Chapter Six #2
The god cupped his face, turning it towards him, and lips touched his. He closed his eyes on instinct alone, mouth softening into the kiss even as the rest of his body strung taut with nerves.
A palm on his other cheek broke him away from the first kiss to pull him into another with the god on his left. She kissed harder, sliding a hand up his jaw and into his hair.
“Be gentle with him,” a god laying on a nearby seat admonished. Gnaeus, by her long brown curls. “Remember he’s not trained like the others.”
“We’re being gentle!” the one kissing him broke away to complain.
Ithna clicked her tongue. “Look at him, he’s scared stiff, the poor thing.”
“Not stiff enough if you ask me,” the god said sultrily, sliding a hand up Ethyr’s thigh and leaning so close he could feel her breath against his skin.
“Varuut,” Gallus huffed to his right, exasperated. “Didn’t you hear what Gnaeus just said?”
Varuut. Goddess of love and affection. Her long, straight hair was loose over her shoulders, the color such a light copper it was nearly pink. It was no wonder he didn’t recognize her; Varuut changed so often between male and female forms in legends it was hard to know which she might have been.
One of the gods at the table stood and walked over, brushing Varuut’s hand from Ethyr’s leg. He leaned down to be face-level with Ethyr, tucking a finger under his chin and lifting it.
“Ethyr,” he said with a smile, and hearing his name from the perfectly curved lips of a god’s mouth had him close to fainting. Ainder, if he had to venture a guess, the god of pleasure and desire. “Come sit at the table. Enjoy this feast with us.”
He swallowed and nodded, though it was barely a shiver of his head.
The god’s smile widened and he drew Ethyr up with the pressure under his chin, rubbing a thumb over it before letting go.
He returned to the table and sat casually, a toned, olive-skinned arm resting over a propped up knee.
Ethyr followed numbly and knelt—properly—at the table before risking a subtle glance around.
Varuut and Gallus had followed him off the bench, returning to his side.
They all sat with casual indifference, not appearing to care at all about the etiquette and ‘proper form’ Yorith had taken such pains to drill into him.
They all watched him, but it was without expectation, seeming perfectly enamored with him just sitting there.
There was only one god not captivated by Ethyr’s presence.
He was lounging faced away from the rest of the room, one foot propped up on the seat while the other leg hung casually off the side.
There was something different about him, not only his attitude, but his aura, like he was a completely different creature from the other gods.
His legs and torso were clad in the deepest blue pants and tunic, more like the night sky than a human-made dye could possibly be.
Ethyr couldn’t see his face, but his hands were pale and his long, braided hair an impossible pitch-black.
Ethyr didn’t have to guess to know who he was.
Kiaro, god of trickery and deception. He was fiddling with an object similar to a lump of coal, except it was made of a mass of what looked like roots all tangled together.
Varuut pressed into Ethyr, squeezing his thigh and pulling his attention back. Her nose nuzzled into the soft spot under his ear.
“Here.”
He looked down at the little square treat she was holding up.
It was pliable in her fingers, dusted with a white powder.
She raised it to Ethyr’s lips and he opened them without thought, letting her feed it to him.
It was as soft as it looked, and intensely sweet even compared to the unending sweet dishes he’d had access to over the past days.
Varuut’s attention drifted up, her breath warm against Ethyr’s cheek. Behind him, Gallus draped his arms over his shoulders in a loose hug, pressing his face into the side that wasn’t taken up by Varuut.
“Let me feed him,” Gallus implored.
“Feed him this.” Ithna tossed a peach across the table. Ainder caught it and handed it to Gallus, who brought it eagerly to Ethyr’s mouth, hanging off his shoulder to see more clearly.
Ethyr obediently took a bite. Juice burst into his mouth and dribbled down his chin. He raised an arm to wipe it away, but Varuut pounced on the opportunity, sucking his chin clean before continuing to Ethyr’s lips, kissing him deeply despite the peach still in his mouth.
Ainder pushed her off. “Will you hold it together?” he demanded, exasperated.
“I can’t help it,” Varuut sighed, eyes trailing over Ethyr’s face as she brushed a thumb across his lips, wiping away the saliva she’d left there. Ethyr stared back, slowly swallowing his bite of peach. “Look at him. He’s made for temptation.”
“Here.” Ainder held out a damp cloth that he’d seemed to pull from nowhere. Ethyr dared a glance up at him, confused, before gingerly taking it. “Wash that nonsense off your face,” Ainder instructed. “Gallus, you can stop hanging off him.”
Gallus stuck his tongue out at the other god, but slid his arms off Ethyr’s shoulders and dropped to an elbow to watch him from the ground instead, head resting on his palm.
His face paint. He’d forgotten about it. He obediently scrubbed his face, watching the colors come off in streaks on the white cloth. After a minute, Ainder took the cloth from him and leaned closer to finish the job, his face so close Ethyr could feel his warm breath.
“You’re above such mortal enhancements,” Ainder told him softly. “You look more like yourself without it anyway.”
Ethyr didn’t dare respond, but he had to wonder if all the fuss had been for nothing, if the gods weren’t into the frivolity that Gionan had insisted upon.
Ainder set the cloth aside and leaned closer, grazing his knuckles along Ethyr’s jawline.
He tucked a lock of hair behind Ethyr’s ear, then combed his fingers so tenderly through it that the touch tingled across Ethyr’s scalp and down his spine.
Ainder closed the space between their mouths, but not fully—just enough for Ethyr to feel his soft breath against his lips before it trailed along his jaw, into his ear, down his neck.
Ethyr shivered. The hand in his hair slid to the back of his neck and lips finally made contact with his skin, kissing the exposed jut of his collarbone.
Tender kisses trailed back up the path the god’s breath had left, the gentle pressure of his mouth lingering on each spot even after he’d moved on.
He made it back to Ethyr’s mouth, and Ainder’s lips yielded so sweetly against his that he could not help but kiss him back. Ethyr opened his without thought and Ainder let his tongue into his mouth, meeting it with his own.
Ainder pulled away and reality smacked Ethyr in the face. He was in a room of gods. He was kissing a god.
“See?” Ainder spoke to the others, but turned a smile to Ethyr. “Much better.”
“That doesn’t count,” Varuut said, annoyed. “You enhanced.”
“Barely,” Ainder countered.
Varuut pushed herself onto Ethyr’s lap, straddling him.
“I won’t enhance his feelings at all,” she bragged.
She pulled Ethyr’s face up with both hands, kissing him hard.
Then she let go to slide the fabric off her shoulders, letting it crumple around her waist. Ethyr stared in astonishment at the plump, perky breasts it revealed.
Varuut rubbed down Ethyr’s arm to his hand, lifting it to her chest and helping him fondle one of her breasts. She brushed a hand under his jaw, then gripped his face and guided it towards the other. He recoiled on reflex.
“Oh,” Varuut said. Ethyr’s gaze darted up to her, terror strangling his breath.
If anything was an insult, surely it would be that.
He hadn’t meant to. But she only hummed in thought.
When he looked back down, ready to obey this time, the breasts were gone and replaced with the lithe chest of a man.
He stared, lips parted. He knew the gods could transform into any shape or gender they pleased, but it was startling to see it happen right in front of him.
“Is that better?” Varuut asked. She stroked hands up Ethyr’s chest, over his shoulders, and wrapped her arms around his neck. “You prefer men?” She laughed, the sound floating and graceful. “I should have known. But it’s been so long since we’ve had a king with preferences.”
“Varuut, stop taking him all for yourself,” one of the gods at the table complained.
Varuut smiled down at Ethyr like a wolf at a lamb.
She slid off his lap and stood. “I’ll share, then.
” She gripped the gold collar around Ethyr’s neck and he scrambled to stand as she pulled him up with it.
She led Ethyr over to the cushioned seat and pushed him onto it before sitting pressed to his side.
Ethyr’s chest could have been bruised from the hammering of his heart against it.
Ainder wandered over to sit on Ethyr’s other side, Gallus following like an eager puppy and sitting by their legs.
Varuut looked expectantly at the god who had raised the complaint. “Catocus?”
The god of war was always described as muscular and tall, but he didn’t look much different from the rest of the gods, save he wore a normal tunic and not the flowy fabric most of the others did.
He was nearly identical to his tapestry depiction, so, other than his depictions’ exaggeration of muscle, he looked like Ethyr had guessed, with straight brown hair and pale skin.
Catocus shrugged and pushed himself up from the table, sauntering over to fall onto the bench at Ainder’s other side. “Let’s see how long he can last.”
“Go easy on him,” Gnaeus implored.
“I will,” Varuut assured. She kissed Ethyr tenderly, running a hand down his chest. Every thump of his heart felt like it’d break through his ribs. He didn’t dare move a muscle, not even to kiss her back. Having four gods squeezing in on him made it difficult to even breathe.