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  “Please, what, lady?” he asked softly.

  “Please, do as you said you will. I ache for your touch, even if it is only through the strike of this board.”

  “Your will is my desire, lady.”

  Thomas rose, shifted the paddle in his hand and lay his palm on her tense back. He admired the white curves propped high before him, like the perfect softness of pale yeast loaves pressed together in the hearth, and the line that divided them and concealed other mysterious places. The board whispered over her buttocks, and she made a soft sound.

  He slapped her bottom, a light stroke with the wood. She jumped, but he could see the lack of pain relaxed her. He did it again, several times, getting her used to the sensation, and enjoying the way the slender back arched and shoulders tightened, the bite down on her bottom lip. She was widening her legs, raising herself to meet his stroke, exposing her wetness to him. Her breath became harsh.

  He caught her, sliding a hand beneath her hips next time she raised them. He lifted her body above the pillows. He brought the paddle down in earnest, and she cried out. His next stroke delivered a stinging blow to those sensitive blood-filled folds. Her sex looked like a dark red peach, running with juices.

  She cried out again, but he kept on, watching fair snow turn to a rosy blush, and feeling his own reaction grow and swell to painful proportions. Her breath came in a sob now.

  “My lord,…it is so much worse, please…”

  Her cunt was indeed rippling in the near orgasm that Zorac permitted her. Thomas was heightening the sensations, driving her mad with unrelieved desire. He watched, fascinated despite himself, as the rippling became a continuous spasm. Lilith’s head jerked and her teeth scraped the wood of the stool. She gnawed like an animal losing its mind from the pain of a trap. Her legs kicked out helplessly against Thomas’s strength, and her arousal was as strong a scent as perfumed oil.

  Forgive me, lady. But I must do this to you. I promise I shall make it up to you, if God makes me worthy enough to free you.

  “Hold, my lady,” he murmured, and lowered his paddle to the bed. He kept her in the air with his one arm.

  “No…” she fought him like a berserker. She was unable to twist around with his hold on her, but still she tried, rearing up to try and flip herself over, too far gone to accept there was nothing such a motion would gain her.

  He turned her over on her back, so she was stretched out on the pillows, her back arched, her breasts the highest part of her, like fertile hills down a smooth, sloping expanse of stomach. He spread and re-manacled her legs, and with her arms bound to her sides, she was unable to do more than rock herself back and forth, and keen in that soft, breathy voice that slid down his back like the touch of her hands.

  He studied the soft curls between her legs and the columns of her thighs, a landscape he would be content to contemplate until the Earth her body invoked in his mind crumbled away and left them all adrift in the Mother’s Womb once more.

  She drew deep breaths, trying to calm herself, though her eyes on him were far from calm. They had the hunger of the succubus. He bent to his saddlebags, withdrew the carved box that had revealed his intent to Zorac, and opened it.

  The phallus had been formed from the soft, sucking clay of a cave deep in the earth. It had been gathered by the hands of the faithful, priests and priestesses of the Old Ways. The clay had been molded over the cock of one of the priests and painted upon the breasts and mons of the High Priestess Helene. They had joined with each other thus, in the ritual that brought together the incarnation of the Goddess and the Horned One, lord of sun.

  When the ritual was complete, the anointed clay had been carefully removed from each of them, molded, fired and glazed into the smooth and sacred object he held now, containing the fluids of their passion and Creation.

  Thomas believed in God, had fought in the name of His Son, but after his time with the priestesses, he found no conflict in accepting the truths of the Old Ways as well. What was in his hands was holy, and he intended to use it for a sacred purpose.

  He lifted the polished phallic object so Lilith could see it. “I roused you with fire and water, my lady. Earth and air will complete a circle about your soul. These four elements are greater than man or magician.”

  He cupped the side of her face in his hand. She turned into his touch, her eyes closing, her face rigid with the torment of her unreleased pleasure. He lifted the curved sculpture of earth. He found her opening with his thumb, stroked through the soaked lips as she cried out in anguish, and parted them with the head of the large, smooth phallus. He kept his thumb over that sweet jewel that guarded her gateway, preventing contact between it and the tool of the ritual.

  The cock was larger than a normal man, but curved for her shape. He took his time. Her eyes opened again, this time showing a trace of uncertainty.

  “You can take all of it, my lady,” he murmured soothingly. “I know you can.” He eased it in an inch, then two, stretching her, feeling her juices coat it, further lubricate it for entry.

  The chains of the manacles could be adjusted to spread her legs wider, and Thomas did so now, one-handed, though Lilith protested in an incoherent moan.

  “We go wider, lady,” he commanded, with gentle sternness. “Spread yourself for me.”

  Her thighs slid away from each other, further exposing what lay between them. Thomas swallowed at the sight of the pink nether lips gripping the large organ, feeling a sympathetic strong contraction in his own. He growled when she lifted her hips and showed him the tracks of arousal on the inside of her legs. He kept his hands steady though his heart was not, and pushed the lance in half way. She whimpered and his gaze shifted in concern, but her head had fallen back on the pillows and her mouth was open, drawing in air, her teeth bared as she gasped. The tiny bud of flesh beneath his thumb throbbed and she screamed. He put his hand to the side of her head and her teeth sank hard into the callused Venus mound of his hand.

  She convulsed, her hips jerking savagely for a release he was denying her. He slid the smooth brown cock all the way home.

  He hated drawing out her anguish thus, but the priestess’s instructions had been thorough and precise. By the blessed Virgin, he had never been so hard in his life and not come. He could feel his seed leaking against his belly beneath his clothes. Lilith’s eyes were on his cock, straining against the fabric of his hose. Her nostrils flared as if she could smell it.

  “I can bear no more,…my lord,” she said. The plaintive whisper wrenched his heart as much as her tears, which were falling from her eyes to the pillows.

  “It must stay thus, for just another moment, lady. You must submit to its presence inside you, accept it being there, before I can proceed to grant you release.”

  She choked. “It is inside me, my lord.”

  “It is not that which I mean. You must become still, accepting it as a wild mare accepts the bridle of her Master and stands, eager to run wild but awaiting his will. You must be still, my lady, to hear the will of more than your own flesh.”

  “It is easy for you to say, my lord,” she said on a harsh gasp, “when you do not have to endure it.”

  “Aye, lady, so it is.” He cupped his palm over her feverish temple, touching the fine hairs close to her scalp, even as he kept his other hand on the phallus, and his thumb in place. “But when a man is wounded on the battlefield, there is a moment that comes, long hours afterward. You move past the agonizing pain, into an acceptance of the abhorrent trauma to your flesh. All senses of the body become dull, and yet the things of the spirit, your desires and perceptions, become clearer than anything you have ever experienced. It is a terrible and yet miraculous thing, for it often heralds the end. For you, it will be the end of your life here. Not your death,” he assured her. “I will not allow you to leave me.”

  “Where?” she asked. “Where did such a thing happen to you?”

  He pulled aside the fabric of his tunic so she could see the scar, the long gash
of a battle axe, embedded over his heart.

  She startled him by lifting her upper body. He aided her with a hand beneath her shoulders. He was not sure of her intent, but then she pressed her lips to that scar. His heart hitched in his chest.

  Though her body blazed with heat from her passion, her breasts heaving erratically against his chest, her thighs trembling, her kiss was a tender one. She kept her mouth on his scar, motionless, and her lips felt like the touch of feathers.

  She stayed in that position for awhile, saying nothing, her jaw pressed against the skin revealed by the opening of his tunic, her lashes fanning her cheeks so he could not see her eyes. He held her against him with one arm, his other holding the phallus still within her. He wished he could hold her cradled in his lap.

  Her body’s jerks eased at length, and he watched as she once again exercised a control over the uncontrollable that astounded and humbled him.

  “I could have lost you in that moment,” she said, her eyes lifting to meet his.

  “You did not.”

  She stared at him, tears leaking from her dark eyes like tiny crystallized souls fleeing the horror of the abyss.

  “My lord,…if this does not work, I beg you, please, take my life. I care not if I go to dust and oblivion. I am so tired, it would be as much heaven as I could want, and more than I deserve, I am sure.”

  Thomas caught her tears on his fingertips. “I know you think of yourself at the end of your strength, Lilith,” he said. “I have pushed you hard. I feel your body roused to pain beneath my hands. But you have strength, and the end is so close. Inside the circle I will form about you, you will find the answer to your freedom, know it in your heart. Trust me, as you trusted me just now, to understand the nature of pleasure and pain together.”

  “You do not know what crime I have committed. I may not be worthy of this ritual, and you may not want me if you knew.”

  “That does not matter,” he rebuked her, holding her close to him, her bare breasts pushed up against his broad chest, her softness the only pillow he would ever desire again. “You look into my eyes and see the other part of you, as I see the other part of me. I have sought you in my dreams, whether it is on the cold, bloodsoaked ground of a fresh battlefield, or the comfort of my bed, which I desire to share with you. You are my quest, the quest of my life, Lilith. I came not for the glory of God, or the desire to make a name for myself. I came for you.”

  “But Zorac said,…you serve the cause of Arthur.”

  “I, like many before me, have served Arthur’s cause, and will do so, always. But he knew men and women make their own choices. His love for his two closest friends destroyed him but it also resurrected him. He honored the love they bore him, and for each other, until the end. It will always be a hard world with hard choices, lady. Men will be selfish and cruel, except in the cause of love. That is the one charge for which they will sacrifice everything. That is the cause I serve, though it has taken me many years to understand that.”

  He straightened. “Now, my lady, no more tears. You have accepted this cock within your tight opening, and now there is more.”

  He eased her back to the pillows and took his hands away from her, leaving the phallus seated deep within her.

  “You must hold it within you, my lady. That is my command.”

  From the same elaborately carved box, he withdrew a purple feather with tiny beaded tips. The beads were so light they did not weigh down the strand on which each rested. He fitted the stem of the feather into a tiny slot just beneath the curved handle of the phallus. Lilith stiffened as the slight draft in the room, and the act of seating the feather, stroked the tips against that tight nub of flesh his thumb no longer guarded.

  Thomas moved so he stood at the foot of the bed, gazing down the loveliness of her body from between her knees.

  She tried to lift her head from the slight downward slope of the stool, but he made a gesture and she settled back, looking at him awkwardly from beneath her lashes.

  “In a minute, I shall open the window,” he pointed just beyond him, “and the night breeze will come through. The feather will begin to do its gentle dance on you, and render you helpless before the power of the slightest touch of air. You will concentrate on nothing beyond the build of pleasure in your cunt. You will feel your juices rising and the power of the Earth growing within you.”

  “My lord—”

  “No, no words now,” he commanded softly. “Ride it, Lilith. Hold it as if it is my lance you grasp with your muscles of silk. I challenge you not to call my name as you explode with your release. You will not be able to stop yourself.”

  “And you fancy yourself a magician now, able to command my words,” she spat, her body’s ache spiraling her back to anger again.

  “I am your Master, and your love, and your heart. Soon, you will not be able to deny the truth of it, no more than you will be able to resist squeezing the phallus with your own muscles, work it deeper within you. Your body has the strength to serve its own desires.”

  Her chin lifted, her eyes flashing defiance. The tremble of her lips clearly suggested the turmoil within. He loved her, loved watching her pride fight her desire.

  He rose, his gaze never leaving her, and moved to the window. The latch turned easily, well-oiled and maintained by Zorac’s staff. Zorac had obviously never feared she would take her own life. Or perhaps he had not cared. A shadow darkened Thomas’s eyes as he considered that Zorac had hoped to drive her to a damnation of her soul. Then he would have been spared the energy of torturing her. He could simply have contemplated her burning in hell forever. Let the Devil do his work.

  Thomas took a deep breath. Anger had no place in this moment. He pushed the window open and felt the night air touch his face. The moon was rising in the sky, and there were stars, so many that they were a blaze of jewels, a good omen. The breeze from the nearby sea pushed against his chest and he stepped aside, giving it its way.

  It swept into the room, riffling the heavy tapestries on the walls. The fire leaped in a flickering pattern. He heard a soft gasp and turned his head toward the bed.

  There were things of beauty in the world. He had seen many of them, some of them ironically in the most horrible of circumstances. But he could not think of anything more beautiful in all his travels than what he saw on the bed.

  His lady, his beautiful Lilith, her body arched high atop a mountain of pillows, her thighs spread, the muscles within her cunt tight, keeping the lance deep within her. Her white stomach an expanse of milk and satin. The crease of flesh where the weight of her breasts lay on her ribs, the pale curves trembling with her erratic breathing. The column of her throat, arched back and exposed as she gasped for air. Her body jerked, small motions, as the wind caught hold of the feathers and swept their beaded tips over her drenched petals. The motion was like a soft rain, unpredictable in where the drops would fall, but relentless in their determination to soak the earth.

  He moved softly, not wishing to distract her, not wanting to change the picture in any way unless it was her desire that changed it.

  The earthen lance moved, and Thomas’s mouth became dry as he saw her wet lips tighten on the shaft, pull it into herself slightly and then ease it back that same amount with the muscle release. She would not move it further than that, with her thighs spread so far open, but that small movement would focus the friction of the head on the place within her that the curved edge of the lance was designed to seat against. The priestess had told him it was a place of intense pleasure to a woman.

  He wished her hands were free so he could bind them in her soft hair, wrap the strands around her crossed wrists beneath her to arch her body up even further, displaying her more tautly to his pleasure. That would be a joy he would anticipate for another time.

  He wanted to be close to her. He needed to touch her now more than he needed air, but he stayed where he was, just watching her, his heart pounding, aching, knowing the rest was up to her.

  C
hapter Four

  Lilith had thought, so many times that it became one of the mantras she used to keep from losing her mind, that if she ever freed herself, she would eschew bodily pleasures forever and commit herself to a convent.

  She knew only the pain of unrelenting lust, its savage tearing, its debasing need. She had never felt a woman’s desire, as Thomas called it, this physical desire coupled with emotional need, this strong, overwhelming need for intimacy with one man. The ability, not only to join with him, but to crawl inside of him and merge with his flesh.

  She had discovered much about herself over the past five years. She had learned that almost anything could be endured, and that hatred could give the body strength to survive. She had cried her share of tears into the unicorn’s pelt, but it had been some time since Zorac had won the privilege of seeing them.

  Her body was being consumed by the elements Thomas had invoked. She felt every naked inch of her flesh, that creation of dust that became so much more with the spirit to animate it. Fire licked over her skin and she wondered if it had leaped from the hearth and covered her with rippling, silken fingers. Moisture covered her beneath the cloak of fire, and gathered between her legs, soaking the object that impaled her. Her muscles acted against her will, milking it within her, sliding it that small, excruciating bit, forward and back.

  He was there, larger than life, a shadow in her consciousness. His intent stillness, his focus solely for her, stoked that fire.

  She was used to the futile build to peak and dreaded hanging there, like Zorac had described it, a convict condemned to hang in a state of eternal suffocation. This was a different feeling.

  The first time, with the water, it had taken her by surprise. Now, she knew that delicious feeling was coming again, but it was taking her higher than before, lifting her spirit as well as her body. The height was beginning to frighten her. Every muscle of her body was gathering, as if preparing for an impact it might not survive, and yet she was splayed open, so vulnerable, when everything in her screamed that she should shield herself.