"How did it heal so fast?" I said.
My fingers brushed lightly over the ridged skin, grazing it cautiously before I caressed the darker area around the mark.
"...I mean, it just happened, right?"
He didn't answer, but I could feel him assessing time with his light, probably trying to figure out where we both resided within it. Whatever answer he came up with, it didn't seem to answer my question...or his. He shrugged.
"Does it matter?"
I thought about this, too. Whatever anxiety I'd been feeling before I removed the patch, it felt like it was gone.
"No," I said. Relief reached my voice. "No," I repeated. "It's okay."
"Then come here," he told me, holding out his arms.
I didn't hesitate that time, either. Shifting around to face him again, I slid between his waiting arms, wrapping mine around his upper body as soon as I'd curled up against him. I closed my eyes, pressing my face against the bare skin of his shoulder and neck. I didn't stop touching him as I lay there, but I found I was tired again, barely able to keep my eyes open. My fingers ran over the dark hairs on his chest, tracing muscles and ribs, stroking his arms even as I wound my body tighter against his.
I dreamt about you, he told me. His fingers stroked my hair, trailing along my spine as I was starting to drift off. I dreamt about you in that place, Allie...with those people... Pain slivered through his light. It felt real, Allie. Why would I dream about that? Were you there, with me?
Which place? I asked, my thoughts a murmur against his skin.
He didn't answer me at first.
I was nearly asleep when his mind rose again.
It felt real, he sent again. Those things I saw...I couldn't have imagined that...
Maybe it was, I told him sleepily. Maybe it was real...
Were you there with me?
I didn't answer in words, but let him feel I didn't know. When my answer didn't dissipate the tension in his light, I curled my arm around him tighter, hugging him against me when I felt another pulse off his light.
That time, it felt almost like jealousy.
PAIN WOKE ME up the second time.
I didn't know whose it was at first...and really, it didn't matter. It was both of ours by then; somehow wrapped into a single thing, yanking me out of the depths of unconsciousness. The intensity of it woke me but didn't wake me. The deepness of the sleep, of wherever I had been, fought back; I was jerked into my body even as my mind lagged behind, struggling to work my limbs. The only thing I knew for sure was that I was lying in front of him again.
My hands held his arms. More than held him, I was touching him, sliding my fingers over his where he held my belly in one hand, where his other hand gripped the mattress not far from my face.
He kissed my neck as he pressed against me, using his tongue, then his teeth, and the pain worsened, grew unbearable.
I was awake then, if still dazed. I tried to think through that confusion, to remember why we hadn't wanted to do this before.
None of the reasons meant anything to me now.
His arms tightened, then his hands were turning me over; I couldn't move fast enough to accommodate him. I didn't consider trying to stop him, or even trying to slow either of us down. His mouth was on mine even as I gripped his hair in one hand. We kissed for what felt like a long time, until I couldn't breathe, couldn't care about anything but his lips and tongue, his breath against mine. When I wrapped my legs around his, he groaned, coiling an arm around my waist before he slid his body closer in the space I'd given him.
We kissed again, longer that time.
Long enough for me to forget where I was.
I forgot everything that had come before, all the things we'd talked about, decided, discussed. I couldn't feel anything but the intensity of the pulls on both of us...the fact that they were worsening.
I couldn't remember feeling so much of him before. That vulnerability I'd felt around him the first time we'd woken up seemed to have ripped open his light, surrounding me with his presence. I could barely take all of it in, couldn't open fast enough to feel everything he offered. His light enveloped mine, along with the wanting it held...a wanting that hurt more from everything that lay behind it.
I had my hand on him as soon as he raised his body enough for me to reach him.
He gasped, and I felt his light slide further out of control.
He had his hand between my legs then, too, and he was sending images to me once his fingers were inside, getting so graphic I found myself gripping his arms, leaning my head against his shoulder when he groaned at my reaction. I caught hold of the structures in his aleimi without thinking, targeting the same points as before. If I was thinking at all, I only intended to calm him down...to help him...but as soon as I had control over his light, he flipped out.
Like really flipped out.
"No!" His voice was loud, filled with so much anger I recoiled, staring up at him as my breath came harder. "No, Allie! No!"
"Revik..." I began.
"No," he growled. His face hardened as he closed his eyes. "Gods damn it, Allie...if you play with me right now..."
He clenched his jaw, as if stopping the rest of what he wanted to say.
I gripped his hair, trying to get him to look at me. When he finally did, his eyes held a kind of disbelieving hurt, along with a pain so intense I found it impossible to look away.
"Allie..." He forced his voice lower. "Allie...if you don't want me, tell me. Tell me now..." He shook his head, his jaw hard. "But I'll never forgive you...I'll never forgive you if you do that to me now...I swear I won't..."
Pain hit at my heart, enough I couldn't answer him at first.
Swallowing, I shook my own head, clearing my throat.
"I just wanted you to retract," I told him. "Can you do it on your own?"
Pain eclipsed his features.
I saw understanding there, along with a different kind of disbelief when he realized what my words meant. Then he was concentrating, all of his urgency aimed there, at doing this one thing. His face hardened as he closed his eyes, trying to follow the prodding of my light, the pressure of my fingers.
I fought him as I tried to help him...then I gave up fighting him and tried to follow his lead. I was still barely aware of where I was, what I was doing with him. It struck me somehow that we were half-tangled in his sheets, that both of us were naked, that his whole body was hot, his arms trembling where he leaned his weight on his hands.
Looking up at him, I couldn't think at all. When he still couldn't seem to get his body together, I bit my lip, pressing on him harder with my light and my hand.
"Goddamn it." I gripped his hair in my fingers, hard enough to hurt him. "Retract...please, baby. Please..."
I felt him fighting his own light, reacting sharply to my words.
"I can't...gods, Allie..."
"Then let go." My fingers loosened in his hair as I looked up at his face. "You have to let go, or I can't do anything..."
I saw him nod, saw the fear in that surrender, even as his light began slipping out of his grasp. He lowered his head, surrendering more of himself to me until I saw pain contort his features again, worse than before. It intensified the urgency in me until I was pushing at him, trying to get his body to obey now that he was so open to my light.
After what felt like forever where we both hung there, I watched the hard end slowly start to retract. It disappeared back into his flesh without lessening his erection...if anything it seemed to make it pulse harder under my fingers.
He didn't wait.
The instant it was down, his fingers tightened on me, his hands trapping me under him. He moved before my brain could catch up with what he was doing.
...then he was inside me.
He wasn't gentle about it.
He entered me hard enough that it blanked my mind...tightening my hands on his shoulders and arms. The pain didn't bother me...it felt so good I lost all sense of where I was. I had
to fight not to hurt him just to deal with the intensity of the sensation, even as he let out another thick cry against my neck.
I couldn't take my eyes off him, even as it hit me again what we were doing...how different he felt. I saw his eyes close, felt him break out in a sweat as he arched deeper...but his second attempt at caution didn't last past where he was all the way inside me. His back and shoulders tensed as his light flared out...and then he once more seemed to completely lose control, arching into me heavily, slowly, moving harder and deeper with each thrust.
I couldn't decide if I should hold him back, or...
"No," he said. "Allie...no. Please. Please...I'll make it up to you..."
I sent a reassuring pulse, caressing his body with my hands until his muscles grew less tense.
Still holding me down, he lost himself in the motion, his eyes glowing.
His fingers gripped my hair, forcing me to look at him as more pain pulsed off his light. I felt him trying to stop, to at least slow himself down, to relax some part of his light and body, but he was groaning again, angling himself deeper without seeming to be able to help himself. I felt him struggling to let go, to get further inside me, but he couldn't do that either. He couldn't come. He couldn't even calm down enough to extend all the way.
I found myself massaging his chest, trying to pull back my own light, to control myself enough to help him, but I was gripping his back, holding him inside me, digging my fingers into his shoulder when he didn't slow...
Something else occurred to me, a kind of horror as I remembered...
"No..." He shook his head, lowering his mouth to my ear. His voice was somewhere between a murmur and a growl, almost drugged-sounding. "No...I can't feel them, Allie...I can't feel anyone but you...it's driving me out of my fucking mind..."
My nails dug into his back. I was probably hurting him again, but I couldn't make myself stop. He was right. I couldn't feel it either...none of it.
Nothing of my time with the Lao Hu. No imprints. None of the others...
He closed his eyes, groaning louder. "Allie...don't...don't think about it..."
"I love you," I told him, fighting a surge of emotion that blanked out my mind, made it hard to talk. "I love you..."
His pain worsened, until I couldn't feel anything else.
He gasped as his light sank deeper into mine, and then he was pulling on me, trying to get me to open more, tugging and hitting me in pulses with his own light, trying to get around me...anything to let him closer. His light grew desperate again, pulling at my heart, at structures I could barely feel.
"Let me in," he groaned. "Allie, let me in...let me in..."
I tried to help him, fighting past shields I didn't even know I wore. Feeling his frustration worsen, my pain keened upwards to the point where I couldn't see. The pulling on him worsened, and I gradually began to surrender my light.
I felt his relief the instant I started.
He wound into every opening I gave him, gripping my body tighter in his hands, slowing his over me as I gradually let go. That coiling sensation beneath us, what I'd wanted from him in the cabin...what he'd used to seduce me time and again with the rebels, grew so intense I could barely feel anything else once his light gripped me there. Once I'd given him permission, I felt him opening me up, working at it in a kind of fevered concentration as he unravelled blocks in my light. I had no idea what he was doing really, but I felt him losing control again as those locks and shields gradually let go.
Then, abruptly, a kind of shock ran over his light, intense enough that he paused.
He let out another groan, coming to a full stop over me.
"Fuck," he said, gasping against my neck. The same understanding reached his voice. "If we finish like this, I could get you pregnant, Allie..."
Holding him tighter, I fought to find some part of my mind that cared about that.
"Is that all right?" I said finally.
He choked out what might have been a laugh, even with his eyes closed.
He raised his head. His eyes narrowed down at me, right before he kissed me, hard, using his tongue, caressing my face with his hands. By the time he came up for air, his body was rocking into mine once more, making both of us cling to one another.
"They can feel this," he murmured. "Alyson...they can feel us doing this...the whole construct is freaking out. I couldn't make myself care enough to stop...I'm sorry..."
Realizing I'd known that too, somewhere in the dimmer spaces of my mind, I only nodded. But my mind wouldn't leave the other, wouldn't stop toying with it.
"You're not going to answer me, are you?" I said. "About the pregnancy thing...?"
His eyes met mine. A sharp pulse hit at me, strong enough to catch my breath. When I focused on him again, his eyes were bright.
He kissed my jaw, caressing my face with his.
"Allie," he murmured, kissing me again. "Allie...I've wanted a child with you since the cabin..." He closed his eyes, his fingers tugging at my hair, his other palm and fingers caressing my breast. "You said you wanted children with me once. Do you still want that?"
Swallowing, I nodded. "Yes."
Pain swam through my light in another warm flood, stuttering my thoughts. It took me another breath to realize it was his.
His desire worsened, even as he arched into me again.
"Does that mean I can try?" he murmured softer, kissing me again.
His pain worsened again in the pause. I felt my face warm, but I couldn't think straight, not even well enough to pretend.
"Aren't we too young?" I said finally.
He shook his head. He arched into me again, hard enough to take my breath.
"I don't know," he said. "I don't know anything, given what we are." His eyes met mine. "I could be sterile, Allie. A lot of Sark males are sterile..."
I nodded to that, too, still watching his eyes.
"Can I try?" he said. "Can I try now, Allie...even with all of them watching us?"
Feeling a flush of pain, that time mine, I shook my head, but not in a no. "It doesn't matter about them," I told him. "You can try...if you want..."
His pain worsened again, even as his light grew more directed.
He didn't wait, but began pulling on me again, fighting to tug and tease more of my light open even as he coiled into me harder where he held me already. I tried to follow his coaxing, realizing only then I'd closed up a little tighter while we were talking, maybe because of the others watching us, maybe out of embarrassment, or the look in his eyes or the seriousness of his light, or my own wavering self-control...I don't know why.
In any case, he worked at it with a methodicalness that I found impossible to resist. I felt him force himself to slow down, to take his time. Like an inhaled breath, the violence in his light dimmed. Around me, his light moved slower...tugging sensually at mine, pulling on it with a heat that stole my breath, that forced my hands open, my body. He felt like the infiltrator again as he worked...maybe because I'd given him a goal he wanted more than an orgasm.
Within seconds I was lost in him.
Once I lost control, his began to slip. Gasping, he hung over me, his eyes bright with light as I found myself talking to him...unable to track anything I said. I gripped his lower back, wrapping my legs around him. He clasped me in his arms as his body arched deeper.
I cried out when he extended all the way into me.
He let out a groan that seemed to come from deep in his chest, pinning me until I couldn't move. He continued to cry out, his voice holding disbelief again. I watched his eyes glow brighter as he asked me to let more of him in.
It started to build in me...then I realized it might be him...that I couldn't tell the difference. He reached up with one hand to grip the headboard, then he was arching into me harder, using the leverage. I slid my hand over my head too, pushing back on the same board, and he let out another groan, watching my face.
It felt like we hung like that for a long time, both of us half gone,
lost in some place only half-related to our bodies. When it started to tip over that edge I gave another cry, pulling on him with my light, pulling on him with every part of me...
He started coming somewhere in that.
I did, too, not long after...or maybe before him, I don't know. His breath came out in short pants, timed with each thrust as his head lowered, his muscles softening as our bodies slowed. He had so much of his light in me by then I couldn't think at all. My fingers dug into his back; I knew he held me just as tightly, but it still felt like it wasn't enough.
I have no idea how long that lasted.
He was still rocking against me, his body spasming in jerks, when I found myself aware of us again, of where we were. I looked up at him, lost in the sharp angles of his face, visible even under the beard. His hair was sweated to his neck, his face flushed, but I saw so much relief and emotion in his face that it brought another stab of pain.
Then we were lying together, tangled in the sheets, kissing.
It seemed like a long time passed before I had calmed down enough to be able to breathe, to just lie there against him. He rolled us partway to his back even as I thought it, and my arm curled over his chest, cushioning my head.
His light felt different already.
So did mine.
Still, the change wasn't quite the same as the first time, despite what Balidor had said. I didn't feel lost in the same way, but there was something else there, a kind of seriousness to both of us that I couldn't quite put my finger on. Also, I could feel more of him than I remembered feeling in that cabin. He felt larger somehow, and yet closer to me, too.
Something about the difference made me almost nervous.
Maybe I hadn't quite gotten over that feeling that he could leave any second, or change on me again. I was still getting to know him as this more complex person, so maybe that made me nervous, too.
As affection-starved as he was, this Revik didn't need me in the way the others had. He was more of his own person. I liked that...in fact, I liked it a lot when I let myself really feel it, but truthfully, a part of me was threatened by it, too.
I watched as he rubbed his face with his hand, seeming to notice his beard for the first time. Tugging on it with his fingers, he glanced at me, smiling.
Allie's War Season Three Page 23