by J G Jerome
I blurt out, “That is so cool!”
She grins back at me, “Right? So I expect I’ll get a text from her in a few minutes. If not, then I’ll send her one telling her ‘goodnight,’ and we’ll try again in the morning.”
“So, you said this is elven magic? Is that what the cloth boxes are, too?”
She shakes her head, back in teacher mode. “No that’s another flavor of cool entirely. Sidhe magic, for lack of a better term, is elemental in nature and in most cases mind based. Are you familiar with Advanced Dungeons and Dragons?”
I laugh out loud, “I was never going to confess that to you! How did you figure that one out?”
She chuckles too, “You’re too much of a fantasy literature geek to not at least have played a couple of times! I somehow doubt you were a Dungeon Master. I can’t see you devoting the required amount of time to build those scenarios.”
“Right again, oh Psychic Mistress!”
“Actually Jack, that is kind of where I was going with the question. Most Sidhe Magic has a power like AD&D psionics as a source, but mostly focused on influencing behaviour and illusion or glamour. The Winter Court is illusions from shadows and air. The Summer Court uses light. Winter illusions are more subtle than Summer, yet can have a bigger impact on reality. Summer illusions are more complex. It’s innate, and we all have it to some degree. The strongest of us can manipulate physical objects with our illusions. When Sidhe use their powers their eyes glow with the aspect they are most closely aligned with. For my court, our eyes glow with the light of the moon; I think I heard you refer to it as ‘moonglow.’ The powers of the other court shine with a pale blue the color of a clear summer sky. The eye colors hold true for almost all creatures of Faerie based upon which court they attend.”
“From what I’ve seen, I suspect elven magic is much more like really advanced science. For the most part, I think their innate powers allow them to communicate and manipulate subatomic particles - electrons, protons, neutrons, Higgs boson, quarks, etcetera. Their eyes glow a violet color when they use their powers. Remember how O’ren casually mentioned ‘when we came to this dimension?’ I speculate they achieved dimension travel via a blend of scientific understanding and their innate abilities to power it. They are gifted at human science. They are also exceptional at imbuing objects with powers; so, they can be used as tools. Those two skills are the primary sources of income for them; although, some races of elf have other sources of income too.”
Her phone pings, and she checks it. “Guess which princess deigns to speak to me now,” she laughs. She lights up the mirror frame again while wrapping up this latest lesson, “The cloths are Brownie magic, which as I said is really cool. Talk more in a bit, Jack.”
Trina’s eyes light again and the shroud engulfs her body. She twists the device and the shroud almost immediately pours into the mirror leaving a thin layer of shadow hugging Trina’s form. Along the back edge of the mirror from Trina’s perspective another shroud rises, resolving itself into an image of Myra. It’s like looking at black-and-white movie of a living person. All the details in a high contrast, monochrome hologram. ‘This is WAY COOL!’
The ladies start talking to each other in sign language! Then Trina points in my direction, and Myra orients herself in my general direction. She does the whole point at her heart, make a heart symbol, and then point in my direction thing. I return the gesture, and see Trina feed it back to Myra in what I kinda recall is the correct ASL translation of ‘He loves you, too.’ Apparently, Myra can’t actually see me. That makes sense as we can only see her; no details of her location. I suspect I will need to learn another language.
I leave them to it and go back to my email. The existing client accepted my proposal for 300 hours of labor over three months for a big insurance product roll-out. I need to confirm resources and timing on Monday.
I have another message from Supreet Mishra asking if I can come to Hartford next week to iron out final details. I respond that I can be in the office Wednesday, but I will want to have a chat with Mr. Randall and Ms. Harper, the two major business customers for IT on the project. I tell her I’m fine with Mr. Shivkumar joining us and, that I am also fine with having both business customers in one meeting as long as they can answer my questions. If they want to bring a supporting cast, that works for me, too. I also should have a chat with their legal counsel while I am there. One hour should be fine for that, too. If that cannot be arranged, then there is no reason for me to fly out there on my own dime. I am also open to meeting via video conference if they would like to meet sooner than Wednesday.
When I finish, they are still going at it. I call down to the desk and ask if they have any bottled water. They say they do. I pull on some sweats and sneakers from my duffel, grab my key, mime drinking, and point out the door. Trina nods as I head out.
I get downstairs, and the middle-aged woman at the desk asks, “Water?” She sets two half-liter bottles on the desk.
“Yes, please. I’m happy to pay for them, but we’re both very dehydrated. Do you have eight of those?”
“Sure. They’re $2.50 each.”
I grimace and tell her, “Thank you. I appreciate it. Have a great night.” Grabbing the bottles, I head back upstairs as I hear her say, “You too!”
I set the bottles on the floor in front of the door, knock quietly, and then I key open the door. Trina is sitting in the chaise where I left her, but without the shroud. I gather up the bottles and take them over to the desk. I notice the mirror is gone before I go back and throw the deadbolt on the door.
“Everything go okay, Sweetheart?” She nods, and I hand her a bottle, “You’re probably dehydrated, especially after the two bottles of wine and dancing. Please drink two or three of these before you go to bed.” She takes it and cracks it open and chugs half of it.
She gasps, “You’re so good to me, Jack,” as she sidles up to me.
I smile wolfishly as I crack open my first bottle. “It’s my job to take care of you, my Pet.”
Tossing her empty bottle in the trash, she lays her hands on my chest. She purrs, “Yes, Sir.”
I lay my left hand in the small of her back. While I drain the first water bottle with my right, I slide my left hand down to cup her ass and pull her tight to me. She puts her right hand over my left and squeezes it into her ass, rubbing her cheek against my chest. She’s actually purring.
“Master, I love how you handle me.” More purring follows. ‘Wow, that’s hot!’
I crush my bottle and toss it in the bin. I lift Trina’s chin and kiss her. “Drink another, Pet.”
“Yes, Master.”
I release her ass, and she grabs two more bottles, tossing one to me. We chug those, too. I put them in the bin and grab two more. “Which side of the bed do you prefer, Trina?”
She shrugs, “Don’t know if I have a preference. Back in college, I slept on the right side as much as the left. It hasn’t been an issue since as I haven’t ever been able to sleep with her for more than an hour or two after infrequent opportunities for love making. Do you have a preference?”
I nod, “I find that I generally end up on the right side. It lets me have my predominate hand available for pleasing my bedmate.”
She looks at me with a grin. “That sounds good to me.”
I hand her another bottle. “Set this by your bed. Drain it when you get up, okay?”
“Yes, Sir.” She gives me a 100 kilowatt smile. “Let’s get ready for bed. I’ll cuddle up on your shoulder and tell you about my conversation with Myra.”
“Sounds like a plan.” I peel off my sweats and grab my toothbrush. I’m thinking, ‘I started the day with a beautiful naked woman brushing her teeth and now I’m ending my day with her beautiful lover brushing her teeth wearing nothing by my shirt. I’m liking the symmetry of this.’
We dance around each other wetting, brushing, spitting, and rinsing. I go drain the main vein and walk out to find Trina wrapping her hair in a blue scrun
chies.
She smiles and then brushes past me to sit on the commode. “I don’t mind if you watch.” I stroll back and lean against the door jamb. I lock onto her eyes as she finishes and does some quick paperwork.
I offer her a hand and walk her to the sink. We do the sink dance again to wash up and pass the towel back and forth.
“You done, my Pet?”
“Yes, Master.”
I scoop her up into a bridal carry and take her to bed. I lay her down, and then I walk around to crawl in bed. “Come to me, Darling.”
Trina climbs onto my chest. “Kiss me please, Master.” So I do - slowly, carefully, playfully. I try like crazy to keep it to a slow simmer, but she starts to heat things up. I pull my face away and place my fingers on her lips. Our eyes lock as she pants into my face.
“Lay down on my shoulder Pet, or I am going to make love to you tonight. I’m trying to honor your wishes, but we’re getting close to the ‘too hot to stop’ line.”
She bites her lip and nods as she adjusts her position to make my chest her pillow. I try to ignore how luxuriously soft her hair is and how great she smells.
“Would you like me to catch you up on our conversation, Jack?”
“That would be great, Love.” I caress her back through the flannel of my shirt.
“Well, my Princess ordered me that the first thing I was to tell you is that she misses you more than she thought possible. She actually said, ‘It’s almost too much to bear. Tell him that I love him.’ She’s got it bad for you, Jack. If you proposed at a vulnerable time, I think she would say yes.” I squeeze her. “I did cover the basic points you and I discussed. She…” Trina stops for a moment and sits in the bed. Her eyes begin to glow brightly as the shadows coalesce around the bed and start to swirl in a circle counter-clockwise. The spinning wall appears to be comprised of smaller spirals of shadow spinning clockwise.
“That should keep unwanted eavesdroppers at bay. You can walk through it if you need to use the loo in the middle of the night,” she says. “Where was I? Oh yeah…” She lies back down on my chest. “Myra has already started investigating the Winter Sidhe houses involved in the accord process. She started with talking to Corrina, who Myra says is completely loyal. I do believe it. Corrina is putting out feelers with her family, but many of them shun her as she demonstrates frequently that her loyalty belongs to the royal house. She’ll probably be more effective collecting information on the other houses. Myra told her not to limit her investigation to the unallied houses that are part of the accord talks. There are other houses with formal alliances to the Queen that would be quite willing to off the Princess if they could turn the situation to her favor. Corrina is going to have Charli and Liesl check out her own family and a few of the others.” I nod.
“I told her about Lorn in case she can get away to come for a visit. Additionally, Corrina is having a couple of assets check Lorn out, as well as to see what happened with Cholley and the truck.”
I ask, “Is Myra coming for a visit tomorrow?”
Trina shakes her head, “She couldn’t commit. I know she wants to, but our girl is all about her duty.” I don‘t bother to hide my disappointment, but I wisely choose to squeeze the beautiful woman in my arms rather than bitch about the one that isn’t visiting. Trina chuckles as she squeezes me back. “As much as she hates what her mother is doing with the suitors, she understands how building relationships with the families is important for the entire realm. She wants to build relationships. She just doesn’t want her pussy to be the door to the conference room.” I laugh at that mental picture. “I gave her the high-level of going to the elves retirement home, which reminds me of something. Jack, don’t do any searches for the Green Lord or glowing green eyes or such. There may be bots out there given Verdic history with the Sidhe.”
I nod. “Thanks for the reminder. I hadn’t even considered it. I was catching up on running my company when you were talking to Myra. I keep trying to put all the Verdic stuff out of my mind right now. I may pull it out later during a meditation session to see what my subconscious has been doing with it.”
“You’re welcome, Jack. That’s probably a good approach. Anyway, that was the whole conversation. It left my arms tired signing that much that fast. We usually only use it in short spurts. I need more training!” We chuckle.
“Well, then we need to get some sleep. Tomorrow will be here fast, and apparently we both had short nights last night.”
“Goodnight, Jack. I love you.”
I squeeze. “I love you too, Trina. Sweet dreams, my Pet.” I turn out the lights.
“Thank you, Master. You too.” I fall asleep almost immediately wrapped in her warm embrace.
Chapter 18 - the Ladies catch up
‘Okay,’ Trina thinks. ‘She’s finally ready! I hope she is alright.’
Trina’s eyes light again and the shroud engulfs her body. She twists the device and the shroud almost immediately pours into the mirror leaving a thin layer of shadow hugging Trina’s form. Along the back edge of the mirror from Trina’s perspective another shroud rises, resolving itself into a black-and-white shadow image of Myra.
(Conversation in ASL)
M: Hello Trina! I miss you so much! How are you doing?
T: Oh Myra, you would not believe the day I've had! It has been alternately horrifying and absolutely wonderful!
M: LOL! Speaking of wonderful, how is my man doing?
T: Oh, you mean my man? He is sitting right over there.
Myra mimes 'I love you’ in the direction Trina indicated.
M: Please tell him being apart from him is almost too much to bear. Tell him that I love him!
T: He is miming back ‘I love you, too’... You two are so adorable!
M: I am sure... I suspect you are even more adorable with him than I am, given he is now ‘your man!’ Tell me more! Have you made love?
T: (shakes her head) Not yet. Lots of cuddles and caresses, a dinner and dancing date tonight, and a shower together. I am fighting my way through my issues.
M: Dinner and dancing? That’s serious shit! Don't let him slip through your fingers, Beloved!
T: I won't! I gave him my commitment that he would own me completely before I leave him in Phoenix.
M: OMG! Does he know what that means?
T: Not from a Fae perspective, but he does from a Dom / Sub perspective. OMG! He says these innocent little things, and I just freeze up...and he sees it every time! I find myself calling him ‘Master’ without thinking about it.
M: Oh really?
T: And he calls me ‘my Pet.’ I melt inside when he says it! I will talk him through the ownership piece from our perspective over the next couple days. I don't think he will have a problem with it.
M: Don't be disappointed if he freaks out a bit, my darling. Humans can be a little weird about something like that. Regardless, I wish you the best of luck, Beloved!
T: I am in love with him, Myra. If I had to choose between the two of you, it would tear me apart. Please don’t make me.
M: I know, Beloved. I would not put either of you into that position. I feel exactly the same way about the two of you. I don’t know what he is doing to us, but I cannot find it in my heart to care all that much. Tell me about the horrible parts.
T: OK. We got out of the compound without any issue. I was so happy to see Cholley again, but I just got a quick hug since I had to get Jack out of there. I wonder if things would have been different if I had stayed longer to talk with him. Regardless, I pulled over to check out the car once we were out of town. You know how I am with surveillance and safety shit. I found a truckload of surveillance devices, and then I found explosives. Based on the feedback from the screener, they would have blown if I had gone more than a couple of miles further. I stripped them all off. I swear, that elf-tech you keep paying for is worth every penny! You may have heard the rumble of the explosives when I banished them.
M: Shit!
T: Exactly! But i
t gets worse... We ran through Jack’s appointments in Cottonwood, grabbed some take-away lunch, and stopped roadside on the way to Jerome to eat it. When I opened up the back of the truck to pull out chock-blocks, Silk tried to kill me! Fortunately we had all of our gear on top of the floorboard, and I had Jack helping me. When he lifted the floorboard, he saw something move and dropped it immediately. After the explosives, I figured it was a viper of some sort. We regrouped, and Jack lifted the floorboard. Silk took a poke at Jack. Short version is Jack punched him to stun him, and I cut him in half.
M: That has to suck. I know you two got along well. He wouldn’t work for anyone outside our court; so, that means it is one of ours who tried to kill you.
T: Probably to throw you off your game. Just like the attack this morning. Was that really a coup attempt, or was it to leave you off kilter for the accord talks?
M: (Nodding). I already have Corrina checking into it. I think her family is the most likely the culprit, but she won’t get much out of them considering how she bitch slapped them the last time they tried to use her to get to me. She’s investigating all the houses, not just the parties to this accord. She has Charli and Liesl looking into her house in case they can get in from the outside easier. You are right to think someone might be taking advantage outside the accord as well.
T: Good idea. Three other things. One, Lorn was harassing Jack when I got back down to the garage. He was making noises about mercy-killing him because you ‘fried his brain.’ Don’t bring him for security when you come down to watch Jack play tomorrow.
M: Hah! How did you know about that?
T: As if you would pass up the chance to see him play when he’s that close. Plus, you did mention having your posse bring you down. I bet your pussy is clenching just thinking about it. Hopefully he doesn’t suck.