Eros Island

by Lucinda Betts, Dawn Thompson

  He collapsed into her kiss, his brow running with sweat, his cock slow to go flaccid inside her, for the petals of that exquisite orchid between her thighs gripped him still. How could he part with such ecstasy at dawn? How could he bear never to feel again what he’d felt in the arms of this goddess? There was no question that she had bewitched him. Angel or demon, he was beguiled.

  Time stood still, then. Gar had no idea how much had passed before he withdrew himself and lay beside her, content but not sated. He could still feel the rhythmic contractions of her vagina, involuntary or deliberate, he couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter. He wanted to live inside her again and again.

  “I think you have bewitched me,” he said through a heavy sigh. “One moment I was struggling to stay afloat in a freezing maelstrom of high-curling seas and flesh-tearing winds, the next I am here, with you in this warm misty place. Have I died? Have I crossed over? Or have I somehow breeched the span and entered the Celtic Otherworld?”

  “Shhh,” she murmured, grazing his moist brow with her lips. “Our time has just begun. We must not waste it.”

  Gracefully, she rose from the bed and padded to a trunk in the corner. How lithe she was, as if she floated on air. Raising himself on one elbow, he feasted on the sight of her slender curves. He salivated over the roundness of her buttocks, over the perfect globes of her milk-white breasts, their tawny nipples standing out in bold relief against the opalescence of her skin. How the breathtaking sight of that body teased him, half veiled in the silken fall of coppery hair, like a sun-kissed halo about her.

  The shock of her hairless pubic mound drew his eyes when she turned, and his cock responded to the sight, swelling to life where it rested against his corded thigh. He was hard again, and he swung his feet over the side of the bed, rose up, and approached her. But she held him at bay with an armful of what looked like cloth made of spider silk, spangled with stardust. For its sparkle was blinding.

  “Put this on,” she said, handing him a sheer garment, so fine he feared to force it over the contours of his muscular body. Nonetheless, he did as she bade him and found it to be quite sturdy. It fit him like a second skin, as if it had been made for him, a sheer garment the color of winter spangled with snow. “…And this,” she added, handing him a headdress with antlers and a half-mask attached. Nodding her approval as he slipped it over his head, she swirled a billowing cape about her made of the same spangled cloth that hid none of her charms, and raised the hood.

  Gar looked on enraptured as she donned a shimmering winged mask; her eyes, the color of dark water, glazed with desire burning toward him. What passion smoldered in that sultry gaze, passion he had not yet tasted. He could but stare, consumed by lust and longing, his quick hot breath puffing back against his face from inside the mask. Her mystical allure was infectious.

  She held out her hand. “Come,” she said, “we must join the others.”

  2

  G ar followed the goddess into the mist to an open clearing where others gathered around bonfires. They were drinking honey mead and wine, dancing and feasting upon nuts and apples and roasted meat. Here, the mist parted to permit the moon to beam down upon the revelers. Faery lights flickered, and Wills-o’-the-Wisp danced on the distant marshes. Gar had celebrated the Samhain feast many times, but never in the Celtic Otherworld, and never in a warm climate, for it was the harvest feast.

  As if she’d heard, Analee said, “It is never autumn or winter here, so we make it so with costumes when we feast.”

  They were the only two dressed as frosty winter, all the rest wore earth colors, their costumes fashioned of leaves and moss, their headdresses wreaths of vines, studded with acorns, nuts, and succulent berries.

  “I rule here,” she said. “I wear the winter white at Samhain to tell the masses all will be well at the Winter Solstice. It is a sign of hope. You are garbed as the winter stag, because you are my consort…for a little.”

  Gar wished she wouldn’t keep reminding him it was only for a little. All around him revelers had paired off, dancing around the bonfires to the music of flute and lyre. Scantily clad wood nymphs danced around him trailing yards of spider silk spangled with some anonymous iridescence. It reminded him of the ethereal phosphorescence in the sea he’d just come from. Would he ever see the mortal world again? Or was he trapped in the Otherworld for the rest of his days? Gazing at Analee in her near nakedness, that did not seem like an unpleasant prospect.

  The nymphs came nearer, almost touching him as they crowded close in their dance. How exquisite they were, one more beautiful than the next, their long hair whipping him as they passed him by. They smelled of incense—patchouli and sandalwood, angelica and yew. It was like a drug, besotting him until his head reeled, and his body swayed to the plaintive music. All the while, the goddess looked on, her sparkling eyes riveted to him through the eyeholes in the winged half-mask she wore, her dewy lips parted.

  Many men in stag antlers appeared from among the trees wearing precious little else, save leaves for loincloths, and surrounded Analee. How long had they been standing there camouflaged by the tertiary bark and branches that blended with their antlers? She spread her cape wide, inviting them to touch every angle and plane, every orifice and recess of her body as they danced around her. As they did, the nymphs began to fondle him in the same intimate manner.

  “They make you ready for me,” the goddess said, “just as these make me ready for you.”

  Scarcely able to believe his eyes, Gar watched the masked and costumed men fondle Analee’s breasts. He watched them follow the curves of her body with light strokes, their hands flitting over her pubic mound, their skilled fingers riding the length of her slit, and she spread her legs apart, leaning into their caresses, writhing against the pressure of their strokes, as one by one they fondled her. They were aroused, even as he was, as the nymphs opened the crotch of his garment and exposed his cock to their caresses.

  Cool, skilled hands rode his shaft and kneaded his testicles, as each in her turn rubbed up against his swollen cock, while the others groped his hard muscled chest and buttocks, and played with his taut nipples. But he could not tear his eyes from what was happening across the way, as the aroused males laved and stroked and petted Analee until she uttered throaty moans that resonated wildly in his loins.

  Gar had never experienced such an arousal. Watching the revelers bring her to the brink of ecstasy, watching her alabaster skin turn pink with the sultry blush of sex attacked his loins like fiery pincers, without the nymphs’ caresses.

  These Otherworldly creatures lived to pleasure themselves and each other. Their carnal cravings were like the lightning, untamable, and unpredictable, like the sea that had spat him out amongst them. He had heard it was thus in their world. He was seeing it firsthand, something granted only to the chosen few. Would he remember it after? Was there even an after? Was death or to be lost among the fay the price for this excruciating ecstasy he had been granted for a little?

  Someone passed him a wineskin and he drank until rivulets ran down his chin, throat, and broad chest. Where had the garment Analee had given him gone? Had they torn it from his body? He was naked and the nymphs were licking the wine from his skin; so many hungry mouths, so many groping hands. Every cell in his body, every pore was on fire, his cock bursting, aching, begging, demanding release, and yet it would not come. What sorcery was this? What torment!

  One by one, the revelers began to leave Analee and pair off with the nymphs that were fondling him. Wine still glistened on his golden, battle-tanned skin as the goddess approached him. All at once, she gripped her cape, raised her arms above her head, and whirled around him closer and closer. It was plain that she meant to cocoon him in the gossamer folds and drive him down in the cool, dewy grass at the edge of the thicket. But Gar resisted, not even knowing why. Something in her strange gyrations suggested entrapment, as if he wasn’t already caught in her web.

  “Why do you hesitate?” she murmured. “’Tis al
l part of the ritual.”

  “I would rather stand back and feast my eyes upon you, my lady,” he returned. She shrugged and continued her strange dance, until she’d spiraled to the ground, her mantle spread out wide.

  Gar dropped down beside her. The tall grass was cool around them, and fragrant with scents he had never smelled before, some otherworldly species of wildflower. It reminded him of the heather that grew on the Cornish moors, ruggedly sweet, with the barest trace of the salty mist that drifted overland from the sea. He couldn’t see the flowers. All his eyes showed him was the sight of the Goddess of the Dream Well, naked in his arms, divested of her spider silk cloak. All else around them had vanished.

  Where had the bonfires gone? Where were the wood nymphs and male revelers? Where were the faery lights? All that remained were the Wills-o’-the-Wisp bobbing about in the distance, and the moon beaming down upon their trysting place. It had not yet reached its pinnacle. Soon it would sit high in the indigo vault above, and all too soon thereafter it would begin its descent to keep its rendezvous with the dawn. What would happen then, when his time in Analee’s arms was up? He would know soon enough, but now, oh, now! Her soft flesh was underneath him, grinding against him, her slender back arched to welcome his cock. That was all that mattered.

  Gar crushed her against him in a smothering embrace. Ghostly mist drifted close, reminding him that when the full moon shone down upon the feast of Samhain, the veil between the living and the dead was at its thinnest. Which was he? That thought kept trickling back to haunt him, along with Analee’s warning that he could only have her for a little while—till dawn. Time was short, and he beat those thoughts back in the rapture of her embrace, for they were both aroused beyond the point of no return.

  Lying on the cool ground wet with dew, Gar could almost feel the pulse beat of the land beneath him, for indeed it had a heart, thumping to the rhythm of his own heart. Under the Samhain moon, the Otherworld had a sensual pulse. He’d felt it in the real world, too, but never as strong as now, among these creatures. Even the trees had a pulse; he could feel their roots stirring beneath him, moving in the soil beneath the tall, swaying grass. They were all celebrants in the harvest ritual—living and dead, fay and mortal conjoined under the full round November moon that seemed to shine upon both worlds.

  Analee’s arms were clasped about his neck as she straddled him. Raising her up with hands that spanned her narrow waist, he lowered her upon his shaft, watching it enter her inch by inch until he’d filled her, gliding on her juices. She felt like liquid silk inside, warm and welcoming. She, too, had a pulse. Right now, it beat for him. But it would not always be so. Once this little interlude was over she would lie thus with another, for that was the nature of the creature she was, this Otherworldly goddess, this sorceress of the well that had granted him ecstasy, but only until dawn. How glorious it would be if such a passion could be had among his own kind. To live in the arms of voluptuous flesh to the end of his days would be rapture, indeed. Such was the stuff of dreams, he knew, but it was a pleasant thought as he raised her up and down along the thick, veined bulk of his cock from root to rimmed tip, gazing at the glisten of her dew upon his skin, upon his shaft as he pumped in and out of her. Engorged, his penis was flushed blue, aching for release, throbbing to the beat of the astral plane palpitating in the very ground beneath him.

  He could finally bear no more. Rolling her on her back, he raised her legs and thrust into her in mindless oblivion. She matched him thrust for thrust. The flower of her vulva from clitoris to vagina opening to him petal by petal until she’d captured him totally, rotating beneath him, gripping him with such sucking force his hips jerked forward as he came deep inside her, filling her with the hot rush of his seed.

  All was still around them. Not even the wind sighed, though it fluttered the grass bed beneath them. It was a moment before Gar collapsed alongside her, his breast heaving as he gulped air into his lungs. They were alone, but movement among the nearby trees caught in a moonbeam called his eyes there. Someone or something had been watching them, and he strained his lust-glazed eyes, dilated in the darkness, trying to make the image come clear. A horse…no, a man…no, a centaur!

  The pulse in the ground beneath them took on a new meter. The thudding of the creature’s heavy hooves reverberated through the grassy bed they lay upon. It had an angry beat, though the beast didn’t move from its position among the ash and oak trees in that quarter.

  Gar raised himself upon one elbow, taking stock of the watcher in the moonlight. It was a magnificent creature, its body the dark four-legged form of a feather-footed destrier, its torso that of a muscular man, whose dark hair worn long was caught at the nape of his neck with a ribbon of vines. Their eyes met, and the creature pawed the ground. The gesture had a ring of warning to it.

  “Who…what is that?” he said, nodding toward the centaur. For he truly thought the strange wine he’d drunk had had its way with him.

  Analee shrugged. “’Tis only Yan,” she said. “Pay him no mind. He’s out of sorts.”

  “He looks a bit more than simply ‘out of sorts,’” Gar observed. The creature looked about to charge, and they were in the open. He got to his feet and took her hand, raising her up alongside. “I think we’d best find suitable shelter elsewhere,” he said. “I have no wish to be trampled. Those hooves of his look mean enough to do the job, and I have no sword to defend you.”

  “There is no need,” Analee insisted. “I rule here, Gar Trivelyan. Yan is jealous. Eons ago, he angered the gods, and ever since on all eight sacred feast days throughout the year, he becomes the centaur. That is his punishment. When all the rest are coupling, he is denied me. He is my consort otherwise, you see, but cohabitation while he is in the body of the beast is strictly forbidden him, and so he sulks, and routs, and strikes the ground with his heavy hooves, but ’tis all bluster. He will not harm you. But he is why you can only have me till the dawn, for then his curse is eased. When he is a man again I cannot speak for your safety.”

  Gar eyed the centaur dubiously. “Yes, well, I still would put some distance between us, if it’s all the same to you,” he said, leading her away.

  “No, not that way,” she said, turning him toward a little lake beyond the clearing. “We shall have a sail if you fear him. Yan cannot follow there. The lake is too deep for the centaur.”

  “I fear no man or beast!” Gar defended. “But I have no weapon to defend you, and unless my eyes deceive me, that thing is armed!”

  “I have no need of defending,” Analee said. “Yan would never harm me, or you, either. He knows the rules well, though he doesn’t like them much, I’ll own. But that is his fault, isn’t it? Come…”

  Her words were scarcely out when the twang of an arrow whizzed through the air. It struck the ground inches from Gar’s foot. Spinning around, Gar clenched both fists and started back toward the ash grove, but the goddess’s quick hand arrested him.

  “Pay him no mind,” she said. Her voice was soothing and slow. “He will tire of the vigil. It has been thus for many ages. Believe me, he will not harm you, for then he would have to contend with me.”

  “No harm, eh?” Gar growled. “I just nearly lost a toe.”

  “No, you did not,” Analee said, leading him again. “If he wanted your toe, he would have hit it. Yan is an expert marks-man. He always hits his quarry. You are a seasoned sailor, Knight of the Realm, have you not ever had a warning shot fired across your bow upon the sea?”

  Gar considered it, a close eye upon the centaur. The irate creature had reloaded his longbow and taken aim again. Analee saw also. Stamping her foot, she spun into a whirling cyclone, parting the tall grass and lifting dead leaves and mulch off the forest floor where the centaur stood among the trees. Puffing out her cheeks she blew a mighty wind that bent the whitethorn, furze, and bracken that hemmed the thicket. Bolting, the creature reared back on his hind legs, pawing the air amid the stinging blizzard of swirling leaves and twigs, acorns
and pine needles her ire had raised, and galloped off deep into the forest.

  They had reached the edge of the lake. Overhead, the moon had risen to the pinnacle. It would begin its descent now, each moment bringing it closer to the dawn. There wasn’t much time left in the arms of the goddess who had granted him her favors for what reason he had yet to discover.

  Yes. These were sexual creatures. It all seemed quite natural to them to pair off and enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. But then, he was a seasoned warrior and he had known his carnal moments also. Still, this was different. She had dazzled him with her magic and her beauty, and though he knew it couldn’t last beyond the dawn, he had to believe there was a reason for her favors aside from the obvious. She was up to something. He would probe that issue, but not now. Not when the moon was sliding low and the beautiful Goddess of the Dream Well was standing before him naked and willing and ready to pleasure him as he had never been pleasured before.

  They had reached the water’s edge. It was warm, lapping at their feet and ankles—comfortable, just as everything was in the mysterious Celtic Otherworld, everything except jealous centaurs with longbows. It was bizarre moments like that when Gar was sure it was all a dream, but then he could still feel the wind the arrow made as it struck the ground so close to his foot he felt the shudder of its vibration. One did not feel such things in dreams, but they did feel such in enchantments.

  Everyone knew the power of the fay. Didn’t the Irish leave their front and back doors open a crack at night to give access to the wee folk that they might pass through unhindered in their night revelries? And didn’t the Cornish pay tribute to the knockers in the tin mines to ensure that those little folk would lead them to the richest veins of ore? What had he bought with the tribute he’d tossed into the dream well, the coiled snake bracelet catching glints of moonlight on Analee’s arm? Why was he the chosen one? What did it all mean? He longed to know, but feared to ask and break the magical spell she had cast over him.