Page 42 of The Fulbourn: Pitch & Sickle

Christ, he’d march into Elyssiam as a one-man army if the prince kept looking at him like that. ‘You’ll regret asking.’ Silas was oddly nervous, about the dance more than anything.

‘I doubt that.’ Pitch held out his hand, fingers like slim lengths of ivory, and Silas’s hesitation fled.

The daemon was, of course, adept at leading Silas about. The ankou only stumbled a handful of times before they found a semblance of rhythm. He had one hand braced about Pitch’s lower back, the other clasping the prince’s warm palm. The daemon’s softness threw him every time. It was so unexpected on a creature so harsh in word and deed.

Around and around they twirled, in a space far too small for such things. Once Silas overcame his worry that he’d tread on Pitch’s feet and break a toe, the flow of their movement was hypnotic. Never once did Pitch’s eyes leave his face as ivory keys were struck and strings of horsehair plucked. The moment was utterly frivolous. This was not where they should be nor what they should be doing.

But he’d be nowhere else.

Silas urged Pitch in closer, so there was no space between them. The prince came readily, pressing in until the hard lines of his body beneath the gown were evident against Silas’s hip. His head was tilted back to look up at the man towering over him, and though he was not smiling, there was no mistaking his happiness. Silas took hold of the moment and kissed him, a brush of lips that slid quickly deeper, to where the air was thin and they were both drawing it in with tiny gasps. All the while, much lower down, the rub of their bodies was making Silas’s limp and untroubled parts stiff and bothersome, an embarrassingly evident arousal only stoked higher by the sway of Pitch’s hips against him. They danced all the while exploring the heat and dampness between one another’s lips.

The prince pulled free with a breathless sound that had Silas’s mind spiralling into raw and needy places. Pitch lifted his hand from Silas’s shoulder and spun away, returning in a whirl of cloudy grey promise. His smile was tight, purposeful, and full of wicked intent. He shoved his freed hand against Silas’s chest with a strength that rocked the ankou onto his heels. Silas uttered a cry as he staggered. The back of his knees struck something hard, and he was going down.

‘Shit,’ was all he managed before he was on his back on the chaise, sending golden cushions scattering where they were not trapped beneath the weight of his shoulders. A flurry of grey engulfed him. Pitch clambered on top of him, settling his weight where Silas was rigid and straining. The prince planted his hands either side of Silas’s face and leaned down low.

‘So clumsy, my dear Sickle.’ His kiss came with a teasing brush of tongue before he was lifting away again. He shuffled himself down onto Silas’s thighs, peeling off his gloves as he did so. ‘But as you look so comfortable…’ The prince tossed the satin gloves and gathered up his skirts, bunching them against his belly so that the front of Silas’s trousers was visible, peaked with stiff want. Pitch’s fingers fluttered against a cock that ached to be freed, and Silas crushed a soft moan against the back of his teeth. The daemon had the buttons loosened quicker than an eye could blink and grasped the pillar of flesh that sprang free.

‘Oh god.’ Silas lifted his hips as the daemon rubbed him in slow strokes, applying only a subtle pressure. ‘Pitch…Christ…’

‘Do you not like it?’ The daemon stopped his attentions, batting his lashes in playful astonishment.

Silas’s laughter mixed with an agonised groan. ‘You know very well I like it.’ He propped himself onto his elbows. ‘But you have already spoiled me well…’ Silas swallowed, certain of what he wished to say, but shy with it. ‘If you will allow…I should like to give you a turn.’ He reached to run his fingertips along the cut of Pitch’s jaw, down along the smooth material that covered his neck. Silas was rewarded with a shudder. ‘Tell me what would be acceptable, and I will do it most gladly. Anything at all.’ Silas rubbed at one of the buttons on Pitch’s bodice. As stunning a woman as the daemon made, Silas missed the man beneath.

Beyond the privacy of the room, a new act was being announced, something about riding crops and naughty nuns. The crowd rumbled with anticipation, stamping their feet upon the floorboards.

‘I know what I would like.’ Pitch’s fingers remastered their hold on Silas’s member. ‘But it may be too much.’

He flicked his thumb over the slick head of Silas’s prick, and the ankou slumped back onto the cushions, turning to mush beneath the daemon’s caresses.

‘If it is what you want, then it is not too much,’ Silas slurred through his pleasure.

Pitch leaned down, bringing his mouth to Silas’s ear. ‘I want us as close as can be,’ he whispered. ‘I want to feel you inside me.’

The band struck a raucous note, loud enough to cover up the strangled sound that escaped Silas. His head was spinning, his vision clouded at the edges so that all he could see was the daemon, with his rouged cheeks and glistening Cupid’s bow lips.

‘Are you certain?’ Silas managed after a time.

Pitch chewed at his lip and withdrew his hand. Silas nearly cried out with the loss.

‘I am certain, but it seems you are not.’ Pitch moved to sit up, and Silas went with him, stilling him with a firm hand against the sway of his back.

‘You misread me. I am very certain.’ He ran his hand along Pitch’s spine, lightening his touch where he knew the scars from the halo to be. Light-headed, heart galloping. ‘I’ve not been more sure of anything since I found myself returned.’

Pitch relaxed against him, like butter melting in a warm pan. He danced a kiss against the tip of Silas’s nose. ‘I want you to take me away from this place.’

Silas’s hand stilled. ‘Of course, if you wish to leave, we shall.’

The daemon chuckled, and Silas’s skin prickled in all the very best of ways. ‘Gods, Sickle, if you can move anywhere, you are a better man than me. Feel the state of me.’ He took Silas’s hand, leading it beneath the skirts. Pitch wore no drawers, only gartered stockings that clung to his firm thighs. There was nothing between Silas’s fingers and the place where the prince was every bit as hard as he. ‘I mean that I want you to fuck me so deeply I have no room to think of anything else. Make me forget all that we are, and all others wish us to be. I want to feel nothing but you. Nothing but us.’

Silas forgot how to blink. How to inhale. He had his hand, at last, upon the daemon’s cock, something he longed for so often, but he just held it there. Unmoving.

‘Good…lord…’ The words barely scraped up his throat. ‘Will you…will you take off the bodice, I need to see you.’

Pitch laughed softly. ‘As you wish. But I’ll not take off the skirts nor the corset. They stay.’

There was a hint there, an undercurrent of subtle darkness that Silas would not challenge. Pitch could do as he wished, as he needed.

‘I’d have it no other way.’