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Eladehl shook his head. "Just news. No conspiracies against us yet. Go. Both of you."
I went to my bedroom. Talin went the other way, to his place across the hall. Neither of us took long, and I'd done little more than strip off the dress and take my hair down before I was back, still pulling my hair from the collar of a comfortable shirt that had once been Eladehl's. I barely made it onto the couch beside Wraythe when the door opened and Talin was back, looking a lot more like the common priest I was used to.
"So, how'd the week with the baron go?" Eladehl asked.
"It was boring, tedious, and kinda romantic," I told him. "At least right up until things went crazy. The best part, though, was that Talin took me ice skating and Zeal showed up. The worst part was his brother trying to be stupid. Then there were the guns."
"Guns?" Wraythe asked.
Talin nodded. "Got that pair of flintlock pistols I wanted. One for me - technically - and one for you. My plan is to make sure that if things go sideways, our desires can use them so they won't be completely unarmed. I mean, since you and I can use a blade. The downside is that I had to get one for the High Priest so he'd approve their use."
"We'll need to practice," Wraythe told him. "I heard they aren't easy to shoot."
"Well," Talin said, "they are easy toshoot. Not so easy to hit things with." He chuckled. "But Nari managed, so I think it'll work well enough. The rest can wait, because it's all settled. Now, what arewesupposed to talk about?"
Eladehl leaned over his knees and met my eyes. "So, I think I'm going to specialize in pain and domination."
"Ok?" I asked, knowing there had to be more to this story. "Get inspired on the Darkest Night?" I guessed, glancing over to Wraythe for some hint of what was going on.
"You wanted him to have fun," Wraythe reminded me. "So when a priest down the hall sent his guardian to make a pass, I relayed the message."
"I choked him until he almost passed out," Eladehl said, dropping that into the room. "He said he wanted me to treat him like my bitch, so I did. Nari, I liked it. Too much."
I nodded, not quite understanding why this was such a big deal. "Plenty of people need that. I mean, Shalsa's the perfect mentor if that's the specialty you're going to choose."
Eladehl pushed himself from his chair and headed for the kitchen. "You don't understand. I don't mean that I spanked him a little and called him a slut. I'm saying that I almost choked him out. And then I talked to Shalsa, and she set me up with a trainer. Saw her the day before yesterday, I think it was?" He kept going until he grabbed a bottle of some clear liquid. "Her guardian taught Wraythe how to handle me if I lose control.Her,Nari."
I nodded, trying to decide if it bothered me that he'd slept with a woman, but it really didn't. Maybe because I'd always known that he eventually would? Most likely because of the way he talked about it, as if this was a "thing," not a person. It was no different for him than any other lesson in class. No emotions involved.
But he didn't give me the chance to reply. "I couldn't really refuse, and I can't claim a male preference while having a female partner, so..." He paused to take a sip, stopping before me. "I'm sorry."
"For what?" I asked him.
Wraythe reached up and grabbed the bottle from his hands. "It's us, Ela. Slow down, talk to her, and don't leave out the parts you only thought."
So Ela sank to his knees before me. "I think I'd secretly hoped you'd be the only woman in my bed. I dunno, so I'd have something like Wraythe does. Something special with you. Some way for you to understand that this thing we're doing? For me, it's a lot more than just sex. You are special to me, Nari. I love you, and I wanted to make sure you knew that. To, I dunno, hold something back for you."
"You can't," I said, finding his hands. "Oh, Ela, that's not how the Path of the Body works, and you are going to be very popular when we graduate to disciple. You'll have many women in bed, and I've already slept with multiple men. It's different, and you know it."
"Yeah," he admitted, "but it's more than that. I didn't just fuck her. Ihurther. I whipped her until she bled, I gagged her so she couldn't scream. I bound her so she had to take it. I abused her, and the worst part is that I liked it." His eyes closed and he breathed, "I liked it too much."
"Ela." I let go of his hand to cup his face, leaning toward him. "On the day we first became friends, you were destroying Ciella. When you first met my guardian, you grabbed him by the ring without flinching, and dropped him almost to his knees. I don't know why you'd think this is a surprise to me. You've always been able to dive into that part of yourself in ways I've always envied. You can be so terrifying, but how is that any different from Wraythe? I've always known I'm safe with you, and I don't think anything has changed."
Wraythe gently pressed his hand behind my shoulder blade. "He's going to need to spend time perfecting this. Time with others who will let him abuse them, and we both agree that it should not be you."
"Why not?" I asked.
"Why not me?" Talin said. "C'mon, Ela, you know I like it rough."
"No," Wraythe insisted. "This isn't a thing he can learn with people he loves, ok? It's the sort of urge that is targeted at the ones he hates, and you two can't become that. Not without blurring the lines and fucking up this thing we have. So, no. Ela needs to make some dates with other students and priests, and he's going to come home with marks he won't want to talk about. He will hurt people, possibly more than he wants to. And this will be hard for all of us. For us because it doesn't make sense. For him, because he has to accept himself." He looked from me to Talin, and then over to Eladehl. "But heneedsto do this."
"This new instructor?" Ela said, sounding like whatever he was about to say, he really didn't want to. "Well, those who only deal in giving pain, not receiving? They're usually called punishers. Faylie says I'm beyond that." He paused to scrub his hand over his mouth. "She says I'm a destroyer. Nari, Shalsa sent me to her. This woman is supposed to be able to take more than anyone else and I could've broken her. I wanted to fucking break her."
"Do you hate it?" I asked, hearing the pain in his voice.
"No," he admitted. "I just don't want to hurt you - but sometimes I want to hurt someone. I need to see them beg. When that guy..." His lips closed and he glanced away. "When he surrendered to me, it was the kind of rush that I can't explain. Better than drinking too much. I find myself thinking about it, and I don't want to slip. I don't want to start putting your face under my hand, Nari, but I don't want to be with anyone else, and yet so many of the submissives are women." Slowly, he looked back. "I want to know I can control it, but I do not want you to think I'm looking for someone else."
"Then we'll make rules," I decided. "First, our bed? It's for us." I gestured to all four of us. "If you need a place, then you use Talin's or Wraythe's room. I don't care what order we're in, but onlywewill use this bed. If I need a session with someone, then I'll do the same, going to his place so our bed can be ours."
