Chapter Fourteen
“A god?” I said in disbelief.
“A god.”
“I fucked a god?”
An eyebrow cocked. “Yes, and quite well, mind you.”
“God of what?”
He snorted and straightened. “Oh, so being a god is not enough? You humans simply must compartmentalize everything.” He boredly paced around me, examining my every flinch and wince. “It is exhausting really. But if you must know, I am an ancient fertility god, and the forest is my domain. I keep everything alive and well, thriving.” He ran his hand up one of the vines holding my knee.
“That’s what you were doing with the deer?”
“Yes.”
“How do I know for sure you didn’t sacrifice it?”
“I am a healer. It is what I do.”
“Healer?” I echoed incredulously.
He crossed his muscular arms with an upward tilt of his chin. “How are you feeling after that tumble? Mmm? Unscathed?”
“Come to think of it, yeah.” I wanted to reach to touch my head, but with my vine shackles, I couldn’t.
Dianus looked at me with amusement. “You gave yourself a concussion running from me. I healed you.”
I eyed my summery surroundings. “How long have I been unconscious?”
He twisted his lips to the side. “Maybe a couple minutes?”
“But it’s summer. I was visiting for Yule.”
With a smirk, he lifted his hand and snapped his fingers. The leaves fell, the air cooled, and the world returned to December. “I thought you would respond better to summer. You know, put you at ease. I see you are not so easily swayed.” He caressed my calf, his touch keeping me warm in the bitter cold. “I like that about you.”
I guessed the fact that he’d healed me was a good start. My mind kept telling me to be scared, but my instinct was to be curious more than anything. Dianus wouldn’t hurt me, surely?
“You’re a f-fertility god?” I stuttered.
He nodded with a hungry look in his eyes. “Like I said, I make sure everything grows. I help acorns turn into oaks. I help seeds take and flourish. That goes for humans as well. For thousands of years, women in my old village would come to me and pour milk on my roots to conceive. Lovers would mate beneath the shade of my branches. Their energy of devotion would feed me, keep me alive.”
“What do you mean? You’re a tree?”
“I am bound to my forever tree.” He pointed behind him to the oak he’d emerged from. It was the largest tree I’d ever seen, its trunk thick, its height towering above everything else. It had an aura of something ancient and magical, for sure. “I cannot leave this forest. There is some radial limit I have to it now that I am weak. People do not worship me anymore.”
“How long have you been here?”
“I was brought here. Then forgotten.” His face dropped, his mouth flat and his eyes blinking quickly. “My devotees snuck saplings on a ship, in blessed cloths they kept secretly sewn into their skirts. They wanted my boon in their new home to ensure its vitality and abundance. They didn’t bother thinking perhaps there were already gods here on this land they had come to steal. They planted me, nonetheless, and I grew again, and their worship fed me. Then things started to change.”
My mind whizzed, connecting the dots. “It became risky, didn’t it? What would they do with a fertility god in a puritanical society? It was probably tricky to worship you and not get caught.”
“You are correct.”
“And then homesteads got less and less common as people realized how hard it was to survive up here. Then the lumber boom fizzled out and took away tons of trade. Even now, less people hang out in the forest. At this point, it’s seen as a vacation. I mean, look at me. That’s why I’m here.”
“You are correct, again.”
Maybe it was the remnants of the concussion, or perhaps just shock, but this conversation was hurting my brain. “How did you even come to be?”
“How would I know? Do you recall being born? Your first memory? You just are .” Dianus squeezed my calf affectionately again, the now-winter sky a milky backdrop to his antlers. “To put it plainly, either I always was here or I am the result of people praying for generations upon generations. Their devotion funneled into an energetic imprint that formed me, made me into a god, made me real.”
“But you’re powerful.”
“To some extent. Now I can appear in the world and I can shapeshift into whatever I see here in the forest, but I cannot change fate, grant wishes, or possess others. I hope that puts your worries at ease. I mean you no harm.”
“But you shapeshift.”
That made sense. He’d looked just like a handsome guy all those times before.
“Yes. I have watched humans drool over tall, dark, and handsome types and stuck with that.”
I knew that was a joke, but I couldn’t laugh. I was too curious. “Shapeshift into me. You can see me. I’m in this forest. Prove it to me.”
He released my leg and took a deep breath. The next thing I knew, a blonde-haired woman was standing before me. Her skin was clear, except the freckling sweeping over her blushing cheeks and button nose. She was in a sage-green linen dress with a medieval flare to it with its boxed neckline and simple silhouette. Her curves were ample, and the tilt to her pouty mouth was pleasant as her hair blew in the breeze.
“Is that seriously how you see me?” I asked in awe.
“Yes.” Her voice came out lower than mine yet still feminine.
I stared at her, trying to comprehend how harshly I saw myself at times. If this was any indicator of how people really saw me, especially a man, then I would never be insecure a day in my life. She was lovely. Beyond just the physical. There was something about the softness of her gaze, the curious tilt of her head.
She gave me one more smile before shifting back to a naked Dianus. This time his antlers were gone, and instead acorns and tiny pinecones formed an earthen crown that nestled in his mane of messy, glossy curls.
“Un-fucking-believable,” I whispered to myself before letting my jaw hang. Indignance bled into my mind. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“What, that I am a god? Would you have believed me?”
“I guess not, but I feel like you were trying to trap me.”
“With what? Your true desires?”
The wind picked up, causing a pendant on a hemp string to tumble between Dianus’s pecs. My mind did a double take as I realized what I was looking at. “Oh my god, is that my IUD?” I spat in horror.
He picked it up and kissed it affectionately before letting it drop back down to nestle in his chest hair. “Yes, lover, it is.”
“You’re wearing my IUD like a fucking trophy?” I shrieked.
His face darkened to something more sensual. “It is proof.”
“Proof? Of what!? That your jizz is so powerful it literally made my IUD expel from my fucking body?”
It stood no chance, did it?
He leaned in closer, his eyes like molten amber swirling, his sweet breath fanning my face and chest. “I want to remind you that your body craves me. My seed. My child. You want to swell with me.” His large hand covered my belly possessively. My body shivered at his words, causing a lazy smile to tilt his lips. “Tell me I am wrong.”
I stared at him, trying to fight my reaction. I wanted him so badly. I yearned for this. The truth was, I knew subconsciously this was too good to be true. No mortal man fucked like that. The stamina, the unbridled joy, and the sensuality he possessed were godlike.
As I recalled all the wild nights we’d spent together, my pussy throbbed with a heavy pulse, the slickness making me restless. I spread my legs slightly for relief, grateful the vines moved with me.
Dianus sniffed the air, the scent of my arousal causing his eyes to flash like a pale harvest moon for a split second. “Mouthwatering.”
“Dianus,” I breathed, but it came out more like a plea than a chiding.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, lowering his hand to cup my pussy.
“No, please don’t stop.” The vines continued to cradle me, the soft grasp around my forearms, shoulders, waist, and legs holding me in place a couple feet above the ground in some forest version of Shibari. I fucking loved the idea of it.
As if reading my mind, the vines around my top half forming a harness tightened, causing my breasts to protrude even more. Dianus brought his attention to one, tracing my areola with the tip of his tongue while he stared me straight in the eyes. My stomach rolled with wild attraction at his boldness.
His hand reached to squeeze my other breast. “Yes,” I hissed, wishing I could touch his handsome face.
“You knew I was not a simple man when you first fucked me,” he muttered before peppering kisses on my sternum. “You even screamed oh my god the first time I made those pretty eyes roll to the back of your head as you came on my cock.”
I shifted around in horny anguish. “It’s just a figure of speech.”
His other hand parted my pussy lips without warning. “You knew. Or else you would not have warded your cabin.” He pulled his mouth up from my chest at the same time his finger trailed wetness from my core up to my clit in slow, light circles. “But I have been welcomed into your home, into your mind, into your heart.” His finger slowly slid inside me. “Into your body.”
I bucked my hips, fucking his finger. “Fuck, that feels good.”
“Clearly, I mean you no harm.” With his middle finger inside me, he worked my clit with the pad of his thumb.
“You tricked me.” I threw my head back, continuing the needy roll of my hips.
“No, you brought in the holly I grew for you from my seed. You collected pinecones and boughs from my forest and put them up on your mantle. You all but decorated for me. You even ate my fruit.”
I shook my head, feeling like a dick-drunk idiot.
“You asked me to keep visiting. To keep you coming on all these cold winter nights alone.”
“Please!” I whined, hoping he’d stop talking and just put me out of my misery. “Stop guilting me and finish what you started.” With my demand, the ivy tightened, pulling my legs wide and slightly bent, with a delicious pressure on my upper half. I wiggled, secretly loving the bite of restraint. “You were the deer, weren’t you? That’s why I never spotted him when we were together, isn’t it?”
He walked to a tree behind me, and before I knew it, he returned, cupping his hand over my mouth. “Open.”
Was he going to poison me for being insolent?
“The deer was you, wasn’t it?” I asked again in defiance.
“Yes, now keep that delectable mouth open for me.”
I slacked my jaw, eyeing his hand. He tilted it, something cognac-colored dripping down. Sweetness exploded on my taste buds. I moaned, rolling my body in the vines.
A low hum rumbled his chest and reverberated all around us as he watched me lick my lips, stealing quick glances at his huge dick. It was definitely a syrup, but it was silky, not sticky, and like nothing I had ever tasted in my life. It was so complex I couldn’t place all the notes of subtle flavors. My tongue ached for another taste, but my pride stopped me from asking.
Dianus ducked and bobbed up between my legs. Tilting his hand once more, he drizzled the magical syrup along my sternum. A breath hitched in my throat when he grasped both breasts and boldly licked up the mess.
“Mmm,” he hummed again, his eyelashes fluttering as he closed his eyes in reverence with another languid lick. “What does it taste like?”
“Sweet,” I panted.
His mouth whispered kisses all over my body, down and across my inner thighs before he teased my center with one upward lick up my slit. “But not as sweet as this.” His hands cradled my ass as he began to feast, the small pinecones of his crown scraping my inner thighs in a tantalizing way.
“Baby!” I cried out, arching my back to shove myself against the ridge of his nose.
He continued, his amber eyes locked with mine as he grasped my thighs with his huge, mannish hands and continued to undo me.
The higher and higher my pleasure built, the more rapidly the vines started to swing me back and forth, helping Dianus tongue my pussy.
“Who is making your pleasured cries echo in this forest?”
I squirmed, my vision turning spotty. “You.”
“Who?”
“You are,” I cried. “Ah, fuck! Fuck me just like that. Please!”
He kept his pace, clutching my ass.
My toes curled and every muscle in my body contracted. “Oh god!” I screamed out.
The world exploded around me in bright whites and shimmering gold. Every nerve ending sizzled with the rush of euphoria as the loudest moan I’d ever let out ripped through my throat, seizing my body.
Pure pleasure seeped from my core, spreading to every inch of me. High, breathy hitches of pleas filled my mouth, mixed with praises and wordless noises as I came down in a blind fog.
I woke up wrapped in a soft buckskin on the bed. The entire cabin was dark with nightfall. Dianus was seated cross-legged on the mound of furs with the fire roaring behind him, his antlers spread wide across the hearth, almost touching the holly he’d created for me on the mantle. He didn’t look terrifying. If anything, he was heartbreakingly handsome. Like a lost faun, forgotten and alone, stuck in a world where he no longer belonged.
His voice came out low and calm. “You have been asleep for a couple hours. I have made sure you have firewood and some soup on the stove. Promise me you will eat a hearty meal? You need to regain your strength after what happened today.”
“Yes.” I stared at him, still trying to wrap my mind around the truth. I wanted to be furious with him. He’d risked so much, had painted the picture of such a beautiful life together, only to smear the paint before it could dry. To give me the greatest pleasure just to inform me we were doomed. I was a mortal, and he was a god. That didn’t usually end well.
“So you were never going to tell me?” I asked.
“I did not foresee there being a reason.” He swallowed hard. “I did not expect to be as fond of you as I am.”
“Why do you stay here on Earth? There must be another realm you can go to as a god. Surely, you’re not just stuck here forever.”
He sat up straighter and made a fist with one of his hands that rested on his knee.
I was onto something.
“I’m right, aren’t I? There’s somewhere else you can go?”
“Shea, you do not understand. My powers are diminished. I can only cross into the Otherworld when the portal is open.”
“When does the portal open?”
He sat in silence.
The twinkling lights on the tree in my periphery lit the logic in my mind. I gasped. “Yule!” I scrambled onto my knees in the bed. “The winter solstice. Equinoxes and solstices are holy days steeped in sacred power. That’s when the portal opens, isn’t it?”
He got to his feet, his antlers melting with the movement. His guise switched seamlessly to that of a modern man in winter clothing. “Even if I go, I cannot stay in the Otherworld. I need energy. I need faith in this forest.”
“I’ll go with you. You can love me on the other side. I don’t like the idea of you just being stuck here. Please, I just want to help you.”
“I do not need your pity. I need your worship!” His voice echoed around the cabin. It wasn’t a yell, more like deep, rolling thunder.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
He watched the fire with a downward turn of his mouth. “I do not want to make you feel as if you have been deceived or that you need to be with me out of fear or confusion.” He picked up a sprig of the holly from the mantle and threw it in the flames before looking at me. “I want you to come to me of your own free will. With love in your heart and devotion on your lips.”
My mouth opened, but no sound came.
He continued somberly, “That is the only way I will have you. In the meantime, I will make myself scarce. And if I never see you again, well, that will just have to be something we both must live with.”
With his heart-wrenching words, he charged out the front door. The chill when he opened it stayed with me, seeping into my bones, down to the marrow.
That night, I journaled and cried for hours, and when I crawled into the cold, empty bed, I buried my face in the pillow he’d used, devastated that his earthy scent had vanished.