Enigma II. Fighting the Man - 25. Chapter 25 - Asher

Asher turns away from the wall, to sit on his hip facing me. Our fingers are still linked. Neither of us have let go. I don’t know how I feel. My head is full of River. Speaking about what happened has brought him back again and he is right here in the room with me. I am full of him.

The pain I felt when he left me is back too. It is dull now and drags at me, rather than stabbing through my heart. I know that he loved me, right to the end he loved me. I think he still loves me and that is why I can't go back. Loving me will hurt him because I can’t be what he wants me to be. I don’t know what I can be.

Asher is right. I have been blind. I have been blinding myself. I know this is not the same, not the same at all. I also know that I knew that. I have always known that. I don’t want it to be the same because no matter how much I fool myself, deep inside I know. The simple truth is that I am not a slave any more. Some of the chains have been broken and the links can never be reforged. I don’t want them to.

Still. I need a new start. I need to find ‘me’ and this is as good a place to start as any. At least here I can use my skills. I can be myself; completely myself, with the freedom to explore who and what that might be.

I think Asher must see all these things going through my mind because while it is happening, he sits completely still, just watching me. When I reach my conclusion, such as it is, I look up to smile at him and my breath catches in my throat.

He is sitting on his hip, leaning sideways on his arm, the shirt falling loose and open revealing his beautiful body beneath. His hair, the most glorious rich chestnut colour, not really much like River’s at all, is literally flowing over his shoulder and spilling down his arm and, in this bright light, his eyes are molten bronze. He is beautiful: breathtakingly beautiful. He smiles and I know he can see it in my eyes.

“My trousers look better on you than they ever did on me.” He says huskily.

“Yours...?”

“Ariel came thieving. He said that I was the only one whose clothes were likely to fit you. He’s right of course. It didn’t even enter my head to refuse. I found myself choosing things that I thought would look good on you. With these, at least, I was right.” He runs his finger along the top of my leg, stroking the leather and making the flesh beneath tremble.

“I... they feel good too... to move in... to dance...” My words fade out as his hand slides back up my leg to rest on the inside of my thigh. I press my head back against the wall to stop the trembling but it doesn’t do much good. Part of me is telling me to stop. Part of me is telling me that if I go any further, I will be betraying River. Part of me is not getting very far and that part of me disappears when he shifts closer and moves his hand from my thigh to my waist.

“I know why they call you Silver. I’ve always wondered. They never explain anything to slaves. I saw you a couple of times, but only at a distance. I saw you dance, and I never forgot. But it never... I have never seen your eyes before. I will never see anything like them again.”

I want to say that his eyes are beautiful too. I want to say that they glow like larva from a volcano, that they remind me of brand new pennies, so shiny and... and... But I seem... I can’t really focus on words right now because he... he is...

I’m not sure exactly how it happened but I’m in his arms and he’s kissing me. I should have known it wasn’t Ariel. Ariel is small and slim and wraithlike... all the things that Asher is not. Asher is so much like me, we could be brothers... in many ways we are.

The arms that encircle me, that draw me firmly but tenderly towards his body are strong and soft and firm. They make me feel safe. His lips are soft and his tongue... I gasp as I experience the receiving end of all the tricks I’ve learned, the skills that I have seen turn men into gibbering wrecks. Just because I know what he is doing, doesn’t mean I appreciate it any less.

I let him control me for a while, losing myself in the sensations he arouses in me. But I can’t resist giving him some of his own medicine and soon the tables are turned and he is the one who is moaning and sighing.

I am still sitting with my back against the wall, but now he is sitting across my lap, his head practically on my shoulder. It doesn’t take much to tip him onto his back and slide out from under him to straddle him. He throws his head back, all that fabulous hair spreading out around him, making me desperate to touch it. But I don’t. I pause for a moment gazing down at him. There is no hesitation in me now. I am not thinking of River at all. I am barely thinking of River. I am putting River out of my mind. There is no room for him. I am too full of Asher.

Asher opens his eyes and looks up at me, his eyes glowing. There is hunger there and I know it is mirrored in mine. I have never experienced someone who was trained as I was, not in this way, in freedom, and the thought excites me. It excites me more that I could ever have dreamed it would. My pause is not for doubt or regret, it is pure anticipation. Like a surfer in the moment when he crests a wave, just before he rides it downwards, I hover over him, staring down into his beautiful face. He gazes back at me with the same wonder in his eyes.

And then he rises, winding his legs around me and reversing our positions. I lie on my back, shocked, and a grin spreads slowly over me, from the inside out. I have been trained to give pleasure and I have elevated that training to an art form. I have gloried in the power that I have wielded over the men, who trembled and moaned under my hands and lips. It was the only power I knew. I have learned how to pleasure to the point of pain and I can make a man lose consciousness in under a minute or to keep him on the point of satisfaction for hours. Now, it seems I am going to get a taste of my own medicine and it feels good.

Asher’s tongue is doing crazy things to my body. I tilt my head back and arch my back as he works his way down. Oh God. I have done this so many times before. If only I had known. If only I had... “Ahh.”

Asher ignores my cries and trembling, and that is getting pretty serious. He continues his assault on a body where every inch is now an erogenous zone. I can’t stop myself shaking and I can't stop myself whimpering. I feel feverish and I don’t think I could move now if I had to. His ministrations step up a notch and the whimpers change to groans.

When he reaches my groin, Asher ignores the obvious parts and continues down my inner thigh which twitches uncontrollably under his lips.

Just when I think I can’t stand it anymore, he slithers up my body and starts again with my lips while his hand slips round behind me and kneads my hip and buttock, making me moan again.

Asher raises himself up and looks down at me, the look in his eyes as arousing as anything he is doing to me. “You are even more beautiful than they said you were. You really are famous you know, even now. I don’t have much contact with that world anymore but whenever I do, your name is still on everyone’s lips. And it’s well deserved. I have never seen anyone more beautiful and there is something else... something I have never seen in one of us before. You are innocent. Despite everything... you are still innocent. You make me feel as if I am your first. You are truly beautiful.”

I smile shyly and raise my head to kiss him. He smiles and jerks away, teasing me, and suddenly he... he... I almost scream as in one smooth motion his arms are thrown around me, lifting my hips so he could enter me and then raising me so that I am almost sitting upright. Still inside me he brings his legs round to grip me and pull me in tighter. I lean backwards, arching my back until my spine cracks. Bending over me Asher licks my belly button and I completely lose control.

I have no idea how long we have been here; how long he has kept me teetering on the brink. I lost all sense of time, all sense of self. For all my skills I would not have been able to control myself no matter what he did to me. I have never been in this position before, not that I can remember. I have rarely let River pleasure me and he has never entered me. No one has done this ever, not with love and I have completely and utterly lost it. Asher is good, very, very good.

I am totally exhausted. My lungs are burning and every muscle in my body has gone into spasm, at one time or another. He has played me like an instrument. I am trembling like a reed, bent like a bow, vibrating like a drum. The orchestra of my body has been blown and plucked and chords have been struck all over. And now... now it is coming to an end because if he does not rise to the crescendo very soon the curtain is going to come down.

I am so dazed I have barely any consciousness other than what is happening to my body. It is almost like the feelings I experienced in training, when I was drugged. I am drugged. I am drugged by his smell, his touch, his body and it is all too much.

The position I find myself in, makes breathing hard but I am too exhausted to get out of it. My body is as heavy as lead and I am like a rag doll as Asher manipulates me. There is no question of feeling fear, as vulnerable as I am. There is no question of feeling anything except what he wants me to feel, what he makes me feel. The restricted breathing makes my head spin and I feel darkness creeping in to the edges of my mind. I know I am going to pass out but it only makes everything more intense, more...more...

“No... no please... please no... no...” My back muscles contract and I feel as if I am going to snap in half. “I can’t stand it... I can’t...can’t...”

“So, what happened to your famous control Silver?”

“You.” I mange to gasp before he slides out of me, so that only the tip teases me. I choke and all the muscles below my waist twitch. He doesn’t thrust back into me but enters me slowly, gently, smoothly. And then he does it again. All so slowly. So... On the fourth time in my eyes roll.

“Hold on Silver, just for a moment. It’s time now.”

And it was.

When I come round Asher is lying next to me, stroking my chest, his legs entwined with mine. I am still trembling.

“You ok?”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah, we did.”

“You did.”

“Have you never...?”

“No. Not that I can remember. I have done it so many times but no one has ever... Not like that. The last time sex made me pass out, I woke up in a cage.”

“I feel privileged.”

“You are.” I turn over and kiss him, then press him over onto his back. “And now, you are about to get a taste of your own medicine.”

That night I fall asleep in Asher’s arms and my sleep is peaceful, content and free of dreams.

Over the next few days we make love again...and again. I don’t sleep with him every night but we make the most of whatever time we have to explore each other and ourselves. We use every trick in the book, every skill we possess and we both enjoy every single moment of it.

The only thing that concerns me is that day by day; bit by bit; I’m losing River. I don’t want to. I want to hold on to him forever. But it was he who left me, he who pushed me away. He is getting on with his life and it’s time I got on with mine, it’s been on hold for long enough. He has Ben now... and I have Asher.

Of course I know that there is a good chance it won’t last but just for now... for now it is fabulous.

In between having sex with Asher I get to dance again, and to see everyone else dance, everyone except Ariel. They are all good, in their own way. The real surprise is Alex. For all of his bulk, once he gets onto the stage he is fluid, seems light and his oiled muscles slide and flex in a way that is so sexy he even makes me twitch.

He commands everyone, in the audience and behind the scenes, for as long as the dance lasts. Then as soon as he leaves the stage he is the same gentle, unassuming man who keeps his head down and his spirits up. His smile is all the brighter for knowing the beast that lurks behind it.

And then the day comes when I am to dance with Ariel. Well... not ‘with’ him. Ariel will dance first and then me. I am excited. I have never seen him dance. I have never even seen him practice.

Ariel goes a little overboard, I have to admit. You’d swear no one had ever seen him dance before and that it’s something very special. He has the whole house in uproar and is making demands right left and centre. He wants a new outfit. He wants a new hairstyle, he wants new accessories, new cosmetics, private practicing time. He insists on sleeping in a private room the night before.

It’s almost as if he’s testing Tony to see how far he can push him and I remember with some unease our very first conversation when he made it clear that’s exactly what he does sometimes. I get the distinct feeling that with Tony, this is a big mistake. I have got over the idea of Tony being my master but he is most certainly the master of his little world and Ariel has no idea of what that truly means.

At first Tony is indulgent and lets his little ice queen have his head. But as the day wears on, he gets more and more frustrated and the next day, the day of the performance, he wakes in a bad mood and it deteriorates from there. It gets worse quickly when Lewis starts interfering and I catch him more than once bending Tony’s ear and throwing spiteful looks at Ariel.

I am getting more and more uneasy about the whole situation and I try to warn Ariel. I try to get Asher to do the same but he just shrugs.

“The little bitch plays prima donna now and again. Usually Tony puts up with it when there’s a special performance in the offing but he’s likely to have Ariel working upstairs for a couple of days after, just to remind him who really is the boss. It’s not Ariel’s favourite part of the job.”

So far I have managed not to think about ‘working upstairs’. Tony has never made a secret of what goes on there or that sooner or later I am going to have to take my turn. Everyone, even Asher has to take a turn in the private rooms at some time or another. It doesn’t bother me, at least it didn’t. I am not quite so sure now, not since Asher. And I am very uneasy about the thought of Ariel, a small and delicate as he is, in the arms of some slobbering stranger. When did I get to be such a mother hen?

“I think you should ease up Ariel. You’re pissing Tony off big time.”

“Good.”

“You’re playing with fire.”

“It’s alright. Thanks for the concern but you’ll see... after the performance he’ll be mellow again. I might not be as good as you but what I do has a certain... appeal. There’ll be as many people out there for me as for you.”

“I’m sure there will me.”

Ariel smiles and stands on tiptoe to kiss me briefly. “No you’re not, but you will.”

He’s right... I do. How can I describe it? How can I explain the ephemeral quality of Ariel’s dance? When I first saw him I thought he was a faery and there is nothing he resembles more in the dance. His body is whip thin and flexible in a way I never thought possible. His pale hair floats about him like a diaphanous cloud and looks almost as if he’s floating in water. His movements are so precise, yet they flow. It is like nothing I have ever seen before and I am truly astonished.

There is something profoundly erotic about the dance and yet he is as distant as snow capped mountains and just as cold. He truly is the ice queen. I think back again to the day we first met. It really wasn’t that long ago but it seems like a lifetime. Was it really less than a week? It can’t be surely. I feel as if, in the short time I have known him, that we have become friends, as close as anyone I have ever known except of course, David, River... and now Asher. But they are lovers and Ariel... Ariel is something different, although he would not have had it so if he could have helped it, Ariel is a friend. In this line of work friends are rare and precious.

Tony had warned me about getting involved with Ariel. He had called him a witch and the ice queen and tonight I can see why. Yes... the word for what he is doing up there on the stage is definitely bewitching. I almost wish that I had fallen in love with him. Or maybe not. I glance up and see a figure on the other side of the stage. A slight shift brings a shaft of light glancing down on rich, red hair and I know he isn’t here to see Ariel.