Raised By Wolves 2 - Matelots (43 page)

“I cannot teach you to swim in a cistern.” He grinned.

He was shedding his weapons and arranging them carefully along the shore. I understood his reasoning and did likewise. When we finished, we could leave the lagoon from any side and find a loaded piece and a blade.

Then we doffed our clothing. He smeared his pale shoulders with fat.

“The sun is very bright upon the water, and I am not brown as you are,” he explained. “I burned my skin when first I learned to swim.”

“Will the fat help?”

“It will not hurt,” he said flatly.

“Who taught you to swim?” I asked.

“I taught myself.”

“Here?”

He snorted. “Will, the water in much of France is not much warmer than England’s. It is why no one in Christendom learns to swim unless they know the waters of the Mediterranean.”

He waded into the water. I followed. It felt luxurious on my tired body. Gaston took my hand and led me out until we were chest deep.

“Beyond bathing – which some have said I have an unhealthy fascination with – and our occasional splashing about in the surf, I have been fully immersed in water only twice,” I said. “Both times it was cold and decidedly unpleasant. This is not, but still…”

Gaston beckoned me closer and gently commanded, “Hold your nose and kneel down so that you are completely immersed.”

I did as he bade. It was no colder on my head than it had been elsewhere. I surfaced and found him grinning when I opened my eyes.

“Now, do it again with your eyes open,” he said.

I reluctantly complied, and was surprised to be able to see things.

And my eyes did not sting as I had expected.

He began to teach me how to exhale under water, so that I need not hold my nose; and how to move about.

“I thought swimming involved staying above the water,” I said the fourth time I came to the surface.

“People who only wish to stay on top of the water are afraid of it. I will teach you how to cover distance on top of it, but first you need to lose your fear.”

“I feel I am conquering that fear,” I said.

He was grinning at me. “Do you think you will sink?”

I nodded. “If the water is deep enough.”

He shook his head and beckoned. “Do you trust me?”

“In all ways,” I said solemnly.

“You must trust me about water. You will not sink. The body floats.”

I snorted. “I know they float when dead.”

He kicked up from the bottom and spread himself atop the water for a moment, and then as I expected, he began to sink – but to my surprise, only so far; and then it was obvious he was floating with no conscious effort.

“All right, you can indeed float,” I said. “You even make it look quite relaxing.”

He bent at the waist and put his feet back under him. “Your turn.

And it is relaxing, but it is like another thing you must relax to enjoy.”

He grinned.

It took several tries, all of which failed because I panicked when I thought I sank too deep, or because I stiffened my body and somehow drove myself under. Gaston was patient, and when at last I floated there, staring up at the sky with the lightest reassuring touch of his fingers on my back, I wondered at how his madness truly worked upon him, in that he could be so calm here and now and so distraught only hours before. Did it have a thing to do with how relaxed he felt with his Horse? Was he a man trying to keep himself above water?

“Are you afraid of your madness?” I asked the sky, as I was still somewhat unsure of turning my head toward him while floating.

He moved closer to peer down at me with a frown. “Oui.”

“Perhaps you need to float on it.”

His frown deepened in thought and then slowly transmuted to a smile. “There are times when I am comfortably immersed in it.”

“As you were when we sailed here,” I said.

“Oui. And other times I hold myself above it, as when I wear the mask of reason.” He sighed. “Thank you for giving me another way to interpret it.”

“We will find the perfect metaphor yet, my love.”

He shook his head. “Non, Will, they are all excellent. They all provide perspective. They all… Before you, I had no one to discuss my madness with. It was a thing, an indescribable thing that overtook me. Now that I have someone to speak with about it, I must contain it within words and ideas that can be conveyed. It has given me power over it.”

I closed my eyes and floated, thinking on words and power.

There was something just beyond my ken on the matter, some half-remembered myth or memory.

Gaston’s hand covered my member.

I looked at him with alarm. “I do not feel so steady…”

He grinned. “I am not playing. When first I learned to float I burned there. I would save you that.”

I winced and laughed. “Please do.”

“Though…” His grin widened. “I might as well.” His fingers began to move upon me. “Float, Will. Relax all except this.”

I knew I would not drown if I rolled away from him and got my feet under me; still, I felt defenseless. I squinted up at his shadowed face as my member rose to his challenge. His eyes were slightly narrowed, and though not hard and dangerous, there was a glint of something more sinister than mischief to them. Whatever that look might be named, my Horse found interest in it, and rose to that challenge as well.

“You enjoy my being helpless, do you not?” I murmured.

“You enjoy being helpless, do you not?” he asked huskily.

“Only at your hand.”

“My hand?” He grinned anew. “And ought else?”

“I surrender to every part of you.”

His gaze sobered, and he appeared almost pained; and then he was upon me. His mouth covered mine as he drove me under with his weight. I struggled not to panic, and to determine how to hold my breath while he plundered my mouth. I thought I would drown. Then there was only him. I realized I might drown in him, as he was far more encompassing than the water. When he released me, I did not move; I hung in some place near the darkness of unconsciousness, bereft of my senses, feeling everything and nothing.

He pulled me to the surface and my body gasped air of its own accord. I clung to him. He was very somber and conciliatory, not in words, but in his touch, as he led me to shore. He would not allow me to collapse in the sand, however; choosing instead to haul me farther into the shade, pausing only to take up a pistol as he went. When finally he leaned me against a palm next to our clothes and bags, I had stopped coughing and gasping, and I had discovered his cock was quite erect.

“I am sorry…” he started to say.

I stopped him with my mouth. I did not want words.

He returned my kiss hungrily, and my manhood rose to match his in the ferocity of its tumescence.

“I thought to wait until the sunset,” he whispered as his teeth explored my neck.

“Non,” I said emphatically. I did not wish to explain how he would not deny me at this moment. It seemed a waste of precious breath.

We were as frantic and awkward as two lads. I turned and hugged the tree with one arm, sparing my manhood from the bark with the other. His greased fingers were soon upon me, and I squatted into them, willing myself to open and convince him I could take them all, or his whole damn hand if necessary, just to speed the process along.

He did not make me wait. He impaled me smoothly, in a long vertical thrust that pushed me up the trunk. My knees weakened at the feel of it, and the tree felt as if it groaned inaudibly against my chest. The world spun and I closed my eyes. Partly to take him deeper, and partly because I was unsteady on my feet, I settled onto him and he pushed back, until we reached some balance of position. Then he held still. He was huge inside me, but I did not feel rent asunder so much as held from within and without, embraced in warmth that saturated my soul.

I felt as I had under the water with his mouth upon me. I could not breathe. There was only Gaston. Somehow I needed to come up for air.

I gasped, little meaningless sounds. Words would not come, until finally, “fuck,” escaped my lips in a short bark.

Thankfully he understood and began to move. He thrust upward, lifting me with every stroke. Though my chest was oblivious to the tree’s rough caress, I was still somewhat mindful of my cock. Yet, I cared not if it felt pleasure. In fact, it did not. It nestled full but weak in my hand, and allowed all sensation to radiate from my arse. He seemed larger with every stroke, and I felt I was being pushed open by degrees, until at last he might crawl inside me, and I could hold him there forever and never be without him.

And then he came, with a growl and one last shove. I could feel him throb within me. I clenched; both to wring him dry and keep him. But alas, he eventually slid free despite my efforts.

We stood panting for a time: him holding me, and I the tree. And then he covered my shoulders with light kisses and licks.

“Are you well?” he murmured.

“Very,” I said, wondering at his concern. “I could only be better if you were inside me once again.”

He chuckled on my neck. “I suppose we need not wait until sunset.

It is only a little after midday.”

“Far too many hours to go without doing this again,” I whispered. “I do not think I could bear it.”

“Oui,” he breathed.

“Please do that as many times as you are able.” I remembered his impressive libido from the night before last, and laughed. I would not be able to walk in two days.

He gently urged me to turn until his mouth could cover mine.

“I was concerned,” he whispered, when he released me.

“Why?”

“I did not plan to take you standing. I thought it was too near the angle the Damn Cousin used…” he trailed off with guilt.

I frowned, and then amusement suffused me; and greater than that, relief, a profound relief. “I did not think of the Damn Cousin even once.

Not at all.” I grinned.

He grinned in return. “Then we have truly conquered him.”

“Oui, I believe so. Gods, how I love you.”

We held each other and laughed. And the afternoon spun into evening in a slow tapestry of trysting and cuddling. When the sunset finally came, it found us on our knees with him deeply inside me once again. This time, his hand was about my member and it sang along with his. I watched the pink and purple majesty of the sinking sun and wondered if the sky in Heaven was as beautiful as a sunset all of the time, as I had surely found its counterpart on earth.

Two days later, we sat in the shade while I rubbed salve onto his burned back. The time had passed much as the first day had, with swimming lessons and trysting. We had been naked the entirety of it, and thus his reddened hide. I, thankfully, was already browned over most of my body; unfortunately, the places where I had been pale had been exposed and in use of late. My buttocks were now as sore from the sun as my opening was from all of the unaccustomed activity. I could walk, but I could not do so without thinking heartily of him.

“You should allow yourself to brown,” I said as I worked.

“Why?” he asked sleepily.

“Then you would be striped in color as well as texture.”

He smiled lazily and turned so that he could gaze at me. “Would that please you?”

I thought of how he would appear with the pale scars outlined in strips of nutmeg. “It would make them more evident, but I feel it would be aesthetically interesting.”

“Anything to please you,” he murmured.

I grinned. “Non, I am pleased beyond all reckoning already.”

He was thoughtful. “As am I. Truly. I am happy. I cannot recall feeling thus. With you before, there was always the feeling of incompleteness, but now that is gone. I am content.”

I knew how he felt. I shared it in full measure. Yet there were ugly and disquieting thoughts lurking about my head. I had been able to push them away, thinking so little of them I could not name them, but I knew I would lose the bliss of ignorance once we returned to the others.

“Let us stay here,” I whispered.

“Could we?” It was challenge and not request, yet his tone was resigned and devoid of mockery.

I sighed. “Men being inconstant creatures such as we are… I will never tire of you, but I can well imagine even this growing tiresome. It is a miserable thing: that we cannot be content to wallow in contentment.”

“Let us escape as we are able,” he said solemnly. “Not because… I require it, but because we do.”

“Oui,” I sighed. “I feel we should do this again while we are all still here. They will surely frown on us for fucking continuously on the beach there.”

“They should not risk my wrath,” he said.

We were smiling, and though the thing we had not spoken of for two days had drifted in to cover our thoughts, it was not dark or menacing.

“Do you feel you are ready to return?” I asked. “Or will I need to chain you to a tree?”

He grinned. “The fucking calms the Horse.”

“Well then, they will just have to frown upon us for ministering to it often,” I said with glee.

We finally packed our things and made our way back to the ships and the beach full of men. Striker greeted us with a hearty embrace and relieved eyes. He regarded Gaston speculatively; as much to my amazement as Striker’s, my matelot grinned at him.

“We are well,” I assured him. “I feel we will slip away again, but for now we will pull our weight. What would you have of us? And how welcome will we be among the French?”

“There are some who would still see you hang,” Striker said, “but most have taken well to the tale we have spun. I do not fear for your safety as I did before. You need not do much among the French, though.

We have a score of fine fools for you to help train. Cudro and Pete have them up yonder on the beach.”

We went to deposit our things at the camp Striker and our cabal had made, high up the beach around a fire pit.

Striker called out in our wake. “I would say don’t fence in front of them, but a few of them think they know a great deal, and perhaps you should knock the wind from their sails – but you’ll just scare the rest.”

“We will be judicious in displaying our prowess,” I assured him.