Mirror Bound

by Kirsten Bij't Vuur

I told him: 'Something did happen, as you probably expected, knowing that work of folk art was magical. Last night, the bloke with the horns tumbled out and hid behind my hearth. I ..'

  Here, Paul interrupted me: 'You mean to say that a real person came out of that mirror-thing?' Stunned, I replied: 'Yes, wasn't it suppose to? I thought you expected that to happen, that it was a test.

  The horned guy sticking out of the piece came out for real, scared to death, nearly starved to death and whipped until he bled. You said he'd feel right at home, yesterday.'

  Disturbed now, Paul told me: 'That work of art was magical in a really small way, meant to tempt its owner into crossing boundaries. I expected it to loosen you up a little, to go have some fun. Where is the mirror now? And the guy?' That was so sweet of him, wanting to help me to have fun, possibly at the cost of my love for him.

  But: 'The mirror is wrapped in black cloth, a skirt actually, face down in the farthest corner of my room. Lukas was very afraid of it. And Lukas himself, he is probably in my bed, sleeping, or in my kitchen, eating. He was skin and bones, and incredibly weary. Wary too.'

  Paul now came straight at me, took hold of my shoulders with both hands, looked straight at me and said: 'That is not how it's supposed to be. Better sit down and tell me every detail. That sounds like strong magic, but I felt nothing.

  Come to think of it, it shouldn't even be able to cross my wards.'

  Thinking of what happened, I told him: 'Maybe the mirror thing is some kind of portal to another dimension and he was afraid something would come out after him.' This thought clearly impressed Paul: 'You think really logically, and you may very well be right. A portal wouldn't need magic to activate, it is just a door.

  And it would explain why he wanted it covered and upside down.' I added:

  'And it had to be black cloth, he insisted on that.'

  'Tell me everything, please, and then I want to meet him. A portal can be very dangerous, and you, and this part of town, are my responsibility, ' he said.

  This was not going as I'd expected, and now I was going to have to tell him

  what I had done.

  Well, I did promise myself I'd see this through, so I started: 'As I said, there was something hiding behind the hearth, and I didn't know if it was intelligent or animal. It was clearly very afraid, so I tried to soothe it and get it out. Eventually it did, and it was the guy from the mirror. He was stick-thin, hurt and very weary.'

  I described the whole event to him in detail, and it was easy enough until I got to the next morning.

  I told Paul: 'This is going to be very embarrassing to tell, so please be patient.' Paul nodded and took my hand to encourage me.

  I went on: 'The next morning, I thought it had been a dream, until I felt his presence, and I felt his, you know, male part, trying to enter me.'

  Shocked, Paul said: 'He raped you?' In distress, I told him: 'Please don't judge until you've heard it all, Paul. I think he's not like us, he needs sex as if it were food. I was a virgin still, and I did not take his action lightly. I turned on him and got very angry.

  He was still half-asleep and fled under the bed in fear. I felt so sorry, you should have seen him. Abused, starved, lonely. I talked to him and got him quieted and in my arms again, where I soothed him and told him you can't just take a girl without asking first. He must have been starved for lovemaking as well, for he proceeded to ask me to allow him to make love to me.

  And not in English, he speaks a kind of flowing language, beautiful to hear.

  But still we understood each other Paul, I gave him permission. I wanted it, and he needed it.'

  As I expected, Paul was crushed to hear this, but he did hold on to my hand and he didn't turn from me in disgust. I didn't really want to describe my feelings having sex with another man to the man I loved, so I said: 'Paul, he is really different. I couldn't refuse him any more than I could refuse him food. I enjoyed it. But he would probably do it with another woman as easily and as skilfully

  I thought he'd kill himself with the exertion, but it gave him strength instead.

  He apologised for not having asked at first, and I've forgiven him. If he asks again, I will allow him again.

  But that doesn't change my feelings for you. I want to do the same things with you, really badly. I was a twenty year old virgin with a crush on a man I

  thought I couldn't have. And now I'm no longer a virgin, and if that means you don't want me anymore, my virginity is the only thing that will have changed.'

  But here, Paul showed me what he was really made of. 'I would be a hypocrite if I held loving another man against you. I practically set you up for it by not telling you what hanging that mirror over your hearth would do to you, even if it took a totally different form than I expected. I don't care about virginity, I do care that he treats you with respect.

  I did ask you to wait for your talent to develop before you decided if you really loved me, I knew there might be other men before that.' Putting his arm around me proved to me he didn't blame me, and he said: 'I didn't realize you were still untouched.'

  I told him the truth: 'I just never met anyone I wanted to do that with until you came along, and you made it clear to me you needed more time. I let Lukas do it also because I wanted to finally know what it was like.'

  Clearly, Paul still found that difficult to hear. I wondered if he realized he could have had the honour if he hadn't kept me away. I thought so. He observed: 'You seem to know exactly what you can expect from this man, and what you want from me.

  I feel hurt, but I don't know if I have the right to. And the thought of you wanting to see my bedroom kind of excites me. A lot. It's really tempting. But first I want to meet this creature of yours, find out if he means danger to you or to us all. Will you take me to him?'

  Relieved that he seemed to understand me a little, I told him: 'Gladly, but I have a few questions first: do you have a file or sharp knife to trim his hoofs with? And do you have some pants that may be too small for you, or that you don't like to wear anymore? Not too tight, he's not used to wearing clothes.

  And what about my magic lesson?' He laughed and took a large file and a sheathed knife from their place on the wall. Then he held out his hand to me, inviting me to follow him up the stairs and into his gorgeous house, where he left me outside a door on the landing: 'I'll check out my pile of excess clothing, he'll want some shirts as well.

  But you cannot come in yet, you will not see my bedroom until I'm ready for some love-play of our own.' I felt relieved at his joking, glad I had been totally honest with him. When he came out, he handed me a black velvet cloth and a glass bottle. He carried another bundle himself, plus two leather

  bound books. 'Homework', he said. Then we left his apartment and climbed the stairs to mine.

  Chapter 5

  I had to put the cloth and the bottle down to open the door, and I picked them up again and entered my house, followed by Paul. Expecting to see Lukas in the kitchen or in bed, I looked around and started to worry: he seemed to have disappeared.

  Looking at Paul I felt a bit foolish, suppose he thought I had made it all up.

  But Paul motioned me to keep quiet, then pointed at the little room where he had personally installed a really nice shower, hooked up to a central boiler located in his basement. Apparently he had other means to find people than just his ears and eyes.

  I moved toward the room rather noisily, not wanting to startle Lukas if he was hiding in fear. Quietly opening the door I found him behind the curtain, slightly startled it was me but very relieved. He spoke in his own language and I again heard the meaning of what he said in my mind: 'I sensed a source of great power coming this way, and got scared. I'm totally without resources, I can't defend myself at all.'

  From right behind me I now heard Paul speak up, but I couldn't understand a word he said, for it was spoken in the same language that Lukas used. It sounded much more commanding than his usual tone, but it didn't seem to scare Lukas a
ny further.

  I could understand Lukas' answer, apparently my mind still caught the meaning of his words when they were not directed at me: 'So I find myself in a guardian's home, what a stroke of good luck. And a guardian who speaks Greek. Now I dare to feel a lot safer.'

  And at me: 'You must be talented then, no wonder you can understand me and make yourself understood through your mind.' Suddenly he realized something: 'That makes what I took from you even more of a loss, though it probably saved my life. Please tell me you weren't chaste for your calling.' I didn't understand, but clearly Paul did.

  He spoke several sentences in the strange language, apparently Greek, and Lukas' face fell. Paul, seeing I didn't understand, explained and translated for

  me: 'If you had been chaste to develop your talent, he might have ruined your guardianship by trying to take you unasked. I told him it was a despicable thing to do.'

  I can tell you, that made me more than a little mad, and I told Paul in no uncertain terms that it was not his place to judge Lukas for what he did, I had already done that and I had forgiven him. It was my body and my decision, and I had made a choice to let him continue, and greatly enjoyed the results.

  If the deflowering of a potential guardian had saved Lukas' life, I'd say it was power well spent, I didn't feel the loss. I had the satisfaction of seeing Paul look a little shamefaced, but not hurt. He might be my self-appointed mentor, but that didn't give him the right to patronize me. He'd better teach me some magic first, for at the moment, I had not a shred of evidence of the existence of magic, I only had his word for it.

  Clearly, the translation of language not directed at the other worked both ways, for Lukas' face cleared and he embraced me thankfully. Regrettably, that did seem to hurt Paul, though I'm sure Lukas was only relieved, not triumphant. Lukas seemed very impulsive to me, almost childlike.

  But in the matter of lovemaking he appeared to be very much adult and very experienced. It would be interesting to get to know him better.

  We sat down with a cup of tea as Paul asked Lukas endless questions about how he had come through that mirror, and who had mistreated him with so much expertise. I couldn't understand the questions as Paul asked them in Greek, but Lukas' answers still came straight into my mind.

  Paul offered to translate for me, and when I told him that I understood everything Lukas said in some strange way, he was amazed. 'That must be your talent awakening,' he told me, 'though it is a talent I've never heard of before.' So from that moment on, he only translated his own questions, and we could all understand one another.

  Lukas' story was frightening. He had been taken from his father's home, a villa in a place akin to ancient Greece, on the shore of the Mediterranean, but with people like himself living there in a society based on intimacy.

  He had been taken to a place that looked nothing like anywhere on his earth, or ours. It was cave-like, but the stone was not like caves on earth, and outside there were no plants or animals at all. The air was hot, laden with moisture and heavy with sulphuric fumes. The creatures keeping him captive were nothing like humans and not like his own kind either. Demons would be

  the best description, and they never gave a reason why they had taken him.

  He suspected they just enjoyed torture. He had been systematically starved, of food and of company. He needed a lot of emotional and physical attention to thrive, and even with plenty of food he would have slowly succumbed to sheer unhappiness.

  They did not actively torture him, just the occasional beating. It was mainly the emotional void that brought him to the point where he had to get away or die within a few days. He was not bound in the caves, and one day he found a strange opening in one of the rocks. In desperation, he stuck his head into the hole, and saw a strange but welcoming living-room.

  Not able to imagine a worse fate than his current one, he jumped through, and found himself on the floor of the room. Hearing someone approach, he hid, and nothing could have tempted him to come out besides an offer of intimacy, the one thing he could no longer do without. My friendliness had made him feel a lot better, able to eat something, to see some future for himself.

  Used to a culture where practically everyone would be intimate with each other, he felt free to initiate sex with me without consideration. Stopped in his tracks brutally, he was devastated, ready to give up. After I explained my anger and we had shared intimacies, he could go on.

  Having no way to return home, he would have to try to fit in. The Greece where people like him lived had to be a different reality than ours, and there was no way to find it from here. We would have to try to make his life bearable, fit him in well enough for him to be able to enjoy some freedom.

  It would be really difficult in our stiff society and with his alien looks, but I was glad to hear that Paul was willing to help, and we decided to start with Lukas learning English and basic Victorian manners. Paul showed him the clothes he'd brought, and fitting Lukas well enough, they'd probably look even better on him once he'd gained some weight.

  But before all that, Paul showed me how to infuse the black velvet cloth with the fluid from the glass bottle, a kind of spiritual holy water. Then we wrapped the mirror in that. Now it only needed putting away in a deep dark place.

  'Why not destroy it?' I asked. 'Frankly, I don't dare. The collapse of the portal might flatten my quarter of the city, or the whole city,' Paul said, 'this should be safe enough.' And then there was the matter of Lukas' hoofs. Though he

  could file them into shape by himself, it would be easier to have someone else do it.

  Of course that was a job for the artist Paul, and with directions from Lukas he cut and filed one hoof into the shape it was supposed to have. Then he did the other one in reverse, without further instruction, proof of his superior craftsmanship. 'If you ever need shoes, come to me, and I'll forge you a nice pair out of copper,' he joked, but the concept of shoeing hoofs was totally new to Lukas. When we explained he said: 'My hoofs are hard enough to climb rocks with all day.

  I'd rather wear shoes like yours. That would make me fit right in.' And he was right. Fitting in would be the main challenge from now on.

  Paul took the mirror for safe-keeping. I'll make you a new piece for over your hearth,' he promised, 'you read those books, and I'll get some for Lukas to study English. I'll get some food too, and cook for the three of us tonight, if you both agree.'

  He translated this into Greek, and we both did agree. In English he said to me: 'You were right to give him what he needed. I will try to keep an open mind.' Relieved by his understanding, I embraced and kissed him, and he left.

  I decided to feed my goat-man, then send him back to bed, but he turned out to be just as much his own person as I was. With another meal inside him, he started to nuzzle me, and fondle my curves.

  Absently I permitted his attentions, until he said: 'Melissa.' I looked at him, saw a thoughtful look on his face. 'You love him, don't you?' he asked. Did he speak the words out aloud, or were they just in my mind this time? 'I do, Lukas,' I replied, I've loved him since I first met him a few weeks ago.' 'Why aren't you intimate then? He loves you badly, it hurts him when I touch you,'

  he wondered. 'I want to very much, Lukas, but he doesn't want to get intimate for fear of getting hurt,' I said. 'That is stupid, he already hurts. I think he should love you as I love you,' he insisted. 'I know, and I wish he would,' I said, 'but he wants to wait until my magic has come through.'

  'Do you love me?' he asked. 'I think I do, Lukas, I haven't known you that long but I think I love you,' I said, 'do you think that is possible?' 'How could anyone love just one person?' he retorted, 'where I come from that would be considered unhealthy.

  Can I make love to you now?' As answer, I took him in my arms and kissed him deeply, the remembrance of feeling him thrust himself into me rushing

  in, making me feel as shameless as a cat in heat.

  We made it to the bed, where I stroked his mottled skin, across his ch
est and over his stomach, until I reached his impressive penis, stroking it too, the base, the smooth, bared top. Then I took it in my mouth, first as far as it would fit, then running my tongue over the smooth surface, under the ridges, and back in. He lay back for some time, enjoying my caresses, only moving slightly along with my movement up and down.

  But soon he took a more active part again, and I felt him move beneath me, felt his hands stroke me, my soft white skin, my beautiful round breasts, until he was once more kneeling between my legs, spreading them gently, stroking my thighs and tasting my most intimate place with his tongue. With my passion rising, I also felt the need to be more active, and I in my turn moved beneath him until I could reach his penis again, head between his legs, passing my heat on to his sensitive member. This was really turning me on, and I soon had a high, feeling his flesh in my mouth at my height of passion.

  Moaning with ardour, he carefully pulled his male part out of my mouth, turned a little and entered me, nice and firmly.

  That was a good trick, penetrating on a high point, for it once again brought me sheer bliss. I guess this was his favourite part, for he looked triumphant, pumping away on top of me, looking at me with real love, fondling my breasts, my face, my hair. He lifted my legs a little to allow himself even more access, reaching other sensitive spots inside me, leading me to new heights. Collapsing on me was becoming an excellent habit, he was so light that I could have had him there for hours.

  I suddenly realized that I had ignored one of his most distinctive features so far. Were his horns just too alien for me to acknowledge? Or did I suppose they had little feeling because they were so hard? In any case, I pulled the blanket over both of us, snuggled comfortably under him, and touched one of the horns.

  Of course, it felt like a horn, hard and rough. But my touch did have an effect on him. He turned his head to give me easy access, and closed his eyes in pleasure. He loved to have his horns touched! Feeling along the surface of the horn, I was amazed that his body could make such a hard substance, and when I reached the base I rubbed the ring where the horn was attached to his skull, a bony ridge covered with soft skin.