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AUTHOR: Flyingskull
SOURCE: Heyer's "Devil's Cub" and X-Men comic books
RATING: NC 17
DISCLAIMER: Don't own the X-Men and don't own the Heyer characters. I do this purely for fun and no gain.
WARNING: Kinks, threesome, extreme sex.
NOTE: In Devil's cub, not one of dear Georgette's best, there's an incredibly slashy scene between Vidal, the Devil's cub and the 'nobody' his cousin wants to marry. How could I resist? Vidal, devil's cub... Remy! The others fell into place so well they got given cameos except for Kurt who got co-opted in a peculiar valet's role. This is a PWP and sheer madness.
The man lolling in the coach traversing London at a murderous pace appeared to be fast asleep, or drunk. He sprawled, oblivious to the rattling of the modish vehicle; his black and silver tricorne pulled down on his face.
His carriage was elegant; his body long and deceptively slender, clad in black velvet and silver lace; his beautiful white hands plunged deep in his coat pockets. The light of the passing flambeaus fired pure white from diamonds half hidden in foaming lace.
In a surprising short time, the coach left the environs of the city and sped through Hounslow Heath. All of a sudden a shot made the horses plunge, the coachman curse and the groom cry out in terror. The gentleman in the carriage raised his head and yawned, but did not otherwise move. The light of the moon showed a man's head in silhouette in the coach's window, and a coarse voice commanded: 'Hand over the pretties, my hearty!'
The man in the coach languidly removed a pin from the cascade of lace at his throat and made to proffer it. The diamond sparkled rosy red, and in an instant the pin was embedded in the higwayman's eye and exploding. The man barely had time to avert his head to avoid being spattered with the unfortunate bandit's brains.
'Well?' he drawled. 'What are we waiting for?' His voice was bored and indifferent, but his coachman shivered in terror
.'Nothing, my lord,' he quavered and cracked his whip. The horses resumed their gallop and the groom, hanging on for dear life whispered, in the coachman's ear: 'We're leaving, just like that?'
'You've seen that man's head. There's nothing we can do.'
The groom licked his dry lips, thinking of the dead man left to wallow in his blood. 'How old is he?' he asked.
'Four and twenty or thereabouts.'
'Four and twenty? And he kills his man as cool as you please and leaves the corpse to the scavengers?'
The coachman was intent on the road, but a death's head grin made his teeth glitter in the moonlight. 'That's the Quality for you, my boy,' he said.
*
The Lady Montacute's drum was a splendid success. All the Beau Monde had graced it with their presence; innumerable candles were reflected in diamonds, emeralds and sapphires in a kaleidoscope of elegance and beauty. Lady Mist, languidly fanning herself with a creation by the the great Chasserau, was talking to her old friend Sir Henry McCoy.
She had elected to wear a Soupir d'Etuffes figured gown, worn over a pale grey petticoat held by stiff panniers, which set off her blue skin to perfection. Her hair was piled up on her head in a daring Chien Couchant, and her age took nothing from her allure.
She had been known as Mistique in her somewhat reckless youth and Sir Henry, towering over her, was very happy to cast a knowledgeable eye over the twin mounds of her still very firm breasts, while vaguely attending to her chatter.
'My dear Henry I vow and declare I never go anywhere but what I hear of that abominable boy!' she was saying. 'And never anything good! People are saying is he wickedly blood-thirsty or something equally disagreeable and it's quite true, you know, but one doesn't want the whole world to say so! They call him Devil's Cub, you know? And it's no use to tell me that they of course would, with those eyes, because I know for a fact that that has nothing to do with it. Jean of course laughs, well she would, he's got her fiery temper, and says that mechant Remy is really thoughtless. Thoughtless!' She closed her fan with a snap and added with some asperity: 'As for Xavier, sometimes I think he does not care at all what happens to Remy.'
Sir Henry lat his gaze wander to the tall arrogant figure adroitly flirting with two tittering damsels at the same time. 'After all,' he slowly said, 'Remy is so very like him.'
'Lud, if you intend to be mean to my poor Xavier, I shall not listen!' said Lady Mist sharply rapping her friend's blue fur with her fan. 'For all his past follies, he was never such a devil as LeBeau! My dear brother may have been reckless, but he was never callous!'
'He's just a boy, Mistique.'
'That makes it even worse!' she said. 'He thinks he can be forgiven everything because of his… yes, devilish charm, but he won't be. He'll pass all bounds and kill someone important and then he'll be forced to live abroad! Mark my words, that dreadful boy is riding to his own perdition!'
'And spoil your dream, is that your fear?' Sir Henry's voice was tinged with sarcasm. After all he knew his Mistique, no matter that he still lusted after her. He knew her failings and her ruthless ambition to have her daughter marry her cousin, the undecently rich and murderous Marquis of LeBeau.
*
The Marquis was endeavouring to persuade a lovely bride that cuckolding her husband was the only think she needed to get a cachet in Society, when an ungentle hand plucked forcefully at his sleeve. Mildly annoyed he turned to chastise the offender, and found himself face to face with Miss Mist.
'Good God!' he said 'I've stumbled into a family gathering!'
'Don't be so disagreeable, LeBeau,' that enchanting damsel said rather pettishly. 'There is something I particularly desire to ask you.'
'You can spare your breath, Rogue,' he said. 'I never do anything for anybody.'
'Not even for me?' she said, batting her long lashes.
'No.'
'You are frightfully disobliging,' she pouted. 'It quite resolves me not to marry you.'
'I had hoped it might,' said his lordship calmly.
'Oh, don't be so afraid!' she giggled. 'I'm going to marry someone quite different.'
'Are you?' said the Marquis evincing faint signs of interest. 'Does your mother know?'
'You are wicked and most hatefully rude, Remy,' Miss Mist said, 'but at least I never have to explain things to you. Mama knows and that's why she is packing me to France.'
'Is she? Are you contemplating a misalliance?'
Miss Mist stiffened in every line of her generous figure. 'It is no such thing!' she declared. 'He may not be a brilliant match or have a title, but all the titled men are like you and you must admit you would make a horrid husband.
''So wise for your tender years…' his lordship murmured, amused. 'I like your hair,' he said, 'you shall be all the rage in France.'
'I want you to meet him,' Miss Mist ordered, ignoring the Marquis' base try at diverting her thoughts. 'Come with me.'
She grabbed his lordship arm eliciting a protest.
'So impetuous, Rogue!' he said, while being ignominiously dragged towards a small salon. 'You must learn to mend your ways, chere. You can't go around dragging gentlemen along as if they were little more than parcels.'
'I'm dragging *you*,' Miss Mist replied tartly. 'You are my cousin, after all.'
'But surely a gentleman, for all that.' His lordship countered suavely.
A most inelegant snort greeted this sally; but, as soon as the cousins entered the small and deserted salon, Miss Mist's face softened and she let go of the Marquis' arm.
LeBeau's gaze alit on a gentleman looking out of a window. The man was short and stocky, with powerful bulging muscles imperfectly concealed by evening clothes. He had quite rightly chosen a coat of severe cut and subdued hue, he wore Lunardi lace at his throat and wrists and a black solitaire adorned his cravat. He wore a square signet ring on one finger, and he had plainly eschewed the services of a coiffeur. His unpowdered hair stood up in odd tufts here and there.
'Lord! What is the matter with you, Rogue?' expostulated the Marquis, who had begun to suspect his cousin had taken leave of her senses. The man by the window turned at the sound of his voice, and LeBeau hastily repudiated his first impression.
The man's face was strong and conveyed the impression of a savage nature barely held in check; his eyes were blue, and so intense his gaze seemed to scorch the air. For a moment, LeBeau had the disquieting impression of standing naked before that magnetic and powerful being, and this annoyed him so much, that he vouchsafed the other nothing more than a slight inclination of the head.
The man seemed to realise this and bowed with careless elegance, his rather cruel lips curled into an ironic smile. 'Logan Wolverine, at your service,' he said.
'La, Logy!' Rogue exclaimed, diverted. 'You are very punctilious tonight!' She tapped Mr. Wolverine coquettishly with her fan. 'This uncouth gentleman is my cousin, Remy Marquis of LeBeau,' she said. 'He is very disagreeable, but he will help us.'
'I understand you judge the match unequal, my lord,' Mr Wolverine said in a mesmerising rasp, 'but I assure you I own a considerable property in Nottinghamshire and Lord Carlisle will speak for me at need.'
By this time LeBeau had recovered his poise and waved a languid hand. 'My dear sir,' he said, amused, 'I'm not Rogue's guardian, tell it to her brother. However,' he added maliciously, 'if you're really set on marrying the chit, I urge you to elope with her. Her family will never give their consent. Now, if you will excuse me…' he murmured and bowed himself out.
For a long moment Mr. Wolverine's eyes burned into the retreating man's back, then he turned his attention once more to his wilful intended.
*
Timothy's was a discreet-looking establishment in a street off St. James, the windows were thickly curtained, but when a funereal clad porter admitted my lord Carlisle and his protégé, Mr. Wolverine fairly blinked at the blaze of lights within the house. The black clad porter has startled him, but Carlisle explained that was a whim of LeBeau's.
'The Marquis owns a gaming hell?' said Mr Wolverine, greatly surprised.
'Oh, no! But Timothy was in his father's employ once, so he strives to please his former master's son. Though I must tell you,' Carlisle said, pursing his lips in disapproval, 'that it wouldn't surprise me in the least, if LeBeau chose to open a gaming hell. It's the only thing he seems not to have done. He's a peep of dawn boy, you know,' he continued. 'Frequents the Hellfire Club, or so I'm told; and if rumour has it right, he's been seen at least once in Mother Clap's Molly House!'
'Really?' Mr. Wolverine sounded more interested than scandalised at these disclosures and Lord Carlisle was forced once again to reflect on the unreadability of his protégé's face and voice.
The had reached the head of the stairway, and Lord Carlisle led the way into one of the gaming rooms. It was somewhat crowded and apparently given to pharaoh and deep basset. My lord passed through it and led Mr. Wolverine through an archway and into a second and smaller apartment. The rattle of dice sounded and Mr. Wolverine's eyes brightened.
'H'm, LeBeau's bank,' Carlisle grunted. 'I should not play if I were you.'
Mr. Wolverine perceived my lord LeBeau at the end of a table, a glass at his elbow. His cravat was loosened, and a strand of lightly powdered cinnamon hair had escaped the riband that tied it at the nape of the neck and was falling enticingly over one eye. He wore a coat of purple velvet, heavily laced, and a flowered waistcoat, one or two of the buttons of which had come undone.
LeBeau looked pale in the candlelight, and rather more dissipated than usual. He glanced up, as Mr. Wolverine drew near the table, but his eyes, which seemed more than usually brilliant, betrayed no recognition.
Carlisle tugged at Mr. Wolverine's sleeve. 'Better play pharaoh,' he muttered. 'LeBeau is in a wild humour, by the look of it. See who's at the table? Oh! You wouldn't know. Red-faced fellow in a bag-wig. Name's Creed. There's bad blood between him and the Devil's Cub. There's bound to be trouble. Best out of it.'
'I fail to perceive how I could be concerned in the trouble,' rumbled Mr. Wolverine, and returned to the contemplation of the table.
'Coming in, my lord? Take the bank?' asked mincingly one of the Summers brothers.
'Not I,' Carlisle said. 'I'm not dicing tonight, but if you have a place at the table, Mr. Wolverine here is of a mind to play.'
My lord paused in the act of refilling his glass and bent once more his red gaze on the newcomer. 'Oh, it's you, is it?' he said ungraciously. 'I thought I knew you. Do you want to throw for the bank?'
'I thank your lordship, but I would prefer to throw against the bank,' replied Mr. Wolverine, and sat down.
'You'll lose, sir,' said Creed sneeringly. 'This is a damned one-sided game.'
LeBeau leaned back into his chair, one hand in his breeches' pocket, the other with its long fingers curled around the stem of his wine glass; his hard stare challenged the player. 'Had enough, Creed?' His tone was an insult.
Victor Creed said with bitter distinctness: 'Enough? No, by God, but let someone else hold the bank!'
The Marquis' eyes never left Creed. 'There's a matter of some four thousand pounds in the bank,' he said. 'Throw you for it.'
Mr Creed said angrily: 'Damned if I will! Not against you, my lord.'
'Raise you a hundred!' LeBeau sang out, insolently.
'I'd say my lord LeBeau can't lose,' Mr Creed went on doggedly. 'If my lord won't relinquish the bank, I say give us fresh dice!'
His words brought about a sudden, uneasy silence. Summers tried to fill the breach saying quickly: 'Lord, you are too drunk to know what you say, Creed. Let's get on with the game.'
'I think not.' The voice had come from the end of the table. The Marquis was leaning forward, his wine glass still in his hand. 'So you don't like the dice, eh?'
'No, I don't like them, curse you!' Creed shouted. 'And I don't like your high handed ways! I've sat here three nights and I've seen you do nothing but win! It smells bad…'
He got no farther; the Marquis was up and had dashed the contents of his glass full into Victor Creed's face. 'And that's a waste of a good wine,' he said.
Mr Creed jumped up, overturning his chair and lunged at the Marquis, but an arm like a rock held him at bay. For a moment golden eyes locked into blue ones, then Creed shook himself free and snarled: 'You'll meet me for this, my lord.'
'Be sure I will,' said the Marquis. 'We'll settle it now, my buck.'
'My lord, this is madness!' cried Mr Summers 'Most irregular! Oh, my Lord! Look out! He has a pistol!'
Quick as a snake, the Marquis of LeBeau swept the dice off the table and threw them, blazing pink, at his foe. One, exploding on arrival, shattered Mr. Creed's pistol, and the other, Mr. Creed's chest.
'My God,' someone said, shakily, 'he's killed him!'
'I wish,' replied LeBeau a trifle thickly, 'but no such luck, I fear. Well,' he went on after a pause, 'he's got his wish for fresh dice.'
The people at the table were bending on the unfortunate Mr Creed and calling loudly for help and refreshments. The Marquis surveyed the chaos he had created with an amused smile playing on his lips. Mr. Wolverine made up his mind.
'Will you play a game of piquet with me, my lord?' he asked.
LeBeau laughed a little wildly. 'Why not?' he said after a while. 'The devil's in the dice tonight and I'll be damned if I'll go home before dawn.'
He got up and led the way to another small apartment in which two small tables were set for cards, both unoccupied. 'We're in luck,' said the Marquis. 'Sit down while I tell Timothy not to disturb us.'
Mr. Wolverine sat down a little pensively. He had not shown it, but he had been rather discomposed by the Marquis' callousness. He was no doubt attracted by the young man and had been very interested in the titbits of gossip Carlisle had imparted to him; but wild recklessness and an appetite for his own sex were one thing, wanton murder another. The Marquis of LeBeau, the Devil's Cub, was sorely in need of a lesson, and Mr Wolverine felt he was the perfect man to give it to him. Smiling secretly, he laid back in his chair and awaited the Marquis' return.
*
The Marquis came back with a fresh pack of cards. 'Cut, Mr. Wolverine,' he said; the other man obeyed and won the deal.
'What shall we play for?' LeBeau drawled. 'The usual stake?'
'I had something else in mind, my lord.' Mr Wolverine said firmly.
The Marquis laughed suddenly and abandoned his drawl. 'We'll play for love, Mr Wolverine.'
Mr Wolverine paused in the middle of the deal. 'I can scarcely suppose, my lord, that would amuse you.'
'Not in the least,' grinned the Marquis, 'but I don't fleece my relatives, or care to be fleeced by them.'
Mr Wolverine jumped. 'Sir?'
'Well, sir?'
Mr Wolverine carefully laid down his pack. 'Do I understand you to mean you favour my suit, my lord?'
'I suppose if Rogue wants you, she'll have you. She's as strong as a bull and infinitely more persistent. Get it out of your head that I have anything to do with it.' Having delivered himself of this diatribe, the Marquis smiled impishly. 'Now name your stake, sir.'
Mr Wolverine nodded and completed the deal. 'Without wishing to be guilty of impoliteness,' he said in a tone that belied his words, 'your temper is such that would preclude love as a stake.' Mr Wolverine paused thoughtfully for a moment and then said: 'We shall play for pleasure.'
LeBeau laughed, a trifle giddily. Mr Wolverine's smile was more than a touch feral, and it put the Marquis forcibly in mind of a predator savouring the hunt. 'For pleasure, Mr wolverine?' he asked. 'How?'
'The loser gives the winner complete sovereignty over his body for the rest of tonight,' said Mr Wolverine, still smiling his disquieting smile. He noticed the Marquis had been taken aback, but was recovering nicely.
'I see Carlisle has gossiped,' LeBeau said, a trifle contemptuously. 'Lord, what an old woman that man is!'
'That's as may be,' said Mr Wolverine. 'I do not comment on my patron. Well, my lord? Will you play?'
'Oh, I'll play, I'll play!' the Marquis answered at once. 'I'm drunk enough and bored enough to risk it. One word of warning, though,' he added, picking up his cards. 'Carlisle doesn't know the whole of it… or even the truth of it. You may be disappointed, if I win.'
Mr Wolverine's eye flew up, interested. The dissipated young man facing him was a more complex creature than at first appeared. His resolve didn't falter, but it changed, subtly. Maybe the Devil's Cub was in need of more than one lesson and he was more than happy to oblige him.
'I don't intend to lose, my lord,' Mr Wolverine said quietly. A fleeting doubt about the decency of exploiting the Marquis' drunkenness to his own ends made him add: 'You can still refuse to play, my lord. I see I was misinformed.'
LeBeau's eyes opened wide and for the first time that night he studied the man in front of him. Once more, he had to revise his judgement, Mr Wolverine was a force to be reckoned with, a dangerous man, a man not to be trifled with. The Marquis was not sure he fully understood the game the man was playing, but he was sure that, if he lost, he would be made to pay rather more than he was ready to concede.
For a moment he was tempted to accept the way out he was being so gracefully offered, but his pride rebelled at that. He was a gamester to the core; the greater the risk, the greater his desire to play. But he was not so drunk and reckless as to follow impulse without ascertaining one thing first.
'Are you perchance a friend of Mr Creed and looking for revenge, sir? He asked, looking Mr Wolverine firmly in the eyes.
'No, may lord,' Mr Wolverine said. 'I met that gentleman…' He stopped at the Marquis' snort of scorn. 'That gentleman,' he repeated firmly, 'for the first time in my life tonight. I believe I have an innate passion for justice, though.'
The Marquis smiled charmingly. 'I perceive I should have let that gentleman blow a hole through me,' he said.
'Not at all,' Mr Wolverine replied gravely. 'But I think that disarming him would have sufficed.'
'I see,' LeBeau said. 'You were repulsed by my murderous attack. He'll heal, you know?'
'He may well do that, my lord,' Mr Wolverine said, intent on the Marquis, the cards forgotten. 'But that is not the point.'
The Marquis nodded. 'And you wish to teach me a lesson in justice?' he said.
Mr Wolverine was surprised, he had not supposed the Marquis would have seen it, as drunk as he was. His plans for the night underwent a further change. The boy was attractive, his smell enchanting, his intellect bright and his body irresistible.
There was danger there, a very real danger. Mr Wolverine had no intention of losing his heart to the spoiled heir of a very powerful and rich family. He envisaged a happy married life with the lady of his choice and a plentiful family. Whatever pleasures he privately would seek, would be kept apart from his family life, but that would be in the future.
Tonight the temptation was too strong, and he would see to it that the Marquis could get no hold over him. Mr Wolverine smiled unpleasantly. 'Yes,' he said baldly, 'among other things.'
LeBeau shivered a little at Mr Wolverine's tone of voice; and even he could not have said if it was a frisson of fear or anticipation. 'I'm devilishly drunk,' he said with charming simplicity. 'You saw what I can do when drunk.'
'I heal as well,' Mr Wolverine said, indifferently.
'I congratulate you.' His lordship dipped his head in an ironical bow.
Mr Wolverine laughed suddenly. LeBeau observed with interest how the other's face changed utterly. Mr Wolverine, laughing, had lost all his look of brooding menace, and had transformed himself into a handsome, witty, attractive companion.
'I'll play!' the Marquis said. 'You have my word I'll not explode you.'
Mr Wolverine picked up his cards. 'I never doubted your honour,' he said.
LeBeau inclined his head once more, with no trace of irony, this time. 'Four only,' was all he said.
Mr Wolverine picked up the remaining four cards. 'I was under the impression that I detested you, my lord,' he said.
'I thought as much,' the Marquis said. 'A point of six, a quinte and three aces. Six played. But now you find that I can be quite agreeable and you reserve your judgement.'
Mr Wolverine drew six cards from his hand with some deliberation. 'True,' he said. 'Yet I confess that, from time to time, I find your manner calculated to arouse feeling of animosity in my breast.'
The Marquis gave a bark of laughter at that, and they played the rest of the hand in silence. As the cards were gathered up, he said: 'Your hand, I believe sir.'
Mr Wolverine nodded. 'Luck was on my side, I think,' he said.
'And ability,' LeBeau said. 'I was a trifle careless with the discards.' He finished shuffling the cards and started to deal.
'Thank you,' Mr Wolverine said, a little surprised. He had no expected the young man to recognise his mastery so easily. 'You concede the victory, then?'
'Oh no!' LeBeau said. 'Never. Not until the last card, at least. I play for keeps, Mr Wolverine.'
'And so do I,' Mr Wolverine said. 'Three only.'
They played in silence, cards dropping like leaves on the table. Lebeau won the second hand, but he did not feel like commenting on it. He had a suspicion Mr Wolverine had let him win, but not even in his cups, would he emulate Mr Creed's boorish behaviour.
The third rubber was dealt and both players picked up their cards. A slow smile spread over Mr Wolverine's face. 'A quinte,' he said slowly, savouring the words, 'a tierce, fourteen aces, three kings, and eleven cards played, my lord.'
The Marquis cast a frowning glance at the galaxy of court cards which were spread before his eyes, and a very dubious glance at the back of the one card remaining in Mr Wolverine's hand. 'Oh, the deuce!' he said. 'All hangs upon this and I swear there's nothing to tell me what I should keep.'
'Nothing at all,' Mr Wolverine said a trifle smugly.
'To chance, then, and may fortune help me,' LeBeau said toasting the air with an imaginary glass. He shuffled the cards in his hand and proffered them, face down, to Mr Wolverine. 'The devil take me if I bring about my own downfall,' he said. 'Do me the honour of choosing a card, sir.'
Mr Wolverine grinned, appreciating the gesture, and picked a card, offering it back to the Marquis face down.
LeBeau turned it face up with no hesitation. 'A diamond,' he said.
'Piqued, Repiqued and Capoted,' said Mr Wolverine, almost caressingly. 'You lose.'
The Marquis rose and bowed. 'I am at your disposal, sir,' he said, his voice steady.
'Pay homage to my member, then,' Mr Wolverine said. He saw, with satisfaction, the Marquis' blood ebb suddenly from his face; his eyes, widened in shock were two coals burning in a marble visage.
Much shaken, the Marquis went round the table and kneeled wordlessly before Mr Wolverine. The fact that he was too high to achieve his aim even on his knees, and that he had to sit on his heels, seemed to comfort him; and he bent his head, ready to perform his task.
Mr Wolverine had no intention of allowing the Marquis to abase himself in a gaming hell, what he wanted was to test the young man's willingness to pay his forfeit and to warn him, at the same time, that he could, and would, take his pound of flesh without a qualm.
'I have changed idea,' Wolverine said. 'We shall go to m lodging.'
LeBeau got up, his head spinning. There was no mistaking the message he had just be given. He regretted drinking so much… or perhaps not enough to carry this through with enough grace and style. Glumly he recognised he would probably be broken on the rack of the older man's animosity, and he cursed himself silently for a fool.
Oddly, he had not a thought on the other's quite evident desire; he felt detested and despised by the powerful man regarding him in amusement, and never imagined that lust was the force that had impelled Mr Wolverine to issue his challenge.
He thought fleetingly to call on his mother for help. Lady Grey, the Phoenix, would surely fly to his aid and incinerate this presumptuous nobody who dared lay claim to her son's person. The shame he felt at this cowardly thought tinged his pale cheeks with rose, and he hung his head, not daring to look Mr Wolverine in the eye for fear of showing his secret shame.
Mr Wolverine had appreciated the Marquis readiness to obey and his elegance and self control in assuming a humiliating posture, so he was nonplussed at the sight of such evident confusion. What was the boy thinking now? Was he afraid? Outraged? An unwelcome feeling of pity entered his heart, to be routed at once by the steel resolve to possess the young Marquis utterly. Nothing would be allowed to interfere between him and his pleasure tonight.
*
Mr Wolverine let himself and his companion in with his latchkey. Silently, he led the way up a narrow staircase and into a spacious flat. His valet de chambre awaited him, clearly warned by the closing of the street door. He was a slender demon-like being dressed in a bright red and white livery which set off his dark blue fur.
The Marquis' eyes widened at the sight and he turned to his companion in surprise. 'He's of the Blood!' he said.
'Obviously,' Mr Wolverine said. 'I found him in Germany, during my travels. He was beset by a rabble intent on depriving the world of a beauteous being, and I was glad to be of some assistance to him. He's been with me ever since.'
His tone of voice made it clear he had caught and understood what the Marquis had been too well bred, or maybe too shocked, to say. The people of the Blood were the aristocracy, no matter how humble the origins from which their gifts had sprung. It was unthinkable to make one a servant, especially for a noblood like Mr Wolverine.
LeBeau bowed, impulsively. 'Honoured to meet you, Mr…?' he said, letting the question hang in the air.
'Kurt Wagner, sir' the charming demon said, bowing in his turn. 'If you will give me your hat and cane, sir…' he continued, deftly retrieving the objects in question from Mr Wolverine. His voice was soft and velvety; his German accent gave an unexpected seductiveness to his words. He was deferent without being servile, and his thin heart-shaped face was alive with impish piquancy.
'Charming, isn't he?' Mr Wolverine said with a hint of malice, following the Marquis' admiring gaze. 'But we'll dispense with his services tonight. Kurt, show my lord the blue room ,take his coat and go. I'll take care of the refreshments.'
Obediently, the Marquis followed the blue elf to a spacious and well appointed bedroom. He felt so keenly the injustice of forcing one of the Blood to live as a servant, that he forgot to be embarrassed by Mr Wolverine's brutality in making his situation clear.
'Mr Wagner,' he said earnestly, as soon as they entered the room, 'please believe me and my family at your service. I'm LeBeau, son of the Duke of Xavier, You have only to knock at their door to find a save haven. I'm sure my mother, the Lady Grey will adopt you into the family.'
'It's not a very respectable family, mind you!' he added laughing at Kurt's unenthusiastic face. 'But they'll make you welcome. I'd offer you my protection, but I am so unfortunately situated tonight, that I cannot guarantee to be able to protect you from Mr Wolverine. But as soon as the sun comes up, I'll be a free agent again and quite willing to do my utmost to help you.'
The furry valet bowed at this, LeBeau's purple velvet coat lovingly draped over one forearm. 'Thank you, my lord,' he said, 'but you misunderstand. Mr Wolverine has saved my life and is uniformly kind to me. I have chosen my profession and I am in need of no help.'
Mr Wolverine, entering the room as Kurt was going out, had heard his valet's reply. Bottle of Bordeaux and glasses in hand, he looked, arrested, at his captive Marquis who had managed to turn an object lesson in humility and shame into a chivalrous attempt to save a blood brother.
Having to put down the bottle and glasses gave Wolverine a good excuse to hide his admiration. It wouldn't do for the Marquis to become too cocky right now. 'Sit down on the bed,' he said curtly, without bothering to turn.
The Marquis sat and waited. He was getting soberer by the minute, and, as he was by no means deficient of intellect, he interpreted correctly Mr Wolverine's reason for the order and his curtness: he wanted to take him down a peg and, being so much shorter, could hardly loom over him, were he to continue standing. There was nothing to be gained by antagonising a man who could, had he wished to, literally command him to cut his own throat or inflict whatever shameful practice he choose upon him.
Having disposed the bottle and glasses to his satisfaction, Mr Wolverine turned to his captive. Without a word he went near the sitting Marquis and took off the amethyst and diamond pin which secured his cravat. Then, slowly and almost tenderly, he unknotted the cravat and let it fall on the floor.
He then slipped the purple velvet riband that confined the Marquis' hair and went to pick a hairbrush. With slow smooth strokes he freed LeBeau's hair of the light dusting of powder that marred its silky brightness, and stood back to admire his work. Satisfied, he gathered the loose tresses in his hands and brought them forward to fall on the Marquis' breast.
Wolverine unhurriedly unbuttoned the Marquis waistcoat and slipped it over the young man's shoulders, caressing the slimly muscled arms in all their length. Then his hands left the waistcoat and caressed the young man's arms upward to lightly encircle the neck and slide slowly downward to the chest.
Still caressing, his knuckles brushed LeBeau's nipples through the silk of his shirt; Wolverine brought his hands up again and untied the silk thongs tipped with amethyst and diamond aigrettes, which twinkled in the candle-light as if in sympathetic answer to the flash of amethyst and diamond drops that pastured on the Marquis' cheeks, when he bent his head down to see.
Slowly Wolverine untied the five thongs that held the Marquis' shirt's upper portion together. He paused to gaze at the long elegant white throat and, almost of their volition, his fingers closed on it.
LeBeau stopped breathing entirely, caught in that slow sensual game of undressing; his eyes were unafraid, even trusting, in Wolverine's eyes; his body relaxed entirely and he looked more a lover than a sacrifice.
Mr Wolverine smiled enigmatically, and his hands relaxed and slid down the swan neck with its hard and masculine Adam's apple, to rest and gently seesaw in the hard and shallow valley of LeBeau's collarbones. Speaking so softly that LeBeau would be excused for not hearing it, he said: 'Rise.'
The Marquis rose, not quite steadily, and stood waiting, again.
With a feral smile playing on his lips, Wolverine snickted out three long bone razor-sharp claws of his right hand. For all his control, he couldn't help grinning broadly in answer to LeBeau's luminous and relieved smile.
The Marquis felt his heart soar. He hadn't been able to reconcile his mental reading of Mr Wolverine with the one of a shameless exploiter of the Blood. But now all was clear, the man was of the Blood as well, and his intuition in the gaming hell vindicated: he would be treated honourably. He would be used, yes, undoubtedly used for pleasure, but not dishonoured. Gone were all the fears which had accompanied him in the walk to Wolverine's home; he was ready and even eager for this congress.
Wolverine brought down his lethal claws and with care and control he shredded the Marquis' breeches. A few brushing motions were enough to free the young man's legs of all restraints. Then the outermost claws snickted back in and the middle claw, like a sword of sensuality, ripped open the silk shirt reaching to the Marquis' mid-thigh
.Gaze firmly fixed on the young man's nether regions and body so aroused his breeches felt like fetters, Wolverine said, huskily: 'Lie down on the bed.'
The Marquis complied, his elegance and economy of movements enhancing, rather than hiding, the unselfconscious proffering of his body. Freeing himself of coat and waistcoat with an inelegant, impatient gesture, Wolverine climbed on the bed, hungry gaze feasting on the lovely sheathed muscles so wantonly displayed.
For a moment he paused thus, drinking beauty with his eyes, and then he bent down and his lips and teeth grazed all over that long exquisite body. From throat to crotch his famished mouth kissed, licked, pressed and bit, leaving in its wake a trail of spittle and desire. His hands gripped, squeezed and massaged the long thighs, following an unconscious rhythm of lust and ownership.
LeBeau gasped and twitched, aching to prolong contact and to let the waves of uncontrollable desire sweep him away. His member proclaimed his awakened lust, and his whole body yearned for more. Fleetingly, he acknowledged the older man's experience and passionate care, and he exulted in it. Maybe Mr Wolverine was not the one to have won, after all.
Feeling the Marquis' arousal under him, Wolverine increased the depth of his bites and the force of his squeezes; until he was rewarded by a shuddering half-cry, and he knew the time was ripe.
Swiftly he grabbed a pomade dish on a little shelf on the bed stand, and he raised the young man's knees in a powerful and smooth movement. He was rewarded by a breathless burst of laughter. 'You're always prepared!' the Marquis said, gasping.
'Hush!' Wolverine hissed, but even he could hear his heart was not in it. No matter, he thought, LeBeau would get his comeuppance later and, for the moment, his affectionate trust and passion suited him very well. He deftly scooped a dollop of perfumed pomade and anointed the tight puckering entrance that was willy nilly presented to him.
The sensations flooding his body and mind were overpowering; and the young Marquis understood, for the first time, the point to Mother Clap's Molly House. He still felt no desire to don feminine attire, but if this almost unbearable pleasure was the reward for that type of congress, then the people who went there were surely not dotards to despise and tease. This was exquisite and refined pleasure, "la crème de la crème".
When Wolverine's finger entered him, LeBeau moaned and squirmed: he wanted more and more. It hurt and felt utterly unlike anything else he had felt in a dissipated and varied life; it yearned and refused at the same time; it felt perfectly right and utterly wrong. He knew it was just the prelude, but it felt like the conclusion to an unsettling and stimulating evening.
Mr Wolverine had no difficulty in reading all this in his captive's face and eyes. His smell, too, had subtly changed, and was affecting him like a powerful liquor. His index finger did not seem to want to leave his hot, quivering, silky sheath; it wanted to dance and explore inside to elicit more hot tight quivers.
With an act of will greater than any he had been called to exercise all night, Mr Wolverine forced himself to withdraw his finger and to prepare to invade the conquered and captive entrance with his powerful member. He knew the beginning of the act would bring sharp pain to both, but he was never one to count the cost to a much craved end; besides it was too late to stop.
Wolverine took a deep breath, bracing for pain and plunged his engorged member in the flushed and inviting hole of the Marquis's arse. They both cried out at the same time, and their mingled pain made them one. Wolverine stopped as soon as he had gained entrance, to give both the time to adjust.
LeBeau's red eyes were glowing with passion and lust, they shone brighter than any candle and seemed to fire an answering red gleam in the depths of Wolverine's blue eyes, 'Please, sir,' the Marquis breathed; Wolverine thrusted his hips forward, eliciting a long and tortured cry that acted like a spur to his desire.
All thoughts of pain forgotten, Wolverine gained his prize with ruthless glee, He smashed inside the tender flesh, aiming for the pleasure spot, revelling in the feel of resilient and surrendering tight muscles. Soon all his plan of conquest by control was forgotten and he abandoned himself to the overwhelming sensation of welcoming pleasure and passion.
He was surprised that his merciless lust was met by an equal desire; he was surprised that each thrust of his hips was met by an equal unrestrained thrust of the young man's hips. If he wanted to conquer the Marquis, the Marquis seemed fired by the desire to possess him utterly.
Grunting and moaning, gasping and sweating, the assault seemed endless and, in some curious way, disjointed from time. Flesh smacking on flesh, eyes burning in eyes, both the savage and the aristocrat were fused in a desire that seemed to transcend both and create an animal with four arms and legs and one fulcrum, cementing all parts in a sweaty, lustful, passionate, loving whole.
Slow measured thrusts gave way to frenzied coupling, both cried out and moaned as the tempo changed. The Marquis' arms encircled the older man's powerful lust-driven body to push him even closer, the Wolverine's hands squeezed frantically the small plump buttocks only to feel long sinewy fingers squeeze his own more prosaic ones.
They strained against each other in a desperate bid to fuse their flesh together, and, harshly, surely and uncompromisingly, savagery met longing, and refinement met completion: all the devious and various purposes of the night forgotten.
They reached ecstasy together with a howl and a shout forcing their bodies to an even tighter union; then fell back in a swoon, but still each holding unto the other, as if to be unjoined meant death: Mr Wolverine's fat, short yard still nestled in the Marquis' convulsively gripping hole. Arms and legs entwined they looked like Aristophanes' beast with four arms and legs, and their head were so near it was extremely difficult to see where the Marquis' cinnamon locks ended and Mr Wolverine's strong black hair began.
They remained thus locked for a while, learning to breathe again; and at last their senses returned to them, and they looked at each other, wonderingly.
The Marquis was the first to regain a measure of self and disengaged gently, rolling on his side and over to straddle Mr Wolverine's relaxed body. Wolverine's hands went to his buttocks, on their own accord; and he lay looking up at his captive boy, a little sated smile curling his lips.
His lover's hands kneaded his buttocks, while their knuckles danced a dance of ownership and teasing desire on his arse; LeBeau smiled the first unfettered smile he could remember smiling in his young life.
Wolverine was entranced by it. It shew him the boy, trusting and loving, and the young man, lusty and yearning: a vessel to be filled with love and sensual pleasure. A timeless time passed, filled with the pleasure of owning and teasing the pouting and shivering mouth-not-mouth which had given him so much pleasure before.
LeBeau smiled unguardedly and bent towards his lover's lips. 'Come with me to France?' he whispered and bent further for a kiss.
Mr Wolverine opened his mouth to say 'yes', but an icy spike of fear stopped him. What was he doing? Was he falling in love with the lovely Marquis? Impossible! There was no chance for such a love, no chance for such a mating of body and soul. He shivered and found his resolve again. No, better go on with his plan; better to squeezer the last drop of pleasure from that sensual and enticing body and then go his way unencumbered by sentimental fancies.
Never to see the Marquis again. Never to touch the Marquis again. Never to bugger the Marquis again. Never to hold the Marquis again and never to be held by the Marquis again with passionate and convulsive strength. 'Regain control, Logan Wolverine,' he thought. 'The boy is ripe to be taught his place, nothing else is of any interest to you.'
He turned his face away, though his hands still lingered, and found a snarl in his confusion. 'Keep your mouth away, trollop,' he said harshly.
The Marquis looked earnestly at him, disconcerted. Surely Mr Wolverine had felt the same thing as he; surely he had hold as tight as he was held; surely his heart was not untouched… Oh, but the night was not done, and it was surely too soon to think of such things and to offer kisses. LeBeau straightened and, once, more, waited in silence.
'Get off me.' Mr Wolverine said.
LeBeau disengaged himself and sat on the bed. His trusting, smiling eyes never left Wolverine as he got up and went to the door. He openly admired his lover's powerful, virile body; the sure and graceful way in which he moved; the way his shirt rippled with the play of muscles it could but imperfectly hide. He felt happy and, oddly, at home. He felt he had found the answer to the riddle of his disquiet and boredom.
The Marquis saw Wolverine go out of the room, adjusting his clothing; and, after a while, he caught the ghost of far away voices. When his captor returned alone and locked the door with two turns of the key, he breathed a silent sigh of relief. He felt foolish for having doubted the man's honour, and even more foolish for having doubted his heart. Smiling, he saw the older man go to a chest of drawers and open one.
When Mr Wolverine returned to the bed, he was carrying three wide strips of black silk. 'Lie down,' he said, curtly, and, as the Marquis complied, he climbed on the bed and straddled him; then he draped the strips of silk on LeBeau's chest.
Unhurriedly, Wolverine took the Marquis' right hand and wrapped one strip about his wrist, tying it securely. The he did the same with his left hand. Stretching a little over his captive, Wolverine pushed down a little lever on the bed-stand. Two iron rings came down on long chains, and he firmly tied the Marquis' wrists to them.
He grinned ferociously into LeBeau's startled eyes and took the third silk strip. 'How much do you trust me?' he asked.
'I trust you with my life, sir.'
'You do?' Mr Wolverine was gently ironic. 'You have no choice, though.'
'Sir,' the Marquis said very quietly, 'my word binds me more than iron chains. I lost the game and you have sovereignty over my body.'
'So, my lord,' Wolverine said, bowing slightly in a markedly mocking way, 'you are in fact constrained to trust?'
'I trust your honour!' cried LeBeau hotly. 'I did when I accepted the stake. I do now, even more.'
'I stand corrected,' Mr Wolverine said. 'I'll give you a chance to prove your trust. I wish, as you have undoubtedly understood, to blind your sight for a while. You are free to refuse to be blindfolded, but if you accept, let the consequences be on your head.' He paused to let the import of his words sink in the young man's mind.
'What shall it be?' he said, after a while.
The Marquis did not hesitate. 'It shall be as you wish, sir,' he said firmly. 'I trust your honour, as I said.'
'Very well,' the older man said. 'On your head be it.' He tied the blindfold carefully, making sure not a peep of light or movement could penetrate its inky folds. Then, without a word, he left the bed again.
The Marquis waited, but how different a wait this was! He had never been so helpless, had never felt so helpless in all his life. He strained his ears to catch a sound which would tell him what Wolverine was doing, but in vain. He felt his heart pound against its bone prison, but the excitement he felt overcame his discomfort. A little breathless, he awaited his conqueror's pleasure.
Mr Wolverine padded silently back to bed, playing idly with the ostrich feather he had taken from the still open drawer. He observed with pleasure and amusement the fluttering heartbeat in the Marquis' throat and considered his moves.
Time dripped slowly in the darkness and silence; slowly LeBeau relaxed against his bonds; slowly his heart regained its calm pulsing rhythm. When the soft tip of the feather grazed the tip of his shapely yard, he jumped and gasped in surprise. His body tensed, his mind raced to understand what had touched him so lightly and intimately, but before he could do so, the sensation ceased.
Wolverine smiled, and proceeded to play. The feather in his hand darted, tickled, teased; it paused in the air, as if looking for a target, and then dipped, and fluttered, and caressed. Sometimes it was reversed and its hard nub scratched lightly or deeply, as this or that fancy took the man wielding it.
The Marquis squirmed, jumped, gasped or giggled, reacting to the several stimuli assaulting his senses. Soon, he was offering his body shamelessly to that instrument of delightful torment and to the man controlling it. Again and again, he was brought to the edge of pleasure; again and again, that pleasure was denied him. He strained, tossed and twisted; hungrily seeking completion.
Such was his exquisite ordeal, that he didn't hear the odd, soft, wet bamf that heralded the valet's entrance in the room. A pause in Mr Wolverine's activities allowed him to notice the stench of sulphur in the air, but by then it was too late. With a maliciously nervous dart, Kurt's sinewy tail entered the hapless Marquis.
LeBeau screamed, more in shock than pain, and stilled, transfixed and panting. What monstrous thing was invading his body? It was too thin to be his conqueror's yard, too long to be his finger. Could it be a whip? What was in store for him, now?
He had not long to wait to know the worst. Unhurriedly, Kurt pushed his tail deeper and deeper inside the Marquis' body; until, satisfied, he slowly opened the heart shaped membrane of its tip. With a contemptuous curl of his upper lip, he drank the keening wail that was ripped from the Marquis' throat.
LeBeau had ceased to think, the balance of his mind wholly overset by the unbearable stimulus flooding his senses. It seemed to him that a huge bird was slowly beating its wings inside him, that a snake had opened its maw to devour him; he felt himself go mad with it and then, all of a sudden, everything changed.
The valet had sinuously slithered out and had positioned his tail tip on the pleasure spot inside the Marquis trembling arse. The dexterous membrane caressed it, stimulated it, pressed and teased it, generating an irresistible wave of lustful pleasure.
LeBeau bucked under it, his keening wail of horror transformed into a senseless babble of desire. Fire coursed through his veins and inflamed his member. He danced to keep the suddenly elusive instrument of bliss in the centre of delight; all forgotten in an overpowering desire for ecstasy. He was near his goal, when a sound he had been hearing for some time resolved in his burning mind as laughter.
He was laughing… no. A sudden chill of understanding corrected his thought: they were laughing at him, the master and the valet. The instrument of bliss and horror was the valet's tail, and his power was clearly the ability to enter locked rooms. It had all been planned when Wolverine had gone out the room. What had happened before, the savage passion and the melting tenderness, had been nothing but a ruse to trap him into becoming the instrument of his own downfall.
He had been offered refusal, but in such a way that he never suspected what the outcome would be. He had truly been piqued, repiqued and capoted, and now nothing was left but to bear their scorn, and hope to survive the rest of the night. Tears of pain and humiliation burned his eyes and seeped through the blindfold. Let them laugh, his dream was shattered, and his heart with it.
'Pity,' Mr Wolverine said. 'It seems my lord the Marquis does not appreciate your unique talents, Kurt. Do with him as you will.'
The valet slithered his tail out of its fleshy burrow and caressed LeBeau's mouth with its soiled tip. 'Thank you, sir,' he said. With unexpected strength, he flipped the unresisting Marquis's body over, the long chains holding him to the bed stand crossing easily. He then positioned him: face to mattress and bent knees forcing the lovely buttocks up.
His three-fingered hands closed on the ivory globes and squeezed them open. Kurt looked intently at the puckering swollen bud, gauging how best to reawaken desire. His hands slid around the buttocks and down the inside of the long thighs, forcing the knees to open. The Marquis was passive through all this, his pliant and unresisting body following the other's will.
The valet de chambre draped himself over LeBeau's prone body; his tongue lapped at a half unseen ear. 'As you see, *my lord,' he whispered, 'you are helping me tonight, more than you envisaged. With your lordship's permission,' he mocked in the same hissing whisper, 'I will now proceed to make clear what I think of your bedamned charity.'
'I meant it in good faith,' gasped the Marquis, in extremis. 'I never meant to mock your state, only to offer what help and protection I could…'
He was stopped by a lash of the tail, curling between his spread knees and striking his belly. The stroke was not cruel enough to elicit pain, but venomous enough to sting.
'You can keep your charitable intentions,' Kurt spit, punctuating his words with flickers of his tail on tender, unprotected parts. 'A great lady did me the honour of birth, and the even greater honour of casting me off, as you would a cur!'
His tail increased the tempo and force of its flogging. 'A lady of Quality, I was told, who was so disgusted by the bastard she had conceived after a drunken revel, that she could not abide his sight, who left me to wiggle in the dunghill with the other maggots and, I'm sure, promptly put such an embarrassing episode out of her mind.'
The valet had straightened up and his tail was now lashing all over the Marquis helpless body.
'You would offer me the protection of your name? And what of me, if I accepted? What life for me, but that of the miserly parasite, forced to adulation and worse for a dinner or a roof over his head?'
The valet stopped, the force of his turmoil so great he could do nothing but shout at the reddened back and buttocks of the man he perceived as a foe.
'I live by my toil, Marquis!' he shouted. 'There is honour in that. True honour that you never knew in your pampered and cosseted life! What I eat is earned, not crumbs picked at great men's tables! I would rather serve a honourable man, than dance to the tune of my rich patrons! It's time you were made to feel what you really are, my lord! A useless parasite getting fat on the lives and toils of men of true honour and worth!'
Kurt flung himself on the body of his hapless captive. His slender and pointed yard forcing an entry in the battered and aching arse presented to him. 'Come, sir!' he cried. 'Join me in the romp!'
Wolverine had seen and heard all, idly sipping Burgundy. He had never asked his valet, and sometimes lover, the cause of his bitter abhorrence of the Quality. Being a private and punctilious man, he had never felt he had a right to ask. Now all was clear to him. All, but the reason why the Marquis' truly innocent chivalry had ignited such a conflagration of hatred.
He got up, pensively, from his chair, and fought an urge to free the young Marquis. Things had gone further than he had envisaged. He wanted the arrogant young man humiliated through pleasure and surrender; not really broken on the wheel of old resentments.
Too late now to change it, he thought, at least this would ensure the Marquis would not trouble him or his valet in the future. He shook his head, as if to chase an annoying thought away; and in truth, for a moment, a sense of loss and desolation had threatened to overtake him.
No, the boy was too dangerous. Better show him he meant business and let him go, never to be plagued by him.
He rose and went to the bed, freeing his now flaccid member. 'Pay homage to my yard,' he said, as coldly as he could, 'and do your utmost to please us both.'
With these words, he grabbed the Marquis hair, raising his head, and pushed his yard against his dry lips, which opened to him in surrender. LeBeau's mouth was hot and tender, his tongue unschooled, and shy.
'Come, sirrah,' Wolverine rasped, more harshly than he had intended, because an unwanted tenderness threatened his resolve. 'You have been serviced by Paphians, I'm sure. Don't you remember what gave you pleasure?'
Tears guttering his cheeks, the Marquis obeyed. His tongue tried to reproduce the tricks that had given him pleasure in the past, but it was hard to keep his mind on the task, while his whole body was shaken by the battering ram of the valet's merciless yard.
Caught between Scylla and Charybdis, he could only offer himself utterly and hope for a speedy surcease. Kurt's tail was flicking and caressing his nether regions, Mr Wolverine's hands, entangled in his hair, were making his head dance to a different rhythm. He choked on moans and screams and flinched from a vengeful possession.
The Marquis surrendered to it all and, to his dismay, a sick and twisted pleasure seemed to grip his guts. His moans of pain became moans of delirious ecstasy, his wayward tongue frisked against the member choking the breath out of him. He felt like hole filled with a dark delight, a thing for other's pleasure, a toy. He forgot his birth and his name, he was absolute for pleasure.
Kurt was the first to reach his climax, his semen felt hot and burning as acid. The sight of his valet's contorted face triggered Mr Wolverine's own climax. He had only a moment to withdraw his yard nearer the lips, to avoid choking his captive to death, then his hand tightened convulsively in the Marquis's hair and his salty sweet syrup filled the gaping mouth.
His two lovers' climax filled LeBeau with relief and an odd perverse pride in having satisfied both. Almost unnoticed, he spilled his seed on the bed, gulping convulsively down Wolverine's offering on Aphrodite's altar.
His passive acceptance had not gone unnoticed by Mr Wolverine, who felt a pang of shame. He had not wanted to guide the Marquis on that particular path, but the deed was done. Filled with dark thoughts, master and valet disengaged their bodies.
Wolverine untied the Marquis' hands and took off his blindfold. 'Rest for a while now,' he said. 'The last portion of the night is almost on us. You will need all your strength for it.'
He left the bed and went to pour himself another glass of the rich red wine. Gesturing with the bottle, he said: 'Care for a glass, Kurt?'
'Thank you, no, sir,' the valet said. 'Most kind, I'm sure.'
Time passed, Mr Wolverine sipped in silence; Kurt watched with avid eyes the Marquis' face.
When his glass was all drunk, Wolverine went back to the bed.
'You will now accommodate us both again, sirrah,' he said. 'But this time you will be active in our pleasures. Dispose your body thus: lay on your back perpendicular to the bed… So. I'm glad to see you have at least learned obedience to your betters. Now slide until your head drops from the side of the bed.'
The Marquis obeyed his orders like a soldier at his drill, or laced mutton at her profession. He arched his head back on the side of the bed and raised his legs in the air; he caressed his belly and slid down his hands to his buttocks. Blushing in shame, LeBeau obeyed his tormentor's last order and gripped his buttock to part them, offering his reddened and battered arse for more punishment.
'Kurt, you will take the mouth this time,' Mr Wolverine said.
'Yes, sir,' the valet said, and positioned himself, grinning. 'He's missed his true calling, hasn't he, sir?' he commented softly.
'That's as may be, Kurt,' Wolverine dryly said. 'Now, my lord, you will do us the honour of begging for it. The Devil's Cub is not one for begging, I hear said, but I think you will do it prettily enough. As you are not used to it… yet,' he went on, 'you may stimulate yourself with your finger.'
The Marquis hesitated, a wisp of his old self refusing this last degradation.
'Do it, sirrah,' Wolverine said in a commanding tone. 'Do you wish to dishonour yourself by not abiding to the terms of your forfeit?'
LeBeau felt deeply the lash of these words and gasped in outrage. So this was what was reserved for him, after all he had had to endure. He felt his blood stir in his veins and recollected, in a flash, an episode he had almost forgotten.
While still at Eton, he had been the favourite target for mockery. He had not come into his power yet, and the more precocious children of the Blood, envious of his prestige and name, had mercilessly jibed at him, and even attacked him.
He had fought, furiously and well, but one day he had been overwhelmed and made to eat dirt by a rabble captained by his insufferable cousin Worthington, proud as Satan of his white angel wings. Tears of outrage and fury had spilled from his eyes, then; and his power had awakened.
Grabbing two handful of earth, he had been ready to destroy his hated cousin's wings, when his mother's thought-voice had stopped him.
'Remember this, my beloved Remy,' she had said, 'they may hurt your body and your vanity, but never give them your mind and your heart.'
He had stilled, then, arrested, listening with all his young heart.
'More important, my son,' his father powerful mental voice had added, 'never let other's dishonourable actions dishonour you. Do not lose your honour by descending to their level. Can you imagine your cousin will not receive a lesson? Be a Xavier, my child. Be worthy of your name, no matter what.'
He had thrown down the energised clods, then, letting them explode harmlessly in the air. He felt the victor, as his father had said. Their honour was sullied, his was immaculate.
When Wolverine's and his body had united, he had hoped to have found a Socrates for his Alkibiades, a Hephaistion for his Alexander. He had been wrong, and, worse, had let his disappointment take him to the brink of real dishonour. He had wagered his body, not his mind and heart. Let Wolverine use at will what he had won, not a jot more.
'I will not beg, sir' he said, his voice thin, but firm. 'I have wagered my body only. Do what you will with it, even unto death, but do not presume to own my soul.'
'Very well,' Wolverine said, his face and voice masking his annoyance. 'Pleasure yourself with your finger. You must have learned enough to know how to do it.
'The Marquis complied. His long finger entered his own arse and found the pleasure spot. He closed his eyes and gave himself as little pleasure as he could, without breaking his word.
The event of the night had been such that his body was now very sensitive to pain and pleasure, and even that little stimulus was enough to make his banner of love rise and wave gently.
The valet moved a pace forward. LeBeau's sight was filled with silken dark blue fur. An iron rod, sheathed in velvet was presented to his mouth, and he gulped it in.
The Marquis' tongue was more assured now. It lapped and teased the half engorged yard, while his lips nibbled and his teeth grazed gently its smooth length.
Kurt moaned in pleasure and gasped: 'He's truly missed… his true calling... as I said, sir.'
'He's quick learner,' Wolverine said dismissively; yet his yard ached for the kisses of that generous mouth. 'I think he is ripe for the taking Take your finger out,' he ordered the Marquis.
Wolverine positioned his now engorged yard on the swollen lips of his captive's arse. 'Now, my pretty elf,' he said, 'let's dance this night's final dance.'
His body made so sensitive he felt his skin had been stripped away, the Marquis could not avoid crying out as he was penetrated. He tried to control his spasming muscles, but to no avail. Knowing he would respond to his tormentors' play, he tightened his will around his self, locking the citadel of his mind in impregnable walls.
'Give them your body, but not your mind and heart.' His mother's remembered voice was a prayer in his heart of hearts. His body jerked and spasmed to another's will, but his mind was elsewhere, now, hidden inside his self of selves.
For a while he thought he could resist the siren call of pleasure and abasement, for a while he was strong against the pull of lust and desire… for a while. The night's ordeal had still to come.
When it seemed to the Marquis that all three would once more swoon in bliss, Mr Wolverine withdrew his member.
'Kurt!' he called, hoarsely.
The valet withdrew his yard as well and started rolling LeBeau's nipples between thumb and forefinger. His fingers were abnormally big, due to the conformation of his hands, and so strong that they seemed to crush the copper-pink nubs.
Still rolling, and occasionally pulling upward, the tortured nipples, Kurt slithered his tail down the Marquis' hairless chest and belly. The spatulate tip wiggled playfully in the soft brown curls of the pubes, to tap the quivering nuts. It then encircled the erect member in a parody of a caressing hand, eliciting a soft gasp.
The wiry tail then slid downwards and, once more, entered the arse. It slithered in, deeper and deeper, and then it stopped, undulating gently.
The Marquis knew what to expect know, and prepared himself for another onslaught of exquisite pleasure and pain.
He was wrong.
When Wolverine's strong member started to penetrate him again, he screamed, but after the first short harsh scream, he stopped breathing, all his faculties wholly suspended.
Wolverine rejoiced in the feeling the bony tail was giving his member as he pushed against the soft, contracting walls of the Marquis guts. When he was wholly in, his nuts pressing against the velvet skin of the buttocks, the valet withdrew his tail enough to wrap his master's yard's tip in its membrane. Then he once more inserted his own member in the Marquis' mouth.
They worked in rapt unison, the body inside which they were meeting wholly forgotten. Wolverine thrusted against the leathery membrane, which rippled and opened and gently embraced the battering ram of desire.
The Marquis was swooning in a delight he had never experienced in all his varied and experienced life, including this night of heights and depths. At last he managed to draw a breath around the valet's yard, which quivered in sensuous bliss to the rush of air.
All three bodies moved as one, captured by pleasure, all thought and causality forgotten. Each striving for more, each enticing the others to strive for more, for more, for some unattainable heaven of lust where they could live forever like this, entwined in unending ecstasy.
All three climaxed at the same time.
Kurt had only sense enough to withdraw at the last moment, so his man-juice spread all over the Marquis face.
*
Rosy-fingered dawn coloured the skies.
The spell held for a few moments more, then Mr Wolverine and his valet disengaged grudgingly from the body they had adored until a few minutes before.
The Marquis lay still, like a dead sacrifice, unable to move or to think. Finally he recollected himself and rose to a sitting position on the bed.
The pain lancing through him was so vast, that it propelled him on his feet. He stood still, panting, until the pain ebbed, and then without a glance at the other two men, he picked up his waistcoat.
'The Marquis' coat, Kurt,' Mr Wolverine said, apparently restored to his old self.
The valet bamfed out and bamfed back in with the purple velvet coat and a pair of his livery's breeches. 'You'll need something to wear in the street, sir,' he said, all deference again. 'You can't wear yours.'
Wolverine bowed slightly. 'I apologise for the ruin of your breeches and shirt, my lord,' he said. 'It will be my care to repay you for the damage.'
Without a word, without a glance, LeBeau took his coat and put it on, over the waistcoat. His face was ravaged by emotions and soiled with man-juice and tears. His eyes were dull jet-black and ruby, harder than stones. He wrapped his coat close around his body and made to go to the door.
'My lord,' Mr Wolverine said, interposing his person between the Marquis and the door. 'Kurt is right, you cannot go out half naked. Allow me to call you a chair, if you will spurn our offer of a pair of breeches.'
He met a look of such venomous hatred that he stepped back. 'Cross my path again,' the Marquis said in a voice devoided of all feelings, 'and they will have to get a bloodhound to find your head.'
Without another word LeBeau swept the old man aside and charged the lock of the door. He barely stepped back for the ensuing explosion and was gone into the hall and down the stairs.
'He'll come to grief,' Kurt soberly said.
'I don't think he cares, Kurt,' Mr Wolverine said. 'Bring me another bottle and rest for a while. I will not need you.'
*
The Marquis walked the streets of the awakening city, trying to keep to the shadows. He was not concerned about encountering danger; but to meet am acquaintance in his condition would be so shameful, he'd had to kill the man or kill himself to protect his family's name.
His thoughts were in a turmoil so great, that he had no hope of unravelling them; he could only yearn for hiding and cleansing water. He knew the way well, and kept to the little unfrequented streets wending their way to his home, fighting nausea and a knot of unmanning tears in his throat.
Each step was a painful jar to his body, his evening shoes with the large diamanté buckles and the high heels, a torment. Because he kept to the shadows, he failed to see a loose stone in the paving and hit it with a heel, jarring his whole body.
This was too much for his stomach, and he heaved. The slimy, salty-sweet, acrid taste, precipitated him into a bout of sickness which seemed never to end. When he recollected himself, he was on his knees; dry heaves mixing with tears, while a few strands of his long unfettered hair trailed in the foul-smelling puddle.
Gritting his teeth on a curse, he rose unsteadily to his feet and went on his way. He was perforce more careful, but at long last he reached his house. Gasping in pain and exhaustion, he let himself in. He skulked like a thief, to avoid his own servants, and was finally able to lock himself in his bedroom.
Ignoring his aching muscles, he quickly divested himself of all his clothes and threw them on the fire. He would leave for France as soon as he was clean. The thought of meeting Wolverine was unbearable, the image of his strong savage face, mouth twisted in a knowing smirk, enough to make him run to the end of the Earth. He felt like ripping his own skin off and throw that as well into the fire.
Exhausted, he feel on his knees in front of the blazing clothes and slipped to lie down on the floor. For a moment he fought to stay awake, but he had spent his last spark of energy in his hellish journey through the dawn, and he fell into a swoon-like sleep.
*
Kurt could not find rest. He knew the master was drinking and brooding, and he could not help worrying. Had he passed all bounds? He had been ordered to take the Marquis by storm, but he knew his festering rancour against the Duke of Xavier's family had pushed him beyond what was acceptable.
True, Mr Wolverine had said nothing to him, but he could not be deaf to the spur of his conscience. He had made the young Marquis pay for a crime his aunt had committed when he wasn't even born. That had not been just or decent. The boy had offered help with no second end in view - he knew that, he had known that at once - and all he had done was throw a generous offer back in his teeth.
He had gloried in the Marquis' vulnerability and abasement; he had shamelessly used all the tricks of a trade Mr Wolverine had saved him from. His words had been bold and contemptuous, but did he really have the right to say them?
Kurt tossed in his bed and wished for the umpteenth time he had not been so cruel to the young and inexperienced man... that lovely young and inexperienced man... that delightful and generous, young and inexperienced man.
Kurt tossed in his bed and came to the conclusion he had been a monster of cruelty. To offer his livery as a replacement for the shredded breeches had been the last and gratuitous one in a series of shameful acts. Tears came to his eyes: it was too late now to apologise, too late to dream of companionship and trust. He had lost his last chance at freedom, now he must serve for the rest of his life.
*
Mr Wolverine opened his third bottle. He did not usually make inroads so early in the morning, but the perfect wine was turning to acid bile in his mouth. He had allowed his fear of feeling too much for the darling boy to cloud his mind.
The darling boy... the heart was a betrayer and no amount of will could keep it silent for long. Indeed, Mr Wolverine had loved the Marquis since that first meeting at lady Montacute's drum. The Marquis glittered like a jewel in a setting of dull stones. He had wit, courage, daring and the most lovely body Mr Wolverine had ever set eyes on.
His fingers played with the amethyst and diamond pin he had found, lying forgotten on the floor. Beauty and sharp mind, loveliness with a sting: that was Remy, Marquis of LeBeau. The sting had imbedded itself in his heart, and he, most foolish of men, had destroyed every chance of happiness.
He had wanted the Marquis so shamed that he'd never dream to accost him once more. No fear of that, now, not after his parting words. He admired the young man's strength, while reviling his own cowardly actions.
That stung him most, that he had acted in a cowardly manner. He had been given a gift of love and passion and had spit on it, shaming the giver. He had never, in all his long weary life, met a human being, be it man or woman, who could withstand the savagery of his nature. Even with Paphians he had had to restrain himself in the throes of passion: he had forgotten once, and the wench had run from him screaming.
But the Marquis had met his savagery and gloried in it. Mr Wolverine's nose was never wrong, that had not been an act. The boy, his darling boy, had revelled in his passion and had answered it thrust for thrust.
Mr Wolverine rose and went to pick up the rags that had once been an elegant pair of purple velvet breeches. He rubbed his face in them, inhaling the Marquis' subtle scent. The boy had not been afraid of his claws, he remembered, the boy had been aroused by them.
With a strangled curse, Mr Wolverine threw his glass to shatter on the floor. Enough! His accursed nature had ruined his future and he was damned for it! Not only he had lost his one chance at happiness, his senseless actions had lost him the bride of his choice. No hope for that alliance now, surely.
But he didn't care, what he cared for, what he yearned for, was silken skin and fearless eyes, tight pulsating sheath and smiling mouth. The image of that luminous, loving smile rose unbidden to his mind and Wolverine groaned. He could not stand it; he would not stand it! What was he doing moaning like a missish wench, instead of grabbing his darling Marquis and so drown him in love that every memory of the hellish night he had just been through would be swept away?
So the boy was going to France? To do what? Drown his sorrows in wine and women? He'd be damned if he let the Marquis go to perdition because he was a fool! This wasn't the time to bemoan the past, this was the time for action.
'Kurt!' he roared with all his might. 'Pack my bags! We're going to France!'
*
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