Instead of speaking any more, he lifted her chin and looked into her eyes. Then he kissed her as gently as he could, stroking the parallel lines on her face tenderly—tracing them one by one with the tip of his tongue, trying to erase her hurt, to ease her pain and let her know how very much he still loved her.
* * * * *
“Oh, Thrace…” His name fell from Trin’s lips like a prayer as he kissed her. It amazed her, as always, that such a huge, muscular male could be so gentle…so tender. He handled her as though she was precious and valuable—someone cherished beyond what words could express or describe.
Before he had started this, she had warned herself that she shouldn’t get too carried away when he started healing her. After all, it was clear that he wanted to leave and she didn’t have the right to try and stop him. Not after the way she’d treated him. But she couldn’t help melting inside when he touched her like this…when he kissed her so tenderly.
“Thrace,” she whispered again and then somehow his mouth was covering hers, kissing her lips instead of her cheek. It reminded her of the first time he had kissed her—when they had been playing their roles at Dreaming Hills. But back then she’d been his Mistress and now she was…nothing.
I have no claim on him. Not anymore. I gave it up when I pushed him awaye…
The thought made her pull back from the kiss though it was the last thing she wanted to do.
Thrace didn’t try to stop her. Instead he leaned back a little and looked at her.
“Trin?” he murmured.
“I…” Trin wasn’t sure what to say. Her mouth still tingled from his warm, gentle kiss. She wanted desperately to lean forward and kiss him again, to take his mouth with hers and show him how she truly felt—but she didn’t dare.
Thrace seemed to understand her hesitation or at least, he didn’t push for an explanation.
“Your back was harmed too, wasn’t it?” he murmured.
“Yes.” Trin nodded, still twisting her fingers nervously in her lap. “Where…how…?”
“Lie face down on the bed,” he said softly. “I’ll tend to you.”
She nodded but didn’t move to do as he said.
“The welts…my back is especially bad. They…they’re very painful,” she whispered.
“Then I’ll be very, very careful.” He cupped her newly healed cheek in one big, warm hand and looked down into her eyes. “I’ll never hurt you, baby. You know that.”
Trin’s heart jumped at the use of his old, sweet nickname.
“I know,” she whispered. “I…I trust you, Thrace.”
“That’s good to know,” he rumbled softly. “Because after I finish your back I’ll have to go lower…if you still want me to.”
Trin’s breath caught in her throat. Though she had been healed and absolved by the Goddess, the teachings of her childhood were hard to overcome. Somewhere at the back of her head the mean, judgmental voice was still whispering shame and recrimination. She did her best to shut it off.
“I do want you to,” she said, lifting her chin. “Please. If…you don’t mind.”
“If I don’t mind?” He gave her a slow smile. “Baby, no matter what else is going on between us, you need to know that tasting and licking your sweet, soft body is still my favorite thing to do.”
“Oh…” Trin could feel the blood rushing to her face and suddenly she had to drop her eyes. His words brought back so many memories…memories of his hands and mouth exploring her…memories of the way he’d knelt between her legs and licked and sucked her pussy until she came and came…
Stop it, she told herself sternly. This is just about letting him heal you—that’s all. He’s probably still going to leave when it’s over. So don’t let yourself get too excited.
“Turn over,” Thrace murmured, stroking her cheek. “Turn over and let me heal you, baby.”
Trembling a little with nervous tension, Trin did as he said. Laying face down, she pillowed her head in her arms and closed her eyes, trying not to think…trying not to hope or to wish too much.
“That’s good…that’s just right, baby.”
Thrace got on the bed beside her and she could feel him bending over her, the warmth of his big body covering her like a blanket. She bit her lip but couldn’t stop the soft moan that came from her lips when he began healing her back with long, slow strokes of his tongue.
As she had told him, her back was the most painful area. The high priestess had dragged the hrakka from her shoulders to her lower back and then criss-crossed her own lines, leaving a hatch mark of stinging welts that burned when they were touched even lightly.
But Thrace’s mouth on her back didn’t hurt. Trin felt the by-now familiar tingling as his warm tongue stroked over her flesh, healing her wounds, making her whole again. The pain that had been tormenting her since the hrakka first clawed her tender skin at last disappeared completely. She gave a sign of relief and snuggled into the bed, flexing her back and lifting her hips in an unconscious gesture of relief.
Thrace, however, seemed to take a different meaning from her movements—or maybe he was simply ready to move lower.
“She hurt you here, too.” One big warm hand brushed lightly over Trin’s bare ass, making her gasp and jump.
“Yes…she did,” she admitted a bit breathlessly. “No…no place was spared.” When she turned her head, she saw him watching her.
“Can I heal you here?” he asked softly.
This time Trin felt no hesitation.
“Yes, she whispered. “Yes, please.”
“My pleasure, Mistress,” he growled softly and her heart jumped again.
“You don’t have to call me that anymore…you took off the collar,” she reminded him as he dragged his tongue over the rounded curve of her buttocks.
His eyes blazed as he licked her again. “I didn’t want to. And now I wish to show you how much I feel for you…how devoted I am.”
“And how…how do you want to show me that?” Trin whispered, still watching him as he finished healing her.
“First of all by healing all of you—your inner thighs too.” Thrace gave her a meaningful look and turned her over gently but firmly so that she was once more on her back. “Will you let me do that, Mistress? Will you allow me to heal you everywhere?”
Trin’s breath seemed to catch in her throat. Should she let him?
“Yes,” she said, not giving the mean little voice in the back of her head time to protest. “Yes, I…I want that.”
“That’s good, Mistress. Because I need to heal you now.”
Hooking his arms under her half-bent knees, Thrace dragged her to the end of the bed and sank down before her. Trin moaned as he split her wide, opening her thighs for him to expose the last of the cruel, red welts that had covered her skin.
“Oh, baby…” Thrace’s deep voice was sorrowful when he saw the evil marks of the hrakka. “This is…she really scratched you up bad. Even here.” One long finger touched briefly on Trin’s outer pussy lips and she jumped and moaned softly.
“Yes, I…I know,” she whispered. “Can…do you think you can heal me?”
“I know I can. Here more than anywhere else. And I’ll be gentle—I swear it.”
“I know you will,” Trin whispered. Daring greatly, she spread her thighs a little wider, even though the action opened her pussy lips as well. “Go on,” she breathed. “Heal me, Thrace.”
With a low groan that sounded suspiciously like her name, he leaned forward and dragged his hot, wet tongue gently over the tender flesh of her inner thighs.
Trin moaned breathlessly as he bathed her thighs with his tongue, lapping gently, tracing the cruel lines to make them disappear. She could feel the cool tingling, followed by a heat that seemed to consume her like a flame—a need that was growing inside her with each caressing stroke of his tongue.
Then Thrace looked up at her, his mouth hovering just above her bare pussy mound.
“Mistress,” he growled softly. “
I need to heal you here too.”
“Just…just on the outside?” she asked, feeling like her heart was racing twice as fast as it should. “Only…only where I was scratched?”
“Only there,” he promised softly. “I swear it, Mistress.”
“Yes,” Trin whispered, not letting herself consider it any further. “Yes, do it…please.”
With a low growl, he bent his head and dragged the flat of his tongue over her outer pussy lips.
Goddess! Trin moaned and fisted her hands in the blue comforter on either side of her. His mouth on her felt so hot and wet and perfect—exactly as she remembered it and yet somehow, so much more intense. Maybe it was because the healing essence he was making was causing her to be more sensitive or maybe it was just that she wanted him so much she could barely hold still. But for whatever reason, her hips were suddenly thrusting all over the bed.
Thrace let her thrust but kept a firm grip on her thighs. He kept up his steady licking and lapping, first on one side of her outer pussy lips and then the other. But then Trin’s restless movements had an unexpected effect. When the big Havoc bent to drag the flat of his tongue from the bottom of one puffy outer lip to the top of her thigh, Trin’s motions made him miss. His tongue was already extended, ready to heal her in the only way he could. But instead of landing on her outer pussy, Trin’s movement pressed it right against her center.
Her pussy lips were already swollen and hot with need, parting on their own to show her berry-dark inner cunt, slick and hot with her honey, so there was nothing to stop him. Nothing to hold him back when his tongue at last connected with her bare inner folds and dragged up to her aching clit.
Thrace groaned low in his throat and Trin moaned breathlessly as his tongue made contact with her open pussy. For a moment they both froze. Clearly, though he couldn’t bear to do it himself, Thrace expected her to pull back. And indeed, the little voice in her head was shouting that she should pull back, that this was wrong.
Not wrong, Trin told it. Not wrong with the male I love!
With a soft moan, she pressed forward instead, grinding against his tongue, pressing her pussy to his mouth as she had the first time he tasted her back on Yonnie Six.
Her motions seemed to set off something inside of Thrace. With a low growl, he wrapped his arms around her thighs and surged forward, lashing her clit almost frantically with his tongue.
Trin cried out softly as his hot, wet mouth tortured her throbbing clit sweetly. She hadn’t known it up until now, but her body had been missing him—missing him terribly. Missing his warm, enveloping hugs, the strength of his hard body against hers, his dark, spicy scent…but most of all missing the pleasure he gave her when he touched her and tasted her in just the right way. As Thrace continued to bathe her clit with his tongue and lap her juices, she felt like a woman dying of thirst in the desert who has finally been given a drink of water.
Shamelessly, she wound her fingers through his hair and dragged him closer. The big Havoc came willingly, burying his face between her thighs, lapping and sucking…tracing her clit with the tip of his tongue one minute and then thrusting deep into her pussy the next to drink her honey right from the source.
It had been so long since she’d experienced pleasure instead of pain between her thighs that Trin felt herself hovering on the edge of coming almost at once. Her clit was throbbing from the way he traced it and her pussy got wetter and wetter as he licked her. But there was something she needed…something missing to push her over the edge…to finally make her come.
“Thrace!” she wailed, pulling his hair. “Thrace, I need…I need…I don’t know what I need!”
“I do.” Looking up briefly, he held up two fingers so that she could see them. “Is this what you want…what you need?”
It wasn’t exactly what she needed but Trin was still afraid to ask for that. She nodded her assent and thrust her hips towards him eagerly.
“Please,” she told him in a half-moan. “Please, yes…”
Thrace entered her smoothly with two long, thick fingers, driving to the end of her channel in one deep thrust.
Trin wailed with pleasure as she felt him pressed against the end of her channel. Then he sucked her clit into his mouth and began teasing it again as he fingerfucked her open pussy, making her moan and writhe all over the bed as her orgasm at last crashed over her.
Oh Goddess, too much…too good! The pleasure peaked inside her, made all the better by his deep penetration, though she couldn’t help wishing there was something thicker inside her.
Something more like his cock, you mean? whispered the judgmental little voice.
Yes, exactly…his shaft inside me, filling me, taking me…Trin thought, still delirious with lust. She was still riding the waves of pleasure and the mean little voice seemed much fainter while she was coming—almost as if it didn’t matter at all.
It shouldn’t matter, she told herself firmly. I should ignore it…banish it forever and never listen to it again! After all, I belong to the Kindred Goddess now—the Mother of All Life—and she approves of love between males and females. Why should I not give in and enjoy the pleasure of Thrace’s touch? The pleasure of letting him fill me…
As if reading her mind, Thrace finally stopped lapping and sucking and looked up from between her thighs.
“Gods, you taste so delicious,” he growled, licking his lips which were wet with her juices. “I could taste you all night, baby.”
“I’d like that,” Trin whispered breathlessly. “But I wish…wish we could do more than just tasting.”
His eyes blazed with interest. “And what exactly is it you want to do?”
“Well, I was thinking…” Trin blushed, unable to make herself go on. After a lifetime of being taught it was wrong to let a male penetrate her, how could she actually ask him to make love to her now? And how would he feel about it if she did ask?
Thrace got up and came to sit beside her on the bed.
“Hey,” he murmured, putting an arm around her. “Do you remember what I told you about how the medicine Commander Sylvan gave me was best for bonded couples?”
“Yes…and?” Trin looked up at him, wondering where he was going with this.
“And so I was thinking, maybe if we renewed our bond it might be more effective. I mean, I don’t know for sure but it might help.”
“Renew our bond? How?” Trin’s breathing was coming faster again and she was very aware of his big, warm body so close to her smaller, naked one.
“The same way we bonded in the first place,” he murmured.
“You mean…” Her heart started to pound. “By letting you penetrate me?”
Slowly, he nodded. “Of course, I know how upset you were last time when we were suddenly in each other’s heads. But if you didn’t like it when we were finished, you could always block me again.”
“I seem to be good at that, don’t I?” Trin asked softly. “It’s the unblocking I have no idea about.”
“Well, this is the way to do it…if you want to.” He cupped her cheek in one hand and looked into her eyes. “If you want to let me in.”
Trin knew he was talking about more than just letting him into her body…his whole heart was in his eyes when he spoke. She knew the courage it must have taken to lay himself bare to her when she had already rejected him once, back when he first came for her at the temple.
She bit her lip, considering…should she do this? Before she’d had no choice in the matter—it was let Thrace penetrate her or die of the passion berry wine. But if she did this now it would be absolutely voluntary and deliberate on her part. She would be asking a male to penetrate her—to fill her with his shaft and thrust deep in her pussy until he bathed her inner cunt with his seed. After everything she’d endured for partaking in this act once, was she really ready to do it again?
Disgusting…a disgrace…blasphemer…sacrilege! howled the voice of guilt inside her. For a moment Trin wanted to shrink away from Thrace’s touch?
??to go hide and keep her shameful urges to herself.
But then Nadiah’s words came back to her, whispering like the fresh, clean smelling breeze that had blown through the trees of the Sacred Grove. “The Goddess approves of love between those she has brought together,” she had said. And hadn’t she clearly brought Trin and Thrace together? They came from two races which did not mix with the opposite sex if at all possible and yet…she loved him as she had never loved anyone else. And the look in his silver-blue eyes spoke of the feelings he had for her as well.
How else could they have come together except by divine intervention? And why else would the Goddess lift the blood curse and send Trin to Thrace to be cured of her wounds if she didn’t intend for them to stay together?
I love him, Trin thought. And being with him…bonding with him is the best way to show it.
She still wasn’t completely sure he would stay, even if they did renew their bond. He had talked about packing and going after she was healed and had also pointed out that she could block him again if she wanted to. So maybe he was just offering to try once more to heal her before he left…
“Sorry.” Thrace’s deep voice broke her train of thought. “I shouldn’t have suggested it. Should’ve known how you’d feel about letting me do that to you again after what you learned about my past.”
“Thrace, no…” Clearly he’d misinterpreted her lengthy silence. “Why would you say that?” she asked softly.
“You saw what happened with my old Master—saw it in that fucking dream.” He sighed. “I thought that was one reason you were pushing me away.”
“I was pushing you away because of the blood curse the high priestess laid on me—not because of your past,” Trin assured him. “It’s a death sentence and I didn’t want to drag you down with me.”
“A death sentence?” His black brows raised in surprised concern. “What are you talking about?”
“It was killing me,” Trin said softly. “It saps your will to live—makes you just want to lay down and die. That’s…” She took a deep breath. “That’s what I’ve been doing these past few weeks. Dying.”