The Last Sorrow by SHORTFRY

Chapter 1

A/N: Umm... don't expect much, this is just practice / diversion from writing my other stories. 2-part fic.

Chapter 1

She had been watching the sprawling hills with an unseeing gaze since the rise of dusk. The colour of forgotten memories – no longer vibrant as the open seas, nor vivid like the endless sky – eyes bled mute. Not even the myriad of hues from the sinking ball of fire in the grand horizon had been able to infuse its warmth into long-cooled irises. And like all the other nights spent waiting beneath the covers of a lonesome magnolia, she sat exanimate.

Soundless, save for the chiming of wind-swept grass and swaying branches of towering trees. The almost-silence coated like a well-worn blanket to provide a comforting cover. Not another a soul had breathed upon the glade this night. It was reason for why it had been chosen – one of perhaps many glades – for its well-kept secrets.

And secrets it had kept. For many moons, it had. A hush of a promise, she knew their unspoken truths would only be a dead man’s tale.

And thus she had waited once again. Patiently as always, eyes kept tuned upon the waning dusk as it gave way to the impending dark. A dark so thick and so opaque that not even the immutable stars had been able to fight its oppressive potency. Like a tidal wave, stories high, conjoined with the air and life and sky – an impenetrable wall.

Distantly, it cruelly reminded her of another. Of the one whose tall, imposing figure could be seen now cresting just beyond the wide-set hills. Approaching, ever closer, yet slow – so ever languid.

There was no rush. Patience was virtue, as the saying went. The moments would tick by the same, the persistence of time.

So she merely watched, transfixed upon the spectre gilded in transparent moonlight. Silks and swords and strands and gossamer fur. All regal. All too familiar and yet utterly foreign, still.

It was only as his approach drew near, stopping barely a step away, did her eyes blink, and her breath sketched anew.

She looked upwards, eyes locking, a sign of mutual greeting. He spoke not a word. He rarely ever did. There had been no need for vociferation, not since the first of their many rendezvous. And because she had come to understand this non-need – such opposition to her prior staple loquacity – did their meetings persist as they were.

A subtle moment passed before her chin slowly lifted, head tilting slightly to the side as eyes peered cautiously, neck exposing, lapels of a too-thin kimono drawing open with a timid hand, unveiling.

The warm breath that descended upon her chilled flesh was immediate, followed by the stroke of a too-skilled tongue, igniting a once snuffed-out flame, gooseflesh rising to the surface like the breaking dawn.

Her gasps that followed – borne not of surprise, for this had been undoubtedly expected – flushed the silence, chased the darkness, burned the bright. Lash-lined lids fluttered; closing, squeezing shut the dimming blue, just as no-longer timid hands wandered; searching, reaching for those untouchable silks and strands that had once been so out of reach.

Fingers grasped smoothness between dainty digits, gliding listless. They pulled him closer, almost flushed, body to body, chest to chest while avoiding dangerous spikes.

Once upon a time, she would have never dared such wanton boldness. Such desperate reaches.

But that had been long ago. Fuzzed throughout the years of an impressionistic portrait, blurred figures and lines like the first sight of morning sun.  

A clank and a thud, armour lay abandoned to leave behind a finely-tailored layer of white and red between her and a chiseled chest. Muscles of a warrior; corded and firm, hidden beneath silks of cloth and skin. They flexed with each movement as strong, steady hands gripped her sides, roaming and caressing with uncharacteristic gentleness.

Her curves were mapped by wandering claw-tipped touches, prickling sensations running up and down the mountain of her arching spine, just as hers grasped and grabbed at the expanse of his ethereal landscape.

She pulled at the edges of coverings, inklings of eagerness lacing each fervid, jerky movement. He didn’t mind her undressing him, as he did her, sharp talons slicing through the scraps she wore like knife through water. And as each ribbon of cloth fell like slain soldiers to be forgotten, he pulled back to study the midnight raven caught within his lethal clutches.

Silver; sheen from the night above – not unlike the curtain of hair that crowned his head – painted her skin, bared before him in all her modest glory. And had her eyes been open, she would have marvelled at the intensity of his gaze upon her flesh.

But they had remained closed, as they usually were. Breath panting, pulse racing.

Once, he had pondered the reason for her obvious avoidance, but had dismissed the fleeting thought as quick as it had come. For how she partook in their trysts had no bearing, so long as he got what he had been there to take.

And perhaps it had been for the best. The look in those faded, cerulean orbs no longer held a once-valiant spark. Dying stars, they were. He was not blind to the reason for the cause. Had taken notice upon the first dimming of light.

Over a decade ago. A lifetime ago.

And once, he had wondered if it had taken all those years for the colours of her life to fade to such an unsaturated state.

Colours of four lifetimes past.

The violet of a tunic once donned by an amorous monk.

The pink-lined silhouette behind a hardened taijiya.

The furry orange-hazel of a joyous kit.

The burning red of a fire rat robe.

Perhaps it had been gradual, like the decaying of a leaf once autumn greets. Or perhaps all at once, like flint set aflame upon a drying desert.

His thoughts did not linger.

Leaning forward once again, he breathed deeply, nose trailed up the column of her throat above the rapid beat of her lifeline, scenting.

Peach blossom arousal undermined by citric melancholy; a grievance thick with musk, a hint of self-loathing. On others, it would have been pungent like a smell of sour and salt. But on her, he tasted, licked and savoured – as he had done once a moon, every moon – enjoying and taking.

Their little ritual.

She shivered upon an errant breeze, and he had half a mind to shrug off his ghost-white pelt, lowering them both towards the padded ground, laying her flat with him above – towering her, caging her.

Pliable. She would always let him move her in every which way as he knelt between her legs, knees nudging naked thighs further apart effortlessly.

Her eyes fluttered open then, looking into burnished gold. He regarded her briefly; piercing and silent, not a thought to decipher neither the pleading that tinged her gaze, nor the flicker of a long-lost something that wavered like a candle tossed at sea.

He descended once more, the feel of his tapered lips pressing harsh against hers, demanding and seeking. She opened to him, mouth slanting, tongues clashing. She traced his fangs – the ones that nipped and bit, ones that could tear into any flesh and bone – and he delved further, commanding her, driving an ever-growing want, fanning flames.  

She was not afraid. Not anymore. Fear had evaporated long ago, misting like fog, smoke of a doused campfire.  

In this moment, all she wanted was to feel.

It was all that she had wanted in recent years. To feel something. Anything.

And he had given her that. Was giving her that.

Emotions, long expired, re-emerged.

Her hands began to wander once more, trailing across a now exposed back, down the front of his ever-warm chest, lowering across rippling abdominals.

And lower still – reaching, reaching, until she felt the river of a yellow-gold obi.

She tugged and pulled blindly until he was fully bare, just as she.

He broke their fervent kiss, only to explore elsewhere. Down her clavicle, across her chest. She was hot as the summer day, yet she continued to shudder slightly. It could have been from the evening chill, or from the cooling of the wet slicks he had left upon her heated skin. Either way, she felt him hold her closer, one arm bracing behind the dip of her all-too breakable spine, the other smoothing over the planes of her stomach, up the underside of a neglected breast, his warmth seeping, melding into her seeking skin.

She arched further into him, wanting contact, hips rising – more, more, more.

His soft lips found a pointed peak, tongue dashing out to lick and lap, nipping on the delicate skin that elicited another gasp. Almost a moan, delightfully breathless.

Her hands found purchase upon his scalp, behind his neck, gripping him closer as though afraid he’d disappear, giving rise to her caving fear.

A shudder scraped at the thought, desperate to escape the malevolent face of inevitability. So she focused on the present – the now, and all the sensations being wrought upon her body in this moment.

She trailed her fingers through his hair, fine like spider threads, glistening in pale luminescence as he moved further down her pliant body, heading towards the one thing she could offer him.

And she had been surprised, those many months ago, that he’d heed her shameful request. But she was giving, and he always took what he wanted, what had been offered. What she had offered.

A near-wordless exchange.

But a single question – perhaps a plea – had brought about his return.

“Will I see you again?” she had asked.

For a period of time, only a shadow of his memory had stood, her query unanswered. Until an unexpected appearance a whole month after, when he had found her alone in the dark of night.

And the next month, he came again.

Month after month, her silent visitor.

Three years passed, and their arrangement had remained unspoken, unchanged.

Her breath hitched suddenly as his wet tongue found her lower folds, tracing fire, burning a path to her desires, quenching a deep-seated ache, a tumultuous yearning.

She could feel the pressure begin to build as her head tipped backwards; mouth agape and eyes clenched tight, seeing stars that weren’t really there as he delved further between her legs, exploring the channel to her core, strong hands gripping her thighs wide and spread.

His ministrations continued without a pause at the sound of her pitiful mewls, knew she had begun to bite her arm to stifle sounds that tried to escape. But he continued, lapping up and down her slit, spiralling around the sensitive nub that made her writhe with each pass of a skilful lick that emanated another appendage she had grown to wildly crave. 

And as he persisted towards his goal, driving closer and closer to her precipice, he couldn’t help but chance a glance towards her pleasure-laced features, to see the spoils of his efforts upon her flushed and heated skin framed by a mass of wavy locks – messy and melanic, chaotically beautiful.

The corners of his mouth lifted in prideful satisfaction at what he saw. And as her body began to grow rigid, he gave a final flick of his pointed tongue before her inner muscles twitched and spasmed, the tangy sweet taste of her release coating his mouth in sinful delight.

“Sessh-omaru –” she nearly screamed, holding back just enough of her rapture for his name to enounce in a drawling moan.

He drank her up like a starved and thirsty pup, savouring every drop, licking clean trails all the way up her slumped body, still quivering from the aftershocks.

She barely had a chance to take a breath before she felt claws rake her hair, yanking back her head before his tongue invaded her still-gasping mouth, tasting herself upon his crushing lips.

Between breaths she remembered glimpses of jagged stripes. A crescent moon covered by dampened bangs. Piercing red eyes, glowing like fresh lava.

He was feral.

But she did not scream. Not in fear.

Not when he kissed her so savagely that she struggled for breath.

Not when she felt his hardened length enter her in one sharp thrust, deep and familiar.

And not when he began to pound into her swollen entrance at a relentless pace, going faster, driving deeper, pressing harder.

Ravaging her, taking her for all she’s able to give, for all she’s worth.

And taking his pleasure.

Because that had been their unspoken trade.

His for hers.

-X-

To be continued…