Polaris Skies: Ch 31

Polaris Skies: Legend of the Bai Book 3 by Chapel Orahamm, Mobile home in snow with green glow against storm clouds

NSFW – EROTICA, BDSM play

Yeller drew in a muffled gasp, almost dropping the rope in his hand. “This won’t be a good thing, Nat,” he protested, trying to return the equipment. Nat took the bundle, his heart fluttering. Maybe it had been too much to ask after all this time. Yeller pulled him back into a hug. “Why?” Yeller’s voice cracked in his ear.

Nat rested his forehead against Yeller’s sternum. His voice echoed coarse and hard in his reply, “I want it burned out of me. I need for there to be something good from what Cashia and Tereza’s relationship is based on. I can’t take running and hiding forever. It’s exhausting, and I don’t like it conquering me. I need to know I can be a good host for her. I need this for myself. I’ve tried to come out so many times in the many weeks that have gone by, and every time I’ve thought I could do it, flashes of memories bore down on me, and I froze.

“He has interrupted my life. My skin, my bones are no longer my own. My heart and my lungs obey his rhythm, and I feel like I’m drowning. My spirit is tethered and strangled. I can’t let that bird rule my body anymore. I can’t let him direct my every action like a puppet. I need the stench burned off of my flesh and scrubbed out of my mouth. I need help. Show me this can be good.”

Yeller swallowed at the admission. Cashia? he asked, needing guidance. He was caught in two directions. One was that he did not want to hurt Nat again by exposing him to Cashia’s version of courtship with his mate. The other was that he did not want to hurt Nat by telling him no.

“We don’t have to. I should have known this would be too much,” Nat apologised, extracting himself from Yeller’s hold to put the rope back in the pack.

Yeller stood back and watched as Nat shoved the hardware back in the bag hurriedly. Should I? Cashia asked Yeller. He had not expected that level of honesty from Nat, or to find him begging, let alone demanding something like this.

I don’t know. I don’t know, Cashia. That PTSD flashback practically broke him last time. We haven’t seen him in a month. We may never see him again if we push him over the edge. Yeller watched Nat fidget as his own heart slowly sped up. Sven said ‘fix’. Will this shatter him? Yeller pressed a hand against his chest, trying to still the pain in his ribs as his heart throbbed.

Nat…I think he wants us to break him, like when a broken bone has set wrong, and it has to be broken again to set it proper. If it’s set wrong, it is interruptive and painful, and there’s no forgetting how bad and wrong it is. You can’t straighten out a bad set by bending the bone most times. This time we aren’t going to strain and bend him, hoping for everything to be rosy. If we break him, we have to make sure we set him in a good way. Cashia pinned Nat with a steady gaze.

I’m not sure it works that way, Cashia. Yeller tensed.

This isn’t something I’ve ever approached like this. You may be right, and this is all wrong, Cashia admitted. He was not familiar with how to treat PTSD. It was a new term to him, let alone psychology in any form of modern understanding.

He had watched men return from battlefields, scarred and terrified. Their eyes would glass over at sudden noises, things that they saw, things that they felt. Small triggers or large. Dogs, blades, the shift of a horse, the smell of the butchered chicken their wives were plucking. Gunpowder, the cacophony of a church bell, cannons, a broom falling over in a corner. Some would scream and run; others would hide. There were those who attacked violently in unseeing retaliation. Sleep evaded them. They lived a split life, between the now and the then. Some learned to hide it, few overcame it, and most suffered through flashbacks. There were those who exposed themselves over and over again to stimulation to become numb to the constriction that an episode would cause. Some drowned it out and took to floating. There were those that made it through and those that took a more permanent path out. He could not answer Yeller honestly about what type Nat would be at the end of this.

Do you have any idea how to do what he’s wanting? Yeller asked nervously, letting Cashia brush past him to take over. He had watched the wolf parade a series of morbid memories across his periphery. He was all too aware Nat was trying to treat a symptom, hoping it would touch the cause in a desperate need to feel normal and in control.

Help me reassure him when he needs it, but we’re going to push this time until he knows it’s us that are doing it and not those chicken shits. Cashia’s eyes glowed feral.

Nat shivered as a glance slid down his back while he squatted over the pack. Hair raised on the back of his neck. He glanced up in time for a hand to swim into his vision. He fell back, startled. Cashia pressed on his sternum, pinning him to the ground. Cashia, in Yeller’s form, straddled him; the man’s body weight settled across his hips, effectively immobilizing him.

“Yeller?” Nat gasped at the pressure on his chest as the man rummaged in the pack. Blazing gold eyes refused to leave him. Nat swallowed. It was definitely Cashia this time and not Yeller.

The man spilt the pack back out and glanced at the contents, deliberating on his choices. He took a second to set a hand over Nat’s heart to feel the beat. It was fast, but the rhythm was solid. ” Da, ne, stop, nastavi, remember?”

Cashia’s rough accent slipped along Nat’s skin and crawled into his gut. Tereza rubbed against his insides. Sven stood guard at the edge of his conscience, ready to take over. Cashia traced along Nat’s wrist, pulling a hand to him, raising an eyebrow.

Nat licked his lower lip. He offered the other hand. “Da.”

Nat didn’t need to provide rope, but he had brought a lot of it. Cashia was a presence enough to rule over him if he had wanted it. Why then? Yeller asked in the background.

Remember the rope burns? Cashia measured out a long length of jute, cutting it from its bundle. Yeller would never be able to unsee the angry bleeding red wounds that had imprinted sickly purple and black lines on his love’s skin. He’s asking loudly to face that demon. Cashia replied as he continued measuring out another set of ropes. He didn’t flinch at me taking his hands away from him back in the trailer. This is probably going to be a simple one to master for him. I’m going to show you a few decorative rope bindings. Because it is done slowly and with precision, it is meant to build anticipation, not cause anxiety and distress. Remember, if you do this, to leave at least a finger or two widths beneath the chords. This is restraint but not meant to cause pain. This type of rope can cause rope burn naturally. Goal here is to not leave behind injurious burns but to let him know this can be done comfortably and safely.

“Hold your hands here, and don’t move.” Cashia positioned Nat’s hands up an equidistant apart, providing a gap of a hand width. He took up the long cordage and made an easy opposing circuit of equal distance. He tied off a cross knot at the bottom and pulled tight, bringing together the circle between his hands. Looping the remaining length around the circle of rope, he created a thick separation and a short tether, leaving a finger width of space between the cuffs and wrists. He shifted off of Nat to settle next to his knees. “Nastavi?” Cashia asked before beginning his next project.

“Da.” Nat nodded. He was doing all right as Cashia showed him what he was doing and explained along the way.

Cashia proceeded at a slow, deliberate pace. He bent in one of Nat’s knees and began a drawn-out process of laying out a length of thin jute and doubling it over. He pulled up Nat’s foot and folded the rope over it several times before slipping an overhand knot through the cordage. He lifted up and tied a double knot, the work tightening enough to stay, but not enough to cut off circulation. He shifted Nat’s foot behind the waif. He wrapped the cordage over Nat’s thigh and around his calf to meet back on the outside of the leg where he crossed the strand under at the cord’s meeting point. He pulled the strands over and wrapped them under the calf and up over the thigh in the opposite direction, repeating the over-and-under pattern up four times before joining the cords at the bend of the knee with another overhand knot. He was meticulously efficient, the rope evenly spaced and beautiful.

“Stop?” Cashia asked when he finished with the first knee. He laid a hand on Nat’s chest again. The man’s heart was still beating firmly, slower than a minute before, but still a touch fast. His skin was warm to the touch and maintaining good colour.

Nat shook his head, “Ne, nastavi.” If nothing else came of this event, he would have command of four distinct words. Cashia shifted to sit between his legs, spreading him wide. Heat coursed through Nat’s body at the position, his cock going semi-hard.

Cashia raised an eyebrow at the movement before turning to bind the other leg. Yeller found it interesting how Cashia found the tying process meditative.

As the rope tightened around Nat’s other leg, his heart tripped, dancing unevenly. He drew in a breath, trying to banish the darkness pushing against his thoughts. Cashia turned to him, finished with the knots and again laid a hand on his pulse. “Stop.” Nat tried to draw in a breath as his chest constricted and his fingers startled to tremble.

You’re up. Cashia pushed Yeller forward.

“Mo grá¹?” Yeller leaned over Nat’s spread legs to look into his eyes. “Tá mé ceart anseo. Anáil²,” he demanded, his heat pressed against his love.

Nat ground his teeth as he fought with his own demons. He bent his head up until Yeller met his forehead. Pulling in one deep breath after another, his heart continued to stutter painfully in his chest.

“Do you want them off?” Yeller reached for one of Nat’s knees, drawing it up.

Nat shook his head. He felt like he was about to start crying, but he really didn’t want to. For once in months, he didn’t want to run. He used to think he was all that and a box of rocks, but this journey had ground his edges down and taken away his bite. He desperately wanted to not feel like he had been run through the spin cycle with razor blades and spikes a couple dozen times. He knew the demons wouldn’t forever stay at bay, and the darkness would creep in again. He wanted a tight collar, a short leash, and a bit more control for when they would raise their ugly heads. He knew that the solution he was seeking was not the healthiest option, and it would do him better to sit in a shrink’s office. The world wasn’t giving him a lot of options at that moment, though.

“You sure?” Yeller asked, his body more aware of his position than his mind. It did catch up about the time Nat nodded his head again.

“Ta me go maith,” Nat finally wrapped his mouth around the words stuck in his throat. His heart was beginning to slow, to return to its steady rhythm, if a bit fast with anticipation.

“We can stop this here and now.” Yeller willed his body to a more chaste plain of existence, but it was coming up around cloud nine. He ground his teeth at the difficulties.

“Keep going.” Nat’s voice slipped coarse and quiet through the room. Yeller bent forward and kissed him gently, pushing his forehead against his. Nat nuzzled back. “Ready for Cashia, or…?” Yeller asked as he leaned back to trace a finger appreciatively along the skin of Nat’s knee where it met the rope.

Electricity snapped through his nerve endings, building low in Nat’s gut, providing rising evidence to his desire to continue with what they were doing. “I’ll leave that up to you.”

Yeller nodded. His eyes glowed in the moonlight streaming through the window. Cashia stared at the man for a contemplative minute. “Were you able to figure out what set you off last time?” He hated killing the mood, but he really didn’t want to kill it later, especially not after working through at least one more set of knots he wanted to set up. The white-haired man’s pale skin was sultry in the moonlight and calling for more jute.

Nat closed his eyes to think. He allowed the memory to brush up against his nerves, trusting Sven and Tereza to support the danger. “I did okay with you behind me. And commanding. My arms? I’m okay with that too. The fingers in my mouth.” His gaze drifted, his gut tightening, his cock bobbed at the idea.

Cashia watched the flush run up his body and the movement between his legs. Well, that something I know how to work with, Cashia mused. Nat might have a bit of an oral fixation, and that can very much be toyed with.

I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be getting hard at that statement, Cashia, but you’re not helping my willpower if you keep talking to yourself in here. Yeller warned.

“It-it was about the time that I couldn’t see you, when you sat up against the bed, and all I saw were legs.” Nat tried to feel through the memory.

“Was it me touching your hair and your head, or was it having your mouth and your ass filled at the same time, maybe?” Cashia offered a couple of alternatives. He had seen the bruises and rope burns when Dietrich and Heinrich brought him back to the cave, and he watched the latent bruises form over the days after Michael’s men. He saw a good bit of what they had done to Nat. He had a few impressions of what might be perched in the man’s brain, waiting to eat him alive.

Nat sought the answer at the periphery of his memory. He furrowed his brows. “I’m not sure,” he answered truthfully.

Cashia dragged a contemplative finger down Nat’s chest and stomach as he rummaged through the pack’s contents. His fingers brushed up against something ridged wrapped in cloth. He pulled a bandanna out of the pack, his eyebrow rising as a small amber-coloured resin glinted in the light. It took him a moment to comprehend what it was he was looking at. It wasn’t much longer than his thumb. A soft taper into an oval egg shape, it meshed into a short post and smoothly rounded flange. An end finial to a curtain rod. “All right. We’re going to try a few options, and see if we can pin down at least one of these triggers and make it yours to command. Is that still good with you?” Cashia laid the bandanna near Nat’s head.

Nat turned to look at it, ever aware of the fingers dragging along his skin. “Da.”

Cashia pulled Nat’s hands up and behind his head, letting him lean the back of his head on his bound fists. He pulled a length of rope through the binding, making it even on both sides. As long as Nat stretched far enough, he would be able to slip his arms back over his head and release the rope.

Cashia brought one of Nat’s bound knees up to his chest and slipped the rope between his thigh and calf behind his knee. He used the same release knot as he had used throughout the process. He shifted Nat’s other knee, spreading him wider as he tightened the rope point to the other knee.

Nat rested into the stretch of the rope. He shifted uncomfortably at the position; the tantalising slip of jute against his flesh brushed his nerves, setting fire to his senses. He wasn’t aware of the hitched moan that escaped his throat.

Cashia caught it, though, his eyes narrowing, pleased. It was an improvement. “Let’s start with the blindfold. It’s less invasive. I’m going to put it on and then go look for something. You can get out of this, right? And you can call out.” He lifted up the bandanna for Nat to see.

Nat was losing to the burn of his desires, though. He nodded again. Cashia raised an eyebrow at him, challenging him for an answer.

“Keep going.” Nat swallowed a breathy voice. He wanted to be touched; the anticipation was killing him. Cashia folded the bandanna and leaned over Nat, cradling his head gently while he pulled the material around his eyes. He left the knot simple to finger and set it back in Nat’s fist.

Yeller wasn’t expecting it when Cashia threw him forward. Enjoy for a minute. It’ll heighten his anticipation while we go find some oil. They’d left him bound and blind back in that garage. This may set him off, but it may help him. We’ll see. Make it good. Kitchen probably has something, or the guy who lived here might’ve left something useful in the bathroom.

Yeller studied the face under him. His hand rested on porcelain skin, always checking the beat there. He leaned in, pressing against Nat’s heat. His lover’s breath hitched as he shifted at the touch. Yeller nuzzled his nose and lightly kissed his lips. He nibbled along the line of his chin and down his chest to lick at an aroused nipple. Feathering a finger over the opposite, he rubbed softly at the rising ridge.

Nat wiggled, the current igniting a demand in his bloodstream. A muted, begging moan escaped him before he could tamp down his voice. His desires were flooding his brain.

Yeller gently twisted, enough to elicit a hitch in Nat’s pattern and an arching of his back. “Be right back. We will hear you if you need us to come back. Right?” Yeller ran a tongue along Nat’s shaft once as he pulled himself away and stood up.

Nat took a second to find his voice after that sensation. “Yes.” his voice strained, but for a good reason.

Yeller left the room, the carpet muffling his steps. Nat lay in the room, the chill distinct after Yeller’s warmth. Footsteps descended the stairs, and cabinet doors slammed. Drawers jiggled, and utensils clanged. The footsteps drifted into silence.

Darkness dripped, unsettling. Sven and Tereza circled, hackles rising at the intrusion. His heartbeat jumped. He drew in steadying breaths as his fingers fidgeted at the blindfold. He knew Yeller was still in the townhouse with him. For all he knew, he was standing in the door watching him, but the quiet dark drove at him like a heavy fog.

The blindfold loosened as Cashia had said it would. His heart rate slowed at the discovery. He drew in a full breath as the panic stilled. He squeaked as a hand crept along the back of his thigh.

“You doing all right?” Yeller asked. Nat shook his head. Hands yanked the blindfold the rest of the way off. Nat blinked up at Yeller, the moonlight almost blinding. “Do you want out?” Yeller reached for the ropes on his legs. Nat shook his head again.

“Tell me,” Cashia demanded quietly, his eyes hard gold. Nat looked away as he tried to steady his heart and lungs. Cashia pulled his chin around, forcing Nat to look at him. “Talk. You’re safe here, and we can stop,” urged Cashia, his accent slithering, his body heat burning up against Nat’s sensitive skin.

Nat shivered at the command. His skin caught, throbbed, burned. Cashia’s eyebrows flicked at the reaction, the only tell on his stolid face. “It was good with you and Yeller here, on me. I liked that. When you left…as long as I could hear you, I was okay. When I couldn’t hear you, being like this…it started coming back,” pleaded Nat.

Cashia nodded, filing that away. He had figured it might happen, and it was something that they could easily leave off now that they knew it was a trigger. Sound deprivation was definitely out. Visual deprivation was to be used only sparingly and within certain parameters.

“Wanna try it again or leave it off?” Cashia offered, trying to be okay with providing Nat with the option to battle his triggers.

“Ne. I feel better seeing you,” Nat admitted quietly, warmth spreading across his cheeks and turning his ears red. He glanced to Cashia’s side to see what he had gone off to look for. A small, opaque plastic bottle no longer than his thumb had fallen at his knees.

“What do you say to another set of knots in a minute?” Cashia asked as he pushed Yeller forward again. Nat nodded, nibbling his bottom lip. Yeller was beginning to get the hint. Cashia would set him up. He was showing him how to treat Nat but leaving it to him. It was different from last time. Why? Yeller asked, running a finger down Nat’s inner thigh and up over his hip to his stomach.

Nat watched him, catching the change. His foot twitched at the ticklish sensation. “Déan é².”

Your boyfriend needs help. When we’ve got him sorted, I’ll be able to pursue my mate. Right now, it’s not about her, so you get to do most of the work. You have a decent imagination up here to work around with, but you’re still a bit naive on some things that need to be done with a more experienced touch. He expects you to treat him a certain way and me another way. I edge him; you make him cum.

Here, scootch under him, pull his legs up a bit more. We’ll switch to something else after a couple of minutes. For now, let’s warm him back up, Cashia directed Yeller, showing him how he wanted Nat.

Yeller obeyed the instructions. He pulled Nat up in such a way that his back and butt perched on Yeller’s kneeling thighs, leaving his shoulders and head on the floor, almost inverting him. The bulge in Yeller’s jeans pressed against Nat’s heat.

Nat glanced down at the contact, his cheeks turning red once more and his breath catching in the back of his throat.

Try something, and watch. Like you listen to his heartbeat, watch his body react. Give him your fingers. Touch his lips, Cashia backed up. He wasn’t exactly used to directing someone through an s/m session. He was in a way, directing the sub, but this – maybe he could think of it like that. He nodded to himself as the idea crystallised in his mind. There was nothing against a dom working on a sub with another. All right, let’s go with that. He was used to being the master, but it might not be bad to take on an apprentice.

Yeller crept a hand up Nat’s chest and rubbed a thumb along his soft lower lip. The texture sent a bolt through Yeller’s spine, and he found himself licking his own lip at the feeling. Nat opened for him, his tongue darting out to trace the pad. He throbbed and quivered against Yeller’s bulge. Yeller watched his skin warm and had to fight a gasp of his own when Nat pulled his thumb into his cruel heat. A memory of a kitchen and Nat sitting on a white Formica counter under a rising moon eased up in his mind. Nat’s tongue swept down the length greedily, his eyes closing at the texture.

Nat’s body ran hot and restless and demanding, a thin clear liquid dripping from his tip to spread across his skin in a rivulet. Yeller’s eyes had turned two-toned, one a brilliant glowing gold, the other a warm honey. Nat turned from them to hunt out Yeller’s index finger.

Don’t give it to him, not yet. You’re winding him up. We have two options, either we stay in this position and use that thing he brought along, Cashia pointed Yeller’s attention to the plug replacement, or you shift out from under him, and we put him in another set of knots. Either way can be a tease as long as you don’t take it all the way with the plug. Your goal here is to turn him into a begging, squirming mess, and all he can see is you. Cashia sat back and waited. Yeller took the first option.

Don’t let him have your finger outright. Use it the same way you do the plug. Ease it, take it back, circle and tease, but don’t give in to his demands, cause that’s you fulfilling your desires and giving into the easy way. Not bad, but not the point here. You’re priming him, associating the connections together so that when he comes to suck you off, he can feel you back there, or at least desire it desperately. You can use the oil, or you can let him suck on that for a sec, seeing as you’re not using it entirely yet.

Yeller let Nat have his thumb for a second as he reached for the finial. He had thought it resin, but it turned out to be glass. He rubbed it against his jeans before slipping it into the hand that Nat was administering to.

Nat pulled back only momentarily at the change in texture and temperature. He opened his eyes a slit, lost to the heat burning through him as he licked the coolness, trying to communicate his every desire through gesture alone. He wanted so badly to run his hands along Yeller’s body. It was exquisite torture.

Not sure how you do this, Cashia. Yeller swallowed, fixated on Nat’s lips and tongue, fighting his desire for them to be doing something else entirely. He could almost feel them caressing him, wrapped around his shaft. His head pounded as his stomach tightened, making incessant demands.

Cool your head, apprentice. I’ve had more than a couple of years of practice. It doesn’t come immediately or easily. There is no right or wrong way, and sometimes you do cum before your sub. It happens. It’s not always perfect, and it’s all right. For now, you’ll have to mute that feeling. It’s called edging for a reason. Find that happy place and move into it and make it home.

Yeller drew in a breath for patience and got comfortable. His free hand spread across Nat’s chest and stomach, kneaded at tight muscles and caressed soft skin. He drew along the separation between Nat’s thigh and his nethers, avoiding touching his most sensitive parts, waiting, playing. It was a rolling battle with his body to not take him then and there. This had to qualify as masochistic in some way. He traced back up and took the solid glass from Nat, finding it thoroughly warm and returned his index finger to brush at his swelling lips. He ran the tip of the glass down Nat’s skin to caress along his hard shaft, collecting the thin liquid to spread along his length, eliciting a shiver from him. Nat nipped at the sensation, causing Yeller to throb painfully at the current flowing through him. He ran the tip under the flaring head and traced the line of veins that ran under the light skin. He circled, gentle with Nat’s balls to rub along the soft spot below his weights and above his entrance. Nat’s breath caught. His cock jerked and more clear liquid pooled at the tip. His legs flexed under their binding as Yeller traced his entrance with the warmed glass and feathered his lips with his index finger, mirroring the movements. He backed away from both when Nat tried to draw him in and came back when he slackened, moaning in desperation.

They continued the dance for a couple of frustrating minutes. Yeller delved deeper and deeper into his watchfulness, almost entering a trance-like meditation on how far he could push Nat and back off to elicit the variety of begging reactions from the white-haired man beneath him. “Mo chroi³, Ruben,” panted Nat, his voice strained and cracking.

And this is where you back off and switch tactics. Cashia directed. Yeller removed the glass and shifted from under Nat, gently letting his hips come back in contact with the floor. Nat breathed through shivers as his body yelled at him to finish. Grab up two long lengths of rope. You’re looking for about four arm-spans of length for both strands, about thirty feet or so. Yeller took up more cordage and began measuring out the length while Nat watched, trying to breathe through the waves of demanding heat. The cordage slipped and accumulated on Nat’s stomach as Yeller measured it out, eliciting more shivers and groans from Nat as every movement over sensitized skin threatened to send him over the edge.

Goal here is to push and prod at his senses, at how his skin interprets contact. Fold the ropes in half and let him out of the restraining tether between his arms and his legs. Yeller followed Cashia’s directions closely and helped Nat sit upright on his knees. Nat stretched his shoulders as he brought his hands back in front of him. You don’t want to keep them in the same position for too long, even if it is tempting. It’s not good on tendons. Cashia continued his explanation.

“Do you want to continue?” Yeller kissed Nat gently as he rubbed at his boyfriend’s shoulders, helping to release the tension.

Nat kissed him back fiercely, strung out and hot as hell. “Dia, da,” he mixed his verbiage, his head no longer completely able to differentiate between Yeller’s Irish and Cashia’s Croatian. He was so freaking close.

Cashia took over for the next part, trusting his senses over his apprentice’s. He created a lark’s knot in the centre of both doubled strands and slipped them over Nat’s shoulders. This would give Nat some time to come down from his edge, though Cashia wasn’t about to let him burn out. He pulled the four strands to the front of the chest and created a simple overhand knot. He glanced up, pressing it against Nat’s sternum. “Da?” he asked, still trying to feel out what the trigger for last time had done it.

“Da.” Nat nodded, throbbing in anticipation. Cashia wrapped the ropes behind the middle of Nat’s back, the ropes sliding against his hard cock. Nat groaned and whimpered. He was close, and he couldn’t imagine hardening more than he already was, but his body wasn’t relenting.

Cashia pulled the ropes back around to the front and created another knot, this one at Nat’s belly button before sending the ropes again to the back where he crossed them at Nat’s hips. The next time he brought the ropes around, he pulled them around the front of the thighs at the joinder of the groin. Nat shivered, his skin begging for contact. Cashia wrapped the strand up to the outside of the thighs, the rope cupping the line of his butt. He hitched the line under the strands on the outside, taking his time to evenly work between both the left and right sides. He hitched the lines up Nat’s side, creating an intricate pattern. He formed a stopper knot at the lark’s head at Nat’s shoulders to keep the ropes from sliding. Nat shifted restlessly, the texture of the rope constant fingers slipping across his skin, the knots kneaded and pressed.

“Please.” Nat dug fingers into the carpet to support his kneeling body.

Cashia stilled, a blowtorch ignited in his gut. “Do you want me to stop?”

Nat shook his head slowly, his high washing over his body in waves of hot and cold. He had never been dragged along for this long. He leaned forward, trying to find balance as he pressed his hands against Cashia’s chest, his fingers twisting into his t-shirt. His eyes fell to the bulge in Cashia’s jeans, and a shudder ran down his spine.

“Do you want it off?” Cashia touched the collar of his t-shirt, drawing Nat’s eyes up.

Nat’s gaze was turning fuzzy. He wanted to taste, to feel Yeller’s skin beneath his tongue. He nodded desperately.

“Do you want it off?” Cashia pressed again.

Nat wrapped his mouth around his words. They spun around his head. He nodded again. Cashia trailed a hand up Nat’s arm and down the knots, skimming skin.

“Da?” Cashia ran a light finger over the head of Nat’s shaft, smearing clear liquid across the top.

“Da,” he mimicked through a raspy gasp. Cashia shifted Nat’s bound hands to the bulge in his jeans as he pulled his shirt off, giving into Nat’s desires for a moment. The white-haired man caressed hungrily, groaning at the thought of what lay beneath that zipper.

I’m going to test something. Be ready for him to baulk, Cashia cautioned. Yeller perked up, his full attention concentrated on every move with the warning. Cashia stood up and unzipped his pants, keeping Nat’s full attention. His length emerged into the moonlight, stiff and as desperately demanding as Nat’s. Cashia shifted, letting the material fall down his legs to leave him naked. Nat, more than eager, lapped at the length hungrily. He moaned pleasurably as he filled his mouth with the flaring head. Cashia kept his hands off Nat and let him lead for a bit. He hissed at the tightness, the sensation heady and dangerous. It had been a while since his host had felt any relief.

After a few strokes that Nat found utterly enjoyable, Cashia touched his hand gently. Nat gave him his hand, thinking he wanted to direct him. Cashia moved his hands to cup his balls gently. It took everything in him to remain standing at the contact. He waited, trying to catch his bearings as they tried to take flight. A grunt escaped his throat as Nat’s tongue curled around his shaft tenderly.

Cashia slowly shifted his hands up Nat’s arm until he reached his shoulder. Nat continued, though his concentration split, his fixation waning in intensity. Cashia paused, and Nat resumed assuaging his insatiable appetite. Cashia shared the sensations, driving at Yeller’s desires. He also shared his trepidation, revealing his plans and impressions. He traced the skin along the lark’s knot and over to run a line along his clavicle.

Nat’s skin sang beneath him, but the knots were tightening in his mind as Cashia’s fingers trailed along his collarbone. He swallowed, moving away from his deep bobbing to lick at the tip gently. Cashia’s fingers brushed into his hair, and he continued with what he was so intrigued with, though the darkness drifted along his awareness in a haze. Cashia’s hand cupped his chin delicately before tracing the column of his throat. Nat paused, the darkness pressing in like a trap on a tight spring. He pushed back from Cashia’s fingers and looked up at him, startled. Cashia watched him with an apologetic look.

He knelt in front of Nat. They sat knee to knee. He kept from touching Nat, willing the man to stop shaking under his own volition.

Nat bowed his head, resting against Cashia’s chest. Cashia brushed a reassuring hand along his back. “Found your trigger.” His voice scratched at Nat’s sensitive skin. He was still hot and in desperate need, the blackness beginning to evaporate with every deep breath he stole back from the night. Nat sighed, his eyes falling on Cashia’s twitching length.

“Why?” Nat’s voice broke, his disappointment and frustration taking over the room.

Cashia continued to brush his skin reassuringly. Should we stop here? He turned to his host. Yeller shared in Cashia’s sensation, trying his best to comfort Nat.

We could return to what he was apparently happy doing and finish this, but I think that would leave both us and him feeling emptier than he came here being. Yeller didn’t like putting this feeling into words.

“Do you want out of the ropes?” Cashia twisted a larks knot free.

“Fix this.” Nat balled his bound hands into fists, pressing himself into Cashia’s warmth.

Cashia pulled him closer, hugging him carefully. “It will break you if I do that.”

“Make it stop doing this. Please.” Nat looked up, his eyes glittering.

“You know what is causing this?” Cashia asked him as he shifted Nat to sit more upright, his hands holding him steady by his upper arms. Nat elongated his neck, glancing away from Cashia as he pulled at the half memory flashing in splintered fragments. Nat’s hands came up to his throat, forming a spot that Yeller recognised. His stomach flopped at the admission.

“Yeah. I know what’s causing it now.” Nat nodded, turning back to look up at Cashia fully. His green eyes sparked like emeralds in the dark of the room. He was angry this time, though, compared to last time.

“Will you be able to look at Yeller again after this?” Cashia didn’t want to jeopardise their relationship to fix something that could be easily avoided.

“I don’t know if I can come to him complete if he can’t touch my throat, my shoulders during sex. I can’t take that knowledge.” Nat shook his head. “I hate being like this.”

Yeller? Cashia reached for his host, desperate.

Yeller paced inside of himself uncomfortably. He had seen the flashes in Cashia’s mind of what he’d do to fix the problem, but he didn’t trust himself to do it. If you don’t want to do this, don’t, Cashia. Yeller leaned forward and kissed Nat’s forehead. Nat lifted his face, savouring a deeper kiss as Yeller pulled his lover against him, toppling his balance on his bound knees. “Your choice, mo gra. How do you want this?” Yeller trembled.

“I want to see you,” he admitted.

Yeller nodded. “Do you want me on top or under you?”

Nat thought quietly for a minute, before sucking in a breath. “Under.” He barely got the word out.

“Do you want me in you?”

Nat drew in a shaky broken sound at the question. “Please,” he gasped as another burning throb told him he was too close.

“We can do that.” Yeller stood up and picked up Nat, tenderly cradling him before moving to the wall that was covered in chalkboard paint. He deposited Nat near the wall and went and picked up the small opaque bottle. He came back and slid down the wall, pulling Nat to straddle him. He kissed him tenderly, running his hands along the bindings.

Nat shivered under the soft assault, his body still warm and willing. Yeller pulled his waist tightly to him as he nipped at open spots of skin. Nat allowed his senses to drift at the torment. He rested his hands on Yeller’s chest, trying hard to find balance.

Yeller unscrewed a light blue cap off of the little bottle behind his back or his infuriated struggle to peel the safety seal off of it. He didn’t completely realise how hard he bit down on a particularly soft spot between the lines of ropes as he tore the seal off. Nat shivered, his cock hardening to the point of pain and his moan escaping as he rubbed against Yeller’s length insistently.

Yeller poured the clear liquid into his hand and set the bottle down, careful to lean it against the wall to prevent it from falling over and spilling. He held the liquid in his hand for a moment as he licked the bite to let the lube come up to body temp before rubbing it in his hands. He shifted, breaking contact with Nat as he reached between them, sliding oiled finger up and down Nat’s cock and his in rhythm. Nat gasped, his body igniting, his breath coming in small panting moans.

The blond leaned forward and licked Nat’s lips, demanding as he traced the path of the ropes along Nat’s inner thighs that led him to pulsing heat. His love inhaled sharply and sighed when Yeller pushed a single digit in carefully. Nat’s lips tingled as he drew in Yeller’s tongue, duelling with it. Yeller pressed slowly until he hit a sweet spot that forced a bead of whitish liquid to pool at Nat’s tip. A breathy mewl escaped Nat’s lips. Yeller nipped at his tongue, his lower lip, as he pulled out and pushed again. Hesitant, he inserted a second finger into Nat’s heat and continued his deliberate ministrations.

He dragged out his time until he was as tight and strung out at the man on top of him. He hit a point where his body cried at him, and Nat couldn’t keep from rubbing in a desperate need for satisfaction. Yeller shifted down farther under Nat. His lover curled over him as Yeller brought him more fully over his length. Nat let out a disappointed whimper as Yeller extracted his fingers and positioned him. His pleasured gasps echoed in the quiet of the townhouse as he impaled himself on Yeller’s length fully.

He gritted his teeth at his lewd, betraying voice. He waited as the sweltering pinch and pull of his internals burned against his back and shot pleasure through his pulsing shaft.

Yeller pulled and pushed experimentally at Nat’s hardness, eliciting more moans as he encouraged movement along his length. Nat didn’t have much of a give with his knees wrapped, his shifting only slight, leaving him filled and edgy. Yeller, sensing the frustration, fingered the tie-offs, pulling them loose. He tugged at the ropes, slowly slipping them from their hold. Nat trembled at the sensation as he gained more momentum. He relaxed into the hollowness starting at his toes.

One leg free, the double knot at his foot still tied, Yeller worked the other knot free. He paused at the first clenching of Nat’s muscles around his length. He reached down between them to encircle Nat’s shaft, pressing a stilling thumb at the base and pulling at his balls gently until Nat calmed. His lover let out a muffled, frustrated hiss as Yeller freed his other leg.

He took Nat’s bound hands and brought them to take his hand’s place. Nat glanced up at Yeller, noticing the split-coloured eyes again.

“We’re in a good place right now. Are you sure?” Cashia asked as he ran his hands up Nat’s feverish arms.

“Yes, are you?” Nat held tight, fighting the tidal wave beating at him. The blackness pulsed around him as Cashia’s hands crept up his shoulders firmly. This time it was no light touch of testing. Cashia gently cupped Nat’s cheek and pulled him in for a hungry kiss. He circled his throat; though his hands were firm, they were gentle. Darkness crowded down, eliciting a rumble from Sven and Tereza. Nat waited, standing against the current as best he could.

Cashia pulled his length out halfway and tightened his grip, pushing Nat down on top of him as his breathing became ragged and his pulse beat like butterfly wings under his palms. Nat was torn between the hard pressure feathering up his neck to beat behind his eyes and nose and the numbing pressure below begging for release. Cashia continued the hard push, driving into Nat, pounding him as his breathing shallowed and his eyes closed to slits. Then, just as Cashia knew his grip was tight enough to cause his own heart to stutter, he watched Nat’s teeth grit momentarily, then relax with a caught breath and a moan. A hard spasm clamped around Cashia’s shaft as Nat drew in a harried breath.

Under Cashia’s tight grip, the wave broke, the blackness evaporated like water in the desert. It curled from his toes, a wash of heat pushing through his balls and out. His stomach and hands went numb. Cashia loosened up, switching Yeller back fast as he edged. Yeller drug his hands away from Nat’s neck and tunnelled into his hair, directing his lips into a feverish kiss as he allowed himself to bury deep into Nat once more. His own need broke, pinpoints of numbing heat bursting across his fingertips and skin.

Exhausted, Nat lay on top of Yeller for a time. He closed his eyes, drawing in shallow gasps as aftershocks rocked his body. Yeller pulled himself from Nat and laid him down to retrieve the bandanna. Quietly, he cleaned them up. Finished, he curled around Nat and threw an arm over his chest, closing his eyes.

“Mo milseain⁵?” Nat’s voice was scratchy and low, but satisfied.

“Mo grá⁶?” Yeller kissed Nat’s temple tenderly.

“Go raibh maith agat⁷.” Nat turned his head to capture Yeller’s lips tenderly.

“Is brea liom tu⁸.” Yeller pressed his forehead to Nat’s, rubbing their noses together lovingly.

“Tá mé i ngrá leat freisin⁹.” Nat laid back, sated.

Cashia let them stay the way they were for several minutes, long enough that Nat fell asleep. He eventually roused Yeller from his peace. Come on, let’s get him out of those ropes. Yeller nodded and sat up to kneel over his lover. Nat looked up at him, dreamily brushing his hands over Yeller’s cheek. Yeller held the warm hand against his skin before pulling the restraints apart. It took him less time getting the ropes around his torso off with Nat’s assistance than it had taken for Cashia to put them on. They freed his feet of the last of the ropes.

“Better?” Yeller asked, his finger brushing along his love’s throat.

Nat leaned into the touch and waited. A soft smile spread across his swollen lips. “Better,” he agreed. The demons were still there, but the leash was properly short and the collar insufferably tight at that exact moment. The deep pit behind him looked like a puddle, and he was going to savour that moment of controlled freedom. He knew it would not last forever, but he would take what he could get.

“Do you want to talk about what happened?” Yeller’s voice was a soft comfort in the foreign room.

“Someday. Maybe.” Nat couldn’t meet Yeller’s eyes.

“I meant…well, if and when you want to talk about what happened in Esterwood, I’ll be there for you. I meant what we just did? I may not know a lot about the whole BDSM world. I was depending on Cashia there pretty heavy for guidance. But I know aftercare or cool down, or something is good. Help with psychology?” Yeller offered.

Cashia brushed against Yeller’s side. Yeller eased over to give Cashia room. He traced a callused finger along Nat’s jawline. “I don’t want to have what happened to us back in the trailer happen again. I will never take your voice from you or anything you do not wish to give. If you are to continue hosting my mate, and we continue along these paths, talk to me. Tell me what you are comfortable with and what makes you uncomfortable.”

“Thank you for this, Cashia. Thank you for your patience and for understanding my problem.” Nat rested into his hand.

“I’m going to give you back your lover, Medeni mjesec¹⁰.” Cashia switched with Yeller. Nat closed his eyes, a faint smile passing his lips.

Thank you, Cashia. He seems to be a little more at peace. Yeller tagged in with Cashia.

Thank the snows of Siberia for that. Breath control is fucking dangerous. Cashia shifted to the edge of Yeller’s conscience and laid down.

“I see Cashia finally went to sleep.” Nat smiled up at Yeller. Yeller raised an eyebrow, curious how Nat had known. “Your eyes were two-toned since I asked you to fix me. You’ve both been watching. When he wakes again, I should thank him properly for helping us – me.” Nat pulled Yeller back down to lay on the floor with him, ropes and other paraphernalia spread around them. He felt like he could sleep for a week, and this time purely out of euphoric exhaustion and no boogie man creeping in his dreams.