Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Two, Part Two

 Notes: Short but sweet! Enjoy it while it lasts, muahahaa ;)

Title: Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Two, Part Two

***

Chapter Two, Part Two

 

Being with Elanus was incredible. It was also…strange.

Kieron bit his lip against a gasp when Elanus pressed his teeth to the inside of his wrist, just enough pressure to make his fingers spasm a bit. Elanus lifted his lips just enough to say, “Mm, don’t be quiet,” before he started to gently bite his way up the sensitive inner skin of Kieron’s arm.

This spot hadn’t been an erogenous zone for him before. True, he hadn’t been with many lovers, but no touch of any kind to the skin of his arm had made his body light up like it was on fire. After his first time sleeping with Elanus since…the event, he’d gone back through his medical records to see if there was something that could explain it—a transplant, maybe.

Total integument regeneration. He’d had to have his skin regrown after taking deadly levels of radiation rescuing Catie. Apparently it had come with a few changes…and Elanus knew about them. He knew things about Kieron’s body that Kieron himself didn’t. Kieron wasn’t sure how to feel about that.

“Stop thinking so hard,” Elanus murmured against the bend of his elbow before blowing a raspberry there. Kieron glared and tried to pull his arm back, but then Elanus licked the spot and he ended up gasping instead. When teeth followed tongue, he had to curl in on himself a little to keep from shivering all over with pleasure.

“I’ll always stop if you want me to,” Elanus said as he worked his way higher. It was a little odd being with someone so much taller than him—if Kieron were to wrap his legs around Elanus right now, they’d envelop his chest instead of his waist. “But I hope you don’t.”

“How do you know all this?” Kieron asked—demanded, really—as Elanus finally made it to his chest. He didn’t bite there; instead he began to suck small, sharply pleasurable spots into Kieron’s pale skin. When he finally covered his nipple with his mouth, all Kieron could do was stare up at the ceiling and moan. A pinch and a twist to the other side, and he had to squeeze his eyes shut and stop himself from rutting up against whatever body part his dick could reach.

“I like to learn you,” Elanus said, giving him a moment’s respite a few seconds later. Kieron was quivering beneath him, throbbing with rising ecstasy but not quite far enough along to let go. “I’m a scientist, I experiment. I make hypotheses and run tests.” He bit the side of Kieron’s neck and Kieron made a sound that, frankly, he’d never heard himself make before.

This was another place where they were so different. “I don’t do that with you.” He knew that much about himself. “Do I?”

Elanus shook his head. “No. You like to be shown what I enjoy most, and then do it better than anyone else I’ve ever been with before. I love that,” he added when Kieron couldn’t quite bring himself to look down at Elanus. “It’s good that we’re different. I can be…bossy in bed sometimes, and you let me get away with it. You always make it good for me.” He finally reached Kieron’s lips, but he hovered over them instead of closing the distance. “Is it good for you?” he asked, uncertainty coloring his voice.

How could he even ask that? “You’ve had me on edge since you started kissing me, are you kidding?” A closer look at Elanus’s face tells Kieron’ that his lover is not, in fact, kidding. “Now who’s thinking too hard?” Kieron asked wryly, then tilted his head up just enough to capture Elanus’s lips. He wove his hands into the long top section of his lover’s hair, pulling him closer to deepen the kiss. “I like that you know me,” he said when they separated at last. “I just wish I knew myself as well as you seem to.”

Elanus grinned, then reached down with one hand and—

“Oh, fuck!” Holy fuck, that hurt but it was so fucking good, oh god, how could he like being pinched there of all places, oh god, oh god, oh— “I’m going to come, oh my god, I’m going to—” And then Elanus slid down his body and took Kieron’s cock into his mouth, ran his tongue down the underside of it just so before he sucked hard, and then the pinch tightened and—

He came, hands still gripping Elanus’s hair in bewildered wonder as he shivered and shook with pure pleasure. An echo of it wracked his body when Elanus’s tight grip relaxed at last, and Kieron felt like nothing more than a puddle in the middle of their mattress.

Elanus came back up to kiss him, his own desperation coming to the fore now. “I want your thighs,” he said, and Kieron hummed his assent. It was just a few seconds of shifting, rolling onto his side and listening while Elanus slicked his cock before he plastered himself against Kieron’s back, slid between his clenched thighs, and began to fuck up against his perineum and balls.

The slick made his slide easy but his tip was dripping. Kieron reached down between his legs to touch as Elanus pushed forward so he could feel the head of his cock every time it pushed through. “Fuck, fuck,” he whispered. Part of him wanted Elanus to be inside of him but this was good too, it was so good. Every time he had sex with Elanus was somehow the best he’d ever had, it wasn’t fair that he didn’t remember everything that came before, it wasn’t, but he was so fucking lucky to have it now…

If only he could remember. If only he could remember. If only he could—

“Kieron,” Elanus moaned as he came. “Sweetheart, fuck, I love you.” He wrapped his arms around Kieron and pulled him in tight, pulsing between his legs and whispering endearments and curses in equal measure. Kieron held him back and reveled in his love.

But felt guilty as hell about it, too.

I don’t deserve you. I’m not good enough. I ruin things. I’ll ruin you and the girls. He would if he kept going the way he was, he knew it. Kieron was too ignorant of himself. He needed to relearn how to be the person who deserved them.

Hadrian’s Colony was as good a place as any to start.

Re-release of Shadows and Light!

 

Hi Darlins!

Just throwing out there that I've got a new (re)-release out as of today. Shadows and Light, my high fantasy take on vampires, is back out into the world :) Some of you might remember this one--it published in 2015, I think, and I got it back last year. I edited it again, it's got a new cover, it's SO FUN and also, damn, smoking hot and full of BDSM aesthetics, yowza. I was going through an explicit phase when I wrote this one.

 

Anyway, you can find it here. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D3BK9VKM

And here's the blurb!

A chance for revenge turns into a fight for survival as Rafael, a former assassin, and his immortal master Xian must escape a city on the brink of chaos. But can Rafael trust the one person he thought he could count on, or will their past keep them apart?

Rafael wanted nothing more than to serve his immortal master, Xian, a High One of Clare, who taught him from an early age how to be an assassin. But after failing his final test, Rafael was turned out into the Lower City, abandoned by the one person he thought he could count on.

Years of hatred and thoughts of revenge have fueled Rafael’s quest for vengeance, but when the time comes to strike at Xian, he hesitates and is taken prisoner. Rafael expects to die, but instead Xian reveals the dark truth driving the ruthlessness of the High Ones—the source of their immortality is spent. Soon the city will devolve into chaos as High Ones battle one another and the rebellious denizens of the Lower City for power and resources. Xian wants to spare Rafael that pain, just as he spared him the pain of becoming a High One a decade earlier.

Their only chance for survival is to escape Clare before civil war breaks out. Even if they make it out of the city, though, there’s no guarantee that Xian will live through the agonizing process of becoming human again. They can only rely on each other…if Rafael can bring himself to once again trust the only man he’s ever loved.

Lord of Unkindness: Chapter Three

 Notes: On with the story! Have some retrospective and revenge.

Title: Lord of Unkindness: Chapter Three

***

Chapter Three

 

There are no buses at this time of night. Ciro walks home with his hands in his pockets. He only pulls them out once, to check his phone and make sure his videos have been delivered. Payment is speedy, and he smiles with satisfaction as he sees the money appear in his account. Fifteen thousand dollars will keep him going for a long time—it’s a pittance compared to what he used to make, but he lives more simply now.

Once I made fifty thousand dollars for proving a politician was sleeping with his opponent’s wife.

He walks for almost two hours before he finally makes it to his current slice of paradise, a third-story walk up that smells like mildew. There’s a lock on the front door of the building, but it’s just for show, and when he walks in he sees two men talking furtively in the corner. They’re doing some sort of drug deal, and one of them puts a hand on the knife at his hip as he makes eye contact with Ciro. Ciro just shakes his head and starts climbing the stairs, leaving them whispering to each other down below.

Once I made a hundred thousand dollars for proving a vegan cosmetics company was using animal products in their signature line.

Ciro’s door does have a lock, which yields quickly to his key. He tries not to use magic now when he can help it. It always leaves his fingers numb, and he’s already practically lost feeling in his hands after the stunt he pulled in the warehouse. He lets himself in, closes the door, and leans against it for a moment with a sigh. His feet hurt.

Someone taps on the window. Ciro smiles, then heads over to the single-pane glass and pushes it up. The frame screams from years of rot and swelling, but the window rises nonetheless, and then his ravens are hopping inside. One of them caws.

“Quiet,” he says. “Jesus, there’s five of you? Shut up before you draw attention to yourselves.” Five is more than he’s allowed around him at once since he first went on the run thirteen months ago, but he can’t bring himself to drive them away. Having them so close is a comfort, and his hands are already starting to tingle now that he’s surrounded with his own power.

It’s a nice feeling. Comforting. Decadent, even, after so long apart.

Once I made two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for following a man to a secret rendezvous with a foreign agent.

One of the birds pecks his hand, and Ciro waves it off. “I’m fine.”

Peck.

“Knock it off.”

Peck-peck.

“Fine. Fuck, you’re worse than Mom.” He swallows around the lump in his throat and goes to the tiny fridge in the corner—it’s a studio apartment, so no separate kitchen. He gets out the remnants of a smoothie he bought a few days ago and chugs it. Hydration and nutrition, all in one go. He throws the empty bottle in the trash, then looks at his birds. “Happy now?” There’s a mutinous light in their eyes, but no one does any more pecking. Instead, they set up a preening chain, working on each other’s feathers with a single-minded devotion that sends simple pleasure reverberating through Ciro’s body. He groans as he falls back onto his futon—ugly as sin and lumpy as hell, but it came with the place—and finally lets himself relax.

It’s hard, living on his own like this. It’s only getting harder. Not making a living so much, he’s got that handled, but even there he’s got to be careful about drawing the wrong kind of attention. But just…the solitude. The loneliness. He misses his family, even though so many of them are objectively awful. He wishes he could see his mother again, not that she’s capable of recognizing him anymore.

Once I made half a million dollars for finding a man who was looking for a new life. I found him, I gave his new identification over to the people who were searching for him, and I looked away. When I looked back, he was gone.

Ciro tries not to feel sorry for himself. He knows he doesn’t deserve it. The way he grew up, so privileged and powerful, so sure of his own superiority for so long, he knows better than anyone just how little he deserved pity, much less compassion. He was used by his family, sure, but he’s not an idiot. It took a damn long time for him to discover his own personal breaking point, and many lives were ruined by his work before that. Even knowing what he does about the last job he did, he still might not have run if it weren’t for the decision they forced on him.

“Nephele will be a perfectly acceptable match,” his father said from behind his desk, not even meeting his son’s eyes.

“She’s a psychopath!” Ciro burst out as he paced. He’s been unable to sit, and frankly couldn’t understand how his father could be so calm either. “She tried to murder Annette!”

“That was regrettable behavior,” his father allowed, “but she didn’t succeed.”

“Annette is still dead.”

“An unfortunate accident.” At least his father did look genuinely regretful about that. “She would have been the ideal partner for you, obviously, but…”

Ciro whirled so fast he dislodged his bird from his shoulder. “Nephele is my first cousin.”

“Cousin marriages were common in much of the world across most of history.”

So were fucked up babies, not that his father would care. Ciro tried a different tactic. “She hates me.”

His father had smiled. “Oh, that’s where you’re wrong. If she hated you, she’d have tried to murder you, not Annette. Nephele loves you very much, and you can turn that to your advantage.”

“I can’t.” He’d shaken his head. “I just…I can’t marry her.” When he thought about touching Nephele, about being forced into a relationship where they’d be expected to procreate, his stomach nearly turned itself inside out. “Father, please, don’t make me do this.”

Double growls started up behind him. Ciro didn’t have to look to know that his father’s Dobermans were on their feet now, ears pricked as they readied themselves to punish him. Ciro flinched. He’d been punished by his father’s dogs before, hard enough that he still had scars.

“Ciro.” His father got to his feet and came around the desk to him. He framed Ciro’s face in his hands, leaned in close, and said, “This is your only option. You need to make the best of it.”

“But—”

A sharp nip to the back of his calf almost sent him to his knees, but his father’s grip on his head was suddenly unbreakable. “There is no ‘but,’” his father had told him. “No ‘or.’ You will do this, for the sake of the family.” He’d patted Ciro’s cheek, hard, then let him go. Ciro had staggered so hard he almost fell then, and his raven cawed with concern.

“You should have chosen crows,” his father said as he went back to his desk. “They’re so much more maneuverable. Hopefully your children will do better, with someone like Nephele as a model.” He’d raised his eyes toward Ciro once last time, and they were as devoid of emotion as he’d ever seen. “Now get out.”

Ciro’s drawn out of his memories by the sound of footsteps in the hallway. He sharpens his hearing—two sets of footsteps, and a familiar whisper of voices. The idiots from downstairs. He can smell the knife—freshly oiled, well cared for. He can smell the alcohol on their breath, the liquid courage they used to come after him. All because, what, he saw them doing a drug deal? Paranoid fuckers.

They stop outside his door. Count down from three. Ciro lazily lolls his head in that direction. His ravens stop preening, going from fluffed to sleek, and—

The door slams open—slams, but makes no noise when it hits the wall. Two birds fly into their faces as they charge into the room, beaks precise, wings brutal. It takes fewer than five seconds for both of them to lose the ability to see. One of them screams something in another language—Polish, maybe? and tried to grab and slice, but the raven is like smoke, melting away the second his fingers touch it. They peck and beat until they’re half the size they were when they started and the men have dropped their weapons, hands up and quivering as they try to protect their brutalized faces.

Two more birds fly straight at them—and into them. Straight into their chests. A moment later, the men stop screaming. They stand up and lower their hands, and Ciro stares with satisfaction at the pure black of their eyes.

“Take them for a long walk,” he says, and his magic obeys him, turning the men around and sending them back the way they came. They’ll wander through the night and into the day until his magic finally runs out, and when they finally revive they won’t know where they are or how they ended up there.

They certainly won’t remember Ciro.

They leave, and the door shuts behind them. The two diminished birds merge into a single large one, and the fifth raven comes over to perch on Ciro’s shoulder and begin to preen his hair. It’s pure comfort, and he smiles even as his hands go numb once more.

Once I made fifteen thousand dollars exposing a fraud who was tormenting his brother in exchange for power.

Now that…that’s a good night’s work.

Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Two, Part One

 Notes: CATIE STOP MESSING WITH THE BED!

Title: Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Two, Part One

***

Chapter Two, Part One

 

Their bunks were made of reformable materials that could rise up from the floor or extend out from the wall, or some of each. Catie had complete control over the design, which meant that when they decided to snuggle up, she could create the right configuration easily.

It also made it very easy for her to mess with them.

“Catie,” Elanus sighed after she made the bed smaller for the third time in a row. “We don’t need to be squished against each other to go to sleep. It’s better if we aren’t squished together, honestly.”

“Buuut this waaaay you’ll be warrrrm!”

“You have control over the temperature,” Kieron said. “You can ensure that we’re warm.”

“Buuut this waaay—”

“Catie!” Elanus’s voice was unusually sharp. “Make the bed normal and then stop monitoring us for a while. Run some calculations on the things we might find when we get to the colony.”

“But Daddeeee!”

“Catie…”

“Fine,” she grumped. The bed expanded by another foot, but also fell two inches at the same time, nearly banging their heads together. The cabin lights dimmed, the air immediately cooled, and a blanket fell out of the ceiling—out of the ceiling, when did she move it up there?—and on top of them in such a way that it hits their heads, not their bodies.

“Great,” Elanus muttered, throwing the blanket open and covering their legs as best he could. “Now she’s pouting. Just what we need, a pouty ship.”

“A pouty daughter,” Kieron said.

“A pouty child. Honestly, what does she even want us to do?”

“Get along, of course.” What did every child want from their parents? “Didn’t you find it reassuring when your parents acted friendly toward each other?”

Elanus laughed. “My foster parents, you mean?”

Oh, right. Elanus had been given away by his parents as a child once he was diagnosed with Elfshot. “Sorry,” Kieron said awkwardly.

“It’s all right. My foster parents were actually pretty good people. They had another child with Elfshot, so they didn’t get caught up in my health complications. Their kid was great.” He sounded wistful. “He used to follow me around all the time, trying to do whatever I did. I was eight years older, so I wasn’t always nice about it, but he was so sweet. Jayse died when he was five, though. Aortic aneurism.”

Kieron swallowed the “sorry” that tried to jump out of his throat. Elanus didn’t need more apologies for the sadness of his life. He needed—well, he deserved—a happy future. Kieron wished he could give it to him. He wanted to give it to him.

He just wasn’t sure that he could yet.

“I don’t know anything about my father,” Kieron offered after a moment. “Apart from the fact that he wasn’t a soldier. He wasn’t even a member of the colony. My mother was negotiating on behalf of the colony for supplies with several Central System planets, and when she came back she was pregnant.”

“I’m a little surprised that was allowed.”

“Oh, they wanted women to have babies,” Kieron said. “They actually wanted to set up a cloning facility, but they couldn’t afford the equipment for it and it’s illegal in the Alliance anyway. I think if they’d made their mark as mercenaries for hire, that was the next step.”

“A cloning facility.” There was a wealth of judgement in Elanus’s voice.

“I know, it’s a terrible idea. They didn’t care, though. All the general wanted was to be able to make as many good little soldiers as possible.”

Elanus hummed thoughtfully. “And yet the colony’s population never even rose above a thousand.”

“Right.” Kieron laughed. “He wanted a personal army, but he was also incredibly racist and didn’t want to let anyone into the colony who didn’t look like him. Not a visionary, that man. But he was a hell of a fighter…or at least that’s what they taught us growing up.” He remembered the propaganda holos they were shown every morning in class—all about how magnificent their fighting force was, the wars they’d turned the tide for, how amazing their tactics and armor and weapons were. When they all grew up—aka made it to age thirteen, which was when they could officially join a unit—they would be part of the greatest army the universe had ever seen.

The reality was a lot less grand than that. They weren’t freedom fighters, or even mercenaries—they were scavengers picking at the edge of larger conflicts or vulnerable communities like a school of sharks, nipping and biting where they could but swimming away whenever things got hot.

“It was all bullshit,” Kieron said. “All of it. I knew it when I lived there, but I really understood it once I could do research on my own. My grandfather was a complete failure on his home planet, which was a tiny place on the Fringe to start with. He couldn’t hack it in their military, but he idolized the service. He used his inheritance to buy an antique ‘fleet’ of three ships and persuaded just enough like-minded idiots to join him, then set themselves up as tyrant kings on the colony. Even then, nothing was ever good enough, until finally he pushed too far and…”

“Boom.”

“Boom,” Kieron agreed. “He pissed off the wrong senator and paid for it.”

“And so did you.”

So did we all. “Let’s talk about something else.”

“Okay,” Elanus said easily, then leaned over and cupped Kieron’s face with his broad, elegant hand. He tilted up his chin and kissed him, slow and deep and possessive, and Kieron promptly melted into a puddle.

Good thing they were lying down.