me. Sir picked me.
In the backyard now, down toward the narrow strip of sandy beach, the ocean churning steadily under endless strings of party lights and a near-full moon, a band playing sappy music and couples swaying on the outdoor dance floor. A hundred or so others are seated at white-draped tables, eating wedding cake and other delicacies from silver carts being wheeled through the tables by pretty naked pets in silly Santa hats. I feel eyes on me and straighten my spine, square my shoulders like Sir taught me and high-step toward the beach. Sir leans in and praises me, his breath tickling the shell of my ear with the promise of pleasure, of reward.
My shiver runs straight down to my toes.
Sir marches me past the crowd, down to where the sand is packed hard and damp from the receding tide. There awaits a magnificent carriage, decked all in white satin, room for two and two alone on the padded bench seat above its tall wheels. I move to stand before it without being told, hear the grooms climb inside while Sir hooks my harness to the carriage shaft. It doesn't look any heavier than the bike-drawn carriages tourists take through Manhattan, but added to the weight of the grooms and the drag of wet sand, I suspect I'll soon be getting one of the tougher workouts of my life.
Sir hands someone my reins, and I'm treated to two hard tugs again, first to the right and then the left. I was ready for that, but not for the stripe of fire that lands across my shoulders a second later; I yelp, jump, take half a step forward and feel the weight of the cart drag at the straps around my chest. From somewhere just behind me, Sir chuckles and says, "That's it, Bill. Don't spare the whip; he likes it."
I grin to myself and roll my shoulders as the blaze fades to embers; truer words have never been spoken.
Sir speaks again, but this time it's to me. "Good ponies get apples and sugar cubes," he says. "If you're a very good pony, I'll rub you down and stud you when you get back."
Well, fuck. This time, my shiver runs right down through the sand.
I don't know where the grooms will have me take them, or how long I'll be gone, or how raw my back and balls and legs will be by the time they're done with me, but I don't care. I don't even care that I'll love every second of it, though of course I will. In the end, none of that really matters---what really matters is that I'm Sir's good boy, and that he'll be waiting right here for me, counting the moments until my return just as anxiously as I.
Ayden awoke to wrongness.
He shoved his furs aside and tuned his inner ear to the forest's song---the bass hum of the trees, the trills of insects---a thousand points of sound merged in near-perfect harmony. He sniffed the air as he listened, detecting nothing but a faint whiff of last night's cook-fire, the loam of the forest floor, the comforting scents of the massive red cedars and the stream running by his campsite.
And there was the wrongness, the faintest whisper of jagged notes worming through the forest song. Had a human dared to cross into their lands?
Ayden's lips pulled back from his teeth in a grin entirely void of humor.
Time for a hunt.
He unwove the branches of his shelter with an impatient mental hum and stepped out into the first light of day. A second sound reached his ears then, a physical one this time: dull hoof beats and snapping branches, faint but rising by the moment. The approaching racket might be nothing more than an animal on the hunt, but he dare not take that chance.
He stooped to grab his kit, lashing his furs to his satchel and slinging it and his fighting sticks across his back.. Then he dropped a sleeping dart into his blowpipe and once again cast both inner and outer ears to the ruckus rushing closer, closer . . .
And sighed, relieved, when he recognized the sound for what it was: a pair of wild boars tearing down the path to his campsite. He lowered his weapon and tuned his other hearing to the boarsongs, churning crescendos of urgency and blind rage. They were almost upon him already. Ayden spun a soothing melody in his mind, a half-forgotten lullaby, and sent it to weave through the boars' frantic tempos---
The two boars emerged into the clearing, drawing to a halt not two feet before him, heads bent and hooves pawing at the earth.
"What haste, fierce ones?"
Of course they couldn't understand him, but it felt good to use his voice again.
Not surprisingly, the boars responded about as intelligently as most people would: one snorted, and the other one squealed.
The squealer took a hesitant step forward and to the side, then stopped again. Its gaze shifted from Ayden to the path beyond and back. Ayden closed his eyes, tried to hear what the boars were hearing, what was driving them forward so urgently. And there it was again, the wrongness, just a whisper yet but a precursor, he knew, of a powerful wail to come: the Hunter's Call, summoning beasts to twist with hate before siccing them upon the human realms.
"Ah." Ayden opened his eyes and nodded at the boars. "I'd not discourage you from such a noble task, but you must know the humans will kill you?"
The squealer took another step forward. This time, the snorter joined him.
Who was he to argue with that?
He stepped aside. Freed of his influence, the boars bolted across the clearing and disappeared back into the dense wood.
Ayden took off after them at a hard run. He followed them for hours, even though he knew with fair certainty where they would go. Indeed, they did not disappoint.
The sun had crested the sky by the time they reached the boundary between the elven and Feral lands, where a foot-wide crack cut through the forest like a fatal wound. No life grew near the fissure for twenty paces, the very earth scorched into volcanic rock and great sheets of muddy glass. No elf had crossed the fissure for nearly three centuries. The boars, however, trotted over without pause, drawn inexorably by the Call that wailed like death in Ayden's inner ear.
Ayden stopped short, loath to set foot or toe upon the deadened earth.
Instead he found the tallest tree at forest's edge: a massive red cedar, its trunk as big around as twenty of him and its lowest branches a good dozen paces overhead.
"I don't suppose you'd offer me a hand up?" he asked, placing a hand upon the trunk and trying to coax a branch to bend within his reaching.
Alas, this tree had sung its melody unchanging for over two thousand years, and it had no interest in shifting for a whelp such as he---never mind that he'd seen a century or eight himself.
Ah, well. He hadn't really thought it would. He fished his steel bearclaws from his satchel, buckled them onto each boot and hand, and started up the trunk the hard way.
Long minutes later, sticky with sap and quivering with fatigue, Ayden broke through the canopy. He dug his farseer from his satchel and peered through the lens. From this new vantage point over a hundred paces high, he could see south across the cultivated human lands for nearly three leagues, and the same distance west across the forest canopy of the Feral lands into the Myrkr Mountains. A few leagues southwest, in the direction the boars had gone, he spotted a dozen crowned eagles gliding over a low mountain peak. No, not just gliding . . . they were circling as a pack, wingtips splayed like fingers on a massive hand.
Crowned eagles never flew in flocks, could barely tolerate each other even when mating. He could hear the wrongness pouring from them in pounding, discordant waves.
Command would wish to know of this. Ayden balanced himself between the trunk and two narrow branches, letting them take his weight, and focused his mind on forming a signal cloud. 'Twas no easy feat for him, a naturally adequate musician at best, to hear the cloudsong so far away and amongst so much noise from the forest below, but at last he detected faint threads of it, high notes jittering chaotic and fast in the upper sky, and he shaped them with his mind into clear lines and measures. Above him, three clouds merged into two and formed the symbol for Ferals and a navigational marker.
He held them as long as he could, gritting his teeth against the strain. But his clouds drifted quickly, and a moment later he gave up, panting, and let them scatter. No matter, though; Command would have seen the signal immediately and understood.
The Surge was building.
\*
Having done all he could for now, he turned his thoughts to a meal, and water, and setting up camp for the night.
Climbing down the massive cedar was, to Ayden's chagrin, nearly as taxing as climbing up it had been, and it didn't help that the Call was growing more strident by the hour. Halfway down, a small herd of caribou bucks in full rack raced by his tree and crossed the border. As he reached the ground, a squirrel whizzed by, and he could not help but wonder what harm such a harmless creature could possibly inflict. But the Hunter's Call would not draw it for nothing; surely it had some purpose.
'Twas not his concern, though. His empty belly, on the other hand, was very much so. Fortunately, he knew these woods well, and before an hour had passed he'd gathered a feast of mushrooms, huckleberries, wild onions, miner's lettuce, and hazelnuts. There was no water source nearby, but 'twas easy enough, even for him, to draw it from the moist air; he untwined the dewsong from the airsong and guided the trickle into his upturned mouth until his thirst was slaked. He drew more to fill his canteen, then climbed back up to the first branch of the cedar he'd scaled before and unrolled his furs. If he slept on the ground this night, he might very well be trampled. Besides, 'twas best to be prepared should something go wrong: should the Surge for once flow into elven lands, or should the humans, in their desperation or foolishness, try to cross the border themselves.
\*
Ayden woke early and alone, wondering what was taking the others so cracking long. Had they not seen his signal? Or were they simply too lazy to travel through the night?
Regardless, he would be well prepared when they arrived. He emptied his bladder, foraged a quick breakfast and a large store of extras, and packed his kit before the sun had cleared the horizon.
Back atop his cedar, he coaxed the leaves and branches to weave into a hunting blind large enough to camp in. From this perch, he had a clear view of the nearest human village a league to the south, and several leagues of their land beyond it. To the west, he could see a few leagues across the Feral woods until the ridgeline cut his view. He spent the morning watching them both, enjoying the solitude and the late summer weather, the many-layered forest song drowning out the worst of the wrong.
He was jarred from his peace round noon by the urgent clanging of bells to the south, and he snapped his farseer toward the human village, where both the temple bell and the bell atop the Surge fortress were ringing madly. The human occupiers of that sorry patch of borderland were dropping tools and baskets in the fields where they stood and scrambling toward safety. Half a league to their west, a mismatched couple of Ferals---a caribou buck and a wolf---were racing toward them. He couldn't hear the humans screaming this far off, but he liked to imagine that they were.
The Ferals were gaining quickly on a man and a woman who'd been working a distant field; the humans with their two weak legs could never hope to outrun the four-legged Ferals, but they were certainly trying. The man's longer stride carried him ahead of the woman, but he paused, ran back to grab her hand, pulled her forward again. How foolish and sweet: they'd die together.
From the east rode two archers on horseback, but Ayden doubted they would make it on time.
And indeed they did not. The woman faltered up a steep hillock, and the Feral wolf caught up with her. She crumpled beneath its lunge without a fight, and Ayden gave the wolf a silent cheer for meting out swift justice.
The male---the stupid fool---stopped again, looked back. Probably screamed the woman's name. Ayden couldn't make out his expression or hear his song from here, but clearly he was torn. By the time he realized there was no helping the woman and began to run again, the Feral buck had gained on him. The man took but ten steps before the buck, as large in its twisted form as a plow horse, gored him through the back and tossed him aside. The man hit the ground with the grace of a soldier and rolled to his knees despite the gaping hole in his chest. Ayden watched him pull something from his belt---a knife, he thought, from the glint of sunlight---but the man died before he could use it.
The Ferals trampled his body as they charged past, but didn't savage it. Instead they raced toward the two riders, then veered off to tackle a man who stood paralyzed in the fields. Ayden fastened his farseer onto him and cursed. 'Twas only a scarecrow. He could see that even from here; how did they not? The cavalry was closing in on them from behind, and he found himself waving the Ferals along---he would have called out to them if he were closer, foolish as that was---but he had no hope of swaying their course. The Ferals charged, leapt, knocked down the scarecrow and sent its head flying.
Then the mounted archers reached their range, and they felled the wolf with two shots through the head that even Ayden had to admit were impressive from horseback. The Feral buck turned and rushed them with lowered antlers---gods, Ayden hoped it wouldn't hurt the horses---but the riders re-nocked their bows in time to take it out.
It was over.
Or not: a third creature, so small that Ayden had missed it before, took a flying leap and scurried right up the leg of a rider. It was on his face before the man could reach for his knife, and he fell from his horse, batting wildly at his head. The other soldier dismounted and killed the Feral rodent, but his companion lay unmoving now, either unconscious or dead. Hopefully dead. That made three kills to three for the Ferals---a definite win. After all, wild animals bred much faster than humans.
The excitement died down after that. The one surviving soldier rode back to town, the bells stopped clanging, the humans returned to work, and a group of men built a pyre for the dead. A lone Feral hawk watched them all as carefully as Ayden did, but none of its friends came to join it.
Speaking of friends, Ayden was growing rather impatient with the tarrying of his own. He gathered his strength to form another pair of signal clouds, just in case, then settled in to wait for the next attack.
\*
The scouts arrived about an hour later. Ayden couldn't see them---they must have been muting their lightsong---but he could hear four of them moving through the forest long before any sound reached his bodily ears. He climbed down to greet them, and found them waiting for him by the time he reached the ground.
Except they were still invisible.
Show-offs.
Ayden looked directly at the space where he knew the one in the lead to be, and a grin crept up his face despite his best attempts at annoyance. "I can hear you, you know."
The forest before him rippled into the shape of a familiar, smiling elf.
"Afi Kengr," Ayden said, grasping forearms in greeting. "By the fallen gods, what took you so long? And where are the rest of you? Or does the Council not deign to concern itself any longer with such business?"
Afi smiled back. "Always so impatient, you are." His three companions, still invisible, spread out to form a perimeter. "Do you know how far we had to travel? And we daren't ride with the Call so strong---'twould be a shame to have our horses go running right out beneath us past the Crack."
Ayden conceded the point with a chuckle.
"Anyway, the rest aren't far behind. But you're right about the Council, they have grown complacent. I have toenails older than some of the boys and girls they've sent this time. But tell me: how far have the Ferals progressed?"
Ayden reported what he'd seen so far, then invited Afi up his tree to take a look. For Afi, of course, the tree bent its first branch. Ayden shot him a dirty look, but stepped up beside him all the same.
"Fret not, my friend," Afi said, slapping Ayden on the back. "Another few hundred years of practice and they'll bow for you too, I know it. Shall we race to the top?"
Though Afi didn't wait for an answer before leaping to the next branch, Ayden grinned and cried, "You're on, old elf!"
He beat Afi to the top by half a dozen paces.
Once in his hunting blind, they sat back, scanning the landscape and waiting for the rangers to arrive. To the west, a wake of vultures had joined the eagles on the updrafts over the Myrkrs.
"Gods, how can you stand the noise?" Afi asked, pressing his hands to his temples as the Call ratcheted up another notch.
Ayden shrugged. "You get used to it."
"The view is worth the price, though."
"Indeed. Will you stay?"
The old scout shook his head. "Command has other plans for me."
Ayden knew better than to ask what they were. Instead they settled into companionable silence, one eye to the Ferals and the other to the woods behind them.
Their waiting ended half an hour later, when the clutch of junior rangers arrived in a hail of stomping boots and rattling foliage and nervous chatter.
"Ah, younglings." Afi sounded fond.
Ayden pulled a face. "I was never that green."
Yet Afi's clamped, twitching lips told a different story. "Come, greet them," the old scout said, cutting off Ayden's indignant response. "'Twould do you good. You've been out alone for too long, my friend."
Ayden snorted. "Climb down a hundred paces for the pleasure of their prattle? I thank you, no."
Afi shrugged. "As you wish."
"Signal if you need me," Ayden called to Afi, who'd started his way to the forest floor. Afi threw a teasing wave, the kind that said he'd have no need of young whelps, and continued on his way down.
The treetop seemed very quiet when he disappeared into the foliage below.
\*
Four days in, and Ayden's little nest had become quite cozy. Below, the greenwood rangers grew ever more restless, their nerves scraped raw under the constant barrage of the Call. They worked hard to conceal it, Ayden credited them that: they whiled away the waiting with stick fights and patrols, blowpipe competitions for range and accuracy, and anxious bets on when the Surge would finally crest. Ayden sparred with them only once, for after he routed all challengers, none would face him again. Afterward, he ventured down only in short bursts to gather intelligence and food. The invitations to stay aground he ignored. The one trembling, brave request to join him in his blind he glared into a stuttered apology.
He probably enjoyed that more than he should have, but the chatter and bravado of novices a quarter his age frayed his patience more than even the Hunter's Call could. Ella would have disapproved. Crack it, Ella would have presided over their silly contests and stroked their pride and soothed them with songs at night. He snorted at the idea, but he couldn't quite erase the smile at the thought of his little sister.
So back into his blind he went, blissfully alone, watching Feral birds arc across the western sky when he detected a hint of deep familiarity above the wrong.
Ella?
Ella! What was she doing here?
In the face of his sudden urgency, the cedar branches bent and shifted beneath him, passing him to the ground in moments. Ella was waiting for him with a soft smile that belied---and nearly disarmed---his concern. Still, he gripped her by the shoulders and asked, "What's wrong, sister? What brings you here? Is everything all right?"
She plucked his hands from her shoulders and held them in her own, shaking her head indulgently. "Always thinking the worst, Ayden."
"For good reason," he said, thinking on that other time she'd come to find him on patrol, nearly three centuries past, with the news of their father---
Ella poked him in the belly, and when he glared at her, she flashed him that cracking cheeky grin and asked, "The new rangers, how do you find them?"
"Young," Ayden said.
She smiled as if expecting his rancor. "Do be patient with them, brother. No doubt they will learn much from you."
"Yes," he drawled, "perhaps in the next hundred years I might succeed in teaching them the value of silence, but I am not hopeful." And speaking of silence . . . "You never answered my question. What brings you here?"
Ella straightened up. "Why, my love of you, of course."
"I see. And the real reason?"
"I'm going to see Chaya."
"What, now?" He gripped her shoulders, scarcely resisting the urge to shake her. "The Ferals are gathering; you'd be a fool to---"
She knocked his hands away. "They never hurt us, you know that."
"But the humans are on high guard now, and they would hurt you."
"Not Chaya," Ella insisted, thrusting forward into his space. He wondered if she realized the challenge she was issuing. Probably not. "She's my friend and I trust her."
Ayden covered his eyes with his hands, held them there until she tugged them away.
"I am not blind nor a fool, thank you very much." Her indignation gave way to sadness as she added, "The human I go to see is dying, not dangerous."
"That is what mortals do, you kno---" Ella eschewed the usual belly poke for a halfhearted belly punch, cutting him off. He scowled at her. "Your presence won't change a thing. Go home, Ella."
He tried to turn her round, but she held her ground. "No."
"Ella . . ."
"I said no, Ayden. I'll not let her die alone."
Ayden let loose an exasperated sigh. Wherever had she learned such stubbornness? He realized that short of binding her, he would not be able to stop her. Though he had to admit, that idea did have its merits . . .
She poked him in the belly again. "Stop that. It's not for you to command me, brother. I am not one of your rangers, if you'll recall."
"Yes, how silly of me to have forgotten." But in fairness, it seemed he had; she would go with or without his permission, so they might as well part on amicable terms. He offered her a resigned smile.
"I forgive you," she said, perfectly grave, though a smile was twinkling in her eyes. She stood on her toes to kiss both his temples. Then she was gone, off at a trot toward the human-elven border as if 'twere perfectly harmless: nothing more than some scribbled line on a disused map.
"Come back before the Surge crests!" he called.
"I will," she called back, not even bothering to turn her head.
"And don't forget to mute your song!"
Her laughing response was a blast of notes so loud that every ranger in his seeing winced---she'd have blazed like the sun to a human's eyes---but then she went virtually silent, and he trusted her to stay that way for the duration of her foolish excursion.
He watched her go until he could no longer discern her through the trees. As he turned back to his cedar, he saw where she'd been standing a single small flower, pink-petaled and perfect, reaching toward the sun. Just like Ella, he thought: always grasping for things she could never have.
\*
Back in his perch, Ayden tracked Ella's progress through the human lands with his farseer. Between the clamor of the Call, the forest song, and Ella's deliberate muting, he'd expected to lose all sound of her, and was pleasantly surprised to discover himself attuned enough to track her all the way to her human's house. He kept watching and listening even when she disappeared inside. From time to time she emerged---fetching water from the well or wood for the stove---a bright, distant figure in the powerful lens of his farseer. A farseer that, strictly speaking, should have been trained on the gathering Ferals . . . Ayden resisted the twinge of guilt between his shoulder blades and kept watching the village.
And for that he thanked the fallen gods in a great, panicked rush when he spotted a pack of human soldiers, spread out a league beyond the village and heading straight for it.
Only centuries' experience with conquering battle rage held him back---and just barely---from hurling himself down the tree and into action. Instead, he readjusted his farseer with shaking fingers. Ten men at least, though from this distance 'twas difficult to discern one from the next. They were slinking through the far field, making faint ripples in the wheat, their steps slow and measured. But that worked to his advantage: he could try to head them off before they reached the village.
Of course, they might not be coming for Ella. The Ferals were on the prowl, after all, and the humans were responding in kind.
But if they were coming for her . . .
He mapped a quick path and memorized the landmarks, then scrambled down from branch to bowing branch. As soon as his feet struck the forest floor, he was racing toward the border and across it for the first time in over two hundred and fifty years.
Ayden ran as he'd never run before, the forest parting a trail before him. He stayed within its safety for as long as he could, but soon the trees thinned and made way for fields of wheat and soy. Before stepping out into the open, he spent precious moments calming his mind and clamping down upon his song until it faded to the softest of whispers; humans could not hear elfsong, but they perceived it as a soft illumination that would betray him. He despised the sensation of binding himself, and the world round him seemed somehow less, but 'twas nothing compared to the thought of a world without Ella.
Even muted, he still possessed the use of all his hearing, and he cast out his senses in search of the soldiers as he sprinted across the fields. He found excitement, eagerness, hatred and anger, confidence and a touch of fear: men on the hunt for a dangerous trophy. Ayden bared his teeth. They had no idea how dangerous their hunt had just become.
He reached the muddy outskirts of the village and slowed to a stop amongst a copse of apple trees near the human's home. Ella's song was wrapped round the dying human's like a swaddling blanket, soothing even to Ayden, though he dared not let it calm him. Instead he cast out his senses once more, his blood rising in his veins as he noted how close the soldiers had come. Too late to head them off, and no time to warn Ella without exposing them both. But surely she'd sensed him by now, and could hear his fear.
Hide, he thought. She might hear it and understand.
Then the time for thoughts was over.
He climbed the tallest tree in the orchard, a measly ten paces to the top, and braced himself to balance without his hands. Through his farseer he spotted the soldiers a hundred paces off, moving quietly down the dirt road. Closer now, he counted nineteen men.
He grabbed a fistful of darts---the lethal ones, not the sleepers---dropped one into his blowpipe, and put it to his lips. Eighty paces. He begged the tree for all he was worth to hide him well, for once the soldiers spotted him, he would lose his main advantage. The leaves and branches rustled softly, closing him in.
Sixty paces.
Fifty.
Ayden blew the first dart, aiming for the rear line in the hope that the soldiers ahead wouldn't notice. The man slapped a hand to his neck, and Ayden planted darts in two more soldiers before the first one even hit the ground. A fourth soldier folded a second later, but then a cry went up and the whole contingent crouched behind their shields, shouting amongst themselves to find the marksman. Ayden took out two more before a sharp-eyed soldier spotted his perch, and before he could reload again, a hail of crossbow bolts chased him from the tree.
Discovered now, he unleashed his bound song with a satisfied growl and called up a fierce gust of wind, but the bolts were too fast and heavy to be swayed much. One skimmed his left arm as he ducked behind the trunk, ripping a burning furrow into his flesh.
He heard shouts of "Elf!" and "Get him!" and "Watch out, sorcery!" as he dumped his kit and jumped to the ground, wondering how by the fallen gods he would best thirteen men armed with crossbows now that he'd been seen. He sang to the wind for a greater gale and it complied, kicking up pebbles and debris and hurling them in violent spirals.
The soldiers shouted in fear and huddled behind their shields again. But this parlor trick wouldn't hold them at bay for long; he needed to act quickly before they flanked him.
Storm, he thought. He'd show them a real storm.
As another salvo of bolts thunked against the tree that sheltered him, Ayden sucked in a breath and sought out every sizzling, snapping note in the air around him, in the dirt at his feet and even within his own body. He summoned them together into a tight, sparking ball of sharp notes and frantic tempos and hurled it at the soldiers.
Panicked screams, then shrieks as his ball lightning burst through the front soldier in a crackling fit of fire and smoke, arced off to a second and a third, regrouped and attacked a fourth. Ayden fought for all he was worth to hold it together, but he couldn't stop it from flowing through the fifth man's feet and into the dirt.
Six dead from his darts, five from his lightning; that left eight more between Ella and safety. He sang out to summon a second ball, and two soldiers turned tail and fled. But the remaining six found their courage and charged him.
His lightning was building too slowly. Desperate, Ayden pulled his daggers and threw, felling the two men in the lead from ten paces out.
He was running out of weapons. He whipped up the airsong round him into a smoldering crescendo, too hot for the humans to press through. Their fear screeched like untuned strings in the music of the battle as they fell back again. The grass round him caught fire, and he let it burn as he struggled to call together the charged notes once more.
A second ball lightning coalesced in his hands and surged forward with a clap of thunder, stopping the heart of the soldier it hit. Ayden urged it on, but his mind-voice cracked and the lightning went directly to ground.
He had no strength left in him to form a third. His legs buckled beneath him and his vision swam, but even as his knees hit the ground, his hands found a dead branch and snapped it in two---he'd dropped his fighting sticks with his kit, so these would have to do. His left arm throbbed where the bolt had grazed it, and his hand was slick with blood, but he had nearly eight centuries of practice on these vermin and if he could just . . . get . . . up . . . he knew he could take on the three who remained.
He was just getting one foot beneath him when something sharp slammed into his back. It knocked him face down into the dirt, ripped the air from his lungs. His first thought, before the pain hit, was of Ella; he prayed like he'd not prayed in over two hundred years that he'd bought her enough time to reach safety. His last thought, before the world went black, was that he'd miscalculated: there had been twenty men, not nineteen, and he'd overlooked the one who had scouted ahead.
. . . Continued in Counterpoint: Book I of Song of the Fallen, available at Guiltless Pleasure Publishing (guiltless-pleasure.com) and Amazon.com.
Rachel is a freelance writer and editor who's dipped her toes into cable news and book publishing and now helps would-be authors polish and publish, writes for websites and magazines, and ghostwrites nonfiction. She's also a novelist, of course, and hopes to be publishing books for many years to come. Her first novel, Counterpoint: Book I of Song of the Fallen, released in August of 2010. The sequel, Crescendo: Book II of Song of the Fallen, will release in the fall of 2011. Also keep an eye out for Anchored: A Belonging 'Verse Novel, to be released by Noble Romance Press on January 17, 2011. You can find Rachel on Twitter (twitter.com/RachelHaimowitz), on Goodreads, or at her website (RachelHaimowitz.com). She loves to hear from folks, so feel free to drop her a line anytime at metarachel (at) gmail (dot) com.

