12-21-2018, 11:11 PM
Shroud nestled into his side, as close as she could get without arousing his ire. She had learned his lessons fast but still felt a modicum of something for him as he’d gone from stranger to savior in the span of a few nights.
It occurred to her that he was neither mother nor father to her. His shape and skin was not quite the same as theirs but despite this, her devotion to him has snared her as quick as any noose around a neck. One that once yanked, grew tight and exhilarating instead of suffocating. Beneath his gallows’ hand, she flourished in the dark like a weed denies sunlight.
So she slept, and did not dream.
If she did, she could not recall it upon waking.
Shroud was obedient up to a point.
She toed a knife’s edge with him each time he came to a halt. A few steps here and a few paces there; testing her limitations until the noose tightened with a nip or small punishments that she recognized as such but found a dark delicious pleasure in. She hadn’t known how amazing his little hurts could be, but she learned like the good student that she was.
He taught her much and she flourished beneath his teachings. Grew a little taller and slimmer, the kind that comes not from starvation but from fitness and dedication- to him, to their time together that shaped her, honed her into a thing her original parents might never recognize as their own. She had become wholly his; bound to him through his generous allowance of her not-once-timid touches and hushed talks.
Even the slimness could not hide the feminine softness that cling to the curves that began to fill out. Her flesh grew lush as it aged.
Then came the call; the god-summons and she’d answered it. Shroud knew that she’d come back to punishment upon punishment, a heap of it that only he could dole out and the shiver down her back was a mix of anticipated pain and pleasure. She craved him; craved the way he’d bite into her neck or pinch her ear between his teeth.
Part of her made a paltry attempt at masking her presence m. In truth, she could have flown overhead and found him that way but there was more fun to be had in stalking him through the forest though she snapped branches and broke twigs to displease him. It is a wonder he has not smelled the sickness that rolls off her in beads of sweat, in the leather that gathers in the bends and folds of her skin. Plague-scent alone should have betrayed her.
He comments on her loudness and she laughingly coughs in return. Too loud? She knew it, but the plague made her stumbly and weak as she found him beneath an oak as addled by disease as she is. Shroud does not keep her distance; her fever-bright eyes and sweaty face find his, her breathing labored and loud enough to be a pant as she staggers to him and places her head beneath his blue-grullo neck.
“I don’t think I’ll ever be as quiet as you,” she mutters softly and truthfully. He was just better at it then she was. For now. Shroud was certain she could one day eclipse him but it might take more than practice and a whole heap of magic she didn’t have.
Oh, and not once does she apoloufor her disobedience.
@[Tunnel] loved it!