Chapter 13: Healing Waters
The grey light of dawn did nothing to soften the edges of the room. It simply made the devastation visible: the tangled sheets glazed with drying spend, the chair upholstery dark with sweat, the two of them locked together in a silent, shuddering tableau.
Vic’s head remained heavy on Erye’s shoulder, his breathing a ragged, wet sound in the quiet. The vibration from the plug still hummed, a low-grade torment now woven into the fabric of his being. His cock, trapped inside Erye’s raw, swollen cunt, gave another weak, involuntary pulse. He didn’t even jerk this time. It was just another tremor in the ongoing earthquake of his body.
Erye shifted minutely, and the movement sparked a fresh wave of oversensitivity through his own abused nerves. He bit his lip against a hiss. His glass skin felt paper-thin, every sensation amplified. The hairline fracture on his hipbone was a dull, persistent ache, a tiny warning bell in the symphony of his pain.
“Vic,” Erye whispered, his voice hoarse from disuse. “Can you hear me?”
A slow, deliberate blink against his neck was the only reply.
“We need to move. The water… the springs. It might help.”
Another long moment passed. Then, with a groan that seemed to tear from the bedrock of the earth itself, Vic began to move. He peeled his head from Erye’s shoulder. His eyes were bloodshot, the pupils still unnaturally wide, swimming in a sea of exhausted torment. He looked ravaged, hollowed out. But a flicker of his will remained, a stubborn coal in the ashes.
His hands, which had been limp at his sides, rose to grip Erye’s waist. His touch was shockingly gentle, mindful of the fracture. He lifted Erye, separating their joined bodies with a wet, sucking sound that made them both wince. The sudden emptiness was a strange, cold shock for Erye. For Vic, it was a brief respite from constant pressure, immediately replaced by the aching, rigid reality of his own cursed erection, standing obscenely between them, reddened and veined.
Without a word, Vic stood. His legs shook, nearly buckling. He locked his knees, his jaw clenching so tight the tendons in his neck stood out like cables. He kept one arm around Erye, supporting his weight, and with a pained, deliberate slowness, began to walk them both out of the bedroom, through the shadowed corridors of his fortress, towards the underground geothermal vents.
The hot springs lay in a cavernous, natural grotto beneath the fortress. The air grew thick and humid, carrying the sharp, mineral tang of ozone and the cloying, metallic sweetness of the bioluminescent veins that pulsed through the water like slow-moving lava. The pool glowed from within, an eerie, blue-green light casting their shadows, giant and distorted, on the slick, condensation-drenched walls.
Vic carried Erye's aching body to the edge of the mineral springs, his cock still painfully erect between them, a brutal bar of flesh nudging against Erye’s thigh with each unsteady step. He didn’t pause at the edge. He simply stepped down into the steaming water, lowering them both into the searing heat.
The water was a shock. It bit into Erye’s raw skin, stinging the countless tiny abrasions, washing over the fracture on his hip with a sensation that was both pain and relief. He gasped, sinking into the buoyancy, letting it take his weight. Vic sank beside him, the water rising to their chests. The eerie light played over the sheen on Vic’s shoulders, over the stark planes of his face. His cock bobbed in the water, an undeniable, pitiful fact.
A weak, wry smile touched Erye’s lips. The old habit of deflection, of using humor as a shield, surfaced through the exhaustion. “Still standing at attention, I see,” he murmured, his voice echoing softly in the cavern. “Persistent little fucker, isn’t he?”
Vic’s head snapped towards him. The hollow, tormented look in his eyes vanished, incinerated by a flash of pure, volatile rage. In the space of a heartbeat, he moved. The water erupted as he surged forward, his hands slamming into the rocky ledge on either side of Erye’s head, caging him in. The force sent waves sloshing against the stone. Vic’s body pressed close, the hard, hot length of his trapped cock grinding against Erye’s stomach through the water.
“You think this is funny?” Vic’s voice was a low, venomous scrape. His breath, smelling of ozone and his own spent desperation, washed over Erye’s face. “You think any of this is a fucking joke?”
The violence in his posture was a lie. Erye could see the tremor in the arms that held him captive, feel the fine, uncontrollable shaking where Vic’s chest brushed his. The rage was just the nearest, most familiar mask for the raw, unbearable humiliation beneath.
Erye didn’t fight. He didn’t flinch. He let his head rest back against the cool, wet stone and lifted his hands from the water. They moved slowly, dripping, through the steamy air. He brought them to Vic’s forearms, where the muscles were corded and rigid as iron. His touch was a whisper.
He softly traced Vic’s tense arms, his fingertips following the paths of veins, the ridges of scar tissue, the violent, beautiful landscape of him. He traced up to his biceps, over the swell of his shoulders, mapping the territory of his fury. His violet eyes, soft now in the aqueous light, held Vic’s burning black gaze.
“No,” Erye said, his voice barely audible over the drip of condensate from the ceiling. “I don’t think it’s funny.” He let his hands drift down again, over the frantic drumbeat of Vic’s pulse. His touch was a cool contrast to the scalding water, to the fever-heat of Vic’s skin. He leaned forward, until his lips were almost brushing Vic’s. His whisper was for him alone, a secret passed between the steam. “I think it’s torture. And I think…”
He paused, his thumbs circling the viciously tight knots in Vic’s forearms.
“I think your cock needs a break.”
Vic stared, his breath huffing against Erye’s lips in ragged bursts. The words hung in the steam between them, an absurd understatement that shattered the last of his fury. A broken, wet sound escaped him—not a laugh, but the ghost of one. His forehead dipped forward, resting against the cool stone beside Erye’s head. “A break,” he echoed, his voice raw. “It doesn’t know what a break is.”
His arms, still caging Erye, trembled violently. The fight drained from him all at once, leaving behind only the stark, shivering reality of his need. He pushed back from the ledge, the water sloshing, and turned away. He stood there, hips-deep in the glowing pool, his back a landscape of taut muscle and old scars, his cursed cock standing rigid against his stomach. It was a picture of pure, pathetic vulnerability.
Erye gave him a moment of privacy he hadn’t asked for. He slid beneath the surface, letting the mineral-rich heat soak into the deep ache of his bones, the sting of his raw cunt, the tiny, brilliant fracture on his hip. The water muted sound, turning Vic’s harsh breathing into a distant rumble. When he surfaced, silver hair plastered to his skull, Vic hadn’t moved.
“Come here,” Erye said softly, not a command but an invitation.
Vic turned, his face wiped clean of expression. He waded over slowly, movements clumsy with exhaustion. Erye reached for him, guiding him to sit on a submerged ledge where the water came to his chest. Vic obeyed, his eyes dull and fixed on some middle distance. Erye settled between his spread knees in the water.
“Look at me,” Erye murmured. Vic’s black eyes dragged downwards, focusing with difficulty. Erye placed his palms flat on Vic’s thighs under the water. His touch was deliberate, grounding. “We’re getting out. We’re going upstairs. And you’re going to try to work.”
“I can’t fucking think,” Vic said, the words thick.
“You don’t have to think. You just have to exist.” Erye’s hands slid up his thighs, over the rough hair, stopping just short of where his cock bobbed painfully in the water. “I’ll do the rest.”
Getting him out of the springs was a logistical nightmare. Vic moved like a man whose nerves had been scoured raw, every motion a potential trigger. Drying him was an exercise in tortured patience. The soft towel gliding over his skin made him shudder. The brush of fabric against the head of his cock as Erye wrapped a loose linen robe around him drew a sharp, punched-out gasp.
“Easy,” Erye soothed, tying the belt without tightening it. “Just walk.”
The journey back to Vic’s study in the mansion’s west wing was conducted in silence. Erye stayed close, a hand on the small of Vic’s back, feeling every jolt and tremor. Servants melted away at the sight of them, heads bowed. The mansion itself felt hushed, holding its breath.
Vic’s study was a monument to controlled power: dark wood, towering bookshelves, a massive onyx desk. He collapsed into the high-backed leather chair behind it as if his strings had been cut. He stared at the blank surface, his hands flat on the wood, as if trying to remember what he used to do here.
Erye moved around the room. He poured a glass of water from a crystal decanter and set it by Vic’s elbow. He drew the heavy velvet curtains against the grey morning light, leaving the room in soft shadow. He lit a single lamp on the desk, its glow warm and intimate. Each action was quiet, precise. Caretaking.
Then he knelt beside the chair.
Vic’s head swiveled slowly to watch him, his expression unreadable. Erye’s slender fingers went to the loose knot of the robe’s belt. He didn’t untie it. He simply let his knuckles brush against the fever-hot skin of Vic’s lower abdomen. “Try to work,” Erye whispered, his breath ghosting over Vic’s thigh. “I’m just here.”
He leaned his head against Vic’s leg, a picture of submission, and let his hand rest, unmoving, near the base of Vic’s cock. The contact was a brand. Vic inhaled sharply, his fingers curling into claws on the desk blotter. He forced his eyes to a stack of waiting ledgers. He opened one. The numbers swam, nonsensical glyphs.
Erye’s thumb began to move, a tiny, almost imperceptible stroke along a single tense tendon in Vic’s inner thigh. It wasn’t enough. It was everything. Vic’s spine locked. He tried to read a line of figures. His own heartbeat thundered in his ears, a counter-rhythm to the slow, maddening caress.
A quiet knock at the door made them both jump. “Sir?” a voice called from the corridor. “The shipment reports from the docks.”
“Enter,” Vic gritted out, his voice strained.
A young man in a servant’s uniform slipped in, eyes carefully averted from the desk. He placed a folder on the corner. “Mister Salvatore also asked me to remind you of the meeting with the councillor at noon.”
Vic gave a tight nod, unable to speak. The servant bowed and retreated. The moment the door clicked shut, Vic’s head fell back against the chair with a groan. Erye hadn’t stopped his gentle, teasing motion. “You’re doing so well,” Erye murmured, turning his face to press a soft kiss to Vic’s thigh. His lips were cool. “See? You can still command.”
“I’m commanding nothing,” Vic rasped, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’m… fucking dying.”
“You’re not.” Erye’s hand drifted a fraction higher, his fingertips now barely grazing the wiry hair at the base of Vic’s shaft. Vic’s hips gave a tiny, helpless jerk. “Read the report.”
Vic’s hands were shaking. He fumbled the folder open, the paper rustling loudly in the quiet room. He stared at the first page. “Demurrage fees,” he read aloud, the words meaningless. “Contingency…” His voice faltered as Erye’s fingertips feathered up the length of his straining cock, not gripping, just tracing the swollen vein on the underside from root to tip.
Vic choked. The report slid from his grasp, spilling onto the floor. “You fucking devil,” he whispered, his head rolling to the side to look down at Erye. Erye gazed up at him, violet eyes wide and innocent, his cheek still resting on Vic’s thigh. His other hand came up, joining the first, both hands now framing Vic’s cock without touching it, a hair’s breadth away. The heat of him was a palpable force.
“I’m not doing anything,” Erye said, his voice a low, sweet purr. “You’re the one who can’t focus. Your poor, aching cock is so hard it’s practically throbbing. I can see it.” He blew a soft, cool stream of air across the slick head, beaded with pre-come. Vic cried out, a short, sharp sound of agony. “It must hurt so much.”
Vic’s telekinesis lashed out, a reflexive spasm of power. The lamp on the desk rattled. A book slammed shut on a shelf. He was panting, his control fraying into shreds. “Erye…”
“Yes, sir?” Erye asked, all feigned obedience. He finally, slowly, wrapped his fingers around the base of Vic’s cock. The touch was light, a loose ring of cool, delicate pressure. Vic hissed, his back arching out of the chair. “Do you need something?”
“You know what I need,” Vic begged, the words torn from him.
“I do,” Erye agreed calmly. He gave one slow, torturous pull from base to tip, his thumb sweeping over the slit. Vic shuddered violently, his hands gripping the arms of the chair so tightly the leather creaked. “But you have a meeting.” He released him, leaving Vic bereft and gasping. “Let’s get you dressed.”
He stood up, fluid and unbothered, as if he hadn’t just held Vic’s sanity in his pale hand. He walked to a nearby armoire and selected clothes: simple black trousers, a loose grey linen shirt. He brought them back to the desk. Vic hadn’t moved, couldn’t move, his cock jutting up from the open robe, red and desperate.
“Arms up,” Erye said gently, as if speaking to a child.
With a monumental effort, Vic raised his arms. Erye pulled the soft shirt over his head, guiding it down over his torso, carefully avoiding any direct contact with his cock. The brush of the fabric was its own exquisite torture. The trousers were worse. Erye had him stand, steadying him with a firm hand on his hip, right over the glass fracture. He knelt again to guide Vic’s feet into the legs, then pulled them up slowly, his knuckles and the rough cloth dragging against Vic’s sensitized skin every agonizing inch of the way.
By the time the fastening was done, Vic was sweating again, his breath coming in short, sharp pants. The confinement of the trousers was a new kind of hell, the rough material a constant, abrasive pressure. Erye stood and smoothed the shirt over Vic’s shoulders, his hands lingering. He leaned in close, his lips near Vic’s ear.
“All day, Vic,” he whispered, his voice promising and cruel. “Every time you shift in your chair. Every time you cross your legs. Every time you try to think about anything else. You’ll feel it. You’ll remember.” He kissed the shell of Vic’s ear, a chaste brush. “Now go be important.”
He stepped back, leaving Vic standing there, dressed but more exposed than ever, consumed by the relentless, throbbing need trapped against his thigh. Vic looked at him, his black eyes wide with a wild, furious helplessness. He took one step, then another, toward the door and his waiting meeting, each movement a fresh vibration of torment. Erye watched him go, a soft, unreadable smile on his lips.