Chapter Seven
Snip.
Another length of copper dropped onto the cloth. Ashenivir curved the sharp ends in with his pliers, satisfied at the neatness of the tiny loops. The faint noise of the city drifted up from the street below—a bard of some sort had parked themselves on a near enough corner that their light tunes had accompanied all his morning chores.
Caring for the apartment—cleaning—was not a thing usually in his nature, but every time he did it, Rizeth was pleased. Even if he said nothing, it was clear enough in his reaction. He liked things tidy, Ashenivir had known that as long as he’d known Rizeth, and any tedium associated with keeping things in order evaporated the moment that small, pleased smile ticked the corner of his Master’s mouth. Being complimented on a job well done made the effort of achieving it shine like gold.
“‘Thus the pleasure of the Master becomes the pleasure of the servant—if such enjoyment cannot be felt in serving, intrinsically, the servant shall never truly cherish his place.’ Master Corvidius, Truest Service, page forty-five,” he recited as he set to polishing the wire. Cleanest copper meant clearest magic, and he’d never do any less for Rizeth than he did for himself.
He’d always enjoyed this. Back at the Arcanum, keeping Rizeth’s component store filled had never felt like a chore. It helped his Master, made him happy, ensured he always had everything he needed for his spellcasting. Trimming wire, grinding gem and metal powders, collecting and arranging all the tiny oddments needed for everyday wizardry—in these dullest of tasks he found a meditative pleasure. Intrinsically.
Ashenivir set the copper aside, and emptied Rizeth’s component pouch onto his cloth to sort through the pieces. Old copper tangled with cobwebs, feathers with crumbling barbs, wilting moss—they needed sorting, but he hadn’t been told to do it. As he brushed out old flakes of herbs from the pouch, he couldn’t help wondering how it would feel if it was an order. A real protocol, even.
“A Ra’soltha shall always ensure his Master is at readiness for whatsoever spell he might need to cast,” he whispered, heat blooming in his face as he did so. “A Ra’soltha shall maintain his Master’s rooms. A Ra’soltha shall—”
“You are up early today.”
His hand jerked, knocking the neat stack of wires across the table. Rizeth caught the ones that skittered off the edge with a mage hand and set them to rights. “A productive morning, I see.”
“I…yes, I just thought…” ‘A good servant anticipates her Master’s needs’, Miss Eveline’s Treatise on the Realities of Service, page sixty-three. “You’ve been so busy with meetings, and a few things were running low, and I had the time so I...I thought I’d take care of it for you.”
Even flustered, he saw the shift in Rizeth’s expression: approval, pleasure, then both rapidly iced over with a mask of blank indifference. It wasn’t the same as his usual careful neutrality—his shoulders were stiffer, his posture straighter, the line of his mouth more deliberate. “You do not have to do that. This isn’t the Arcanum, you are no longer trading service for tutoring.”
“I like doing it,” Ashenivir said. Chewed the inside of his lip. “And I’m not trading service, I’m giving it.”
Rizeth’s jaw tightened—only slightly, but Ashenivir saw the flex before it was forced away. He could call it out, but he didn’t want to argue again, not when the morning was so nice and things were so calm and they were going to dinner tonight, and if he started on the topic Rizeth would find out about his meeting with Catriona and then they’d definitely argue.
He sat forwards, banishing the thoughts his Master could read on him as easily as he read his Master’s moods. “But if you like, you could tutor me again,” he said, dropping his voice flirtatiously low. “You don’t have any meetings today, you could teach me something long and hard to swallow.”
He loved the slight flush that rose high on Rizeth’s cheeks when he flirted. It came brighter with compliments, he’d noticed—he tried not to overuse them, not wanting to wear out their effect. It was something altogether special to know how to rattle his Master.
“You have plenty of things you ought to be learning.” Rizeth shot a meaningful glance at the long-ignored pile of notes and books on extradimensional spaces that had sat at the end of the table for over a tenday.
“I prefer it when you teach me.”
He leaned back as Rizeth came to him, taking hold of his chin to tip his head up. “I have not been so lax in my work as you, apprentice.”
Excitement fluttered in Ashenivir’s stomach. “You finished your spell?”
“Indeed.” Rizeth kissed him, firm and full of promise. “Do you remember what it was?”
“Yes, Master. I do.”
Head bowed, Ashenivir knelt with his arms folded behind his back and drew a slow breath, aware all the while of his Master circling him. His bare skin prickled in the gloom—the bedroom had been made dark around them by mundane means and magical, the cooling charms allowing for closed windows and drawn curtains. Faerie fire clung to the wall lamps, their low purple glow calling him back to Rizeth’s Arcanum quarters.
“Tell me, apprentice,” Rizeth said. “What do you know of words of power?”
“Extremities of magic, Master,” Ashenivir said, keeping his voice low and even. “Utterances of pure arcana, bound to a single purpose. I know of two well-used enough to have their forms recorded.”
“Very good. And those two are?”
“One to kill and one to stun.”
He gasped as nails scraped along the top edge of his ear, making it twitch. He did not raise his head.
“And how does one cast such a spell, Ra’soltha?”
“With great focus and intent, Master. The power is in the wielder. There is only a verbal component, and that is very simple.”
“How so?”
The nails ran down his neck and across his shoulder, just hard enough to leave a delicate burn in their wake. Ashenivir squeezed his elbows.
“All the caster must do is speak a single word. It doesn’t matter which word for death is used—kill, die, perish, expire—the outcome is the same. The target’s life is ended.”
Rizeth stood before him now, and lifted his head with a single finger. In this position, with the room like this, Ashenivir felt once more Rizeth’s apprentice, and a sudden wave of understanding washed over him. He’d read of many different kinds of service—so many that frankly his head span with them all—and though in each he’d seen a facet of himself, none had fully encompassed him. None had been a true mirror.
“My research has reached a point of necessary collaboration,” Rizeth said. “Will you assist me, apprentice?”
In Rizeth’s eyes and in his words, he found that mirror. He was no pet, as Catriona was; and he was no slave, as he’d read of and as Rizeth seemed to think he wanted. He was, and always wanted to be, his Master’s apprentice.
Ashenivir blinked as fast as he dared, trying to drop himself back into the scene. “Yes, Master.”
Rizeth moved his hand to the top of Ashenivir’s head. One word he would speak, one whose potential and expression he had spent hours folding in on itself, binding the threads of his Weave in such a way as for them to flow forth on that single word, and the word was,
“Pleasure.”
A sensation like a flood of warm water flowed over his scalp and down his body. It carried away tension in its wake, sinking slow and subtle through skin and muscle both. He’d expected more of an all-consuming burst—an immediate orgasm, perhaps, long and unstoppable. This was far gentler.
And then Rizeth scraped his nails across his scalp.
He gasped—shivering tingles raced from the touch, every inch of his skin suddenly keenly aware of the very air that lay against it. Rizeth stroked along his neck and a moan drifted from his lips. The touch was featherlight, two fingertips, yet every nerve came alight at their passing.
“Describe the sensations, Ra’soltha. Tell me how it feels.”
“Good,” was all he could get out. He was achingly hard, a throb of need pulsing between his legs. Rizeth caressed his cheek, running a thumb over his lips, and he whimpered. “Very, very good, Master.”
“Stand.”
His legs trembled as if he’d been teased for hours, unsteady beneath him. His body felt near feverish, burning with a desperate desire to be touched. All this he relayed to his Master, who, in an obliging mood, proceeded to bring him to a breathless agony. Rizeth ran his hands, slow and even, down Ashenivir’s arms, along his sides, across his stomach and chest, white fire following in their wake until it was all he could do to stay upright, one moan after another filling the room.
“Everywhere you touch comes alight, Master, I can’t…I can hardly think.” His revelation, his worry, even the lingering tendrils of guilt—all fled in the wake of the pleasure consuming him. Rizeth traced the line of his hip and he arched into the touch, rising on tiptoes in an attempt to move his Master’s hand lower. “Master, if you touch my cock I think...I think-I think-I—” Rizeth’s fingers teased as he wanted, closer and closer, and he let out a keening whine. “—I think I won’t be able to stay standing for you.”
“Is that so?” Rizeth said, and ran a single finger along the length of his cock.
Ashenivir’s head fell back as he cried out, squeezing his eyes shut against the wall of pleasure that slammed through him. It knocked him almost clean out of his body—certainly it knocked every ounce of sense from his head—and all he could do was endure as he came harder than he thought he ever had. His legs gave out, exactly as he’d expected, but a firm arm around his waist kept him upright.
“Good, Ra’soltha, sit for me now—good boy.”
He whimpered as Rizeth sat him on the edge of the bed, all his skin tingling. He was still hard, and wondered how long the spell would keep him that way. He also wondered at how clean he was—his cock shone, visibly wet, and the sensation of having come encompassed him, yet there was no evidence of orgasm on his thighs or stomach or anywhere at all. Had the spell limited him?
Rizeth took his face gently in both hands and kissed him. A lightning-charge exploded in his head, and a pained whine stuttered in the back of his throat as another climax spasmed through him. He remained as hard as ever when Rizeth drew away, and fought to get his breath, each attempt tangled with small, choked gasps.
“Twice,” Rizeth said, examining him with a curious gaze and a probing sweep of magic. “You came for me twice, didn’t you?”
All he could manage was a weak nod.
“And yet you haven’t come at all, not truly. Orgasm without orgasm—not entirely as I anticipated, but there always seems to be some twist to my spells when I cast them with you, xi’hum.” He stroked Ashenivir’s cheek, and even that touch threatened to send him over the edge again. “Legs apart, feet flat on the floor.”
He obeyed, and his pulse skyrocketed as his Master went to his knees before him. His heart threatened to burst in his chest at the first brush of Rizeth’s breath over his thigh, his fists knotted in the sheets. A dark cliff of overwhelm threatened; he shook his head, dizzy and voiceless—a flicker of magic touched his mark, and its calming presence pulled him back from the edge.
“Breathe, Ra’soltha,” Rizeth murmured. “Breathe and feel.”
Oh, he felt. Bright ecstasy sang through his veins as Rizeth’s mouth closed over the head of his cock. Every slide of lips was perfection, every press of tongue divine, and false orgasm tore through him again and again and again until the only anchor to reality he had was his Master’s firm hands on his thighs, holding him down.
His moans merged into one long sound of pleasure, cut with urgent gasps and sobbing cries. When Rizeth stroked the inside of his leg, it burned to the bone; when his head dived deep, taking Ashenivir to the back of his throat, it flayed him bare. Tension tightened his stomach, a stormfront gathering deep inside him, and although he almost feared it, he threw himself towards it. Rizeth’s hand found his, and he gripped it so tightly he swore his bones cracked. Hollow wave after hollow wave rolled up from the base of his feet to the crown of his head; a crackle like the aftermath of a lightning spell criss-crossed his palms and wrists. Rizeth’s tongue flexed along his aching shaft, swallowing him yet deeper into the hot, wet confines of his throat, and all at once the storm hit.
He came then, truly came, and all of him tore apart to be remade by the magic compelling him to feel and to feel nothing but pleasure-pleasure-pleasure.
That was all he was. One word—his Master’s word—consumed him, and he was more than glad to be so devoured.
It took Ashenivir the rest of the day to recover. Rizeth lay with him for two hours before he could speak in coherent sentences again, and it was another hour before he could stand unaided. He’d known the spell would be powerful, but it had been far stronger than he’d ever imagined. Far too intense—it lingered in his Weave, trace tingles sparkling beneath his skin. He’d modify it for next time.
Next time. A smile tugged at his lips. There would always be a next time, and after each and every scene…
Ashenivir, dozing in his arms, mumbled something in his reverie. His heart beat steadily beneath Rizeth’s palm. This, after each and every one.
“Ashenivir,” he whispered. A slight stir, and another sleepy mumble. “Ashenivir, do you still want to go to dinner?”
As if on cue, Ashenivir’s stomach growled. He sat up, yawning widely. Faint pillow-creases decorated his face—apart from bathing, he’d spent the entire day in bed, and most of it unconscious. “Please. I’m starving.”
The rasp in his voice was utterly delicious, and made Rizeth hunger for more than food. He allowed himself a single kiss—a single long, indulgent kiss—then exerted great force of will to get both of them out of bed and upright. But when he finished dressing, he found Ashenivir still standing, naked, by the open dresser drawers.
“I can’t…” he started, then made a circling motion by his head, short and sharp. “My head is still…can you choose for me?”
A sudden cold uncertainty ran face first into the joy the request sparked. I’m not trading service, I’m giving it. Was this another push for more, was he exaggerating his inability to choose to get what he thought he wanted? Rizeth quashed the paranoia—that way lay naught but ruin.
“Of course.”
He picked out clothes, ignoring the flash of guilty pleasure when Ashenivir accepted them without question. The same dark blue wrap shirt as he’d worn the first time, though perhaps a touch warm for the weather, still set him off quite beautifully, and paired uncommonly well with pale grey, sleeveless robes. All his dancing had tightened the fit of his breeches—Rizeth found he had to fight to keep his hands to himself when Ashenivir bent to fasten his boots. Great Goddess, the things this boy did to him.
They took a carriage to the restaurant, and were seated at a more central table this time, the early-evening dinner rush having filled up most every other spot. Even so, it took very little time for a waiter to arrive—one of the reasons Rizeth favoured this place was that, unlike most other Sea Ward establishments, its elegance was matched by its efficiency.
“—and icewine, for my partner,” he finished up. The waiter nodded and bustled away. Ashenivir stared fixedly at the white tablecloth.
“That’s new,” he whispered.
“You’ve not had icewine before?”
“You’ve never called me your partner before.”
Had he gone too far, too fast? A half-decade of play and just barely a single month of this, was that really the word to use? He hadn’t even thought about it; it had just slipped out. He opened his mouth to apologise, but Ashenivir got there first.
“I like it,” he said. “I like it a lot.”
Rizeth took his hand, their fingers lacing together as though it were the most natural thing in the world. “I am very glad to hear that.”
The last time they’d come here, Ashenivir had gone running off after Rizeth had—or so he’d thought—overstepped in ordering for him, exposing the fact he’d been paying far more attention to Ashenivir’s habits than he ought to have. He’d brought it up, somewhat apprehensively, on the way over here, and Ashenivir had ducked his head in that sweet way he did that failed entirely to hide the bloom of indigo on his cheeks, and explained he’d not felt over-observed at all.
“You knew me so well,” he’d said. “I liked it too much. Liked it being you too much, and I didn’t know why. I didn’t know what to do with...with how you made me feel.”
“You know now, I hope?” Rizeth had asked.
“Yes,” was Ashenivir’s reply. “And I can promise it doesn’t involve running away before dessert this time.”
Which was good because, this being their second official romantic excursion, Rizeth wanted to ensure Ashenivir experienced everything such an event ought to entail.
They spoke of little of consequence as they ate—River’s wedding, the copious advertisements for the Sea Maiden’s Faire that plagued every upright surface in the city, the plot of Ashenivir’s latest serial—but every piece of the mundane conversation spawned a fresh curl of warmth beneath Rizeth’s sternum. By the time dessert arrived, it had spread to fill every inch of him, not just a heat but a light, as if the sun on its descent beyond the window was transferring its presence into him.
It’s only dinner, why do I feel this way?
The answer was obvious, and maybe if he said it—the way he should have tendays ago—it would relieve the great, burning tension that wrapped his heart.
“I didn’t think you liked such sweet things, Master,” Ashenivir said, examining the silver plate of confections curiously. Fruit, in a dozen varieties, sugar-dusted and half-dipped in chocolate.
“I like you, do I not?” Rizeth said. That pretty, delicate stain of indigo spread once more across Ashenivir’s face. Rizeth could hardly breathe, his throat so full of what he should say that nothing else could get through. He took one of the sugared strawberries and held it up. “Open your mouth.”
His fingers left traces of sugar on Ashenivir’s lips as they closed over the fruit and he wanted more than anything to kiss them away. It was far too public a place for him to do such a thing—even after all these years, a twinge of fear still crawled up his spine at the idea of showing such affection where anyone might see. Not the fear of the Arcanum, of damaging Ashenivir’s prospects, but an older fear, wrapped in webs and carried in the keen red eyes of a Matron Mother.
Ashenivir licked his lips as he finished the sweet. “May I have another, or are they for you?”
“You may have as many as you wish,” Rizeth said. He couldn’t kiss him and he couldn’t tell him he loved him but he could feed him, and for tonight, that would have to suffice.
“Don’t you want any?”
Rizeth held a slice of orange, drizzled in darkest chocolate, to Ashenivir’s lips. “I find far more pleasure in seeing you enjoy them.”
Magic buzzed over his tongue as he spoke and Ashenivir went very still, gripping the edge of the table tightly.
“I think you might have cast the word of power again, Master,” he said in a tight whisper. His face had darkened to a midnight shade, his breath shaky.
“That was not my intention, I assure you.”
He could feel it clearly, the Weave prickling in his throat. He’d tied it tightly to that word, pleasure. Too tightly, it seemed.
“I know,” Ashenivir said. He shifted in his seat, and his eyes found Rizeth’s, searching for an anchor. It was no simple thing to dispel a word of power, especially without alerting anyone to a major working, but he ought to try, given it was his fault. Ashenivir’s pupils were dark and all-consuming, his lips parted, right on the edge of a very public ruination.
“Are you hard again, Ra’soltha?” Rizeth murmured, in lowest Drow. Ashenivir swallowed visibly, nails digging into the tablecloth.
“Yes, Master.”
You can’t kiss him in public, but you can do this? What’s wrong with you?
Ignoring himself, Rizeth took hold of Ashenivir’s hand, tracing light circles over his palm with a thumb. “Well, apprentice? How does it feel?”
“Touch my mark and find out, Master,” Ashenivir whispered hoarsely. Maintaining eye-contact, Rizeth did just that. A maelstrom of arousal and need and embarrassment swept through him the moment he connected, and it was only his iron self control that allowed him to keep a straight, silent face. He set Ashenivir’s hand down, and let his fingers skate over the soft underside of his wrist.
Pleasure spiked in the mark, so strong it made him dizzy. He blinked it away and dropped out of the connection. Ashenivir fought for breath, sharp and hard through his nose, teeth sunk into his lower lip.
“Master, you’ll make a mess of me if you keep this up,” he said, rushing the words out as if it were difficult to form them. From what the spell had done to him earlier, it probably was.
Rizeth motioned to a passing waiter for the bill. “Then let us get somewhere we can make a mess of you, Ra’soltha.”
A few days later, the spell seemed to have finally disentangled itself from Rizeth’s mouth. Still, he kept the word pleasure far from his vocabulary just to be on the safe side, and had sent excuses rather than attending the most recent Arcanum meeting. He dreaded to think what might happen should that spell recast itself in Lyzira’s direction, even with Seldszar’s machine between them.
It lingered in touch, or so it felt whenever Ashenivir put hands on him, which he did far more than usual, even for him. At any other time, any other place, his insatiable hunger might have proven inconvenient—here, it was a delightful indulgence. Whether it was the clinging magic or not, Rizeth never tired of pleasing him, or of seeing him lying there breathless in the aftermath, bitten and bruised and gleaming with sweat, wordless and satisfied.
So he was unsurprised when, as he sat reading one evening, Ashenivir decided to climb into his lap. He shifted his book to one hand, and wrapped the other arm around Ashenivir’s waist. Lips pressed to his throat, kissing up to his jaw.
“I am reading, Ra’soltha.”
In reply, Ashenivir plucked the book from his hand and tossed it aside. At once the energy between them changed—the noise of the city outside faded, the only sound that mattered the quickening of Ashenivir’s breath against his cheek.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
Ashenivir continued to kiss his throat and began to unfasten his shirt. “Having you.”
“Are you now?”
“I’m allowed, aren’t I?” A hand curved around the back of his neck, and he felt a slight pull as Ashenivir wrapped the long tail of his hair into his fingers. “I’m yours, you’re mine, and I want you, so I’m having you.”
“You might be polite about it.”
“Mm, I might,” Ashenivir said. He drew back enough to meet Rizeth’s eyes, a dare in his expression, tease in the smile he fought without success to keep from his face. He knew exactly what he was doing, and knew in turn that Rizeth knew it. The charge that sprang to life between them was as inevitable as the tide.
“You have until the count of five to apologise and return my book to me, Ra’soltha,” Rizeth said. “One.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Two.”
“What are you going to do if I don’t?”
“You know the answer to that. Three.”
“You haven’t punished me in days, Master, I don’t think you want to anymore. You like it when I don’t behave.”
Ashenivir searched his eyes, an eager, anxious anticipation clear in his face. That was the razor-edge Rizeth so loved to walk; for him to know what was coming, desire and fear it all at once, wondering if what had come before would really come again, or if he’d gotten away with it this time.
He hadn’t.
“Four,” Rizeth said, never breaking his gaze for a moment.
“Well, in that case…” A thoroughly wicked grin caught Ashenivir’s mouth, and he yanked hard on Rizeth’s hair. The sharp tug of pain shot straight to his cock, and he bit his moan into a growl.
“Five.”
He turned Ashenivir over his knee, ignoring the cry of protest and the pretence at struggle. Ashenivir squirmed, and Rizeth pinned him in place with a firm hand as he roughly pulled down his breeches.
“If you will not give your Master an apology, he will take one,” Rizeth said. He grabbed Ashenivir’s arms and held them in place, one-handed, behind his back. “You have one more chance to give it, Ra’soltha.”
Ashenivir’s breath huffed against his calf. His hair fell in tangles over his head; unbraided, it was long enough for the ends to brush the floor. No apology was forthcoming. Rizeth exaggerated his sigh, flexing his hand around Ashenivir’s wrists.
“So be it.”
His hand snapped up, catching the soft flesh of Ashenivir’s ass in a sharp slap. Ashenivir cried out, and kept on doing so as Rizeth spanked him again and again, until that side of his ass was darkened and warm to the touch. He trailed his fingers over the heated skin.
“I hate to see you so unbalanced,” he said. “Let us remedy the situation.”
He delivered the same treatment to the other side, and by the time he stopped, Ashenivir was gasping something, a rush of tangled words. Rizeth snagged a fistful of hair and pulled him up. “Speak clearly, Ra’soltha.”
“I’m sorry.” Ashenivir’s face was dark, all the blood having rushed to his head. “I’m sorry, Master, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I—”
“You had your chance,” Rizeth said coolly, letting him drop back down again. He scraped his nails over the darkened flesh of Ashenivir’s backside, making him hiss. “I do not believe you are sorry, in point of fact.”
“I am, I am, I swear,” Ashenivir panted out. He struggled in place, whining when Rizeth held him still.
“Then tell me what you’re sorry for.”
Silence. Rizeth spanked him, lighter this time, a quick smack to either side.
“What are you sorry for?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t convince you to fuck me,” Ashenivir said, his smile audible.
“I suspected as much.”
He cried out as Rizeth pushed him down further over his lap, pulling his ass higher, stretching the skin tauter. His hair spilled across the floor—one day, Rizeth was going to tie him up with it, weave it into the rope and bind his own hands with that beautiful hair whose length his Matron tried to take from him. For now, though, there were other matters to attend to.
“No, no, I didn’t mean it, I am sorry,” Ashenivir tried, thoroughly unbelievable. “I’m sorry, Master, please forgive me.”
“That, Ra’soltha, is exactly what I am doing.”
He howled at the spanking this time. Rizeth layered his strikes along the backs of his thighs, taking extra care with the tender place at the very top, right beneath the well-treated flesh of his ass. He never sped up, but never slowed, nor lightened his touch, and by the time he stopped, Ashenivir had gone limp. His breath came hard, every inhale a gasp, every exhale a whimper.
“Think carefully before you answer,” Rizeth said, drawing circles with a nail over the top of Ashenivir’s thigh. “Now tell me; are you sorry?”
“Yes, Master.” His voice was weak, choked with tears, and Rizeth’s chest went tight. He grabbed for the mark, releasing Ashenivir’s wrists as he did so, and a surge of pain-pleasure-want-love flowed into him. There was no way to lie through the mark, it simply wasn’t possible, but in that moment Rizeth didn’t trust it or himself. Too far. He’d gone much too far for no good reason and this was why she’d left, because he always had to make everything a scene, couldn’t love someone the way he was supposed to—
Ashenivir’s foot tapped his. He glanced down and found a tear-streaked face turned to his and beautiful, was his first thought, absolutely beautiful. Ashenivir tapped his foot again, and struggled in his grasp; he instinctively tightened his grip, and satisfaction sparked in the mark.
Rizeth ran a palm over Ashenivir’s ass, feeling the throb of well-abused skin, the heat of his ministrations. “What are you sorry for, Ra’soltha?”
“For throwing your book, Master.”
“And?”
“For being impolite.”
Rizeth held him in place a moment more, hand hovering above his ass, as if to strike again, then lowered it. “Apology accepted.”
He drew Ashenivir up into his arms, then, feeling like a coward, dipped back into the mark. Pain, yes, fluttering like an uncertain heartbeat, but that pleasure remained; pleasure and want and love. He rested his cheek against Ashenivir’s head.
As long as he had the mark, he was safe.
He hurt all the way from skin to soul. Ashenivir pressed his face to Rizeth’s neck, smiling into the warm skin. They lay half-tangled on the couch, one of Rizeth’s hands stroking through his hair, and the other, cooled with a cantrip, laying over the throb of his punishment. His cock ached, but he felt no urgency to do anything about it. He shifted to relieve the discomfort where it pressed into Rizeth’s thigh, and Rizeth’s hand dropped from his hair to slide between his legs.
“Mm, since when do I get rewarded for taking punishments?” Ashenivir mumbled. He caught Rizeth’s wrist and tugged it away. “Besides, I don’t need it.”
“Are you certain?”
His mark shivered—Rizeth had stayed connected to it almost non-stop since he’d started crying. He sat up. Tension caught at the corners of Rizeth’s eyes, his mouth tight. Ashenivir took his hand and put it to the back of his neck.
“I’m alright, I promise. I really don’t need anything, and even if I did, you shouldn’t give it to me after how I behaved.”
It had been so long since he’d been properly punished; deliberate rudeness had seemed the only way to push the boundary he needed to push. He never felt so wanted, so loved, as when his Master cared about him enough to keep him in line. Action. Consequence. That was what he’d wanted, not sex.
Rizeth kissed him. “Very well.”
He lay back down, head on Rizeth’s shoulder. More than ever, calm certainty quelled the whispering guilt about his meeting with Catriona. This was where he was meant to be, how they were meant to be, if only Rizeth would stop being so stubbornly blind about it. Every time Ashenivir pictured his future stretching out before him, the only sense he saw in it for himself was service, starting and ending his days at his Master’s feet.
He’d done his research. This wasn’t one book’s-worth of idle fancy; it was dozens of books and hours of thought, and soon he’d learn the reality of lived experience from Catriona. There would be no point left on which Rizeth could fight him. Nervous though he was, he’d been nervous before, yet had gathered the courage to express his feelings anyway and the world hadn’t ended, only changed for the better.
This was no different. It was one more facet of the love he’d confessed, and soon Rizeth would understand that.
Ashenivir pressed a kiss to Rizeth’s neck, sighing as the arms around him tightened.
Soon, he’d have everything he wanted.