Sucks to Suck – Chapter 19
14 November 2024
This piece was commissioned by meloriavandress through Fiverr. Thank you for letting me share it.
Elwen lies on her side, her fingers gently tracing the shapes of Maronette’s stomach as she watches her girlfriend, or now fiancée, to be more precise, pant in exhaustion after their passionate lovemaking. Elwen still feels a slight soreness in her rear, despite Maronette’s gentle and caring way and the thankfully manageable size of the magically grown cock, which still lingers between her legs. Soon, the spell effect will wear off, but Elwen enjoys looking at Maronette’s body while she is still under the enchantment. The incongruity between her very feminine body and that appendage is far from being off-putting to the spell-weaving singer. If anything, there is something arousing in how transgressive it all is, and that gains a whole new layer of tenderness when she thinks about the reason for the enchantment: So they can start a family, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say make a new addition to their family, for as far as she is concerned, herself and Maronette are a family already.
She moves her finger to brush gently against the flat skin above the magically grown member, which now lies flaccid and looks even smaller than in its more usual aroused state, and she’d even go as far as to say it looks ‘cute’, in an oddly specific way. But just as she contemplates maybe playing with it using her fingers and seeing if she can arouse her lover, maybe coax her into another round, the flesh shrinks and contracts and Maronette grunts in a mild pleasurable way as she feels the spell wearing off. Her body transforms back into its original state. Elwen chuckles in amusement.
“What?” Maronette asks, her voice slurring and deep as if she is almost asleep in the wake of their passionate moment together.
“It’s just… Adorable, these little noises you make,” Elwen offers, tracing a path back from Maronette’s pubis to the valley between her breasts. “Whenever the spell activates or wears off.”
“It… Feels strange,” Maronette says in the guise of explanation, “but in a good way.”
“I can imagine,” Elwen admits with another brief chuckle before sitting on the bed. “Maybe I’ll understand it better when it’s my turn to wear it.”
“You know I’m not opposed to it,” Maronette offers, rising too, though not fully sitting on the bed, just lifting her torso and leaning on her elbows.
“I will draw myself a bath. Would you care to join me?”
“In a moment,” Maronette responds, rubbing her eyes. “I should go downstairs to check the mail.”
Elwen dips her head in agreement and gets up from the bed, striding in full nudity to the door separating their bedroom from the washing room. But in her stride, she feels something warm running down the inside of her rear cheeks and her thighs, and it takes her a moment to understand that it’s likely a mix of Maronette’s seed and the lubricant gel they used moments before. She blushes deeply, hoping that her lover is not looking too closely towards her butt as she walks away from the bed, lest she catch a glimpse of it. Inside her head, she points out how silly that self-conscious moment is, knowing on a rational level that Maronette would not be scandalised or put off by the sight of the aftermath of something she had done herself, but the situation is still new to Elwen, and she can’t help but blush.
If Maronette has noticed anything, she says nothing about it. Elwen leans over the large tub, made of marble and held by bronze lion-paws-style supports with copper pipes and faucet, and starts to run the hot water. When she turns, Elwen spots her lover closing a white silk robe with designs of bright red rose blossoms around her frame. As she ties the sash around her waist, Elwen suppresses laughter. The soldier woman is often dressed in practical outfits and military uniforms, and seeing her wild, long hair loose and her body wrapped in some silks with floral patterns is too much of a contrast to her usual attire that a chuckle can barely be contained in the singer’s throat. Maronette hears the resulting snicker and rolls her eyes in mock impatience before she heads out of the room with a dismissive wave to Elwen’s amusement at her improvised attire.
In a few moments, the tub is full of warm water, and Elwen tosses in a few bath salts and petals to give the water a slightly perfumed scent before sinking herself in. She feels the warmth rising as she adds her own volume to the tub and closes her eyes to release a pleasurable sigh of relaxation when she finally lets all her muscles go limp and her body touches the bottom of the tub. She leans back, sitting in the bathtub and feeling the water level rise to the middle of her breasts, engulfing her in that embrace of warmth. Then Elwen lets her hips slide further against the bottom so her torso sinks until her head is fully submerged.
For a moment, it’s as if time has stopped entirely. All she hears is the low-frequency rumble of the water lapping against the tub’s sides, and all other noises from the outside are silenced: The city life, the rain, the creaking of the house, nothing can reach her there. With her eyes closed, there’s nothing to see either, and the warmth of the water around her is the only thing she can feel against her skin. For a brief moment, it is as if nothing else exists outside of her, and she finds her mind emptying of thoughts, of unvoiced concerns and worries, of painful memories. Her mind is as empty as the space between the stars in the night sky, and she finds some much-needed peace for herself there. As she holds her breath, the way she fends away any intrusive thoughts is by focusing on that: The space between stars. And it works, for a moment.
At some point, that soothing blackness gains an orange glow, and the sound of crackling flames disrupts Elwen’s tranquillity. The sound of flames and of wood and stone collapsing. The sobbing, the crying, the fear. She’s young and standing on the treeline, watching her family estate burn to the ground as the servants and the family stand like tiny silhouettes amidst the topiaries and statues of the garden, watching in horror as their home is consumed by flames. A few topiaries burn as well, set ablaze by embers carried by the wind. An accusatory pillar of black smoke rises against the night sky, like a pointing finger denouncing the heavens, only visible where the orange tint of the flames draws its contours and otherwise merges with the immense blackness above. The night is not without stars, but the smoke from the house has eclipsed them. Elwen opens her mouth and screams, in anguish, fear and also rage.
No noise comes from her mouth, except the noise of her throat and the bubbles vibrating the bath water. Submerged like that, she could scream in silence, and nobody would hear her. And she does. She screams until her lungs are empty, and she suddenly opens her eyes and rises to the surface to gasp for air. The idea of talking to her family about her impending wedding brought forth such a deluge of feelings that she can’t name them all or tell where guilt ends, and resentment begins. She has never been one to be short on words, but that is one of the subjects where her voice, which moves crowds to tears and weaves magic that changes reality, fails her.
Elwen rubs the water from her face, removing the excess and finding that her heart is beating much faster. If it is purely from her holding her breath and then suddenly filling her lungs again, or if it is also pushed to that by the blazing memories of her family, she can’t say for sure. Elwen takes a few moments to calm herself, with slow, deep breaths, before she reaches for the piece of cloth that she uses to rub the soapy water across her arms and chest. The sound of soft footsteps from the door announcing the impending return of Maronette, though, more than any breathing exercise, is what has the best effect on helping her calm down. She doesn’t want to be alone with her thoughts, and there is no one else she’d rather have by her side at the moment.
Maronette enters the bathroom holding a pile of mostly cream-coloured envelopes, going through them one by one while still using the silk floral robe she borrowed from her soon-to-be wife.
“Anything good?”
“A few thank you letters we were already expecting, some publicity…” Maronette says, not lifting her eyes from the letters as she walks into the bathroom.
“So, same old?”
“Same old,” she confirms, flipping through the mail and about to discard the pile of letters over the counter when her eyes suddenly frown at the sight of the second to last envelope. “Huh.”
“What is it?”
Maronette’s first instinct is to pluck the letter from the group, placing the remainder of the mail over a counter in the bathroom and looking at the envelope in particular, front and back. From her position in the tub, Elwen can tell that the letter has no return address and no seal from the royal mail, meaning that it was hand-delivered to their mailbox by someone. Maronette seems to be arriving at a similar conclusion as she flips the envelope to look at both sides a couple of times, and her frown deepens.
“A letter from Sister Belgrade of the Temple of the Followers of Springtide,” Maronette says, sounding very unconvinced.
Maronette initially hands it to Elwen, but the singer raises her hands to show her very wet palms. The soldier blushes mildly and dips her head to acknowledge how silly it is to hand it over, on instinct, to someone in a bath. Maronette sits against the edge of the tub and opens the envelope.
“Dear Lady Elwen, I hope this finds you well, yadda, yadda…” Maronette reads, making a gesture with her hand as she skips over the formality. “…We would like to thank you for your most generous donation to our humble temple, yadda, yadda…”
Maronette hums for a moment and then tosses the letter on top of the rest to exchange a meaningful glance with her lover. They both know what that letter means, of course, and waste no words reminding each other that the Black Rune Society is demanding payment of their dues. The smile Elwen had on her face since she heard the comforting steps of her paramour coming to rescue her from traumatic memories of her past suddenly disappears and she furrows her brow in deep thought.
“Alas, their appetite for coin is never sated, is it?” Maronette muses, touching the water with her hand to feel the temperature.
“No, it’s not,” Elwen agrees darkly.
“Well, it’s dated from three days ago, so I guess I can talk to Guy and arrange a dead drop for tomorrow. Then we don’t have to think about them for a while longer,” Maronette offers, getting up from her sitting stance and opening the robe, letting it fall from her shoulders, before she steps into the bath, ready to join Elwen.
The water level rises further until some excess water drops from the edge of the tub and onto the mosaic-tiled floor of the bathroom, though that is of little concern, as the whole floor was built with a slight slant and a drain for just such occasions.
Elwen does not respond to the idea and barely registers it at first. Usually, the sight of Maronette stripping down would be enough to bring a smirk to her lips and cause her to either compliment the woman sincerely or in a deliberate, crass way to see her squirm and blush. But she does none of that, and it is the sound of the overflowing water dripping down the sides of the tub that pulls Elwen back into reality from her thousand-yard stare, right through Maronette and into the distant past. Or maybe distant the future.
“Elwen?”
As Maronette calls her, she touches her arm, and Elwen shakes her head to look directly into her lover’s eyes, to find them with a bigger dose of concern than she would’ve liked. She shakes her head, finally responding to Maronette’s initial statement:
“Don’t. I mean, I’ll handle this myself.”
“What? Nonsense. You’re really busy with your show, I’ll talk to Guy.”
“No, not Guy. I mean I’ll handle the payment myself,” Elwen explains and, sensing Maronette’s confusion, she clarifies further, “personally.”
“What? No, absolutely not,” Maronette says categorically.
“I need to talk to Yurastasia.”
“No, you do not. If we are not doing any work for them, and we aren’t at the moment, and we don’t need their help, then it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie.”
Maronette isn’t wrong; Elwen knows, but she is yet to realise the full picture. And ever since Elwen realised who had actually sent the letter when Maronette read the name of the sender, the gears inside the singer’s head started to turn. She knows that the Black Rune Society is the source of many of their problems, but it is often also the solution to some of them. And in this case, they need their help. Maronette has simply not yet understood it.
“We are going to need them soon, though.”
“Why? Do we have something to do that I am forgetting?”
“You’re not forgetting, but you are probably not thinking things through.”
Maronette frowns. She doesn’t like Elwen pointing out that she’s overlooking something. As Elwen’s bodyguard, she often prides herself on being a step ahead in guaranteeing her security. She likes to display that her talents extend beyond fighting, but it often falls to Elwen to think not just tactically but strategically.
“We are trying to have a child, are we not?” Elwen begins.
“Yes and?”
“And what if we succeed?”
“Then we have a child. I don’t follow what you’re trying to say.”
“No, there’s something between conception and birth, right?”
“Pregnancy?”
Elwen dips her head and touches her own stomach under the water. She then reaches for Maronette’s hand and brings it to hover over her stomach, and moves it in soft circles around it. Right now, it is flat and soft, but it isn’t hard for them both to picture how it will swell and grow should they succeed in conceiving. Something that has, so far, eluded them.
“Exactly. And there are some obvious tells that I won’t be able to hide on stage.”
Maronette shifts uncomfortably. She clearly isn’t happy that she has not thought of it until now, and she hums, pondering. Elwen chuckles and pulls her lover’s hand from under the water to kiss her knuckles and let it go before she continues:
“So, we will need to find a way to handle it.”
“We can say you’re sick or travelling.”
“To go nearly nine months away from the public eye? My career would crumble. Let alone that, the speculations regarding what I’m actually doing would go wild.”
“I… Well, so maybe we find some other way to disguise it.”
“It’s going to be increasingly harder the further along I am. And if an unmarried lady is known to be pregnant, you can expect a lot of inquiry, especially a famous diva like me,” Elwen says, trying to use some humour to lighten the suddenly tense atmosphere, but Maronette is not sold on it, and neither is Elwen.
“So… What? How does the Society help us with that? They could help us make you disappear, maybe, but that would not solve the problem of you being off the stage for long.”
“No, it would not. But they can make it so I make it to the stage even while I’m in hiding.”
“You lost me.”
“That’s… To be expected. This isn’t a very well-known spell and not an easy one to execute… But it’s possible to construct a replica of me that, externally, will be impossible to tell apart from the original.”
“What?”
“I mean, perhaps you and perhaps Lorian would be able to tell it’s not really me, but for most people, it would think, act and, most importantly, sound and sing exactly like me.”
“Is that really possible?”
Elwen nods.
“It is if you are a mage of sufficient power. Which, sadly, I am not. Not yet, at least. But the Society has many talented sorcerers and I’m sure they can arrange that.”
“And who controls this… Duplicate.”
“It’s called a simulacrum, actually.”
Maronette knows deflection when she hears it, and she doesn’t say anything in response. Her silence is as good as repeating the question. And Elwen’s silence in return is as good as answering it.
“Elwen…”
Maronette’s tone is suddenly dark and filled with deep concern. She reaches out to take both of her lover’s hands and hold them in her own, rubbing knuckles with her thumbs as she searches for the singer’s eyes. Elwen tries to avoid her gaze, imagining what she’s about to say next, but Maronette keeps her eyes fixed on her until Elwen can no longer hide behind a turned head. As she lifts her head and faces her lover, the soldier continues:
“…Do you have any idea how much power this will give the Society over you? If they are controlling your… Simulacrum? While you are away?”
“I know.”
“Do you, really?”
“Yes, Maronette. I know it, damn it.”
Elwen pulls her hands from Maronette’s hold and folds her arms in front of her chest. Maronette looks wounded at the sudden withdrawal, and that fills Elwen with guilt. She cannot bear to hurt the other woman like that. She shakes her head apologetically.
“I’m sorry. I… It’s the only way, alright? I thought about this a lot.”
“It’s not just the control… We will be indebted to them. Even further.”
“I know. But if we want to have a child, this is what it will take.”
Maronette bites her own lips. Whatever she is considering saying next, she decides it is best left unsaid, and instead, she shakes her head and sighs in resignation.
“I’m coming with you.”
“What?”
“To see Yurastasia. I’m coming with you.”
“You don’t have to. I know you’re not particularly fond of her.”
“I don’t think anybody is, really, except maybe you for some weird reason… But I still want to go with you.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’d be a lousy wife if I didn’t. And yes, I’m sure. If they have terms, I’ll be there when they present them. It’s my child, too, after all.”
Elwen smiles again, and then her smile broadens, and she tosses herself the short distance between them both on the tub, splashing even more water out, to put her arms around her lover and kiss Maronette’s lips softly.
“Thank you. You’re the best I could ever want, Maron.”
“More like I’m the only one in here with some good sense, and I want to be there to keep you safe from them… And from yourself.”
“There’s so much wrong with what you just said… But you wanting to protect me is what makes you the best.”
Elwen laughs and kisses Maronette again, this time passionately, letting her tongue enter the other woman’s mouth, and feeling Maronette’s own pushing against her. Their tongues wrestle and dance together, and their hands soon begin to explore each other’s bodies under the water.
Outside, thunder and rain intensify, but the thick walls of the home reduce the noise of the storm outside to a low rumble, sealing them from the world. Elwen’s soft moans echo through the tiled washroom as Maronette’s hands cup her breasts.
The day after the letter is received, the two women find themselves in church, something they rarely ever do. The colourful stained-glass windows bathe the interior of the temple with filtered sunlight, as the storm of the previous night has given way to a bright sunny day. The colourful mosaics display the deities of Summer, Winter, Spring and Fall in their crowns of leaves and flowers, and while most of the faithful sit closer to the pulpit from where a priest is soon to deliver that morning’s sermon, they sit in the back.
Maronette places her hand on the wooden seat of the pew between them, and Elwen puts her own on top of Maronette’s. Her bodyguard intertwines fingers with her and delivers an encouraging squeeze as they watch the old woman approach with a collection box. Elwen reaches into her purse and pulls out a specific number of coins. Their handholding is broken, and Maronette takes a deep breath as she watches the tithe collector approach.
And then the old lady asks, with a tired, hoarse voice:
“Would you be interested in tithing?”
A phrase they have heard so many times before. Elwen’s heart begins to race as she lifts the seven coins to place in the tithing box. They are past the point of no return now, she thinks as she places them one by one. As the seventh coin clinks inside the box, it sets in motion a sequence of events that, Elwen knows well, will be largely out of her control. She closes her eyes for a second and tries to imagine herself submerged in water, surrounded by quiet nothingness. But in the back of her mind, she can already hear the flames. Always there. Always burning.
