Tour Day: Donovan J. Brooks Brings us a Very Sexy Sneek Peak of his New Release

Foreplay and Fangs welcomes Today's Tour Author, Donovan J. Brooks!

Inspired by characters such as Captain Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter, black and white films, and vintage burlesque, Donovan seeks to capture the forbidden and erotic side of a decade rich with vibrant hues.

He has an affinity for the 1940s, parboiled detectives, murder mysteries, and sexy, sultry dames. Erotic moments can be triggered by a brush of the fingers, a heated glance, or a daring confession. Donovan seeks to capture these scenes and paint them with words. Romance varies but should never be limited, especially when the characters speak in authoritative tones.

 

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Today, Enjoy A Special, Sexy Sample of Donovan's Work!

Spotlight on "When Dark Falls", by Pippa Jay

In a city where Dark Technologies Inc. now runs the show, Kadie Williams has more immediate concerns than the fall of Blaze, their guardian superhero. Almost every morning for the last few months she’s woken up with cuts and bruises on her body, and no idea how she got them. There are no nightmares. No evidence that she sleepwalks, or any sign of a break in. And nothing to tell her who’s been cleaning up after her. As just one of thousands of civilians conscripted to slave away in the labs of Professor Dark, she knew there'd be trouble ahead. But  she never expected it to be so bad, or so personal.

Spotlight on "Scandalous Endeavors", by Amanda Marie!

Lady Amelia’s willing to create a scandal to stay in her beloved England. A Scottish duke ignites her passion, but will she abandon her endeavor for love?

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Thursday Taste: "His Cemetery Doll"

This is a group for writers who want to show short excerpts of their awesome work every Thursday.Please restrict excerpts to no more than 400 words. All genres permitted. A comment on each others work plus sharing and tweeting will encourage everyone to keep going with WIP's. Every writer needs a little help in their aim to succeed in their art so it is not much to ask. Our blog is http://thursdaytasters.blogspot.com

This week, my taste comes from a new project, a story of a haunting. I call it, His Cemetery Doll.

 

Thursday Taste: Another Little Nibble of Satin and Steel!

This is a group for writers who want to show short excerpts of their awesome work every Thursday. All genres permitted and a comment on each others work will encourage everyone to keep going with WIP's Our blog is http://thursdaytasters.blogspot.com

Ready for another round of Thursday's Tasty Treats? Another glimpse at the Lotus Petals sequel: enjoy the opening lines of Satin and Steel: Book 2 of Blood and Fire

 

***

There was a man standing by the side of the Westminster Bridge. He looked positively cheerful under the light of a single lamp illuminating his curious appearance. He stood alone, patiently rocking on his heels and humming to himself. Tall, long-limbed but not gangly, resplendent in darkly-dyed leggings and a jerkin in harlequin's jacquard , black-and-gold, he was quite out-of-fashion with the modern men of London. He might have sprung from a Shakespearean performance on the stage of the Old Globe Theatre. Perhaps he was waiting for someone there, though it was an ungodly hour to be meeting with anyone, even in secret, over the slow and silent River Thames.

The vampire pondered all of this as she watched him from her distant vantage point. She saw him very well, even in the darkness, and took several long moments to appreciate the sight of him, the slim lines of his handsome frame, the wiry grace nearly hidden by his nonchalant posture. His wavy chestnut hair was cropped short, to his nape, but not as short as other men wore it these days. He appeared smooth-shaven, no sideburns or mutton-chops, either. Indeed, he was a peculiar and remarkable sight—one that any common Londoner would mark immediately, and perhaps that was part of the fun of it. 

Her dark, black-cherry lips parted slightly, baring sharp fangs.

The man did not stir as she emerged from her hiding place in the shadows. Even as she quietly strolled up to the bridge, slowly walking right to his side, he never stopped his careful watch of the gloomy night above.

She cleared her throat softly for his attention.

"By the stars above us," the man marveled quietly, his back still turned. "Could it be that an angel of death has chanced upon me?"

"Feste," she grinned. "It is so very good to see you again, my friend."

"And you as well, dear lady."

He finally turned to look upon her, giving her an appreciative once-over before taking her hand, bowing as he brushed his lips against it.

"My dearest Glory Ballantine. You are a vision."

"Flatterer," she scolded. "You might say the same of yourself, standing here in that jester's uniform. Who exactly are you waiting for?"

"Why, you of course, my darling."

His eyes sparkled, and she saw the glimmer of his own two fangs in the cordial grin he flashed her.

"So it must be true then," she purred, taking his arm. "The Councilwoman has sent her agents here to London."

*** 

 Check out our other authors!

Participating Authors

Naomi Shaw  Don Abdul  Pablo Michaels

What are Readers Saying?

Lotus Petals is pulling in more five-star reviews on Amazon! Drop by and see what people are saying! http://tinyurl.com/ozanpnh

 

"This book is very deep and intense at times, and incredibly character orientated allowing the reader to really connect with the main characters and follow their story... The ending definitely left me wanting to know what will happen next, and if love really will save them."

~ Claire Taylor

"This novel is suspenseful, full of rich detail, has complex characters and lots of actions (and not just in the bedroom). I fully loved reading it and am anxious for the next book to be released as this one leaves us with quite the cliffhanger! I NEED to know what happens with these characters next! I give this book an enthusiastic 5 stars! I can't wait for the next book in the series!"

~Sheri L. Velarde

"In Lotus Petals, the author combines an eye for detail with beautiful writing, then adds in an engrossing plot, fascinating characters and a great love story. You simply cannot go wrong with this book."

~Jeff C. Morton

Thank you so much to ALL my readers, for the wonderful response we have received! I'm pleased to announce that I've begun work on Book 2, and hope to have it to you very soon!

In the meantime, please continue to help me spread the word about Lotus Petals, and if you have a review you'd like to give, or just comments you'd like to share, I welcome your emails, tweets, and Facebook messages!

Thursday Taste: "Satin and Steel"

Thursday Tasters is a group for writers who want to show short excerpts of their awesome work every Thursday.  All genres permitted and a comment on each work will encourage everyone to keep going with WIP's. Our blog is http://thursdaytasters.blogspot.com

This Thursday's Taste will hopefully wet your pallets, My Lovelies; in response to the many comments and messages I've received, today I'm posting a sneak peak at 

Satin and Steel:

The Books of Blood and Fire

Book 2.

“You will not find the demon hunting in plain sight down there on Broad Street, ma cherie.”

Rhiannon spun, hand on her katana. Leaning casually against the shadowed side of the chimney-stack, there stood a tall, wild-looking woman. She wore hunting leathers, like Rhiannon, and a flowing white pirate’s shirt.  When the woman grinned, Rhiannon saw the fangs in her winning smile… though she needn’t have seen that to know what she was looking at.

“Oh, silly me,” the creature purred.  “Perhaps it is you who are hunting Broad Street?  Were you searching for a throat to feed on?  I am quite sorry if I have interrupted…”

Real Classical Romance: a Review of "A Winning Streak", by Tea Cooper

They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover. I can't help it; it was the cover that first drew me to A Winning Streak, an erotic release by author Tea Cooper and Breathless Press.

 

 Turns out it wasn't a mistake. A Winning Streak is a real treasure, quick to engage and evocative in its historical setting of Arcadia, amid the rivalry of the Greek Gods. It's sweet and romantic as well as compelling and sexy. Though I have a little insider info on what is expected in erotica, this story still kept me curious about the outcome, and how character's "Winning Streak" would end up.

Commentary: Hunting Grounds

Hunting Grounds is one of my "experimental" pieces: it's the first time I've written gay male romance.  People who have been following long enough will remember that Eat Dessert First is a gay male romance, but Hunting Grounds was actually written first.  I've held it off the blog for a while because I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with it, but I think it's time to let it take its place here with its brothers in the Blood and Fire stories.

Hunting Grounds deals with a character from Rhiannon's world, a male vampire who has not (as of yet) been revealed to be gay in the course of his travels with her.  I didn't want to throw scenes into a book that didn't belong or fit there, just to point out something about this character that didn't naturally come through on its own.  At the same time, I really wanted to try my hand at writing from a gay male perspective, and to give this vampire his day in the sun, har-de-har-har. Hence, Hunting Grounds was born.

To The Victor

Overhead, she could hear the sounds of the enemy celebrating.  It was a raucous uproar, a hundred men dancing on the grave of her master, the great warlord known as Set.  He had been slain by the leader of the barbarians.  His power was broken.  His clan was in chains.

His woman was their prisoner.

Sadira bowed her head, a grim and bitter scowl on her face.  They had captured her and bound her with ropes, tying her wrists and ankles, and thrown her into her master’s bedchamber for their leader.  She waited on her knees on the bed, stripped of her leather armor, left in only a thin cotton bodice and a flimsy loincloth to cover her nakedness. 

But that was nothing new.  She had been slave all her life to Set and his sadistic madness: she had been servant, soldier, consort and victim to his whims, a prize for his pleasure.  To be honest she was glad he was dead;  she had lived on her knees before him, exactly as she was now, and more than once she had wished she could be the one to sink the blade into his heart.

Art Work in Progress

Preliminary pencils for my new work in progress.  This is the first time I've drawn the figures fully nude and 'showing off', as it were; this is especially true of the male figure.  Though I've drawn male anatomy in beginning stages for purposes of spacing and proportion, this is the first time I've drawn the full penis as part of the composition.  Originally I intended to put loincloths on both characters, but after a little thought it would be better practice for me to pursue full nudity.


These two characters come from a short story I will soon be posting, featuring bondage and my first attempts at exploring BDSM and M/s in erotica.

The Forge (Part Three)

(Back to Part 1)

"Your eyes," he said as their lips parted.  "Do you know how gorgeous they are?"

She gazed up at him, and those very eyes were aglow by the light of the forge-fires, burning gemstones.  Her pupils were dilated, fuller, with what he hoped was pleasure; a pink blush rose to her cheeks.

"Kayao," she said.  "I…"

"What happened before, in the church," he said.  "Whatever it was, it wasn't your fault."

She seemed to hardly hear him.  As he fit himself in a little closer between her knees, her hands came up to rest against the flat plane of his stomach.  He was aware that her nipples had stiffened, now clearly visible underneath the thin cotton of the shirt he'd loaned her.

"Kayao, I don't understand."

He gazed at her up and down, taking in the sight of her soft curves and lithe limbs.  When he brought his eyes back to hers, he took her face in both hands and tilted it towards him again for a second kiss.

To his delight, her hands came up, too, tangling in his own dark hair and pulling him closer.  He kissed her more deeply, a little harder, a little hungrier, and she surrendered with a tiny moan as his tongue slipped into her mouth to trace hers.

"You know I can never get the thought of those beautiful eyes out of my head," he whispered.

"You are saying that… you desire me?" she asked.

"Oh, quite a bit."

He continued kissing, twining his arms around her and hugging her tightly against his body.  She leaned into him, pressing her chest against his—and he realized, a little shamefully, that he had grown hard underneath the leather of his breeches.

Before he could stop her, Aya slid forward, slipping off the anvil to press her whole body against him, and she let out a sudden gasp as she felt the weight of his erection nudging eagerly against her soft belly.

"Oh," she said.  Her cheeks flushed redder in the firelight.  "Oh, Kayao, no, I can't…"

"Because of your vows?" he said, feeling a hard, smooth stone fall in the pit of his stomach.  He wouldn't ask her to violate her faith, her sacred beliefs. 

And yet he wanted her so much.  The shape of her body against his, the weight of her in his arms, they felt so perfect and right.  He wanted to lie her down on the bed in the next room and kiss every inch of her slowly, taking his time with her and savoring the intimate blessing of her nakedness beneath him.

"I…"

Her breaths were heavy, full of some emotion he couldn't quite name.  Her gaze strayed from him a moment and went to the rumpled, outstretched robes drying by the fire.

"You'll have to forgive me for saying this," he murmured, lowering his head to kiss her neck.  "But you've put off those robes, Ayasha.  You've spoken out loud."

She shivered underneath him and she arched herself slightly against him.

"If you wish to retain your vows, I will stop," he whispered in her ear.  "But I want you very much, Ayasha… you've already let me partway in, and I want all of you, if you'll let me have it."

Her mouth opened, but no words came out.  Kayao lavished her with his tender kisses, up and down her throat and across her shoulder—he felt her tremble with the sweet bliss that he pressed along the surface of her skin as his lips brushed against her.  After several minutes, though, he stopped and straightened.

Ayasha opened her mouth again to ask him why, but he cut her off as he stooped down to gather her up in his arms, lifting her and carrying her towards the other room, and his bed.

He was worried she would protest, find the words to deny him and shelter herself again under the black folds of her mourning instead.  She put one palm on his cheek, though, and kissed him—the warmth of her was so welcome, so genuine.  He sat her down on the mattress and knelt on the floor in front of her, resting his hands on her knees.

"Aya," he whispered softly.  "Have you ever taken a man to your bed before?"

She blinked at him and shook her head.

"Of course not, silly," she whispered.  "My vows… I was always true to them, I promise."

"Then," he said, with a glimmer in his eyes.  "I will have to make this very special for you."

His hands traced upwards, following the folds of his breeches against the contours of her legs until he found the waistband of them.  Slowly he stripped them away, and Aya pressed her thighs together with shy instinct.  He realized she was shivering, though the room was more than warm enough against the winter outside.  He slid warm palms along the outsides of her thighs, along her velvet skin.  Even the tiniest brush of his fingers seemed to intensify her trembling, and she made a soft little noise of pleasant surprise—then, she rolled her head back and uttered a long, low moan, as he slid his hands gently across her inner thighs, nudging them apart.

She obliged him.

Underneath the white cotton of the shirt he could clearly see the hard outlines of her nipples atop her breasts, which rose and fell as her breathing became a little deeper, and little heavier.  One of her hands came up to give her own left breast an eager squeeze, pinching the stiff peak between two fingers with an eager little groan.

Kayao slid himself in between her thighs to wrap his arms around her torso, and nuzzled the tender curves of her lovely breasts through the cloth of his shirt, breathing in the smell of her sweet, untouched flesh underneath.

Ayasha brought her arms up, cradling Kayao's head against her chest, and buried her face in the dark mess of his hair.

"You smell good," she whispered, breathing him in.  "Like soap… and steel… and…"

He grunted.  Sliding his hands under the shirt he pulled it up over her head, and then she was naked beneath him.  He kissed the bare skin of her belly, up to the mounds of her breasts, peppering them with little affections and sending hopeful flutters of anticipation through her nerves.  She nuzzled her face into his hair as his tongue explored the pink ring of areola, languidly tasting, musing over the pert little peak at its center.  He pressed his lips softly over the throbbing bud, taking it in his mouth with a gentle moan of pleasure, sucking with gentle care.

Goosebumps had risen up on Ayasha's arms.  She arched against him readily, craving the heat of his body closer to her.

"Kayao," she murmured.  "I… you cannot being to imagine how this feels to me…"

She practically purred as he kissed and caressed her anxious, excited nipples, warming them with his loving tongue, his attentive lips.  Soon, though, he was moving lower, kissing a tiny line down the center of her body; she moaned again as he made his way down, past her navel, to the silky thatch of blonde hair that marked her womanhood.

"What are you doing?" she whispered fervently, shivering with anticipation as he kissed the soft mound of her skin.  He flicked his dark eyes up to hers; the full, dark desire in her eyes had grown deeper, so rich he though he might drown in them.  He smiled with boyish enthusiasm, a mischievous promise that elicited another shiver throughout her whole body.  Without answering, he ducked his head, and dipped his tongue into the wet folds of her opening, quickly darting it over the throbbing, thrilling pearl at the crown of her sex.

"Ah!" Ayasha moaned, falling back on her hands and throwing her head back in joy.  One hand came back quickly, delving into his hair and pressing him closer to her.  He explored her expertly with his tongue, tracing the delicate lines of her flesh up and down, always ringing back to that singular locus of pleasure to kiss it, cherish it, stirring it with the tip of his tongue as she shuddered and cried out softly in mounting bliss.  She tasted wild and sweet, the perfume of her body strong and inviting, making his swollen member throb against the crotch of his leggings.  She lifted her hips, offering herself fully to him.  If there had been any lingering doubt in her mind, it was gone now.

He slipped his tongue into her body and she moaned again.  Slowly, oh so slowly, he circled his tongue along the opening before sliding it deeper, then slowly, slowly withdrawing it.  A moan of his own joined hers and one hand fell to the bulge in his own pants, nursing the eager erection with a mental admonishment to be patient.

"Aya," he said softly; when he pulled his mouth away from her he replaced it with his fingers, lovingly, gently massaging the little stone of her clitoris.  She looked down at him and he rose up to take her in his arms again, sitting beside her and pulling her to his chest. 

"Oh, Ayasha," he said again.  "I have dreamed of seeing that look in your eyes."

She smiled and kissed him.

"Are you ready for me?" he asked her.

She nodded, cuddling against his chest, fitting herself against the contours of his body—but then she hesitated.

"Kayao," she muttered, a single note of curiosity in the darkness.

"Hm?" he replied.

"Can I see your face?"

There was a long, long silence.  The question turned his arousal into sour terror.

The look on Ayasha's face quickly changed, and he realized his silence had made it seem she'd upset him.  He inclined his head to kiss her again, his heart thumping wildly as he lifted one of her hands to the hardened leather of his mask.

"Yes," he whispered in her ear.  "I think… you should see it.  Before you let me go any further."

Her fingers found the place where the mask fastened in place, right behind his ear.  She let them linger there for long, long moments, studying his face as she'd known it—covered by the stitched, weathered animal skin, a face of hiding, of secrets.  She could sense his apprehension, he knew; he was rigid now, holding his breath.

"Are you sure?" she asked.

"Yes, Aya," he said.  "Please."

The look he gave her was earnest.  She took a slow breath, and undid the buckle on the strip of leather that had hidden his face from everyone around him for years.

As she carefully removed the mask, he realized she did not look right away.  She was giving him a moment to steady himself, and he tried to, uttering a long, ragged exhalation.  When he touched her hair, signaling her, she finally looked up.

He knew what she saw.  The scars were terrible.  Twisted and ugly, they marred the whole left half of his face, remnants of burns and blisters stretching up his cheek, the bridge of his nose, almost to the opposite temple.  Little knots of warped flesh were shiny and smooth in the tiny glimmer of the lampts—stripped of his protection, Kayao felt his own deep, amber eyes would scream of his anxious worry.

Aya studied the damage for a long time.  After several minutes, she lifted her hand up to run it over the scars, touching them gently, exploring the contours of his secret.  Finally, her eyes met his again, and she held him that way.

She had nothing to say.  Silently, she pressed her lips against his, stroking one hand through his hair.

"It doesn't bother you?" he asked desperately.  She didn't answer him, but instead took his face in her palms and kissed the scars themselves, following the twisted injuries with her lips, breathing softly on his skin.  He was barely aware of the silent tears that had sprung to his eyes.

"Kayao," she sighed, leaning her head against his shoulder.  "I may be falling in love with you."

"Oh," he murmured.  "Oh, Aya… "

He leaned close, nudging her down against the tousled sheets with another deep, heavy kiss.  She wriggled beneath him just enough to get her hands beneath his vest and strip it off his shoulders as he lay her down.

"It may hurt," he warned her.  "If you have never been with a man."

"I know," she breathed.  "I'm not afraid."

He paused to kneel over her, kicking his boots to the floor and stripping off his breeches.  There was a moment of careful speculation, when she looked on his ready member for the first time, rising up from the thick black hair.  It was almost as though it caught her by surprise, and he was sure in that instant that she hadn't been lying: his was the first naked phallus she had ever laid eyes on.

He caught sight of her astonishment and it made him chuckle.  Gently he lay down beside her again, slipping one hand under her neck to tilt her up and kiss her while the other hand kneaded the head of his cock.

"I will be," he said.  "I want you to enjoy every moment of this."

She nodded.  As her initial awe wore off, she reached out to pet him, quietly taking the stiff shaft in her own hand and running her fingers curiously along the length of it.

Kayao uttered a soft moan against her ear, pressing his hips a little closer as she stroked him.  He kissed her again, his tongue finding hers and dancing with it, and they traded slow strokes of tongues and hands for many moments, uttering tiny sounds of hushed, eager joy between them.

"Aya," he finally muttered.  "May I make love to you?"

"Mm-hmm," was all she said.  She let him lay her down and then climb carefully on top of her.

"I think you are ready for me," he murmured between languid kisses.  His hand strayed down to her wet cleft and he slipped two fingers inside her, testing her.  Ayasha moaned, pressing against him as he slowly spread the digits a little wider, sliding them gently two and fro.

"If it hurts," he said, "if you want me to stop… just say so."

"No, Kayao," she purred.  "I am ready.  I want you to."

She ran a hand over his face, caressing the length of his scars.  He withdrew his fingers slowly and guided the head of his cock to her opening, running it gently up and down the slick petals of her womanhood, and he leaned in to give her one last kiss before he slid carefully into her body.

He could see there was pain—her expression tightened a minute and she went tense—but evidently she had prepared herself, because she relaxed again rather quickly, letting out a heavy, lusty breath.  Watching her carefully for any sign of discomfort, he began a slow, steady rhythm in her, and she moaned against his warm chest.

He moved his hips in measured circles, in and out of her, savoring the tightness of her, the heated, wet warmth of her cleft welcoming him.  She reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck, continuing to kiss him as his member stirred up a fluttering response in her own passion, and slowly she began to rock her hips with him, opening as he slit it into her, tightening to hold him there.

"Oh, Kayao," she whispered.  "I love it."

"You are so beautiful," he murmured in reply.  "Please, Aya… look at me… let me see the look in your eyes."

She released her tight hold and leaned back into the pillows, meeting his eyes.  Their bodies moved as one, coming tougher in slow harmony, lost in each other's gaze.

"I love you," she said, so softly he wasn't sure he'd heard.  But he groaned quietly, and when she kissed him again he knew his climax was fluttering to life, the pressure beginning to mount in his rigid, eager cock.  His pace quickened a little and he grunted to feel that pressure build, eager and excited, desperate to be released.

"Oh yes," she moaned, and the way her body moved he thought she must feel it too.  "Kayao," she urged him.  "Do it.  Please do it."

He kissed her, and then without warning he rolled with her, putting her on top of him.  She gasped in quiet surprise, shifting her hips and taking over the rhythm as his big hands closed over her hips and guided her.  She rose up, moaning happily as she sank back down on his member, feeling his shaft filling her.  They rocked together, their pace increasing; she grasped at his wrists where he grasped her waist and rode him with mounting fervor.

His body quivered, hot through the core, and he caressed his hands down her thighs and then back to her hips, starting to bounce her up and down on his cock.  The sudden change in pitch made her catch her breath with a delighted squeak.

"Come with me, Aya," he panted.  "Come with me, let me see your eyes as you do it, look at me, please."

He watched her, enthralled by the sight of her arching her back and pressing her luscious breasts towards the ceiling as she came up and down on his member.  She managed a little nod as she rocked her hips down, and then he rolled his own head back with a groan.

Together they tipped towards climax.  She twitched her rhythm once, twice, and slowed again, then quickened her thrusts once more.  Kayao plunged deeper, desperate to be in her heat, driving himself to the hilt in her hot, sweet cleft.  He felt the first shudder of orgasm travel through him, quivering within the tightness of her sex, and that quiver turned into a tremor very quickly.

Suddenly she was crying out in beautiful pleasure, turning her face towards him so he could see the flood of light and joy and heat in her eyes.  Her body tightened harder around him and the pressure burst, shooting hot semen deep inside of her.  He called out her name, thrusting as deeply as he could manage, releasing himself inside of her over and over again, overwhelmed.

They lay together for long, long moments afterwards, basking in the fading aftershocks of their shared culmination.  Ayasha rested her head on Kayao's chest, listening to the rise and fall of his breath, looking pleasantly drowsy as the sound of it lulled her towards sleep.

"Are you okay?" he asked her very softly.  "Aya… I don't want you to feel bad about this."

"No, no," she said.  "Never.  Oh, Kayao…you have no idea how… how freeing this has all been."

"It doesn't shame you?" he asked.  "To have betrayed your vows with… with me?"

She lifted her head and looked at him, beautiful affection in her eyes.  She caressed the scars on his face and kissed them again.

"I have not known true faith in my vows for some time," she said.  "I have clung to them because I have had nothing else of my own… nothing of friends, of family, no training beyond… beyond that which I have little joy in knowing or using."

Her hand drifted down to his chest and rested there.

"You have been my friend," she said.  "And now… you have given me something very real, and very good, to have faith in again.  Believe me, I am not in the least bit ashamed."

He took her hand in his own and kissed the top of her head.

"Then," he said, "in regards to your living situation."

"My house," she said very softly.  "Yes, it's… the damage is bad, Kayao.  It may take days."

"What if it didn't take any time at all?" he said.  "What if all you needed to do was move your belongings here, with me?"

She met his eyes.

"But… the others.  Your neighbors…"

"Do you think I care what they think?" he said.  "You are the woman I love.  I want you here with me, safe.  Always."

"Do you mean that?"

He touched her cheek, and kissed her.

"Of course I do, Aya.  And I don't even care if you put those robes back on and hide underneath that hood and never speak a word out loud to me again.  I want you here in my house… in my bed.  With me."

The smile on her face was radiant.

"Then, I will," she said.  "Always, Kayao.  My true friend… my love.

"I will always be with you."

The Forge (Part 2)

(Back to Part 1)

He froze. 

Ayasha had never spoken out loud before.  Her voice was lyrical and lovely; the way she said his name, delicate and conscientious.  Shy.

He spun, unsure he had actually heard it.  She was still there, standing in his kitchen with her hood down for the first time ever, dripping onto his floor, her small hands hidden in the sleeves of her robe and tucked sheepishly behind her back.

"Is it alright," she asked carefully, "if I were to come down with you?  If the fires of the forge are already lit…"

Of course.  How stupid of him.  It had never occurred to him to simply bring her down where she might dry off more quickly, in a room already warm and bright and ready.  Mostly because he had never allowed anyone into his forge before.  It was his place, his private comfort.  He'd never even brought one of his lovers down there to his rooms.

"Yes," he said, still dumbfounded.  "Yes, that's… quite alright."

There was another reason he'd never let anyone below into the forge with him before.  It was his mask.  The leather fit him perfectly, but in the heat of the forge-fires it became stifling and impossible, sweat slicking the skin underneath it, running into his eye.  The forge was the only place he ever removed that mask.

The Forge

The Forge is the first of my "Hump Day Request" stories, written in response to a prompt by one of my readers. This is the original prompt, received through my Tumblr Ask Box:

I wanted to request Seduction! I'm in the mood for something soft and sweet. I want a story where the guy seduces the shy sweet innocent gal. She's not secretly dirty or secretly kinky. She's a virgin, and innocent, but has a LOT of love in her heart. So he can seduce her and coax her into trying some fun stuff with him. That stuff can be as tame as doing it with her on top, or as wild as.. well.. wild stuff.. The main point to it should be seduction though.  I want 100% unfilterd romance.

One thing about romance: it always takes a hell of a lot longer than pure sex.  I'd written stories about this couple before but never hit quite the right note with them, so this time I took a different angle, putting them in a fictional fantasy/historical setting and gave them a new twist. I'm pleased with the results (and hopefully my requester is, too), and while the focus was sweet romance, it's still a little sexy, too.  But as I said, romance takes a bit longer than sex.  That said, The Forge will be a three-part story.
Here is Part One.

 Ayasha was not well-loved among the people in the mountain outpost of Harpy's Roost; she was an  outsider, and worse than that she was a heretic: a priestess of the Chyaen religion, robed in the dark cloak and hood of the Charossians wherever she went.  She was a disciple of the Death-God.

It wasn't precisely the aspect of her deity that turned the residents of the Roost away from her, though.  She wore black robes, where most Charossians wore white and gold; her hood always hid her face, where there was no such prescription for the loyal priests and priestesses of her order.  She never spoke, bound by an oath of silence that all acolytes took at initiation, but such an oath was renounced upon initiation into the Order proper and evidently, she had never been released of it herself.

Ayasha had turned away from the great Chyaen Temple in the faraway city where she had been raised and taught the miracles of a chosen worshipper.  She'd left her home to come out to the isolated northern country and settle in the harsh terrain of the great mountains, leagues and leagues away from the nearest church which bore her patron's crests.  She was no missionary, either, seeking to bring the will of Charos to the untouched northern range.  Ayasha was an apostate, cast out from her church, and shunned.

The black robes were a bad omen, a mark of shame.  The hood hid her face and her disgrace.  This was the garb of mourners, and Ayasha had been sentenced to a life of silent mourning for her own spiritual death.

She'd come to the Roost, alone, over a year ago, and since had lived alone, a hermit unto herself even within the borders of the town.  She was avoided, mostly ignored, left to her own devices.  As far as the residents of the Roost were concerned, the unlucky Charossian was content enough with that: she never spoke to anyone, and she didn't seek their friendship, and she didn't mind their pity.  The Roost and its single Untouchable existed almost within different realms all their own, interacting only as needed and happy to go on without ever meeting eyes.

Most of the Roost, at least, was content with this.  There was one man—Kayao, master of the outpost's great Forge—who did not truck with his neighbors' manners.  Kayao himself had been the source of some discomfort and avoidance among others before: he was terribly scarred, the left side of his face mutilated in an accident of his youth and now always covered by a thick leather mask.  Of course, his own deformities had come years ago, and he'd grown up with that mask covering one half of his face, of knowing that no friend, no woman who would be his lover, could ever look upon him without it.  His mask was like Ayasha's robes, his mark of shame, but he'd also been a boy in this region, raised and tempered here.  His people had become accustomed to his ugliness, and the mask hiding his true face was hardly noticed by anyone anymore.

Ayasha was an outsider.  He wasn't sure if her masks could ever be ignored.

He'd never understood why Ayasha was to be shunned in the first place.  He'd met her on her first day in the Roost, when she'd come to him to request a new bridle and shoes for her horse, and since that day he'd been the only one in the outpost who was not somehow afraid of her.  He'd seen beneath her hood that first day—he'd seen a sweet, cherubic face with wide, innocent eyes, one blue, the other green, and the earnest, genuine light in them that asked for nothing besides simple human tolerance.  She was beautiful.  Was it only the maimed man, forever meant to hide his ugliness, who could see that?

He did not know why she'd been cast out of her church, or why she'd been made to wear the black robes of a dishonored priestess or keep an eternal silence.  He didn't care.  She was young, she was alone, and she was only searching for a place to exist after everything she'd known had been stripped from her.

Kayao was her only friend.

And he realized, as time went on and as Ayasha became a part of the everyday reality in Harpy's Roost, a part of his everyday reality, that soon there was more to his feelings than that. 

Ayasha came to Kayao periodically, seeking his skills to help repair her simple tools or to request his aid in matters of upkeep on her simple home, a spartan hut on the edge of town where she was mostly unbothered by others.  She was always under those robes, she never so much as put back her hood, but Kayao snuck glances underneath its shadows nonetheless to her pretty eyes, and the shy smile she sometimes gave him when she noticed him peeking.  She was always very careful to pay him promptly and kindly rejected any offer to forgive payment or delay it until another time; Kayao knew nothing about where she might earn her money but that was not his business in any case.  One winter as he helped her to repair a portion of her roof damaged in a snowstorm—helped her, notably, as she refused to stand idly by to watch him handle the job alone—he wished she would let him do it without compensation.  He wanted to help her, after all.

He wanted to do more for her.

She occupied his thoughts more and more often, her gentle, silent presence a comfort to him.  Kayao was a hard man, had to be, as all residents of the Roost were in this harsh and unbroken mountain wilderness.  The women he had known were hard, too, carved from the very stones of the peaks, as it were, beautiful and regal and strong, but Ayasha was different.  She had grown up in the city.  She'd never had the callused hands of worker, and he saw the blisters rise and turn her palms ruddy now that she was given little choice.  He saw her take in the sight of work—like the roof in need of repair—and steel herself to do it though she had never been required to do anything like it before.  She was a priestess, not a farmer, not a fighter; but she had been dealt a new hand, and when she stood beside him in her dooryard watching him slaughter a set of chickens for her, she did not turn away or flinch.  She asked him—in her graceful, subtle sign language—to instruct her, so that next time she would know to do it for herself.

And somehow she'd managed it, without so much as staining the dark cotton of her mourner's robes.

He worried about her, living alone far from the others.  The Roost was built on perilous, craggy mountainside, and Ayasha in her seclusion had been relegated to a dangerous section of the borders.  In a bad enough storm she could easily be hurt or even maybe killed without anyone there to help her, and when the winds howled some nights he couldn't stop the thought of her isolation from gnawing at his gut.  Sometimes he even ventured out to check on her, and she was always there, silent and patient, whatever nervous fear she might have felt tamed behind those lovely mismatched eyes.  She'd let him in and start a pot of tea, and he remained with her throughout the storms to be sure no harm came to her.

He had fallen in love with her, of that there was no doubt.  His affection for her, his secret adoration, glowed and burned like the fires in his forge, with beautiful intensity every day.

Soon, it was impossible to deny.

On the night Ayasha came to him through the storm, Kayao had already been awake, standing in the storefront of his smithy and gazing out into the gales of sleet coming down.  It was perhaps the worst winter storm the Roost had seen in years, and his mind of course had gone to Ayasha's humble hut, standing alone near the cliff side.  He was thinking about the patch he had made on her roof that spring, and wondering if it would hold through this harsh northern wind.

It hadn't.

The knock came just as he had made up his mind to pack up and go to her, and when he opened the door and saw her standing there, holding the hood of her robe down over her face as the wind tried to snatch it away, he was speechless for several long seconds before he realized the stupidity of that and hurried her into the safety of the shop.

"What are you doing?" he demanded once he had shut out the howling storm again and turned to regard her disheveled state.  "You shouldn't have come out in this all alone, you could have been injured!"

She looked up at him, arrested as she tried to adjust the hood, and her mismatched eyes held a note of uncertain hurt.  He chastised himself immediately; he'd never spoken that way to her and of course it must have sounded exactly like the others in the Roost who mightn't have cared less if she stayed in her lonely hut as it blew over the cliffs.

"I'm sorry," he said, softer this time.  "I was worried, I was just about to come out to you.  What's the matter?"

She shook her head at him and her gaze fell to the floor.  He noticed that her robes—which she had never allowed to be stained, even when she learned to slaughter chickens in the dooryard—were dirty with wet slush and mud.  It was the first time he'd ever seen her in disarray.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

The hood bobbed as she nodded, and her graceful hands slipped out of the robes voluminous sleeves, working through signs even as they shivered.

Roof, she told him.  Partway collapsed.  Fallen tree.

"Oh," he said, and his heart thumped painfully.  "Were you hurt?"

No, she signed, though he could see the way her shoulders trembled a little in fear.

"Aya," he said gently.  "Don't worry.  We'll look at it in the morning.  You'll be safe here for the night."

She looked up at him again.  He saw the glimmer of tears in her eyes, tears of relief, and then she threw her arms around him in gratitude.

He was shocked at the sudden display of affection.  After some hesitant moments, he carefully lifted his own arms back and returned the hug.

"Tea," he said, his mind a stammer of uncertainty.  "You're all wet, you'll need some tea.  And…"

He frowned, then pushed her gently away from him to look down into her face.

"Aya, do you have anything other than these robes?  They're soaked.  You'll get sick."

She wore an expression of chagrin, and shook her head.

"Oh.  Well… I'm sure I can find something for you—"

She shook her head again, a little more frantically this time. 

"But you have to take them off," he insisted.  "Come on, Aya, you must take them off some time."

Her eyes fell to the floor again, and a third time she shook her head.

"That's nonsense," he told her.  "Aya, if you don't get out of those robes you're going to take a chill and get sick.  I respect your faith but I'm not going to let you do harm to yourself by it."

He put a hand on her shoulder and guided her towards the back door of the shop, which would lead to his personal rooms and to the stairs which led below, to the forge.  Kayao had moved into the small secondary chambers off of the forge room for the winter; in a place like Harpy's Roost, heat was precious, and the fires of the smithy made dwelling in the quarters below far more comfortable in the winters.  So he had not made use of his own kitchen or upstairs domicile in some weeks now, and when he brought the lamps to life around his humble dining table, it was obvious.  Everything had been taken downstairs, down the the teapot, which now rested on one of his anvils.

"Well, damn," he sighed.  Then, "Pardon that, Aya, wasn't thinking.  I'll have to go downstairs for the kettle, if you don't mind waiting up here.  My trunks are down there, too, so I'll bring you up something to wear while we put those robes out in front of my forge-fires to dry."

She regarded him with those clear, lovely eyes and nodded, taking a seat at the table.  Meltwater from her robes dripped to the stone floor beneath her.  In a moment of cautious forwardness, Kayao reached out for the folds of her hood, and—very slowly, giving her time to stop him if she wanted to do so—he pulled the wet, black fabric back, revealing her fully for the first time since they'd met.

He'd known that Aya had fine, golden hair underneath the hood.  Occasionally a length or strand of it had escaped its confines to tumble playfully into sight.  What he hadn't known was how long it was, falling well below her shoulders, presently in dripping dark tangles like a bedraggled thing.  She  trembled a bit as the hood came down and turned her face away from him, as though she was ashamed.

"I'm sorry," he said softly.  "I don't mean to dishonor you, Aya… I'll put it back, if you want.  I just don't want you catching cold."

She shook her head again and put her hands on his, letting him release the hood and keeping it where it was.  She ran one hand through her disheveled lengths of hair and it occurred to him, suddenly, that she must not have cut her hair since donning the hood in the first place.

"Oh, hell," he muttered, unsure of what to say to her.   Then, "Sorry, again.  Me and my mouth.  Are you sure you're okay?"

She nodded.

"I'll be right back."

He turned to leave here there as he descended into the forge, when:

"Kayao?"