The Pirate King Ch. 07

But not at me, I realized. His gaze was steadily boring into the man who had been sparring with me seconds before. When he reached me, he turned those eyes to me, giving me a thorough look-over. "Did he hurt you?" he asked, poking and prodding at my chest, my stomach, those eyebrows so close together I thought they would fuse.

"Captain," I said, amused. He didn't stop so I captured his wrists gently.

He gave a sigh. "He didn't, then."

I gave a quick puff of laughter. "Sir." He looked up at me, smiling down at him, and sighed again.

"I know," he told me, and I believed that he might, "I know, I just don't like seeing you -" he waved a hand towards the still mass of men, watching us with fascination that bordered on terror. Or perhaps terror that bordered on fascination. The Captain let out his breath in a huff. "Why didn't you come to see me, like I asked?"

It had not been a request, and we both knew it. "I want to spar you."

"Why?"

"I need to know you can take care of yourself when I leave."

He stared at me. "I can take care of myself."

"I know," I told him, pulling his wrists to my hips and hoping he would hold me. His hands rested lazy on my hip bones and I felt a calm pass through my body. "But I still want to see."

He took that in, fingers tapping on my bones, sending ripples through the calm waters he had created. "You could have asked."

I shrugged, smiling. "I could have."

I almost got a smile for that. "Okay." He broke from me then, moving away towards the practice blades, and a part of me tried to follow him. But when I recognized his trajectory I shook my head.

"No," I said quietly. I tossed Natch my wooden blade, walking over to retrieve the belt the Captain had given me. His eyes followed me, confused, a little worried. "Not wood."

He crossed his arms. Around us, the men began to murmur.

I didn't care what the men had to say. I needed to know that the Captain could fight. I needed to know that, when I left, he would be capable of taking care of himself. Not with wood, against wood; against steel, against a real fighter. Men fight differently when they're faced with a true edge, as much as they deny it, they fight more true. And that truth was what I wanted to get at tonight.

"Ghost." Natch came up behind me as I collected my blade. "The men -"

"Are nobodies," I reminded him. "Captain?"

He shrugged, but I could see the concern he carried on his body. He would fight; I knew he would.

"Still having fun?" I asked Natch quietly.

"Just don't want you to get hurt," he replied, just as quiet.

"I won't let him hurt me."

"That's not -" Natch shook his head. "Ghost, if you hurthim."

I looked over at the man waiting for me, surrounded by men that might be mine or might be his, but were probably ours, waiting under the lowering sun. The red light was catching in his curls, tangling up and forgetting which way it had been trying to go. It gave him the appearance of a halo of blood.

I smiled. "I don't think I can."

I heard Natch sigh behind me as I made my way over to the Captain.

He stood easy there in the sun, waiting for me. Waiting for the motions my body would bring to him. This was so different than the motions we usually used with each other, and yet felt so familiar, felt so right. I suddenly realized that this was a long time coming, we'd been working towards this ever since we'd first laid eyes on each other, even if neither of us knew it. "I won't let you hurt me," I promised him again. "And I won't hurt you either."

"I trust you," he said quietly, crouching down, blade held loose in his hand. He held it well, properly. I smiled to see how easy it sat in his hand, and at the words that came from his chest so easily.

"Good," I said, and launched my body at his.

I took him down only three moves in. He pulled an attack halfway through, and I used the vacuum that created to hook his arm and increase his momentum over my hip, slamming him into the deck.

There was a collective gasp, then a moment of silence. I collected his blade from where it had been sent skittering, then crouched beside him, smiling gently. "I thought you trusted me."

"Holy shit," he breathed.

I waited until he seemed to find the wind that I had knocked from his core before standing up. "Come on." I reached a hand down to help him up. "And try this time."

This time, he didn't hold back. We were two brilliant things, or maybe two dark things sucking up all the brilliance in the world around us, masked and cloaked in light with the weighted crushing all-ness of eternity sitting in our cores. That's how it felt like, our two weights somehow greater than our mass, and yet we were so light and ephemeral and nothing could stop us except maybe each other.

The men got out of our way quickly. I think they didn't know what to expect; no one lasted long fighting me, but this was theirCaptain. And he could last, I knew he could last, how many times had he lasted against me? I had learned from him that I had no need to hold back, not like with the rest of these land boys, and so I didn't and they ran to be free of me but the Captain, I heard the Captain laugh even as my knife narrowly missed his cheek.

I immediately understood his patterns, his body, the way he would turn and push and become light only to switch into complete darkness, and I danced with him through all of that and let waves crash against my ears, let my hands become storms, let my stomach carry the entirety of the crushing polar ice fields and he took it all and came back with the permanence of the stars.

I nicked him on the shoulder at one point; he got me back on the chest when I didn't pull back fast enough. Then I landed a blow with the hilt of my blade on his hip, and another glanced past his neck, but that had been a trap and he very nearly threw me.

But in the end, he was still a land boy, and could not keep up with me. He began to tire and made three mistakes in quick succession, one at my expense and very nearly dangerous. When I next had an opportunity, I decided to end it before he hurt himself or me.

The opportunity came quickly. I offered him a good shot at my chest, and he lunged for it, overextending. I quickly dropped my knife to grab his hand, pressing hard into sensitive tendons and continuing his poor momentum choice at the same time, twisting his body so that he would trip over his own stepping foot. He gasped, and I saw shock on his face as he began to go down. It would have been an awkward and painful fall, but I dropped beneath him and caught his torso before it hit the deck.

There was sudden stillness as he just lay in my arms, breathing heavily. I leaned over, my own breath shaky from exertion and excitement, and gently laid a kiss on his forehead.

He suddenly started laughing. I looked at him, concerned, but he just reached up and sunk his hand into my hair, pulling my lips to his for a kiss, and I knew that he had felt all the same things that I had, had seen all the same things that I had, and he loved me and I loved him and we held it all under our skin like the end of the world.

"Holyshit," I heard from somewhere above us. I pulled away from the Captain to find Natch skidding to a stop next to our bodies. We'd somehow ended up nearly across the deck from where we'd started. "You were - and then - holy fuckingshit, can you teach me how to do that?"

I laughed until the Captain pulled me back down for another kiss.

***

The Captain didn't let go of me until we were back in his room, keeping at least one finger on me at any time as we found the knives that had been dropped. There was a brief examination of wounds, but the Captain brushed it off. "We're fine," he said forcefully, his eyes never leaving mine. I nodded, knowing he wanted me all to himself. I grinned as he snapped at the man trying to look at the small cut on my chest and gently guided the man away.

The minute we were alone in his room the Captain turned and grabbed me, kissing me hungrily. I responded, my hands reaching for his body, but he grabbed my wrists and shoved me up against the wall, pinning my hands at my sides. I let him move my body as he wanted; I was his to command.

"Fuck," he muttered, breaking the kiss. "Need my hands, need yourshere."

"I'll stay," I assured him, but he shook his head.

"Not good enough," he whispered against my lips, tightening his hands around my wrists. I moaned into his breath, and he took my lips between his teeth.

"Rope," he finally panted when we broke again. I nodded, and he pulled me towards the chair where the rope still sat, coiled. As we approached the chair a wicked expression passed over his face.

"Down," he commanded. I started to go to my knees but he shook his head, letting go of one wrist to grab my hair. "Get in the the chair."

I didn't move as quickly as I could, letting him drag me to the chair bodily. Once I was seated he began working on tying me up. It was a strange mirror of so many nights we had spent together, but his hands were much rougher, his fingers taking trips to places they would have never dared before. In those nights we were both restrained; now, I was the only one tied down and it was torture. "Sir," I begged him, already vocal with need, but he just yanked my head back forcefully and kissed me into silence, then tied my feet to the chair legs.

I was crazy with the sight of him there between my legs, so close and yet there was nothing I could do to reach him. As he finished, he ran his hand up my pant leg, fingers so light that I cursed and he smiled a smile so dangerous, so hungry, that for the first time I almost felt nervous.

I couldn't remember ever being nervous before, not ever in my life.

That moment of nervousness somehow kicked my need into overdrive, opening up doors inside of me that had until then been closed. My body leaned against the ropes that bound me, sounds slipping from my lips without me having remembered creating them.

He grinned up at me, then stepped away. I cursed, then cursed again, then fell silent as he began to strip. All I could do was stare as his clothes fell to the floor, as his perfect body was revealed to me. No matter how many times I saw him like this, I didn't think I would ever be used to it. I waited, nearly breathless, for him to come to me.

But he didn't. He just stood there, too far away, un-fucking-touchable, perfect, and all the things building up against my skin were threatening to burst and then I would be nothing, nothing left but splashes of desire over the floor. "Sir," I begged him, "please, sir."

"What?" He pretended to be surprised, smiling that dangerous smile. "Is there something you need?"

"Sir, please, you sir." I couldn't stop to think about if that made sense or not; those were the words that had come, and so those were the words that were said.

"Oh, do you?" He walked behind me, trailing fire with his fingers across my shoulders. He dropped his lips to my ear. "Hard to tell," he whispered, his breath sending me into rhapsodic throes against the ropes.

"Shit," I heard him mutter as he played with the collar of my shirt. "Didn't think about this."

"Fucking cut it," I said desperately, needed to feel his skin against mine, then quickly added, "please, sir," just in case. I was rewarded with a kiss against my neck. I twisted my head to try and find him, but he was already gone.

"Shit, sir. Sir!" But he was walking away from me. I groaned and collapsed back against the chair, unable to do anything but wait.

When he came back he held a knife.

I sucked in my breath, suddenly aware of how compromised my position was. He met my eyes and grinned, and I felt every nerve in my body sharpened by that smile. He put his knee next to my leg, pressed against me dangerously close. "Stay very still," he whispered in my ear, and I almost fell into shudders right then and there. He drew the sharp edge down my chest until it met cloth, raising goosebumps in its wake. I listened to the cloth ripping, muttering quiet curses and pleas to myself and any gods I could think of at the time that my body wouldn't pick this moment to twitch.

He made it the whole length, pulling the two halves of my shirt open to bare my chest. "Good enough, I'd say." Then he got that look on his face again, and he brought the blade back to the cloth. I heard ripping again, and then he held a swath of the fabric in his hand.

He tossed the knife away not bothering to see where it landed. His eyes were on my face, that wicked grin slowly eating its way across his muscles. My eyes were on the cloth in his hand, anticipation building within me at what he intended to do with it.

He put his other knee up on the other side of my lap so that he was straddling me. I gasped, feeling his chest press against mine, his cock slide across my pants, over my own incredibly sensitive member, so hard, so close, so far, to come to a rest against my stomach. He wrapped one arm around his shoulder and used the other to smooth back my hair.

He leaned down and kissed me gently. "Close your eyes for me, love," he whispered. I complied and immediately felt the cloth pass over my lids. "Gonna make things dark, okay?" He kissed each eyelid from behind the safety of the the cloth, then stood. I whimpered to feel his warmth leave me. For a moment his fingers lingered on my shoulders, and then he was gone.

I sat still for a moment, plunged into total darkness and complete isolation. I was no longer in a room, but instead in the sea; I floated in cold currents of control and warm waves of desire, the only things I was able to know the things I could feel, the ropes on my skin, the sea beneath it, the screaming need beneath that, and I sat there and felt my heart race as I wondered -

He bit me so suddenly on my shoulder that I shouted, all my attention suddenly crashing in on that one spot, the sensations he brought down on me, and I tried to lean into him but he was gone as quickly as he had been there and I was back in my cold and warm sea of desire, waiting, waiting, and then his fingers gently landing on my hip on the other side and I gasped, but he was kissing my wrist and I cursed and then he was gone again.

He kept this up, lighting up my body and then sending me back into the dark, using teeth, fingers, differing pressures, never setting a rhythm that I could find and it was driving me mad. At some point his fingers hooked under my waistband, toying with the laces, and I tried to lift my hips toward him. His fingers immediately dug hard into my skin, shoving me back into the seat with force. I whimpered and let him do what he would, taking his time with the laces until I felt the waistband loose against my skin.

"Now lift," he told me. I lifted my hips and he slipped my pants down to my knees, exposing my rigid cock to the cold air of the room. "Lift those again," he whispered into my thigh, kissing the bare skin and sending awful shivers of intense pleasure up my spine, "and I will leave you here like this. Understand?"

I nodded furiously.

"I asked, my love." He bit the same spot and I heard a choked noise get mangled up in my throat. "Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," I somehow managed, my voice pieced together from all the bits he had left me. Immediately after I said the words, he was gone again.

"Sir?" I called, unwilling to wait. My body felt so tender; fuck, my soul felt tender. Somehow I was so much more exposed this way, unable to see. I needed him there with me, needed his touch, needed his smell and his lips and his -

"Shh, shh, I'm right here." He pressed his lips to my neck and felt me shudder. "Now, I need you to listen to me, okay? This is very important."

I nodded. I would do anything that he said. I was his, so completely his. If it kept him touching me, anchored to me, then I would do anything.

"Earlier today," he muttered into my neck, kissing me lightly, "you didn't ask to come. Isn't that right?"

My body froze. Ice particles slipped into my spine and spread out into every single one of my nerves at once; I felt like someone had filled my veins with something colder than snow, and yet hotter than the sun.

"I asked, isn't that right?" He bit my neck with considerable force and I sucked in my breath.

"Yes, sir," I managed in that same cobbled-together voice.

"And you need to learn that that isn't okay, don't you?"

"Yes," I barely breathed, feeling his teeth move to my collarbone, "sir." He bit and ice reacted with fire reacted with water and I thought I might fly apart.

"Then here is what you're going to do. You're only going to come when I say you can this time; don't even bother asking. Your body is mine today, and I am in control. You will come when I tell you." Another bite, this time just under my ear, and more bits of me were lost to the sea and the fire, but he was still talking and I struggled to listen. "Do you understand?"

I had to breathe for a bit before I could make the words. "Yes, sir."

I felt him smile against my skin. "Good. Then we can finally get started."

Shit, I thought. What had this been, then? I had almost come undone at only this, if there was more...

But my attention was suddenly demanded by the fact that he had disappeared.

"Sir?" I called out, desperate for him. Terrified of the spaces that existed without him, the possibilities they carried. When he didn't respond, I turned my head, trying to listen for him. "Sir?"

Then suddenly his mouth was around my cock.

It took literally everything within my body not to lift my hips to him. My body should have been doubled over, my chest heaving, eyes wide, but my eyes were covered and my body was restrained and the Captain slowly moved his mouth down my shaft and I cursed and felt like begging, although I wasn't sure what I was supposed to be begging for.

He worked my shaft for what felt like eternity and also no time at all, his mouth a terrible and perfect extension to the warm dark that was my everything, his tongue torture against my head and shaft. It was so much that I came very close to coming.

"Sir!" I called out, panicked. He lifted his head; I could feel his fingers digging into my thighs.

"I know," he told me from somewhere in the darkness. His voice was husky, roughened by the things he was doing to me. "I know, but you won't." His tongue licked lightly against the head of my cock and it was close, so fucking close. "Will you?"

I cursed and tilted my head back, trying to find some oxygen that hadn't already been sucked out of the space around my nose and mouth by my greedy lungs.

"Collect yourself, my love," and his words were not unkind, but instead a serious suggestion, "because we're going to do something fun, and I really, really don't want to have to think up another punishment."

"Yes, sir," I whispered around all the fire his words had slipped into my soul.

He stood and kissed me, a soft teasing press of lips and tongue that was gone as soon as it had landed. I tried to follow him as he left, but of course I didn't know where he went, and of course the ropes kept me still, and he was out of reach and out of the world of darkness that he had put me into. I heard him moving around the room and tried to wait patiently, but it was so hard, so difficult. I was about to call out for him again when I heard him put something down at the desk next to me.

"Love," he said, and his voice was close and dangerous and I gasped to hear the chords of my own feelings mirrored in that single word, that powerful word. I expected him to say more, but instead he climbed onto my lap and slid his ass over my cock.

"Oh shit," I voice as I realized what was happening, "oh shit, oh fuck."