One Of Us [MF] [fantasy] [long] [plot] [rituals] [gentle mdom] [passionate] [wholesome as fuck]

*This is a standalone story with recurring characters. You can find other ones featuring these guys [in my profile]( https://www.reddit.com/user/cresserelle/comments/gxvp4t/list_of_stupid_stuff_i_wrote/).*

***

It was near sunset. Though it’s been drizzling throughout the day, and clouds still rolled heavy through the sky, it was warm; typical fickle Kontarian summer. The weather would definitely not deter the festival bonfires, which were now starting all throughout the Ritual Field.

One went up by the forest wall, where some three dozen people were already gathered. A young man named Aerin sat on a wooden log and watched the wind foam the tall grass. It was strange that life was carrying on as usual. So much had happened over the past few months, so much had changed.

Someone patted him on the shoulder, and sat down by his side. It was his friend Moyna, and her crooked smile.

“Watchya thinking about?” she asked.

“Stuff,” he replied.

“Where’s Gabrielle?”

Aerin smiled. “She’s with Haedde, getting ready.”

“Excited about the ritual, is she?”

“Kind of stressed, but that only makes her put on a brave face.” His smile grew dreamy. “You know what a dork she can be.”

“Why’s she stressed? Nothing scary about it.” Something about Aerin’s expression made her pause. “She knows how the ritual goes, right?”

He tried to look innocent. “She’ll find out.” Moyna said nothing for a moment, then smirked, and jabbed his ribs.

“You’re a dog, Aerin. You seem nice, but you’re such a fucking dog.” He had the decency not to deny that. “So funny though. Would you ever have believed that someone like her was going to be initiated? I swear, life is ridiculous sometimes.”

“Yeah.” He leaned back, and gazed at the heavy clouds passing overhead. “You know, that’s what I was actually thinking about. Life can sometimes be ridiculous.”

***

Picture this: you are born to a princely family. You are brought up in a strict and puritanical society. Though your instincts rebel, you can see that your life will always demand a closely scrutinised outward correctness, and that your heart’s keen desires will always have to be a guarded secret. And one day, completely unexpectedly, you get an opportunity to abandon all that. You tear yourself from the luxuries, the palaces, from your own noble House, and leap into the unknown; and, still not quite believing what has happened, you end up on the floor of an actual witch hut, in Kontaria of all places. What gives?

Gabrielle corrected herself. Haedde was not a witch. She was a shaman. There’s a difference, though Gabrielle wasn’t entirely sure what it was.

Either way, this place was slightly alarming. It was a circular wooden hut, with one window, a sunken fireplace in the middle, and… lots of stuff. Dried roots, herbs, cloves, sticks of bark, bleached bird skulls, clay jars, mortars and pestles, mushrooms on strings, bear claws, sacks, caskets, beeswax combs, gourds, jay feathers, sets of fine copper tools, salt crystals, grains of incense, and at least one stuffed toad. All of this was either stacked on the shelves, or hanging copiously from the ceiling.

No less alarming was Haedde herself. She was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front Gabrielle, tossing scrying pebbles, and muttering to herself. She looked to be roughly five hundred years old. A thin wisp of smoke from a small censer was swirling around her. She was surrounded by tiny mixing bowls filled with dyes. Her fingers were stained, red and blue and black.

But most alarming of all was Gabrielle herself. She was seated in her skimpy knickers alone. Alright, undressing in front of strangers isn’t exactly calming, but Haedde was after all a physician of sorts, so Gabrielle could swallow that. Most physicians, however, don’t paint all over your skin with runes. The cryptic letters now covered her thighs, stomach, breasts, back, and shoulders, dense inscriptions in red and blue and black.

Picture this before moving on, because it’s a memorable sight: Gabrielle was a good looking girl, enough so that she’d been treated with suspicion by the morally upright, who just assumed she’d be given to earthly pleasures and enjoy leading young men astray. (They’d been totally right, but that’s incidental). Her light blond hair had been shorn mid-way through her neck. Always fond of active pastimes, she had a fine, toned body. There was something steely about her, a fight response to feeling anxious – a straight back, a curl to her lip, an attentive glint in her dark blue eyes. And on top of all that, the runes.

The runes were a part of the ritual. In less than an hour, at sunset, Gabrielle was to be initiated into the community of Kontaria. She hoped that the ritual itself, at least, wouldn’t be as alarming. Aerin had assured her that she’d actually enjoy it, but was for some reason vague on its details.

Haedde determined something from how the pebbles fell and grabbed Gabrielle’s wrist. With another low, throaty incantation she painted three new, short words.

“We are almost done.” Her voice was gravelly and sure. “We only need one last answer: who should we thank for bringing you here?” Gabrielle did not understand, and only blinked. “How does a high-born lady from Harmen end up on my floor, getting ready for her initiation? What spirit drove you here?”

“Um.” Yeah, right? Good question.

Aerin was largely to blame, of course. When the Kingdom of Harmen was going to war with Kontaria late that spring, she never thought it would affect her pre-planned future, a noble wife in some splendid palace. But one day, fates threw a young Kontarian prisoner of war into the dungeon of her castle. She just had to sneak around and get to know him, didn’t she. She just had to discover that he understood her better than pretty much anyone in Harmen, didn’t she. She just had to break him out and run away with him, didn’t she. That’s exactly how you end up in witch huts.

“I couldn’t just let Aerin sit there in chains. They were going to kill him.”

Haedde inclined her head, but her gaze remained fixed on Gabrielle’s eyes.

“Compassion, then? Very well. And… he’s a handsome lad, isn’t he, our Aerin?”

“Excuse me?” The pitch of Gabrielle’s voice was an answer enough. He wasn’t handsome, he was flat-out gorgeous. It’s that unruly auburn hair that gets into his clear blue eyes, and that enthusiastic grin, and, lady, you should see him naked, you should see his lithe body, you should see the way his abs flex when his hips buck forward and he plunges into you—

On second thought, Haedde was this village’s healer. She probably poked around Aerin’s body ever since he was a little kid and was perfectly aware how it looked, hopefully except for that last part.

“Compassion and desire,” Haedde surmised. “A heady mix. They drove you to help him. But was it them, too, that made you run off together with him?”

Again, Gabrielle had no good answer. This was certainly not a kind of conversation she was used to having. Also… Haedde was a priestess of sorts, after all, so she surely didn’t just openly mention sexual desire? Maybe the word had less explicit overtones in the Kontarian dialect than it did in Harmeni. Yeah, it probably did.

“I don’t know… I think meeting Aerin just made me realise that there were people in the outside world more alike me than my own compatriots.” Who found her urges natural rather than threatening, for starters.

Haedde smiled. She took a little wooden box, and with a tiny bone spoon she transferred a bit of orange powder into a small clay bowl. She then added a smidge of water from a diminutive copper pot, and with her last clean finger mixed it into a thick paste. The dye ready, she poked Gabrielle right over the heart. A true physician’s approach to personal space, Gabrielle thought, trying not to flinch. Those weren’t letters that Haedde was drawing on her now – it was an abstract symbol, of circular lines and simple geometric forms.

“A tiger sigil,” Haedde said. “Not very many tigers left in Kontaria. Pity – beautiful creatures, especially in freshly fallen snow. We associate them with courage. Do you know why courage is important?” Gabrielle wasn’t sure if she was expected to actually reply. Haedde placed one final stroke of paint and looked her in the eyes. “It’s because it enables change. And this is our one purpose in life. All things grow.” She nodded, picked up the bowls, and stood up. “Wait until the paint sets, then we go.”

A short while later, Gabrielle put on her dress. It was such a small thing compared to the chaste and lavish garments she would wear in Harmen. Knee-high, short-sleeved, thin. But those were typical Kontarian summer clothes. She supposed that once she got used to it, she would no longer feel so exposed.

“Here, carry this,” Haedde said, and shoved a flat clay bowl and a sealed clay flagon into her arms. Back in Harmen, Gabrielle had servants to carry things for her. Well, okay. This she could get used to as well.

Strange shaman. Strange letters. Strange clothes. Gabrielle got lost in thoughts as they walked towards the Ritual Field. It was a ceremony to welcome her in her new home, but none of this felt too homelike. The path turned among the ferns by the forest’s edge, bypassing the village. Soon, the fire-dotted field appeared in front of them; and before long, they reached their gathering, and walked in among the people.

Gabrielle sought out Aerin’s eyes. His knuckles were at his mouth, the flames were reflected in his pale blue eyes, and he looked dangerously close to bursting with pride. She cracked a smile, and tried not to think too much about the small crowd now looking at her. Fortunately they were all here for the festival night, and not solely for her, but until whatever this ritual involved was done she’d have to endure being the centre of their attention.

She already knew most of these people – at least the faces. Remembering their strange Kontarian names was a whole other challenge. Most of them were Aerin’s friends or family, but three present village elders in bright colourful robes and beaded necklaces lent an official air to the occasion.

Haedde exchanged a few words with the elders. In the west, beyond the hills, the pallor of the sky gave way to a vivid orange. Sunset. A liminal time. Neither day nor night. A time for change. All things grow. The shaman turned to Gabrielle, and cleared her throat.

The ritual turned out not to be alarming at all. Haedde filled the bowl with a dark, brown liquid from the flagon. It was that sour millet wine, fairly strong, that the Kontarians seemed for some reason to enjoy, and used especially copiously for ceremonial purposes. She then offered the bowl to everyone in turn. “One of us,” some chanted. Someone started beating out a steady rhythm.

Aerin took his sip, trying not to laugh. So did that girl with a crooked smile – what’s her name again? Then Aerin’s best friend – who only went by his nickname, Leapfrog, for which Gabrielle was very grateful. Tassilo and Fina – these two names she had to remember, Aerin’s parents. Last of all, Haedde handed the bowl to Gabrielle.

“One of us. Bottom up, girl.”

There was not much of the wine left. Gabrielle took a deep breath and poured it all into her in one go. Cheers erupted around her. This stuff wasn’t as bad as when she’d first tried it, she thought. Maybe she could develop a taste for it eventually.

“This is done, then! Kontaria accepts you. Now, in the second part of the ritual, it is up to you to accept Kontaria.” Damn, there was more to this? The shaman looked around the crowd. “Shall I carry out the rite, or is anyone willing to take this up?”

Aerin must have been waiting for this. As soon as Haedde spoke, he hugged Gabrielle from behind, and smiled brightly over her shoulder.

“I’ll do it!” he offered. Haedde looked at him, stern-faced.

“Yes,” she said. “I suspected you’d like to.”

There was a brief outburst of good humour as Aerin rolled his eyes.

“Did something hilarious just happen?” Gabrielle hissed into his ear.

“Not really,” he whispered. “We’ll need to take a little walk for this, I’ll explain on the way.” He was a bit too upbeat. Something was definitely up.

To her relief, the people’s attention was slowly turning away from her. A small barrel of oat beer appeared from somewhere and was being opened. That one man with a very clear voice was fiddling with his lute, looking up to the clouds for rain. But some people still wanted a word with her – surprisingly, first among them was one of the village elders.

“One more thing,” he said. “Though you were of an enemy nation, you have saved one of ours. And the information you gave us helped us end the war with fewer losses. As such, we want to give you something on this occasion. To show you that we’ll remember.” He held out in his two hands some sort of a folded cloth. She only had to look at its colours to know what it was. Purple, white, gold. A flag of Harmen. A prized war trophy that they must have won from the invaders’ camp. Gabrielle looked for something to say, but the man just smiled, patted her once on the shoulder, and walked away.

Leapfrog offered some congratulations and bad jokes, as did a bunch of other vaguely familiar people. Then Fina appeared by their side – a very comely woman in the typical Kontarian way, streaks of grey in her light brown hair. Without warning, she gave Gabrielle a big hug. It felt… homelike, kind of.

“I’m so happy to have you among us, kid.”

It turns out that if you rescue your significant other from a dungeon, their parents end up really liking you. This trick always works, and it’s really surprising that it isn’t used more often.

“The family from Hakkandi is here, I’ll introduce you. But we’ve got all night for that, so don’t worry, you two don’t need to hurry.”

And then finally Aerin managed to nudge her towards the trees. A song was breaking out by the fire – some folk nonsense about a girl raised by strict parents sneaking out to dance. It was pretty catchy. Even the cat observing from under a pine tree was bobbing its head to the rhythm.

Seated on a log, Leapfrog watched the pair retreat among the trees. Someone walked up to him. He looked up and saw Moyna, drinking from an ale keg she’d been the first to procure.

“Oh, look at them,” he said. “Improbable lovers, united despite all odds.”

“It’s so romantic it makes you want to retch.”

“Makes you want to kick their lovebird arses.”

Moyna took a thoughtful sip. “Kinda makes you horny too, though.”

“Yeah.” He tapped her on the hip. “Hey, fancy a quick fuck before the bards warm up?”

She calmly finished the deep quaff that she’d been in the middle of, then pulled him up by his shirt.

“Yeah, sure. Come on.”

***

The pathway inclined up among the trees. It was getting dim, but real darkness wouldn’t fall for a long time yet. The ferns slid damp along their knees. Aerin put his hand on Gabrielle’s waist.

“So, how is my Kontarian girl feeling?”

She smiled, flatly. “Like I’m playing dress-up.” She looked at the runes which covered her forearms. Go figure, a lifetime of elite education, and at nineteen she ends up illiterate. The runes were so alien, the colours in her hand so familiar. “I’m Harmeni, Aerin. To the bone.”

His good cheer did not falter. “Yeah, you’re Harmeni. Nobody wants you to deny that. But now you’re also Kontarian. It’s not one or the other.” She gave him a sceptical look. “We’re not greedy for pure bloodlines, okay? You should see the seaside villages, where merchants come from all over the world and sometimes settle. Kontarians of all shapes and colours.”

“I’d like to go there… I’ve never even seen the sea, you know?”

“What?!” he stopped, abruptly. Harmen was huge, but it *was* landlocked. He’d never thought about this before. “Okay, right as the weather turns, we’re taking two days off and riding to the beach. You’ll really like that, I promise.”

“Okay, okay.” She smiled more openly now, and glanced back. “The shaman lady is pretty intense, isn’t she?”

“Haha, yeah. But you can trust her, really. Remember, if you ever need to talk or something, she’s always there with her herbal teas. For you, too.” She looked at her feet. He’d been doing this ever since they came here – introducing her to people, pointing out who was helpful and trustworthy. As literally the only person she knew in this new life, he could wield a great power over her, to make sure he was the only person she trusted, make her depend on him. Instead, he did everything he could to ferret out and dispose of any power imbalance between them. She wondered if he was even aware of that, or was it too obvious for him to consider. She unconsciously hugged him closer.

He sniffed her hair. “Mm. Incense. Hey, show me your flag!”

“It’s not a flag, it’s a banderole.”

“Same difference?”

“No, a banderole is very long and narrow. It’s attached to a knight’s lance. A flag is attached to a flagpole. Flags can be large standards, which have their own bearers and are super important, or regular battle standards, usually banners but sometimes also pennants. Remember that banners are different from gonfalons, because a gonfalon does not display the arms on its tailed part, as a banner does, and usually hangs from a horizontal bar, and is more ceremonial really. Though a royal banner of arms is technically a gonfalon, of course, and also has its own bearer, traditionally the most senior knight of the Order of Algar. A banderole can be flown off a building if you really want to, but it’s a social blunder to do so if you have some other flag available, a pennant or better.”

“Huh,” Aerin said.

“Yeah.” She unfurled the banderole. It was longer than a man’s height, but no wider than a hand. It was made of fine cloth, tapered as it went, and near its wide end – there it was, emblazoned with a golden thread. The royal Eagle of Harmen.

It was the coat of arms of the country, and of the royal family in particular. It also featured in the arms of its cadet branches. Such as her own, the noble and ancient House of Lhamedos.

She’d ridden under the sign of the House of Lhamedos many times, with her parents or alone. The people in the streets would gawk at it, and stand wonderstruck. And she would look from above, power and prestige radiating off her, aloof and awe-inspiring.

Yeah. She was kind of going to miss that.

She sighed. They entered a lush grassy clearing, where several massive old oaks with pale, almost white trunks grew. Aerin stopped. Gabrielle shook off the memories.

“Okay, fine. Guess I’m now really the Tiger of Kontaria, the fiercest warrior in the land!” She put her hands on her hips and the banderole, which she’d tossed over her shoulder, fluttered like a cape in the wind. She was kidding, but he actually sort of agreed. That whole dungeon breakout was the gutsiest thing he’d ever seen, and she’d done it for him. “Well, anyway. What’s the next part of the ritual?”

“It’s about binding your body to the land, making yourself one with the soil, sort of. You know, like you ceremonially eat something raw that’s grown out of Kontarian earth, show that you accept the land’s vitality as a part of yourself.”

“Okay, got it. So should we find some berries or…” Her eyes narrowed. “Why are you smiling like that?”

He slowly strolled over to her, all the while looking to the sky with great innocence. “Well, eating is not the only way to accept something raw and Kontarian into your body. For example, for the sake of the argument, let’s just suppose that some Kontarian were to ceremonially come inside you.”

She chortled. Of course. Of fucking course. “And this other way is shaman-approved?”

“Oh, yes!” He was suddenly totally earnest. “I think most new people go for the cum. The ritual is just more fun that way. Eating a girl out counts, too.”

“Kontarian rituals, man.” Should have seen that coming, really. She leaned against one of the trees and looked at him with glee, when a sudden realisation struck her with sheer horror.

“Aerin?”

“What’s happened?”

“All those people at the gathering… are they assuming that you’re going to give me berries or the dick?”

He shrugged. “Haedde could have given you some fruit right there on the Ritual Field, no? It’s kind of obvious.”

“But. Like.” Her voice was remarkably tiny. “All those village elders were there. And your friends.”

“Yeah?”

“And your parents.” Oh gods fucking above. *‘I suspected you’d like to.’ ‘You two don’t need to hurry.’*

Forced now to consider something he’d been taking for granted, he blushed a little bit and rubbed his neck. “Gabrielle, we’re fully grown, and we’re a couple. Literally nobody here thinks that we just hold hands when we’re alone.”

She now sort of wanted to sail even farther away, and breed goats in the mountains somewhere, and never to be seen or heard from again. She’d been brought up to be chaste and undefiled by desire, to serve her family well. And even after that desire awakened in her nonetheless, and she chose to heed its call, it always had to follow a secret path, of furtive looks and whispered conversations and climbing up windows in the dead of night. And no matter how much she rebelled against it, the shame was always there, crouched like a cold toad on the bottom of her mind, a silent reproach planted by all those goodly priests and tutors and nannies that she’d looked up to in her childhood.

To be openly acknowledged as a sexual being, so publicly and so casually, was not at all something she had the mental tools to deal with.

He watched her, surprised. Clearly, there was a lot about Harmen girls that he still needed to learn. She was one of the bravest people he’d ever met. She’d walked her own forbidden path in the Kingdom. When push came to shove she challenged Harmen, stood up to it, saved both him and herself from its clutches, the danger of death be damned. And now here she stood, eyes shining bright against crimson skin, embarrassed to her core like a teased kid.

He felt bad for her, but without a doubt this was the most fiercely adorable thing he’d ever seen.

“Hey, come here.” He hugged her close, kissed the top of her head, and rocked her gently. “Oh no, poor girl’s dark secret is out. Now everyone knows she enjoys her some cock.”

“Gah!”

“She probably even likes it when you touch her clit! No doubt she even touches it herself, thinking about naked people! Wow, what a terrible pastime that’s also enjoyed by nearly everyone else, Gabrielle you giant dork!”

“Will you shut the fuck up?” She was chortling again, which considerably weakened her request.

He let her go and seized at the lacing of her dress. All it took was one knot to untie, one buckle to undo, and off the slight thing went. Fucking hell, taking off a proper Harmen gown took about half a secret rendezvous. They could still hear distant music from the Ritual Field. She looked around, to make sure nobody was coming. Embarrassment still gnawed at her, but arousal was rearing up strong.

The cloth band that supported her breasts offered no resistance either. It came undone behind her back, and then furled away; she felt like a gift unwrapped. He greeted her breasts with a greedy smile and a fond little squeeze. She put her hands flat against the bark and sighed softly as he pulled down her underwear. This was a feeling she’d always liked, of fabric dragged eagerly down her thighs. It was the point of no return for good times.

Having freed her of her clothes, he stepped back a few paces. He folded his hands on his chest and chewed on his lip.

She was slouched back against the tree a little, the corners of her pelvis bucked sharp forward. It was clearly unnecessary for her to be as gorgeous as she was; it was a luxury of nature, completely extra. From her graceful legs to her full breasts to the edges of her cheekbones to her fair hair, she embodied a raw and overpowering feminine glory. But on top of that there were the runes, the letters of his homeland imprinted on that body, on that peak achievement of Harmen. And that truly made him burn.

There was something possessive about this feeling, and he wasn’t even sorry. These letters meant that he’d swayed this foreign girl, that this strange and powerful creature was becoming more similar to him, that he and what he stood for was now a part of her identity. And then there was the pure side to his excitement – a simple happiness that she’d found her place. He knew her, and he knew this land. She’d thrive here. He’d helped her get home. She may have had Harmeni blood, but like many unsuspecting people all around the world, she had a Kontarian heart.

“Don’t slouch,” he said suddenly. “Stand proud.” She gave him a needling little scowl. “You’re fucking gorgeous and you own this place. There’s nothing in this world grander than you naked. Stand fucking proud.”

She rolled her eyes, but the edge in his voice plunged deep into her. There was conviction there, absolutely irrefutable. Something inside her responded.

He clenched his teeth. There was this look in her eyes, scrutinizing, playful and domineering. There was the lively wilfulness in the slant of her shoulders. There was that swift spright start that her breasts did when she moved. Unbearable. Harrowing. He couldn’t.

He rushed at her, and before she knew what was happening he grabbed her shoulders and her knees and swooped her off the ground. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and the world blurred as he whirled around and brought her out under the open sky.

“Hey!” he shouted at the clouds. “Hey spirits! Fiery Ones, Shimmering Ones, Quaint Ones, Low Ones! Have you seen our new girl? Have you ever seen anyone so fucking awesome?!” Wind bustled in the treetops. Sparse raindrops dipped on his face. He looked down at her and tossed her up in his hands. “You’re making the sky wet,” he said.

His voice was normally mild and pleasant. It wasn’t difficult to get an embarrassed blush out of him – something she liked to take advantage of, because those were wicked cute. But he absolutely was a passionate person within, capable of vibrant emotions. When the inner fire is burning, creatures of passion can be unyielding, acting as if possessed. Right at that moment, Aerin was positively ablaze.

He leaned down and dropped her on the ground. She flinched as her hands and buttocks landed on the soggy grass, but her attention was quickly drawn back to him. He undid his belt and pulled his shirt over his head; she watched the play of his abs as his body briefly stretched and twisted. Now successfully bare-chested, he chucked the shirt aside and swiped the mess of his auburn hair aside. He kicked off his shoes and trousers with about two decisive moves. Normally all those clothes would try to slow him down, but at that moment they obeyed him perfectly. The universe knew better than to oppose him, at least until he took out his energy on something.

Gabrielle realised that the something was her. Her entire body trilled with excitement. She wasn’t even aware of it, but she lowered her head, and her widened pupils really brought out the light in her eyes, and her face set into a smile that was very slight and yet extraordinarily intense.

Scholars have named this phenomenon the “fuck me eyes.” It did utterly nothing to calm him down.

He dropped to his knees by her side, and she followed with great interest the jolt that it gave to the jutting bulge in his underwear. She expected another hug, but instead he put his hands on her shoulders, pinned her to the ground, straddled her, and with his mouth helped himself to her breasts.

This further contact with damp ground made her skin break out with gooseflesh, and he smiled as his lips traced the tiny hard bumps on her lovely, soft warmth. He took her nipple in his mouth. She moaned, closed her eyes, and the back of her head fell heavy on the grass. He took turns sucking her and tickling the nub with the tip of his tongue – when suddenly, a snapping stick somewhere nearby made her eyes shoot open.

“Aerin,” she whispered. “What if someone comes by?”

He let go of her nipple and landed an overbearing kiss on her breastbone. “They’ll know that we’re here and won’t bother us.”

“How could anyone know we’re here?”

He straightened up. His lips, chin and throat were stained with her body paint, like a predator stained with his prey’s gore. He gave her a bright, reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, you’ll be loud.”

Her laughter was a little enthusiastic, and a little outraged. “Boy, you’re being quite insolent today.”

He cocked his head. “Is that courtly vocabulary? Are we feeling high and mighty?” She slapped at his chest. He grabbed her wrists and pressed them to the ground. She couldn’t stop laughing. She writhed and struggled under his grip, and to her satisfaction found how much stronger he was. His torso was hunched up above her, bulking up his lean frame. His muscles were clearly defined against his skin. His chest was flexed, casually overpowering her attempts. She eventually stopped moving, and lay more or less calm. She felt warmth and wetness between her legs. Sweet merciful gods, she needed him to fuck her so bad.

Above her, he shot her a relaxed smile. “Are you done? Will you be a good girl now?”

He was so worked up under that surface calmness. His face could mask it, but the oblong bulge of his underwear, now seeping liquid through the fabric at its end, would not. There was only one thing she could do. Work him up even more.

“Never,” she snarled out. His smile broke into a gleeful grin.

“Yeah, that’s my girl!” he said, let her go, and tousled the shit out of her hair. “She’ll fucking never let anyone bully her!” Laughter choked her, and all defence she undertook was vaguely raising her hands above her face. He swept her hair away, kissed her, and stood up.

“Okay, stay there. If you won’t act right, I’ll just make you.”

She rolled over, wheezed, and knelt up. The drizzle was slowly intensifying. “What has gotten into your idiot head now?” He walked over to the tree where he’d undressed her, and picked up the banderole. “What are you doing?”

He got back, knelt down behind her, grabbed her wrists, and pushed them up to her shoulder blades. Then he wrapped the banderole around her elbows.

“Oh, you wouldn’t dare!”

“Who’s stopping me?” he asked, amiably. He weaved the flag up her forearms like a shoelace, and wrapped it tight around her wrists. “This okay?”

“Harder,” she spat. She winced as he sharply pulled the ends and tied a knot. Oh gods, with her own royal colours. That delightful bastard will pay for this. But not today, not today.

There was still a decent length of fabric left. He turned her around, wrapped it anout her neck, and tied a neat bow at her throat. Then he sat on his toes, put his hands on his cheeks, and looked at her with a dreamy smile.

“You look like a piece of chestnut cake wrapped for the Iris Festival.” Slightly bowed forward by the contraction of her arms, she gave him a death stare. “Hey, can you move around in that?” He stood up and stepped away a little. “Come on, try to get here!”

“What, on my knees?”

“On your knees.”

“Are you daft!”

“If you make it, I’ll let you suck my cock.”

She leaned down and growled with exasperation. Her face felt hot, her heart raced, her mouth watered, she was wetter between her legs than anywhere actually exposed to the rain. This had no right to be as hot as it was. Why, just why.

She straightened her back and looked upwards.

“Oh, just and gentle spirits of the forest, strike him down with blisters for this villainy.” She glanced at his taut underwear, at that prominent, diagonal bulk. She stuck one knee forward, then another. She inched on, kneecaps skidding on moss, trying to balance with her shoulders, muttering swearwords. At last she reached him. She looked up at him. His hands were folded on his chest, and he raised his eyebrows.

She sighed, lowered her eyes, grabbed the hem of his underwear with her teeth, and carefully pulled down. It took a lot of laborious twisting of her upper body to pull the cloth off his unhelpful hips, but nothing could make her give up on her prize. Eventually, she succeeded. His cock sprung up free right above her eyes. She leapt up after it and greeted it with a kiss. A small drop of precum landed on her cheek.

She almost tipped over; he finally came to her aid and grabbed her lightly by the shoulder. Thus steadied, she tilted her head and took him in her mouth.

A shudder of delight went over her. The hardness, the girth, the shape – it was such a satisfying thing to feel. She rocked her head back and forth, relishing the sense of her mouth being penetrated, and moaned softly. He smiled with affection.

“You needed that, didn’t you?” A quiet agreeing whimper answered him. He gently stroked her hair. “You’re such a good girl, Gabrielle. Look at you. Such a perfect little cock slut.”

His teasing wasn’t the worst part. His obnoxiously justified smugness wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was just how much she agreed with him. She intended to give him a light graze with her teeth, just to remind him to behave, and found that she couldn’t – because she *was* a perfect little cock slut, and it was her duty and pleasure to service him, her master, that idiot dickhead. What should have been annoyance became just a darker shade of delight. She glared up at him, and there was everything in that glare: an admission of her total surrender; a promise of a terrible future vengeance; the playfulness of two friends sharing an inside joke; the dead seriousness of basic, animal desire.

He held that gaze for a very long moment. Then he slowly withdrew from her mouth; she let him go, denied but docile, and her mouth was left half-open after his glans popped out. He put his fingers on her chin and lightly shut it, and wiped her lips with his thumb.

“Alright, enough of that. Wouldn’t you prefer to be fucked full on?”

“Yes.” It’s amazing how much enthusiasm can be packed into one hoarse syllable.

He knelt down, seized the sides of her defenceless ribcage, and nudged her forward. She entrusted herself to his hands, and he brought her down until her cheek and her breasts lay on the muddy moss, her knees still on the ground and her buttocks up. She breathed heavily, half-stunned by anticipation. He fondly patted the back of her neck, and all she was able to respond with was a slight curl of her eyebrows.

“Now that you’re sitting pretty,” he said, hobbling over behind her, “let’s… oh. Oh, girl.” He chuckled, with a great tenderness. “Girl, what’s all this?” She was drenched, her swollen labia dripping with clear liquid.

“For you,” she managed. He leaned in and kissed that sloppy mess, and then slipped one finger inside, feeling around, gliding free on that lavish coating; she squealed, a gorgeous clean tone.

He bit on his lip. It had seemed like a fantasy come true, to bring home a princess from an enemy land, to read desire in her eyes, eyes that could weigh him against some of the noblest sons of a whole kingdom. But, well, there’s one problem with a fantasy becoming reality – it is kind of a lot to live up to. He was, after all, still the same Aerin, an ordinary Kontarian boy, with all his vulnerabilities and insecurities still living happily inside him.

Except, except, she knew that. She’d met him when he was downcast and hopeless. And still, knowing the human in him, she could look at him like he was a god. When you have a believer like that, a believer that you respect and that you’ve been honest with, it’s surprisingly easy to be a god. You just need a little inspiration, a little enthusiasm, and some of that, how did she put it? Insolence.

He grabbed her by the hips, adjusted her, and dragged the entire length of his shaft over her wet clit. She whined, and ground her cheek into the wet earth. “Please put it in me,” she complained. The tone of his chortle assured her that this was exactly his plan, but now she was overcome with an urge to beg. “Please fuck me. Please use me. Please take over my body. Be my master? My lord?”

He listened to the outburst with growing delight. Is there anything in the world hotter than enthusiasm? No, there fucking isn’t.

“That’s some court titling again. Did you speak like this to all your Harmen boys?”

“Only the really awesome ones.”

He placed the tip of his glans in her slit and pushed just a tiny bit, pressing against her opening. It filled him with a primal satisfaction to see his cock right where it belonged, ready to fulfil its purpose.

“Aerin, please. What do you want me to say? I’ll fucking say it.”

“Say nothing and wait. Good girls are patient.”

She could have just backed up a little and he’d slide right into her, but that wouldn’t do. She needed him to impose his own will on what was happening to her. So she kept still, under the blunt pressure of his glans, and politely waited until he deigned to claim her.

At long last she felt him tense up, and for a split second the awareness of the imminent and inevitable penetration blazed white hot in her mind, an utter and absolute agreement. Then all at once he was inside her, whole, brimming her with total fulness, forcing out of her a loud, ecstatic whine.

“Thank you,” she managed, her idiot desire to grovel clearly far from satiated.

“See? Now where’d all that bashfulness go?” He reached in and stroked her hair. “You’re way too good for that. And way too slutty.”

Her eyebrow twitched. “Wow, I’m being so good, and you’re so rude.” She felt his index finger land on her inner thigh, glide up, and circle her clit.

“Excites you, doesn’t it? You gigantic softie.”

“Fuck me, you jerk!”

He grabbed her shoulders and shifted his weight onto them, pressing her hard into the soft moss. His hips jolted with pure animal energy. He slammed into her with decisive, deep blows. She heard the sounds of her subjugation, of skin clashing on skin, of her flesh parted by his onslaught. More importantly, she felt the hot, hard, stretching fulness, coming and going as he invaded and receded from her. Her spine curled, her legs writhed apart, her whole body made a determined effort to gift itself to his.

“Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me…”

She chortled, hardly believing the begging, desperate tone she heard herself produce; and yet it furiously turned her on, this airing of her vulnerability. She repeated the words, over and over, and thought with delight how insufferably smug they must have made him feel, how reassured of his total mastery of her.

He was, indeed, going slightly deranged. Her embracing his sexual energy so eagerly was by itself breath-taking. But there was something more, something that made him feel soft even as his thrusts rose rough and raw and ruthless. He recognised the trust she was putting in him, and the courage that this required of her. Courage not only to toss aside the caution and the pride and to suffer herself to be sexually dominated, but also to sincerely confess her joy with these beautiful, whole-hearted sounds. He dug his fingernails into her collarbones, and fucked her with all the passion she deserved.

*[continued below]*

Source: reddit.com/r/eroticliterature/comments/k2tuau/one_of_us_mf_fantasy_long_plot_rituals_gentle