By My Side ... (A Valentine's Day Story)

by Christine Blackthorn

  "These will hurt, Sweetheart." He warned her. And they did, more than a little. The sharp whistle of the leather cutting air was a warning a split second before the right side of her back exploded in long lines of pain. The impact was so shocking it pressed the air from her lungs and let tears burn behind her eyelids. She gasped but before she could assimilate the sensation, the shock, the pain on her right side was mirrored by a second blow hitting along the left side of her back. A whine broke from her mouth, cut short by almost superhuman effort. The third blow along her lower back was less shocking, not because it hurt less, or was delivered with less force, but because she had expected it with body and mind. Still, her thoughts reeled. Pain sizzled in her jaw where her teeth ground against each other. The sound very audible to her own ears.

  "Breathe, Lena, just breathe for a moment."

  His large hand stroked away the rigid tension, if not the pain, as he caressed her back. She felt him close, his lips stroking along the curve of her neck though he carefully avoided touching her burning back. When her breathing evened out her asked:

  "Can you bear more?"

  "Yes." Her voice was roughened by pain but still permeated by certainty.

  "Good girl." Another soft kiss to her nape, the caress so much more intimate through the burning of her back.

  "Tell me why you are being punished."

  She had to think for a moment, so much of the last minutes had been concentrated entirely enduring, on doing something right, that she had almost forgotten why she had found herself bound and in pain.

  "I disobeyed. I prevaricated and I lied to you."

  She felt the kiss on her shoulder, felt it as the gentle caress it was.

  "These three were to remind you to follow my orders. Six more strokes to go. You know how it feels now. I expect you to count the next six."

  She bit her lip. Count. Right. She had to count them. The thought sharpened her mind, gave her once more a clear goal to follow. She could do this.

  "Ok."

  The next stroke fell before she had even finished the word and the sudden renewal of heat and pain along the curve of her back made her gasp and press into the leather straps before her. Her fingers found the leather holding her wrists to the frame, twisted and entwined with it in a desperate attempt to help her swallow the scream of pain rising in her throat. Still she was able to say: "Four"

  His hand stroked over her neck again, a silent reminder to hunch her shoulders. Only when she had done so did the next two blows fall on her shoulders in short succession, barely giving her the time to count between them. Then he hesitated again and she knew what he was expecting of her.

  "I refused to answer a question and I lied."

  She felt lighter, with every word she felt a little lighter. And she felt him as she had never felt another before. He surrounded her with his presence, with his very being. The touch of his hand on her back was so much more present, so all-consuming. She felt him in every pore, in every breath, in every beat of her heart, in the deepest recesses of her mind.

  She arched into his caressing hand even as it stroked over the burning streaks on her back. Elena felt the tears gather in her eyes, overflow and wet her cheeks. She let them fall, let them free her. And just as she had arched into the touch of his hand so did she lean into the pain of the flogger. It was not a caress anymore, not a patter of sensation hovering at the border of pleasure -- it was sheer agony and she wanted it. She wanted it not for the agonising torment it represented but for the reality it was. The pain wove an impenetrable wall of crystal around them behind which all disappeared. The only truth remaining was he and his hands on her. She did not have to wonder, to calculate and castigate anymore -- she could only feel.

  It was over too fast. She heard the thump of the flogger as he dropped it to the floor a spilt second after she had counted the ninth stroke. His hands slid around her waist. She felt him fit his cool skin against her burning back. Her head fell backwards on a sound somewhere between a moan and a sob and it found the support of his shoulder in instinctive trust. But his mouth as it played over the delicate shell of her ear was hotter than sin.

  "Tell me!"

  He wanted to tell her the reason for the last three strokes of the whip. Her admission of the lie already lay on her lips but in the end she told him the more fundamental truth.

  "I lied to myself. I never dared to really try, never allowed myself to bond."

  "Will you now? With me? For us?" The hope -- was it in his voice or her mind? It mattered little. With tears running free from her eyes she whispered:

  "I will try."

  The meeting of their lips was as careful as the touch of butterfly wings; as delicate as the connection spinning around their destinies.

  Bond

  His fingers found the fastening of the leather on her ankles and wrists. Within seconds the straps fell away. Elena had lost the strength to hold up her arms, let alone carry the weight of her own body. She would have crumbled to the floor had his arm not caught her, held her securely.

  Her arms tingled, then hurt as the blood flowed back into her stiff muscles, her limbs complaining about being extended for that long a time. His large hands spanned her arms, massaged away the pain, his touch a momentary distraction. They were still caught in that crystal ball, cut away from the world, from the judgement and demands of reality. It was still only him. She smiled at him, felt it, saw it mirrored in his eyes. He was so much taller than her, she barely had to turn her head to do so.

  "You are still all the way gone, aren't you? I like seeing you like this, befuddled and open."

  His lips were soft and warm as they stroked over her brow, along the bridge of her nose. She lived for that sensation and it lived in her. Her lids fell closed without any conscious choice of her own. When his mouth covered hers she leant into the taste, the touch, the lazy strokes of his tongue over hers. It was a never-ending kiss, lazy and soft. It consumed her and in its slow abandon it felt natural.

  He lifted her without breaking the kiss, his touch careful, his arm positioned so as not to touch the sore skin of her back. But before he sat her on the bed he broke the kiss, held her suspended until the sudden intent quiet penetrated her floating stage. Her eyelids were almost too heavy to open when she forced them to, her neck needing the support his arm provided. He was smiling at her and before she knew her own lips stretched softly.

  "Elena, I need to know if this hurts you and I am almost certain you are not in a state to tell me. So, I want you to keep on looking into my eyes. Can you do that?"

  Hurt? She was not hurt. She was burning, all over. But it was a nice burn, a burn that told her she was alive, a burn that kept the world at bay, held her to him.

  "I am not hurt." Her words made him chuckle. She liked that sound, liked the way little lines appeared around the corners of his mouth, feathering out. They made him look more approachable, less stern. She wanted to feel them under her fingers. So she did. It made the lines deeper, the smile broader. He removed the arm under her knees, setting her carefully down on the soft sheets, then captured her stroking fingers in his. She became fascinated with his lips playing over her knuckles, the way his teeth scraped over the tips of her fingers before gently sucking them in. She loved the warm heat, engulfing the sensitive tips, the feeling of his lapping tongue. It was so essentially erotic.

  Elena barely noticed how he lowered her onto the cool sheets, every move deliberate, eyes intent on the slightest emotion flickering over her features. But she herself was caught in his intent stare, his expressions, the sensations he gave her. It was not only that he had taken away all the world but he had become the world. Everything seemed to exist only through the filter that was him.

  Only when he bedded her head on the pillow and moved back, still holding her hand, did the spell break. The cool sheets soothed the burn of her back, the softness a protective cover. She did not like it. It made her wonder, question, frightened. It made her puzzle as to what she was su
pposed to do next. What did he expect from her? Was a bond developing? If not, what could she do to make it happen? What was he thinking of her?

  Almost as if to recapture the sensation, the burn, the link to him, she moved her shoulder, scraping her back against the surface beneath her. The burning pain was salutary, pulling her back into the isolation of her own sensations, away from the intruding world. His large hand came to rest on her chest, without true pressure but holding her still through the power of his touch.

  "Stop it, Lena. Lie still."

  Elena frowned at him but it seemed to have no effect, no impact other than making those lips twitch with amusement. She was glad at least someone was amused. For a moment it was enough to distract her, to capture her attention, but too quickly her mind engaged again. And it engaged with a vengeance.

  Somewhere in her mind woke that voice always telling her how flawed, how weak she was, and how much of a freak; and the voice was yelling at her, drowning out all else. It taunted and reproved. It told her that she was broken, worthless and wrong, depraved to her bones. Look at her. She had been punished but instead of this holding any shame for her she was rubbing against the evidence of her punishment like a cat in heat. Tears burned behind her eyes, a scalding pressure which seemed to spread, to reach, to strangle her.

  She had always known one thing -- she had known she was good at this game of submission. She had been told too often, had been praised for it too frequently, not to believe it. It was the only thing she was good at, the only thing that had always made her attractive to the men forced to sleep with her. And now even that knowledge was taken from her. In the space of less than an hour he had not only shown her how little she knew about truly submitting to the control of a supernatural, so necessary for the bond, but had made her see how little she had even tried. So how could she ask him to see her as anything but a tool? She did not deserve it.

  For years she had felt insufficient, desperate to find place until she had begun to hate her own family for what they were demanding of her. Under all the self-loathing, the self-doubt and despair there was also a healthy dose of self-righteous arrogance. Deep down, in the secret recesses of her subconscious mind she had blamed them, proudly secure in her superiority. Now, she did not even have that mental protection anymore.

  She was losing her family, her life, because she herself was just as much to blame as fate or genetics. For a moment back there she had thought that she could redeem herself by accepting the punishment, by starting new -- and for a moment it had worked. For a moment it had felt as if she would be able to be free, be what he needed her to be. She had felt him, had felt a bond, possibly the bond, but she did not seem to be able to hold onto it. His hand on her chest denied her the reminder of the pain, denied her the crutch she needed to escape the self-hate and self-loathing -- she was too confused to even know what to feel anymore.

  "Please." She was begging, unashamed, barely conscious of it. She simply needed.

  "What do you want, little one?" She stared at him. What did she want? She could not think, could not make it clear in her mind; though her instincts knew what she wanted, needed, desired. She just could not give it voice, put it into words. He bent to her, his lips stroking over hers in a fleeting caress, gone before she knew it. She reached for him, the move reminding her of the pain of her back with insistent stings along her muscles, but she did not care, she simply wanted to pull him close, make him stay, make him shield her from her own reality.

  "Make it stop." He was so close she saw the strange mix of emotion in his eyes. It was not pity, nor was it surprise or even triumph. It was a warmth, a hearth fire to warm herself on. The bed dipped under his weight as he stretched out besides her, his movements careful, mindful not to jolt her. She did not care. Before he had even settled his muscular limbs against her soft form she pressed herself against him. She expected to feel the smoothness of leather, the hard edges of belt and fastening but instead she only found skin. Glorious, warm skin and every evidence he was interested in her.

  Should it have alarmed her? Possibly. Probably. But she had passed the place where any form of alarm was conceivable to her. Instead she was simply grateful, glorying in the sensation of his skin against hers. She could not think anymore, did not want to, just wanted to feel. Like an addict she craved him, wanted to wrap him around herself, her mind and sensation, hiding in his very presence.

  Suddenly he shifted them, his weight a warm, firm blanket pressing her into the soft pelts underneath her. The pain of the move buried under the rising swirl of emotion and sensation in her mind, her body. She buried her nose in the crook of his neck, so close, as if she could even fill her airways with his scent.

  He allowed her a moment to wallow in his closeness, but when she tried to free her leg from underneath him and wrap it around him she felt the rumble of disapproval through her body. It froze her. Not just stopped her movement but froze something in her. Her head fell back to the bed, her arms sliding from the safety of his touch. Before panic could take hold of her, he caught her gaze, held it with the calmness of his own. There as no anger there, just control -- and demand.

  "Stay still, little one."

  It was an order and a challenge, a chance to redeem herself for her earlier faux pas. She understood it as such and it in itself allowed her to settle. She did not need to fight for his attention, did not need to struggle and prove herself -- she just needed to do what he asked. But she could not help repeating:

  "Please?"

  Another smile. His brow came to rest gently against hers, sharing his breath, his scent with her without her having to strain for it.

  "What do you need, Lena?" The words were spoken against her mouth and she swallowed them greedily with her lips. She felt the smile, the nibbling teeth. Her tongue snaked out, tasting him on her lips but falling short of touching him. How much movement was movement?

  "Sweetheart, what do you need?" He had asked her a question. She needed to answer it.

  "You. I need you to stop the world." His quick kiss shook under suppressed laughter, as he leant back a little his eyes were brimming over with amusement.

  "Stop the world?" Gentle teasing. "Hmmm - I will try."

  This kiss was deep and open-mouthed, no ounce of teasing left. It consumed her, filled her and she was more than willing to go along. Her lips opened to his taste, to his tongue and the sensual duel for dominance. There was no doubt who would win the contest in the end, but a kiss was a game well played, a taste and competition in which surrender served both the winner and the loser. His tongue was rougher, and more flexible, than a humans, its edges a little sharp, a little hard. It caught hers with a sensual stroke, dancing with her, tempting her. When his mouth left hers her own lips were swollen, her breathing hard and languid.

  "I think I might be able to." Dark satisfaction tinged the whisper. For a moment she was lost. What was he saying? Then she remembered: she had asked him to stop the world. And he had. A little.

  He nibbled along her jaw, his uneven teeth so tantalising in their difference, on the one side the gentle caress, on the other the genuine threat they presented. She gave him her throat, an instinctive sign of submission as well as a quest for more pleasure. She felt his smile against her skin. His hands roamed over her sides, careful in their touch.

  The bed moved under sudden pressure. It jolted her, reminded her of her burning back. It was almost enough distraction to keep her mind from fixing on the long planes of his body as he levelled himself up on his knees and came to straddle her hips. But nothing could distract from that much overwhelming beauty.

  His shoulders gleamed under a thin sheen of sweat, testament to the temperature of the room which was designed more for her needs than his. Her eyes were caught by the light reflected across the panes of muscle, the lines of strength and suffering across his skin. When had he lost his clothes? She could not remember in her fascination with his body. Her eyes were drawn irrevocably lower. His tight breeches had not hidd
en the narrowness of his hips, or the long, elegant lines of his thighs but the almost blindingly white texture of his skin was breath-taking.

  It was not the paleness of a human unused to the rays of the sun. A pale human's body, even an albinos, showed the lines of blood vessels, the marks of genetic imperfections and moles. His did not. The translucence of humanity was entirely lacking -- his skin was an empty canvas on which a violent life had painted images of cruelty and pain. And still the scars held only inhuman beauty.

  As did his cock, long and slightly curved, it rose fully aroused from his hairless groin. She was not certain if he shaved or if it was an orcish characteristic, but the skin covering his body was smooth, without even the hint of hair covering humans. Naked as he was, she had full view of him. It was breath-taking, frightening and fascinating, to realise how much his body resembled humanity -- and how much it differed.

  "Touch me, Lena." There was a plea in his voice, a dusky demand covering unexpected vulnerability. It drew her gaze and whilst her hand reached for him, smoothed over the skin of his thighs she watched him. At her first touch his eyes unfocused, his lids closing halfway in agonised pleasure.

  His skin was soft under her touch, softer than she had expected -- the texture of sun-warmed silk on a lazy summer day. Her hand smoothed along his thigh, caressing the hard strands of muscle under the silken cover of his skin. But they both knew where her hand was travelling to, and they both held their breath in anticipation. His half-lidded gaze was fixed on her questing fingers, mesmerised by the knowledge of her touch. She felt powerful.

  Her first touch along the length of his penis was gossamer soft. It made his body shake. She felt it against her skin, in the movements of the bed below her as his shakes transferred themselves to the mattress, she heard it in the hitch of his breath. And she loved it, loved watching the emotions flicker over his features, the agonised pleasure, the violent control barely maintained.