HuanJen thought for a moment. Slate had a feeling of glaciers shifting, of waters moving.
“I see. how bad were we?”
“Clairice was glad she’s a nurse due to the access to Insulin. She put it that way … twice I believe.”
The Fang-Shih laughed. “Thank you. I suspect a good laugh was necessary anyway, as was the advice. I feel bad for Lorne, I should …”
“Not.” Slate interjected as the mystic corrected himself.
” … talk to him. No, he’d be to embarrassed. This is very difficult for him.”
“I can’t do much for him either, he’s not as good as socializing as he seems.” Slate grimaced. “I can understand that.”
“True. Well, I shall take your advice. Get it out of our system as it were.” HuanJen steepled his hands. “Slate, you and Garnet, you went through a phase …”
“I had a pet name for her. For about fifteen minutes.”
“Cuddle Vixen?” The Zone Cleric’s voice held no guile.
Slate’s face fell. He felt a headache start to begin - he got those around HuanJen from time to time. Around the mystic, it felt like his mind was trying to escape.
“I’m just not going to ask how you know …”
January 14th, 2000, Xaian Standard Calendar
Zone Clerics had little privacy, though one would argue that as their job was to basically interfere with other people’s lives, it was only to be expected. They were, after all, a mixture of social worker and social facilitator. Privacy was, at best, an accidental and happy occurrence.
Some, however, had so little privacy, they ended up having a great deal by a strange kind of social inversion. They became such fixtures, something you were so used to, you stopped paying attention to the jucy details of their lives. You may have well listed to gossip about the sun or moon.
HuanJen and Jade were taking time off. Not fitting in their lives between exorcisms and counselings and his various sessions on spirituality. A day where they discouraged midnight rushes and panicked calls.
Some people didn’t believe it. After all, there were rumors HuanJen was wearing a business suit, for the gods’ sake. If you’d believe that you’d believe anything.
January 15th, 2000, Xaian Standard Calendar
The Crosspoint, one of the many apartment-communities that dotted Metris.
The tenth floor, near the top of the building.
A certain apartment.
“Gods, I’m bored.”
Jade lay on the couch of the apartment she and HuanJen stared, staring at the ceiling. There wasn’t much to stare at except the light fixture and a peculiar black stain she’d never noticed before.
HuanJen bustled around the kitchen, putting away dishes. “Jade, it’s nine in the morning. You’re getting preemptively bored.”
“Yeah.” Jade reached back, and pulled the Lakkom out of her back holster. It seemed to hum in her hands, the strange black-and green staff responding to her nervousness. She nearly tossed it onto the coatrack, but thought better of it, stood, and placed the device gently in its usual resting spot.
Carrying a kinetic discharge weapon that responded to her mental states was not a good idea right now. It had caused enough problems when she was still learning it.
“Well, we have a day to ourselves, barring any terrible emergencies, I say we enjoy it.” HuanJen, his duties done, sat on the couch, managing to somehow sprawl in a dignified manner. Jade dropped down next to her lover.
“Are we not used to taking time off? Are we that pathetic?” Jade asked belatedly. “Have I turned into my father?”
The mystic put an arm around his lover. “Well, considering what Slate told me, perhaps. I mean, what have we done the last few months?”
“Hey, we had the Nax exorcism, all those meetings, the Guild Medical stuff, Crimson and his wife started coming to Sundays, there’s all those …” Jade scowled. “Well shit.”
“A little time can’t hurt us.” HuanJen smiled and kissed this apprentice on the cheek. “A bit strange actually, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.” Jade crossed her arms. “Heh, no wonder we were … were we as bad as Slate said?”
“I’m not the best judge.” HuanJen smiled wanly. “I think of it as we were merely being expressive. Just at times that people really aren’t comfortable with. As if we had any idea when they were.”
“Yes.” The Vulpine curled up a bit next to her mentor. “I suppose it’ll be best for, well, everyone. And Lorne, since Randy’s wedding is in, what, a month?”
“About, yes.”
Jade nodded. “Well, how the hell do we get whatever we were doing out of our system? Come on Mr. Philosopher, I hope you’ve got an answer.”
“Let’s just relax.”
“Eh, easy for you to say.” Jade stood up suddenly and began pacing between the kitchen and the living room. “I want to do something. Gods, are we so busy we can’t slow down?”
“You are,” HuanJen commented. “I’ve got years of training to call upon, which I keep trying to share with you, love.”
“Bite me.” The comment wasn’t without affection. Jade crossed her arms and stared at the kitchen. “I’m feeling kind of stupid, OK?”
“I understand.” HuanJen stood wrapped his arms around Jade’s waist and nuzzled her neck affectionately. “Relax, dear. It’s a learning experience. Are you complaining?”
“Hardly. Well … OK, I am. We’re new at this, you think our friends would give us a break.”
“They did.” The Fang-Shih gave his lover an affectionate squeeze. “I do know Rake was pushing for me to get an apprentice, and I do suspect my schedule was so quickly organized with some helpful suggestions?”
“My lips are sealed,” Jade retorted, half-sighing. HuanJen always smelled like fresh days.
“Then, they gave us a break. And they meant well. I suspect we probably were out of line.”
Jade melted against her lover, feeling like melting ice. “Perhaps. It’s all happened so quick, so much so fast with you …”
“I feel like a wildfire raged through my life,” HuanJen added. Jade’s affection radiated through him.
“Yeah. Yeah. We’ve been living us between the cracks. We just need time …”
“Like now. Time to be us.” The cleric’s voice held an edge of sensuality that cut into the conversation. “A moment without being between anything else.”
“You always make sense.” The Vulpine grinned, eyes closed in a kind of calm pleasure. “It’s irritating, you know. Gods, I feel the tension …”
“Drain away, yes. Stop running and moving. Lets live us for a bit. The more I think about it, the more … “
” … it appeals, being here and now. My mysterious holy man, I am so calm now …”
“Good. It’s nice. I like seeing you happy. Gods, I love holding you. I remember in the book store …”
Jade’s voice was husky. “Or behind Chin’s? Hmmmm. Your hands were everywhere.”
HuanJen kissed Jade’s neck, his hand stroking her throat. “When you feel good, it is … wonderful to me.”
“You make me happy.” The apprentice cleric pressed herself against her lover-mentor. She could feel his arousal pressing between her buttocks.
The young sage’s tongue darted into her ear. His breathing was heavier. “I’d like to make you as happy as possible.”
“Really? Well, what do you have in mind? I’m open to suggestions.” Jade’s mind swam in an ocean of warm feeling.
“Such as?” HuanJen felt his heart pounding. Time was slowing into nothing.
“With you?” Jade purred. “Huan, anything you have in mind. What are you thinking?”
“Do you trust me?” The words were strangely anxious. The Vulpine mystic felt an unusual tension in the air.
“Always. Ever since I met you and you let me be home.” HuanJen sighed at the words and buried his face in her furry neck. Jade continued. “I trust you totally.”
“Thank you. And now �
� let me show you what I have in mind.”
With a swift motion, HuanJen bent Jade over the kitchen table and dropped to a sitting position. He flipped her skirt up, and ran his strong hands up her thighs.
“Oh, my …” Jade began. She felt a hot flush gush across her skin.
“Just relax,” the magician-priest’s voice gleamed with a golden sensuality. Each word felt like an erotic caress. “Just relax, let me worship you, let me give to you, my dearest, beautiful Jade.”
Jade gasped as HuanJen pulled her panties down in a single, fluid motion. He wasn’t being rough, but he was being very forceful to say the least, enough of a change from his usual demeanor to be exciting. The inertia of his usual calm self had transmuted into a wave of sexuality, combining with the vulnerability of her position to ignite a fiery arousal.
HuanJen seized her thighs and his mouth quickly sought her sex, his tongue plunging deep inside her, eliciting a series of short gasps from the Vulpine. He lost himself in her, her scent, her warm skin and fur, her sounds. Only Jade remained in his mind.
“Gods …” Jade gripped the edge of the table, eyes closed, mind reeling, her yin-yang medallion clattering against the hard wood tabletop. It was like being both given to and devoured utterly, HuanJen in total control, yet his only focus was making her happy, which meant, in a way, she was in control …
… a spiral of pleasure and power and the other side of the sky …
HuanJen continued his ministrations enthusiastically, Jade’s hips bucking against his face. He let his left hand creep up her buttocks, and begin to gently stroke the base of her tail. Jade’s breath was a sharp hiss drawn through her teeth, the sensations he was creating were merging into something outside of herself.
For a moment, she realized his knowledge of Vulpine anatomy probably came from Garnet or another lover. There was a split second of hanging over the pit of self-doubt, then she remembered who and where she was. She was completely exposed to her lover, and right now his whole soul was dedicated to making her happy. He was hers, and yet she didn’t need to posses him at all, and yet he owned her utterly at that moment in time.
“Yes. Oh, yes. Gods yes.”
HuanJen was aware only of his lover, his self contracted to a vanished point. Jade mattered. She was a center he spiraled around, a vortex of feeling into which he vanished. She was the world’s breath and the waves on the sea.
“Goddess . . ” he whispered, catching his breath, before returning to the delightful task of making his lover happy.
Jade grinned toothily at the comment. Goddess. She was being worshipped by her cleric-lover - on his knees, devoted, his mouth engaged in something that felt as holy as prayer. The vulpine licked her lips, hips moving rhythmically in time to the magician-priests attentions. Tingles ran up her thighs, growing stronger
“Yes, Huan, I …”
Jade let out a yelp as her climax washed over her. Panting and letting out short, sharp screams, she let the pleasurable wave course through her, luxuriating in every sensation. HuanJen’s tongue-strokes and kisses didn’t end util she was happily spent, lying on the table, every muscle relaxed.
“I love you, dearest.” HuanJen rested his head against her left thigh, breathing heavily.
“I love you, my holy man,” Jade exhaled, “that was wonderful.”
“I have wanted to do that for so long. Just show you, love you, give to you. Jade, it has been such a long time …”
“I can tell.” Jade slid to the floor in a puddle of satisfied black fur. She smiled up at her lover, who was delicately cleaning his mouth with a hankerchief.
“You’re beautiful,” HuanJen said simply. “You’re wonderful.”
A blush spread beneath Jade’s fur. “You’re going to spoil me, you know.”
“I can’t give you enough.”
Jade managed to flow into a sitting position and nuzzled the mystics neck. “You’re all I need. You’re everything. And you’re the only person I can say things like that to without feeling like a complete and total idiot. No wonder I act like an such a sap occasionally.”
“Well, I am your own personal miracle worker.”
“Yes,” Jade purred, kissing her lover’s neck. “Miraculous. Transforming.”
Jade slowly undid the shirt of her lover’s work outfit. He smelled like summer and mystery. She inhaled deeply. He was an intoxicant.
“Alchemical worker, changing me.” Jade kissed down HuanJen’s chest. “The fire I burn in. Searing into purification.”
Her mind was a rage of feelings turning into poetry. His skin was smooth, delightfully so. A man without fur was a new experience to her, a new taste. Her lips and tongue slid over every surface easily.
“Glowing with you …” Jade’s voice was a whisper. “You taste like light.
“You illuminate me, dearest Jade.” HuanJen looked into his companions deep green eyes.
Jade tried to speak, then just shook her head, kissing further down her lover’s stomach. Gingerly, she ran one hand between his legs, finding him expectedly erect. The cleric’s breathing got deeper as she undid his belt.
“I love you.” HuanJen’s words echoed in Jade’s ears, ending in a sigh as her tongue slid wetly over his shaft.
Jade licked and kissed up and down her lover’s manhood, occasionally adding a gentle nip. Every action produced a sound, a twitch, a reaction that thrilled her. She could feel his pulse through her lips, his heart racing at her gifts to him.
HuanJen sighed as Jade took him deep into the warm, wet embrace of her mouth. The Vulpine sucked his manhood gently but firmly, eyes closed in a blissful haze. Every stroke of her lips, every caress of her tongue slowly coaxed him towards release.
“Ah, yes, a goddess.” The mystics voice was a hiss, his hands entangling in Jades soft, black hair.
The vulpine continued her attentions while her lover played with her hair and caressed her face and neck, whispering endearments. The fire within his body was slowly rising, she could feel it in her soul, hear it in his sounds. His arousal was like sunlight bathing them both …
HuanJen groaned uninhibitedly as he climaxed in his lover’s ready mouth. Liquid lightning raced down his spine as he poured himself into her, a river of molten gold. She was void, she was open space, she was everything, and you could pour into her forever.
“I love you …”
Jade released his manhood from her mouth, adding a few warm kisses. For several moments, HuanJen lay draped over Jade, her head resting in his lap. Their breaths echoed in each other’s ears.
“A first, our first,” Jade managed to speak. Her fur felt like a slowly burning fire and her mind was spinning. “I love you, HuanJen.”
“I love you. Thank you.”
“No,” Jade sighed, “Thank you.”
“No, I insist …”
“Shut up.”
HuanJen clamped a hand over Jade’s mouth. “No, thank you, dearest one. Thank you for being here. I feel like myself.”
Jade rolled her eyes and didn’t try to speak. There were times arguing with HuanJen produced results, and this wasn’t one of them. Instead, she gently zipped up his pants and wrapped herself around him.
“So, not so sure our friends had the right idea?” HuanJen asked.
“I’m re-evaluating the situation.” Jade smiled up at her lover. “Suddenly, I do feel like just saying here and doing nothing but being with you … as pathetically sappy as that sounds.”
“Sounds wonderful. Here, why don’t I get us something to drink and we’ll go lie down in the bedroom and do nothing together.”
“Wonderful.” Jade stretched, and stood, grabbing the edge of the kitchen table to steady herself.
There was a strange ripping/tearing sound. Jade sprang back, only to find HuanJen somehow behind her and standing up. The table’s top crashed to the floor.
“Ooops,” Jade managed to get out.
“Er …” HuanJen blinked. “I guess I didn’t fix it so well.”
/> “You should have called Rake.” Jade chided. “All well, at least it served one last, useful purpose. It gave it’s life so, uh …”
“You’re not going to find a poetic way to put it Jade, we had sex on the table. Just accept it.”
Lorne Thompson enjoyed his time off; being a Gendarme was demanding, even in relatively peaceful Metris. That evening he sat in his eclectically-furnished living room, stripped down to his boxers, a cold beer on the table, a copy of Metris Monthly in hand, and all was right with the world. If only Clairice was off of the phone, he’d be perfectly relaxed.
She didn’t sound quite herself. She was sitting by the bookshelves, on the phone, making a few confirming noises, and that was it. She didn’t seem troubled, just stunned.
“Good Lord.” Clairice finally set the phone down. The nurse stared into space, eyes focused on some intimate, personal horror.
“Yes?” Lorne asked curiously, trying not to betray his confusion. It took a lot to keep Clairice quiet. It was probably whe she, Jade, and Garnet got along so well; none of them was good at shutting up when they were together.
“That was HuanJen and Jade. They wondered if I had that spare kitchen table. There’s is broke.”
“Well … they broke the table?” Lorne searched his friend’s face for information. “Oh, you’re kidding. You don’t think they … they did, didn’t they?”
“I could tell.” Claricie nodded. “You could just tell.”
Lorne eyed Clairice strangely. “Why aren’t you more surprised at this?”
“Long story.” The nurse shook her head. “I think they probably needed it though. Whatever the hell it was.”
“True.” Lorne raise his beer in a mock-toast. “Let them enjoy. You know, on reflection … I’d rather have them occasionally disgusting than alone. Its like Slate and Garnet, sort of a sign that … well, things can work out for people.”
Claricie blinked. A pained expression crossed her face.
“What?” Lorne asked, curious.
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