Ashes Of Memory

by Aiden Bates

  He shrugged. “You told me some. A lot, I guess. Why?”

  I told him.

  He swallowed, and nodded slowly. “Uh… yeah, you told me a lot. Can you memory wipe me or something?”

  I chuckled. “‘Kay, so, I didn’t tell you everything. Or, I greatly exaggerated. We don’t do memory wipes. It’s kind of like trying to pull one card out of a house of cards. Nothing is isolated. You’d end up as crazy as I am.”

  “You don’t seem that crazy to me,” he said.

  I wish I could have just appreciated that as some kind of compliment. Instead, it made me think of all the people back at Custodes Lunae who gave me sidelong looks or walked on eggshells around me, and all the work I’d had to do to help them forget how ‘unstable’ or ‘dangerous’ I was. I turned my head to stare out the window at the dark world passing us by, just barely out of sight. “I’m just used to hiding it at this point,” I muttered.

  Tam didn’t respond to that, but I didn’t sense the taut pressure of unspoken words coming from him. He wasn’t mulling over the right thing to say, or worrying that he’d offended me, or that I was about to melt his brain because I was a little stressed.

  I mean, part of that was just ignorance. But I liked to think the other part was a degree of confidence, if not trust, in my ability to manage myself.

  The ever-present hum of the car’s engine, the vibration in the seat, and the distant growl of asphalt under tires all mixed together with the late hour, and I managed to fall asleep after running checks on the mishmash of magic and conditioning that kept my psyche from cracking like an egg.

  “You wanna what, now?” I asked, eyeing Tam critically after what he’d just suggested. It threw me enough that for a moment I wondered if I was dreaming.

  Tam rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, last time… I saw some stuff. In your head, I guess? You thought about tying me up, right?”

  I groaned, and gave a quiet chuckle as I put my hands on his chest. “Tam, that was just a… passing fantasy sort of thing, you don’t have to—”

  He put a finger to my lips, a slow smile spreading over his. He tapped the side of his head. “You can look. I told you—I trust you.”

  I bit my lower lip, excited but embarrassed. Usually my control was so much better. There was just something about him that made my focus waver. Especially after what he’d done to me the last time. For a dragon to say he was okay letting me in his head was a big deal, though, and I took it with the solemnity that it deserved. “I trust you, too.”

  He lifted my fingers to his head, even though I had told him that wasn’t necessary. He closed his eyes, briefly pressing against my right hand as if he savored the touch. I unlocked my own mind and pushed out threads of mental magic to probe at his surface thoughts as they resonated into the psychic plane. They had the quality of fantasies—illusory thoughts with no basis in real memory, ephemeral but remarkably clear. Visual and tactile, too. I caught flashes of him pulling against ropes, of me on top of him, grinning. I felt tightness around his cock as I rode him—that was incredibly clear, and had the feeling of a well-worn thought, revisited over and over again from memory.

  And behind all that, I sensed his own excitement. The rush of lust and interest that marked all of this out as the kind of fantasy he really wanted to explore; not just the passing, shame-filled fantasies I’d sensed in the two other men I’d risked letting go of myself with.

  “I see,” I murmured as I let my fingers trail down his cheeks and jaw, and then slipped them behind his shoulders.

  “It’ll be fun,” he purred as he slid his hands around my waist and pulled me close. He was already hard, like me, as he ground his hips to mine and dipped his face to graze my lips with his tongue, his breath hot over my skin. “And I know you want to.”

  “All right,” I admitted, “you caught me. I like the idea of having the run of a big, powerful beast who can burn me to cinders with his breath at any moment, I guess.”

  He snorted, and a puff of smoke curled from his nostrils. “I would never,” he growled. “Not unless you provoked me…”

  It sent a thrill up my spine and down into my cock. He reached up to one of my hands, and pulled it around and down to his jeans. “They may not tell you this in mage school,” he said, nuzzling his nose against my jaw, “but dragons have incredibly sensitive balls. Doesn’t take much to control us, really—if you’ve got a firm grip. I’d be practically helpless…”

  My stomach fluttered the way it always did when Tam talked like that, or when he looked at me just the right way, or… pretty much any time I was around him, maybe, but this was more intense. I pulled at the button of his jeans, then the zipper, and found that he hadn’t bothered with underwear. “I guess you must be pretty careful who you let get close, then,” I said. “Wouldn’t want to be taken by surprise.”

  “That would definitely be dangerous,” he agreed, his voice slightly more ragged as I grazed his cock with my palm. It pulsed in time with his heart, throbbing against my hand as I reached further, and found his heavy nuts already pulled tight against his body. They were more than a handful, and the scent of musk reached me as I massaged them.

  Tam groaned, and nipped at my jaw. “You can be rough.”

  I chuckled nervously. “I…”

  He reached for my hand, and closed his fingers around mine, urging me to squeeze. “I heal, Vance. You’re not going to harm me.”

  “It’ll still hurt,” I said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Yeah, you do,” he said, squeezing my hand tighter. “You just want me to like it.”

  How much had he managed to see? I hadn’t let either of my other partners in that deep, not even on purpose much less by accident.

  “Hurt me,” he breathed. “Please.”

  I took a shaky breath, and pushed past my nerves. “It’ll help if I can…”

  Tam nodded. “I told you—I trust you. Look all you want.”

  I didn’t go deep or anything; just enough to feel his surface thoughts storming over the depths of his mind. But they didn’t have the quality of passing fantasies anymore. Each one felt rooted, deep down, as if the deepest parts of his mind were out front. He craved; he needed.

  Reassured, I squeezed a bit harder on my own and watched the excited reaction blossom across his mental body as the pressure on his nuts increased until sparks of pain flared up and mixed with his desire.

  “Harder,” he gasped, nodding. “Take me over, beautiful. Make me yours.”

  Between his words and the echoes in his mind that told me he was being entirely earnest, what last reservation I had inside melted away. A sense of power and control filled me. He was mine. It felt like he was mine. My very own dragon to play with however I wanted.

  I gripped his balls in my fist, hard, and he gave a pained grunt as his knees shook. His eyes watered as he tried to hold my gaze, but his eyes closed tight as I pulled, and he had to grab my shoulders to stay standing.

  “Take your pants off,” I ordered.

  He opened his eyes again and looked into mine. “Make me.”

  That threw me. I knew what he meant—for me to compel him. Violate his mind like I did his body. “Oh… Tam, I shouldn’t—”

  “I want you to,” he said. “Really.”

  “I know,” I said, “I can see that, but…”

  He kissed me, nibbling at my lower lip, tasting my mouth. I felt it when he wished I would hurt him again, so I did, and his breath caught as he held me tight, his mouth pressed to mine. The need in him built to an almost painful crescendo that I would have felt even if I hadn’t been in his thoughts. Make me, he thought, the sound of his voice clear as day and laced with a potent cologne of curiosity, lust, and something else I had never felt before and didn’t have a psychic vocabulary for.

  Something like a need to be controlled.

  I pulled away from his mouth, and spoke out loud at the same time that I pushed a burst of psychic force into his mind. “Take off your pan
ts.”

  My gut turned, sick at what I had done for a second—until a swell of pleasure practically overflowed from Tam’s mind. His hands left my shoulders and went to his jeans. He pushed them down, grunted as I tugged on his balls again, and carefully stepped out of them. My lips tugged into a smile. “Good boy,” I purred, and then took a step back, leading him by his nuts toward the bed. “Now your shirt.”

  The command hit him, and again that same blossom of pleasure washed through him as he pulled his shirt off and tossed it aside. His eyes were glossed briefly as he did, but not the way I had seen in others who were forcefully compelled.

  “On your knees,” I told him, this time with no compulsion. He didn’t move. A giddy, defiant kind of sensation bubbled across his surface thoughts. He wanted the game, so I gave it to him, pushing the thought into him. “On your knees, dragon.”

  Like I had drugged him, his pupils widened and he gave a quiet groan of excitement as his knees buckled. I followed him, keeping my grip as I knelt. He gazed at me, drunk with helplessness. “Please,” he rasped, “don’t hurt me.”

  If I hadn’t felt the reverse of those words in his thoughts, I would have been horrified with myself. As it was, I could see the game taking place in his head, his want to say whatever he felt—and his trust in me to hear it for what it was. Still—verbal play wasn’t something I was terribly experienced with. I hesitated, my mouth partially open as I froze and couldn’t decide how to respond.

  Tam grinned a little. “I won’t judge you, you know. Whatever you say, whatever you do to me—just remember it’s a game.”

  I bit my lip and nodded once. “I… I think I’m the one in charge here,” I said, haltingly at first but with more confidence as I saw the change in his expression. I leaned in close, my lips almost touching his. “And if I want to hurt you,” I said with as much of a menacing tone as I could, while I gave his balls a hard, twisting tug that made his body shake, “then I will. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me, is there?”

  He trembled, and his head shook once.

  “Say it,” I demanded, giving him another cruel twist.

  Tam gave a weak kind of cry, and almost doubled over, but forced himself back straight. “No,” he said. “Nothing… nothing I can do.”

  There were tears in his eyes, but he was harder than I’d seen him before, his cock standing at full attention, thick veins bulging. His piss slit was wide and weeping as well, precum trickling over his foreskin and down his shaft.

  “Good boy,” I crooned, and let his balls go to glide my hand up his shaft. “Now, we’re going to put this to good use, I think. And if you’re very good, and do what I say—I might even let you come when I’m done with it.”

  He shivered, his eyes rolling as I gathered some of his precum and smeared it around the sensitive tip with my palm. To my surprise, the first rush of orgasm went off like a siren in his mind, threatening to wash everything else away.

  “No,” I said, pushing my thoughts against his. “You can’t come until I tell you to.”

  The tide receded in his mind and Tam’s eyes went wide. “You… you can do that?”

  I grinned, and stroked his cock slowly. It swelled, and throbbed, and his balls churned, but with the compulsion in his brain, it just wasn’t physically possible for the right nerves to fire. “It looks like I can, doesn’t it? If I wanted… I could make it so you never come again unless I tell you to. Would you like that?”

  He swallowed, and a note of uncertainty briefly flitted across his thoughts. It was chased almost immediately with renewed excitement. The corner of his mouth twitched up. “I’d be all yours,” he said. “Forever.”

  That was a big word. But it was all part of the game, right? I nodded, and gave him another polishing over that sensitive cock head. He shook, muscles twitching with the nearness of an orgasm that wouldn’t come, and I pressed my mouth to his ear. “I would own this,” I said, and slid my hand down to his balls to give them another vicious squeeze, “and these.”

  Tam’s breathing was short, sharp and shallow, coming in little gasps. “Fuck…”

  “Not just yet,” I said lazily, and let him go to stand up. He started to follow, but I held up a finger. “Not you. I like you down there. Take out my cock.”

  When he didn’t move, I gave a dark chuckle and trailed a finger along his jaw. “I said, take out my cock.”

  The compulsion was strong enough to make his hands twitch up even before he consciously responded. He pried at my jeans, and then my briefs, until my cock sprang free. The tip was shiny with precum of my own, proving to him that I was enjoying myself. He stared up at it, and then at my eyes, waiting.

  “Suck,” I compelled him. “Slowly.”

  He leaned in, and wrapped his lips over the tip of my cock, that dragon-hot mouth sending a shiver through me as he took me in one painful inch at a time, his tongue dancing slowly from side to side. I rested a hand on the top of his head, tangling in his hair as I let my eyes drift closed. “Fuck,” I breathed. “Good… just like that. Nice and slow, Tam.”

  As he bobbed slowly on my cock, little sounds of enjoyment buzzed out of his chest and into me. Surprisingly high-pitched at times, given how deep his voice was. Each time I heard one of those quiet little whimpers and felt the follow-up hum of a groan, I thought he might make me come. But that wasn’t how I wanted it to happen—and not how he wanted it either. Tam loved when he could get me off by fucking me. I’d seen that last time we were together, when he’d finally gotten it just right, and his mind had fairly glowed with self-satisfaction.

  “Get my ass ready for you,” I said, pushing the thought into his mind. “Use some of that precum of yours.”

  He continued to suck me as he reached down and gathered fluid obediently and reached between my legs to find my ass and pry my cheeks apart. His thick finger brushed against my hole, smearing the slick stuff around and teasing gently inside me.

  That and the heat of his mouth were too much. A familiar little fire lit down at the base of my cock. I gasped, and pushed at his head. “Stop,” I told him, and he practically fell back.

  I held my breath and stared down at my bouncing cock and tight balls, waiting to see if the spark would quell. It took a few moments, but I didn’t go off. I exhaled the breath and found that Tam was watching as well, a shit-eating grin on his face as he raised a hand to wipe his lips. “That was fast,” he murmured.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “Don’t get full of yourself,” I warned. “I’d hate for you to have blue balls for the next month.”

  His smile vanished, and he dropped his eyes. “Sorry, sir.”

  “Oh, it’s ‘sir’ now?” I wondered, and gave a grunt of approval. “Okay. Well, get on the bed, on your back. Time for me to put that cock of yours to some use.”

  He glanced up at me, sheepishly refusing to move.

  I told him again, this time with magic behind it, and he got to his feet haltingly and sat down on the bed, then lay back. “Like this, sir?”

  “Just like that,” I agreed, and tugged my shirt off. I stood between his knees, pushing them apart, and looked down at his cock. There was still plenty of precum leaking out of him, and I gathered up some of it and used it to stroke him, spreading it around to get him slick. Tam’s eyes rolled back in his head. His hips thrust into my fist, slow, and the thick knot at the base of his shaft flared. “You like that?”

  He nodded. I stroked him tighter, watching his foreskin gather and stretch as I pulled it up and down, hiding and revealing the weeping head of his dick each time. I’d been cut. Tam’s was the first intact cock I’d gotten to play with, and it never failed to amuse and fascinate me.

  That, in turn, never failed to amuse him. He craned his neck to watch me, a lusty half-smile on his face.

  “I bet you’re close,” I purred, noting the rock-hard swell of him, and the way his balls were pulled up and churning. “Like you could almost come.”

  “I am,” he breathed. “Are
you…?”

  “What, that easy?” I scoffed. “Definitely not. I haven’t been entirely convinced yet.”

  He thrust up again, and gave a plaintive whine. “I could come again,” he said, “inside you… the way you like, sir. Just… can I please come now?”

  His cock throbbed hard, jumping in my grip. His nuts nearly disappeared inside him. None of the contractions necessary would happen, though, as his brain wouldn’t make the right commands happen. “It must be so frustrating,” I mused, watching his cock strain for something it couldn’t reach, “to be so close and just… not be able to make it happen.”

  “Please,” he begged again. “Please, let me come.”

  His face was flushed, and sweat beaded over his body. I tugged his foreskin back with one hand, and rubbed my palm over his cock head with the other. The wild sensation of it flooded him, so that his knees threatened to crush me as they closed, and he gripped handfuls of the blankets with both hands. “Fuck,” he grunted, “fuck… Sir, that’s… I’m too sensitive, it—”

  One hand moved to stop me polishing him. I gave his mind a casual sort of push. “Don’t stop me. I told you, this is mine. I can play with it however I want. Can’t I?”

  His hand froze inches from where I teased him, unable to get any closer. He gasped, breathing hard as his body tried to rebel and failed. Tears began to stream at the corners of his eyes. Gasping turned to manic chuckles that were sometimes almost cries of pain.

  “Can’t I?” I insisted, demanding an answer.

  “Y-yes,” he managed to get out.

  “Yes, what?” I urged, polishing slower, the nonstop trickle of precum making it easy to keep going.

  “Yes,” he gasped, “you… you can play with it however you want.”

  “And why is that?” I went on.

  Tam barked a short laugh that turned into a whine, the thick muscle over his chest and torso tensing, his hips swiveling to pull away from my grip but never getting far enough to stop it. “Because I… because it’s yours,” he ground out.