A Swithin Spin: A Princely Passion (17 page)

“Don’t even pretend to hate this.”

Kilan ignored Antal’s admonishment. When he spoke, he tried to sound contemptuous and failed miserably. “Just because I don’t hate it doesn’t mean I like it.”

In reply, Antal inserted a second finger, and as well as the in-and-out motion, used a corkscrewing one.

Oh for
… Kilan lost to the darkness behind his eyes. He writhed, pushing, pulling at Antal, unsure if he tried to push the other man away or tug him closer. When Antal captured both of Kilan’s wrists in a single one of his hands and pushed them back over his head, Kilan stared up at him, astonished. “Leave them there,” Antal instructed, releasing him and yet…not. He might not be holding him down physically, but Antal’s gaze demanded he…
obey
. Kilan hesitated, frowning, wondering where that thought had come from. Antal couldn’t command him just to lie there, and yet somehow he had. Why did the idea send such a thrill through his mind and body? Even as Antal took to stretching him, his intention clear, Kilan couldn’t move. He didn’t know if he wanted to, but that didn’t make sense. He certainly didn’t want this to end in his being penetrated. He’d never wanted that, and nothing had changed.
It hadn’t
. It didn’t matter that Antal wanted him even though he had longed for that very thing.

He couldn’t help it; his gaze flicked down between their bodies, his eyes widening. Where his own cock lay sleeping, Antal’s pointed the way, dark in color and plump with arousal. He could only describe Antal’s cock as rampant, burgeoning, and altogether threatening. Any other time his thoughts might have struck him as comical, but not now. In contrast, his cock lay semi-tumescent, placid almost, if not quite flaccid.

Antal noticed where his gaze lay. “We’ll get that up for you by the time I’m through,” he said with a chuckle.

Kilan groaned, his head falling back. He’d never imagined any of this. Nothing was as it should be. He’d certainly never envisioned being limp. “I don’t need help, thank you. I’m just…” What was he, exactly?

“Nervous?” Antal prompted, and yes, it was true. Not wishing to, Kilan nodded, agreeing.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Antal repeated, his voice a caress this time. Something bright and determined existed in Antal’s gaze, but there existed also kindness. “Kilan, I’m not going to force you.”

“That’s a peculiar thing for a Swithin to say,” Kilan couldn’t help remarking. The Swithin regarded such things as abominable. So far, their culture was free of rape.

“I know, but the look on your face…” Antal’s gaze studied him. “You don’t need to feel afraid.”

No matter how much he kept denying what was happening, Kilan took comfort from the tenderness in Antal’s voice. “You said --”

“I said if we do this, we do it my way. I didn’t say you had no choice.”

Oddly, in that moment, Kilan wanted Antal to take away his choice. Not…force him, exactly, but make the decision. He wanted sex with Antal, but he didn’t know if he wanted the things Antal clearly intended to do to him. All he knew was hands; one set of fingers stroking his face, the other set pressing, insistent inside him, the sensation half-pleasurable, half-burning. Kilan chose silence, hoping to indicate yes, and Antal took his lead, moving up against him. Only one thought went through Kilan’s head.
How was that ever going to fit
? It would. He knew it would. He’d had sex with both males and females. He found it incredibly erotic to see his cock sinking into another person’s body. The ensuing and shared delight of those instances seemed to indicate his fears were for nothing. Other people loved doing this, so why shouldn’t he? Even so, he couldn’t help feeling apprehensive.
Am I really going to do this?

Part of him protested. Part of him acknowledged his true question. Did he want to do
this
with Antal? In that moment he realized that if he lay with any other man, he would have refused, but he’d invested too much time, too much emotion where Antal was concerned. He…cared for Antal more than he wanted to admit. He found Antal beautiful, intelligent, creative, skilled, and courageous. Antal was everything he wanted to be but was certain he wasn’t. To have Antal look at him the way the guard looked at him now… He had never expected that heated gaze. He had never expected to see desire of any kind as Antal looked at him. He supposed in a small way he worshipped him. He simply couldn’t refuse. To have this with Antal… No one could take it away from him. He just hoped he didn’t do something stupid to spoil it.

Antal watched for signs of anxiety on Kilan’s face. He saw what he’d expected. Not dread but uncertainty mixed with a healthy dose of curiosity and a touch of excitement. Antal would have preferred to see a little more excitement, but he understood Kilan’s reservations. He just appeared a little more reserved than most. Wanting to make this good for Kilan, Antal bent forward to kiss him. He connected them at their mouths, teased Kilan’s tongue into playing. When he thought the kiss was enough of a distraction, he rubbed the tip of his cock against Kilan’s body. The slight sound that Kilan moaned into his mouth told Antal that Kilan had noticed, but the kiss had done what he hoped it would -- united them and relieved Kilan’s dread.

Easing back from the kiss because of the angle necessary, he continued to use his fingers to gently stretch that sweet rosette, at the same time rubbing his cock where it so wanted to penetrate. He gradually eased from one degree of force to another, watching Kilan’s frown tighten in unison with the increasing pressure. With his gaze he followed every movement of Kilan’s eyes, staring, making the other man gaze back, making sure Kilan knew he saw him, understood what he was feeling. Incredibly, Kilan’s arms lay over his head where Antal had told him to leave them. Kilan gasped at the moment of entry and then bit at his lip. Antal could read the pain on his face even before Kilan began shaking his head. Antal eased back.

“I know,” he whispered, purposely speaking low, keeping even his voice intimate. “I know it’s painful. I know it’s intense. It’s the first time. Two, three, four times…by then you’ll love this. Believe me, it’s worth it.” Antal could see the calculation of whether this would happen again in Kilan’s gaze, of whether Kilan would allow it, even while the prince considered whether to believe him. He could also see his anticipation when Antal said it would be worth the suffering. Kilan’s cock certainly appeared to agree; it rose up eagerly.

He didn’t know how anyone could stand the discomfort, yet when Antal said it was just because this was his first time, Kilan believed him. People wouldn’t do this if it felt terrible. It
was
terrible; that bright spark of pain inside him insisted this was madness, and yet even in the midst of the pain, he felt other sensations. Each time it became unbearable, Antal eased off before trying again. Each time, just as he thought he would have to beg Antal to stop, Antal backed off, then nudged his way back inside.

Only when a hand took hold of his cock did Kilan realize that not only was Antal slowly thrusting in and out of him, deep enough but not too deep, but also that Antal supported his weight on one hand and played with him with the other. Fingers fondled his cock and balls, and that distracted him from the pain. He was still nervous, but some part of him felt most definitely excited. Antal’s gaze flicked down to where he clasped Kilan.

“That’s better,” Antal whispered, laughter in his voice, giving Kilan’s erection a squeeze that made him squirm.

For some reason he’d expected Antal’s sudden dominance to manifest in roughness, but this wasn’t rough. The thrusting in and pulling out felt rhythmic, not exactly slow but not what he would call fast. The thrust inward shot little jolts of pain into him, through him, but the pulling out… Ah, that was misleading. It brought relief, even pleasure, but no sooner did his body respond to that than the jolt happened again. Kilan had started this believing he preferred the pulling out, but now, with Antal’s grip on his dick, he wasn’t so sure.

Through all this
feeling
, the bright, blinding thought rendered him asunder: Antal was inside him. They were joined physically. Emotionally… Antal stared at him. Even as the
enormity
of having another person’s body connected to his struck Kilan in a way it hadn’t before, Antal tilted his head in such a way that Kilan knew, just
knew
, Antal saw him. Antal looked at him in a way that went beyond what they were doing. Even as Antal shook his head, Kilan could tell what he was saying without his having to speak. Didn’t it take years for lovers to understand each other on that kind of level? He knew what Antal meant:
later
. They could face their feelings later. Now was the time for sex.

Kilan expected a kiss as Antal leaned forward. Instead, Antal dipped his head, rasping his tongue over a nipple. Kilan was so unprepared for the sensation that his body arched. His cock throbbed, jerked in Antal’s grasp. Lower things clasped. Antal felt that. Kilan knew he did. He didn’t need to hear the indrawn breath, but hear it he did. He didn’t know how Antal could bear such a tight squeeze.

“Relax. Breathe,” Antal told him, and Kilan couldn’t help wondering if he didn’t issue the instruction as much for his own sake as for Kilan’s. He was trying. He so didn’t want to bungle this. He’d tried to withstand the initial pain but hadn’t managed to hide his suffering. To his surprise, Antal had been understanding, but then that was Antal through and through. He wanted this. He just had to…

Loose. Stay loose. Stay…

Coherence departed. Kilan lay there, aware of his intellect as a thing apart from his body. “Is that the comet?” he heard Antal ask, and he blinked, realizing the power flared around them. The comet had responded to his silent plea, helped to loosen his body. He nodded, unable to explain, unable to speak, but Antal seemed to understand that he’d lost his voice during the onslaught. Together, he and Antal rocked. He even strained up, trying to meet Antal’s thrusts with a push. He tried to hold back his gasps, his moans, but finally Antal forced them out of him. It wasn’t perfect. This was his first time. Antal said it got better the more one did this. For now, for some unknown reason, the comet helped him. Kilan hadn’t known it could do that.

He sensed urgency: his and Antal’s, his lover murmuring, encouraging, jerking him, thrusting…and he knew just before it happened that when he came it was going to be hard and devastating. Therefore, it shouldn’t have come as such a surprise when he erupted, but his resulting shout still echoed around the cavern walls, rebounding even as the waves of his orgasm faded.

“Are we fine with each other?” Kilan asked.

Antal couldn’t remember when he’d last heard a plea for reassurance in such an innocent question. He turned, aware he looked ridiculous wearing Kilan’s jacket and with the blanket fashioned as a rudimentary covering not unlike a skirt around his waist. Even so, he felt better with something around his midriff. He really had felt uncomfortable clambering about in the tunnels with his nether regions so vulnerably on display. His discomfort had nothing to do with sex, just practicality. Clothes acted as protection as much as anything.

As absurd as he looked, it felt good to be up and well, able to take command. The joke was apparently on him. How ironic. The prince didn’t want responsibility, and Antal didn’t know how to relinquish liability to someone else. He didn’t know for sure what would make Kilan happy, but where his own happiness was concerned, he now accepted that Ryanac was right: he needed to take time off, get used to delegating, and not try to control everything. He and Kilan had much in common; equally they were opposites, and didn’t they say something about opposites attracting one another? Not only had the sex felt fabulous, but they’d both found something neither had expected. He didn’t know how Kilan felt about that, for he didn’t know how he felt about it himself. That would take some thinking, and right now they had other, maybe no less important things to worry about, but things that required more urgency. Even so, he couldn’t help smiling. Kilan frowned.

“What?”

He wasn’t surprised to hear the defensive tone in the prince’s voice. It only delighted him. “Nothing. And yes, we’re fine. Was it what you expected?” He couldn’t help teasing even though a new day had begun. Whatever came next, he wanted Kilan to remember last night, the details, the finer points, the way he’d shouted when he climaxed. All of it.

At once, Kilan’s gaze turned wary. “Better, actually, but it’s not something I’ve ever considered wanting.”

He sounded a little bewildered about that. Antal longed to ask him if he meant he hadn’t wanted it even last night but had gone along with the experience in order to have sex of any kind. Or had he gone along with it and now never wanted it again? Maybe he’d never wanted it prior to last night, but he wanted it now? The choices felt too complex to resolve easily; Antal despaired of asking, trying to coax Kilan into giving an honest response. Maybe they both needed a way out of this…just in case. “It can just be one of life’s experiences. We don’t have to do it again, if you don’t want.”

“Do you want to?”

He couldn’t
quite
tell if that little lilt in Kilan’s voice sounded hopeful, but it sounded like a definite possibility.

“Ah. So we’re going to gently dance around each other, not wanting to be the one to ask what happens next?”

Kilan’s color deepened a little. “Later,” Antal promised. They needed to talk, but even he couldn’t think clearly at present. He doubted very much that Kilan’s thoughts were any better. They needed time. They needed to get out of here before they said something or did something neither of them had taken the time to think about.

With day returning, they’d detected a crack in the rock wall running through the ceiling of the cavern into the distance. With sufficient natural light penetrating down through the split, Antal felt certain they could follow the fissure to an exit. If only daylight would show him the way out of the more personal situation they’d slipped into so easily last night. “Let’s get out of here,” he said gently. “We can talk once we’re home and safe in the city.”