The Choosing Ch. 06

He spoke the truth. I felt it with each syllable. I opened my mouth to tell him I understood and the room began to fade. The edges first, dissolving into a spray of colored pin lights.

I stepped into him, pushing up on my toes. Our mouths met. Lips on lips, tongues entangled a spark of heat. Melting like wax I succumbed to the teasing pleasure. Not enough. Not enough. I hungered for more. Greedy I grabbed at him, taking more and more.

He murmured against my lips, "Come back to me. Find me again. It's too much for you now. Later. When you're stronger. Rest now, rest now my beautiful and return again."

I could no longer feel him. I pressed harder, pushed to find the feeling. The more I tried the more the feeling dissolved. The sparkle of lights erased the room, closing in quickly until Nadar was gone. Blackness curtained down until I was left with just the image of his moonlight halo. My dark angel.

I thought of the dream as I awoke to Hatha shaking my shoulders. I sat up and rubbing the last vestiges of sleep from my eyes I opened my mouth to tell her about Nadar's nighttime visit but after one stuttered syllable I stopped.

"Mistress?" she questioned softly her hands pulling me up to sit and stripping me of my night rail.

I lifted my buttocks and raised my arms to help her slip the material off my body. "It is nothing," I lied. "Nothing at all."

"You're tired," she said, she stood between my legs. I looked up at her. "Yes, I am," I said, this time speaking honestly. I was so weary I felt numb. Old. Fragile.

I scraped a hand across my face. I was not looking forward to seeing the Mother in this state. I wanted to sink back down on the bed, pull up the covers and hide from the world.

"Let me help," Hatha said. She'd come down on her knees, her hands rested on my thighs.

I shook my head, "Only sleep will help, Hatha."

She smiled up at me. With her hair loose about her shoulders and her tattooed arms bare she seemed so young. Almost like the daughter of the angry woman in black who had first met me in the Night Palace. I laughed.

"What makes you laugh Mistress?"

"You Hatha."

She frowned and I laughed again. "Do not take offence Hatha. I laugh because I'm thinking back to when I first saw you all starched in black and scowling. Never then did I think I would see you so pretty nestled between my thighs."

She blushed and flicked her gaze away staring at the bed covers. "You think me pretty Mistress?"

I curled a finger under her chin tilting her face up until her eyes met mine. "I think you beautiful Hatha. I think you magnificent."

"Mi-mistress," she stammered and moved to place a warm kiss on my palm. That simple act filled me with joy. My heart glowed with the connection I saw in her eyes. I thought back to last night, to how sorrowful I had been at her 'service' comment. As I looked down at my friend I shook my head. How could I have doubted her? Of what joined us? We were friends. She was more than my handmaiden. Much more.

"Shall we go now Hatha. What state of undress am I required in today?" I joked though a stifled yawn.

"You are still weary my Mistress."

"I am, but there is little we can do about that."

I arched my spine and raised my arms up, closing my eyes for moment as I sank into the pleasure of the stretch. While my eyes had been closed she had stood. I felt her hands on my shoulders. I smiled, and turned my head to rub my cheek on her hand. She pushed when I expected her to pull. I fell back on the cot my legs hanging over the edge.

"Hatha," I laughed.

"Lay still," she ordered, and because it was comfortable I did. A warm wash cloth worked across my body in wet slippery strokes. A moan of pleasure slid from my mouth as she added pressure to the heat of the cloth massaging me with each stroke. "Oh, Hatha, that's so good."

She hummed as she worked down my torso to my legs.

"Stand," she ordered and I did so with a feigned groan of protest. The cloth worked across my shoulders and back with ruthless efficiency. I resigned myself to the fact that we would leave soon, scrubbed clean to face the Mother.

"You are clean," she said finally, sounding very satisfied.

"A fresh slate," I joked. I moved as if to turn to face her but the hands she had shifted to grip my hips would not let me.

"Hatha..."

"Let me help you Mistress. Let me..." her whispered words trailed off as she breathed against my skin and rested her cheek on the pillow of my arse.

She spread my cheeks, and licked me from behind. A strangled gasp slipped from my throat as the damp point of her tongue hit my arsehole. I spread my legs and leaned forward until my hands hit the wall beside my cot.

"Yes." I heard her murmur from behind.

Her tongue flickered across my most private place. A flutter of constant shooting pleasure. I fell into the pleasure of this darkest kiss. Her fingers snaked between my thighs to slide between my sticky lips and push inside. I gasped again as her fingers curled inside me circling pressure into the walls. I clenched around her fingers in a sharp almost painful orgasm. Once and then again as she gave me no respite.

Dizzy, my hands slipped on the wall and I fell forward onto the cot, my knees banging on the edge. Twice I had just come, but I wanted more. The sharp stinging orgasms had just fueled the need. I got my stumbled to get my footing and turned to face Hatha. She smiled up at me from her knees on the floor. Her lips swollen and wet. Her tongue poked out to flicker at the seam.

I came up on my feet, with rough fingers fisted in her loose hair I brought her mouth to my aching centre. Two hands I held fast in her fair, holding her as if reining a mount. I saddled my swollen sex on her mouth and ground my mound down on her face riding her with ruthless intensity.

"Yes. Hatha—yes." I grunted as I ground down on her tongue riding to my next orgasm. Power surged through me, up my body from my sex, pulsing at my breasts. My nipples points of aching intensity. Up, up she took me to the peak of my orgasm. Racing, higher and higher on her skilled mouth.

I looked down at her, as she ate at my sex, her hands gripping my hips digging into my flesh to keep me from moving away, her eyes drilling into mine. It was too intense, her need to please me too much to bear, I looked away and saw him.

Askel.

The young man watched from the door. He'd let himself in but had shifted no further than the door behind him. He leaned against the wood, one hand moving fast, rubbing the erection bulging beneath the soft suede of his breeches. His eyes were fixed on Hatha's face at my sex and he stroked in time with each movement of her head. It were as if an invisible line existed between his cock and the tongue lapping at my slit.

I laughed. His eyes flicked up to meet mine. The power of his lust made me reel, I locked my knees to keep from falling back. Hatha paused in her licking, I twisted her hair to keep her from moving away. I did not want her to stop. I did not want her to stop. Or him.

A new heat uncurled deep within flicking out to crackle across my skin. "More," I whispered and heat my own voice ring deep with an unbeknownst power.

He understood my command. The Vessel's compulsion. He pushed his breeches down until they sat below his hips. His cock jerked free, plum tipped and glistening with cum.

"Touch," I commanded and his hand began to stroke. Root to tip he pulled on his shaft.

I watched.

He watched.

And Hatha worshiped at the altar of my sex.

It took but a moment for me to come again. Pulsing surges of release that shot from my body drenching Hatha with my cum. My power peaked with my orgasm energy surging up and down my spine trying to burst free. I had to release. Release the power. Askel. He was my release.

"Cum," I hissed through gritted teeth.

His mouth gaped open as his body obeyed my call without question. His hips jerked and thick ropes of his seed pulsed forth onto the cold stone floor. Like a puppeteer I controlled him. With the certainty of the power that coursed through my veins I knew it.

"Cum," I said again.

I felt it the surge from me, a pulsing link of power from my sex to Askel who shuddered once more in orgasm. He fell forward to his knees, on all fours he arched his back like a pained animal and his cock spewed forth stream after stream of cum.

I laughed.

I was potent. I was ringing with power. With magical might. From my toes to the ends of each strand of hair I was abuzz of my arcane energy.

I released my fingers from Hatha's hair and brought my hand down to stroke across her cheek. "Thank you," I murmured looking down at my fingers starkly pale on her flushed skin.

"I am in your service," she parroted the platitude of a handmaiden.

Her words stung. Like a careless slap. I still felt the buzz of power but it no longer resonated with joy—the fire dampened by Hatha's service.

I was a brittle shell. A Vessel of still, but of loneliness, or empty sorrow.

"You are in my service," I said, voice hollow as empty as I felt.

"I am your Handmaiden. You are my Mistress. I service you as you need. You are the Vessel."

"The Vessel," Askel repeated, now seated with his back to the door.

From where she still knelt between my thighs Hatha turned her head to his voice, noticing Askel for the first time. As only Hatha could she rose to her feet and with a mouth still glistening with my released asked, "What are you doing here?" as if he'd just interrupted us breaking our fast.

"I am here to take The Vessel to the Mother."

"I am ready," I said.

Hatha looked to me with her brow furrowed.

"I am ready," I repeated more firmly. I wanted to leave the room. I did not care where to, just away from the stifling presence of loveless Hatha's service.