I forgot how absolutely sublime it is to move and stay still at the same time. It’s amazing, a true monument to people’s ingenuity to the grand pursuit of idleness. To be sitting down, immobile, completely still, and nevertheless be traveling is an absolute marvel. Whatever genius came up with that outlandish concept deserved to live the rest of their life being carted around for that simple thought.
But alas, that magical time is now over, and I am standing still and staying still, the sensations matching together as I stand outside the cart with the other denizens as it shifts and writhes. Shadow things with no real form, small really, not even coming up to my knee. One of them seems to have taken a shine to my shield, perched atop it and calmy leaning against my head. Doesn’t weigh a thing either. It can stay there until I decide it can’t anymore.
Some forgotten town that may not have a name, loggers mostly, from the look of the people come to gawk. Bearded broad men carrying their work in their shoulders, their eyes. Yet I can’t help but notice the lightness in their steps. Heard rumors that log drivers are good dancers, and from what I can tell, that might be true. Still, they eye me like I might be something to take. I don’t mind, not really. So long as they stay over there like good little boys and don’t bother the work. They’re going to be paying so they better not trash the place beforehand. I can’t clean the perfume and the floral cloy from my noise.
The mistress is nowhere to be found, closeted away in her home. The noises don’t paint a good picture. Saws and nails and all sorts of the wrong type of banging. Amaru doesn’t seem to mind, so I don’t either. I do mind the gathering crowd though. It is my job to make sure that they stand over there and don’t come any closer. So far, everything seems calm and collected and over there. The shadow thing shifts and moves to my head, sitting like a toddler. I sigh and let it happen. Its fine. Still doesn’t weigh any more than an idle thought.
“Does he have a name,” some smart ass in the crowd ventures. I glare in the general direction of the voice. There are no further remarks from the gathered men. Mostly men. Some women poke through, attached at the hip of something a little more rugged than they pretend to be. I don’t bother to pick out faces. The voice had a horn attached to it and it came from behind me.
“No seriously,” says Annette, “I think he should.”
She sidles next to me, strolling once more like nothing in the world could be better. She’s in a new dress now, the last one left in a crumpled heap somewhere forgotten. Low cut, and she hums with my blatant ogling, puffing out her chest in some vain attempt to get me to look more, when I’m already diving headfirst into her cleavage.
“So then, what do you think we should name him?” I say.
She stretches and thinks to herself, strutting and posing and showing off the dress and the way it hugs her figure. It dances against her skin, giving the impression of her hips but never staying with it for too long. Shame, such a shame that she is not naked and kneeling and panting before me.
“Eddy,” she says, “I say he should be Eddy.”
“Any reason?”
“None whatsoever. He just kind of looks like an Eddy.”
I shrug. Eddy doesn’t seem to mind being christened at least. He stays on my head as the crowd shifts and waits for something amazing to happen, in contemplative silence. The carriage continues to rock and knock and shake and rattle and roll as whatever preparations continue.
“Are you going tonight?” Annette asks.
“Wasn’t planning on it. Not exactly interested in watching.”
“Oh, come on. It’ll be fun. It’s nice to watch. I’ve watched you before and I have to say that was beautiful. At least come for me. I’m leading the band. Never worked with full instrumentation before. Once worked as a duet with a guy who had a flute. Don’t work with people who play the flute by the way. It makes them… off.”
She looks at me again and presses her breasts onto my arm. They make a wonderful argument. They make a very concise and logical point that I will get to touch them afterwards and maybe kiss them if I behave. Although I am pretty sure that would happen regardless. Then again, I’ll get to see more of the dress and the low cut and the hips and the legs. And I would have a very close seat to the stage, and thus the orchestra.
“Alright.”
Annette beams at me and her teeth gleam in the sunlight. Eddy shifts and makes an odd noise. Squeak, maybe, or a purr. Not quite sure how to classify it, but he settles back to stillness and I am left to my duty.
The crowd keeps watch. The carriage shudders and dies and finally settles into stillness. The horses are seen too, and I have left to do is wait for the doors to open. The little shadow things do most of the work for the venue, laying the lanterns and the tables outside as more and more of it spills outside. By the time the sun decides that it would be a good time to start slacking off, the lanterns are lit, and the tables are set, and all is right with the world. The invisible wave wafts through the air and the thoughts start once more. I miss Annette and her skin and her body and it being naked and serving me. But it is not to be. I would prefer it, but it can wait. She’s just playing music and by the time morning comes round, she’ll have a full night in there, breathing the fumes and that would certainly do a number on anything that so much as knows what a desire is. I shrug and roll my shoulders as the shadow thing on my head pokes me and points to go away. It is his time to work, and I am in the way. Far be it from me to keep a man from his work. I look away for a moment and when I look back, there is a small booth before the entrance. There Eddy sits, watching the crowd with placid attention before the gates open.
—
The inside has transformed completely. A cabin manor made theater, plush with curtains and red and overflowing floral vases. That same scent of the tea drifts through the air with utter abandon. I shudder and step forward. Not good. Not good, but great and a wonderfully bitter tingle in my skin with each step. More shadow things dart and dance, more alive than they’ve ever been in the sunlight. Dark things enjoy dark spaces. One sneaks in front of me and stops my steps. I am tired of small things telling me where to go, but not so tired as to stop obeying.
It leads be past the grand entrance way, through a door that almost does not look like a door. I think this one is a she. And then it becomes as such. Still without a name. Still without a personality other than bland obedience to a master that is not me. The halls are tight, tighter that I find comfort in. Squeezing, crushing, suffocating me in that same cloying perfume that tries and fails to invoke a soft meadow to lay one’s head down in. It smells to made, too manufactured, and measured to be comforting and safe. She leads me to another door that is almost not a door, more of a bit of wall that decides to swing open every so often, and knocks. Surprising strength coming from something so small and weightless.
“It’s open,” Amaru says. I bristle and want to leave, but that would be impolite. He had sought me out and the little shadow thing politely creaks the hinges hidden in the wall and steps aside before letting me in.
A small parlor greets meet, a massive mirror showing my face to me for the first time in a good long while. I almost laugh. I do not remember my face being that sullen, that fierce, that sharp and glowering. But it is there, and blue eyes look back into me and recognize it as me before moving on to my host. He sits at a small table, applying some soft powder to his skin, makeup and paint scattered at reach. Dark black lines circle his eyes, sharpening his gaze into dagger points and I freeze. He is still shirtless and the ink on his skin swirls and dances. I notice the looping lines above his crotch, marking him and staining him and snatching my attention. The fierce predator smiles and the ears drop, and he stands.
He’s taller than me. Not surprising giving his natures, but it’s not often I have to look up to someone. Even the bastard is shorter than me, although I think the ears tip it in his favor. I definitely look down on him, though. It’s the smile, the lips, that does me in, and the odd color he plants on them. Pure snow white, clear and undriven, almost blinding. And the teeth, the wonderful bright shiny teeth that I can’t look away from. I need to know how they do that, if only to satiate my curiosity. There has to be a good method that I am not aware of, something that works better than my routine.
“Hey,” he says and shuffles in his seat like a nervous kid sent to his mother.
“Hi.” He gets a response. I know him well enough for that.
“What do you think,” he says as he gestures to his face.
“Good work.”
“Thank you. I can never quite tell if I do a good job with it. Dantea always says its fine, but y’know, she’s probably just saying that. Are you just saying that?”
“No, I’m not. Never took you for something this theatrical.”
He sighs and shifts back. I get to see the muscles on his shoulders ripple and flex in the mirror. I should keep him here and never let him leave. Lock the door and turn down the lights and ride him till our bones turn to powder. I do not shift my thighs together to alleviate some rather uncomfortable sensations. That would give it all away. I set my face to stone and think of nothing at all. Certainly not the tightness in his leggings that outline a wonderful shape that snakes down to his knee.
“I like and I don’t. Sure, putting on a show is nice, but it’s the same thing, every single time. At least when I was with the Midnight Carnival, I got to be different types of clowns. I liked being the sad ones, if you believe it. But here, I get up on stage. Dantea gets up on stage. She gets up on me and then it’s over. People like it. Or at least pay to see it. But it’s gotten stale. You never did the walkabout, did you?”
“I think I’m still on it, by some definition.”
“Fair. I miss that. I miss that so much. And I like the traveling part of this. When we left the Thistles, there was the hot spring in the foothills with this wonderful willow hanging over it. And I’ll never forget this. The steam from the springs froze on the branches and just made the tree sparkle and shine. I said we should stop and rest there for a bit, but she said no.”
“Shame.”
“Yeah. Heard from Annette you guys went swimming a few days ago in the river. From what I’ve heard from here, they’re starting a log drive in the morning. Last chance for something fun. Should be a good turnout.”
“I’ve been outside. A lot of people were there. One of those shadow things seemed to take a liking to me.”
He chuckles a little and the world quakes beneath him with the motion. I watch the lines of dark ink on his skin dance and shift with the muscles and once again, all the various ways I know to take a man to his knees flash through my mind. He might get a bruise or two, but it would be worth it. He would like it too, probably.
“One of the best parts of the job, honestly. No clue what they are. Dantea tried to explain it to me once, but I’m not the best study of that sort of thing. Something about animated light and summoning will for it. I’m not sure. I’m really not sure. But they’re friendly enough.”
That momentary elation for the simple joy of camaraderie fades and once more I am left with the deflated paint of a man who does not want to perform.
“Do you want to go out there?” I ask. I know the answer. I don’t know if he does. Or at least well enough to say it.
“No.” And my doubt was not worth the thoughts.
“No, I don’t Claire. I really, really don’t. But that’s the job. And there are parts I like. I’ll be fine. Not the first time I’ve had a hard time getting up and at them.”
“I don’t know if you need to hear this, but you don’t have to go out there. You can refuse to do this. Probably a bad idea to get on the bad side of the succubus, but you don’t have to go out there.”
He chuckles again and its soft, so incredibly soft and jumping. Bird song and brook babble and the rustle of wind and leaves on a summer afternoon.
“I know. You sound just like him, you know that? Told me the same thing, or made me feel it. One last time, though. Bad form to leave a job unfinished. So, she gets one more time. And then we talk, and she gets to make a case that I should stay. I don’t think she’ll convince me this time.”
—
The chair is comfortable, I will give the decorator that. And while it is appreciated, it certainly isn’t welcome. It’s just too far from the lip of the orchestra pit to put my feet up. But it is wider than some of the chairs I’ve had the pleasure of using. It’s not the best chair, but one of the better ones. And I get a wonderful view of the curtain as it hands from the rafters, another massive tribute to red and crimson and alizarin.
The crowd filters in, carrying the hushed excitement they paid for. A name they know came to town for an exciting show. Of course, they had to see it. None of them sit next to me though, keeping the kindness of a one seat gap intact.
Surprisingly calm considering the clientele. Expected more rambunctious antics, maybe a brawl, especially with this overwhelming red. But everyone seems calm and collected. Some bad jokes, sure, and some laughs that come out a little too barking and sharp to be considered polite, but nothing extreme. I feel the eager anticipation being shoved in me from the wave, and I wouldn’t put it past the mistress to do something similar to calm the nerves and keep everyone sedated. Or at least civil. A shadow thing that I decide is a boy, and thus it is, comes trapsing by with a tray held over his head. Blackberries, dusted in fine powdered sugar. I take one and it does not seem to mind that I do not pay. And they are good. Very good. I appreciate them, but the little shadow thing comes and goes before I can show my thanks.
“Can I have one?” Annette asks. She just pops her head up above the barrier, still in that same low-cut dress, leaving over and letting it all spill and cascade. I can feel the eyes behind me look to her. I move and shift to block most of them. That is for me and me alone. At least, as long as they do not move forward, I will allow the wayward glance to slip through the barrier. I hold up my hand and like an obedient baby bird she opens her mouth. I toss it in clean and easy.
“Oh damn. Those are good. Little shadow things know they’re way around berries.” She snickers and her chest jumps and bounces again, and I once more feel the eyes turn and stare and gawk. The claw in my gut rakes and tears at the muscle. She beckons me and only me and I am the only one that stands. She beams and lets me look over into the pit.
Dozens of the shadow things sit in rapt attention, more eyes on Annette. But they do not leer and gawk. They just sit quietly. Each and every one has an instrument on their lap. Each and every one is polished and shined and tuned. Annette holds up her hands and, as one, they all raise with her. She holds for a long, long, long moment, hands aloft and wavering, trembling with raw anticipation. At her command, they all play a single, long note, clear as ice crystal on still pond, in perfect harmony, light and joy and show condensed into a single sound drawn and teased like a spider web. With another wave they stop and set the instruments down.
“May,” she says as she points to a trumpet two rows back, “Still a little out of tune, sweetie. Try taking it in half an inch.” The relevant shadow thing fiddles and fumbles with the metal. Annette turns to me, and I can’t help but huff out a laugh.
“I thought they sounded fine,” I say.
“They’re amazing. You head the rehearsal’s, right? I’m so excited. I don’t even know what some of the instruments in the back are called.”
“They look like drums.”
“Yeah, but they have specific names. Like swords. Or axes or something. And one of them has to be hit with a rake or something. Giovanna, let her hear the drum thing. ”
Another shadow creature produces a fan and scratches it against the drumhead. It sounds like someone scraping a rake across a drumhead. Not unpleasant, and I bet there are several compositional arrangements that can make very good use of the noise. Annette is happy with the new toy, so I am happy to. From the back, yet one more shadow thing holds up an open with ten fingers. A second later, one of them goes down. She shoves me away and back to my seat and I am left to gawk as the lights slowly snuff out, one after the other and plunge the audience into absolute darkness.
The music starts up and the colors bleed from the gaps in my thoughts. Red. All so red. Pink and vermilion and crimson and blood and madder and coral and salmon and cardinal and carmine. So, red. My skin is red. The curtain is red. The sound wriggling through my ears is red and rust and rose and I try to think of blue, of green, of yellow, but they are all red. Red. So very red. The heartbeat in my chest might be red, but I am not sure. Something tugs at my hands and decides that I need to look inside myself to confirm. My eyes roll and soften, and I slump in the seat as the curtain rises.
The stage is empty, and the world is blue now. Calm blue that cools the veins, cools the mind, slides through the canals of thoughts with rippling circles, chasing away the nasty, nasty red. It is blue. I am blue and the stage is blue and the air I breath gives me more blue to consume in my chest. I don’t like being blue. Being red was more interesting. I am somewhat concerned about what yellow could do to me, but before that idea crystalizes into a train of thought, it goes away. I was not thinking blue, so that couldn’t be, and the blue decided that for me. It was the right decision. I should think blue and nothing else. Blue is not my favorite color. Red isn’t either for that matter.
My distaste for blue lets me see the wave and wobble of the conductor’s horn peaking over the lip and I remember that green. That is a good color, one of my recent favorites, although it has to do mostly with its association to a wonderful wriggling muscle that does wonders when I open my legs for it. I should open them now. And the green might come and take me. The stage shimmers and shifts and it is no longer a single color. Multitude rainbows shatter and break against one another as a figure of red takes the stage, gliding through the bombardment, dodging every shard without moving from their path. The red comes to the center and bows. The audience loses what little of their minds remained.
The movement takes my mind and slides it over into the forgotten place where dreams go to die. I do not need them. The red quivers and quakes and that is all I need. The red dances and shifts and moves, it moves like oil on water and mixed sandstorm gales with blizzard hail. Creation and unmaking with endless shake and union and I cannot look away. There is music, but it is color and shape and form and formless nonsense that pierces everything imaginable.
The red is joined by a blue, a calming blue that moves, but not quite in the same way. Slower, calmer, gentler, each step a tectonic shift through the wooden planks. I can feel the rumble travel through my hips and settle in the base of my neck before bouncing off of me like a cave echo. Calm. I am calm. The red is no more because of the blue waves that come from the form. It dwarfs the red, crushing it and bringing it to heel. The audience claps and cheers, respectfully so, as the colors start to mix and blend.
The music softens for a bit and I can see again. No more vivid swirls of everything magical and wonderous poured through my pupils. It’s still there, at the edges, at the fringe, but it doesn’t threaten to take more than that at the moment. I can still see the horn bobbing and I take a deep, deep breath. It smells like that tea again. My stomach turns and I gaze towards the ceiling. Intricate carvings of nude figures dancing and cavorting in what might be a field or a forest. The shadows are too deep and reaching for me to actually tell, but I believe it is tastefully done. It should be at least. Everything in this place bleeds the impression that the owner has good taste.
My eyes drift downward again to a waltz. Dantea and Amaru, hands clasped, dance to Annette’s spinning of creation through the noise. Graceful, light, intimate twirls, and dips. I watch him and him alone, the fine control he expresses, the shift of the muscle and the bone beneath the skin, letting the whole-body bend and shift. I think of more positions he could be in. Mostly on his back. Sometimes on his knees. Sometimes standing and picking me up with my ankles on his shoulders and my thighs pressed to his stomach. He dips her low, so low, almost letting the top of her skull dash against the floor. Dantea smiles right at me and I can’t help but notice how sharp her teeth are. Normal as far as I know, but still, the pulse jumps and the hands go to the hammer that is no longer there. No weapons were allowed in the theater. House rule. Everyone had to follow it. I regret my obedience.
She comes back up and bows, like a swan of crimson velvet. She turns and steps and there is Amaru, beaming and bright, finally deciding that it is appropriate for him to put on a shirt. Terrible shame. Incredible shame. I think I am glaring at him because the smile falters for a moment before it settles back into docile compliance at the faceless crowd hidden in shadow. The music starts again, and I can’t seem to recall thinking anything in particular.
—
Intermission rolls around and I am covered in a cold sweat. There was black, endless infinite black in the music and nothing else. No other color. It only lasted a moment, but it was there. Void and gaps and nothing at all. I breathe. It’s the only thing I can do. The floral scent of the tea fills the air. There has to be a fresh pot of it underneath my seat. It’s the only explanation I can think of. The mind has the tea, and the soul has the black that fades and drops and will be gone in a moment or two. But its fine. It’s here now, but the memory will fade, and I will be calm again. Annette pokes her head over the lip again, beaming, and stifling child giggles that burble through her lips.
“What the hell was that,” I ask and the face freezes in stone.
“What was what?” she says, “Listen, if it was about the glissando two movements ago, that was all Jules’ fault. I told him not to go for it, but that’s trombones for you.”
“No. That was alright. Good choice on his part. Give him a raise. No. When you stopped, when the music stopped, it was like everything went black.” Annette shrugged.
“Don’t know what to tell you. Instructions were to keep everything red and blue. I’ve taken quite a few liberties with that, but the black noise wouldn’t work here. You alright? I can send one of the boys to grab something for you. Wine? Beer? I think they have water.”
I shake my head and keep my mind slow. She shrugs and sinks back behind the barrier between us. I don’t hear the crowd shift and move. They should be though. An hour or so sitting always tends to gum up the works and it would be a good idea to stretch. Not for me though. I just sit in my little chair, staring at the curtain of red velvet that falls like shooting stars. Dancing, they were just dancing together, a wonderful swirl of color mixing with another that swirls back again. I don’t know if they mix. At least not yet.
Tired. I am tired. I don’t know what time it is. I don’t know where the sun is, or where the moon is in its place. It’s not early, I think, but the degree of lateness is something beyond my reasoning. I don’t even know how long this had been going on. At least an hour. It always would be about an hour or so. Shows tended to break at about then from what I know. So that means there is another hour or so left. Maybe. Unless there is another break and another bit and another break and another bit, the show would go on and on and on some more until I meld into the seat and refuse turn to dust. Or I could just walk out of here whenever my legs get tired. A little shadow thing walks in front of me and offers me a glass frosted over. I turn it away and the thin shrugs and still sets the glass at my feet. Cold tea, it seems. Insanity. Absolute insanity.
The lights dim again, and the curtain rises. The music swells and I see no reason to stop the colors shifting and bleeding into my mind. No black, though. Just red and blue, tinges of orange and green shifting between them. Beautiful, simply beautiful, the dance and twirl. The glass finds its way to my hand and someone takes a sip. It is me. It has to be me. The cold weeps down my throat and settles in my gut. It’s refreshing really, the floral spreading its roots and blooming in my core. The colors sharpen and shine and sing down to twin forms once more, blue square and lethargic, red writhing and lithe. The glass is empty, and I am full of cold ice burning down to my heels.
The colors meet, never mixing, center stage. There are blanks in the color now. Boxes and hills that they dance around. Slow dancing really, not quite the deliberate march of the first act. Not quite the stately stride of a waltz. Together, they are so close together.
The black comes again, sharper this time. A dot really, a speck of dust on a mote of grit, centered between them. Small thing really, but it swallows me. I keep staring into it. I keep looking into the middle of the black dot, the middle of the small bit that doesn’t move with the colors. I control it. It moves with me. Wherever I look, it is there, right in the center. It cuts through the colors and the shades and the tone, letting the gap of color linger and swell before the red or the blue mixes back in to fill the gap. Still no purple though, no violet or indigo. Still a sharp line between them that the black enforces. I want another drink and there is one before me, in my hand now, glass empty. I can’t sate the throat and the drink only pours more and more cold within me. A shard of ice, the size of my fist, coils, and pierces over the rising knot.
I close my eyes and let the black grow to be all that I can see. It’s nice, not seeing any colors for a little while. It stops being a hallucination and becomes music again. Kind of heavy on the horn for my taste, but it makes sense given the conductor. A little more drum maybe, or a good old piano. I think the entire thing could be done away with and replaced with a nice long piano piece, but that’s my preference.
Through the music though, through the shut of senses, I hear something else, something like drums and hand claps shoved together. I am amazed that it takes me so long to realize what it is. It was the music’s fault. If that wasn’t there, then I would have realized it in an instant. Sex. Skin on skin pressed together, the sound of Amaru shifting inside of Dantea as she sings the song of carnality and warmth and delicious intimacy for the world to see.
The black claw razes my core. So that’s what all that was. My mind breaks and the little part of me that is still somewhat rational sits in placid confusion. This was in me. The black claw that bleeds and shears and finds everything soft and delicate. That was in me. That little bit sits back down and sits in calm wonder. There is nothing more it can do. Its weak and small and it doesn’t really want to get in the way. That would be impolite and that little bit of not black would hate to be impolite. I take a deep, deep breath and I can smell the bitter tang of smoke break through the flowers. I breathe it out and I swear I can feel the sparks still dancing on my tongue.
The black makes me stand, the music of red and blue subsumed by the void in my skull that says to stand in front. The crowd does not respond. There is still the meeting of red and blue to observe, the swirl to lose themselves in. A black dot barely even registers. I am not important to the grand show. I am not something to be paid any mind. The black in my core reaches up to my neck and wrenches it to the side, cracking the bone and it feels good. The same to my knuckles, blending into the drumbeats and the rakes and I step forward into the color.
The dance is still there, the motion of bodies contorting and twisting. But it is closer now, so incredibly close, there almost isn’t a line between them. A section is blue and then it turns red. Simple as that. No line, no gap, just one then the other. I step forward and up onto the lip between me and the stage. I gaze down into the mouth of the pit and see the little speck of green waving happily, lost in its own reverie of noise. The things making the music are not black. They look that way, but they are not full. Just gaps, just voids in the world. The black in me is something, is a nasty thing that spits venom and flame and scours the world and roars as I step over all of them.
The music stops and I do not want it to. It should continue. It should be loud and thumping and dedicated to working its way into my body and the fact that it stopped means it can no longer do any of that. That has to change. That must change, because I refuse to allow the world to be something I do not want it to be. I turn to the little speck of green.
“Play,” says the black spilling through my lips. The green nods and takes up her hands. Her chest shifts and bounces in the low-cut dress that should be ripped off and pooling on the floor. Later. She will be that way later. Despite the black hunger, I cannot have everything at the same moment. I can certainly have everything though. It all just has to wait in line.
The music loses every single bit of sophistication it has. Drum beat and drone and slow, so incredibly slow, bubbling noise that bounces through the floor and shakes the curtain above. The crowd still says nothing. No claps, no cheers, no boos, no murmur of general confusion. I have broken that invisible wall that separates the parties so easily and that should not happen. I step forward and that same wall bends and shatters and breaks.
I can see everything. The press of her body against his, the slight distension of her stomach by him. That, that simple swell in her belly, that turns the step to a stomp. She is lost in the sensation though and does not acknowledge the avalanche coming down on her.
My fist hits her right in the back of her head. The snap echoes through the high ceiling of the theater, those same carvings that held sharp shadows so dearly hang on to sound just as well. Replaying and replaying and replaying, that same sharp smack of my bones into her. To her credit, Dantea keeps most of her body still. The skull, though, that falls to her chest. She does not scream, or even move to cover her head in any meaningful way. A long, long, long moment passes between us as the color fades and once more, I see the simple stage of wooden planks stretch into the darkness of the audience beyond.
She turns and looks at me, red eyes dancing and burning and laughing at me, at my simple transgression against the theater. Dantea remains silent, however. I look down to their joining. He is only halfway inside of her. I hit her again.
And she laughs. She laughs high and sweet and sharp like kitchen knives against whetstone, and they needle under my skin. The black reigns strong within me, weathering the laughter as she slowly rises and sinks down again until that bulge appears just below her navel. That little rational bit in my mind sighs. Shame. All such a shame.
I grab her throat and crush and lift and squeeze, pulling her off as fast as I can. And he is free and gloriously towering up to the sky, still slick and wet. She lands on the cold boards and rolls away, stopping once she is on her back and staring at the ceiling. And she is still laughing, still singing glass shards that needle into my muscles. She rises. The pieces of her body slot back together and form something shorter than me yet looming over. The black is not scared. I hear Amaru shuffle and shift and try to scramble to his feet. The show has gone off the rails and the best thing for him to do would be to leave. I glance over my shoulder.
“Stay.” And he does. My voice echoes through the music again, echoes through the long shadows and shakes the pane of reality. I still smell smoke and fire and embers slowly cooling under the night sky. Dantea bends and shifts and waivers now that the music is for me and me alone. Heavy thumping drumbeat in time with my step. She does not move away, just teetering and laughing at my approach. I hit her in the stomach and the laughter sputters and dies, buried into a cough that wracks her body. The hand finds her hair and lifts her to my eyes. They still smolder and burn through the smile and the cough.
“That is mine now,” I say. My voice is even, calmer than it should be. A simple statement of fact for the world to acknowledge. And if it doesn’t, everything burns to the ground.
“Take it then,” Dantea purrs. She laughs again and the world turns topsy turvy. I stagger forward and that is backwards and sideways and upside down. The red shifts and staggers and swirls in the black center void of stars dying and shifting and I want Amaru hard and hot and bucking underneath me. She is in the way of that union.
The worst part, the absolute worst part out of all of this, was the pathetic display she put on. There were flashing lights and graceful music and that only got her halfway. That only got half of that glorious length in her. From the eyes, he was faking so much of it, so much of the joy put on for the people. I step forward and I go forward, just an inch or so. It is still forward.
Something claws at my cheek and I am bleeding. Sharp nails, talons, rake in my eye and I bleed onto the stage, dripping and pouring and the puddle of red crimson blood laughs at me, bubbling and burbling and popping mocking me for feeling pain. I sigh and the cold finally leaves for blackened heat, the wonderful, blackened heat. Bitter. It’s bitter and biting and searing my core as Amaru cowers behind me.
The claws come again from the dancing red with no music. My other cheek sears with bleeding pain and it runs to the corners of my mouth. Blood, copper metallic blood laps into me and I love the taste. The black coils and runs through me, fiddling through my muscles and tensing and shifting and growling together. I like the taste. Sharpens the colors, sharpens the light and the music and the swirl of something dark within me. It makes sense. It all makes sense now.
My mate lies helpless and frozen. A threat drifts through the air, bleeding me and making me tired and sluggish. My other mate waits in the wings, her little hovel surrounded and damp. Simple. All so simple. I have to bleed someone else to get them to leave. I want my hammer, but it is not here. My hands clench and tense and crack. I’ve already devoted myself to the simplest form of brutal subjugation. I see no reason to evolve beyond that.
The streaks of blood on the stage boil and sway and rise together. It shifts to one mass, pooling in front me. I raise my hands. I raise the haunches and I steel the gaze as the black notes pound and scream. The horns, the wonderful horns go low, low enough to shake the room and turn my muscles to slurry. And then it sharpens, and I smile. The music takes the muscle and molds it back to stone and brick and steel and bent iron.
The claws come again, and I do not bleed. The beast in my core purrs and struts and I laugh this time. Deep in my chest, down to my belly and I laugh as the blood does not grow. The red wavers and bends. I step forward and the boards creak in protest. Another claw to my stomach and I do not flinch.
I catch the hand as it rakes across my back. The demon stops laughing. I was getting annoyed. It did not go with the rest of the song. Clashing, atonal, not quite the same tempo. The music had shifted behind me and she refused to let it go. More claws, more talons, more little knives breaking my skin and I bleed some more. The music can only get me so far. But I do not let go. I do not let the prey escape my grasp. My other hand gropes and grasps and goes to her neck. Slender, so slender and graceful and soft and I crush her. All the black, all the notes, all the blood pouring from my skin and I crush the soft skin and delicate bones. So much though, it takes so much. The red swells and finds the muscles and tendons of its own, slowly trying to eke out enough strength to combat me. I take my other hand free and move to her neck too. Same, it does the same.
Dantea struggles, her form flickering and shifting and glamor failing as the form behind it manifests. Horn and fang and tail, red skin, and bulbous pockets shift and bouncing, tumors really. I don’t see the eyes, though. No red gleaming and shining and peeking through the black. But there are teeth. And mouths that snap and bite and try to take more of my flesh. I squeeze tighter and tighter and tighter. My palms meet and something snaps. Dantea laughs one last time, and it goes quiet. The music stops and I slowly stand.
The swirling colors are gone, and I can finally see the stage for what it is. A stage and nothing more. Simple tables and chairs, some other benches and a nice long couch sized to let Amaru lay there and do nothing at all. He is afraid. Absolutely afraid. But he is hard and that is good enough for me. He does nothing. He says nothing. The crowd is silent. Indifferent really, to the demise of the hostess. No cheers, no applause, no boos even. Just nothing. Silence and shadow. I do not care.
I walk to Amaru as he is frozen to the spot.
“You’re mine now,” I whisper to him. He nods and that makes him a good boy. I kiss him and I still taste the floral cloy of the tea on his skin, his tongue. It will wash out. It will fade and be replaced with green grass and clear skies in a matter of time. The black claw beast sneers and chuffs. Adequate for now.
The music starts again, and Annette will get a reward at some point. Good choice, losing most of the instrumentation. Just her lyre and her humming. Just her voice and the strings coming together. I slowly, so slowly, lay myself on top of him. A moment, just a moment to be on him and feel him on me before he is in me. Mine. Simply mine and the knot tightens in my core at the realization.
The dreams are gone, and he is real. The floral meadows and kind shady trees are gone, and we are left on a barren stage, him still bearing the taint of another woman. I will change that.
“I am going to ride you until you break,” I say. Those words echo through the theater, bouncing from the walls and the ceiling, back to us, again and again and again. And each time it registers in his beautiful mind, there is fear. Raw fear that he is now pinned and helpless and trapped. It’s not wrong. And it is the right thing to feel. The right thing to do is not struggle and he does that as well. The clothes come off easily enough and I am naked before him, on him, almost over him. I take his hand and lead it to my chest. His hands are so soft, so smooth and gentle and I push him to go rougher.
He does, slowly, giving me more and more strength in his grip until the fondles become teases become iron vices on my skin. And it feels good. It feels right. I want him to fight back and try and struggle. He will fail and fall and kneel, but I still want him to try. I shift and move his length between our stomachs. Hot, hot, and pulsing and terribly aching against him. I press into him and his wonderful preseed spills from his tip, forming rivers on my body. His hands go to my back and draw me tighter.
I start moving, running against him and his length outlining the path he will take in me, the heat of my stomach, my core against his and he shivers and shakes and rocks his hips with my motions. The music still plays, still sweeps, and soars and shifts into the thoughts. It melts into Amaru, as well. I see the gleam in his eyes, the dark hunger forming in his core, pulsing in his blood stream, turning his breath ragged and hot. Hand to the back of my head and he pulls me down to his lips. Cold, he tastes cold, so wonderfully cold. Ice and snow and fallen evergreens shattering in the blizzard winds. Windswept peaks of barren rocks and thin crystal casing of ice on the tree branches. I pour into his cold and he pours it into me, and I take all of it.
There is no more preparation. There can be no more because that would prolong the act even further. I am ready anyways. The entrance twitches and spasm and my core responds in kind. There is no more procrastination.
But there is savoring. There is relishing in the slow descent, every inch gained a celebration of carnal indulgence more jubilant and raucous than the sham production. And throughout it all, I remark on my own silence. The breathing hitches and stops and hisses sure, but it is calm. It is calm, my claim of the length of vein and throb and pulse. Amaru is not though. Every little ground I gain on him is met with shudders and gasp and delicious groans of mountain avalanches and felling trees. Deep bestial noises that finally draw away from the empty pomp and circumstance of the paint lining his eyes. That can still stay though. I don’t mind that at all, the cutting pale that looks into me as I glare back at him. The blush on the cheeks, that can stay as well.
I hit the halfway mark and settle there for a moment. He is deep within, warmth and wet enveloping him. I embrace the sensation the fullness within, the shots of preseed that still shoot from him and impart the warmth into me. I hum and shift, letting him feel the embrace the folds the ripples and once again he rumbles beneath me. And he shakes, like a scared fawn, and the trembles shift him inside of me and I relish the rattle of his length. I lean down, kissing him once more, letting my taste eke out that worthless demon’s.
“Claire,” he moans. He barely even gets the one syllable out. He shudders and gasps my name and that is the best song I’ve ever heard. Annette has talent, but there is something to be said when I am the one making music. He groans and shudders and moans, such sweet, beautiful noises that echo and bounce and join together with the others.
I slip and inch further down him and I finally let out the noise that has been in my stomach ever since I entered that damned carriage. It takes my whole body into the black knot of howling beast claws. The whole body bends and shifts and breaks over him with the air in my lungs refusing to empty, finding another ounce, another cup, another pint to spill out into wonderful song. No words, no syllables. I have no need for such high concepts with Amaru so deep in my core. But the meaning, the cold rapture of him inside, the moan carries that better than words could. I slip down a little more and he hits spots and triggers and all sorts of wonderful machinations that slide up my spine.
The knot breaks and the noise stops and all I see is pure blinding white before me. Beautiful stark white star, pale milk light of moon, flashes and nova eruptions as he goes deeper and deeper and wider, spreading me and filling me and finally, finally letting the mind go blank and empty. I squeeze and spasm and the knot, the terrible knot that is my basest self, snaps.
A heartbeat, and then another. Then a handful more, each pounding in my ears loud enough to break the drums and make them bleed. I lose count of them as each one is swallowed by the binding white. Each one lost and I do not know if I am breathing. I think I am. My heart is beating, and that generally means I am breathing as well. Not quite linked, those two functions, but if one happens, then the other is usually functional.
The white fades glacially. Music, I hear music through the deafening roar of my summit. Meandering strings and a warbling hum that feels sore and tired as it drifts through my mind. The knot lays in tired strands, finally undone. I lay atop Amaru’s broad chest, listening to his hammer heartbeat and the slow rise and fall of his breath. Calming, meditative, trying to find some mote of peace within him. My senses travel down to my core and alight. He is still hard. He has not finished. And that means he remains unbroken. I made a promise to him. Maybe a threat now that the words come back to me, but still, an idea made manifest through words and I would not be an honorable person if I did not go through with it.
The loose strands in my stomach come back to life. He is still hard and in me and our hips are not joined quite yet. So, I have to keep going. I have to keep going otherwise the knot will shatter me and break me and the only thing that can worm its way through the tight strands is that wonderful length and girth of breeding prowess still so eager and hungry.
I come down from the summit and look into his eyes. Shut tight, scrunched, and sealed and sewn into one another, teeth gritted so hard they might crack. I let go of that last little bit of tension within me and I take all of him.
And I laugh, triumphant. Victorious. Mine, all mine, tip to root claimed and stolen and ripped from him into me. It is mine now and mine alone, to see and use as I wish. The lights slowly dim, and he opens his once more. Wide in fearful awe as I pin him with my body and shut him down to the cushions. I smile something savage and terrible and sharp and the wonderful terror pouts from him and shakes him and his is trembling. I hold him, embrace him and the painted ink on his skin as I raise my hips and savor the lingering gap.
I slam down and the eyes go back to shut and screwed and scared.
The boards creek beneath us as I rise and fall, savoring the full and the empty, shifting hips and parting bone and ripping muscle. A hand to my stomach, I believe it is mine, traces the shape he makes within me, past my navel, breaking the hard lines and divots and asserts its form over mine. I linger until he opens his eyes again, wide eyed, and he stares at what he is doing to me. He gawks and looks in silent awe at the shape he makes, the form I take for him and once more, I lean into his lips. His length twitches and shakes, scraping the back of my core as I move him within me.
“I can’t take anymore,” he whines into the endless still air, “Claire, please.”
“Do you want me to get serious,” I hum. He nods and tenses and another splash of wonderful warmth fills me and sings its grand song of virility. I feel his sack twitch and writhe and bounce against me.
One last time, one last time I raise until only his tip remains. It hurts my soul to only have that embraced. Always the full length, always all of it, always every single inch he can give me, should be inside me. Every single moment of every single day until the sun and the stars fade into darkness, and then even still, I ride him.
My hips raise and fall. My hips shift and lam and bounce on top of him, putting every ounce of my weight, my strength into every motion I take. He tries to buck and thrust. He tries to set the tempo and the apace and every single time I break it with my own motions. The grip and the fingers try so hard to stop me, to stop the end of the world housed in my core.
Something shifts and breaks in the floor and we drop an inch. Nail and screw and iron and splinters and I do not care. I am still on him, subjugating the rhythm. A deep pull in his core and my own click and I howl as he swears and damns me. I unleash violence and end upon him with my hips. The flesh bruises and breaks and shatters and he still fights, still rages against the endless onslaught of my body.
And finally, finally, once the pain reaches into his mind, the fear starts turning to rage. Rage against the demon on him, the failure of the previous mistress that could not quite satisfy him and rage at the world for denying that existence of his with pathetic appeasement. The grip turns from weak oak to iron, digging into my thighs and asserting his own rhythm.
The weak thrusts find new strength, new tempo, new melody within. The moans and mewls start to deepen and sharpen, growls and bestial hisses to match my own. Amaru finally drags himself down into the mud with me, the primal need beyond the theater. We are not civilized people. We are not civilized things and the grand sacrilege of trying to elevate the union beyond the basest for angers me. It is already perfect and whole.
His latent savagery pumps into me, the ink and liens and the paint on his eyes bludgeoning my senses with their blur and the fury of his need hurts. He hurts me so good, finding parts of me to unravel with his length, parts of me to batter and break and bruise and shatter within me and my core. And I break him back, wrenching and twisting and bending and turning over him, fighting him on every claim to his pace. It is a fight, a struggle between us now in the echoing halls of the theater. The sounds of our flesh, our voice collide and bounce and shake the room to the silent audience that sits it rapt awe. No cheers, no boos, silent observation of the basest of natures and they do not interfere. There is no stopping the inevitable and they are wise enough to know that. Anette has stopped playing and that is terrible, Understandable, but terrible. A measured choice that it is time to cease all distractions so that we may focus. Ended up being the wrong one, but I understand the logic behind it. Not worthy of punishment.
To my immeasurable disappointment, his climax is coming. The twitches the spasms the breath all point to that single instant a few moments from now. A not insignificant part of me wants to strike him for his lack of performance, but that terrible little piece of rationality stays my hand. If I hit him, he might be less likely to mate with me in the future. Unless he likes that, but it is not worth the risk at this point.
But it is still welcome, the twitch and the hit and the throb inside of me, our heartbeats synching for the briefest moment. The hands grip even tighter, even more strength eked out from his digits, eked out from the soft hands and desperate need. I can no longer ride as I wish. I am trapped, bone to bone, with him as he shifts and moans and roars his release into me. Shame I don’t have quite the same. The stars dance and flicker between over my eyes and show me wonderful lighting storms in my core. That all-consuming white that would snap me like a twig, though, that is gone again, that brief moment of absolute clarity lost to moment. But it is still rapturous, still shaking my core and flowing my voice from my throat and I lose control. I collapse onto his chest as it rises and falls like the tide.
It doesn’t come in shots and pulses, his release. It is a continuous flow of rapid white water into me. Ebbing and flowing, sure, but always more, always more for me from him. Full, so incredibly full of blistering warmth. Thick and heavy, his seed sits in my stomach, dragging the muscle and flesh down into him. His voice cuts out with rough hoarse growl and he pants like a dog.
The release slows to shots, mighty pulses of his tectonic strength ravaging his core. Amaru’s stomach tenses and flexes. Every ounce of his body goes into the next throb and I milk him dry. His twitch is matched with my pulse. We are the same rhythm, and I will drain him dry. I do not count them. There is no point. He will give me enough and if he doesn’t, we will go again. Long, long pulses of flexing muscle, so numerous and virile, so strong and plentiful, my core drowns in him.
But still, it ends. The river goes sluggish, then stagnant, then dry. And I am still on top of him as his eyes flutter and flicker in the dark spotlight center stage. My hand goes to my stomach. Rounded, just a little, from his release and his shape. The thought and the realization make me shiver.
The worst part is whatever wind he had for that glorious moment has faded. He slumps, defeated and dead to the world. Still, panting, huffing ragged breath to my cheek. I move and his seed moves with me.
“I think you’re done,” I whisper to him. He just nods meekly, and I kiss him on the cheek. I look out to the crowd and do not see anyone. There is just the sound of a solitary applause and the darkness spills forth and takes me in its cold embrace.
“So full,” says a thing with no mouth.
—
Everything feels wonderful. Simply wonderful. A little achy, sure, but the good kind of ache. The ones that fade and burn for a moment when stretched, the ones that speak of a past night well spent. I smell green grass and fresh wood and the gentle suggestion of rain a few hours coming. Plenty of time to seek some shelter and wait it out. Maybe start a small fire and tell stories if need be. And I have a very good mat to sleep on, warm and broad and breathing.
The realization hits me like a stone to the temple, although still not quite enough to actually arouse me. Amaru makes a very, very good mattress and he should be proud of that fact. Being a piece of furniture is hard line of work. I do shift though. My cheek is a little too close to his collar bone and its starting to hurt my jaw. I doze again. Its fine. The conversation we’ll have will come later and the potential consequences are no reason to cut a good morning to sleep in short. He snores a little, softly and I nuzzle further into his chest.
A particular bitch of a woman snickers in the distance. And a particular bitch of a woman will bleed for that.
“Sorry,” Annette fake whispers, “But that was cute. You’re cute, Cottontail. Don’t mind me.”
Amaru does not wake as I pull away from him. My gaze lingers on his chest, trailing down to his stomach. He is still naked and that is simply the best part of the morning. It slowly becomes less enjoyable when I see the massive bruise clawing up his crotch. I look down to my own naked body and see a similar splotch of dark purple and nasty yellow green between my thighs. Annette laughs again and my wonderful bed awakens with a pleading groan.
“The pain means it all happened, right?” he whines. Fair enough, honestly. I imagine at some point it will hit me too and then the world will be terrible again and I will want to crush everything with my hammer.
“Oh absolutely, big guy,” Annette says, “And stay down. Both of you. I amazed you can even speak after all that.”
“Me too,” says the man whose seed still fills my belly rather rapturously. There is no pain, but there is an overwhelming numbness that takes over and sends me falling like a cut tree back into him. He groans again, turns into a cough. I don’t apologize. I can’t. I having some trouble speaking at the moment.
We’re in a desolate clearing, some ruins of some forgotten town with no name. Might never have had one. A ring of stumps slowly encroaches into the forest beyond. Whatever structures were here have fallen and faded and we currently lie in a massive, overturned wagon turned lean-to. A pair of skulls, horse, sit bleached white by the elements some way away.
Annette sits on what was probably a very nice porch at some point, completely nude. Now, its little more than a mossy set of boards and nails with relatively few sharp edges. She strums idly at her lyre. My hammer sits close to her. Good. Very good. That made it out at least. Everything is fine and dandy save for the lingering scent of floral perfume tea.
“Lost the dresses,” she says. Dantea is a terrible demon, and I should kill her again. If I killed her the first time. I should kill her anyway. But that can come later. Amaru is breathing deeply again, and I wish to join in him our dreams once more.