The Kraken's Mirror

by Maureen O. Betita

  “I once met a man who hailed from the year 2250. He claimed to be a historian seeking accurate information regarding the formation of a Caribbean nation, which stretched from the Bahamas to the island of Barbados. He seemed quite surprised to find no political movement toward that end.” He watched her digest the news.

  Her hand shook slightly, brushing at her shaggy hair. He quite enjoyed how long it grew. But he imagined the length took some getting used to for her. He took a moment to imagine that thick luxurious mane down to her waist, shining in the sun. It would glow in the moonlight, the silver standing out from the dark, nut brown. If she stayed, he’d see that.

  “How will I ever find my way home if there are so many possible portals?” She spoke so softly, he wasn’t sure he heard her.

  But his fantasy of her remaining at his side took the hit. He abruptly stood, knocking the chair back. He stalked to the bed, stood directly in front of her, and stripped off his shirt. He tossed it to one side and worked the buckle of his belt. He’d make her forget about any portal!

  “What are you doing?” She scooted away from him. “We only got here, I’d like to clean off the sweat, get some food.”

  Interesting how she tried to deflect her desire, even while her eyes followed his every movement. She licked her lips when he cast off his belt.

  “There is a spring outside. I’ll feed you afterward.” He jerked his boots off, leaning over to almost touch her, his bare chest inches from her face. With a final wiggle, he left his breeches on the floor, turned and walked out the door. He heard her snort, and then the patter of her ragged sandals on the wooden floor as she followed him.

  Ten minutes later, they stood under the small waterfall, lost in kissing, touching, holding.

  She’d laughed when first spying the small pool and waterfall. Her comment made little sense to him, but the water feature delighted her. And that was enough to make him smile.

  “A real bit of cinematic license! A private shower provided by nature—it’s so Disney!” She stripped quickly while he walked into the water.

  It took him years to expand the pool to its present size. First, he’d removed the larger rocks, carried sand up from the beach, built a retaining wall, and directed the water to flow down the other side, away from his cabin. Smoothing the large rocks lining that side, sitting near the pond, rubbing one stone face upon the other until they carried no rough patches took the most time, but provided the most comfort. The stones faced the sun so they grew almost hot. He’d created a relaxing place to recline after the cool of the water, even planted a small bit of soft grass that ran nearly to the pool.

  One of those folk tale books in his library showed a place like this. An enchanted pond where a beautiful woman kissed a frog and became royalty. He wasn’t a frog. But Emily was the first woman he’d ever brought here. Her smiles and laughter made his heart soar with pride.

  He pulled the hair back from her face; the better to layer kisses down one side and up the other. Her small hands clung tightly to his hips. The water swept away the sweat and with it his uncertainty of bringing her here. He admitted, her approval meant a great deal to him. His sanctuary.

  The light filtered through the overhanging ferns and caressed her face.

  “Emily Pawes.”

  “Hmmm?” She opened her eyes to meet his.

  Time stood still. His heart took a leap of faith. Here in the sun, far from the chill of the lonely Caribbean he sailed, he found home in the deep wood warmth of her eyes, and he spilled his heart. “I love you, Emily Pawes.”

  Glacious couldn’t hear, couldn’t follow him to this place. Her domain was the sea and cold places. He might say those words, mean them, and her ice cold eyes wouldn’t sharpen, set their sight on this warm woman in his arms….

  Emily’s eyes widened and her mouth gaped. With the sparkle from the waterfall spilling down her face, he couldn’t tell…was that a tear? Her hands dropped from his hips, then she brought one to touch his face. “Oh, dear, Alan. Captain? But…what if you aren’t real? What if none of this is real?”

  “What if my being real isn’t important?” He fought to keep his heart light. What counted is that he said the words to her. She would know, no matter what happened from here forward. She would know he’d said I love you and he’d meant it.

  He went to his knees, pressed his lips to her belly and moved lower. She’d know how real he was, he swore she would.

  ***

  This place and this man—they were parts of a Technicolor dream that couldn’t be real. She was Snow White or some twisted bit of a fairy tale. An obscure story Disney would never film. An old woman and an enchanted waterfall, a world full of daring pirates. This wasn’t real.

  Oh, God. What was he doing?

  He lifted one of her legs, draped it over his shoulder, took his hands and spread her for his mouth, sliding fingers inside her. She shuddered, hands gripping his hair, aware of every stroke of his tongue, every nip of his teeth, each breath he took.

  His hands, his fingers!

  “Fuck! Fuck! God damned, fucking shit. Hell…hell…hell! Cock sucker! Fu-u-u-u-u-u-u-uck!”

  Alan broke through every wall she’d ever built, clung to her when she fell to pieces and folded into the water. Sweeping her into his arms, he smiled, touched her lips and walked with her to a smooth rock, the size of a small table. He set her down, gingerly.

  It was impossible to catch her breath, and she gasped, staring into the sky. The deep heat of the rock sank into her back. Slowly, she relaxed.

  Why didn’t he fuck her? He could have done anything.

  He did. He told her he loved her. What did that mean? He isn’t real. He was only a figment of her imagination. He…no, she made him up. Right? She turned her head toward where this figment stood.

  Under the waterfall, he posed rinsing his hair in the water. Its silver cascade fell to his ass. His concave, old man, skinny ass. She snickered. “I made up a dream man with an old man’s ass?”

  Her body hummed, drew to attention when he turned slightly. His strong, sinewy arms, painted from the decades of Caribbean sun, made her think of sculpted tree limbs. His thighs…. She swallowed, felt her nipples tighten.

  Without even thinking, she sat up, staring at him. He continued to turn toward her. He was erect, one hand dropped to his belly. He had a slight softness there. It made him more believable. A glistening trail of silver hair spiraled down to his prick. His fingers were spread. She took a breath and felt it sink to her toes.

  She hadn’t made him up. A sudden clarity flew about her mind, wiping it clear of the fear that she was mad. A small thread of logic tried to tangle her thoughts and she ignored it. If she was mad, this was the most glorious madness of all. Of life itself.

  She slid off the rock, her feet anchored on the sandy bottom, but when she stood, her body overbalanced and almost stumbled.

  “Emily?” He quickly closed the distance between her. “Are you…?”

  He stopped when she closed her hand around his cock. She looked up into his sapphire eyes and only nodded. She set a hand at his chest and pushed him to lean back upon the rock she’d vacated. He didn’t resist, merely allowed her to direct him. She let her free hand trail up his chest, following the silver trail. Slowly, she bent and kissed the pierced nipple, sucked it into her mouth and hummed.

  He gasped, and the sense of power this gave her steadied her purpose. He’d touched her every way possible. He’d swept her away with passion and a personality that she held no defenses against. And no regrets.

  Save one.

  She didn’t know how to do the same to him.

  But she was going to try.

  ***

  He accepted that she couldn’t believe in his reality. No yet, although in his heart, he judged she wanted to. He’d met many people who walked through portals into the Kraken’s Caribbean, and some did go mad. The terror of that possibility kept her from accepting this was more than a delusion. He’d be patient and she
’d find her way to him.

  Fifty years of walking his own world burdened by a curse schooled him in patience—and resignation.

  The rushing water barely cooled his blood as he inhaled through barely open lips, tasting her again and again. He smiled at the memory of her curses. How odd that profanity took the place of other softer phrases, other thoughts and feelings. His heart knew she held more depth; that it anchored all the way into her bones, her blood and her breath. When he studied her eyes, they spoke softer words.

  He turned to glance her way and froze. Her eyes studied him; her fingers absentmindedly touched her pierced nipple. He remembered the sharp cry she’d emitted when his needle pierced that wonderful, dark nipple, the same instant she’d melted around his cock. She’d been a woman totally immersed in passion and lust.

  But he glimpsed something different this time. He tilted his head, a fierce longing…yes! She radiated with fierce longing. For him? Did he dare believe that?

  Did he dare to trust? He allowed her to take charge and move his body to her bidding. To lay him upon the rock, to kiss and suckle at lips, neck, to forge a fire path down his torso. And he stayed passive, keeping his arms limp, though it killed him not to seize her. She flattened his hands, left no doubt in his mind that she wanted him to act as though bound. He trembled at the fantasy. No one ever dared tie him down.

  She feathered kisses on his chest, nibbled her way down his chest. She bit his belly, chuckling low. Her hands spread his thighs like he was a woman, and at last she sank her lips about his prick.

  He stood it for only a short while, fighting his body’s demand to wrap around this woman and bury himself in her. At last the drive won. He raised his arms, lifted her from his prick and she allowed it. He could feel her desire as he maneuvered her up his body, the heat of her cunny leaving a liquid fuse. He parted her legs, sat up and they became one.

  They kissed and he tasted his near capitulation to her on her tongue when they melted together. She took a deep breath and rocked upon his lap. In his last moment of clear thought, he locked eyes with her.

  “Alan…Alan…Alan…” he heard her cry out.

  It was enough proof.

  Chapter Eighteen

  For the first time since her affair with Captain Silvestri began, she woke up with him still abed with her the next morning. His left arm draped over her, his warm hand cupping her breast. Not aggressively, rather relaxed and in total ease. Such a wonderful night. No talk of serious things. Very little talk.

  They’d touched, stroked, and sat in companionable silence to watch the light fade from Tortuga. Few tiny flickers of light, from candle or lantern, reached the haven Silvestri built.

  And no doubt he’d built it. She observed the pride he took, stroking the carving on the door, the polish on the table. How carefully he lifted the chairs to the hooks on the wall. He touched the headboard of the bed with lingering fingers. He eventually draped a light blanket over her shoulders as the night waxed and the stars shone intensely.

  When the moon rose, she’d turned to him in surprise. “The moon is full?”

  “Tomorrow night.”

  “Isn’t that when the vampires waltz? How can they hold the party? Isn’t it dangerous?”

  “Tomorrow night is the blue moon. Second full moon of the month. They’re only allowed one hunter’s moon per month.” He stroked her hair. “Have you ever worn it long?”

  “Oh, sure. Nearly to my ass a few times.” She’d leaned against his hand, wanting to purr, if she only knew how. She asked him later if the vampires would be at the party, and he’d assured her that yes, of course. But as participants, nothing more. He even promised to point out the swamp where the zombies wandered. It was well after midnight when they retired to the humble cabin.

  It took her some time to fall asleep, even though her body craved it. Her mind spun with things he’s spoken of earlier. Other times and other places? Her memory played back some of the things she’d seen when wandering Tortuga after her bath. She’d seen some strange stuff. A man in a top hat and tails. A woman in a silver cat suit, shawl tied around her hips. It wasn’t just the blenders and microwaves that were out of place. She’d grown so used to seeing anachronisms that few of them registered as strange anymore. People, appliances, she’d even heard modern music sung at street corners and didn’t think it strange.

  The microwave on the ship. How did it find power? She’d never asked, just figured it was part of the vast delusion. Her memory produced a sudden vision of a man juggling in Nassau. Rubik's Cubes. He’d been juggling Rubik’s Cubes! And the woman in the cat suit—holding a camera? Or maybe something totally different.

  There’d been a lovely parasol in a window off High Street, with some sort of hydraulic tube attached to its handle. The proprietor could not say what it was for.

  Suddenly, the story that Jezebel told her, how Tortuga was the site of washed up items from everywhere and every when became clear. She’d fallen to a black hole of lost items? Like where all the extra socks went when they disappeared from the dryer at home.

  She finally fell asleep with visions of every lost item in the universe washing up on the beaches of the Caribbean like some vast landfill.

  When morning came, her body was rested, but her brain still spun with all the possibilities. His breath was soft at the back of her neck. His cock stirred and she knew he was waking up.

  The night before, he’d been near frantic in his pursuit of her pleasure. She’d been caught in the chase and run neck and neck with him. Like some mad contest, they’d pushed each other to a mindless state of satisfaction. Fun and furious, and she refused to consider any drawbacks. She knew he found her desirable now. There was no room in her mind for doubt after the night.

  He pulled away from her, urging her onto her back. His hair covered her face when he bent to welcome the morning with a kiss.

  The light slipped through partly opened shutters, illuminating his silver hair into a shining mass of brightness. She smiled, reached up and lightly pulled it away so she could meet his eyes. The sapphire appeared black for a moment. Then she wondered again at the depth of their color. She could dive into those eyes and just float away for the rest of her life. He met her gaze and examined her face. So intently, she wondered if he were memorizing it.

  She understood the sentiment. She wanted to remember him always as well. Delusion or not.

  She traced his crow’s feet with her fingertips, loving how they drew attention to his eyes. She softly caressed the odd, crescent scar. He wouldn’t tell her where it came from, making it a mystery. Wonder opened in her heart. This man loved her? He’d actually said those words to her.

  If only she could say them back.

  He winked, then murmured, “Doesn’t matter.”

  “You reading minds now, Captain Silvestri?” Somehow the thought didn’t surprise her.

  “Not hard to see you toy with regret.” He tilted his head at her. “Maybe even guilt. Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter.”

  “It does too—”

  He stopped her words with a kiss. One of his mind-numbing kisses, so soft that the thought of butterfly wings entered her mind. He continued to kiss her, and when his lips left her mouth, he replaced them with two fingers, silently asking her to drop her doubts.

  She inhaled and smelled herself on his hand. And she kissed the pads, running her tongue along his nails, conveying trust and willingness to indulge whatever bit of decadence he wished to toy at.

  He smiled, almost sadly, then moved his lips from her face, to her neck, to her breasts. He lingered on her breasts, using his tongue with pure magic. Her breasts were never been much of an erogenous zone. Until he woke them up.

  She wrapped hands in his hair as he made love to each breast and nipple one at a time.

  He touched softly, as if apologizing for the power of the night before as he continued down her body. He licked at scratches, rubbed bruises with a tenderness she didn’t think many men were capable
of. Each touch was in direct contrast the passion of hours ago. He made up for that desperate harshness with every move he made.

  She didn’t ask for it. Hadn’t felt she needed the reassurance. He didn’t hurt her and she’d never felt in danger. But a growing tenderness inside her signaled he’d been right.

  He sank his mouth to her belly, and she could hear him speaking, but couldn’t make out what he was saying. When his fingers dipped between her thighs, she didn’t care anymore. His tongue and lips played her body like a symphony. Her brain shut down, stopped trying to understand or analyze. There was nothing in her experience to compare to this.

  For an hour he savored her, coaxed words from her that she admitted in her heart as truth.

  I want you. I want your touch. I want you. I need you. And finally I love you. That slipped from her as he slid her down an orgasm so intense and peaceful, she was no longer afraid of death, for just a moment. An hour of passionate progression about her body took her to nirvana. Every kiss, every touch, every gentle connection reinforced it. His cock anchored deep inside and she heard him murmur, home. She felt him release into her as she fought to keep from crying.

  He sighed, took a breath, and kissed her. His arms wrapped around her, eased her up to sit atop his kneeling figure and he held her. For an eternity.

  Her head rested on his chest, hearing his heart beat.

  She’d just been made love to. She thought she’d been down that path before. Now she knew that was wrong. This was deeper than anything she’d ever come close to. With a sigh, she held him and accepted this new life and new love. Even this new world as her new home.

  An hour later, he closed the door and they paused on the porch. Her head still spun, slowly adjusting to a new reality. She felt giddy.

  He stopped before they began the descent to Tortuga. “Wait.”

  She turned to him. Damn, she loved a pirate. A cursed pirate. Somehow, the peace of that admission would stay here, on this mountain, where it was safe. He pulled a chain from his pocket. An extremely fine gold chain, and at the end, a pendant rested.