In Kuroinu

The forest had come back to life around us by the time her breathing steadied. Insects in the canopy. A frog somewhere to my left doing its thing. The air was cool on my skin where her body wasn't pressed against it and the sweat was drying on my chest and the ground was damp under my back and none of that mattered because she was warm and she was still on me and her ear was still twitching under my palm.

She shifted. Her hips moved and she made a small sound against my neck because I was still inside her and she was still sensitive and every movement registered. Her fingers curled against my ribs.

"That was-" she started.

"Good?"

Her head came up. Her green eyes were bloodshot and her cheeks were flushed and her hair was a disaster and she looked at me with the expression of someone who wanted to commit murder but was too exhausted to follow through.

"Adequate."

I laughed. I couldn't help it. The most stubborn woman on the continent was sitting on my cock in the middle of a forest with tears still wet on her face and the best she could give me was "adequate."

She bit my shoulder. Hard enough to sting. "Shut up."

"Ow."

"You deserved it." She pressed her forehead against my collarbone and her breath was hot on my skin and her body was still doing small involuntary clenches around me and her hips kept making tiny movements she probably didn't realize she was making.

"Llusse."

"What."

"You're moving."

She froze. Her ears went scarlet. "I am NOT."

"You literally are. Right now."

"That's- it's involuntary. Elven physiology. Post-combat response."

"We're not in combat."

"SHUT UP."

I put my hands on her waist. She tensed. I rolled us.

The ground was soft enough that her back hit leaves and dirt and not rock and she gasped when I settled over her, my hips between her thighs, still inside her, and her wrists came up and I caught them. Pinned them to the ground on either side of her head.

She tested the grip immediately. Her arms flexed and her wrists twisted and I held on. She was strong. Elf muscles were deceptive. That lean frame could draw a heavy bow all day and she had speed I'd never match. If she wanted to break free, she could.

She stopped pulling. Her wrists settled in my hands and her chest was heaving and she was looking up at me.

I pulled out slowly. She sucked in a breath and her thighs tensed and the cool air hit my cock where her body had been and the wet was everywhere, slick on me and slick on her and the sensation of leaving her after being inside for twenty minutes was a shock for both of us. Her pussy clenched on the head at the last inch, holding, and then I was out and she was empty and her hips twitched upward.

I pushed back in. Slow. She was wetter than she'd been in round one, swollen and sensitive and open, and the slide was slick and easy and the heat was intense. Deeper than before because the angle was different from above and she took all of me in one slow stroke and her back arched off the ground and her fingers curled into fists above my hands.

"Ah-"

Slow. I kept it slow. Long strokes that pulled almost all the way out and pushed back in deep. Her body responded differently than it had when she was on top. When she was riding me she'd been clenched tight, fighting, holding on. Now her thighs fell wider. Her hips tilted to take me deeper. Her breathing was long and shaky instead of the sharp punched-out sounds from round one.

"Haruto-" Her voice had lost the edge. The bark was gone. She was using my name and she wasn't shouting it. "That's- nn-"

I let go of one wrist. She left it where it was. Her arm stayed on the ground above her head and her fingers uncurled and spread against the leaves. I put my free hand on her hip, adjusted the angle, and thrust in deep.

"Ah- there- right there-"

Her legs came up. She wrapped them around my waist and her heels pressed into my lower back and she pulled me into her on the next stroke and the sound she made was low and continuous and she wasn't trying to cover it. Her free hand found my shoulder and her fingers dug in. Holding on.

I went deeper. Her pussy was hot and slick and every thrust drew a wet sound that mixed with her breathing. She was looking at me. In round one she'd had her eyes shut or her head thrown back or her hand over her mouth. Now her eyes were open and she was watching me and her green irises were dark in the dim light and her lips were parted and her face was open in a way I'd never seen from her.

My cock was throbbing from the slow pace. The tight heat of her and the way she squeezed on every instroke was building the pressure at the base of my spine and I wanted to go harder and I stayed slow because her face was open in a way I'd never seen and I didn't want to break it.

"Nn- more-" The word came out like she hated it. Her jaw tightened. Her eyes were still on mine. "Please-"

She heard herself say it and her face went red and her chin trembled and she looked like she wanted to take it back and couldn't.

I gave her more. Harder. Her head pressed back into the leaves and her legs tightened around my waist and her hips came up to meet mine and the wet sounds got louder and her nails dug into my shoulder.

"Ah- ah- Haruto- nn-"

I drove into her. Hard. Her back arched and her breasts pressed against my chest and her hips ground up into mine and her thighs were shaking against my sides and her mouth was open and her eyes were still on mine and they were soft.

I pinned her other wrist. Both hands held down, her body open under mine, and I fucked her hard and she wrapped her legs tighter and her head went back and the tendons in her neck stood out. Her pussy was clenching around me in fast tight pulses and her ears were flat against her head and her breathing was ragged and she was close and her eyes came back to mine.

"Haruto-"

She came saying my name.

The full sound of it. Loud, raw, broken across two syllables, her back arching off the forest floor and her legs locked around my waist and her fingers squeezing in my grip and her pussy contracting around my cock in long rolling waves. No hand over her mouth. No muffled scream. Just my name in the dark forest and the sound of it going up through the trees.

I came inside her. Deep. My hips pressed against hers and the orgasm rolled through me in heavy pulses and the Blessing surged, stronger than the first round, and the transfer flooded both directions. Power into her, attributes into me. Her body went taut and then limp and then taut again as the magic hit her and her eyes flew open and she gasped and her ears went straight up and she turned her head sharply toward the tree line.

"I can hear-" She was panting. Her eyes were wide and unfocused. "Your heartbeat. I can hear it. From- it's like it's inside my head."

I was still on top of her. Still inside her. Both of her wrists still in my hands. She looked at me and her eyes were wide and bright and the remnants of an orgasm were still moving through her body.

"I can hear the insects," she whispered. "All of them. I can hear mice in the brush. I can hear-" She turned her head. Her ear was pointing toward the city. "Voices. From the inn. I can hear Mila laughing."

I let go of her wrists. She brought her hands down and pressed them flat against my chest and her fingers spread and she breathed and her pupils were wide.

"The forest is so loud," she said. "How is it so loud?"

I pulled out. She made a soft sound and her legs loosened from around my waist and settled. I rolled to the side and we lay there in the leaves, both of us breathing, and the forest was dark now and the sky through the branches was scattered with stars and the ground was cold and neither of us moved for a while.

She sat up first. Found her tunic and pulled it on. The leggings went on next, efficiently, and she was dressed faster than I was. She sat with her arms around her knees while I pulled my pants up and laced them and she was staring into the dark between the trees with her ears swiveling, tracking sounds I could only catch the edges of.

"Inside," she said. "I'm cold."

We walked back to the inn. The city was quiet and the streets were empty and she walked close to me but not touching and her ears kept moving and every few steps she'd turn her head to follow a sound I couldn't hear. A cat on a roof. Water in a pipe. The creak of a shutter two blocks over.

My room was on the second floor. She came in behind me and closed the door and stood in the middle of the room with her arms crossed and looked at the bed and then looked at me and her ears were pink.

"I'm only staying because my room is cold."

"Sure."

"It IS cold. The window doesn't shut properly."

"I believe you."

She glared at me. Then she pulled off her boots and climbed onto the bed and lay down on her side facing the wall and pulled the blanket up to her chin.

I took off my shirt. Kicked off my boots. Got into bed beside her.

She didn't move for a while. Then she rolled over and her head found my chest and her arm went across my ribs and she pressed her face against my skin and her ear was flat against my heartbeat.

"If you tell anyone I cried," she said into my chest, "I'll put an arrow through your eye."

"Your secret's safe."

"And this doesn't mean I like you."

"Obviously."

Her arm tightened around me. Her fingers curled into the sheet beside my hip and she pressed closer and her breathing was already slowing down and her body was going heavy against mine.

She was asleep in two minutes. I knew because I counted. Her breathing evened out and her grip on the sheet relaxed and her body went boneless and the frown she always wore smoothed away and she looked young. Younger than a hundred and ten should look, even for an elf. Her ear twitched once against my chest. Then again. Then it settled.

I lay there. She was warm against my side and her hair smelled like the forest and sweat and underneath that something clean and sharp, like pine sap and cold air. Her heartbeat was steady against my ribs. Mine was slowing to match it.

Outside the window, the city made its small sounds. Somewhere a dog barked once and stopped. A cart wheel on cobblestones, fading. The wind through the eaves of the inn.

My hearing was sharper than it had been this morning. I could pick out the individual sounds with a clarity that hadn't been there before. Llusse's boost. Elven senses layered on top of what I already had from Filia and Tianne. The world was louder now, more detailed, and the girl responsible for it was drooling on my chest and her ear was twitching in her sleep and she was going to deny all of this in the morning.

I closed my eyes. Her ear twitched against my skin.

I slept.

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