Archive of Our Own

I touch down with a flourish of my wings, blasting wind over the barren landing in front of our house. Folding the appendages just enough to fit through the wide door, I let them drop to the floor—smooth and meticulously enchanted for cleanliness—as I enter.

A sigh escapes my lips as my wings drift down to the pleasantly cool floor.

Throwing off my shoes, I weave a cleaning spell to send the dirt and grime on my body to the floor, letting its own enchantments dispose of the material properly.

I glance at the mirror leaned against the wall, its place not yet decided, and comb my fingers through my fiery hair. I shake off my wings to help the cleaning spell along, the pale grey feathers shimmering iridescently. 

The one part of me where I really agree with Mara’s assessment. They are the best.

I hum as I amble across the living room to the kitchen to make dinner—she isn’t due till after sunset and a glance out the window tells me I have probably half an hour or so.

I run over a list of potential dishes and settle on frying some fish. The accompanying rice will cut it a little close, but it’s easy enough and I’m not sure Mara has eaten fish with anything other than enthusiasm in her entire life.

Reluctantly, I drag my wings up off the floor and tuck them into their natural place against my back to avoid tripping or knocking anything over as I go through the familiar motions, humming turning to singing.

By the time the sun dips below the distant peaks and the door opens with the light sounds of leather on tiles, I have two plates sitting on the table and am most of the way through cleaning up.

I scurry over to meet her, entering the living room just as she shakes her helmet free of her gorgeous emerald locks. My stomach flutters as she gives me a bright grin.

The amber-skinned elven paladin sets her helmet on its stand next to her already-removed gauntlets, moving with far more grace than someone wearing more than my weight in armor ever should, and spreads her arms out.

“My favorite cute little bird!” she greets and I return the greeting as heat rushes to my cheeks. Every. Damn. Time. It’s not fair.

I move to help remove the rest of her armor but the paladin catches me, gentle hands under my arms, before I can slip behind her.

She’s a full head taller than me without the boots, but she treats me as if I’m weightless and then her long tongue is in my mouth and the world narrows to that warm contact.

I lean in, letting her lock our lips together and probe my mouth in detail as if wondering whether something had changed in the last half day, her motions equal parts firm and gentle as always.

After however long, probably like thirty seconds, my unprepared body starts squirming for air and she pulls back and lets me slip back to the ground.

She supports me as my disoriented brain refuses to put my legs in the right place as I heave air into my lungs. After a few seconds to catch my breath, a wide smile asserts its place on my lips and I look up to meet her azure eyes.

They twinkle with teasing delight as my heart thunders.

She gives a smug smirk and asks, “So, fish for dinner?”

“Huh- Yes- Wait, wha- I didn’t even eat any while cooking!” I stammer out.

She just looks me smugly for a few more moments, letting me stew and why is she so fucking hot when she’s smug?

Then she laughs and ruffles my hair as I slump against her armor. I let out a meek noise of protest as she ruins several seconds of finger-combing. Then her hand glides down to the base of my wing, gently massaging it and my squeak turns into a moan.

“I know you were focused on my tongue, but I do have a nose y’know,” she comments and I press my face against the metal of her armored side to cool down the heat that was rising. Again.

I let out a halfhearted grumble which even I can’t parse and pull away from her, drawing another teasing laugh that reignites my blush— again —and makes me want to just melt against her as I begin undoing her armor.

Melting against her would work better without it and after dinner.

“Stop teasing me! And help me get this off you so we can eat.” Despite my attempt to be demanding, it comes out more like a desperate squeak.

Mara acquiesces with another chuckle and we remove the armor soon enough, the ritual practiced a hundred times.

I repeat the cleaning spell once more for her.

To my inevitable frustration, Mara would certainly insist on maintaining the admittedly beautiful masterwork—though, it looked much better on her than on display—before we go ‘sleep’ but it needed to be done. 

Using cleaning magic on a suit of armor enchanted with so many layers it was worth more than our house would have been difficult to begin with… and one of those many layers was antimagic. Unfortunately, the creator didn’t deem ‘self-cleaning’ worthwhile.

Dinner passes in a flash, both of us hungry enough from the day to delay talking until food is gone.

“That was delicious!” Mara declares as she finishes and a smile blooms on my lips at the praise. Every time.

I’ve cooked food for her thousands of times and she’s praised it every time—though it took a bit to go from encouraging to appreciative—and every single time it makes me way happier than it has any right to.

She leans across the table and pecks my forehead.

“I’m going to go clean my armor.”

She’s halfway to the living room before I remember to give her a sound of acknowledgement and put away the dishes with a quick spell to cause the dirt and grime to slide off into the garbage.

I hum my way over to join Mara on the couch, slumping against her shoulder with a wing draped behind her. She smells of the forest.

A contented sigh leaves my throat as she ruffles my hair again, then reaches back to run a hand through my feathers before returning to rubbing a rag on a piece of plate that I can’t immediately identify.

Maybe a vambrace? It's small and curved enough.

Watching her go through the practiced motions is soothing and I let out a yawn.

Rub rub rub clank , rub rub rub clank ...

My eyes flitter half shut as time blurs by until a finger pokes my nose.

“I’m done,” Mara informs me, looking down at me with a smile. I smile back.

“‘Kaaay,” I mumble.

“We should go to our room.”

“‘Kaaay,” I mumble, mind still half asleep.

She laughs and a strong arm slides behind my back, gently gathering my wings as a second slips under my knees. I’m awake by the time she’s halfway to her feet, lifting me as effortlessly as ever.

I wrap my arms around her and press my face into the side of her boob, curling up against her as she carries me to our room. So beautiful, so strong.

I squeak and jump as she squeezes my butt in response.

Then she lowers me on the bed, sitting me down on the edge before slipping a hand through one of the wing holes in my shirt.

I gasp as she runs her cool fingers over the skin there. “Come on, get your arms out of the sleeves.”

I do as she says and then let her gently guide my wings through the slits cut into the back of the shirt, a task only barely doable without her help.

Back home, people mostly just wore open-backed clothes, especially button down ones, but it’s colder here and years among the landbound folk have made me hesitant to show off so much skin.

Plus, I have the luxury of someone who is always happy to remove my clothes for me and only marginally more reluctant to help me get into them.

I let her pull the shirt free of my head and splay my wings out on the bed behind me as she brushes a lock of scarlet hair from my face, tossing the cloth aside.

She kisses my nose and a giggle wells up and forces its way out of my throat.

I stand up to strip off my pants and then move to help her get her own clothes off, but Mara pushes my hand away, running an intense, shameless gaze over my mostly naked body with far more lust than it deserved. Oh.

I feel warmth well up in my cheeks—and core—as a premonition of the coming night occurs to me. My arousal only intensifies as she slowly strips off her own clothes, revealing a toned body, lithe and smooth in a way that belied her strength and more beautiful than anyone had any right to be.

A litany of scars decorate her amber skin, equal parts attractive and reminders of the dangers we’d—mostly—left behind.

She looms over me and angles my chin up with a gentle but irresistible motion, meeting my own flustered gaze with lustful anticipation that sends shivers through my body.

She leans next to my ear, wrapping her arms under my wings, holding me up, and whispers huskily, “I’m going to make you mine tonight.”

She didn’t say it like a question, but if I were to express anything other than enthusiasm she would have stopped, as she had… well, a couple times in the past. I am a needy girl.

I fall into her embrace, knees weak as my fantasies speed ahead of reality, her pinning me down or locking me in her arms or tying me up and how she would make me scream. 

Instead, she just runs a hand softly over the skin between my wings and whispers, “How do you feel, fast or slow? I’m thinking nice and slow tonight. Do you want me to give your wings a nice massage, tease you till the light peaks through the curtains, make you beg?”

I rub my thighs together.

Oh Goddess. Please. She says it like she hasn’t already started. I just want her to unravel me.

Mara waits.

Oh, she wants an answer.

With great effort, I manage to whimper one out.

“P-please,” I beg.

She chuckles in my ear and sweeps me off my feet, setting me on bed and laying herself down besides me, laying on my splayed wing, pinning it to the bed but distributing the weight enough not to hurt me.

She cups my cheek with her top hand and I press into her hand.

She gives me a chaste peck on the lips and runs her hand down my bare arm. Long and slender fingers, calloused by decades of swordsmanship and yet so careful, caring, entwine with my own.

Gradually the fire calms a little as we just lay there, hands clasped and eyes locked together.

“You’re beautiful,” she says, breaking the silent moment and making me flush with joy and try to curl up with embarrassment.

She puts an immovable hand on my knee.

So I do the next best thing after curling up and deflect instead. “N-no, you are.”

She just laughs at that, answering with her ever-attractive smug confidence, “Of course I am.”

She pokes my nose.

“But so are you.”

Mara takes her hand off my knee to run it along the feathers of the wing beneath us. Then she shifts closer, releasing my hand to encircle me in a hug, a safe cage of unyielding muscle. Goddess, I love her so much. She’s way more than I ever should have gotten. I wrap my hands around her neck, pulling myself in in an effort to satisfy a sudden need for closeness.

Her hands dig into my wings, fingers burying themselves in my feathers and then softly massaging the tired muscles beneath. The feeling is heavenly and a long, breathless sigh draws itself from my lips.

“I love your wings,” she whispers, shifting to the sensitive flesh where they join my back. I cling to her tighter.

She rubs her cheek on the one still trapped beneath us. “I love how soft your feathers are. I love how beautiful they are and how beautiful they make the rest of you.”

Adamant fingers dig into my muscles, unclenching them by force and sending a jolt of pain and pleasure through me. My yelp turns into a bashful moan as she rubs little circles before letting up the pressure. She smirks. 

“I love the noises I can get out of you by playing with them. Probably my second favorite part of your adorable little body, my sweet starling.”

I look at her imploringly, hoping she’ll get my meaning without making me figure out how to form words.

She draws a hand away from my top wing, despite my best attempt to pin it down with said appendage, and places a finger to my lips. “The first has got to be your mouth.”

“Your voice is beautiful, whether you’re just talking or singing, moaning or squealing or whimpering. Your mouth is really the best for kissing. 

“I can kiss your hand or your cute nose if I want playful, your forehead or cheek if I want caring or loving, your neck or stomach or your thigh if I want to be sensual, or rrriight between your pretty legs if I want sexual.”

Each place is accompanied with a poke or a caress, though the last one has me clamping my thighs together to another chuckle from her.

“But I can do every one of those with your mouth. Playful,”

She kisses the corner of my mouth, quick and teasing.

“Or if I just want to remind you how much I love you.”

She places a gentle kiss on my lips, full but chaste.

“Of course, sensual is easy too.”

I close my eyes as her free hand cups my chin, drawing me in for another kiss. She nibbles my lip and prods with her tongue, long and slow. I press against her, lost in the slow rhythm as I moan helplessly into her.

I’m not sure how long she holds me there, releasing me only to let us breathe. Eventually, she pulls back though, smiling as I open my eyes to meet her self-satisfied gaze. Her chest rises and falls with slow, controlled breaths, a contrast to my own panting.

Then she rolls me over onto my back, knees between my legs and elbows placed carefully on the bed to support her weight without hurting my wings. She slips a hand under my head and  her smile turns lewd.

“Can’t forget sexual either though.”

That’s all the warning I get—and with my mind frazzled by our last kiss, I only get halfway through parsing it—before she locks our lips together, shoves her tongue into my mouth and claims every part of it. I couldn’t pull back even if I wanted to, her hand holding me close.

Compared to the slow embers of the last kiss, this one is a raging fire and it sets my mind alight as I press myself against her, desperately grinding my dampening groin against her, locking my legs and wings around her, and breathlessly gasping in pleasure even as my lungs demand air.

My fingers dig into her emerald mane and back and I cling to her with all my strength.

Then she pulls back, pushing me down when I try to follow her. She’s so much stronger than me and I just squirm against her palm on my chest even as I heave deep breaths.

“I also love how good your tongue is when I shove you between my legs,” she comments as she catches her breath and I just blink at her in confusion. What is she talking about?

“Wha-?” I pant out.

“I was telling you about why I love your mouth,” she reminds me and I blush. 

“Now then, I promised to give your wings some love, didn’t I? Come on, roll over.”

I squeeze my legs tighter around her waist.

“What did I say? Something about teasing you until dawn, no? Now roll over, my dear starling, you’re not getting anything that easily.” Inexorably, she unwraps my legs from around her and straddles me instead. 

I roll over under her obediently, carefully feeding my wing under myself, and she settles down, pinning me to the bed. She runs slow fingers through my hair, pressing her fingernails into my scalp, until I calm down.

And then my oh-so-good torment begins as she picks up one of my wings and carefully folds it so she can start with the wingtips. She caresses the large feathers, sending pleasing vibrations down to flesh below.

Then she works her way up the feathers to the top of my wing and I let out a sigh as she runs her fingers down the top. The last segment has no muscle to knead, but her tender, caring ministrations are ever-so-pleasant.

I let out quiet, slow moans as I lay there face down, eyes closed and body relaxed as Mara lays her love on me.

She moves along my wing and my breath hitches, hands gathering sheets as she reaches the muscle and digs her fingers into the knots.

A quiet whimper slips from my lips as she works her fingers in circles and sends little jolts of pain through the wing and up my spine.

She eases up when my whimpers grow louder and plays me like an instrument, filling me with a delightful pleasure-pain that has me quivering and whimpering beneath her as I let the feelings wash through me.

Then she’s onto the main segment, working the powerful muscles responsible for lifting my light body into the air and her kneading and massaging feels so good. Oh Goddess. Why is she so good at this, at me?

Her dexterous fingers manipulate the tendons and fibers and unravel tension and hurt so good and the moans escaping from my mouth are louder and breathier now as she works up and down from the base of the wing. Like caressing my thigh or biting and kissing my neck, it feels so fucking good and quivering has turned to squirming as I try to grind my burning loins against the bed but can’t do more than wiggle with Mara atop me.

“That feels good, yeah?” Her voice is low and husky as she winds me up and fuck I love it so much. She’ll make me beg and deny me and remind me that I’m hers until she lets me come undone in her arms.

It’s not really a question, but I whimper out an answer anyway. “Y-yes. Really good.”

Her fingers press harder and my own clench the sheets as I tear up and let out another whimper. And then just at the edge of too much, she lets go, soothing the aching muscle with soft caresses.

She gently stretches out my wing before letting it drop on the bed, limp and loose, and I lay there, panting as she lets me calm down once again. She leans down, pinning me flat to the bed as she whispers in my ear and strokes my hair and my tense body relaxes again, the heat in my core dissipating.

“And of course, the other one.”

She picks up the other wing and starts over the very tip, working her way down again and I’m in a torturous heaven of denial again as the whole process repeats itself.

Loving ministrations lead into another sadistic massage and it feels so fucking good and there’s nothing but her weight on my hips and the cocktail of sensations her fingers invoke. And then she’s done.

I whine as she lets up again, but I can’t keep my protest up as her fingers delicately caress the very bases of my limp wings and I’m moaning softly again. Oh Goddess…

“I love you so much,” I manage to whisper.

“And I love you, my lovely little bird,” Mara answers.

I feel her weight slip off me and glance over my shoulder as she sits on the edge of the bed before patting her lap.

With some difficulty, I push myself to my hands and knees and crawl over to her, placing my hand in three different places as my frazzled brain tries to figure out how to be maneuver myself on top of her and then she just scoops me up and I’m sitting in her lap, my own legs across her bare thighs, and her skin feels so nice.

She wraps her arms around me and I’m cocooned in an embrace of soft skin and hoping that she’ll move a hand between my legs. I rest my head against her shoulder as she runs her hands over me, never happier that she’s so much bigger than me.

“Wrap your wings around us,” she whispers and I do. We stay there for a bit, wrapped in the soft blanket of my wings, her hands gently playing with and caressing me.

She gives me a quick kiss, runs a hand down between my breasts over my stomach and then just as I tense in anticipation of her touch, she pulls away and pokes my nose.

“Y’know, elven culture involves a variety of magics,” she begins and I blink at her in confusion, addled mind trying to figure out what this relates to.

“Among them is a considerable number of sex-related spells,” she continues and I feel indignation well up, cutting through the haze. How could she?

I blurt out, “You know sex magic? And you never used it on me!?”

She just tuts at me, placing a hand over my mouth.

“Have some faith, my darling starling. I knew of it, but we are very far from home and I had no way of getting it. I only learned this in these last couple days. Now are you going to let me continue?”

I simmer down, face flushed with heat as I nod energetically and she pulls her hand away.

“As I was saying, there’s one I think you’ll be fond of… a temporary compulsion spell.”

Uhm. My insides do a thing that has me squirming in her lap. That is… She’s not wrong.

Though, that should be grossly illegal and extremely difficult… I can ask tomorrow—right now, I don’t care. She already has my heart and body. What will it feel like to give her a part of my mind too?

“Make me yours,” I whisper, before she can elaborate.

She chuckles and runs a hand over my wings. 

“You already are, my beloved starling,” she answers and I feel goosebumps run up my skin.

With a gentle hand on my chin, she raises my head. 

“Hold still.”

She incants in elvish spelltongue and her finger tip blooms with violet light. She presses it to my neck and my breath hitches, but I suppress the urge to jump. Just at the edge between warm and hot, her finger burns like pressing a hand against a sun-baked stone.

She carefully traces something that feels like quite an elaborate pattern around my neck, leaving a band of warmth, and pulls away. Then she snaps her fingers. It flares to that same burn and a flash of heat fills my head.

Then it’s gone and nothing feels different, except the band of warmth still wrapped around my neck.

I look at her curiously and she smiles back.

“Hmm… stop breathing,” she commands. 

My throat closes mid-breath as my body stops breathing. As I stop breathing, as I obey. I control my body. I could breathe if I wanted, except… I won’t . Mara said not to.

I squirm in her lap, rub my thighs together over the arousal in my core as she chokes me not with her hand, or a kiss, but with a command.

“Breathe.”

She holds me as I catch my breath.

“I think we’re going to have fun with this,” she comments. “There’s one more I was thinking to use now, one which-”

“Just do it,” I pant out. I don’t care what spell it is. Tomorrow, I’ll ask her all about the spells, unravel them. But right now, I’m well and truly hers and she doesn’t need to ask.

“Sit straight and still, then,” she says with a chuckle and my body is sitting up even before I fully realize what she said. I love it.

Her hand pulls my underwear several inches down my thighs and she speaks another incantation, her finger burning violet once more. This time I can watch as she burns another flowery design into my skin in lilac fire, starting just over my folds and trailing out to my hips and halfway to my belly button.

I shudder but my body remains a still canvas for her careful art. Then she’s done and snaps her fingers.

I close my eyes and inhale a gasp as tendrils of ice reach out from it, coiling in multitudes in my core and reaching out throughout my torso and into my limbs and to the tips of my fingers.

Mouth open, I stay frozen for a breathless moment before the tendrils of cold fade to a memory and I’m left with a beautiful declaration of possession in lilac lines on my stomach.

Mara pulls up my panties, covering part of it and running fingers over the rest as I whisper, “W-what…”

The look she gives me is practically predatory and I shudder as she pulls me in, pressing skin against warm skin as she whispers, “Aww, now you want to know?”

She pauses to consider a moment. “Oh well, this one time. It’s quite simple, my little bird, while it’s active, you won’t cum.”

Oh.

She nudges me off her lap. “Now, up you go, stand and face me.”

I stand in front of her as her eyes roam over me appraisingly, shoulders tucked in and hands over my body and wings tucked tight against my back. As arousing as her attention is, it's equally embarrassing without the comfort being pressed up against her.

She hums. “Now that won’t do. I wonder… be more confident.”

I just stand there awkwardly. “Uh.”

“Too vague, huh. Take a confident pose, then.”

Like reaching for another sweet, no matter how much I want to not, I spread my shoulders and put my hands on my hips in my best mimicry of Mara when she’s decided to show off for me, blush radiating down my neck.

Realizing I have no idea where to put my wings, I happily hide- wrap myself in a cloak of iridescent feathers.

A light chuckle. “Loopholes already, starling? Beautiful as your wings are, I want to see the rest of you too. Spread your wings.”

My wings unfurl. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, trying to embody some of the confidence I was doing a poor job unwillingly projecting.

I open my eyes and meet hers, twinkling with teasing amusement and shameless attraction. It makes me aroused and happy.

“Say ‘I’m beautiful,’” she commands.

“You’re beautiful,” I respond, because clearly that is what she meant. And she really is, even just sitting there in plain underwear, her toned abdomen shifting as she breathes.

She blinks a few times before giving another chuckle.

“Allllright then, say you’re beautiful.”

“You’re beautiful,” I repeat as commanded.

“You think you’re so clever, huh?”

I look away bashedly.

“Say the words ‘I am beautiful.’”

“I-I am b-beautiful,” I force out, but at the same time it feels… nice to say.

My enchanting lover smiles.

“Now say ‘I’m cute.’”

“You’re cute.” I would not usually describe her as cute, but I can hardly argue.

Mara stares at me for a few seconds before finally breaking out into a laugh, a wonderful sound that makes me proud, even if it was hardly the intended goal.

“That was funny the first time… no, okay, it was funny every time, but you can stop now.”

I pout and nod.

“Say you’re cute.”

“I-I’m cute.” I flush as I make myself say it.

“Hmm, you like being cute, huh? Say it again for me, it’s nice to hear you finally admit it.” 

That’s cheating!

“I’m cute.”

Then she makes me repeat it another five times and by the end I’m pretty sure all my blood has migrated to my face and I preen with a pleasant bubbly sensation. Not that I would ever admit it without magical compulsion.

“Did you enjoy that?”

Fuck. “Y-yes.”

Mara hums an acknowledgement. “We’ll revisit this tomorrow.” She can try, but I’m never saying that by choice.

“Now,” she smiles, “I got you some clothes to try on and while I was planning to corral you into them the hard way, this seems much easier and much more fun.”

“Wait wait wait, you’re going to make me put on clothes?”

“Yep.”

“But, but…” I whine.

“That anxious to get my fingers inside you, dear? We have all the time in the world.”

I let out a wordless whine and pout. I want her to fuck me and the anticipation is only making me horny again and making the wait worse. Or better. Fuck.

I’d be squirming if Mara had let me move, though holding more or less the same pose is getting uncomfortable and not in the fun way.

“Wait there a moment.” She gets to her feet in a single graceful motion, gliding more than walking to her dresser and taking out four garments hidden in sleeves of bland cloth before setting them on the bed.

She pulls a red dress free from one and holds it out. “Put it on.”

With reluctance, I take it and, after flipping it over several times to figure out how to get into it, I finally set it down and step into it before pulling it up. Blushing all the way, because trying new clothes is bad enough without an audience.

Enchantments within it come to life and the cloth fits softly to my skin and stiffens.

It goes up just below my wings on my back and cups my meager breasts, holding on through its shape and leaving my upper back and shoulders entirely bare.

I face Mara, unsure what I’m supposed to do now.

“Now come on, look in the mirror.”

I do. I see her watching me from behind in the mirror. My cheeks are flushed rosy, but that’s basically stuck there at this point.

The dress skirt flares a bit at the hips, corrugation allowing for freedom of motion as it hangs down to ankles. The red matches the color of my hair perfectly. I don’t like it. It feels wrong to have my shoulders bare like that, it puts too much emphasis on my boobs—far too small for the focus—and the color is too bright. The skirt is too puffy. It just… isn’t me.

The prettiest part of the outfit is the violet collar spelled upon my neck.

“How do you feel about it?”

I don’t really want to tell her I don’t like it—the color alone says it was made just for me, but… I shake my head, looking down.

“Don’t love it, huh? Yeah I expected as much but it was worth a shot. You look good in it, because you do in everything, but it doesn’t look great on you. Onto the next one, dear. You’re trying them all.”

There is certainly an intended way to remove the pseudo-corset, but after a few seconds of futile struggle, I give up and counterspell the enchantments temporarily, letting it fall.

The next outfit is also a dress, but a very different one. Getting into it takes some effort and, unlike usual, Mara is content to watch me struggle to get the elastic dress over my head, wings tucked tight against my back, so that I can spread them out through the whole in the back.

She does catch me when I trip with the dress halfway over my head though. Fortunately my predicament spares me from her facing her there as I eventually manage to squeeze my head through the collar, my wings through the back, and my arms through the sleeves.

I stand in front of the mirror and… I like it. 

The almost-black cloth shimmers iridescently like my feathers and hugs my upper body, running halfway up my neck and flaring slightly at the wrists. The skirt is simple with a slit up to the midthigh on the left.

I flare my wings, then tuck them in, and stand with forced confidence without an order, a hand on my hip.

I can’t imagine when I’d wear it—the last time I went to an appropriate event I was wearing armor and covered in blood and mud—but it makes me feel elegant.

I blush at Mara smiling in the mirror behind me.

“Like it?”

I just nod.

She steps in and spins me around, putting her right arm under my wings as she leans me back and pulls my exposed leg from the dress, leaving inches between us and me thoroughly off balance.

I melt into her slow kiss as her fingers run along my bare leg and back. She sets me down. I suppose it's hardly teasing if she lets me stop being incredibly horny.

The third outfit, Mara does help me get into, because it would have been borderline impossible to get into the suit without her. I look in the mirror.

On me, it looks okay. It looks almost knightly, but Mara’s the knight and I am most definitely not.

Mara has hardly any more clothes than I do, and no suits among them, but the mental image of her wearing one made my stomach flip in pleasant ways.

“You need to get a suit,” I declare with a blush.

She chuckles but hums assessingly. “I think you’re right. I’ll get a suit, you wear the dress, and we can go crash some noble party.” The described scenario tints my mind with the same mixture of embarrassment and enjoyment as everything else Mara is doing seems to. “Still, I think you should keep it. Who knows when my little bird will need to look dapper, mhm?”

The last outfit is mortifying. Socks up to my knees, a skirt halfway down my thighs, and a shirt that bares my midriff and the spellcrest on it. A choker with a small brooch on the throat sadly hides Mara’s magic, so I omit it for now.

I do a twirl and the skirt flares even as my wings kick up a minor breeze.

I love it. I will never wear it for anyone to see, but I love it.

Oh no. She was right. 

I am cute.

Curling my wings in front of me, I smile in the mirror.

I do another twirl and remember I have an audience standing behind me, freezing in embarrassment.

“Do you like it?”

“N-no,” I say, telling perhaps the most pathetic attempt at a lie in my life.

“Sonita,” she tuts my name, “tell the truth.”

My blush spreads to my neck and I blurt out, “I love it!”

“There we go, real cute ain’t it?”

I nod.

“And you like being cute, don’tcha?”

I nod again. I’m pretty sure my ears are red.

“You’re already the cutest, y’know? No matter what you wear, but especially like this.” I preen and flush with joy and embarrassment alike at the praise. It’s as wonderful as it is mortifying.

“Come here, my cute starling.” I obey, stepping towards her.

I squeak as she scoops me up, an arm under my knees and under my wings. She sits on the bed with me back in her arms, righting me.

Her hand slips under my skirt and I shudder in anticipation, my thighs spreading almost involuntarily.

She leans in, whispering in my ear, “Now, after making you try those on, I think you deserve a little reward. Besides, I haven’t gotten to test this crest at all. You just have to do one last little thing, cutest starling, and admit what you are.”

It’s not an order and it takes me a moment to figure out what she means. Oh. She wants me to… I push my hips forward but she just pulls her hand away.

“I-I’m c-cute,” I whisper out.

“Good girl, you really are.” She purrs and finally, finally slips her hand into my panties and a shiver of delight runs through me.

I lean against her as she rubs her fingers in circles around the hood. Her practiced fingers don’t take long to get me panting in pleasure.

The hand under my wings shifts and fingers dig into the base of the feathery appendage, driving the air from my lungs in a gasp of masochistic elation.

She slides her fingers into me, parting my folds and making my stomach clench as she wastes no time seeking out my weak spots. A moan pulls free from my lips.

I throw my arms and wings around her, burying my face in her neck, in her woodlands scent. Goddess, she’s so good at this.

My hips buck up into her hand.

“Sit down,” she whispers the order and I force myself back into her lap, the delightful contradiction of being pinned down by my own mind only amplifying the pleasure. Fuck, it feels so good.

I moan desperately into her neck as she intensifies her ministrations, her thumb massaging my clit in addition to the intruding digits. 

“Mahrah,” I moan her name.

Her other hand releases its painful grip on my wing and slides up the back of my head, running through my hair before grabbing a fistful.

“Hands behind your back.”

I disentangle my arms, clasping them behind my back, squirming against paradoxical restraints that I know exist yet can’t grasp.

Pleasure and heat radiate from her fingers and well in my core as my breaths grow shallower.

She pulls my hair and I whine as she drags my head away. She tightens her fist in response and it turns into a pained whimper as my eyes squeeze shut. Then her long elven tongue is practically in my throat and my thoughts scatter.

Sensation narrows to her tongue on mine and her fingers buried inside me and I squirm desperately against my nonexistent bonds, hips bucking as I keep them glued to her thigh. My body tenses, clasped hands squeezing and toes curling and abs clenching as fire wells in my core.

Fuck, I’m so close.

Cold tendrils of magic awaken, battling the heat of pleasure, almost forcefully loosening muscles, but Mara doesn’t slow. My body burns with ecstasy, threaded with ice, the cocktail of pleasure only intensifying itself. Fuck. Fuck. Oh Goddess, fuck.

I’ve slammed into a wall where release should be and Mara is content to pin me against it like any other wall and grind me into it, and I can’t think, can’t breathe at the overwhelming feelings. No, wait, I can’t breathe because I’m still practically choking on her tongue.

My lungs are begging for air but I can hardly parse the feeling from the torrent of sensation.

On and on I hang in blissful, incandescent, freezing torment. I’m lightheaded and still my body insists on using any air I still have or can scavenge on trying to moan into Mara.

After the world’s longest moment, she pulls away abruptly, leaving me hyperventilating and more desperate than I think I’ve ever been in my entire life. I reach to relieve the burning need but my hands are still behind my ba- No, they’re tangled in Mara’s hair and I put them behind my back where they’re supposed to be.

“No need for that, come here.” Before I can make use of my new freedom to make a futile grasp for release, Mara’s spun me around and my wet panties are against her stomach and I’m breathing in her calming fragrance. 

A hand on my waist holds me inviolably close and I wrap all six of my limbs around her, pulling myself tight with all the force I can muster—all my strength not even enough to hinder Mara’s calm breathing.

I grind against her until a command arrests my motion and then she’s stroking my hair soothingly and whispering praise in my ear, telling me I’m cute and my voice is beautiful and a dozen other delightful nothings.

Eventually, my body starts to cool down and my grip loosens.

And I’m still incredibly sensitive and aroused alike.

She runs a hand down to my stomach, but to a mixture of disappointment and relief—but mostly disappointment—she doesn’t immediately wind me back up, instead pulling her hand back.

I whine. She pokes my nose.

“Now, while I have you here in your adorable new clothes,” she ruffles my skirt, “you’re going to put on a little show for me.”

“A s-show?” A concoction of mortified anticipation fills me. I’d never be able to do it if I had a choice, but right now, Mara could take that choice away.

“Think of it this way, darling:” she murmers, “you want me to fuck you? This is your chance to tempt me.”

My stomach flips and flutters. Mortified anticipation indeed.

“Now come on, up you go, give me a show.”

I stand as commanded, thighs rubbing together almost involuntarily as I rush to figure out what to actually do.

I’ve been inside an… adult tavern exactly once and at the time I was doing my best not to look at the scantily clad pretty girls so all I remember is that they somehow used poles for the job.

Well, I can do that , at least. My fingers blur the somatics of a conjuration spell with the practised speed of an experienced battlemage and a fraction of a second later, a pillar of grey, iridescent hardlight stretches from floor to ceiling, earning a quirked eyebrow from Mara.

On a whim, I weave magic into my hair and wings to grant them a faint glow.

I grab the pole and have no idea what to do. I just need to stop thinking and… channel the horniness?

A thought occurs to me and I force myself to follow through before I can second guess it. Releasing the pole, I twirl to face away from Mara—both because it’s easier to do without looking at her and to give her her show—and reach under my skirt to pull my panties off.

I make every effort to keep my motions looking smooth and confident and absolutely no effort to keep my hips from swaying as I lean over, pulling the damp cloth over my knee-high socks. 

I stand and spin them around a finger before tossing them aside and twirling back to face my audience of one—and thank the Goddess it’s this specific one—to reach up under my shirt and while wiggling my modest breasts as much as the process reasonably allows, undo my bra and toss it aside too.

I give an elegant curtsy, hiking my skirt up higher than one normally should. The goal is to tease, but I’m not entirely confident I didn’t bring it a tad too high for that.

My face is no doubt as red as it’s ever been, but I pull the whole thing with a semblance of grace that surprises me. I’m rewarded with a look on Mara’s face that mixes surprise, appreciation, and desire.

I grab the hardlight pillar and press it between my thighs, spinning around it and swaying in an effort to project as much seduction as I can manage with my nonexistent experience. Ideally, I would gauge Mara’s reactions and adjust my performance, but the only way I manage to keep this up is to pretend the entire world doesn’t exist.

I break that as I pull my chest tight against the pole, make eye contact with her as I channel all the lust and confidence I can muster into my expression, and run my tongue along the hardlight pole. It’s a weird experience—it has absolutely no taste, no temperature, and an incredibly smooth texture.

She meets my lustful gaze with her own, licking her lips and slipping a hand between her long, amber legs as the other runs up her toned abs to grope at one of her perfect breasts. A shudder runs through her body as her fingers slip inside and wiry muscles tense and release over her body. She’s so beautiful, so fucking hot.

The sight of the most beautiful woman in the world not just masturbating, but masturbating over me somehow manages to turn me on even more , makes me want, need, to bury my face between her thighs and do my very best with my tongue and fingers.

The combination of desire for her to fuck my brains out and to make her feel good strains my willpower, makes me struggle not to just melt into a puddle, but I was ordered to give a show. And I’m enjoying it. I start to relax a little, lose myself in the sensual acrobatics.

I pull my body high up the pole and then let go with my hands, falling backwards into an arch and catching the pole again. Except now I’m upside down and while my skirt is pinched against the pole, my shirt is barely preserving my modesty. Which is half the point.

I flare my wings as if falling and my shining hair hangs down. Then I hook one leg around the pole and extend the other straight up in one of the most awkward feats of acrobatics I have ever performed, but I’m light enough to manage. Flight-adapted physiology and years of adventurer strength training paying off.

With a flap of a wing, I set myself twirling around the pole and then, coiling my wings backwards to help hold on, let go of the pole with my legs just long enough to flip my hips around to face down, and once I’m holding there, flip around my body to match, hugging the pole as at the start but now upside down.

As I spin around to face Mara, I make eye contact and grind my whole body against the pole, repeating my licking performance.

Once I’m back to Mara, I flap my wings to arch upwards, back against the pole, grasping the rod behind my head and arresting my spin with another flap. Then I spread my wings and push off, falling forward and letting my dance pole disappear in a flash of light behind me.

I land in front of Mara, flaring my wings to arrest my motion. My skirt also flares, just barely short of showing what’s underneath, and I tuck my wings in with a twirl to keep it up a moment longer before coming to a halt, panting.

I do another equally inappropriate curtsey before doing my best strut forward, swaying my hips side to side. I lean over her and for a moment entertain saying something flirty, but my mind short circuits and I abandon that, simply climbing into her lap.

This time though, I don’t simply cling passively. I run my fingers over muscle and grind against her, flooding my sensitive, aroused body with pleasure. I sit straight, hands on her shoulders, and rip my sight from her irresistible body to force myself to meet her eyes. I bite my lip as I shake my butt and I’m rewarded with her hands on my hips.

I push up onto my knees, looking down at her in a reversal which actually isn’t that uncommon given that I can fly but nonetheless feels all kinds of weird here.

Her hands slide up and under my shirt to grope me, kneading soft flesh and drawing a moan from my lips. I do my best to just sway my body, continuing despite her interference.

She immediately makes that a lot harder as her fingertips locate my nipples. She twists until I whimper and my hands clench her shoulders and then just a bit farther. It hurts and I love it and I just want her hands all over me.

I exhale a gasp as she lets go only to inhale another as she pulls up my shirt and gently takes one of my nipples into her teeth.

Her hands drop down to the outsides of my thighs and slip up under my skirt to my hips, running over my meagre curves and then her long fingers dig painfully into my butt, taking handfuls of my flesh. Sitting tomorrow will be uncomfortable. I’ll just have to stick to her lap.

I whimper and moan as her long, powerful fingers knead my butt, work their way up and down the back of my thighs, and she bites my nipple and her tongue flicks over it and she arcs my hips forward with that delectable, gentle inevitability.

This is the warrior who wields a sword twice my weight, the woman who punched a troll into gore until it stopped regenerating and crushed a golem into gravel with her bare hands. It sends shivers of delight through me whenever she reminds me because I am totally safe in her arms and she would never hurt me. Uh. More than I wanted to be hurt.

Her lips switch breasts and my hands wander down her body to remove her bra. I fill my hands with her generous boobs and gently massage them.

She rewards me with a quiet sigh of pleasure, breaking away from my nipple and it's a beautiful sound that reignites the need to get between her legs, to make her feel good. And this time, nothing is stopping me.

I wiggle free of her obligingly loosening grip, slipping back down to straddle her legs.

Then she catches me again, pulling me tight against her naked chest and whispering in my ear, “That was a wonderful dance, starling. I hope you realize you’ll be doing that again in the future.”

I flush at the praise. The dance, as she put it, was exhilarating and the declaration fills me with anticipation. I push against her and she releases me, having said what she wanted to.

I lick at her collar bone, delighting in the traces of salt and flowers, and grope her. Her hand comes up to grab a loose handful of my hair and I well up with pride as her breaths turn heavy. 

I take one of her nipples into my mouth, sucking and licking. I don’t bite; unlike me, she doesn’t enjoy pain. And for the best, because even if she did, I’m not sure I could hurt her pseudomagical body if I tried.

Switching between her breasts, I lavish my affection on them. She’s far quieter and less expressive than I am, but pleasing her is no less satisfying for it and I delight in the subtle shifts of the muscles in her stomach and her pleased sighs and the way her fingers occasionally twitch ever-so-slightly in my hair.

I slide down, kissing and licking my way over the amber skin of her stomach, fingers tracing over her abs, and hook my fingers into the edges of her panties. She lets me pull them off and I lay more licks and kisses on her legs as I do.

I toss them aside and settle on my knees as she parts her legs, placing my wings on her thighs to support my weight.

For all that she’s less… expressive than me, her antipication is obvious as she grabs a handful of my hair and draws me closer to her sex, slick with arousal.

Hands on her hips, I press my face to her core, desperate to please. She smells of flowers and tastes of nectar because elves are wonderfully unfair.

I lap at her folds, running my tongue over her a few times before moving up. I suck and lick and shudder as her fingers tighten in my hair in response, her breath hitching.

“Good, just like that,” she sighs and I squirm at the praise, redoubling my efforts as my thighs rub together.

“Use your fingers. A little higher, yeah,” she trails off into a low, quiet moan and I swell with elated pride at making her feel good. I gradually speed up and earn more moans as her thighs squeeze down around me and her fingers make a painful fist in my hair and she pulls me in.

I reach between my own legs but she notices and denies me even as I please her in a sadistic gesture that only reinforces the ache in my core.

Each of her moans is breathier than the last and I shudder in delight at every beautiful twitch that runs through her. I look up from between her legs, still working my tongue and fingers, as her moans mix with pants and her abs and chest shift.

“Oh yesss, faster,” she commands and I further speed up, revelling in her ever tighter muscles as she leans back on the arm not filled with my hair. I focus entirely on her, on giving her all the pleasure I can.

And then she’s throwing her head back, breathless as her spasms run through her body, clenching glistening abs and walls squeezing down on my fingers in the most wonderful sight in the world as her legs squeeze me.

I keep moving, gradually slowing down as she rides out her orgasm and soon she’s recovering her breath, head still thrown back and giving me a wonderful view of her chest, rising and falling with deep breaths.

She sits up and looks down at me, a faint flush on her cheeks as she releases my hair and loosens her legs enough that I’m no longer trapped.

I run my tongue over her one last time as I pull my fingers back, licking my lips and meeting her gaze. She smiles at me. 

“Good girl,” she praises, dragging out the ‘O’ and rolling the ‘R’ and I just about melt.

Her arms slip under mine and she pulls me up effortlessly despite the leverage working against her and I’m back in her lap, pressed against her naked body. I wrap my wings around her and my stomach does a pleasant flip as she sighs happily against the soft feathers.

She slides her hands down my sides, deftly undoing the knot holding the skirt waist tight and slipping it off me somehow without my assistance. She strips off my shirt as well, pulling it off my wings and leaving me nude save for my socks.

“Conjure some chains, would you darling,” she whispers and I shudder, fingers moving to obey her commands as she shifts me slightly away from her.

This is hardly the first time she has tied me up with my own spells, an experience that’s both delicious in its utter surrender as I’m forced to maintain my own bindings and very practical as real chains on bare skin would be a recipe for disaster.

I can proudly say that I’m probably the only mortal mage capable of maintaining half a dozen complex constructs through a mind-shattering orgasm, though more than one was ruined by the instinctual terror of a sudden drop before that was true.

Instead of tying me up with her hands though, this time, she adds another layer to being bound in my own magic by forcing me to do it myself. 

I know I’m being compelled and yet I’m far too horny to find where magic melds with thought, squirming in excitement as I loop chains—cool instead of temperature-less, digging into my skin without pinching it—around my breasts and torso, tight enough that it makes breathing just that bit difficult, and my wings, all at her teasing direction. I have to wield the spellchains as intended when I bind my forearms to each other behind my back.

Both ends of the chain protrude from the small of my back and I loop them over a support beam, hoisting myself into the air until I’m high enough to be eye level with Mara and dangling helplessly from the ceiling, bound by my own mind and magic as hardlight chains dig into flesh.

Mara clearly delights in my predicament and desperation, which only makes it so much worse. I try to reach her with my legs, still unbound, to wrap around her and pull her in so she can just fuck me already, oh Goddess.

I whine as I manage to hook my legs around her but of course cannot move her in the slightest, only pulling myself slightly closer and tighter against my restraints. She almost disdainfully pushes me off, causing me to swing back and my restraints to press ever so slightly harder.

“P-pleeassee,” I beg.

She stands, toned muscles tensing and releasing in a symphony across her naked skin. 

“Quiet, my dear.” I stop whimpering, but I still need her to fuck me and squirm in 

She reaches under the bed, putting her toned rear and the long muscles running down the backs of her thighs on display, to retrieve some ribbons and a gag.

She steps next to me, caressing my face and running her free hand through my hair, which is very nice and not at all what I need . I wrap my legs around her waist and she only chuckles, slipping her fingers behind my head and grabbing a handful of hair.

She kisses me gently, ignoring me grinding against her which feels good and is not enough but pulling me back when I try to bring my lips closer to hers. Then she pulls back and slips the ball gag into my panting mouth, ribbons tickling the back of my neck as she fastens it, planting a chaste peck on it.

I do my best to keep from drooling around it.

She parts my legs and steps around me, ducking under my splayed wings, and grabs one of my hands, forcing my fingers together and wrapping a ribbon around them. 

I clench my hand and unclench it, gently straining against the bonds holding my fingers flush and keeping me from casting. She binds my other hand.

Gagged and with my fingers bound, even I’d struggle to cast anything. A flush of panicked claustrophobia runs through me and then Mara wraps her arms around me and kisses my nape and I relax in my powerlessness.

I’m so wet it’s running down the inside of my thighs, so horny it hurts, covered in goosebumps and shivering in anticipation.

Her bare footfalls are soft as she walks back in front of me and gives me an appraising look.

“You really are adorable, my starling,” she declares. “I love the glowing hair and wings. Seeing you tied up and so, so desperate though? Do you know how delicious you look right now with your pretty flailing legs?”

She slips a finger under one of the chains, “Now tighten these, nice and slow.”

I shrink the chains and they dig into my skin and wings, flattening to distribute pressure. I exhale as they squeeze my ribs like an over-tightened corset until, “Stop.”

I hang there, panting in shallow breaths as each one strains against the bonds. She pulls her finger out and runs it over my stomach and fuck me fuck me fuck fuck fuck. My hips buck and she chuckles.

“Beg,” she commands, freeing me from silence and I whimper, desperately trying to form proper words around the gag. I need her to “fughck mhmgh.”

And then her fingers trace the crest on my stomach, remind me of it, and I realize what I’ve gotten myself into.

A single finger slides down, parts my folds, and I all but thrash against my restraints as I thrust my hips and let out a stream of muffled sounds that might have been curses because I need it, need it so fucking bad it.

But she just pulls her finger away and I pant shallow breaths as she runs her long tongue sensuous tongue over the slick digit, looking me in the eye from close enough that I can feel her exhale on my cheek like a forest breeze.

Her hand comes down and she leans in, making me imminently aware of her hot, wet breath against my neck and I’m so wound up that when her teeth ever so lightly touch my skin and I feel the lightest ghost of a touch between my legs, I almost spasm. Her tongue presses against the vulnerable, burning skin, leaving behind a line of saliva that turns frigid as she blows on my neck.

I try to beg, a stream of muffled sounds from behind a gag, but I’m not sure it would have been proper words even without it. It doesn’t matter, I know Mara knows what I mean, what I want, she just doesn’t care, wants to tease me and that only makes it worse and I want to scream in lustful frustration and-

I throw my head back in a muffled cry as a lance of pain from my neck meets with mind-whiting pleasure flooding out from my core, inside and out as she gets to work on me with her hands and teeth and my leg hits something and, and fuck fuck fuck, I need more more more more more .

In euphoric seconds I slam into the barrier of ice, but instead of pinning me against the metaphorical wall, Mara just smashes me against it and smears me into paste, muscles desperately trying to convulse and forcefully untangled by thorns of painful cold.

My eyes roll back and I this time I really can’t breathe, unable to loosen muscles enough to draw even the shallow breaths my bindings allow me, acutely aware of the way they dig into my skin and yet not as my entire perception concentrates on her teeth and tongue and fingers and practically I can’t feel the chains at all.

Oh Goddess fuck Goddess fuck fuck fuck.

My wings pull me tight against her and press our bodies together to the sensation of skin on skin and my arms squeeze around her and fingertips dig into firm muscle so hard it hurts and I’m on fire from within as her fingers melt me and without as her skin sets mine alight and a layer of frostbite separates the two and my wings push against something soft as they flail frantically as a small part of my body demands I breathe while everything else demands I scream, scream, scream and thrash in pleasure and pain and whatever the fuck is happening to me and it’s not like I can tell any of it apart anymore because it’s all blended together in a moment of eternal euphoria.

My thighs squeeze together desperately as something warm cups my cheek and then I drop limp and as the heat and ice fade leaving an absence that my body desperately tries to fill somehow and can’t and I can’t move and there’s a nice smell, a meadow, and there’s something in my... something in my hair . Fingers. Gentle fingers in my hair. I whimper.

“Shh, shh,” a gentle voice—Mara’s—whispers.

With no other choice, I ever so slowly relax again, pinned softly to the bed by and cradled against Mara. My face is pressed against her neck, inhaling her scent. The chains are gone—even with my prodigious channeling abilities, maintaining magic through, I shudder, that , is absolutely impossible. No way.

The bindings on fingers are also gone, the ribbons never meant as serious restraint and unable to withstand whatever I was doing. The gag is gone too—I have to assume Mara removed it at some point though I have no idea when—and my throat is raw. I can feel tears on my cheek. My sense of time is on vacation. My core aches from half-spasms.

And I still fucking need to cum .

“Oh, you’re back to whining, starling.”

I try to respond but decide that words are hard and just cling to her comforting, strong, beautiful form instead, feeling lithe muscles flow beneath her skin. Her hand presses against my stomach and then I gasp as the tendrils of ice retreat through my body. Finally.

“Do your best to hold on, dear,” she orders softly. “It would be a real shame to waste all that effort, mhm?”

She pulls back slightly, leaving me lying on the bed, slipping down, face between my legs.

Her tongue runs along my ever so slowly and a long, loud moan forces its way free from my lips. There’s nothing rough about her now as she winds me back up, long and dextrous tongue slow and gentle over my sore sex.

Even if Mara wasn’t absurdly good at this, I am more worked up than I thought was possible and it takes her what may have been literal seconds before I’m gasping and clutching at the sheets, doing my best to follow her orders.

“Gonna,” I pant, “gonna cum.”

She slows because of course she does, but compared to the euphoric torment of before, the gentle edging is, well, gentle. Up and down and up and down, so warm, moaning and panting with my eyes closed and fingers in her hair and legs around her neck.

I’m only vaguely aware, drifting at the edge of release, as she swaps from using her tongue back to her fingers and crawls up next to me. Her free arm cradles me and she takes me up and down and then up and up and up up up up, every muscle tense as I struggle to hold off release.

“Cum for me,” she commands, whispered breath dancing over my ear.

I let go, fall apart in her arms. I let out a choked gasp of pleasure, tongue out and closed eyes rolled back, my body spasming almost painfully and arching as a wave after wave of bliss washes through me, filling me from toes to fingertips.

I’m floating in an endless ocean of warmth, unable to control a muscle as who knows how long of teasing and edging and torment washes over in a wave of release.

Instead of letting me crash down, Mara drags it out, guides me down with slow fingers and a mastery over me until spasms turn to twitches and I fall limp in her embrace.

I’m not sure I could move if I wanted to and my whole body aches. I just want to lay here, with Mara stroking my feathers and hair. With great effort, I manage to wrap us in my wings, meeting her smiling eyes.

“I love you,” I whisper.

She responds with a teasing twinkle in her eyes, “I love you more, starling. Now let’s sleep.”

Closing my eyes is just a matter of letting my body do as it wants and I fall asleep listening against Mara’s chest to her heartbeat.

I wake up the next morning—afternoon—to Mara cooking breakfast—lunch, more sore than I’ve been in years and covered in a variety of bruises, from her teeth and her fingers and the chains and who knows what.

After a brief moment of consideration, I heal none of them as I whimper my way over to Mara, only realizing when she stares at me that I am completely nude.

For quite possibly the first time ever, I’m too thoroughly fucked to even be embarrassed, not speaking of aroused.

“Good morning, darling,” she says with a chuckle. “Satisfied?”