Cantrips: Volume #1: Minor Magics Crafted to Amuse and Entertain

by Joey W. Hill

  “We sensed…a disturbance. Your mind was closed, so I couldn’t contact you. I thought we better check on you, since Marcellus said you left his company rather abruptly.”

  “A disturbance in the force, Luke,” Mina intoned in his ear, then pushed her hair back, taking a better grip on David’s shoulders to haul herself up where Jonah could see her full face. “I am pregnant,” she announced. “He was trying to convince me that’s a good thing.”

  “I see.” After the initial flash of startled reaction, Jonah seemed to take that in stride. “How is he doing on that?”

  “I still think it’s a bad idea, but apparently what’s done is done. No way to send her little soul back to the manufacturer. What do you think?”

  David cheerfully thought of all the ways he was going to strangle her in truth. However, as he held his commander’s gaze, he saw a lot of things in the male’s expression, and wondered at Jonah’s response himself. After a long pause, the second-in-command for all the Goddess’s angelic legions inclined his head.

  “You have known what it is to grow up without love, Mina, so I think she will be the best-loved child that has ever graced the Goddess’s vast universe. And I think you will be an extraordinary mother.” His gaze shifted to David. “Just as I know you will be everything a father should be. As long as you start paying better attention, even when domestic crises are occupying your mind.”

  Jonah pivoted, heading back out of the cave. “Spend some time on the training field with Cassius this week,” he called over his shoulder. “He’ll beat that lesson into you, so next time I don’t have to drop everything to find out why your mate is causing a hurricane with storm surge in the middle of a landlocked desert. Sam says you owe him north-facing windows, Mina.”

  David stared at the cave entrance, listened to the rush of wings as Jonah and the other two angels took off. I know you will be everything a father should be. Jonah had known what those words meant to him. And as for his sea witch…

  He turned, but she refused to relinquish her hold on his back. He slid both his hands over the sleek tentacle on his waist. “You all right?”

  “Everyone but me seems to think this is going to be okay. They think a baby’s mere appearance means world peace and chocolate rainbows. There are places where a baby just means one more for a mother to watch starve to death.”

  “Mina.” He forcibly loosened the tentacle, slid her around and under his arm so they were face to face. The suction cups on her tentacles slid along his leg, the faint sting a brief kiss of pain before she had legs again and he was holding her against him, arms around her hips and back. “Our child won’t starve to death. Come here.”

  He moved her over to the tidal pool’s edge, bringing them up to the rocky ground with a brief pump of his wings. Carrying her out of the cave into the afternoon sunlight, he laid her down on the sand, where she could look up and see the breeze moving through the trees. “Don’t think; just feel.”

  He bent and kissed her, the narrow line between her breasts. As he did, he stretched out one wing fully, touching the tip of it to the top of her foot, drawing it up along her ankle, the inside of her calf. She squirmed at the sensual tickle, then stilled as he went higher, over her knee, folding the wing forward so it was sliding along her thigh. He registered how it felt in her mind, that soft, furlike brush of contact, a part of him. He adjusted so the wing tip glided over her mound. Gripping her thigh with his hand, he moved it at a deliberate pace so he slowly widened the spread of her legs, his gaze falling on the intimate folds revealed there. She pressed her lips together, her hands curling into the sand.

  As he straightened, his gaze moved up her body, over her breasts, her mouth. Threading his fingers through her damp hair, he shifted his body, kneeling between her legs. When he bent to her breasts again, the tender skin inside her knees was pressed against his thighs. He folded his wings along his back so the crossed tips were caressing her ankles, the soles of her small feet.

  Closing his hands over her breasts, he increased the pressure of his hands so the constriction was a delicious stimulation. When he put his mouth over one nipple, nudging and nuzzling, then doing a slow, teasing suckle, her hands had moved to clutch his hips.

  Imagine a child here, suckling your breasts, nourished by your milk.

  He gave her his voice in her mind, and she closed her eyes, intensifying the intimacy of it. Moving down to her abdomen, he laid another heated kiss on her belly, his tongue teasing at her navel. He smelled her arousal. Through the palm of his hand, low on her stomach, he felt the subtle shift of her pussy muscles contracting. She loved his mouth on her there, though he could never get her admit to that. She wouldn’t admit to anything. His stubborn witch.

  Think of the way it will feel, the skin stretching, becoming fuller here, a tangible weight as the child grows.

  He moved down even further, his tongue taking a brief taste of her clit. She shuddered.

  Imagine my cock inside of you, the two of us together, making her, a creation of our love. For some it’s mere biology, but not for us. She will be special and amazing, and you will love her with a loyalty and passion as fierce as the love I know you bear for me.

  Her breath was shortening, and she was not alone in her aroused reaction. David slid his hands to her hips, cradling her as he stretched out on the sand, bracing his elbows for the best angle to bring her to his mouth. I want you wet and quivering, sweet witch. I’m going to get you begging, and then I’m going to turn you over in the sand, put that tempting bottom of yours in the air and beat it raw for getting me in trouble. For worrying about things that don’t need to be worried about. I will always take care of you, love you, protect you. And our child.

  He smiled against her flesh at the thought of all of it, his cock getting harder at her reaction, a delectable mixture of apprehension and desire. He was close enough not only to inhale that irresistible aroma, but catch those tiny drops of cream on his tongue, swirl them over her clit, making her glisten from that and the stimulation of his mouth.

  He would do everything he promised, because he knew she needed it, because it would give them both pleasure and help her push away her fears. Before he was done, he was determined she would feel at least one tendril of joy for the new life she carried. The life he was certain would show her once and for all that the Dark One blood would never rule her.

  A miracle baby, in more ways than one.

  Part Four

  Angels, at least those of the Dark Legion, were far more carnal than the religious texts suggested. He was never so glad for that than in a moment like this, when he had his witch at his mercy, his mouth hovering so close to her cunt he could inhale her musk with every breath. It was so easy, such an intimate, incomparable pleasure, to take a long, dragging lick from the perineum to the clit. He slid his tongue over that tight furl of flesh, feeling it quiver and change under his stimulation. Then the deep thrust in, bringing his mouth right up to the labia, sealing over her pussy and breathing into her, breathing her in, as he licked and swirled along the velvet slickness inside of her channel.

  Mina made a guttural, animal sound, twisting beneath his hands, her fingers reaching for him, clawing and sliding off his shoulders as he slowly fucked her with his tongue, taking his time, watching her eyes open wide in dazed pleasure, then close, lashes fanning her cheeks. Her stomach muscles were rigid with need as she moved against his mouth in shameless want. As she lifted up to his mouth, he captured her soft buttocks in both hands, kneading and working her so her clit was pushed up against his mouth even more insistently. He knew her body so well, it was second nature to find his way to the cleft between those cheeks and stroke the sensitive rim there.

  It resulted in another short gush of cream on his tongue, and she cried out. She was fighting her climax, he could sense it. He’d brought her so close, so fast, and she refused to be a pushover, his stubborn witch. He smiled against her, traced his tongue around her clit, then sucked on it, biting. As he di
d, he slid three fingers into her, rubbing the sweet place that could make her come to pieces. His other finger dipped into her rectum, just the tip, enough to make her feel the penetration.

  There she was, so close, teetering over… he waited one more beat, then pulled free, administering a sharp slap right onto the outer labia, possible because of the wide spread of her legs. She jumped at the unexpected blow and gave a short, resentful mewl. “Not until I tell you that you can go, sweet witch,” he reminded her.

  Giving him a calculated look, she let her hands slither around her breasts, cupping them and teasing the nipples in a way that riveted his attention. She arched her back. “Maybe I’ll just entertain myself.”

  “Stop.” The stern command had her freezing in that position as his hot eyes covered her. “Arch your back more. Offer them to me.”

  She did, her fingers tightening over breasts and nipples. “Now hold that position,” he murmured. “Your legs spread, your breasts cupped and offered in your hands, waiting for me to take you, waiting for me to let you climax. Don’t move an inch.”

  Leaning forward, he made his way down to the left breast. When he tongued the nipple, a tiny brush of contact, she shuddered. Putting his other hand over her cunt, he slid two fingers in, a gentle scissor of movement. As he continued to touch her nipple with those light presses of his tongue, not a lick or a suckle, the moan became an incoherent plea, and more thick honey dampened his hand. He moved around the nipple now, licking her fingers, pressed so hard into her flesh there were white circles around the pads.

  “That’s it, baby. Squeeze your beautiful tits for me. Your cunt is just weeping, begging for my cock. You want to be bad, but you don’t know how to be anything but my sweet slave, do you?”

  Sometimes he wasn’t quite sure where the thoughts and feelings came from, this desire to completely subjugate her with pleasure, the way humans did it with leather and whips and fetish magazines, but it was definitely in his blood. He hadn’t had much time with other women before he met her, but even with them it had never come forth as strongly as it did with her. As a warrior, he thought it was like having a dormant weapon, one that hadn’t made itself fully known to him until the foe for whom it was specifically intended stepped forward.

  Mina was his to protect, not to fight, but the analogy wasn’t entirely inaccurate. Her craving to be dominated was directed toward him and him alone, a vital craving that helped her manage so much of the dangerous darkness within her.

  She was wriggling against his touch, unable to help herself, and she was going to make herself come. “Uh-uh.” He caught her wrists and pulled her arms out to either side of her as he shifted his body upward, pinning her arms beneath his calves. In that position he gripped his cock, temptingly close to her mouth and avid gaze. “Take me deep,” he ordered. “You keep your focus on me, my desires. What I command.”

  She opened, and he could push himself practically down her throat, she was so good at trusting him for this. He had to suppress a groan, realizing he’d given her a chance for payback as she sucked on him like a vacuum, her tongue stroking the underside of his cock. Her eyes lifted again, gazing up at him as he stretched her mouth, made her serve him, and she knew just how crazy that drove him. Mother Goddess, but she was beautiful. And amazing. All his…

  She was bringing him too close. With regret, he pulled out of her, but in one swift movement, he turned her over and put her on her hands and knees. He’d take her this way, after he lived up to his promise.

  He found himself filled with a different inclination first, though. Standing on his knees behind her, he cupped her breasts, more gently now. They were small, but attuned to every detail of her body as he was, he could already tell there was a little more fullness to them. Merwomen had monthly courses like human women, though Mina’s had always been wildly irregular, possibly contributing to how long conception had taken between them.

  But everything happened in its own time, at its own pace. Like now. Though his own body was raging with need, his cock so hard it was painful as hell, he didn’t want to rush this. There was far more involved here than simple lust. His palms slipped down over her abdomen, cupping that curve, then over her hips, slow, stroking.

  “My love.”

  She looked back at him, her hair falling over her shoulder, her expression uncertain at the tenderness suffusing his voice. “You’ve never called me that.”

  “I’ve thought it. I know how you are about sentiment, but that’s what you are to me, Mina. My love, my mate. The center of my universe. You’re everything I could ever want.”

  “You just feel that way because I’m carrying a baby.”

  “No.” He shook his head. “It’s a turning point for us. This is an expression of your love for me, of our love for each other. The faith we have in it. The faith you have in yourself, and in me, in us. It chokes me, the way you don’t realize how you’ve sent a message even after you’ve sent it, sweet witch. I’m saying thank you.”

  She stared at him, so many thoughts going on behind her eyes. Some he could see; others were too jumbled to make out, but they were all powerful. Hard for her to handle. “I want to come,” she said plaintively.

  He grinned then, though the pain in his cock was matched by an ache in his chest, the pressure of loving her so much his ribs creaked. “Put your elbows on the sand, your forehead into the cup of your hands. Spread your knees.”

  She accommodated him, and David drew in a steadying breath at the sight she made, the pink mouth of her sex, the tracks of fluid her arousal had made down her thighs. The tight points of her breasts, brushing the sand. The small puckered rear entrance. All of it offered to him, so blatantly sexual and needy.

  He struck her with the flat of his hand across her buttocks, a practiced blow that made the pretty cheeks wobble, an effect he made sure she’d feel deep inside her pussy. He saw her flesh contract in confirmation, heard her suck in a gasp. “Better brace those elbows,” he advised.

  He spanked her on alternating cheeks, then between them, giving her exposed cunt some artful slaps that quickly brought her close to climax again. Then he moved back to her ass. He kept going until both cheeks were reddened, and her arousal was dripping into the sand, forming a pattern of tiny dark droplets. He bent, licked along the inside of her thighs, caught the fluid glistening on the edges of those flushed lips. Playing around the clit without touching it, he teased her rim with his nose, then brushed his mouth over those abraded buttocks.

  “David…” She was nearly in tears. “I want you. Now.”

  “You know the rules. Beg me, sweet witch. And say you’re sorry.”

  “I’m sorry…for getting you in trouble with Jonah…for being difficult. For being afraid…”

  He swallowed as her voice broke. He always knew this game was not a game at all, but he hadn’t expected to bring it boiling up in her so abruptly this time. It told him just how close to the surface it had been.

  He moved back over her, his arms on either side of her body, blanketing her with his own as he slid an arm around her waist, cupped her breast and laid his head next to hers. “You are the most courageous woman I’ve ever met, Mina. There’s none braver in the whole universe. You never have to apologize for being afraid. Only for not trusting me to take care of you.”

  She sniffed, pressing her face into his braced arm. “You have an entirely male, entirely unrealistic view of your abilities. As considerable as they are.”

  “And you have an unparalleled gift for backhanded compliments.” He shifted to bring the head of his cock to the mouth of her pussy, sliding in just enough to stretch the lips, holding there. She could have pushed back against him, but she waited, quivering, making it more intense for both of them.

  “Pull your hair over your right shoulder,” he commanded, low. She shifted on her elbows, making a sexy little noise at the way it rubbed them together, but she managed it, gathering all those thick raven locks in both hands and bringing them into a tumble ov
er her shoulder, exposing the pale line of her neck to him. He touched his lips there, tracing her pulse. Her elbows were still planted in the sand, hands clutching her hair as her knuckles rested against the inside of his braced arm. When she unconsciously tilted into his touch, he deepened the contact, suckling her throat, marking her with that force as well as his teeth, then lightening the touch again, caressing and stroking. Her neck was extraordinarily sensitive, and her slippery flesh quivered against the head of his cock, her arousal becoming more concentrated.

  “You’re going to come for me like this. Holding still, my cock barely in you, my mouth on your pulse.” The flutter of those tissues told him he was right, but hell, it was going to be torture to feel it. He didn’t mind. He was going to drive his witch crazy, drive out the fear and anguish moving through her. Those emotions and the despised forces behind them were doing their best to extinguish the stuttering spark of hope he wanted to fan into a steady candle flame.

  She set her fangs to his forearm, biting hard enough to punch through flesh and find his blood. He couldn’t help but bare his teeth in a grim smile at the frustrated gesture, even as it made things tighten low in his gut. Giving her breast an admonishing squeeze, he won a small yelp as he pinched the nipple, a little rough. “Easy there, witch,” he reproved. Then he put his mouth on her neck. Traced the pulsing vein once again, bit her as well, more gently. In fact, he made all of it gentle. Teasing, caressing strokes of his tongue, tiny nips and nuzzles, then to her nape where he suckled the point of bone there, his warm breath tickling the aroused nerve endings further.

  She whimpered, making more of those incoherent noises. Her tissues contracted on him as her cunt tried to draw him in. The ripple of that heated flesh along his cock head was enough to have him shuddering and biting back a groan, the shaft flexing in reaction. It gave her an extra stroke of contact at the joining point of their bodies. She’d released her hair, her fingers opening and closing spasmodically, digging into the sand. He felt the rough grains sticking to her damp palm as it moved over his braced hand and she clutched his fingers. Her mouth pressed in mindless need against the top of his hand. Her thighs were trembling, her whole body starting to quiver as it reached for that release.