Archive-name: Fantasy/obsidian.txt Archive-author: Judith A. McLaughlin Archive-title: Obsidian and Masquerade **note from the author** This is a story derived from the happenings in a superhero group known as Nemesis, which also runs training academy for young people who have just discovered their paranormal abilities, teaching them how best to use them and how to defend themselves from the world's numerous supervillains. This is my first attempt at erotic fiction and I would appreciate constructive input. Please direct comments to jmclaughlin@ruby.vcu.edu Erotic Tales of the Nemesis Training Academy: Obsidian appeared in a dazzle of colors. He immediately fell to his knees. He was used to transporting around, hell, it was one of his powers, but this seemed almost maliciously unsettling. When he had forced the contents of his stomach back into place, he raised his head and looked around. The room was the lavish standard that his hostess (wife, he corrected himself) maintained in every room of her tower. The bed was large enough for five or six people, covered with red satin sheets. The floor was covered with what seemed to be animal pelts of various shapes, sizes and textures. There was a daybed of black velvet and gold, golden tables with tops of black marble veined with red, and hangings of red and black silk on the ceiling and walls. A haze hung in the air, permeating every pore of his body with the thick aroma of a musky incense. He dragged himself to his feet and batted aside the hangings around the bed so he could fall freely into the feather mattress. He lay there, somewhat uncomfortably. Then he pulled himself out of bed to change out of the heavy black armor and thick red cloak that Facade had made him wear for their wedding. Wedding? He could barely think of it as such. The demonic shadows that were their attendants, the psychotic bitch that was his bride, and the "deflowering" of the bride and groom by the "priest" all made him want to close his eyes and hope he woke from this horrid nightmare. But he'd tried that. A number of times. Even his dreams and fantasies were being invaded and violated and altered. The only time anything could stay untainted was while Facade was otherwise occupied, like when she was fucking him. At least he was free to imagine someone he cared about, like Marcia, being the female form he was servicing. Obsidian drifted off into a fitful sleep after he had dropped off the restricting garments. His dreams were thankfully few, and mostly pleasant memories of times spent with his fellow Nemesis trainees, especially Marcia, aka Masquerade. A flash of multi-colored light brought him to groggy wakefulness. He opened his eyes to see Facade standing in the center of the room, staring at him through the hangings. "How is my darling husband enjoying his apartment?" she asked, a bright smile crinkling her sparkling, almond-shaped eyes. "Just fine," he said, unentwining himself from the sheets and rolling out of the bed, "darling." His mouth was dry with an unpleasant taste in it that made him ill. He plodded across the room toward the one open door that he assumed led to the bathing area. He was right. "Oh, my, he's shy in front of his wife!" she exclaimed, her tone pronouncing the fact that he had left on the underwear he had worn under the suit to be cute and/or quaint. Her own attire left little to the imagination, being made up mostly of translucent slips of silk strung together over the important portions of her anatomy. He blushed fiercely as he bent over the sink to drink from the faucet. The water was cold, probably piped from a nearby glacier, or chilled by spells cast by Facade's hideous, demonic other husband. He laved his face and neck while he was there, letting the chill wake him out of the dream-haze he was in. He needed all his wits about him while dealing with Facade. One wrong word, the wrong tone to his voice, and she might kill him where he stood. He had married her to keep her from killing his sister, and he prayed to whatever gods watched over young women who also happened to be demon sorceresses that Facade had not forgotten their deal and slain Satin already. "Are you feeling all right?" she asked from directly behind him in a terribly sweet voice. He got a sick feeling in his gut that she might want to fuck him. He had no idea how long it had been since the last time, but he didn't really look forward to doing it again. "A little out of sorts," he said with a smile, turning to face her. "Oh, that's a shame," she replied with a pout. "I guess that my little wedding present will have to wait then." Her smile was one of those that chilled him to the marrow, with th crazy look in her eye. Hastily, he amended, "I'm not that bad off." "Good, good," she said, "you're eager for my gifts now! You make me so happy, Michael." She kissed him briefly on the mouth. Yeah, right, he thought, but he followed her from the room obediently, a smile still on his face. She gestured, and a rainbow arced from her hand to the floor next to him. It bounced off the floor and spiraled upward, little bits of it sparkling off. When it finally dispersed at the ceiling, he realized that a young woman was standing where it had struck, and that she was stark naked. He snatched up his cloak from the floor and swung it around the girl's shoulders. She was hugging herself, and when he stepped around to fasten the cloakpin, he saw her face. "Marcia!" he exclaimed, taking a step backward. "Mike?" she asked hesitantly. "Do you like my gift, Obsidian?" Facade asked, batting her long eyelashes and smiling dangerously. He tore his eyes from Marcia's terrified face long enough to shoot a smile at his wife. "I love your gift, Facade. Thank you." "Oh, well, I guess I'll leave you two to get reacquainted," the sorceress said lightly. She stepped forward to the huddled girl and lifted her face with a finger under the chin. "She's very attractive, for a superheroine," Facade appraised grudgingly. "You could always take her as your secondary wife, you know. After all, I have another husband." "I'll consider it," he replied, looking back to Marcia's eyes. He barely noticed when Facade vanished in a shower of multi-colored sparks. "Mike?" Marcia said again. "What was all that about?" "Ummmm, well, uhhh...let me explain it...umm, why don't you sit down?" He gestured at the bed and the daybed. After a second's deliberation, she sat on the edge of the bed, clutching the cloak around her. "You, uhhh, want some water or something?" he asked awkwardly. "Sure." He hunted around the sink for a glass or cup and finally found one, which he filled with the glacial water. He returned and handed Marcia the cup, which she drained gratefully. The edge of the bed groaned a little as he sat next to her. "Well, uhm, Facade told me that she was the one who captured Satin, showed her to me, and told me that if I wanted to save my sister, I had to marry her. 'Her' being Facade, you know? So, of course, I did, and now, I guess, I'm her husband." He stuttered a little as he rushed nervously through his explanation. Marcia's blue eyes widened. "Oh, God, Mike, she's the mistress of illusions. She might not even have Satin!" "But I saw....I mean...oh, damn." His head sank into his hands. "I never seem to do anything right." She laid a hand across his shoulders. "Mike, I mean, it's just a possibility. Odds are she has Satin, and that you saved your sister so we can free her and she can blow Facade away at her leisure. It's just...well, we found out about her illusion powers and I thought I should...tell you, that's all." They sat in silence for several minutes. "Are you okay?" he asked. Her mouth twisted into a wry grin. "I was just a bit cold, not having any clothes in a dungeon and all. I'm fine." "That's good." He looked at her. A shock of blond hair had fallen into his eyes. "I guess we should do the right superhero type of thing and try to find a way to escape, huh?" "I was just thinking about that." She looked around the room. "No windows. I guess that let's that one out." He stood and walked to the various doors around the room. All of them led to either closets or other rooms. The other rooms, the sitting room and dining room and bathroom, had no means of egress. "No doors either," he told her. "How about through the walls?" She stepped up to the wall and concentrated. He pushed on it with his hand. Normal materials should have become less dense, basically becoming a cloud that was simple to walk through. It was still solid. And so it went with the floor and ceiling as well. "We can't transport out, can we?" she said with little hope. Mike concentrated. A sustained VEEEEEEEEEE- sound issued from the air in front of him, then an explosion of force knocked him backward into a wall. He slid down the wall to sit on the floor, shaking his head to clear it. "Woooof," he exclaimed. "Remind me that the next time I try that stunt, I should be in stone form." "Mike." "Huh?" She looked at him with a completely serious face. "Next time you try that, change to your stone form." He burst out laughing, and she with him, but her laughter had a hysterical edge to it that he didn't like. He crawled over to the bed and pulled her off it into his arms. She continued laughing for a minute, the laughter melding into tears. He held her against him tightly, and felt his own hysteria edging up into his chest, constricting his throat and making it impossible for him to say anything of comfort. Marcia swallowed hard and took a deep breath, wiping her face with the cloak. "Well, that certainly isn't going to help," she said, her voice only quaking a little. Mike found swallowing difficult, but he managed to say in a trembling voice, "No, I don't suppose it will." Their eyes met and locked. She grabbed him around the neck and pulled him into a fierce kiss. He was stunned a moment, but recovered in time to part his lips in answer to her own. Her tongue brushed over his teeth and deeper into his mouth, touching his tongue and sliding around it slowly. He responded in kind, moving his hands inside the cloak, around her naked back. Her breasts pressed against his bare chest and he felt her hesitate, then abandon whatever the reason for hesitation. He felt her hands in his hair, grabbing fistfuls that were almost painful and pulling him harder against her. Their tongues wrestled for several minutes. Then they parted, gasping. "Mike, make love to me." This gave him reason to pause. He was sure he looked as thunderstruck as he felt. "But, Marcia, we've never...I mean, you're still a...I didn't think you liked me that much...I mean...are you sure?" She held his face in her hands and looked directly into his eyes. "I'm sure. I want you now. I want you because we may never get out of this alive, and because I'm terrified that something is going to happen to me, and because you're the most wonderful guy I've ever known, much less dated. Please, Mike?" The appeal in her eyes tore at his heart. He wasn't sure if, after the abuse of the last week of his life, the necessary portions of his anatomy would perform, but he was willing to try. His answer was to lean forward and kiss her again. He fumbled with the cloak clasp as he kissed along the line of her jaw to her ear. He blew gently across her ear and she giggled. "You tickled on purpose!" she protested, smacking at him feebly. Feeling his hands still at her throat, she looked down. "Oh, let me do that." She smiled as he relinquished the clasp to her smaller fingers and ran his fingers through her hair, turning her head so that he could have better access to her earlobe. The cloak slid heavily to the floor and she wrapped her arms around his chest, scratching his back lightly. She sighed as he kissed her neck and ran his tongue down her throat, along her collarbone, and down to the valley between her breasts. He trailed his fingers across her stomach, almost but not quite tickling. Fingertips just brushing the tiny hairs on her body, he lazily spiraled them up around the curves of her breasts, closing the spiral toward the nipples, but never touching the areolae. He sat back so he could watch her. Her skin was smooth and pale, her oval face classical in its lines. She closed her eyes, her back arching to try to bring his hands to her nipples. He tickled his hands down her sides and around her back. One hand moved to her upper back and the other reached down to grasp one of the firm, pale globes of her ass, and he lifted her, bringing his feet under him. "Wha-?" she exclaimed, her eyes opening. She saw him grin mischieviously and felt him jump. Then the cascade of silk and satin struck them, coolly slipping over their bare skin. The bed gave softly under Mike's backward landing. Marcia heard his breath whoosh out of him and rolled off into the pile of satin that was the top sheet. She knelt over him, laughing, as he gasped. He was grinning, and started laughing before he really could. "You schmuck!" she said, leaning down to kiss his forehead. "You could've warned me!" "Ah, my dear," he replied when he was breathing almost normally, "the element of surprise has many advantages, like this!" He lunged upward and sucked her left nipple into his mouth. She gasped, moaned, and fell forward, managing to catch herself with her hands. When she had herself firmly held, she bent her left elbow so he could lay his head back. He reached up with his left hand and palmed her neglected breast, kneading it briefly, then flicking his index finger over the nipple. Her body shuddered, and he saw her arms trembling. He moved to sit up. "No," she sighed, tossing her head back, eyes closed, "no, just keep doing that." He shifted himself further onto the bed to give himself better access with both hands and his mouth. He ran his tongue across to her other breast and she moaned again. She was leaning over him with her back arched, her ass in the air. Her head dropped forward again, the long blonde hair almost hitting him in the face. He eased back to a very light stimulation, then sucked down on her nipple hard as he palmed the other roughly. She shivered and groaned. "Mike," she sighed breathlessly. He felt her move and then felt warmth on his abdomen as she straddled him. Her hips strained against him in a slow, involuntary rhythm of their own. She looked down at him, and slid down his body to kiss him again. He felt her crotch come to rest against his erection, and felt her rubbing against the rough cloth that restrained it. His hands travelled down her back to knead her buttocks. Their mouths were locked together, sharing their rapid, hoarse breathing. He brushed his fingertips down into her wet cleft, probing gently into her opening. She rubbed against him hard and he slid a finger into her easily. "More," she said into his mouth. He moved in and out slowly, then added a second finger. She almost winced, but started to get into his slow rhythm, rocking her hips against him, matching him stroke for stroke. The rhythm started to increase, and when he slid three fingers into her, she bit his earlobe and dug her nails into his shoulders. Before she reached a point where the rhythm led inevitably onward, he rolled her over on her back to give himself access to her front. With her hands in his hair again, he slid down the length of her body. He nuzzled the blonde fuzz and inhaled her scent as he continued to stroke. She nearly shrieked as his tongue fluttered down her slit. He kissed the lips, and took the hood of her pleasure gently between his teeth and hummed his own pleasure into it. She moaned, clutching at his head and the sheets, the vibrations of his voice driving her over the edge. Her hips bucked once, twice, spasmodically, then her body froze. He ran his tongue around her clitoris, flicking across it, continuing his rhythm in and out of her. For several long seconds, she seemed suspended, and then her body melted into soft, sweet sighs. He withdrew from her and made his way back up her body where she met his lips in a soft kiss. "How was that?" he asked, kissing her throat. "I want you, Mike, please." Her hands slid down to the cloth at his waisst and ripped. He lifted his hips away from her so she could pull the offending fabric off him. As she did so, his erection bounced free against her stomach. She gripped it and slid her fingers up and down the shaft, feeling the silky skin. "Please," she said again. "Tell me if I hurt you at all," he admonished. "I will." He lifted himself up away from her again and carefully positioned himself, the head of his penis resting against her vagina opening. He rubbed up and down against it a couple of times, and looked up into her eyes. The depths of her blue eyes drew him in. She looked a little scared, and she licked her lips as she gazed up at him. With a gentle push, he slid into liquid softness. A small whimper escaped her lips, but she smiled up at him quaveringly. He smiled back. "I love you, Marcia." "I love you, Mike." He added a little pressure and was surprised at how easily he was completely engulfed. He lay down on her, supported on his elbows, and they embraced, locked together at the hips, kissing. After several minutes, he began to move a little. The strokes were small at first, lengthening slowly. She was tight, and her muscles gripped him like a glove. Her hips matched his movements exactly, and when he resheathed himself in her, he ground his pelvis in a circle against her, rubbing her clit. "Faster!" she cried into his neck. He lifted himself to oblige her. The speed built until she reached out with one hand to brace them against the headboard, while the other hand clutched and clawed at his back. She threw her head back into the pillows, and he bent his to his pleasant task. The pressure was building in him. He felt the near-pain in his cock as he pounded Marcia. "I'm going to come," he told her through gritted teeth. "So am I," she gasped. Marcia's body froze again just seconds later, her muscles clamping down on his cock so hard that he couldn't move. The muscles rippled as her hips jumped against him and he exploded with a shout. He went limp, collapsing onto her, feeling her breasts cushion him. As his vision cleared, he rolled to one side to give her breathing room. "Oh, God," he said, gasping. "That was incredible." "You're right. Thank you." She rolled on her side and smiled down at him. "I love you." "I love you too." He reached for her and she laid her head on his chest as he hugged her against him. They lay that way a long time. "I like the sound of your heartbeat," she said softly. "Thanks," he said, drowsy in her closeness and heat. "It makes me think about being alive." He laughed gently. "Why don't we think about sleep now? We need to be thinking clearly. Maybe tomorrow will offer the escape that today didn't." She kissed his chest with warm lips. "Sure, Mr. Optimist." "I love you, Marcia." "Mmm-hmmm." Mike had had one of the most comforting, restful sleeps of his life. He was awakened by Marcia being torn from his arms. "How sweet." His eyes flashed open and his blood ran cold. Facade stood next to the bed, holding Marcia by the throat. The sorceress' eyes narrowed as she saw him come to awareness. Marcia looked half-awake and terrified. As Mike lunged forward, feeling the flash of cold that accompanied his body's transformation to living stone, the woman drew back her free hand and a bolt of energy streaked into Marcia's body, crackling through it. Marcia screamed. If his blood was cold, it turned to ice at the agonized scream. Seconds ticked by, and he felt leaden, frozen to the spot, his hand just fractions of an inch from Marcia's arm. He watched Marcia's body twitch in Facade's hand, then go limp, all animation slipping from it. His heart wrenched and his stomach lurched. The smell of charred flesh reached his nostrils. Facade gazed calmly on her handiwork, and gestured. He saw one of her rainbow portals flash into existence, and she carelessly tossed Marcia's body through it. He saw it land with a sickening splash in a murky swamp just as the portal closed. The sorceress smiled down at him. "Well, now that you've had a pathetic child, you can appreciate me all the more." Anger surged up in his throat. "WHY?" he choked, stone eyes that couldn't cry burning with the need to weep. Facade looked disappointed. "Oh, come, come, now, Obsidian. All this over a girl? Why, do you want to make me positively jealous? I might, oh, destroy your sister by accident, after all, in a fit of jealousy." He swallowed his anger and grief with much effort, determined not to let Satin die at this madwoman's hands if he could help it. Marcia was dead. That meant he had to find a means of avenging her, but not at the cost of another he loved. Obsidian managed not to flinch away as the sorceress slid into bed next to him, and hoped desperately that good really did always win in the end. (c)1992 Judith A. McLaughlin Permission granted to republish on electronic media as long as the text of this copyright notice is attached intact to any and all republished portions. --