MaLeila shrugged. “I’ve always channeled my emotions through magic, even before I knew magic was real.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not really.”
“Okay.”
MaLeila was certain he already knew anyway, but he wasn’t the nosy type or the one to push and shove until she either gave in or forced him to back off. She appreciated that about him.
“Okay. That’s enough magical training for today. You need to relax,” Dominik said approaching her and grabbing MaLeila’s hands.
MaLeila grinned at him. “Relax how?”
Dominik’s answer was to place a kiss on her lips; it was teasing, soft, timid, not because either one of them was shy or uncertain. But because of the initial disbelief that they were getting away with something that was socially perceived as wrong, even though it was so common in the twisted world they were plotting to reshape.
After that initial timidity though, MaLeila pressed her lips firmer to his, pushed her tongue into his mouth, standing on the very tips of her toes. Dominik let go of her hands, put them under her ass and lifted her up. She wrapped her legs around his waist making it easier for her to kiss him, arms resting over his shoulder and around his neck. Her arms and legs securing her, Dominik ran his hand up and down the sides and back of her body. His hand brushed a particularly sensitive part of her lower back and she pulled her lips away from him to tilt her head back and moan, feeling the touch at her core. His hand slipped under her dress and played with the waist of her panties.
“Wait,” MaLeila said, letting her head fall back forward to look at Dominik’s face. He looked at her, chest heaving with breath against her own, blue eyes clouded with excitement and lust.
“Is this too much?” he asked her.
“No,” MaLeila said and paused to take a breath in between before saying, “No it’s not. I just don’t want you to get the wrong idea. This isn’t romantic. This is just—“
“Two friends giving each other a good fuck,” Dominik interrupted. “Got it.”
MaLeila had planned to put it in a much more diplomatic manner, but she supposed Dominik got the point even as infatuated with her as she knew he was.
She unwrapped her legs from around his waist, allowing him to push down her panties. While he did that, she lifted his shirt up from the hem and when he was done pushing down her panties to her thighs until they fell the remainder of the way on their own, she pulled the shirt over his head. They both went for his belt and the button of his pants. Between their fingers getting in each other’s way, it took them much longer to undo the belt and button than it should have. When they finally managed to undo both, MaLeila pulled down the zipper and then Dominik pushed both his briefs and pants down, his erection springing up between them. He stepped out the briefs and pants along with the sandals he had been wearing before he pressed his lips back to hers.
It was MaLeila who pulled them down to the soft grass, forcing him to lay back so she could straddle his thighs and sit on her knees right above his erection. Without breaking their gaze, she grabbed his erection in one hand and guided it to her entrance. Then she let go and slowly eased herself down onto him. She grinned as she watched Dominik’s face scrunch in tortured pleasure as she slowly sank down on him. Finally, he was fully sheathed inside her and she began to rock against him. He groaned at the pace and grabbed her waist, ready to take control from her, but MaLeila put her hands on his wrist and stopped her rocking.
“No,” she said, still grinning at him and trying not laugh.
“Fuck you.”
“No. I’m fucking you.”
MaLeila slowly began to rock against him again, still keeping her eyes on Dominik’s face. As she watched and felt Dominik squirm beneath her, MaLeila began to understand the appeal or fetish of watching their lover underneath them that seemed to be a trend in romance books for men. Knowing that for that moment, she controlled Dominik; that at that moment he had no control over what his body did as she rocked against him; that at this moment, she could make him promise to do whatever she wanted him to if it meant she would give him the sexual high he was craving.
The rocking against him slowly but surely began to build heat in her stomach, the buildup having been so slow in her efforts to bring Dominik to his peak at an agonizingly slow rate that she wasn’t aware of the tight coil that had built in her sex until it was almost unbearable. She struggled to gain control of the trembling in her legs before finally giving up and focusing on the tight coil within her that continued to build and build, wanting yet not wanting to for it to explode inside her. Wanting because the anticipation was now almost painful and not wanting because she didn’t want it to end. Then she felt him get harder inside and begin to pulse.
“Fuck,” she cried out as her body reacted, the tight coil releasing and spreading heat through her shaking body. She had just enough control and coherency to lift off Dominik and move to sit on his thighs before he came, all the while muttering and groaning in his native language; his juices shooting all over his stomach and the front of her dress.
After they both managed to gain control over their bodies again, they both got up and redressed.
“I’m a mess,” MaLeila said as she wiggled back into her panties trying to ignore the stickiness between her thighs.
“You are,” Dominik said with a smirk. “I ruined your dress. Sorry.”
MaLeila looked down at the semen staining her dress and shrugged before saying, “There are a lot more where this one came from.”
They made their way back to the castle together, not with their not like a couple would with hands intertwined, not exchanging a few kisses here and there, and not even being awkward like what they had done was a mistake. They walked back to the castle falling into the natural teasing comradery they’d fallen into over the last few weeks and when they were headed their separate ways to their rooms agreed that he’d help her more with the summoning of the undead the next day. She went to her room and took off her dress and the sticky underwear before she went into the bathroom to take a shower.
It was as she stood under the showerhead that she began to feel agitated, not because she felt at all guilty about what she had done with Dominik. Rather she was agitated at the fact that she didn’t feel guilty at all. It was one of those things you were taught you should feel guilty of early on, yet despite that MaLeila couldn’t muster up any guilt, mostly because some dark part of her that she didn’t want to acknowledge—a part that most people had and didn’t want to acknowledge they had—wanted to show Marcel that her life didn’t revolve around him, that she didn’t need him or Tsubame’s help and could get what she wanted and needed on her own. It still wasn’t a justification for what she’d done, nor did MaLeila really care about justifying it if she were honest, but the more and more she got involved in this war, the more she began to question her own motivations. She felt abandoned by Tsubame, was still having issues with Marcel, and Nika didn’t particularly seem to care about MaLeila one way or another so she had no reason to stay here. She had no reason to figure out how to take control of the army for Tsubame’s ambitions, especially when she was sure the woman could defeat the Thorne’s demon assassins on her own if she needed to.
She didn’t need to wonder. The answer immediately came to her head. MaLeila supposed she had known all along but hadn’t wanted to admit the truth, mostly because she was convinced it was something Tsubame had put in her head, because it would be playing right into Tsubame’s game, a game that more and more MaLeila realized Tsubame continued to win not because she was good at manipulating people, but because the woman had an innate understanding of people’s inner motivations, what they wanted and needed, and could almost always count on them to act in accordance with that nature.
From the beginning Tsubame insisted that she knew MaLeila better than she knew herself. Insisting that her desire to please Bastet and Devdan, to ignore the secret urge to put the whole magical world in their pla
ce and make them regret the day they ever called her the nigger witch, was holding her back. How the proverbial “fuck you” she had given to the Magic Council while bold wasn’t a true challenge to the Magic Council if she continued to simply ignore them and never hit back when they sent opposition against her. MaLeila had dismissed the statement as a lie, as a way for the woman to plant the idea in her head that MaLeila was already like Tsubame so why not help her. But MaLeila herself said that the woman never lied. Hid things. Made vague statements and let people make their own interpretations of it. But never lied. She was just able to see things before they ever came into fruition, without having to use her magic to see the future.
And Tsubame had been right, MaLeila resigned to herself. As soon as she didn’t have to care what Bastet and Devdan would think, without Bastet telling her to ignore the Magic Council, without Devdan’s general disdain and indifference, she had done things, said things, thought in ways that she would have never dreamed she could have.
And she couldn’t bring herself to feel bad about any of it, even cheating on her lover. Even using a new friend’s infatuation for her against his own family.
When MaLeila was done showering, she wrapped a towel around herself and stepped into her room, only to find Tsubame sitting on the bed. It was the first time she had seen the woman since she sent Marcel away and the first time the woman had come to her for something in weeks.
Without preamble and with her eyes on the television that had been off when MaLeila went into the bathroom, Tsubame said, “I think you might want to see this.”
MaLeila came and sat next to Tsubame on the bed, looking at the television. There had been more demonstrations going on in Algeria and the surrounding regions for years. Some more violent than others. So it wasn’t news, not news that would concern Tsubame anyway. MaLeila tilted her head and started to ask the woman why she was so concerned about something that seemed so relatively inconsequential until a clip, followed by a picture came up on screen, making her heart clench and eyes widen in surprise. She opened and closed her mouth a few times before finally managing to find her voice and saying the first thing that came to her mind.
“What the fuck is Devdan doing?”
“Well,” Tsubame said nonchalantly. “Different media outlets are giving different stories, but the gist of it is Devdan is the leader of an extremist rebellion that’s holding a European journalist hostage in one of the most prestigious hotels in the world.”
“And what’s the real story?”
“I don’t know,” Tsubame said honestly. “There are a myriad of scenarios that could have led to this, some more and less likely than others.”
“You can see the future about as well as you could read the morning news on your tablet,” MaLeila deadpanned.
“If I wanted to,” Tsubame said. “But you and I both know there are limitations to looking into the future. You could probably see better what’s going on than I could since you’re closer to him. Besides, part of the fun is watching the future unfold without knowing what’s going to happen.”
MaLeila pressed her lips firmly together, trying to contain her mounting frustration with the woman. When she was able to contain herself, MaLeila declared, “We’re going to Algeria.”
Tsubame raised her eyebrows slightly and with her hands folded into the sleeves of her kimono dress, she said, “Why so worried about him? I’m sure he can take care of himself.”
Of that, MaLeila had no doubt. He had proven that numerous times over the years and had taken it upon himself to take care of her along the way. Devdan always did whatever was in his power to crush his opponents and MaLeila didn’t think even death could stop his single minded determination.
But that was the problem.
MaLeila couldn’t begin to count how many times she’d gotten between Devdan’s wrath and the person or thing he had directed that wrath toward; how many times she’d reached up to stay his hand when he pointed his gun at a perceived enemy whether that was a boy in her class that was harassing her, a past opponent, the Magic Council, or even just someone he didn’t particularly care for. Regardless, she had always been there to make him see some semblance of reason, and despite everything that had inevitably split them apart, MaLeila feared that if at some point he decided to unleash his full wrath, so would his many enemies. And if they all came together against him, he might not be able to handle it.
“Maybe he can,” MaLeila said as calm as she could while clenching and unclenching her fists and trying to ignore her racing heart. “But let’s not sit here and pretend that if it were Marcel, you wouldn’t have already left to go see what he had gotten himself into. So regardless of why I want to go or whether I need to go, I’m going to Algeria. You can stay here in hiding if you want. I’ll get Dominik to go with me if I have to.”
Tsubame stared at MaLeila for a few beats. Her face making that unreadable expression that a poker player could only dream of having for the game. It always set MaLeila on edge and reminded MaLeila how unpredictable Tsubame could be.
Finally the woman said, “Well look who’s finally grown a backbone?” Then she shrugged and added, “Of course we’re going to Algeria. You’re didn’t think I’d let something so unexpected happen without going to investigate it. Not going would be careless. I simply wanted to see what you’d say about it.”
MaLeila huffed. “You wanted to see what I’d say? After you ignored me for weeks?”
“I wasn’t ignoring you. I was simply allowing you to find your way and come to realize about yourself what I knew about you back when you were bored during that conference and playing on your cell phone the whole time. I needed you to learn to stand on your own two feet without having to rely on anyone else steering you in the right direction. If you’re going to rule this world as part of my universal kingdom, you’re going to have to only rely on yourself to make the hard choices and be willing to live with the consequences afterwards,” Tsubame replied. “That’s why I let you decide how to ensure we could be certain we’d have access to Marie’s army. That is a guarantee at this point, correct?”
MaLeila nodded slowly. Every time she thought she’d gotten a step ahead of the woman, it turned out she was still ten steps behind. Still, while that certainly explained why the woman had been distant from her, MaLeila still had the nagging feeling there was still something else going on that Tsubame was purposefully keeping from her.
“Good. Let’s go then.”
“Dominik will probably want to come with us,” MaLeila said as she went over to her drawer to pull out under garments before going to her closet. “Will Marcel get back in time to go with us?”
“No,” Tsubame said as she started to leave the room. “Marcel is already there. I sent him ahead of us.”
18
Nothing had gone the way he and Bastet had planned. They were supposed to bring the African families on board, maybe get in contact with the South American families whom many of the African families were closely tied with and quietly make their way to the Vatican to vote for the indefinite removal of the Magic Council. He wasn’t supposed to piss Anya off. Anya wasn’t supposed to try to get in touch with the United Nations Embassy and in touch with sorcerers who secretly ruled the embassy on the Magic Council’s behalf and who secretly despised Farah for her refusal to cooperate with the Magic Council. Farah wasn’t supposed to rally most of the African families and threaten the rest into holding Anya hostage so she couldn’t ruin their plans because if the Magic Council didn’t have her, they couldn’t know what they were up to. Devdan had little choice but to agree to the plan if he wanted to keep what little trust he’d earned from them.
However Anya turned out to be only the first of their problems. Next they had to weed out the traitor who told Anya the plan in the first place as well as hold off the forces that the embassy sent to retrieve Anya. Even in the aftermath Devdan wasn’t truly able to recall or process what happened. In order for him to fully remember he was sure it was
going to take weeks using his ethereal sight to search his memories and look into the past to figure it out and rather sooner than later because the longer he waited, the harder it would be to see. Time only moved forward so it was easier to figure out where time was going rather where it had already been and what had happened in its wake. All Devdan knew was that Mekonnen, who had been conspiring against him with Anya all along, ended up dead by his gun, and Ezra became the effective new patriarch of the Ethiopian Magic Family, made official by the passing on of the magical robes that had been passed down from each matriarch and patriarch since. Then Devdan stood up, not too worse for wear though slightly battered from the confrontation and fight with Mekonnen, and threw his gun on the floor asking if there was anyone else amongst them that wanted to kill or betray him to gain favor with the Magic Council.
There had been no takers.
And all that was without figuring out how the fuck Marcel had gotten involved with the situation right under his nose. Devdan shouldn’t have been surprised though. He had always been shit at politics and diplomacy.
“Fuck,” he muttered tossing back another shot of vodka.
“I think that’s enough,” Adina said firmly reaching to take both the bottle.
Devdan firmly grabbed the neck of the bottle before she could touch it, set his jaw, and glared at her, daring her to keep reaching for the bottle. Adina wisely pulled her hand back, and Devdan hung his head back down in his left hand.
Marcel rolled his eyes and said, “She’s right. Drinking yourself into a stupor isn’t going to help any.”
“I know it’s not,” Devdan snapped at the currently blue-eyed, blonde haired man. “And my magic is so fucking strong I couldn’t get into a stupor if I wanted to. But excuse me for trying because within the span three fucking weeks, I’ve started a rebellion, held a woman hostage, killed a diplomat and put a new one in his place, pissed off the U.N. and got the embassy outside of one of the most prestigious hotels in the world which I’ve managed to secure as my base, and am looking to overthrow the Algerian government. And that’s the story that CNN is giving, all of which is true and only becomes a different story with different perspectives. So while I understand that this probably isn’t the best way to cope or reconcile the situation, all I’m asking for is just a moment of quiet to my fucking self before we discuss what we’re going to do about this shit mess we’ve gotten ourselves into and how we’re going to get out of it alive.”
The Immortal Queen Tsubame: Ascension Page 18
