Harrow's Wife Ch. 01

"Tell me everything you know about the Bond," he said, slowly rubbing her belly with his right palm. His hand was warm and the contact intimate but not demanding. The closeness of his naked body was awkward but it did ward off the chill of the autumn evening.

"What did you want to know?"

"Why is it needed? Why would a sorceress ever need a Bond? Doesn't she have enough power even without it?"

She took a moment to collect her thoughts. Why would he want to know something like that?

"Well, there are different kinds of power, and each kind is best used for certain things." She wondered if that would satisfy him.

"Go on."

"Okay...um...so the main source of power is her own energy. It's the sort she's most familiar with so it has the widest variety of uses. It's a very flexible option, and her comfort with it lets her use it very efficiently. Creatively too, once she's experienced."

"Isn't it tiring, using your own energy?" he said.

"That depends on what you're trying to do. Simple elemental effects - fire, water, earth and air - those are the easiest and require the least energy."

"Why is that?" His hand was making wider circles now, rubbing below her navel as well as above. His touch felt pleasant against cool skin. She relaxed against his chest a little more.

"Because there are no resisting forces. Nothing to create opposition to the wielder's will."

"Okay."

"Complex forces - like weather, for example - are a lot harder to control and require a lot more power. That can get exhausting after a while. Magic affecting living creatures is the hardest."

"Why so?" His slow-stroking hand increased its range further, higher to the bottoms of her breasts and then lower, grazing the upper reaches of her pubic hair. She surrendered the new territory without complaint.

"Life always creates resistance. It's in the nature of living things to resist change," she said.

His left hand came around her body and cupped her left breast, teasing the nipple idly with his thick thumb. She instinctively tensed at the bold touch but he didn't withdraw it.

"That's why you needed my consent to attempt the Bond?" he said.

"Yes. Passive resistance is hard enough to overcome, but active resistance is very difficult."

"So what's the purpose of the Bond? Why was it needed, originally?"

She struggled to arrange her thoughts as increasingly pleasant sensations competed for her attention. Her left nipple had grown stiff under Harrow's thumb and tingled with the friction of each stroke. His right hand was roaming freely over her stomach and upper thighs, leisurely seeking out and heating any cool patches of skin.

"Well...remember I said there were different kinds of power? The Bond allows a sorceress to add someone else's power to her own, or to change the locus of her power. Instead of power springing from her own body, she can cause it to manifest though her Bond-mate's."

"And that's how you plan to get around the brand," he said. His breath was hot against her neck, raising goose bumps. "You're going to have the magic spring from my body instead of yours."

"That's the idea. I've never tried it myself. Just heard of it being done."

"If you've never been taught to do it, how do you know what to do?" he said. His right hand gently tapped the inside of her right thigh and she absently spread her legs wider as she arranged the answer in her head. These were hard concepts to explain to the uninitiated!

"When you use magic for long enough you get an intuitive sense of it. So even if I don't know how to do something, I have a pretty good idea of how it SHOULD work."

The fingertips of his right hand were gently caressing the top of her slit and she grew warm in response. His left hand was pinching and rolling her left nipple firmly and she found herself wishing he'd pay attention to the other one, too.

"So...personal power, the Bond...what other types of power are there?" He punctuated his question with a soft kiss on the side of her neck. Shivers coursed down her back. She forced herself to focus on his words as his hands wreaked havoc on her concentration.

"The most potent one is freed life energy. When something dies, it releases a lot of energy. You could do...pretty much anything if you had enough of that."

His fingers slid between her pussy lips, then up to graze her clit, wet with her juices. Her breath came more rapidly and she instinctively spread her legs further.

"When we create the Bond, how long do you think it will last?"

"Uh...maybe...a day? Maybe until dawn the next day?"

"What makes you think that?" Harrow's wet fingers were skillfully brushing her clit. His other hand had moved to her right breast, teasing the nipple erect.

"Wha...what?"

"What makes you think that?"

"The world...operates on cycles. Day and night..." She gasped as his hand squeezed her right breast firmly. His fingers were moving in faster circles on her clit. Her skin was burning. She could feel his cock, hot and hard against the small of her back. She remembered the feel of it inside her the previous night; the fullness as it stroked easily in and out of her.

"So...the Bond will last until one of these cycles ends?" he said.

How could he still be asking questions? Surely he could tell the effect he was having on her body. She felt a tension slowly building in her sex. A tightening, a quivering.

"Harrow...don't stop," she breathed.

"I won't."

Then something inside her gripped hard and she moaned. Her pussy spasmed uncontrollably, pushing waves of pleasure through her hips and radiating out to the rest of her body. It didn't last long, but it was the most wonderful sensation she'd ever felt, blotting out everything else for a few blissful seconds.

When she regained her bearings she was on her back. Harrow was above her and his cock was sliding easily into her tight sheath and somehow it was the most natural, most welcome sensation there could be. He began thrusting into her roughly, as she'd asked him to the previous night.

She wanted to touch him. She extended her hands, found his arms on either side of her head and followed them up to his shoulders. She could feel his strong muscles working hard to support his exertions. His cock was stirring up delightful pleasure inside her and scattering it throughout her body.

"Get ready...for the Bond," he said, his voice strained and breath laboured.

The Bond - how could she have forgotten? She opened her awareness to the energy around her and could almost see it swirling and building around the two of them. She gathered her own power in response, aware that only the slightest trickle of it would escape the dampening effect of the brand on her skin and hoping that that small amount would be enough to invoke the Bond.

The pleasure between her legs made it difficult to focus, but that same pleasure - the mingling and interaction of her energy and his - would add to the effect if she could get the timing right.

"Now!" He grunted, slamming his hips against hers with uninhibited lust, then holding himself deep inside her. She could feel his cock thicken and pulse as he climaxed.

At the same time she released her power in a massive torrent, seeking a conduit into Harrow.

And then it was over. He lay on his back gasping for air and she was on her side, her fingers stroking through the hair on his chest. Somehow, the intimate contact no longer seemed threatening or embarrassing.

"Did it work?" Harrow asked once he'd recovered his breath.

"Only one way to know. Hold your hand out in front of you," she said.

Suddenly the dark room was illuminated by a faint blue aura that covered Harrow's right hand like an unearthly, shimmering glove. The stunned expression on his face drew a laugh from Gwen.

It had worked!