But then the knight stretched her arms upward, lazily, purposefully, so that the muscles of her stomach and shoulders rolled, and the scholar found himself stepping forward. He stopped only when he stood, hazed and overwarm, between her spread knees.
His hands found her hair—still long, then—and pulled it around her shoulders so that the ends dragged softly over the tips of her breasts. ‘God, Una,’ he said, reverent. ‘I would command you, if you would let me.’ Then, hands tightening in her hair, voice roughening so that it reminded her of his old jackdaw’s scrape, ‘I would serve you, if you would have me.’
The knight leaned forward and pressed her mouth to the arch of his stomach, just where the wings of his ribs came together. She felt his flesh tremble beneath her lips and was struck suddenly by an awful terror. He was so vulnerable like this, so fragile. His head was thrown back, and even the skin of his throat was whole and unmarked, though she remembered the slick twist of scars.
She pulled away. ‘Perhaps we should not.’
‘What?’ He blinked down at her, flushed and unsteady. Then his eyes went to her hands, and the knight realized she had curled them into fists, rather than reach for him. He touched the white points of her knuckles, smiling a little. ‘Do you truly think you would hurt me, still? I am not afraid, Una.’
Darkly, she answered, ‘You would be, did you know my thoughts.’ She wet her lips. ‘It is not—gentle, the way I want you.’
‘Ah,’ the scholar said, ‘you’rethe one who’s afraid.’
‘I’m not—’
‘Shall I tell you whatIwant? Shall I make an order of it?’ The knight drew a sudden, sharp breath and the scholar knew he was correct. There was a certain pleasure, God knew, in following orders, in placing the heavy reins of your life in someone else’s hands. All your sins were not truly yours, then; all your unruly desires were safely curbed. But now the knight held her own reins, and her hands shook with the weight of them.
The scholar leaned down so that the stubble of his cheek scraped along her jaw. ‘Take me however you want. Use me cruelly or kindly, as you like. Command me, if you can.’
He smiled as he pulled away, a sly and arrogant smile that made the knight’s fists loosen suddenly. It was a thrown gauntlet, a taunt from a challenger who stepped grinning into the ring. It made a battle between them, and oh—she liked to win.
‘Though I warn you,’ the scholar added, and stroked the back of his hand down his own throat, where his scars had once been, but were no longer, ‘I have a history of mutiny.’
She said, shakily, ‘Then kneel, boy,’ without knowing if it was a plea or an order.
‘Make me,’ he answered, without knowing if he was begging or demanding.
The knight grabbed the hem of his shirt and pulled him to the floor. He went too easily, forgetting to resist. His face was very hot. He could feel his pulse in his skull, his stomach, his cock.
The knight lifted the long hem of her shirt and let her knees fall apart. He said, in some torment, ‘You weren’t—you weren’t wearing anything under—God.’
He stared, trembling a little, until the knight made an impatient sound and reached for him. But she hesitated, hand hovering just before it reached him. Gently, the scholar covered her hand with his and brought it to the back of his head, curling her fingers into his hair.
Then she brought his mouth to her cunt and kept it there.
He came to her ravenously, almost roughly, and she had to pull his hair hard to slow him down, make it last. Still, the sight of him kneeling between her legs—his lips slick and swollen—
She pulled him away from her, panting, thighs shaking.
He groaned. ‘Just let me—you were close—’ Her scholar, always so articulate, was slurring slightly.
She stood, pulling him clumsily to his feet, bringing his mouth to hers. ‘Shh,’ she whispered into his mouth, and felt a tremor move through him.
Then she turned and shoved him down on the mattress. She stripped his trousers roughly from his legs—his fault, for coming fully dressed to her bed.
He protested. ‘I won’t last—you don’t understand how long I’ve—’
The knight climbed astride him. He struggled beneath her, and oh, she liked that. She caught his wrists and pinned them above his head easily, one-handed. He stopped struggling, abruptly, and she liked that even more.
The knight lowered herself onto his cock in one fast, merciless push, and rode him until he lost their first battle. He came hard and helpless, on a hoarse shout.
When the scholar recovered (he did not think he would ever recover), he turned in bed to find the knight breathing very carefully, strangely still.Almost resigned, as if she were accustomed to being used and left like this, flushed and hazy, unsated.
The scholar rolled her gently onto her back and slid his fingers between her legs.
‘You don’t have to—’ the knight said, but she had thought of those long, clever fingers often, almost more often than his mouth.
He spoke into the shell of her ear—of course he did. Of course he would not stop talking, even now, with his hand working inside her and his cock pulsing thickly against her. He told her how good she was, how beautiful, how badly he needed her. He brought her to the very edge—and she hung there, tense and sweating, unable to let go.
