Chapter 22 – To Cherish, To Hold #6
Araxis rocked his hips against me, slow at first, then picking up speed as he sucked in sharp, pleased breaths.
One hand stayed wrapped around my wrist, which was pinioned above my head; the other came to rest at the base of my neck, possessive, certain, while his hips ground against me, his weight shifting as his slit pulsed and quivered around my cock.
Instead of thrusting up into him, I stayed deeply seated, our bodies shifting in micro-movements as he rolled and squirmed against me.
Pleasure surged through me in waves, my skin feeling too sensitive, flashing hot and then crashing into chills.
His fingertips dug into the skin of my neck, and a whine escaped my throat.
"Kiss me," I breathed. "Please."
He slid his mouth against mine, hips still grinding, chest heaving beneath his thin shirt as he rode me, chasing his own pleasure. He licked into my mouth, possessive, his fingers tracing hard lines up and down the length of my throat, as if memorizing the feeling of my skin beneath his grip.
I could hear the wet sound of our bodies moving together, and it might have been the death of me.
He rocked his hips back and forward, faster, the movements growing unsteady, sharp, needy.
I could feel the rumble in his chest, the deep purr echoing beneath my own ribs.
"Come for me," I hissed against his mouth.
"I want you to come with my cock inside you. "
A sharp, shocked sound escaped his mouth, and then Araxis jerked, his channel tightening like a vise for a moment as a flood of slick gushed around my cock.
His hand released my wrist, bracing instead against my shoulder – hard, tight.
I moaned as his channel gripped my cock, spasming around me; I tore my mouth away from his, sucking in a hard, shaking breath, fighting against the spill of pleasure cresting inside of me.
The vise of his channel slackened, just slightly, as the pink plate above shifted to release his cock, gleaming in the dim light of the shuttle.
I tipped my head back towards his, pressed a kiss to the side of his throat.
"Can I fuck you like this too?" I asked, voice low, feeling almost drunk with how wet he was around me, the way his pretty pink cock was nudging against my stomach at this position, how he was still quivering around my length.
"Hm." Araxis dropped his head down, nuzzling his nose into the crook of my shoulder while his quills rippled in a sensuous cascade behind him. "I don't know, Sashen. Can you?"
My other hand dropped to his waist, fingers digging divots into his white skin. "Anything for you," I murmured, and then I thrust up into him, gently at first.
The first few thrusts punched out a soft sound from his throat, his cock bumping against my stomach, leaving a trail of gleaming wetness against my skin. Araxis mouthed the skin of my neck, skimming his teeth over the side of my throat.
"Do it." I pumped up into him, a little more forcefully, and felt his whole body shudder against me.
"I want you to leave a mark." And then I shifted his body, just slightly, so that I could get more leverage, and I started thrusting into him in earnest. My hips snapped up in a quick rhythm, hard and certain, and the shocked, pleased sound that whined out of him made heat curl tight in my belly.
I felt his teeth skim back to the juncture of my shoulder and neck, and then the sharp sensation of his bite, chased by the soothing swipe of his tongue.
"Touch yourself," I groaned, eager to watch as I snapped my hips upward, pounding into him as he pulsed wet and ready around me.
He reached down and fisted his own pink length in his pale hand, holding it in place so that it was the power of my thrusts that rubbed his own cock through his grip.
I moaned, watching the sight of him, how his dick dripped slick between his own fingers, his channel tightening around me every time I slid into him.
"Tisqen," he groaned into my shoulder. "Sashen, I'm close, I'm –"
I knew he was, and I shifted ever so slightly so that I could get a deeper thrust. I buried myself in him once, twice, three times, his gasp sharp and delighted as his cock slid through his own fist.
I came hard, my orgasm ripping through my body with the force of an exploding star.
I emptied myself into him, come flooding him as his channel clamped down around me; the pressure, how hot and wet and tight he was, made my hips jerk again, my orgasm seeming to continue on and on as he came in spurts of glistening slick across my stomach.
I sucked in a hard breath, dizzy. "Oh," I said, reeling. My hands were still grasping his hips, hard enough to bruise, so I released him and trailed my fingers up and down his sides, over his ribs – gentle, so gentle. "You are perfect, Araxis. You're everything."
He leaned back, slow, and stroked his come-slick hand down the side of my face, dropping it farther to touch the mark stinging on my neck. "Thank you," he said softly. As if he had anything to be thanking me for.
I reached and pulled his hand to my mouth, kissing the centre of his palm.
My cock was still seated deep him in, so he carefully pulled away and stepped off of me.
I was covered in his slick, and I knew that my come would be dripping down his thigh as he stood and got dressed, as we went back upstairs to our rooms.
I wasn't, by nature, a possessive person, but something about the thought scratched at some itch deep inside of me, the same way that I felt a primal satisfaction knowing he had left a bite mark in my skin.
I'm yours; you're mine. And it might not be forever – it wouldn't be, I finally understood that – but at least it was for now.
I begrudgingly rose, stepping back into my own pants as Araxis looped his waist ties carefully in place.
I reached out and tugged him in close, pressing another kiss to his sweet mouth, my hands raising to cradle his face.
To show him, through touch at least, how much he meant to me.
When we broke apart, his stare was soft, his hands at my waist tender.
"I wish we could stay here," I murmured as I stared deep into his eyes.
His crest rustled, quiet. "It will all be over soon," Araxis said. His hands tightened, ever so slightly, at my waist, and he smiled, something small and hesitant.
I knew that. And Araxis would win, and we'd go our separate ways. I just wasn't ready for that part yet. Maybe I'd never be ready for that part. "Can I stay with you tonight?" I asked, feeling reckless. The worst he could say was no, and I'd have a broken heart either way.
He flushed, then, and nodded. We tidied up and Araxis vanished to the engine out back to hide the paper we'd written on. I wondered if I should write anything else before we left this little sanctuary. I composed a half dozen different notes in my head while he was in the back of the shuttle.
Can I come with you after the Tournament? That made me sound like a lost puppy.
I don't want a future without you. Definitely pathetic.
I'd love to spend some time with the kids before you go to Xitera. A coward's way to broach the subject.
Question, do space princes ever have concubines? I'm available! Insulting to us both.
Or the worst, and the one my mind kept catching on: I think I'm in love with you. Humiliating. Impossible.
So in the end, I wrote nothing, and we ambled our way back through those empty hallways and the many staircases.
On the way, I told him about the voltaari who had spoken to me – he knew, based on what I'd said, that it had been Atosha because on top of everything else, he was a much better student than I was – and he sounded pleased to be able to spare their life.
We didn't see anyone else until we made our way back into the stairwell of the main building, and then, just past the fourth floor, we rounded a corner and found Andiri stepping out onto the landing.
Her dark eyes skated over the pair of us, her crest rustling and bristling as her eyes grew wide and impossibly black.
I saw her stare land on the mark Araxis had left on my neck, and her crest flared to life behind her, blowing big and wide.
Araxis drew to a stop, gesturing for me to move past him, and he positioned his body between Andiri and the path I would take upstairs.
I slid by and he said something firm in abayan, his own crest rippling gently, before he followed me up the rest of the distance to his room.
There, he stepped into the shower while I took a moment to sprawl on his bed and inhale deeply, my face pressed against his pillow.
When he emerged, draped in a robe and freshly scrubbed, I moved to the edge of the bed and sat next to him. Araxis's hands raised as he began threading his fingers through his crest in efficient, practiced movements, braiding the quills back into place.
I watched, quiet. He shot me a brief, sideways look with the smallest smile. "I cannot do it quite so neatly as my sibling, Vivith. They did a ceremonial braid before I left. The children helped." His mouth quirked on the last word, and warmth unfurled in my chest at the thought.
Yeah, I bet they helped. I bet they made a mess and were silly and squirmy and so, so proud of him.
"Could I help?" I asked, nudging his leg with my knee.
Araxis's stare shifted away, his fingers tidily tucking, folding, and rolling segments of his crest. "Braiding is only done by members of one's creche," he said quietly. "It's quite… intimate."
Oh. I pulled on a practiced smile. "I understand," I said, the warmth draining from my chest. "I might head back to my room to clean up. I'll see you downstairs?"
He nodded, his robe slipping just a bit from one shoulder as he shifted his arms to finish the final section of his braid. "Thank you," he said as I stood, still not looking at me. "For… everything."
I watched him for another moment, sitting there on the edge of the bed and carefully pulling himself back together.
He was so beautiful that it almost hurt to look at him – pale and angular, each movement graceful and studied.
"Well, I'm yours," I said gently, and then I slipped from his room and went down to my own space to try and put myself back together.
To bury that box deep again, although it was certainly beginning to feel like an exercise in futility.
I stood in the shower for too long, letting the heat scour away sensation from my skin, and I resigned myself to the fact that I wasn't just falling in love with him. I had fallen. I was in love with him. How could I not be? How could anyone not be?
I'd never had a chance, not from the first moment we locked eyes in the den until now, when I'd follow anywhere he led in exchange for the barest scraps of his attention, the shadow of affection.
I would love him when he left me, no matter to which disparate ends of the universe we were flung, and I thought I could be okay with that.
I knew that some part of my heart would always beat with his – no doubt the best part, the only part worth anything at all.
We were too entangled for me to ever extricate myself, to fall out of the cosmic synchronicity that had pulled us together – not that I would want to.
If these last few hours were all I got – if I was able to walk away with the memory of the moments we had shared; if I'd been able to feel this, just once in my life; if at least I knew how much he meant to me – it would have to be enough.
It was more than I'd ever had before, and I would force myself to cherish every dwindling moment we had together, even if my chest ached the whole time.