Hurt Me
But the act of casting can be incredibly healing. Taking control of a situation that frightens you can be an act of empowerment on top of making actual magic.
Magic Philosophy by Namina Kimathi
Please note this chapter includes rope bondage, pain play, lingerie, and frotting.
I’M AVOIDING OLbrIC. Avoiding everyone, really, but especially Olbric.
After my magic went rogue on him, I’d fled in the middle of the night, finding the alcove in the illusion tower to doze before I spent the day doing my best to stay out of sight.
In the days since it happened, I’ve made myself scarce, calling off my Monday arrangement with Arlon with a note saying that I caught a head cold. I’ve been sneaking food from the kitchens before and after mealtimes, not lingering long enough for anyone to stop and talk.
Not for the first time, I find myself wishing I could just leave the godsdamned Crux. Even if only for an afternoon. There’s just so few places in the Crux I can go to be alone.
Olbric showed me most of the nooks and crannies among the various towers, so I can’t use them without risking him finding me. I’m afraid of going to the baths alone right now, so all that leaves is me locking myself in my room and pretending I’m not there when someone knocks.
Now I’m sitting hunched on my mattress like a fucking madman, working on fletching more arrows that I don’t need just to keep my godsdamned hands busy.
It’s cowardice. I’m well aware of that. But I’m terrified of hurting Olbric again. Of hurting anyone. My spells are still buried in the back of my closet, but it sure as fuck hadn’t made a difference when I’d burned him in my sleep.
The nightmare that had woken me so violently had been about Lucien again.
In it, he had been like a walking corpse, his fingers blackened, eyes gaunt.
Every staggering step looked painful, but he still took them, stumbling towards...
something. His frostbitten fingers had reached out, clawing, grasping before landing on shining magiline.
Without warning, someone pounds on my door. Sharp, desperate knocks. I jump, heart racing as the arrow in my hand clatters to the ground.
“Dom?” Cancassi calls, their voice tight with urgency. “I need you to go to Olbric’s casting room. Quickly.”
“What? What’s happened?” I ask as I throw my door open to meet them, but the hallway beyond is empty. My heart hammers against my ribs, and some terrified part of me wonders if this is some new fucked up trick of my own mind.
There’s only one way to be sure.
I rush out of my room and down the divination tower stairs. It’s only midday, and eyes follow me as I all but sprint to the evocation tower before finding Olbric’s casting room on the first floor.
I grab the handle, throw the door open, and -
Olbric smirks at me from the center of the room. He’s bound up in the most ridiculous abjuration I’ve ever seen, hanging partially suspended by a messy web of rope. Yet for a moment, I’m so relieved to see him unharmed that it takes me a second to catch up with what’s actually going on.
“Oh no,” Olbric says in mock distress. “It seems I’ve gotten all tangled up. I think I need some help getting down.”
Anger flares hot as I stomp towards him. “That’s not funny, Olbric!” My fingers fumble with the mess of ropes, trying to pick through the knots. Whoever suspended him did a fine job, but they fucked it all up by tangling extra strands around him in a haphazard web.
“No, but it’s gotten you in the same room as me, at least,” he says, the good humor in his voice going flat.
I scoff as I let my hands drop before heading to the cabinet. “I’m getting the scissors.”
“Dom, wait.”
The quiet plea in his voice stops me in my tracks.
I take a breath, using it to tamp down my anger before I turn to face him.
His arms are bound behind his back, one leg bent and hoisted high while the other is left perched on tippy toes.
Yet under all those ropes, I realize he’s wearing red garters and stockings over matching lacy underthings.
My silver collar is fastened around his neck.
“I don’t want you to be afraid to be around me. I don’t want you to be afraid of touching me.” He swallows before he gives me a wavering smile, his hazel eyes full of pleading. “Please touch me?”
I sigh even as my frustration cools to longing. It’s been days since I let myself touch him. Touch anyone. The urge tugs so hard that I take a step back towards him.
“What if it happens again?”
Olbric shifts his weight, increasing the bite of the rope to sway closer to me. “Dom, please look at me.” His eyes are full of trust. “I’m yours, Dom. Use me as you will.”
The breath leaves my lungs in a gust. Something in the words feels like a lifeline, cast out for me to grab onto. I’ve felt so alone in this for so many weeks, have been harboring so much fear and doubt.
But Olbric’s fearless. He always has been.
I step forward before I press my lips to his. He moans softly, his breath caressing my skin as he returns the kiss. Even when I pull away, he tries to follow me, craning his neck only to whimper when I pull back.
I take a steadying breath before I look at the mess of ropes around him. “Let’s focus on getting you down, first.”
“You don’t have to get me down,” he says, a hint of teasing entering his voice. “For someone who thinks ropes are boring, Cancassi sure is good at tying them.”
“Yeah?” I ask as I untangle a wayward cord that looks like it’s been looped around itself just to make a mess. “You call this good, huh?”
Olbric chuckles and says, “Don’t let them hear you say that. It took them ages to truss me up.”
I toss the excess length of rope aside before starting on the next, though I avoid the ones that are actually holding him up. “I’m sure it did. You’re a fucking mess.”
“Bet you could get me messier,” Olbric says, and the heat in his voice makes my cock twitch.
After holing myself up for days, desire sparks hot. I reach out to wrap my hand around his loose hair before I pull his head back, exposing his neck. I step close, lips brushing over his pulse.
“For scaring the shit out of me, I should beat that ass raw.”
Olbric bites back a moan, his breath stuttering. It’s a thrill to feel his pulse race under my lips. “I’m yours, Dom,” he repeats softly. “Use me as you will.”
I tighten my grip on his hair before I crush my mouth against his. He returns the kiss, all fire and heat as he nips at my lower lip. When I pull away, he’s breathless, his lips swollen already. He sinks into the bite of the ropes with a groan, his eyes heavily lidded. “Dom, please...”
Fuck, but I’ve never been good at saying no to him. I pull him close, hearing the creak of the ropes before I deliver a sharp smack to his ass. He grinds prettily against me, a wanton whimper escaping him.
“Hurt me,” he gasps. “Please, Dom.”
I swear before delivering another slap, harder this time.
I remember the first evocation I ever cast with him.
How scared I was of hurting him in a way that wasn’t welcome.
That fear has taken on a new clarity lately, but that doesn’t change the fact that Olbric loves this.
He always has, and hearing his quiet plea erases every worry, every fear for a blissful moment.
The next strike makes my hand tingle before I release him to go to his supply cabinet.
I search through it until I find a flexible leather paddle and return to him.
I pull his hips flush against me before I deliver a stinging slap to the back of his thigh.
He throws his head back with a shout, and the sound makes my head swim.
“You want me to hurt you?” I ask as I bring the paddle down again. Olbric jerks against me, his hard cock barely contained by his lacy small clothes. “I’ll hurt you, love.”
Everything outside of this room is so uncertain and frightening, but here, listening to Olbric’s shout of pain and bliss, everything makes sense. I crave that normalcy as I strike him again.
“I want you to rut against me like the mess you are,” I hiss, making him sway in his ropes as I smack a tender spot on his inner thigh. “And I’m going to keep hurting you until you cum in those pretty little panties.”
Olbric moans before he starts to rut against me. With only one leg freed, he struggles to get the leverage he needs. I take pity on him as I press my thigh against his crotch, and he moans as he frots against me.
I rain the blows down, reaching around him to strike one cheek, then the other before moving on to his thighs. He’s going to be a mess of welts by the time we’re through, but it’s a comfort to know he welcomes the pain.
A desperate whimper breaks past his lips as he rocks against my thigh. His face is flushed with the effort, his body taut in the ropes as he fights for his pleasure. He buries his face against my neck, pressing closer as the paddle connects with another echoing crack.
“Fuck,” he gasps, his breath puffing against my skin in hot, desperate bursts.
“Let me see it, beautiful.”
It takes a few more strikes before his body goes tense against mine. A long, whimpering moan escapes him, his hips slowing their desperate grind. He sinks into the rope’s embrace, and when I look down, his red underthings are stained dark.
I press a kiss to his sweaty forehead before I circle behind him. His welted ass and thighs match the color of his small clothes almost perfectly, and seeing just how satisfied he is in the wake of the pain I inflicted helps settle my frayed nerves.
Gratitude wells up in me, and I make quick work of freeing him from the remaining ropes before I carry him over to the far bed.
I gently lay him down, my lips swallowing his moan as I fumble for a bottle of lotion.
I roll him onto his front before I settle between his legs, tugging his soiled underthings aside.
My cock springs free from my trousers, and I slick myself with a fevered sort of eagerness before I sink into him.
Olbric gives a weak cry, his hands fisting in the sheets underneath him as I sink deep.
Yet he only spreads his legs wider, giving me more room as I start to move.
His body is flushed underneath me, ass and thighs welted, yet when I grab one reddened cheek, he arches and moans, pushing back against me for more.
I take him slow, one arm twining around his chest to hold him close as I chase my end. Olbric reaches back, his hand gripping my waist hard as he urges me on. I’m so pent up that it doesn’t take long, and when my pleasure peaks, Olbric lets out a quiet moan as I empty into him.
For a moment, neither of us move. I stay buried inside of him even as I shift us both, rolling him onto his side as I settle in behind him. I curl up against his back, my arms wrapped tight around his chest.
“Please don’t run away again,” Olbric says, breaking the quiet at last. The soft plea makes the knotted emotions in my chest twist painfully.
I swallow even as I tighten my grip on him, pressing my lips to the back of his shoulder. “I won’t.”
Olbric’s hand closes over mine, his fingers stroking my wrist gently. It reminds me of the burns still healing around his, and as I look, I can see the scabbed prints from my pointer finger and thumb, still etched onto his skin.
“These things you’re seeing and hearing...” Olbric says at last. “What are they saying to you?”
I let out a long breath. “They’re telling me to go home.”
Olbric shifts, half rolling so he can look up at me. “Do you think you should listen?”
I swallow, trying to sort through my thoughts. Maybe I am losing my mind, maybe I’m not. Maybe something in the silver made my magic go rogue, or maybe it’s always been like this. There are so many questions, and yet there’s only one place I can think to go to seek answers.
“Ever since the Tower, I’ve been thinking about where my magic comes from.
Been wondering if my mother’s still alive,” I say at last, remembering the green eyes I had seen in the faces of strangers, the red hair in the shadow in the baths.
“I-I can’t shake the feeling that maybe that’s what these dreams are trying to tell me. That I should go home. Seek her out.”
Olbric rolls to face me, shivering as my soft cock slips out of him. He reaches up to cup my cheek, and my eyes automatically flick to his healing wrists.
“Then let’s go.”
It takes a second for the words to sink in. He says it like it’s such a simple thing. Like the thought hasn’t been haunting me ever since the Tower.
“You’d come with me?” I ask, a painful kind of hope tightening the knot of emotion in my chest.
He leans over, his lips soft as silk as they brush mine. “Of course I will.”
All at once, the knot in my chest seems to come loose. Tears well to my eyes before I catch his lips again, pouring all my love and gratitude into the kiss. I’ve felt so alone, so scared, but Olbric’s fearless.
And knowing he’s with me in this makes the idea of it feel less impossible. After months of avoiding it, it feels like I’ve finally stumbled on a trail. After months, it feels like hope.
“Thank you.”