Theater of Flesh-1936: Freaks and Fetishes (closed for haremfaery)

[Zagreus_D]

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Something was wrong. D could feel it the moment he stepped out of the stifling heat of the crowed performance tent, and into the slightly less stifling heat of the humid August night.

He had just finished introducing the third act of the late-night show, Yvetta "The Sultry Songbird." Inside the tent the rise and fall of her operatic aria was naturally the only thing that could be heard. Out here, on the other side of the thick canvas walls, the absence of background noise was unsettling. Usually there was always a handful of crew members loafing around, drinking and smoking, unwinding from a long days work, a few drunken patrons stumbling about, looking for the kind of entertainment that wasn't offered on the main stage, but in the small private tents tucked away discretely behind the featured attractions. The stillness was wrong.

D began walking out toward the dirt road, the only access to the dusty field which would serve as home for the next week or so.

If police had come on grounds to harass the show-people, the crew would do their best to keep them up front until D arrived. But that usually caused a commotion. The drunken patrons would have scurried away unnoticed, but his own people would be a buzz of activity, a few of them acting out like lunatics to distract the law, while everyone else rushed to stash away contraband, and ensure that all of the women appeared to be picture perfect models of virtue.

He didn't get far before he heard a howl echo across the field. It was Talya, the wolf woman, and the call, D did not doubt, was intended to draw his attention. It did not come from the front of the carnival as D expected, but from some distance away in the opposite direction. D turned and quickened his pace to a jog.

If he didn't get back to the main tent before Yvetta's performance ended, Horatio or Montaigne would introduce the next act. It was not uncommon for D to be called away in the middle of a show to put out some fire or another.

Talya howled again, a double yelp for urgency. D broke into a run, his top hat tumbled from his head. He made no move to retrieve it. He saw Tony first, running toward him, headed back toward the carnival. He had come from the line of trees that bordered the field. The man stopped when he saw his employer.

"Tony, what's going on?"

Tony was out of breath, bent over panting, hands against his thighs. It seemed like an eternity before he answered, "The Amazing Orsino... someone shot him... We heard the gunfire and..." D didn't wait to hear any more. He ran full on into the shadows of the trees and nearly collided with two men who were supporting Orsino's limp body between them. They were bringing him back toward the carnival.

"Drop him!" D barked, "Are you crazy? You can't take him back there. The police will be all over us in a heartbeat, and it won't matter to them what happened or who is responsible. They'll shut us down!"

Silenus chuckled from where he stood, relaxed against a tree. His cigarette glowed brighter orange for a moment as he took a long drag. "I tried to tell them, boss. None of these cunts around here ever listens to me."

The confused crew men set down the body. As D's eyes adjusted to the dark he was able to make out other figures standing around. About ten of them had responded to the crisis. "Go back. Try to act normal. For fuck's sake don't say anything to anybody." The group haltingly began to move back toward the carnival. D spotted Talya and grabbed her arm, pulling her aside. "What happened to him?"

"I don't know. We heard gunshots, and I was able to track the smell of blood. He was dead when we found him. No one else was around."

"Did any of the patrons hear? Did they see anything?" D couldn't fully conceal the hint of panic in his voice. The police could be exceptionally brutal to those that they considered low life scum. If they had any excuse, they would beat and bully the innocent outsiders of his troupe, and D would be powerless to stop them.

"There were two patrons outside the tents when we heard. They must have heard the shots too, but Beth and Gillian offered them free services to keep them out of the way."

"Good girls." D sighed in relief. "Tell them I'll compensate them personally."

Talya nodded, "I'm sorry no one was there to tell you. Tony was supposed to stay behind and grab you as soon as you got off stage, but in all the confusion he just followed along with the rest of us. I sent him back as soon as I realized, and I started barking like mad once the guys decided to bring the body back. I knew it was wrong to..."

D cut her off gently, "It's okay. You did good. Just keep an eye on those idiots for me... in fact, if a couple of the girls are willing, tell them to keep those guys company, help them get their heads clear. I'll deal with their stupidity tomorrow, for tonight I just want to make sure that they don't run their mouths to the wrong people."

Talya's mood changed visibly after receiving the boss' praise. If she had a tail she probably would have wagged it. D reached out and scratched her affectionately behind her pointed furry ear, a gesture which D had learned was not something the woman found condescending, but rather enjoyed. Talya sighed in appreciation and then dashed off to find the troublesome crew members, and make sure that they were given some amorous attention.

When everyone had gone and were safely out of earshot D turned to the only person who had not followed the directions he had given.

Silenus snuffed out his cigarette against the tree. "Go on back and look after your damned mess of children. I've got it from here."

"Make sure no one finds the body," D instructed.

Silenus snorted, "They've never found one before, and they ain't gonna start now. This is not the problem. If there's going to be a problem it's going to be with HER." The old man stooped down and tossed the tall man's corpse over his shoulder, a feat that should have been impossible given the differences in the men's sizes, but Old Silenus shuffled slowly off into the forest, baring the weight without complaint. D left his friend to the task at hand. He preferred not knowing what Silenus would do with the body. He walked slowly back toward the field, taking his time so that he could gather his thoughts.

D had no affection for the man who called himself "The Amazing Orsino." He had fantasized about jabbing a knife into the man's throat nearly every night since their two traveling shows had merged into one. Only one thing had stayed his hand, and that was HER. The same HER that Silenus had so ominously alluded to. Her name was Perizada, an exotic goddess of a woman who lived faithfully and obediently in Orsino's shadow. D was still not completely certain of what she was truly, Orsino had barely allowed D to get close enough to wish her good morning at breakfast, but even from a distance D knew that she was powerful. Magical.

Orsino was nothing. He was a cruel and petty tyrant who mistreated his performers, withholding their pay, and punishing their smallest indiscretions with iron fisted authority. D had attempted to buy his show outright, and not because his acts were in the least bit lucrative. With the exception of Perizada who performed a variety of arts and entertainments with exquisite skill, there was no real talent in the bunch. They were all simple and desperate souls who had turned to the carnival life because they possessed minor deformities which prevented them from living that illusive dream called normalcy.

D attempted to purchase the show in order to alleviate some of their suffering, but the greedy bastard had refused to sell, insisted instead on becoming "partners," which basically meant that he would use D's money to fund his starving troupe, but still get to walk around like a big man, as if he had somehow earned the sudden success he had been given. D wanted badly to kill him. What D did not want, was to deal with the questions and consequences that might arise once the man was dead.

At the edge of the carnival field D stooped to pick up his hat. Now he had no choice but to face Perizada, to speak with her for the first time, and to find out exactly who she was, and what she intended to do now that her companion was out of the picture. He walked toward the wagon house where Perizada resided with Orsino and knocked on the wooden frame of the door.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada doubled over in pain. It was if something was being ripped from her deep inside. A rending in her womb, a searing fire in her gut, hot pokers in her head. She knew the pain. It had happened untold times before.

She fell to her knees in the vardo gasping for breath. The pain continued for seconds or hours or centuries. She did not know. When it finally stopped it was as if it never happened but it left her breathless and exhausted. Why was she not back in her vessel? Could she finally be free? What did freedom feel like? She had no idea. Her heart thumped. She jumped up from the floor. Her movements were fluid and graceful even in her eagerness.

She willed herself to be methodical in her search. Starting at the front of the vado, she moved widdershins touching everything, lifting everything, opening everything, every chest, every drawer that she came across. She pulled all the bedclothes off the bed. Would she even recognize it if she saw it? He hadn't made her return to it in a very long time.

The Amazing Orsino, as he called himself, had been a two-bit magician, pickpocket, and grifter. Until he found her vessel.

A family who once had money was selling off what they could to pay their taxes and keep stately home. The grandfather had been a world traveler and brought back many curiosities from all over the world. Her vessel was one of them, although the man had no idea what it was that he owned. He never called her forth. And so she slept on.

Orsino bought the vessel, a metal box of sorts inscribed with strange drawings and writing he didn't recognize or understand, that he thought would make an interesting additional to his magic show, or perhaps in his next scam. She appeared to him when he began polishing it. His prayers had been answered. Hers had not.

Remembering what the vessel looked like, she went back to searching the vardo to find it. It must be in here, Orsino wouldn't dare leave it where someone else could find it.

The knock on the door interrupted her. She pulled her silk kimono tighter around her and opened it to find Mr. D standing there, hat in hand. She found him to be a handsome man, his face as smooth as a youth. It seemed to her that he actively avoided her while Orsino had been alive. Orsino saw rivals everywhere. She expected he had made threats to Mr. D to stay away from her.

She opened the door and stood aside to let him him. "He is dead." Her voice was flat, there was no sadness in it, or joy. She indicated a chair on the side of the vardo that she hadn't ransacked yet. "Please sit, Mr. D. Excuse the disarray. I was ... looking for something." She never met his eyes. She rarely met anyone's eyes.

Orsino had been a very jealous man. She had seen him beat a man to death for looking at her. She learned not to give him cause to justify his brutality. Old habits were hard to break. She should know.

 

[Zagreus_D]

Upon seeing the ransacked state of the vardo, and hearing Perizada's very frank and unemotional acknowledgment of Orisino's death, D's first thought was that Perizada herself may have killed the man. Yet there she was inviting him in.

No, he decided quickly that none of the circumstances indicated Perizada in the least. She was a magical creature, and had more intimate access to Orisino than anyone. If she had killed the man, it would not have been clumsily done, with a gun, drawing the attention of witnesses. He did not know Perizada well, but he suspected if she did decide to kill, the deed would be artful, subtle, and no one would ever have cause to suspect her.

"Do you have any idea who may have been responsible?" D asked as he stepped up into the vardo. Moving to the offered chair required D to slide through the narrow opening in close proximity to Perizada, who kept her eyes cast downward. In that moment he caught the intoxicating aroma of her aura. She smelled of ancient magicks, exotic yet familiar. Without really intending to, he found himself leaning into her, breathing in the potent emanation of her power. He felt that he could almost name her, that if he could but taste her, he would surely be able to identify the origin of her particular bouquet, just as he could with any wine.

He had to force himself to back down, to move on, away from her, and into the chair. He moved with the heavy lethargy of a man under the influence of opium. He felt giddy, light headed. His hat dropped to the ground between his feet, and he leaned forward with his head in his hands, willing the sensation to pass. He needed to keep his wits about him, to think clearly. He had no idea that a magical being could have such an effect on him, but then he had not encountered magic so pure and unspoiled for hundreds... could it be thousands of years?

 

[haremfaery]

"Do you have any idea who may have been responsible?"

"No ... Yes ... I don't know." She wanted to answer truthfully, but what was the truth?

After Mr. D was seated she tossed the bedclothes back onto the bed and sat on it directly across from him curling her legs under her. Her small feet were covered in embroidered red velvet slippers. She glanced at him and looked away again. "He had many who wished him ill. Orsino was a difficult man as you well know. And a difficult man to like. Only audiences loved him."

"That was one of Orsino's many faults. He wanted--needed the adoration of his audience. In gaining that, he had no care for interpersonal relationships." If he did it would not have mattered. Perizada's magick required balance. All things come at a price. Orsino never cared about the cost as long as he got his way.

"He was cruel to the dancers." She meant the women who performed in the "Men Only" tent. "He was condescending to the roustabouts. I doubt there is a single person in the carnivale that he did not rub the wrong way at some point or other. I know there was no love lost between the two of you." That was the best most truthful answer she could give. She finally looked up to see Mr. D with his head in his hands.

"Are you all right, Mr. D? May I get you something? A drink? Some tea? Coffee?" Perizada's coffee was notorious in the camp. Turkish coffee she called it. Most didn't even know where Turkey was. All they thought was that the people who lived there must have ironclad stomachs and never cared to sleep. She could read a person's future in the coffee grounds left in the cup.

 

[Zagreus_D]

Perizada's words danced elegantly through D's foggy mind. He liked her voice. It took an effort to distill any meaning from them, but he managed with focus. Her answer seemed honest, nothing he did not already know. No one liked Orsino, there were no lack of probable motives, but who killed him hardly seemed to matter anymore. Perizada though, she mattered. He wanted her to stay... with the carnival, that is... or no... he wanted her in a far more personal way.

Now she was offering... offering coffee... No, she offered so much more... anything he could ever want... If only he took possession of her. That was what he wanted. He wanted to possess her. This thought stabbed into his mind with crystal clarity, holding the promise of terrible sobriety. No! He struggled against the thought which tangled and twined within his mind, a bramble vine with sharp thorns. Don't panic. Relax. Let it go. Be drunk. Slowly, he willed the thought away. He forgot what it was that he almost knew about her. It was better to be drunk on her, better to stay within the foggy drunken dream.

At length, D lifted his head from his hands and focused on the beautiful woman curled delicately upon her bed. He realized that at some point he had lost track of what she was saying. His smile reflected an almost ridiculous drunken bliss. "Forgive me, I'm feeling.. not quite myself, though I blame you entirely." D made the remark off handedly, with the sort of sideways honesty that usually accompanied his intoxicated states.

"Do you have this effect on all men... or is it just me?" He watched her, puzzling once again over the strange familiarity of her magical essence. Words came forth in a drunken ramble, "Succubus? No. That's not it. They stink of sulfur beneath the perfume... and you..." He leaned toward her again, rising from the chair, pressing his hands against the edge of her bed, bringing his face within inches of the supple curve of her breasts. "You're entirely pure... undiluted I mean... hardly virginal I suspect... Orsino wouldn't have that, would he?.. but not demonic... not in the least."

He stopped rambling suddenly, and tilted his head to the side to look up at her, attempting to snatch a moment of eye contact. "Tell me Perizada, what are you?"

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada cocked her head at Mr. D. She had never seen a man react to her in this way. He had not seemed drunk when he entered, but now...Did she really have such an effect on him or was he teasing her?

"No, Mister D." With her exotic accent it almost sounded like she called him Master D. "Many men have lusted for me, but none have acted as you do. Are you sure you are all right?"

She stayed still as he leaned close unsure what he would do. "Orsino is far from my first. He did call me demon in his rages, so have others. It is all a matter of perspective, I think. I could be a virgin for you--should you wish it." Her tone promised much. Like an opium poppy.

When their eyes met, he saw that hers were not the nondescript brown that they seemed from a distance. The irises were ringed in dark brown, almost black, but the rest was like a tiger's eye shot through with a starburst of honey-colored gold. In that moment when their eyes met, Perizada realized that she could not hedge her answer. She realized all her answers to him had been as truthful as she could be. She could not lie to him. She realized that Mr. D must be her new master.

"Tell me Perizada, what are you?"

"We are born of the smokeless fire, greater than men, lesser than angels, keepers of hidden truths. Some say we are older than God yet bound to his will. I do not know. We are Djinn." She spoke as if it were an incantation. "And I am your humble servant." She bowed her head slightly.

 

[Zagreus_D]

" I could be a virgin for you--should you wish it."

D felt a flush of lusty heat at the suggestion. He did not have a particular fascination with deflowering women. He preferred for his lovers to have enough experience to truly understand and enjoy the interplay of passions. But the idea of a lover, both experienced and innocent... it stirred his interest to an unexpected degree, and if she were capable of doing that, becoming a virgin for him, what else might she be capable of? He mastered the rising tide of his curious desires and focused instead on the question at hand.

He asked his question and listened as Perizada recited the poetics of her origin.

"Djinn, of course. I should have realized. I've never met one of your kind before..." D was not entirely certain that this was true, but memory became a tricky thing when one was thousands of years old. The sheer familiarity of her magic seemed to indicate that he had encountered a Djinn at some point in his past, but the details of any interaction were lost to the fog of time. He could remember tales and legends, nothing more. "Is it true then that you are bound to a magical object that serves as your prison? And you are compelled to obey whoever possesses that object? Orsino... he is your master."

 

[haremfaery]

"Yes, that is true. The Djinn to many types of vessels. Lamps, urns . . . in my case, a metal box lined with sandalwood. And yes, that is the curse of the Djinn--to obey our Master. Although the wise quickly learn to be careful what they wish for. There is a balance that must be maintained. One man's gain becomes another's loss." She shrugged. She really no longer cared. In the end, all of her masters had been the same: using her powers to satisfy petty lusts for wealth and power.

She looked at Mr. D sharply then. "You said he was dead. I know he is. I can feel it." Her face became more thoughtful, "Strangely, I have not been pulled back into my vessel. I feel a certain . . . autonomy that I have never experienced before. Now that Orsino is dead, I imagine his possessions are now yours." She cocked her head in question.

"However, until the the vessel has been," she searched for the proper word and came up wanting. She choose the best she could, "activated, I am in a sort of limbo. Unable to fully act of my own accord and yet not fully bound to my Master's whims. I had thought, perhaps, if I found my vessel and destroyed it, that I might be free. But when you ask me questions, I feel compelled to answer truthfully, so . . . unless someone else finds and activates my vessel before you do, I believe you are my new Master. But you must activate the vessel to bind us completely. Mister D, this has never happened to me before. Always my vessel has fallen into other hands and my new master was clear to me. I do not know why this is different this time. Could someone else already be in possession of my vessel, even though Orsino's belongings technically belong to you?" She was becoming more and more distraught at this confusion. It was unsettling.

 

[Zagreus_D]

Yes, now she is mine. The voice in his head incited D's lust to new intensity. Lust was the way of life for D, as much a part of who he was as performance and laughter, but it had always been a part of the backdrop, now it stood front and center, illuminated as if by spotlight, refusing to be ignored.

He reached out his hand and touched his fingertips to Perizada's cheek, and ran his fingers down, caressing the elegant line of her neck. "I do not want to be your Master, Perizada," D said, in defiance of the voice within his head. Lies! Do you dare to lie to her? Her... who has no power to lie in return? "No. That's not true. I want you. Every inch of me craves possession of you. I've never felt anything like it. But I won't. I must not ever claim you, sweet lady. I believe I know where your vessel is hidden. It is yours... and your freedom, if it is mine to give you."

D struggled to master his wandering fingers which now lingered upon the delicate hollow above Perizada's collarbone, but though he managed to speak the lines that he had chosen, his body was insisting upon following a different script. It was all he could do to hold himself steady in place, to resist the urge to part the smooth fabric of her kimono and explore the soft rise of her breasts.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada leaned into Mr. D's touch. He was so very different from Orsino. Orsino was a great lumbering bear with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Mr. D was a gazelle.

"I must not ever claim you, sweet lady. I believe I know where your vessel is hidden. It is yours... and your freedom, if it is mine to give you.

"You would do that?" She looked into his eyes to try and find the lie in his words, the cruel joke. "I want to be free, and yet, I fear it. I have never had the curse or the gift of free will."

Mr. D's fingers slipped lower. But not low enough. Perizada, overcome with gratitude and with some trepidation, leaned forward and closed the gap between them. She kissed his sensual mouth. His lips were soft, like a woman's. She had never kissed a person of her own volition before. If indeed that was what it was. Perhaps she was only responding to his desire for her and her need to fulfill that desire since as far as she could tell, he must be her master. Although she did not feel that horrible compulsion/revulsion that she felt with Orsino. Perhaps because she actually was attracted to Mr. D. Had always been attracted to him from the first time she saw him despite Orsino's explicit orders for her to avoid D at all costs or face his wrath.

 

[Zagreus_D]

The tentative grip that D held over his traitorous body unraveled the moment that her lips met his. He moved toward her, not with aggression, but with fluid certainty. His tongue pressed into her mouth, hungry to taste the honey sweetness of her shadowy depth, caressing, exploring, penetrating.

Perizada emanated magic. Her kiss flooded D with primal power that did more now than intoxicate him like a drug, it awoke within him an alien remembrance of the god he had once been, long before the ancient Greeks had named him, tamed him into something almost human.

...Once he had been the snake, the bull, the lion. He was sex, and sacrifice, and hunger, the coil of the wild vine, the fermentation of the ripe berry which had the power to sooth and comfort, but also the power to drive men and women into madness. He held loyalty to no man, no nation. Only the Great Devouring Mother Goddess held power over him, and to her he owed everything. He had died for her times-unnumbered, and would do so again should she desire it. There was no pain, no pleasure, no torment, or treasure that he would deny her. At long last he had found her again!

No, not so, this woman who embraced him was not the Goddess herself, merely her priestess come to him in order to enact the ritual of Sacred Marriage, and receive his blessing of fertility to swell her belly. Afterwards his throat would be cut, and his blood would spill across the crop fields, returning him to Mother's true embrace, and giving good harvest to the humans who worshiped him.

His hands untied the cord that bound the priestess's ceremonial robe. He parted the cloth and pressed his hands lightly over her breasts and belly, sensing the ripeness of the womb awaiting his seed. He laid her down below him and mounted her, mouth to mouth, body to body, eager to perform the sacred rite. But something was not right. Layers of strange fabric twisted around him, constricting him, binding him, preventing him from plowing the virgin beauty who lay receptive beneath him. He broke away from the kiss, confused and angry. He looked down at the maiden to demand an answer...

"Perizada?" He recognized her as soon as his eyes focused. He clung to the vision of her, as if blinking might sweep him away to some strange time and place beyond the edge of common memory.

Of course he remembered the story of his origin. What he had forgotten was the feel of it, what it was to be something other than human. Over the course of millennia, D had been in the constant company of humans. The being he was now had been shaped by their fears, their dreams and desires, as they shifted over time. They still considered him a wild man, even now. He had been given the role of violator, breaker of all of their repressive rules and laws. But even so, those laws defined him, his true wildness, all but eradicated. So much had changed since the days of blood and magic, and he had very nearly forgotten.

He couldn't explain why simply kissing Perizada had unlocked those memories, but he couldn't find any reason to be afraid of them. He liked the idea of recapturing the essence of what he had once been, and he loved the potency and vitality that filled him at her merest touch. There were waves of intoxicating dizziness and disorientation, but when they passed he seemed to have greater clarity than before. Everything seemed so clear now.

D's thoughts resolved quickly, and all the while he never removed his eyes from the magical creature, the lovely Djinn that lay meekly beneath him. Surely she was a gift of the fates. It would be foolish to try to become her master... D knew enough about ancient spell-craft to feel certain that there would be some disastrous consequence if he were to ever dare to call her his own. He had offered her freedom, and he would keep his word, but right now he did not own her, not really, and why shouldn't he use her to remember, to feel the unbridled power that he had possessed in his own right, so long ago.

Use her.

In that one phrase he recognized the hidden nature of his thoughts. This was nothing more than the clever negotiating of an addict. It's okay to drink the laudanum, that's not the same as smoking dope, and if I do smoke the dope, that's okay too, because it will only be this one time, and really it's okay if I only do it once and while, if I only do it only when I'm alone, if it's only once a week, once a day, only when I really need it, and this time I really need it!

D laughed aloud at the humor of it, or the hopelessness, or the horror. There was no safe way to be near her, but dammit! he wanted to be near her. Through all his ridiculous justifications, his attempts to evade the inevitable consequences with useless logic, his cock ached to enter her, hard and swollen in anticipation of the fulfillment that was the very core of his being. All he had to do was kiss her again, and the decision would be made, the choice would be out of his hands. He would betray her, and all of the consequences would come to pass, and she would understand because she was trapped by the same magic.

But he hadn't set out to seduce her. He hadn't even kissed her. She had kissed him. Did it matter? Were they safe if the choice was hers alone? Or was this just another trick of the mind, another way to deceive himself into believing that it was safe to give in to his powerful compulsion?

"You choose," D spoke in hushed tones, a hint of despair resounding in his words, "I cannot trust myself to ask anything of you. I could betray you at any moment, whether or mean to or not. So you must command me, Perizada. Tell me to leave, and I will go. I won't speak to you again until my promise is fulfilled, and you hold your vessel in your own hands. Tell me to stay, and I will do my best to be obedient to your desires alone, but even that may not be enough. Tell me what to do."

 

[haremfaery]

The kiss was unlike any she had ever experienced. It was love and lust, sacred and profane, she was worshiped and defiled. Perizada had always sensed the power that seeped around D's edges was now palpable. Elder magic like her own. They were of a kind and she had never known until this moment.

Was that why D avoided her? To keep his power a secret? She had always thought that Orsino had bullied him into staying away from her as he did to any man who looked at her in a way he found objectionable. Orsino was an imposing man and used his physical presence to intimidate everyone around him. If that was not successful, he would resort to a more direct form.

As for Perizada, his punishments were swift and brutal for any perceived infractions of his rules for her. She healed quickly--it was part of her magic, no injury could every do permanent harm. But that did not mean she did not feel pain. And Orsino learned how to make that pain last until he was convinced she had learned her lesson.


"You choose."

Perizada didn't hear anything D said after that. Choice. It was a foreign concept. She felt a certain autonomy since Orsino died and was beginning to to think it had to do with the carnival. The carnival itself was infused with a certain magic. Perhaps that was why she had not been pulled immediately back into her vessel. Or, if as she suspected, Mr D was her new master, perhaps the entire carnival was now her vessel for her to roam at will until commanded otherwise. Mr. D owned the carnal and nearly everything in it. It made a certain sense to her.

"You choose."

The words whispered in her head. What master had ever given her a choice large or small? She loved Mr. D in that moment for giving her a choice. Loved and respect him as she had no other.

"You choose."

"...Tell me what to do."

She returned to the moment at hand. She looked into his eyes, searched his face. "Stay." She whispered.

She dissolved his clothes. They disappeared like morning mist. She wanted nothing to impede them, nothing to stop the first man to give her a choice." She pulled him to her in a kiss that was fueled her love for this man who gave her the power to choose. She would do anything for him to repay that.

 

[Zagreus_D]

"Stay."

He released the breath he had not known he was holding. He could not say if what he felt for her was love, or simply an addict's craving, or if there had there ever been a clear distinction between those two feelings for him, what he did know was that such feelings had never been more intense or immediate than they were in this moment. It was easy to stay.

His clothing was suddenly absent, no flourish or flash, just gone. It was an extraordinary display of magic. For all of his age and understanding, D had long ago lost the ability make such sudden and dramatic shifts in the pattern of reality, but he felt no sense of shock with the sudden change, just the dawning of a new sensual awareness. His skin alert and responding to Perizada's smooth brown skin and lithe body. She kissed him again with delicate passion, her lips parting to welcome him.

D was prepared for the sudden sweep of magical energy that surged through him this time, and the profound nostalgia that it provoked. The memories that had surfaced before were present again, but they did not overwhelm him this time. He allowed himself to settle into the role the ancient ritual had cast him in, without forgetting Perizada, and all of his stated intentions. He would serve Perizada with the same dedication he had offered to his Mother, and those ancient priestesses who had invoked her.

In his days as sacrificial consort, D's understanding of sex had been simple and primitive, all penetration, friction, and forceful thrusts. D had learned a great deal about pleasure in the interceding years, and he wanted more now than to simply achieve a quick release of semen and orgasmic energies as his service to the goddess. He longed to hear the music of his lover's breathless moans.

He kissed the gentle curve of Perizada's jaw, tracing his tongue along the delicate bone, until he found the meeting place of jaw, neck, and ear. He kissed and caressed every inch of this subtle erogenous area, gently scraping and biting against her flesh with his teeth to test her response, and learn if she was one who found pleasure in the tease of slight pain.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada gasped and arched up pressing herself to D. She ran her fingers through his hair tugging it lightly. Everything he did was delicious to her.

No one had touched her like this in ... never. For previous masters, she was always a means to an end, no thought for her, her desires, her wants, her wishes. But here was D, with magic as old as her own, treating her as an equal, a lover. She could love him for that alone. She had been drawn to him the first time she saw him. Orsino had been jealous and so her interactions with D were few and far between. She had had no idea just how powerful D was. It pulled her like the moon pulled the tide. The very air crackled with their energy. This was meant to be.

She made a virgin of herself for she wanted to be new for him and for herself. For this to be the first time of many first times when everything was a discovery, a surprise, a revelation. Each touch, each kiss, a disclosure of one to the other as they melded into one desire.

And now. She moaned again at his kisses. They struck deep in her core. She let her hands explore what she could reach of his body discovering him.

 

[Zagreus_D]

The pull of Perizada's hands in his hair, the press of her body, the deep resonance of her voice, every slight shudder of breath captured D's awareness, inspiring arousal and further fueling the flame of his passion.

He continued exploring his lover's body with his mouth and hands, discovering her breasts, kneading the generous mounds as his lips sought out her nipple. He found what he sought, drew her into his mouth, and flicked his tongue against the tender bud of puckered flesh. Then he sucked her hard, worshipping her with his hunger, in honor and remembrance of his first and greatest lover, Mother.

He was shocked to taste the energetic power of Perizada's magic flood his mouth, sweet as milk and intoxicating as honey-mead. He drank of it, allowing it to nourish his primal core, which had been slowly starving over millennia, until the pain of it had dulled away into a numb ache that was always present but never acknowledged. When he felt the flood thin to a trickle, he gave suck at her other breast, greedy as any infant.

Only after he drained this second source, and felt the rapturous delight of his former godly power coursing through his body, did he pause to consider the implication of his actions. Did feeding off of her in this way cause Perizada some harm? Would it diminish her power? Did it cause her pain? He was seized for a moment by guilty panic. He broke away and looked into her eyes, seeking some answer to questions that haunted him.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada moaned in disappointment when D stopped.

She had never been pregnant, never given birth, never nursed a child. Having D at her breast was another new experience for her. She felt a different kind of release, similar to an orgasm, but more diffuse, it was more than enough to make her sigh with pleasure as he drained her. She felt warm and very protective of him. She did not feel depleted, simply empty waiting to be refilled. Already she felt its return. Boundless as the night sky, the more he took from her the more was returned. It was the best of drugs heightening her senses and arousal.


"ātashé del-am,* what is wrong?" She stroked his cheek. She wanted him more than she had ever wanted anything, more than life, more than love, more than freedom. She pulled him down to her. "Take all you require from me. I give it freely. Make love to me now. We will puzzle out the meaning of this after."




___________
*The fire of my heart, a Persian term of endearment.

 

[Zagreus_D]

"Take all you require from me. I give it freely."

D leaned his face into her hand, comforted that he had not offended, or taken more than was offered.

Over his many years in America, he had enjoyed countless lovers, and for each of them he felt passion and hunger, but always he had maintained total self control. Even in acts of surrender, and submission he felt himself to be the director of the affair, granting permission, and providing comfort to his wary and timid partners. This sense of innocent uncertainty, of wild insatiable desire, of sincere surrender to a power greater than his own, was a true return to his origin and purpose, like coming home after too long an absence.

He realized that he trusted Perizada completely. He no longer felt obligated to hold back. She would be the guide and guardian of their passionate exploration. She would tell him what to do. She would pull him back if he went too far. He was free to love her without boundaries, to lose himself in ecstasy, all of the worries and inhibitions that had haunted him dissolved away, as easily as she had dissolved the clothing that had bound his body.

"Make love to me now. We will puzzle out the meaning of this after."

D was ready to obey his lover's commandment, his rod firm and eager, his heart filled with fervent devotion.

He pressed his cock into her warm wet opening, inspiring a graveled moan to rise from his throat, which grew deeper and louder when he encountered the fragile resistance of her maidenhead. He thrust his hips forward undaunted, tearing through the thin membrane and plunging his full length into her virgin hole.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada cried out and dug her fingernails into D's back. The pain was sharp and acute but was quickly supplanted by the pleasure of their coupling.

Once again, D was everything that Orsino was not. He went slowly drawing moans and sighs from her as water from a well. She guided him with her hands and words teaching him what brought her the most joy. At the same time, she touched and stroked and kissed him keeping him near the crest of bliss but not allowing him to go over it. Time stood still. They teetered between heaven and earth on that delicious agonizing knife edge of bliss when everything is wanting and yearning and craving.

 

[Zagreus_D]

All the while as they made love, D was acutely aware of the ebb and flow of magic. He could no longer be sure where her essence ended and his own began. His tactile senses did not end abruptly at the surface of his skin.

He could feel golden tendrils of pleasure unfurling all around him, twisting and coiling up the walls and across the bed. He felt a narrow ribbon of himself brush against Perizada's hand and lightly twine around her wrist.

Then he looked.

Vibrant green vines were growing wild everywhere, delicately wrapping his lover's body and his own. He recognized at once that he was the cause.

It was a very old trick, one that he had not performed in a hundred years. It was far too extravagant a display, given the meager amounts of magic at his disposal in this modern age. In the abundance of Perizada's presence however, this verdant growth emanated from him without effort. Feeling a sudden need to be certain that he was indeed the source, he focused his will along the spreading green pathways and pressed the vines to blossom.

He thrust his groin with growing vigor against Perizada's sensuous hips, and felt the blossoms begin to swell and ripen, growing engorged with sweet juice. D was certain that he would be unable to hold back from release much longer.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada paused at feeling lightly restrained. She opened her eyes to see vines creeping along the vardo and their bodies. The scent of earth and greenery mixed with the musk of their bodies. It was all from D, she knew. He was born of the forest, lush and fecund. He was an oak to shelter under, a cool stream for her to swim in, losing herself in the sensual pleasure that washed over her.

She let out a delighted breathless laugh. "It is beautiful. You've grown me a garden." She managed to speak between his thrusts. She tightened her grip on his shoulders, pulled her knees up urging him to thrust deeper. "ātashé del-am, make me your own." She cried out as she mounted heaven. She shattered like glass and rained back to earth. Figuratively, although, who could know for sure? Reality and illusion were indistinguishable;e as the magic danced over them, between them, within them.

 

[Zagreus_D]

"ātashé del-am, make me your own."

With this permission granted, D unleased the frenzied wilderness that lurked in the shadowed caverns of his soul, translating his ancient elemental passions into unfettered movement. He rose up above Perizada, even as he descended inwardly into some primal bestial force, thrusting with savage abandon against her wet and welcoming cradle.

The sound of Perizada's voice surrounded him, filled him. She became the whole universe, the earth upon which he toiled, the heaven toward which he strove, containing womb, and distant oasis.

And when he felt the contraction of her yoni, pulsing with electric heat, he felt the outward rush of his own release, answering the Mother's call, making an offering of his sacred seed, as he passed from power into oblivion on a surge of pleasure more intense than any he had felt for two-thousand years.

He held nothing back, everything that he was belonged to her. He could begrudge her nothing. Even the delicious magic that had coursed through him, bringing him bittersweet memories of an elder time, abandoned him, and returned to their source.

Empty and exhausted, D collapsed back down, and rested his head on Perizada's breast. Heart pounding. Breath heaving.

All around them shreds of miraculous greenery lay withered, crushed and torn.

 

[haremfaery]

Perizada felt relaxed and sated as she never had before. She lazily stroked D's head. The two of them dozed for some time. A wilted blossom fell from the dying vine above them and brushed Perizada's cheek bringing her to wakefulness.

"D?" She stroked his back. "D, we must talk about this." She really didn't want to talk about it. Orsino's murderer was still out there, the location of her vessel was unknown, and this newfound magical connection between them, while amazing and nothing like she had ever experienced, she knew there had to be a price for it.

 

[Zagreus_D]

Perizada stroked his hair, her limbs loose and languid. He willed himself to settle into the same easy contentment as his lover, but some hollow ache opened up in his center, a seed of dissatisfaction, from a lingering need as yet unfulfilled. He lifted his head, meaning to speak to her, but she had already drifted to sleep, and he had no heart to wake her.

He shifted his weight off of her body, and stretched out along her side, leaving his head at her breast, his arm draped across her. He closed his eyes and let himself drift, turning the odd events of the day over in his mind, examining his actions and thoughts from every angle, working backwards through time. There had been a moment, somewhere between his surrender to Perizada, and his initial sensation of drunkenness, that was distinctly wrong. She had offered him coffee and he had... what? He visualized the moment, evoking the memory of the drunken sensation, Perizada speaking, an offer of coffee, and then something had made another offer, something tempting and...

He felt something move, a slithering thing in his mind. He had very nearly seized it, but whatever it was evaded him, disrupting his thought process so that he couldn't remember what he had just been thinking... something about Perizada. He took another track, thinking back and recalling everything he knew about Djinn from legends, but he didn't seem to get any closer to the slithering thing.

Eventually his thoughts became dreamlike, as D began to doze. He was hunting the thing through the landscape of his mind which was one moment a forest, and the next moment a temple in ruins, then a luxurious theater. The thing was easier to track than he had expected. It left an oily black sheen on everything it touched. In his dream he discovered Perizada, standing at a distance in the wing of the stage. She turned and hurried toward him, a warning on her lips, but she slipped on black oil, and fell down, and the floor became a vast pool of black oil, and Perizada was at the center of it, floating on its surface, and D wanted to go to her, but he knew at once that he would drown in the oil if he dared to try and reach her.

"D?" She stroked his back. "D, we must talk about this."

D's eyes opened at once with barely a flutter. Truly he had not been sleeping deeply, but lucidly skimming through the dream realm. "Yes. I agree."

 

[haremfaery]

She shifted and propped herself up on her elbow so she could look at him properly. A long thick lock of her hair slipped over her shoulder and covered one breast. She looked like an odalisque lying there.

"D, we must find my vessel. You] must find it. Activate it. Then I will be truly yours. If someone else finds it first . . ." She looked alarmed. "What if Orsino's murderer finds it?Was Orsino killed because of me? Could the murderer know? You could be in danger yourself now and I cannot protect you."

Her voice was edging up in register as her anxiety increased. The same sense of urgency was back that she had when she was going through the vardo looking for her vessel. The cloying scent of dying flowers and sex filled her nostrils. She found it annoying and distracting now that they were finished. She had to focus on finding her vessel. She flicked her hand and the withered vines disappeared but the scent still lingered. It reminded her of the perfumes used to anoint the dead.

 

[Zagreus_D]

D reached out a hand and began to coil the lock of Perizada's hair lazily around his finger.

"I believe your vessel is in my safe. Orsino insisted on storing some of his personal items there, because he feared thieves among his own people. I don't think he ever considered the possibility that I might rob him, because he always felt so confident in his capacity to rob me." A sneer of genuine malice passed over D's features, marring his usually peaceful face.

"It's yours now. I'll give you the combination to the safe, and you can fetch it whenever you like. I won't put my hands on the cursed thing. Tell me Perizada, would you really have me claim you? Do you have any idea what that might actually do... to me? to you? Did you really think you could slip a leash around my neck that easily, and keep me as your docile pet? Have you not seen enough of me to realize that I am a wild thing, that would fight you at every turn, once I discovered that I was trapped?" His words had started quiet and calm, but as he spoke the razor edge of anger concealed within his words became more and more apparent, until he sound something like the trapped wild thing that he described.

The imagery of his dream seemed clear enough, and D had always been a true dreamer. Perizada was the bait meant to lure him to some terrible demise. She had already planted some twisted bit of magic in his mind, which had been working on him from the moment he came into her presence. Her sudden urgency to get her vessel into his hands and seal the pact between them was sufficient evidence to convince D that Perizada's sweet and seductive manner had been a pretense from the start.

He struggled to contain the wrath that was brewing in his heart, to prevent dark clouds of anger from further obscuring his perceptions, but true clarity seemed an impossibility when Perizada was anywhere near him. He had been so distracted by his concern for her free will that he had practically begged her to rob him of his own. It terrified him most that a part of him would willingly sacrifice everything in order to return once more to the blissful surrender he had found in her embrace.