Page 24 of Stitches
Ashmedai helped Levi shift the belt until the sheath was on the correct side. “Feels perfect,” he said, letting his fingers move to Levi’s wrists and caressing the stitches on one and the smoothness of the other. Keeping hold of Levi’s wrists, he caressed more insistently the one with stitches, like a question.
Levi gave a hasty, private nod, like he wanted nothing more than for Ashmedai to do as implied but didn’t want to acknowledge the throng of people around them.
Covertly, between their bodies, Ashmedai lifted the still-stitched wrist and began to run his thumb and middle finger in slow parallel strokes like the first time, the pulse of shadow magic not unlike the deep purple shadows that occasionally clouded Levi’s eyes.
Perhaps Ashmedai completed the motion a little slower than the time before, watching Levi’s face instead of his wrist, and noting theway Levi’s breath caught, high in his chest, with a quiver at his lips. Ashmedai slowed further, drawing the spell out for as long as he could, and he could have sworn a whimper left Levi by the end.
A crash forced a much louder gasp from Levi’s lips—nothing dangerous, just a pile of lumber toppling nearby—and Ashmedai felt Levi start to tug his hand back. Then Levi relaxed, clearly not wanting their contact to end, and both their eyes fell to the wrist and fading shadows.
Smooth. Just like the other.
“Will I see you again tonight?” Ashmedai asked, releasing Levi with a linger of his fingers.
Levi’s entire face looked indigo now. “Yes.”
Ashmedai couldn’t wait.
Levi
Levi stared at the tower ceiling above his bed. The hunt was tomorrow, and though he had trained with his daggers and was reasonably confident in his skills, he had never put those skills to practical use before—unless the daydream with the deer meant more than he knew.
The daydreams had persisted all week, usually just a flash of something he didn’t recognize, a time and place he knew he had never been. The walks with Ashmedai had persisted too and were much more pleasant to dwell upon.
But dwelling was why Levi was still awake at such a late hour.
Defeated, he threw aside his blankets and rosefrom the bed. He could read, but learning something new about the world outside the barrier, or even just indulging in some of the more torrid tomes Braxton owned, wasn’t appealing tonight.
Levi sat in the chair at his window, gazing toward the castle. There was a light on in one of the towers. He wondered if Ashmedai was awake too.
At that thought, Levi touched each of his smooth wrists. He wanted to ask for more stitches gone, but every time the desire occurred to him, they were at the tower door, and he didn’t want Braxton to see.
With a wave of his hand, Levi created an illusion of Ashmedai before him, this time mirroring him in a chair beside the window, reading a nondescript book. Levi’s illusions didn’t include sound, or he’d mimic Ashmedai’s voice as well to read him something. That would be far more appealing than reading to himself, especially when Levi’s mind drifted once more to Braxton’s romances. Some of them got rather heated, and imagining those scenes spoken aloud in Ashmedai’s deep tones made the heat rise in Levi’s cheeks.
Despite having no sound, Levi could do much more with just an image—like shed Ashmedai of his clothing. He didn’t know what the king’s body looked like beneath his garments, but he had often wondered….
No. Levi couldn’t do that. Even if it would only be his imagination, it felt wrong to objectify Ashmedai in that way. The real thing would be preferable anyway.
Dismissing the image, Levi felt equally guilty considering pleasuring himself with the image of Ashmedai still so fresh in his mind, even though he’d already resisted the urge for days, after Ashmedai removed more stitches. The sensation was more than pleasant, it was…pleasurable. He’d noticed even more the second time than the first.
Levi had pleasured himself before. Not long after he first achieved consciousness, Braxton had told him to familiarize himself with hisbody, and Levi had done so. He hadn’t expected to find pleasure when his exploratory touch inevitably led between his legs, but when he started to feel it, to harden and find his breath catching, he hadn’t shied away. No bodily reaction could have been more natural.
He looked again at the castle in the distance and the light on in one of the towers. Oh, to know another’s touch someday, rather than only his own.
Snatching up his cloak but not changing out of the nightshirt he wore to bed, Levi fled down the stairs as lightly as he could. He didn’t know what he was doing, where he was going, but when he reached the bottom of the tower, his first stop was to ensure Braxton was asleep.
Braxton didn’t bother locking the workshop at night, and the door was propped open, allowing Levi to easily peek inside without a creak. Breathing evenly, Braxton lay upon the bed set against the left wall. Beyond him, at the very back of the workshop, was a large black crystal, like the smaller ones, but as immense as the Amethyst gemstone in the market.
Levi had seen the black crystal before, when cleaning the workshop, but every time, he felt more unease being near it. He doubted the Amethyst gemstone, even being the Source Crystal, would make him feel that way, though he’d always avoided it when in the market square, afraid proximity would call more attention to his eyes.
Fleeing just as silently for the front door, Levi soon slipped out of the tower completely and headed down the road. Although night was not truly night, at least not much different than their version of day, the air felt colder as Levi walked, though that might have also been because he was in a nightshirt instead of trousers.
A short walk to clear his head and expend some energy would help him sleep. That’s all he needed. But, as he drew closer to the top of the market steps and the more direct road at his left leading to the castle, Levi wondered if Ashmedai would admit him should he knock on thecastle doors.
Shuffling up ahead drew Levi’s attention to the right portion of the road, where the Emerald carriages came and went through the wood. Levi pulled his cloak tighter around himself as he stared, hoping he was imagining the sound—and the slowly approaching shadow from the wood’s depths.
A figure began to emerge, and before Levi could take it in fully, he darted down the market steps.
What a fool he was to go walking at night! He knew enough stories and whispers of the demon to be aware that the twilight hours when the streets were empty was the likeliest time for people to disappear, snatched up by the demon itself, even if they were nowhere near the barrier. Bedtime stories to frighten children maybe, but then who was coming out of the wood?
