Of Lillies Read online

  Of Lilies

  by

  F.R.R. Mallory

  Freya’s Bower.com ©2007

  Culver City, CA

  Of Lilies

  Copyright © 2007

  by F.R.R. Mallory, pseudonym

  For information on the cover illustration and design, contact [email protected].

  Cover art Freya’s Bower © 2007

  Editor: Marci Baun

  ISBN: 1-934069-45-0

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Warning:

  This book may contain graphic sexual material and/or profanity and is not meant to be read by any person under the age of 18.

  If you are interested in purchasing more works of this nature, please stop by www.freyasbower.com.

  Freya’s Bower.com

  P.O. Box 4897

  Culver City, CA 90231-4897

  Printed in The United States of America

  Of Lilies

  The stillness of the house seeped into him, it had stopped breathing, had inhaled, its systems poised, caught somewhere between what they were and what he thought they were. He wanted to shake himself free of the sticky web-like threads of his irrational thoughts. Houses didn’t breathe. Except, they did. Their life subtle, nearly invisible. He could feel the weighted presence of the house, surrounding him, part cradle, part the waiting other. He retreated deeper into his mind, it...they must believe he slept; believe their actions unobserved by human. He didn’t know why. Only that it was true.

  Minutes distended as his mind struggled to hold on to substance and form. He could hear another click of the mantle clock barely audible on the distant family room fireplace. Martin reordered the facts in his mind, allowed his memory to lead him through the house, see the rooms, know the furniture, the placement of yesterday’s newspaper, the remote control to the television. It existed just - so. Just so! Then he realized he could no longer hear the ticking of the clock. Had he fallen asleep?

  He eased his eyelids open just enough to see the edge of his pillow. No. He was still awake. So where were the steady clicks of the clock? Perhaps it had chosen that night to wind down? He knew he rationalized the silence because it allowed him to cling to the familiar. It wasn’t clicking because reality had shifted, or, his observation creating and sustaining his reality had shifted. Another silent semantical argument waged entirely inside his mind. His brain scrabbled around searching for something to hold on to, form, shape, pattern, familiarity. He needed reality, the world, to make sense. He was afraid of what it might mean if it didn’t.

  He inhaled another deep breath, eased his eyelids closed. Silence gathered around him again, the sensation of weight, and presence, palpable. He forced his muscles to relax, to show no outward sign of his wakened state. Time stretched again. Minutes or hours, he couldn’t be sure. Only the rhythmic rising and falling of his chest continued his masquerade of deep sleep.

  This was the most dangerous time, the moments where his mind moved between waking and dream, seduced in both directions. The struggle to stay wakeful, yet appear completely vulnerable – asleep.

  The sweet scent of lilies crept into his awareness bringing with it the freshness of outdoor spaces. He inhaled, feeling the perfume color his thoughts, wakening images within him of a clear brook with water tumbling over large smooth stones and a woman bathing there, her face turned away from him.

  He drank in another deep breath of the scent. Awareness of his bedroom faded further. His body felt light, and insubstantial, as if lifted free of restraint. The deepest part of his mind knew this space was named the astral. It had rules that he needed to remember without disturbing its unfolding. He watched as light coalesced into the images, solidifying them. It filtered through trees casting fluid shadows across the lines of her back. Primal hunger rose within him, teasing at his senses. He tried to step forward, but his body worked differently here. The scene shifted, more like the progression of a movie with her face now profiled toward him, head tilting. The scent of lilies intensified, intoxicating him.

  ‘Closer,’ he told himself. His longing to be nearer to her expanded with every breath. Yet he remained held, unable to walk forward by the nature of this realm. The frustration of it loosened the emotional walls within him. She became every woman who had entranced him from a distance, beguiling, luring, stirring his depths, only to remain untouchable.

  He heard a roar echoing through the woods, bouncing off the rocks, altering the serenity of the scene. Then he realized the sound came from his mouth. It was a guttural, beastly sound. The woman looked up to catch him with her eyes. He could feel her laughter and witness the enjoyment she was experiencing at his expense.

  The unpleasant taste of anger soured his mouth, shocking him. Where from, this sudden desire to hurt her? He tried to draw back, realization of the ease by which she had stripped him of his civilization, his humanity. “No!” he whispered, mouth finding it difficult to form words in this place.

  She laughed again, body rising with sinuous grace, revealed yet hidden within the soft draping folds of a deceptively sheer fabric. The cloth made it hard for Martin to see the substance of her, every movement a shift of line and curve, mastery of seduction. His lust-fueled anger swam within him, circling to rise and fall like an animal pacing a cage. She must be punished for the torment of his need.

  He tried to pull his attention back, turn away. This path led to a loss of self. There was a key to escape, to repudiation of her. He had to remember. The more he struggled to think, the harder it became to look away from the way her hips swayed, opening and closing as she stepped from stone to stone, closer and closer to him. Each brush of the fabric across her skin added to his misery and sexual hunger.

  He drank in another desperate breath and gagged, the scent of lilies so strong and thick he was drowning in the flavor, the overripe aroma, the weight as if the air itself grew heavy against his flesh.

  Too late, his mind wakened to the danger. Not of Earth this womanly form. The perfection of her body was a trap and he her intended prey. Still, he couldn’t look away, his gaze lingering on the soft fullness of her mouth, the way her teeth just peeked out between her lips. He longed to crush her lips with his, until they were bruised and engorged with blood, fullness, and desire. The warning claxon in his mind rang again. Name for this. He knew her name. It would sever her bondage over him, her control of his movement. He must reach for her name.

  Her tongue came out to moisten her lips.

  “Why?” He could hear the whisper of her voice deep in his mind. “Why do you resist me? Am I not exactly as you so long for me to be? Have I not made of myself the embodiment of that which your body craves in the deepest most private crevices of your inner self? You cannot violate oaths of fidelity here. In this place, there is only freedom to experience yourself fully, without artificial restraints. In this place, you can be the truth of your core, and no one will chastise you. Why not lift your fingers to my breast, brush across my nipples, and know the rapture of your full arousal. Why not?”

  Why not? His mind echoed, this realm not bounded by the rules of the waking world. No oaths. No promises, just the certainty of bare, naked action. His worries? Just left over guilt, regrets with no place here.

  His body roused as if freed by his thoughts. Need. Why fear a dream woman? He’d created her—owned her. It was his body, his mind. She was right; he couldn�
��t cheat within his own dreams. He could grasp her close and ravish her with abandon. There was none to tell him, “No.”

  Hints of triumph in her laughter worried at him, but not enough to turn his attention from the rise and fall of her full breasts. Her perfect mounds pressed against the thin fabric, thrusting her nipples forward into trembling pencil eraser points.

  He shuddered, and desire ripped away the remains of his cloak of civilization. She needed to be his, her body opened upon the soil, taken with the hard thrusts of his body. His resistance faded against the rise of his passion.

  Her hand lifted, nails long and curled.

  His eyes followed the strangeness of their shape. The lust clouding his mind dissipated slightly as he fumbled to dredge up the language that explained such fingernails. A picture he had seen in one of the books he had read looking for...looking for. He heard a hiss which brought his gaze back up to where her tongue moistened the pouting fullness of her lips. So ripe, like stained cherries.

  What had he been looking for? Cherries. Lips. Sucking on each of them while his tongue explored her mouth. No. There were books even now tumbled across the floor of his family room, pages open to picture after picture. Seductress. Another name... Of course he’d seen her in a book or magazine, weren’t all dream women crafted from the images of beautiful models? She could seduce him. Cherries… The book… He tried to maintain focus, feeling the landscape wobble when his mind roused more saying something about rules for such things.

  Rules for wet dreams? He wanted to laugh.

  A second hiss drew his attention back to her mouth. The hiss became a delicate whisper of his name. Of course she wanted his attention, all of his attention. No woman was flattered by a man distracted in the midst of seduction. Her lips beckoned with tongue-moistened softness. Hardened nipples led the fabric that grazed his body with maddeningly light. “Mine.” He whispered back, inhaling her breath with his mouth. She tasted of dark nights, hidden moons, and vapors rising up from still waters. She tasted of hunger, lust, the reddened blur of primal passion.

  “Mine,” he repeated. His hands rose to cup and lift her breasts, rubbing her nipples across his in little arcs of erotic fire. His chest muscles tensed as if prodded by miniature electrodes that sent tiny shockwaves running down his stomach wall to arouse him further. His right hand slid up the curve of her breast to the small hollow where her shoulder met her neck. His fingers lingered there, with his thumb rubbing across the throb of her pulse, curling around the right side of her neck, lifting and bending her neck, demonstrating his control.

  Her half-lidded eyes seemed to accept this power shift between them, as did the way her tongue darted against her lips. Tiny gasps escaped from between them. He snaked his hand up under her hair, right at the back of her skull, and curled his fingers down to tug her head back. She shuddered against him.

  “Mine.” He whispered, his lips just grazing hers, as if he could breathe the word down inside of her to make it take root there. He bent her neck back, forcing her body to curve into his, and pressed into fuller contact. Her eyes fluttered open, and, for just a moment, he thought he saw laughter there, a game, her game, then the moment slipped away from him again as her eyes closed. He confirmed his victory of her by crushing her mouth with his, knowing his pressure might bruise her lips yet in that moment, not caring. Again, a burst of erotic fire raced from her body to his. Unexpected. His mind jolted. This was different. The flowery flavor of her seductive hunger flooded his mouth with the taste of overbloomed lilies.

  He tried to exhale, to escape from her kiss but found himself unable to resist the growing agony of his lust. Every point of contact between their bodies danced with arcs of energy, shocking and reshocking him in quakes and thrusts, his body aroused beyond the threshold of voluntary sex.

  The dreamscape trees evaporated, transporting him out of the astral landscape and back against the familiar contours of his bed. Weight. He could feel his own weight, and hers. No longer standing. His brain couldn’t comprehend how one moment splintered into the next. He tried to remember what it meant, knowing it meant something.

  Lust chased the thoughts back. He couldn’t resist the satisfaction he felt at having a beautiful woman so eager to receive his passion. He smiled up at her wondering what she would think if she knew he couldn’t remember her name. Conquest. The word burned inside him. Just a woman to bed. He laughed. She would think this meant something. Women always wanted sex to mean something. Still, there was something in her face, a look with her the victor and he the conquest. But, didn’t he want to be taken, wanted? A veneer seemed to ripple between them giving him a momentary glimpse of something else astride his body.

  As if to defy his momentary confusion, she smiled down at him before lifting her torso to pull the sheer fabric over her head, allowing him a spectacular view of her exquisite body. It worked. His focus hardened, and his hands found her nipples, forefingers and thumbs closing to pinch as he pressed her body onto his. The shock of their bodies joining collapsed the bubble of his fantasy. Her voice rose in triumph.

  His view of her shifted from beautiful woman to ash skinned gargoyle, face sharp, teeth narrow and sharp, claws long-nailed and cruel, now gripped his shoulders in animalistic ferocity as she took what she came for.

  “Name her!” The voice deep within his mind grew louder. “Name her!”

  He screamed. Horror replaced lust but too late to call back the blooded hardness of his arousal. Monster. But he couldn’t move, his body lay frozen, bound by unseen straps and cuffs to the four corners of his bed. He screamed again.

  The creature tilted its head back, shifting from sensuous woman and back, as if a cosmic light switch were being thrown between two realities. The speed of its thrusts upon him increased. It strobed, fueled by its own howls of laughter.

  Martin sucked in a desperate breath. How could he have been so easily tricked? A beast, a creature. He knew its true name. Defeat it…

  “Too late!” Vaginal muscles squeezed, the words spoken in his mind. Mine to take, fool. “Taking this, and this, and this.” Her voice gloried in her triumph of him, her victory - the wresting of his life force from within his vulnerabilities, the seduction of his soul.

  She leaned down until the stink of rotting flowers made him want to wretch. “So easy,” she whispered. “So easy.”

  “My name...?” She prompted him; the shudders of her body confirmed the completion of her desire.

  He could feel her milking his essence, the core of who he was, his humanity, his life energy. Again. He had succumbed yet again to his night borne visitor. “Succubus,” he whispered and banished her from his bed.

  Cherie

  Downtown Santa Rosa had lost some of its luster as the brisk breeze of early spring tore anti-war flyers off staple ridden posts to scatter their bits like giant uneven snowflakes across the lawn and fountains of the central square.

  Cherie paused near the street corner and waited for the signal to change. Her gaze followed the dancing pieces of paper to where they swirled past an outdoor vendor selling clumps of bright flowers stashed in big green water-filled buckets. A lean male customer who looked to be well into his thirties with his hair salting to gray around the edges, smiled and laughed with the clerk while selecting a bundle of glowing white lilies.

  Cherie snickered, her thoughts immediately jumping to the wild claims in the book she was using as research for her next sex column. According to “Is Your Man The Victim of a Succubus?” one of the key clues to such nocturnal dalliances was a man’s affection for lilies. Were ghost-women sexually molesting this guy in his sleep?

  She gave him a more careful perusal, realizing he looked a bit familiar. His easy-going manner and bright smile lent him an aura of confidence that was attractive even ten feet away. Cherie decided she might molest him, given the chance, unlikely though that was.

  The chirp of the signal change interrupted her voyeuristic contemplation and urged her to step out onto the uneven c
obbles. She dropped her head a bit and hugged her book and notepad to her chest. The wind had a bite to it. Halfway across the wide avenue she heard discordant rising sounds, voices lifting with anxiety in their tones, another more mechanical sound, and then the unmistakable squeal of a car’s brakes and tires.

  She started to turn toward the noise when someone hit her from behind throwing her off her feet, sprawling her face forward to the ground. She rolled instinctively, managing to jerk one hand free to cushion her face on the second roll. Behind, where she had been, the squeal of tires rose in pitch to an ear-agonizing crescendo. Cherie discovered she was yelling, fear washing across her with the split-second realization the car might hit her at any second. She curled in on herself, trying to make her body small in the gutter, which now blocked her roll. She heard herself chanting, “Oh God, Oh God, Oh God.”

  Then the sounds faded taking with them the sense of imminent danger. The dreaded crunch of metal on her flesh didn’t happen. She twisted, discovering her face was pillowed in a carpet of strewn white flowers and another person was wrapped tightly up against her back, covering her. It was shocking to realize she hadn’t known they were even there.

  Their bodies moved in unison, untangling until they were in a disheveled sitting position, facing each other.

  Cherie shuddered; her body adjusting from raw panic to an aftermath of adrenaline fueled trembling. Wanting to both laugh and cry she tried to reassemble her scattered composure as a host of small pains announced their presence. The man, because it was a man who had sheltered her, was the same man who’d caught her attention moments before. A man who had sacrificed his lilies to protect her from injury after she’d laughed about him in her thoughts. Guilt washed her face in heat. She fumbled with something to say; an apology, a thank you, an introduction – anything. Instead the word that bubbled to the surface of her irreverent brain, the word that popped out of her mouth to land between them like a question was, “Succubus?”