Fushigi Yuugi Fan Fiction ❯ Facepaint ❯ Once More, With Feeling ( Chapter 8 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

FY is still not mine, this is still a yaoi, etc. New warning - blood in this chapter (the lemon part, but it's not particularly squicky.)

AN: Okay, Mareu figured out the basics of how his seishi powers work a chapter or so ago, but I'm not going to say what they are yet - it can be a surprise. ^_~

Facepaint

by Sunandshadow

Chapter 8 - Once More, With Feeling

I walked into the seishi's dining room and Nakago choked on his tea. Soi and Tomo looked at him in shock, then followed his gaze to me, and both facefaulted. After taking a moment to recover, Soi leaned over and whispered to Tomo, "I'd call that Tamahome green, wouldn't you?"

Tomo nodded emphatically but whispered back, "You said it, not me."

"Are you ok?" I asked Nakago with real concern. He said nothing, but his look of shock changed to a poisonous glare. "Oh come on, now what did I do wrong?" I seated myself at the table. "You said several of the Suzakus have seen you, so I figured dyeing my hair would be a good start on my disguise." I huffed.

Soi coughed. "Interesting choice of color."

"Do you think it looks ok?" I addressed my question as much to Tomo as to Soi. "The first guy I ever had a crush on had hair like this, and I figured now that I'm a bisienen I could try and pull off the look. Of course I don't have his purple eyes, or…" I blinked at Nakago, who was now an odd shade of red. "Uh… what…?"

Clearly trying not to laugh, Tomo asked, "Mareu, was this guy's name by any chance…"

Nakago cut him off, "Don't say it." Tomo paused, caught between his habitual reaction to Nakago and the fact that he had transferred his loyalty to me now. He compromised by staying silent but smirking at Nakago's discomfiture.

"Uh, his name was Kyoichi Saionji. Why?"

Tomo turned to Nakago and said smugly, "See? Aren't you relieved to know it's not the same guy?" Nakago glared daggers at him, then without a word got up and walked out of the room.

I waited until he was out of earshot, then demanded, "Ok give: what the hell was that about?"

"Tamahome." Soi grumbled the name.

"This is a guy who has green hair?"

"This is a suzaku seishi who has green hair and purple eyes and Nakago had a crush on him." Tomo clarified in a cheerfully acid voice. Soi scowled.

Ok, now I was confused. "But… but I thought he was straight!"

"He wishes he is. He's like you, likes both, but he'd never admit to liking a guy. Hell, he'd never admit to liking anyone, but at least he pays attention to Soi." Soi preened slightly at Tomo's grumbled admission.

"Ohhhhh! That makes so much more sense!" At some point he must have decided that admitting that sex with a guy could be a good thing would be tantamount to accepting the emperor's abuse of him... How awful. It would be really disturbing to be powerfully attracted to someone yet think that even feeling that was wrong because you were betraying yourself to your enemy, or maybe becoming your enemy...

"It does." stated Tomo, his disbelieving tone indicating that it most emphatically did not.

"Yes, yes of course... Dude, you know, that was the only major difference between he and I - maybe he really must be my long lost twin, or something."

Soi's eyes widened as if she had just had an epiphany. "Or something... Maybe... maybe you're his reincarnation! It says right in the legend that the celestial warriors are incarnated over and over again to serve their god - if Seiryuu rejected the original Miboshi's service he could only have used another seiryuu sei as a replacement, and since the rest of us were already here in this incarnation..."

Soi let her sentence trail off and Tomo wide-eyed finished it for her. "...Seiryuu must have grabbed a copy of Nakago from a different incarnation cycle?"

I scowled. "I am not a copy of anyone."

Tomo looked alarmed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean-!"

I sighed and dragged a hand through my hair at the reminder of how fragile he was and why I really shouldn't take my irritation out on him. "Yeah, I know what you meant, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to growl at you. This idea just bothers me. I mean, I've always kinda halfway believed in reincarnation. Although my guess was that I was a reincarnation of Socrates or Confucius or something. Modesty? Me? Never heard of it." I winked at him, though it was a bit half-hearted because I was still disturbed. "But... before Seiryuu brought me here I didn't have a seishi symbol or any kind of divine powers, I was just a... well not exactly normal, I've never been what you could call normal... but I was just a college student, and a girl at that. So how could I possibly be another incarnation of him, if the seven of you are always incarnated to serve your god?"

Soi shrugged. "Don't ask me, ask Seiryuu."

Tomo sniffed at this unhelpful reply. "Well I think it doesn't really matter if you're Nakago's reincarnation or just someone chosen by Seiryuu because you have a similar temperament - you're Miboshi now, and presumably will be for the rest of your life. You're yourself, no matter how you came to be here."

I couldn't help but smile - Tomo seemed quite pleased with himself that he'd managed to come up with some profound words to counter his earlier slip, even if I hadn't really taken being referred to as a 'copy' as an insult. That was one of the most charming things about him - when something really mattered to him he tried so hard... I couldn't help but want to reward him for his effort. So, I smiled fondly at him and said, "Perhaps you're right." and let that be the end of the conversation, though I still felt that I must have come here by absurdly lucky chance, not destiny or deserving. But then, I have always had the devil's own luck - I should have more than enough experience by now at enjoying rewards that I didn't earn.

And perhaps... perhaps I could come close to deserving this divine power and miraculous freedom from my previous life that the rest of them had bought with their suffering in this violent world trapped in the past... perhaps if I threw myself into loving and helping them, if I wielded this gift well enough, it would be almost the same as earning it. It would be a true good deed if I could help repay some of what the gods and the universe owed these people for their pain.

* * *

In bed with Tomo again, a setting that was quickly beginning to feel like home, as he idly stroked my chest and gazed at me with those smoldering golden eyes. "…My god you're beautiful…" he murmured. Then, in a more aggrieved tone, he added, "Even with green hair."

Thus challenged, I let my eyes go slitted with mischief and pounced on him, gently pinning him beneath me, my thighs wrapped around his and our chests just brushing lightly. Teasingly I inquired, "Have a thing for blonds, do you?" and was rewarded with a guilty blush. "Heh. Thought so! Well don't worry, I've dyed my hair before and the color generally washes out completely in four weeks."

I licked the hollow of his collarbone and murmured, "Actually I have a thing for hair too; not the color, but the length. I've never had a lover, male or female, with such gorgeously long hair." I demonstrated my appreciation by kissing his moonlight tresses where they were fanned across the pillow. "And yours has such a lovely silky texture too... I like." I nuzzled his hairline and bit lightly at the nape of his neck, and murmured in a huskier voice, "I like you." A little whimper escaped him, and if he had been hard before, now he was like steel against my belly. Mmmmm… My mouth continued its journey and I slid one hand down his body to lightly trail the backs of my nails over the blue symbol burning on his abdomen, savoring his little sounds of want. Hmm, maybe I should make him beg… My mouth curved into a naughty grin against the underside of his jaw. He might enjoy begging and for once actually getting what he asked for.

I lifted off of him to give him room to maneuver. "Turn over."

Tomo smiled and rolled to his hands and knees.

"No, not like that. Lay flat on your stomach. Please?" I didn't want to sound too commanding at the moment - I made my tone of voice convey that this was just a playful request. Puzzled but amiable, Tomo obeyed, craning his neck so he could see what I was up to. I resumed my previous position straddling his thighs, lowered my lips to his hairline, and began my treasure hunt.

I kissed and licked at his hairline and the sides of his neck. "Mareu, what exactly…?" I thought to myself, If he can talk, I'm not doing enough. I promptly remedied this by moving my mouth (gently this time) to the spot on the left side of the back of his neck that was the mirror of the bruise on the right side. Tomo moaned and quit talking. I smiled to myself, then went on with my pilgrimage to all of the typical sensitive spots of a back. I ran my tongue down his spine, then moved my mouth back up, blowing gently.

"Rrrghk!" All of Tomo's muscles snapped tense and his back broke out in gooseflesh, but between my chest and the mattress he couldn't get away. "Mareu, what the fuck…?!" I quickly replaced my mouth on the back of his neck, which was now twice as sensitive, and Tomo subsided with a strangled moan. I smiled to myself.

I licked once more at his hairline and the sides of his neck, this time getting more of a response. I trailed my tongue down his spine again and he tensed in anticipation, whimpering a strangled, "Don't…!" and I didn't, leaving the moisture to evaporate with agonizing slowness while I nipped at the hollow under one of his shoulder blades. He growled and writhed, but didn't tell me to stop.

I whispered huskily in his ear, "Isn't that a neat trick?" then quickly attacked the hollow of his other shoulder blade. He answered with an inarticulate moan and a hunch of his hips as he tried to either thrust into the mattress or impale himself on me, but couldn't do either because I was sitting on his thighs. I chuckled, kissed the back of his neck one last time, then sat back so my mouth could reach the small of his back and he had more freedom to move.

I repeated the lick and blow trick on the lower half of his spine, carefully keeping out of the way when his hips snapped upwards. "Rrrhkk!" I quickly let my tongue apologize for my offense by sucking on the crest of his hip. When he bucked his hips into the mattress again I switched to licking the dimples flanking his tailbone. Then I nibbled the crest of his other hip, earning another desperate thrust. I kissed my way down his tailbone. Finally I started to lick at the cleft of his ass, but I couldn't reach much because I still had his knees pinned together between mine.

I lifted myself off of him, giving him complete freedom of movement so he could open his thighs for me and I could begin giving him a thorough rimming. But he had other ideas, apparently - in a flash he flipped over and yanked me down on top of him, and I suddenly found myself with a mouthful of tongue, creamy thighs wrapped around my waist, and a red-violet cock weeping precum sliding against my abs. Not quite the reaction I had been expecting, but I certainly wasn't complaining. In a moment I was lust-dazed and humping back, losing myself in the sweet coppery taste of his tongue, noting distantly 10 little fingernail pricks across my shoulder blades. Half of these went away for a moment and an object was pressed into my fingers. I forced my eyes open and discovered that I was holding the little bottle of oil. Oh, that's useful. I thought bemusedly. Hmm, from this position it would seem I'm topping… Funny, I seem to be doing that a lot... I was curious as why this was, but I didn't have the brainpower to pursue it at the moment.

Oil on hand, quick slide of the hand down his shaft so he could thrust against my abs more effectively (he moaned his appreciation), then a more thorough job oiling myself and his behind. Then I positioned my tip at his entrance, pushing just enough to tease. Now was the time to make him plead for what he wanted. "Beg me! Beg for what you want!" I commanded, trying to keep the laughter out of my voice and almost succeeding.

"Mareu!" he whimpered. "I need you inside me! Please, now, please!"

I slid into him and he cried out with pleasure and relief, but I was not by any means done making demands; I wanted to hear his voice rough with need telling me how to make him feel. "Tell me what you want." I growled, thrusting slowly. "Tell me!"

Through the haze of sensory overload Tomo tried to answer. "I want…" I want you not to leave! "…want you to…" I want you to stay here and… and…"love me!" The words slipped out without his intent or even the full realization that he'd said them aloud.

I, however, had been so focused on enjoying his words that when instead of the expected 'Fuck me!' or 'Make me cum!" he came out with the universes-different 'Love me!' I facefaulted and froze in mid-stroke while my brain reevaluated the situation. At my sudden stillness Tomo's eyes opened and he looked at me in confusion, then he realized what had happened and his expression turned stormy with anger at himself and fear for what my reaction would be. He slammed a fist into the mattress. "Fuck! I didn't mean to say that!" His voice was anguished and still ragged from having been so aroused. "I'm sorry, I didn't…!"

I let out the breath I had unconsciously been holding. "Hey, shhh, it's okay." I brushed a hand gently across his cheek. "It's okay." I repeated reassuringly. "I'm not upset. I just… was surprised, and I wasn't sure what to say."

He just looked at me with these deep pools of hurt in his eyes that tore my heart and reduced that usually calm and practical voice in the back of my head to a twitching puddle of hormones and maternal instincts. Oh gods, pleeeease don't look at me like that! "Hey, it… I…" I floundered, desperately trying to think of a way to make that hurt go away without telling a lie or making a promise I couldn't keep. I could ignore him, shut him out the way Nakago had, but in addition to wounding him cruelly it would also be a betrayal of myself, the person I have built myself to be. So I had to answer him, but how? Oh fuck, I'll just say it! I sucked in a quick breath and forced the words out as fast as I could. "I'veneverfalleninlove because Ican't because Idon'tknowhow!"

"… don't … know how?" he asked, with (thank the gods!) puzzlement and a tinge of hope in his voice rather than hurt.

I nodded mutely, then after a moment added timidly, "I can feel other kinds of things, like the affection you feel for a friend or a child, I can feel lust and aesthetic appreciation; just not… capital L Love. That 'truly, madly, deeply', 'happily-ever-after' stuff - I never quite understood that. I'm sorry…" Tomo blinked, silently considering this, thoughts flashing quickly by: Is he really incapable of love? Permanently? Is Nakago like that too?

I could find no words with which to make things better, so I hid my face against his shoulder. I breathed the gentlest of kisses onto his skin, and where before my hands had held him with the assurance of possession I now let them lay upon him lightly, as if I was afraid of his reaction. I wasn't really - not afraid he would reject me, because I knew he didn't have the emotional strength to push me away yet - but I was deathly afraid that he would now see me as unreachable, so that my touch would hurt him even as it gave him pleasure, the way Soi is with Nakago. To give him that kind of pain where my intent was to heal would be a terrible failure, and the fault would be squarely mine for not reacting cleverly enough, not being kind enough to lie, grossly overestimating my competence to heal him in the first place… No, I simply could not let such a thing happen.

"I'm sorry." I whispered again. I gently stroked his arm, then lifted my head and met his eyes once more. "Are you mad at me?" I made pity-me eyes at him. "I mean, you have a right to be, but… I hope you're not mad… because I really do like you, you know." That was simply, purely, true, and I felt good saying it.

I watched him take this in, trying to find his way through the storm of his emotions, anxiously trying to look deep enough into my eyes to read my heart. A truly passionate person is a thing of beauty... but I'm not sure I would become one if I could, so much suffering seems to come with the territory. Maybe I'm a little cold-hearted, but at least I'm content most of the time, and things don't torture me the way they do someone as fiery as Tomo. Compared to his passionate craving for me, my liking of him might be considered a pitiful thing... but it was real, it was there, steady as sunshine on a summer day, and I wished I could just open up my heart and show it to him. But we poor humans cannot look into each others' souls, we must make inadequate words and gestures do the work that ought by rights to be done by empathy.

"Why?" the question tore itself from his soft lips. "Why me, why… do you like…?" he let the question trail off, a little too timid to complete the thought, but it was enough; I smiled with relief and held him a little closer.

"'Why?', huh? Well, let me see…" I gazed at him and just let the beauty of who he was wash over me and pull a fond smile from my lips. Gods, where to start? There were just so many things I liked about him… "I like the way you speak." Tomo blinked and I smiled at his surprise. "Listening to you I can tell that you understand the power of words, how you have to choose them carefully but speak them with true emotion as if they weren't premeditated. It takes skill and intelligence to be able to do that well, and it takes a particular flavor of mind to realize that it ought to be done at all."

"I like how gracefully you walk, I like your scent, I like your textures, I think you're very, very beautiful… And you're so passionate, not just in the way you do this," I gestured at our still-joined bodies and the rumpled sheets that evidenced our interrupted lovemaking, "But in the way you live, the way you are - maybe I'm sunshine, like you say, but you are a bonfire, a storm, the tides of the moon and the sea, the wind in the trees at midnight..." I blinked and faltered, almost blushing, having surprised myself with my own poetry and the depth of my attraction to him. Maybe it wasn't love, but nurtured a bit it might reveal itself as a full-blown obsession. Whether that was a good thing I really wasn't sure... It always makes me nervous to think about committing myself to something so intensely...

My words, however, seemed to have managed to reassure Tomo a bit. "Then… why are you leaving?" The nurturer in me hurt to hear the cry of abandonment behind his words.

"I have to earn a place for myself here. I have to have power - not huge amounts, but enough to work with. Right now Nakago has all the power here. I'm hobbled by the fact that I know next to nothing about this country and its culture - if I tried going around gathering up power on my own I'd probably end up making enemies... look, it's not really why I'm leaving that's bothering you, is it? It's that I'm leaving at all, and you don't trust me to come back." Tomo immediately looked guilty, so I rushed to clarify, "And that makes perfect sense, you have no real reason to trust me, you haven't known me long enough, and I know I don't have the kind of personality that inspires blind faith. Nor would I want people to follow me blindly - that would be way too much responsibility..." I shook my head - I was supposed to be addressing Tomo's fears at the moment, not my own, especially since mine were old and familiar and it would do me no good to worry them over again.

Nor would it do me any good to be embarrassed by the fact that my hard-on had vanished, although I was. Funny, I've heard so many stories about guys being mortified by having erections when they didn't want to, but I'm so used to flaunting my sexuality that it had never occurred to me to feel that way myself; yet here I was embarrassed not to be aroused, even though it was a perfectly logical result of emotional stress and Tomo had lost his arousal too. A foolishly small thing to be worried about while there was a much more important discussion going on, but Tomo had to have noticed my 'crestfallen' state, buried in his body as I still was... just barely... I forced the issue out of my mind and dragged my focus back to trying to reassure him that I was planning to return. "So... what if I explain why I'll want to come back? Maybe that would make you feel better?" I offered tentatively.

Tomo blinked, then noncomitally said, "Alright."

"Okay." I took a deep breath and tried to organize my thoughts. "Well... I suppose it all comes down to curiosity. I told you I think of myself as being like a cat, right? Well, where I come from cats are supposed to be extremely curious, and often get into trouble because of their curiosity. Anyway, whether cats are truly curious or not, I am. And I find everything here in Kotou fascinating! I want to find out more about dragon gods and wishes, more about whether I'm really Nakago's reincarnation, more about who you are... more about everything here! Hell I'm even curious about what the art supplies here are like to work with!" I forced a smirk, then gave him a more honest, serious look. "I never walk away from something I'm not done studying. And I am absolutely not done studying you."

That was apparently reassuring enough to give him the courage to finally demand what he really wanted, and it was a demand, even if he couched it it pleading. "Mareu... you keep telling me you think you'll want to come back. Can't you just promise? Promise me you'll come back! Please?"

I hesitated, my perhaps too-vivid imagination immediately supplying several situations that might simply make it impossible for me to come back, from something as simple as my death to something as implausible as a Lady-of-Shallot style curse that would destroy myself and/or Kotou should I ever set foot here again. I was annoyed at him for trying to force me to promise, but more annoyed at myself for hesitating over mights and maybes when Tomo obviously needed to be reassured, I mentally growled and shoved those irrelevant scenarios to the back of my mind. I might hate the idea of making any kind of commitment I wasn't absolutely certain I would be able to keep, but dammit, soothing his worries was more important than indulging my little phobia!

I took a deep breath and looked him in the eyes. "All right, yes. I promise that I will come back. Back here, back to you... I give you my word."

He looked directly back at me with those big amber eyes, just looked... then suddenly hugged me hard, burying his face in my neck.

"Good." he said softly into the side of my neck; I could feel the word as a gently puff of warm air. Then, after a moment, he added, "Kiss me?"

I blinked, then suddenly all the tension went out of my muscles, and I let out all my stress and worry with a big breath that hinted at a hysterical chuckle. It was going to be all right. "Anytime." I murmured gladly, then kissed him as requested. And kissed him some more, gently at first, and then more thoroughly. Gods his skin smelled good...

As we resumed our lovemaking, I could feel his desperation to keep me there with him in the way his legs locked around my waist and his lips sought the hollow of my throat. I was finding that it felt very good to be wanted so very badly. I was flattered... and aroused, which permitted me to relax further as that embarrassment was erased. Even the ten little pinpricks across my shoulder blades returned, as we got more energetic and Tomo clutched me more tightly to him, even as I drove my hips more forcefully against his bottom - it felt almost like we had simply gone back to where we were before. I had fixed it, I really had, everything really was all better... I was flying.

Flying so high I was getting very close, very quickly. "Close..." I murmured to warn him, then took a moment to lean in for a desperate, breathless kiss. In this position I couldn't free a hand to stroke him, so I crooned to him instead. "Cum for me, Tomo..." I breathed. This time I was asking, not demanding, and he whimpered and arched in response. "Gods, you're so beautiful, so sexy..." I cried out as I lost my grip and started shooting, my hips involuntarily snapping forward, as I was suddenly caught up in the instinct to drive my seed into him as deeply as possible. Eyes closed with the overwhelming sensation, I groaned, "Cum for me, lover. Cum with me..." And he did cum, and every muscle in his body clenched, including the ones wrapped around my cock, and it felt like ecstasy... then suddenly I was doubled forward, hissing through my teeth at the tearing pain across my back. "Ouch! Fuck! Goddamn it, what the hell...?!" I howled involuntarily.

Tomo's previously half-lidded eyes snapped open, and he looked at me in confusion. I sat back on my knees and reached up to touch my back... and felt hot, sticky wetness, and not the kind from stray cum. Bringing my hand back in front of my face, I saw that, sure enough, my fingers were wet with blood. Tomo looked at the crimson smears, non-plussed. Then, understanding slowly dawning, he brought one of his own hands to his face and looked in horror at the drops of red staining his nails, almost the same shade as the paint on them. Then his eyes flew to me, his expression shifting to absolute panic. "Mareu! Oh my god, I'm so sorry, I...! Fuck, I'll cut my nails, I swear, just don't...!"

"Whoa there!" I caught his anxiously fluttering hands and pressed a kiss on the back of one. My back was still screaming in pain, but I forced the grimace off of my face. "It's all right, they're just scratches. Don't panic sweetheart." Where that term of endearment came from I had no idea, but I was too busy to worry about it.

"But you're bleeding...!"

"Really, it's okay." And, oddly enough, it was. I wasn't mad at him. The pain was there, but it somehow seemed faded, more an annoyance than the agony it had been a moment ago. It just wasn't as important as keeping Tomo from feeling the awful guilt and fear and sorrow that were written all over his face. I regarded him steadily, searching my mind for some word or gesture that would impress upon him that I really didn't mind. And maybe I've read too many vampire novels, but suddenly I knew exactly what to do. I raised his hand to my mouth and, with a small smirk, licked the blood from one carmine-painted nail. Tomo looked at me as if I had lost my mind - but, thank all gods, dragon and otherwise, not at if he thought I was about to storm out of his room and never speak to him again. "Well, I told you I don't enjoy pain; but, I don't exactly hate it either." I left that ambiguous statement in the air for him to interpret as he liked, and chuckled, which had the minorly annoying side effect of making my wounds throb all over again. "Hey," I added, "I guess now we're even for the bruise I put on the back of your neck."

He regarded me stubbornly, almost daring me to object. "You will come back. Before these heal. And I'll..." he hesitated, suddenly shy, "...I'll see the marks and know you're mine...?"

I looked at him in disbelief. Possessive much? That was a hell of a dramatic way to ask someone for a permanent relationship, carve it right into their back. O_o The artist in me appreciated the gesture, while my good old fear of commitment was breaking out into a cold sweat. Fortunately the rational part of me was in control of my mouth, and it objected more calmly, "That will be less than two weeks. You want me to talk the Emperor of Konan into supporting a civil coup in less than two weeks? I'm good, but I'm not sure I'm that good..."

"If you can't do it in two weeks, you probably won't be able to do it at all. The longer you live among them, the more likely you are to be caught, and some of them are quite powerful, and they have good reason not to like Seiryuu seishi, and you barely know how to use your powers, don't thing you're immortal just because you suddenly have divine powers, we can be hurt too..." Tomo noticed that his argument was degenerating into an outpouring of worry, and he closed his jaw with a snap, determined to keep his fears caged more tightly. But I had gotten the point.

"Alright." He blinked at me, then his expression lit up as he realized I was actually giving in. "Back before these heal. I'll try." I added cautioningly, but he was undaunted, and gave me a smug smile - a real victory, since this was the first time he had truly smiled since the near-disaster earlier. Despite my own fears, I couldn't help the answering grin that tugged at the corner of my mouth.

* * *

And so, the next morning, with new Chinese clothes over my scratched back, a sword I barely knew how to use, and a skittish horse to keep an eye on, I set out for Konan and the Suzakus' last reported position.

AN: Hey all! ^_^ By the way, this fic has the most lemons I've ever written, so I'm curious to know what you think - are they any good? How's the level of detail? Is it weird reading them in first person? Would you like them to be more artistic/poetic/stylized, like the one in Chapter 5, or more like this one? Does anyone particularly want me to go back and add the masturbation lemon to Chapter 3?

Heck, I'm just a feedback whore in general, so please review! Remember, a review that makes me really think about the story makes me more likely to finish the next chapter soon! ^_~ mailto:sunandshadow@excite.com