Castle Town, page 8
Petra nodded slowly. “That confirms what I suspected. For reasons I do not understand, Makoa, you can see into the realms beyond the veil. Perhaps it lies in the nature of your Sabantian bloodline, or… Makoa?”
He’d begun to rise again, once more thinking of finding Ruby or his mother, or that new Verity, or Gods, even Zentallion. He couldn’t sit still with this energy pulsating through him, pulling on the tip of his hardened manhood like the cord of the fates.
“I’m sorry, Petra, but it’s… hard for me to hear you just yet,” he muttered. “Later, we should speak more on this. But I must go and…”
“Makoa.” Petra stood up, leveraging her speed as an esper to come around to the other side of him. “I cannot, in good conscience, allow you to leave this room. I will need you to calm down and aid me in undoing the delirium that Zentallion has infected you with.”
He laughed and shook his head, even though he recognized the truth of her words. Infection carried such a negative connotation. It was more as though Zentallion had stirred to life what was already there, reminding him of his emotions, his nature as a man, in its truest form. Truest and perhaps grossest form, but the sensation was not one he could deny.
“Her power, in part, allows her to paint emotions upon the soul in broad strokes,” said Petra. “Fear or anger, or in your case, desire. It is not a subtle ability, but it can be… tremendously effective. Makoa, please sit down!”
“Petra, I have the utmost respect for you and all that you’ve done for myself, my mother, and our family,” he said. “But I must now order you, as your prince, to step out of my way and let me… go find Ruby. Or Gods, even Rebethia! Well… perhaps not Rebethia, but there were a few pretty faces among her entourage and—”
“I would be betraying your mother’s trust if I let you out this door.” She set a hand on his chest, trying to gently push him backward. “Focus on breathing deeply. In… and out.”
On some level, he knew she was trying to help him, but that fact did nothing to alleviate his annoyance. He sighed and tried to simply push past her. Petra was quick to reset herself into the doorframe, and as Koa tried to slip by and grab at the door handle, all he managed to do was press his body into hers.
She tried to push him back, and they briefly grappled with each other. Not in a violent manner, more like a couple persisting in a dance after far too much wine. Petra tried to get her leg around his, perhaps intent on tripping him, but it only brough Koa’s erection into blatant contact with one of her thighs.
“Oh!” Petra’s eyes widened and she froze… leaving him with an opening.
He set his leg and twisted much the way that she had, thinking he could toss her behind him and be out the door in a series of motions.
Petra didn’t release her grip on his shoulders, and they fell onto the bed together in a tangle of limbs. She let out a hiss of annoyance as they continued their wrestling, both angling for a position that might allow them control of the situation.
“I will tell your mother about this spat of bad behavior, Makoa!” she growled.
Koa twisted, grabbing Petra in a full body hug from the side. “Tell her whatever you like. I’ll make the proper sounds and all will be forgiven.”
“You… are a spoiled little princeling!” snapped Petra.
“And you’re an interfering esper!” he shouted. “I’m not about to let you stop me from…”
He twisted in the same instant Petra did, putting them in an interesting, borderline compromising position. Her robe had ridden up and his lower half was pressed into hers. She wore a very small pair of girl shorts that were fascinating to witness on an esper’s body, but it was the point of his cock spearing into her crotch, blocked only by a couple of thin layers of clothing, that truly stole his attention.
Petra… is gorgeous, he realized, not for the first time. By the Gods!
“You know… I could stay right here in my room.” He rocked forward, humping more than wrestling, breathing the words against her neck. “I think you may yet convince me.”
An odd, sighing laugh escaped Petra’s lips. “Prince Makoa.”
It was the same tone that his mother occasionally used on him when he was being stubborn. He found it hard to decide whether it was annoying or intriguing to hear that voice coming from her at that moment. He knew he wasn’t thinking clearly, but knowing something was a bad idea and stopping it from happening were two very different things.
He kissed Petra, remembering how Zentallion’s mouth had tasted and unable to stop himself from contrasting the two. Petra tasted like sweetened wine. She stole a breath and touched his shoulder.
“You are not yourself right now,” she said. “I’ve watched over you since you were an infant. Always, Makoa, I’ve looked out for you, near as closely as your own mother.”
“Who better to save me in my time of most dire need?” He kissed her again and slid a hand inside her robe. She could have stopped him if she’d wanted to. Gods, she could have flung him across the room with one arm, strong as she was.
But she won’t. She cares for me far too much. Is this insanity, or a stroke of horny genius?
“This is not a genuine stirring of your lust,” whispered Petra in between kisses. “Zentallion’s… power. It clouds your desires.”
He gently pulled her hand downward to rest on his erection. Petra glared at him over a blushing smile and gave it a squeeze. It was all the encouragement he needed. Again, the audacity of what he was doing almost made him hesitate even through the intensity of his lust.
“Makoa,” said Petra, stroking him now even as she made a last plea. “The bond between your mother and I. This is not as simple of a thing as…”
He ran two fingers across her girl shorts. Petra let out a stifled whimper, surprisingly sensitive. Or was she? Koa honestly had no idea how espers worked when it came to acts of passion. As far as he knew, she’d never taken a lover in her time bonded to his mother.
He threaded his fingers into her girl shorts and yanked downward. Petra’s womanhood was a flower of dainty, dark purple lips with a perfect canal of pink, a match for her unusual skin color. Koa ditched his own trousers and undershorts, and the two of them stared at one another for a moment.
“I’ve… allowed this to go too far,” said Petra.
“Save those sorts of thoughts for when we’re finished.” He ran a hand up her thigh and let a finger press into her womanhood. Petra gasped, hips raising upward for him.
So sensitive. Let’s see how she handles something a fair bit bigger.
He positioned himself between her thighs and pressed forward. He felt the tightness and wetness of her cunt enveloping his member… but only for an instant. Petra let out another rather uncharacteristic noise of passion and moved with inhuman speed, almost seeming to snake around him as she twisted and changed positions.
He felt something wet glide across his cock and realized, belatedly, that it was Petra’s tongue. He spent a moment trying to determine which was more lurid — the sight or sensation, before calling it a draw.
Petra’s tongue had never seemed larger or longer than a normal human’s, but she’d managed to wrap it partially around his member, not quite completing a tight circle, but curving and cradling his shaft. One of her hands held his thigh firm, and as she slowly licked upward, she pushed off that leg as though needing the purchase.
It was unreal. If delirium had been Koa’s experience under Zentallion’s power, this was a step into true madness. He never could have imagined Petra doing such a thing. Gods, it would have shamed him to even make an attempt at imagining it, as though betraying his closeness and relationship to her. She was a part of his family. She was his mother’s esper.
Her lips formed a perfect circle as she took the head of his cock into her mouth. Koa let his head fall back, pleasure making some of his muscles tense as though attached to drawstrings. Petra was laying diagonal across the bed, next to him rather than entirely on top of him, but she was still near enough to grab and touch.
He ran a hand down her back, fingers sliding across the delicate smoothness of her violet-toned skin. She froze in mid-suck as he palmed one of her buttocks, and then stopped to let out a breath as he found her womanhood again.
For an instant, Petra seemed caught between closing her legs and spreading herself open for him. Koa didn’t give her a chance to do either. He pulled on her thigh, urging her over toward him, and she allowed it, lifting one leg to straddle his face.
He couldn’t see what she was doing with her mouth and tongue anymore, but what the illicit view had been replaced with was just as erotic and fascinating. Petra’s crotch was bare, hairless, really, but her womanhood was… glowing.
What in the Herald’s name is that?
A tiny violet pinprick of light pulsing to the rhythm of a racing heart illuminated Petra’s cunt from the inside out. It was only visible from about that angle, which made Koa wonder how many others had seen it, if perhaps he might even be the first.
Petra brought her mouth down on his cock, engulfing the better part of it, and Koa’s sense of trailblazing discovery morphed back into a strong desire to hump her mouth. He brought his own tongue forward, licking Petra like one of the sweet fruit sorbets the cooks made and stored in the castle cellars during the fall and winter months.
“Mmm…” she moaned. “Makoa. My… own desires are… not the focus here.”
“They’re entirely my focus.” He planted a kiss on the edge of her thigh, and then the lips of her womanhood. “Your body is telling me you need attention.”
He didn’t rush, teasing more than outright pleasuring, feeling her needs building like the glow of the rising sun. There was a balance to it almost perfectly illustrated by the stack of their bodies, an even back and forth. Koa would raise his hips, letting her sink and suck downward with her mouth. Then he’d kiss and lick, hear her make a vulnerable and erotic noise, lose her focus on his member. She’d regain it and suck again in a perfect cycle of shared rapture.
The violet glow between Petra’s legs intrigued him so, but he couldn’t quite reach it with just his tongue as far inside her as it was. He made to shift, to roll Petra around and see if a certain other part of his body might have better luck, but she gave him a long suck and cupped his manhood in a way that made him keen on the idea of staying right where he was.
He watched the glow speed through its pulses faster in response to his efforts, which to be honest, was rather encouraging to his ego. Petra moaned, and he lavished her womanhood with more kisses, tongue flitting out for one more long lick that made her suddenly jerk.
“Ma…koa!” Petra seemed to curl inward after the initial moment, the violet light pulsing so bright that he almost had to look away.
Again, Koa wished he could bury his cock right up to the hilt inside her cunt, discover if the sense of warmth he thought he could feel was real, or just the heat of the encounter.
But Petra was still sucking, her head bobbing faster and faster now. He grabbed one of her thighs like he might hold one of the railings along the castle stairs, hips flexing as she brought his full length into the hot, wet swirl inside her mouth. Her tongue was still moving, and the seal of her lips was so tight that he could feel the tiny noises she was making humming through his member.
He felt himself going over the falls, so to speak. Katlyn had always gotten irritable when he’d reached his busting point without warning her so she could grab a towel for the mess. Petra seemed to ignore him as he tried tapping her on the small of her back, still sucking with that same eager, loving intensity.
“Petra,” he muttered. “I’m… about to…”
He both heard and felt her laugh slightly. The pleasure rocked through him a moment later, so intense and overwhelming that his body went through a series of spasms. Petra kept her mouth right on his cock from start to finish, the pull of her lips even taking on a more determined quality as she sucked in time with his release.
Perfection. Bliss. There wasn’t a word to describe it, not that he felt much like talking over the pleasure, over the gallop of his pounding heart. He blinked, still feeling Petra slowly sucking as his erection softened in her mouth.
The first thing he became aware of, aside from the obvious, was how dark the room was. The glow between Petra’s legs had faded and he questioned whether he’d truly seen it in the first place. He knew he had, but it was so bizarre and unexpected that it made him doubt the true extent of his knowledge on espers.
Petra shifted, sliding up to lay next to him on the bed. “Are you calmed, Prince Makoa?”
“I… suppose I am.” He laughed and slid a hand down the side of her face.
She kissed his thumb, but gently brushed his touch away.
“I dispelled the effect of the delirium during our… interaction,” she whispered.
“Was that the glow I saw within you?” he asked.
“No.” She said the word in a way that immediately told him it wasn’t a matter she wished to explain or discuss. “How do you feel?”
“Better. Clear headed, I suppose. This delirium that Zentallion infected me with seems like a truly powerful and dangerous bit of magic. She could bring down a queendom if she applied it with a subtle and intelligent touch.”
“Quite easily, if not for the existence of other espers.” She slid in closer to him, explaining in a soft, knowledgeable voice. “It is, in part, why Ostean nobility is so beholden to the practice of bonding with espers. It takes an esper to counter an esper, most often.”
“I suppose it also makes it clear why espers are so feared outside of Osteanus. Why the Estorians ban them from most of their cities and during diplomacy.” He looked at Petra seriously, caught by the immensity of the moment with her still naked against him. “Explain to me again what it was that I saw within the gardens between you and Zentallion.”
Petra’s mouth slowly shifted into a pleased, proud smile. “I am still impressed that you witnessed that, Makoa. The word for it within my brethren’s languages is ezalkamada, which roughly translates to skirmish in the Ostean tongue. We were in the midst of a skirmish for advantage over one another, but in a realm beyond the veil.”
Koa shook his head. “What does that mean?”
“Espers are not simply from a faraway land, Makoa, but a place which cannot be reached through conventional means. We come from a wide range of different realms beyond the veil, but all make the choice to ground ourselves here in the mortal realm, the realm of slow advancement.”
“Why? Why do you choose to come here?”
“I can only answer for myself,” said Petra. “I… had nothing left in my home realm.”
“How did you get from there to here?” He touched her face, wondering about her as he rarely had before. She’d always just been Petra, present and reliable, strange but familiar.
“There are places where the veil is thin, even here in this realm of logic,” said Petra. “Glass Tree Grove, where the Osteans of the bonded bloodline take their pilgrimage, is both an intersection of many realms and a place where the veil is thin enough to be passable.”
“Is that why I could see you and Zentallion tonight?” he asked. “Are the castle gardens another such point of weakness?”
Petra shook her head. “The veil is of moderate strength here, weak enough for a skirmish but far from allowing any eye to perceive our actions in another realm. I suspect your ability to witness it is due to your Sabantian background, my prince.
“The wild magic of the Sabantians,” he said, with a touch of derision.
“Why would you speak of it in such a tone?”
He hesitated, considering the question instead of giving in to a dismissive reflex. “I suppose… all of the stories of the Crumbling Kingdom have left a poor taste in my mouth. The tragedy of mad sorcerers destroying all they’d built through their own folly. It left me thinking that any bloodline magic I might have within my veins would be more harm than help.”
“It is still a part of you, Makoa. Whether you understand it or not. Whether you choose to apply it or not. Never forget that.”
He wasn’t sure he understood everything she was telling him, but he didn’t have to understand, not just yet. Petra rubbed a hand across his chest and slowly rose from his bed. He didn’t stop her and in fact, realized how her absence would likely worry his mother.
“What happened here between us must never be spoken of,” she said as she quickly dressed herself.
“My lips are a locked door.”
“I am serious, Makoa. The bond between your mother and I allows for strong emotions to pass both ways. She may already suspect what has happened here, though without the knowledge of with who. If she ever discovered this, she might perceive it as a betrayal of her trust.”
She absolutely would, he thought. And she’s no idiot. She may yet figure it out.
“I won’t tell her, Petra,” he said. “But if she ever asks me directly…”
“…There would be no getting around it, in that case.” Petra sighed and then let out a small chuckle by his door. “She is much like you in how stubborn she can be when she gets an idea into her head.”
“That she is. Have a good night, Petra.”
“You as well, my prince.” She waved her fingers at him. “You should rest up.”
CHAPTER 14
Avina let her esper sleep in the next morning, despite an overwhelming urge to shake her awake and demand answers. The previous night had left her with too much to think about in all directions.
She fought the impulse to give in to frustration by dressing in a tunic and slacks and seeking out her newest handmaidens. She had Verity serve her breakfast, while summoning Mav to her private training room in the castle underworks for some fencing practice.
“Are you sure about this, milady?” Mav held one of the training rapiers in her hand, looking distinctly uncomfortable with the prospect of fencing her new liege.
“I am always specific in my requests, Mav,” said Avina. “Put your steel up.”
