By My Side ... (A Valentine's Day Story) (17 page)

It was not an orgasm, or not
like any orgasm she had ever experienced before, it was too
absolute, too complete. His teeth scraped along the sides of the
enlarged bundle of nerves, a sensation close to pain, just to be
laved away by the sure stroked of his mobile tongue, first along
one side, then the other, then over the top with devastating
pressure. Then he began to suck, sure and even pulls. She screamed
until her voice broke, her body thrashing across the bed. She was
not sure if she was trying to escape his touch or her own mind, but
he held her firm, his hands under her buttocks raising her to his
mouth, narrowing her world to him. In her mind, in her body, along
all her sensations and emotions, he was all there was.

When the pulls of his mouth
slowed, softened before being replaced with the gentle licking of
his tongue, she had no voice left, no mind, no will. She was
utterly lost -- and found again with each of his touches. His mouth
forced her to ride out each wave of pleasure, even the last
contraction, the last spasm, leaving her devastated and shaking.
She could feel the tears, the heated moisture that had drenched her
cheeks. Her skin was burning, a clear indication that her tears had
abraded it for some time, but she could not care or stop. Elena
felt the bed shift under his weight, felt his body covering hers
and she relished the solace it brought. If she could have, she
would have disappeared into him.

The tip of his penis slipped
into her with ease, even though her body was still tight from her
orgasm. It was not just the moisture coating her labia, her upper
thighs, but the way her body opened in instinctive trust to him,
her very core soft to receive him. Not even the slow stretch as he
pushed into her could disturb her serenity. He was in her, around
her, buffering her from the world. Fully seated his touch reached
deep, the tip of his penis touching her cervix. She had never felt
pressure that deep before.

Then he withdrew and it was as
if hot velvet was rubbed against her channel. Whilst he had pushed
into her inch by inch, she had not felt the little spines lining
his cock, but when he withdrew they were a soft scrape against her
sheath. It woke ever centimetre, made her feel every inch. He
pushed in again, this time with more strength. His hand found her
thigh and hitched it up to his waist. At the deepest point he
ground against her, her clitoris still swollen and tightening again
for another orgasm. She felt the touch of his testicle against her
skin, close enough to her anus to wake tingling nerve endings.

She had no time to accommodate
the sensation with her mind before it was replaces with the scrape
of his penis sliding out of her. It became a dance of constant
change, the powerful thrust into her, coupled with pressure on her
cervix, the touch of his testicles, and then the scrape of his
retreat. With each thrust, with each slide of his body over her
clitoris, she tightened more, her body winding around his cock,
deepening the scrape of the spines against her channel. And with
every shift of his body he shifted the pressure, touched her
somewhere else, stroked over new nerves in her.

Elena was consumed by him and
would not have wanted to be anywhere else. Her eyes opened to him,
the need to see him too overwhelming. She fell into his gaze, into
the victory there and she realised that she felt him not only in
her body, but in her mind. He was there. Everywhere. In the kiss
they shared she did not know where he began and she ended.

In her mind she could feel the
urgency of his need, the way his body was clamouring for
completion, pushing at his reigns. She expected him to let go, to
push them into another orgasm -- and there was no question that she
would follow him when he let go, her body ready, primed. He took
his time, savouring each touch, each stroke, prolonging the
intimacy, the closeness.

This orgasm, when it sneaked up
on her, was softer, though not any less consuming for it. It
swirled through her body, viscous and heavy, slow pleasure to fill
her. She let it and as it took her she felt his restraint break.
His arm lifted her shoulders off the bed, crushing her against his
chest. His movements lost their controlled harmony, became erratic
and almost violent as he pounded into her. Her arms held onto him,
her face searching refuge against his neck. She felt the growls in
his throat, her tongue laving the strands of muscles as they went
rigid. She felt the heat of his pleasure fill her, the pressure of
his cock twitching in her as it emptied its seed into her. It was
that feeling, the sensation of being filled by him, of being
possessed on a basic level, marked and branded by his touch, which
brought her again.

It seemed like hours later when
he loosened his grip on her, unwinding her arms from the death grip
she had around his neck, to bed her carefully on the soft pelts. In
truth, she knew it had not been hours, but it had been a
considerable time since they had stopped moving. For a long while
he had just held her, as if loathe to break the connection, to let
her go. Not even as his softening penis had slipped from her body
had he moved, only shifted her a little to make it more comfortable
for them both.

But the fire died and soon the
warmth of the room was only a fond memory, his body's warmth not
enough anymore to shield her from the cold draft. Her back was
beginning to remind her of the rough treatment it had received.
Still she would not have been able to move, would not have wanted
to break the connection, if not for him. It was the low-key shiver
shaking her frame that broke their absorption with each other.
Reschkar pressed a gentle kiss on her brow and rose.

She watched him, watched how he
threw a thick blanket over her before feeding the dying glow of the
fire with new wood. Then he filled some water into a bowl before
placing the carafe before the rejuvenated flames in the hearth. Her
eyes followed his every move has he cleaned himself, his movements
quick and economic. The whole time she marvelled at the bond that
linked her to him.

Elena felt the power flowing
through her, not a power of violence or force, though it could be
used for that purpose, she suspected, but a softer power, a power
based on loyalty and family, on protection and belonging. She was
not in his mind, did not feel his emotions or knew his thoughts,
but she felt herself through him, felt the warmth of the ErGer
bond, that sensation of unlimited fellowship others felt because of
their link to her -- and through him she felt it too. Through him
she was home.

"What are you thinking, Lena?"
His voice was a little hoarser than normal, almost hushed as it
reached her across the room. In her mind she stroked over the cord
of pure him that seemed to link them like an umbilical cord.

"That."

She wondered if he would feel
her mental touch. He smiled as her picked up the carafe from the
fire and crossed to her.

"That." He answered her. Then
she felt something along that cord, a tightening, a touch, an
invasion. A few hours ago it would have frightened her -- now she
just opened to him. Then she realised what he had been doing.

"You could have just
asked."

A small smile tugged at the
corner of his mouth as he pushed the blanket from her body, baring
her to the warming air of the room. She was not cold, he had
ascertained that with his little foray into her mind.

"I could have." He agreed. "But
then you would not be getting used to my touch."

His lips might be curved in a
small smile but there was no doubt that this was a warning, or
rather a declaration of intent. He would enter her mind, would
assure himself of her well-being, her state of mind, when he felt
the need to do so, whenever he felt the need to do so -- and he
would not accept any opposition. He held her gaze one more moment,
imprinting his will on her, then he reached for a cloth. He poured
a little of the water onto it, soaking it through.

His touch was gentle as he ran
the fabric over her body, the water warmed by its proximity to the
rekindled fire. It was not erotic, not sexual, it was the touch of
a lover caring for his partner. Still she winced, the pressure of
his hand enough to rekindle the pain in her abused tissue. His eyes
held no pity, only resurfacing heat. He spread her legs, stroking
the cloth over her inner thigh before pressing it to the
over-sensitised skin of her swollen folds. Stinging pain followed
by the tease of water drops running past her clitoris, the entrance
to her sheath, her anus, almost brought her shoulders off the bed.
He held her still with nothing more than his eyes.

"Mine. I love the fact that
your flesh is sore from my touch, that tomorrow you will feel
reminded of my possession with every move you make. I love that I
will be hard every time I see you wince, every time you have to
move with careful deliberation."

It robbed her of her power of
speech, stunning her not so much with the rampant possessiveness of
the sentiment -- but with her own reaction. Her tired and depleted
body had tightened, heated under the words, moisture already
seeping from her core again.

The shock, and the discomfort,
kept her quiet as he moved through the room, tidying away the water
and cloth, banking the fire. He slipped under the heavy blankets
with her, rearranging her on her side without asking for her
preference, his arm pulling her into the protection of his large
frame. The room was dark and cozy, the bed a warm nest. She felt
his deep breath against the crown of her head, felt her limbs
softening against him, her body relaxing into him.

Her unfocused gaze swept the
room one more time, came to rest on a dark shape on the floor. It
looked so innocuous there, the long strands of leather fanning out
from the top of the grip in a jumbled half circle. It had been
innocuous, in the end, the violence coming more from her mind than
the strength of his strikes. She knew he could have easily left her
back in bloody tatters -- instead a warm, burning sensation of
liquid softness lay under the skin of her back, wrapped around her
memory.

"What is it, sweetheart?"

She must have made a sound,
given away her thoughts in some way. She turned her head to meet
his gaze as he leant over her. But he was not looking at her, he
had noticed what her mind had been dwelling on.

"I am asking myself if it was
reward or punishment."

That drew his attention back to
her and she saw the quick glow of his teeth in the dark room as he
smiled. Then he kissed her, on her brow, on her eyelids and
finally, softly, on her mouth.

"You are a very smart woman,
Lena. Let me know when you have figured it out."

Her mind was still circling
those thoughts in a lazy manner when her eyes closed under the
heavy weight of sleep.

Endings?

It was three days later. Elena
found herself sitting on the side of that same bed, the strands of
the flogger running though her fingers in a rhythmic pattern. Her
mind was thoughtful, heavy with a strange melancholia. She had
barely seen Reschkar since the night they bonded. The next morning
had come with one emergency after another -- frozen well, an
avalanche burying one of the food stores and damaging the gates.
His days had been filled with emergencies far from her, though she
had spent each night in his arms, his body too tired to move more
than the paces it took him to cross the room and pull her
close.

She herself had spent those
days among the orcs, helping where she could, trying to find her
own footing. Her respect for these people desperately trying to
overcome their own histories of abuse and subjugation, to make a
new life, to form a culture of their own, was boundless. Where ever
she went she met determination and hope -- a hope she quickly
realised was linked to her presence among them.

There were fights and
disagreements, as would be found in every group of such disparate
people. She saw these outbreaks of aggression from afar, saw
flaring annoyance and even outright brawls, saw the aftermath of
nightmares on children's faces, the marks of violence long since
healed on bodies -- but only ever from a distance. She moved in a
charmed bubble, a treasured pet, isolated from anything bad by all
and sundry. Where ever she went there were smiles and shy touches,
food they all needed to ration for the winter, offered to her when
one of the very young or very old could use it so much better. It
was driving her insane.

And then there was the bond.
What had felt so strong and steady that night, now seemed to thin
out a little more with every second. For that one night she had
thought she had finally fulfilled her genetic destiny, had bonded
to Reschkar, had become an ErGer in more than name only. But with
every passing hour since then, with the slow degradation of that
bond, her fear of her own inadequacy had reasserted itself.
Whatever was wrong with her had allowed for a semblance of a bond,
but she could not even do that right. It was fading. Another day
and it would be gone again. She suspected Reschkar had simply been
too tired to notice.

Today, she had stayed in the
room, hiding from their expectations, hiding from their belief in
her, hiding from herself. Her hands played with the flogger, the
broad strands of soft leather trickling through her fingers. At
least one mystery she had been able to solve.

She heard him come in, felt the
way the room changed with him in it, as if he wrapped reality
around him. He made little sound as he moved across the room, did
not speak until the bed moved under his weight. She felt him on the
bed behind her, knew his large body framed hers. But he did not
touch her.

"So, what is the answer? What
was the flogger in my hands that night - reward or punishment?"