Out of Step

The dancing grows more frantic and ecstatic. More spins, more twirls, more pirouettes and leaps, mixing and matching the pieces of the routine I had down. The practice is failing me and now I am just instinct.

And then I'm back in my full-fledged mind as something catches my attention in the shadows. Carina, the blue one has slipped away from the town and is staring in fish-mouthed, wide-eyed awe at the whole preceding. I don't even know if she recognizes me. The movements die down as I let the heat rise again. Some of the audience started to drift. If the movement is not constant, if the next moment is not better than the last, then that contract of growing excitement is broken. But I have a good selection enthralled. I could simply stop and they would still be here. They would pull me from the stage and tear me to shreds, but they would be here. Baikal's front and center.

I build it up again, the scaffold as my muscles stretch and turn. Each second sees me growing lighter and lighter, fluttering on the stage like a breeze. The world turns with me and I am under the gaze of ceaseless desire. It is a crushing weight trying to capture me every second and then I am gone. Just a hair's breadth away, but it can never quite settle me down. A hand comes on stage to snatch and now I am on the other side.

The urge is too strong. My limbs are heavy and tired. It comes as a sudden collapse and I am splayed open under the surgeon knife of the audience. They saw everything I am and fell for the bait. I kneel and crawl, kicking my legs up and showing even more. I work the fans a bit more, and I finish with the fun little toss. I spread and show and everything I have is open for the taking. As I grab the fan, someone grabs me. To my eternal delight, it's Baikal.

I'm over her shoulder and I count the ears I've managed to catch. 16 in total, not counting mine, divide by two, so a total of eight, all for me. Not quite the twenties the rumors carry, and maybe not the largest of the night, but respectable. Carina catches my eye and I give her a little wink. Just to be a bit more of a showman, I toss one of my fans over the crowd all the way to her. It takes two steps for her to catch it, but I think I did pretty well for myself, all things considered.

---

"Feel his legs. They're like iron. His arms, too. What was he doing out there? Hauling trees?"

"Where'd he even get all this? I've never felt anything like it. It's so smooth."

"Shut up, all of you. Just get him undressed. He's going to burst through his small clothes if we wait wany more."

"We're working on it, but it's like unweaving a basket. Must have taken him ages."

"His stomach's flexing. Forget his arms. Feel his stomach. It's so hard."

"Just hold still, sweetie. We'll get you out of all this soon. Then we can really start the fun."

"Stop petting him and actually help us. Baikal, you too. I know you two know each other, but that doesn't get you any special treatment."

Baikal has been devouring my lips for what feels like a fortnight at this point, and as the object of affection, I think she gets all the special treatment she wants. She gets lips and tongue and a nibbling on her lips that I get in return. She strokes my cheek and holds me still. She's the only one I recognize, the only one with a name. There are the other chittering voices moving and me, massaging me, opening me and playing me. They've all collided into a shapeless, warm mass, the heat from a bonfire, a thick blanket in a snowstorm, the oddly pleasant burn of too much work in the hot sun. Every part of me is alight with sensation and Baikal will not stop kissing me.

They are gentle with me, the army of hands and urges. Nothing is pulled or tugged or bent. I am simply one way and then I am another. The silk slowly unfurls as the hive mind figures out the pulse box. There's a knot at my hips that certainly helps. The long ribbons unwind and there are more hands on my legs. I tense the muscles and they coo in response. They have an iron cord to play with. And they play with it well. I want to answer them. All the sweet words have implied questions and I want to give them half answers to string along the mystery. I was off doing something differed, wrestled with alligators, tussled with a whale, bound up lightning and incarcerated thunder. Might have even murdered a roc or two in there. They'd believe none of it, but it would get a good laugh.

My breath catches and hisses as something soft presses into my stomach. It's not Baikal. It's one of the nameless ones that tend to me. I look past her for a moment and see two breasts slide, riding up me as their attached body keeps moving. The ears are starlight blonde fading into a raspberry red at the tips. It takes a moment and I smile. That's another little trick that's made it this far. I like it. Aniso's made it up, as far as I know, and most of them go blue or green, but I've seen red before. And it looks good.

"Baikal," says the new red, "If you don't start sharing him, we'll have to kick you out."

She whines through me, and there's a tense grip on my head to keep me still. But she wants to share. Baikal is not the entirety of the world and neither am I. But Raspberry keeps moving up with a gentle shove and I have someone new close to me.

"You smell different," she whispers, "Good, but different."

I blush red and warm and she moves into my back. There are nibbles and knicks woven into soft kisses. I wish I could move my arms. The silent rules say I should simply lie back and think of nothing at all, but I don't want to do that. I want to push back against the pain, fight only in a token resistance.

My arms are under another body, and it doesn't want to let me go. It takes a bit of working, but the grip loosens and I work through it. For once it tastes the cold bite of the night air for a moment, before it reaches Raspberry's soft hair. She stills for a moment. The dance was broken, but I make it work. The hand coaxes her up to my lips and I taste her again. She's also been drinking, but the tree hollow spirits we make. Also good, also home, also sweet and intoxicating. I think I'm the only one without a bit of that fire in them at this point. I have more than enough. Her hair is soft and silky and she's kept it short. Hard to grip and steer, but she lets it happen, if only for the novelty of the sensation.

She breaks and takes in the bewilderment of the broken pact. I'm already back to Baikal. She tends to get jealous without her fair share of attention. Granted, her idea of fair is all of it. She gets as much as I can give. Raspberry waves across my chest and my hand goes to that for a glorious moment. Then Baikal takes said hand and makes it feel her. She's so wonderfully possessive.

That particular trait means she misses the best part. The crew on my legs finally gets me free. My length breaks its bonds and hits my stomach. I rock my hips and they all get a wonderful sight. Baikal even breaks from my eyes to take in all of me. I watch the wave of surprise and lust and need roll through our clearing. Raspberry works her lips. Baikal just stares it down and enters a standoff with the others.

Kind of dumb thing to be prideful about, in the grand scheme of things. Something completely out of my control, but it's my body. And that can stun a conclave of women into awed silence over everything I am. I flex and bob and that gets them back to doing something.

Baikal takes the initiative. I am hers and this is hers and she takes it all for herself. Her lips are around me, on my stomach, on thighs, on my sack. She fends them off with fang and claw. The growing congregation grows frustrated, but she keeps on me.

I am free though, to bask in the freedom newly afforded to me. I find Raspberry in the crowd and gesture her close. I have ideas and with everyone so focused on another part of me, I can act on them. She likes duplicity and I like that she likes duplicity. She shuffles over, and I watch her legs move and tense and she has wonderfully powerful thighs. She could probably fell trees with a step and I can't wait to feel it.

"What's your name?" I ask. My voice hitches and catches as Baikal starts with her tongue. Someone else comes in with lips and hands and I am starting to lose what little rationality was left. Raspberry smirks and cocks her head. It's an odd question. Not an unpleasant one, but certainly rare.

"Ladoga," she says.

"Now, Ladoga," I say, "Get on my face. I want to show you something."

My eyes glance up to her crotch and she is excited. I can see it through her thin coverings. She smiles and it is a beautiful smile. There are knives in there, serrated and teethed and simply deadly. I smile back and she sees something in kind. That's beautiful. She shifts a bit more and I am gazing up her body. Her stomach is hard and toned. I can't see most of her face over her bouncing chest, but I can still see the ears bob and twitch. They're excited. All of her is excited.

I have to use my teeth to free her. And that gives her a wonderful thrill. I watch it crawl up her body. Something shivers and twitches and I can't do what I want for a moment. Something's on my stomach. My core pulses and twitches and there is a soft gasp that I can't quite place the source. It slows down the act and the moment and may or may not have caused me to bite Ladoga's thigh. She gasps and yelps and I get that same wonderful ride through her body. So, she liked it. She shivers and gasps and her hands turn to the earth for support. Overall, I am quite pleased with this turn of events.

My teeth are back in control and they go through the motions through the cloth. She is burning. All of her is burning. Fever flushed red and panting, I give her what I have been given. Its tongue and love and heat and wonderful panting need. She's sensitive. She hasn't really given herself enough attention, in my opinion, and that's a shame. She is so lovely. She is so eager. She is so sensitive. I lick and touch and move her as gently as I can. That's enough to get her gasping and writhing and rocking her hips against me. I do not claim to be an expert at this, but I know to mimic the motions. I know to find the spots that seem to send her seething and sputtering. It's hard, harder than it should be with all the attention I have given to me. It's still fun. She tastes of sex and need and that alone is such a wonderful urge to run with. It's all consuming. It's intoxicating.

I feel the pulse start through me. A thin stream of pressed starts to roll through and out of me. My stomach clenches and tightens. The nameless mass grows hungrier and hungrier. There is the prelude. The final act is there. It all could happen in a moment and it would all be simply right.

Ladoga shivers atop me and that is the moment where time freezes. It is a tremor in the broken windowpanes of reality. The shards align and resonate and Ladoga simply stops breathing as all the sensation in her body simply being too much.

It's tense, her climax. Her thighs are a bit too strong to be considered completely safe, but that's also why wanted to do this. I can't beat it. I don't want to breathe because that would take me away from all of this. It's tight and painful in the best way. I can't breathe because all of my life is down to the marrow of the dance. It's beautiful.

It's also short. Everyone backs away. The world is still. Ladoga comes down, blinking the stars and the pale blight of her mind. Her breathing deepens and slows.

"That's it," Ladoga says, "We have to ship them all of. If they come back half as good as this, it's worth it."

I wiggle my noggin. I want to be out of the vice now. I want to breathe clear air and see the stars that are actually there and not the ones blinking at the edges of my vision. She gets the sign. She gets off of me. I am free. No one is touching me. I am simply adrift on a raft of soft flower petals. I put my hands behind my head and let the dreams think for me. The group should get back to me and do all the things to me. I spread my legs and that should get something back to me. I feel the crowd respond to my movement. It seems to me that most others don't seem to respond at this point. It's a dance that stops and that's not the point of the dance. It keeps moving and spinning and twirling the silk.

Something grabs my legs and takes them a bit wider. I'm almost surprised at how far they can go. But they do. The spread and open and all of me is exposed to the stars.

"What did he do to you Ladoga?" says the leg spreader.

"No clue, Ness," Ladoga sighs, "Something with his tongue. Someone else can try. It's amazing."

The crowd shifts again and I have a new friend towering over me. She's paler than the others, hair and ears carrying on the good tradition of taking on snow. She's also smaller than the others. I think I might even be taller, if we ignore the twitching ears. And she's nervous. I smile softly and use my hands to get her aligned. She lets me move her. She lets me take and bend her in the gentle waves. Ness is decidedly less gentle with her movements on me. I'm more than fine with that. I can take it. I love the way my muscles burn as she takes me open, just past the point where I'm comfortable.

I start on my new nameless friend and she's even more sensitive than Ladoga. She was even prepared for me. Something had taken away her last line or protection and I am on her in her nest. She is sweet and soft and timid, almost scared of me in a way. I am giving her such incredible sensation and that alone does carry a level of fear. I am the unknown shadow dancing on the wall from the candle flame. I am the shiftless shapes in the night. I am beneath her, devouring her in such a unique way.

And then I have my turn with all those sensations as Ness does the same to me.

I don't think it carries quite the same weight with the underlying nerves, but the act itself carries such a tender caring exploration that I can't help but stop and hitch at this moment. I give it the veneer of letting my new friend rest and hold on. Ness is very good with that tongue. It's in circles and lines, mouthing words and songs from a home I've let grow wild.

I start going back to the one at my mouth. She's simpler than Ladoga, if only because she doesn't quite know what her body needs. She's finding it out and I'm helping her. We wander through her body, finding spots and moments and times together to settle and grow. The pleasure finds its place in her core and from there it starts to expand even more. The rhythm on her is simple and easy, riding her inexperience and her sensitivity to do most of the work for me. I wouldn't call it easy, especially with the distractions I'm facing, the odd sparks and tingles and all the wonderful flights of fancies that don't allow me to be completely coherent in my act. It's still enough. There's still a steady pulse of preseed pulsing from me and running down my stomach. Everyone still watches in awe over me.

It starts with a sharp hiss and that's the sign that it's coming. I feel the body above me tense. I respond in kind. It's moving through the warm star sea, but not quite coming up to breach. Ness's good, but she's still not quite there. The path is not set out. The body over me does. It's barreling down above me and it comes with another gasp. The body collapses in a terrible repose away from me. She knocks against my legs and that sends Ness to the ground and now where a tangle of knotted limbs and a warm current I laze along. I blink the growing stars from my eyes and I look to the rest of the clearing.

We are still the center of a whirlpool, but offshoots have rooted to the ground. Pairs and trios, women tending to one another as best they can. Everyone is trying my little experiment, it seems, although some have reverted to hands and riding thighs. Their preference, I suppose, and I am in no place to deny anyone anything. Baikal has a hand on someone else's head, keeping her pleasure and her ecstasy still. Her teeth are gritted. She looks savage, legs tense and coiled, free hand digging a trench with her nails in the earth. I can almost see the steam flaring from her nostrils as her prey tends to her. She grabs another near her and forces another deep panting kiss. She's a taker, it seems, and I can't wait for my turn.

I roll free from the bodies and they find their recovery together. Ness takes the rider and softly murmurs comforts and reassurances. It seems her name is Articia, but she goes by Arty for short. I like it. I'm not sure if I prefer Casper or Johnathan at this point.

Whoever I am, I caused this in some fashion or another. I take a step back from the needs and the urges and simply settle into the moment. So many others, so close and so far, lost to that same needling instinct that is commanding me to bring one back to me. They are getting at it as best they can and they are all very, very good at tit. Strong, healthy bodies colliding and mixing in a tangle of knots and lips and tongues.

Something grips my shoulder and pulls me back down. I have more tasks at hand and simply staring at them won't make them go away.

It's Baikal. She's furious. We have a promise made in the nebulous time of our childhood that I have forgotten. I was supposed to be hers and hers alone probably. It also might just be in her mind that this happened. Who knows? I don't. I'm much too busy being spun around and pinned to be of any rational help. She's back on my mouth, trying to work her tongue as best she can. It's new. There has been so much newness for her, and I am the old ways come back so different.

"What were you doing out there for so long," she asks, voice so casual, "No bullshit."

I smirk. That phrase is definitely an import as well. It's one of my favorites.

"Two tours as a high lancer up north in Vernon," I say, "That's where I got the legs. Then I deserted because of a very long story, and a lot of snow. So, I went east and apprenticed to a goldsmith for a while. That made the rest of me. And now I'm back."

She's back to kissing me and that's a wonderful piece of homecoming. I taste the others on her, more of the milling storm of urges and needs. I think she was with Ness for a bit at the end. At the edges of my sensation, I can feel the others gravitate back to me. The actual reason we are all here is at hand. The play before was fun and illuminating, there is so much more to us. Baikal straddles me, pressing her weight into my length. Sher rides it between her thighs, up and down up and down. Her excitement beads over me and I smirk through her lips again. She's gone. I'm barely over the edge of reason, some little part of me away from myself, watching this from on high. It likes the show. It likes to be the audience and the show. I like to be both and non and I swear Baikal has ten arms from the way she is holding me. I am back into the moment, back into my body. I am hard, painfully hard and my partner is ready to throttle something if she doesn't get her way in the next instant.

No one stops her, least of all me.

It's instinct and nothing more. One hand to get me in line, one hand to hold me down, and there is another army around me. More hand to my face, some soft, some rough, all eager and hungry. Some are back down on my legs, some are on my arms and all of them simply want their turn at me.

Baikal drops and she screams. It's anger and rage that it has taken so long for us to be like this. It is primal and hungry that the single motion was not enough to sate her body. So, she does it again. She pours more rage into every motion and each one is met with me. I am strong and unbreaking. I am a wanderlust filled drifter faced with the endless onslaught of the elements. Baikal is trying, but she needs to try harder to break me.