Earthly Desires Read online

  “But your people will be worried, surely. You wouldn’t want them to think you’re dead.”

  Efrosin waved his hand, dismissing that dull concern. “They are all quite funny when they’re scared and cross, and they will search for me until they find me. Truly, there are likely knights looking for me even now. My dear Geoffry will probably be hanged if I am not found before nightfall, and judging by the sun, that is not so very long hence. Alas. He was a good servant. But let us think, ten leagues on horseback…they could be here any moment, could they not? You must hurry. If you’re to ravish me, there is no time to lose.”

  Dmitri stared at him with an unfathomable emotion in his deep brown eyes, which were fringed with lashes so thick they would tickle wonderfully, Efrosin was quite sure, if applied to his neck, or wrist, or nether region.

  “Geoffry—the man who pulls you from trees—shall be hanged?”

  “Indeed he will, for the sin of losing me.”

  “And ‘alas’ is all you can say? You do not care for him at all?”

  “Did I sound too blithe?” He concentrated on a somber expression. “It is a pity and if I could regret it, I most certainly would, but I can’t. It’s how I am.” Efrosin tried hard not to sound so cheerful, but it was an impossible task. Perhaps he should apologize again? Sometimes that did the trick. “You have lovely eyes,” he said instead. “And a beautiful mouth. Have you ever sucked a man’s prick?”

  Dmitri’s sigh was unmistakably wistful before he seemed to remember himself. He cleared his throat. “No.”

  “Really? Am I the first to ask? In that case, will you please be so kind as to suck mine?”

  “Do you think of nothing else?” Dmitri asked, sounding frustrated, which was charming indeed.

  “Oh quite. I truly never think of this at all. But you see, it is only now, with you, that I have ever felt quite exactly like this before. You are so very handsome.”

  “Am I?” He seemed surprised at this information, which made Efrosin’s cock throb in delight.

  “You are. Now, will you make good the promise of your lips on mine? That tree over there looks sturdy, and if you have more rope in your bag, then—”

  “I have no more rope. Are all princes as brazen as you?”

  “I haven’t the faintest clue.” Being jerked through the air was giving Efrosin rope burn, and if he was going to have rope burn, then he’d prefer it was from struggling to take Dmitri’s dick whilst strapped to a tree, or perhaps a rock to hold him down. So he said as much.

  “Listen, I am not going to screw your royal highness on the forest floor, nor bent over a boulder, nor tied to a tree. What you need is to get back to the castle.”

  Here in the mossy dim of the forest, with wood and moist earth filling his senses, Efrosin had never felt so far from home. But instead of fear, he felt a strange, warm comfort. “I think I’d quite like to stay here. For the time being, at least.”

  “Stay? Here?” Dmitri sputtered. “This is madness.”

  “It’s my birthday after all. I’ve decided what I want. How much farther until we get to where you’ll consent to kiss me more?”

  Dmitri sighed as though he really wasn’t eager to kiss him now, and that rather stung. “There. Just ahead.”

  Efrosin finally pulled his eyes from Dmitri’s face and saw before them a tiny log cabin. It could not be more than one room. Efrosin had never been inside a structure so small in his life. Just contemplating it set off peals of laughter.

  Dmitri clenched his jaw. “Didn’t your mother teach you manners?”

  “I didn’t have a mother.”

  Dmitri looked a bit shame-faced. “Of course. I’d forgotten the tales of your birth. I was…unkind. Forgive me.”

  Efrosin cast a glance from under his eyelashes. “Get me inside your hovel and do what you will with me, and I’ll forgive you any unkindness.”

  Efrosin’s dick had been hard since their first kiss, and as that was a sensation wholly unfamiliar to him—and thus utterly delightful—he was eager for his life-long abstinence to come to an end. He summoned his straightest face, though he could feel it was softened with mirth, and said, “As your prince, I command you, take me into your home and defile me.”

  Despite his laughter, he thought it must have done the trick, because Dmitri grabbed hold of his waist and quickly led him to the cabin.

  * * * * *

  As Dmitri thrust open the door to his home, he wondered again if this was some bizarre dream he’d fallen into. The lurid turn it had taken was not unusual, for he was but twenty and quite lonely. He often dreamed of beautiful men coming to his cabin for the sole purpose of bending over for him.

  There had even been a very queer dream similar in its lack of believability wherein a young, beautiful woman had arrived at his door with an apple in her outstretched hand. When he took it from her, to his great astonishment, she hitched her skirts up, and he’d spied a long, hard, curved cock instead of the fuzzy mound he’d been expecting. He remembered his relief at seeing that sweet appendage, women having never been to his taste.

  He’d clutched that velvet prick in his hand and tossed the witch’s skirts up to her shoulders, rubbing his own hardness all along her strong, masculine stomach, until he’d woken up gasping and sticky.

  Perhaps if he did as Prince Efrosin asked, the dream would end and he’d wake the same way he always did—physically sated but utterly alone. He wavered between pinching himself awake, and tossing Efrosin on the bed to fuck him silly the way he’d been begging for the whole walk home.

  Did Dmitri really want to risk that he might never dream this particular dream again? Efrosin was beautiful, and pulling at him impatiently where they were attached ankle to ankle and wrist to wrist. The prince wanted it—wanted him. Dmitri’s cock throbbed in answer. But if it wasn’t a dream, what of the king’s search party? How would it look to be found buggering the prince? Would they execute him on the spot for such an offense?

  Efrosin clapped his hands, his eyes glowing with amusement. “This is smaller than my old dollhouse.”

  Dmitri shut the door behind them and took in the room with its wood stove and the square table his father had built to the right. A rocking chair sat next to the only window on the left. In the middle, a trap door led down to the root cellar where he stored his cured meats and vegetables. With a critical eye, he gazed at the far wall and the shelf full of his most treasured items— books—and the rather threadbare mattress atop the wooden bed with tall, smooth, sanded posts, in which his mother had conceived Dmitri.

  Was it truly so small? To Dmitri it was the world. Who could have need for more? “Well, it’s only me.”

  “You’re alone here?” Efrosin seemed enlivened by such a concept. “How incredibly novel.”

  “Rather old hat, actually.” Dmitri started every day alone, went to bed every night alone, and spent all but fourteen or fifteen hours a year completely on his own. To say that he was lonely did not fully capture the immensity of his situation. It suddenly hit him that if this was not a dream—and he was rather convinced that it was not—then he only had a few hours of Efrosin’s company. Who knew when someone might visit again? Much less someone like Efrosin. He should make the most of it.

  “I’m generally not allowed to be alone,” Efrosin said, tugging at the links between them, urging Dmitri deeper into the room. “Why?”

  “I might float away, of course. All it takes

  is someone leaving a window open, and an inopportune waft of air from, say, a lady passing by the door waving a fan, and voila, I’m off on an adventure that could end in death.”

  Dmitri believed that Efrosin sounded much too cheerful about that, but then he sounded cheerful about everything.

  “Have you ever imagined what it might be like to see the stars in their own dark habitat?” Efrosin said. “I suspect it is my destiny to do so. For I could float that high, I’m quite sure. The problem is suffocating before I get there. The air gets so very thin.”
Efrosin looked around again, his babbling ceasing for a moment. “The bed will do, I suppose. Do be romantic and tie me to the posts and cut off my clothes.”

  Dmitri was sorely tempted as he imagined what the prince’s naked body might look like. “Won’t you need them for the trip home?”

  “They can wrap me in blankets until they reach the river, at which point I’ll happily swim the rest of the way.”

  “Ten leagues is much too far to swim.” “Says who? Go on now, tie me up and cut my clothes off. I feel as though I’ll burst if I’m forced to wait a moment longer.”

  Frowning, Dmitri reached for the knife he had tucked in his boot and quickly cut the rope that had lashed them ankle to ankle. He watched in awe as Efrosin giggled and floated feet-first toward the low ceiling, still attached at Dmitri’s wrist.

  Dmitri didn’t know if he should try to pull him back down again or not, but Efrosin jerked on their attached arms and said, “Cut that one too then. Or the blood will all go to my head, and that gives me such a terribly funny headache.”

  Dmitri cut him free and stared as Efrosin spun round in the air, twirling until his feet touched the ceiling, and then pushed off again, sliding through the air like an eel in water. He reached out with his hands to run his fingers over the walls and the shelf of books before rising back to the ceiling again, where he repeated the push-off and continued his exploration.

  Efrosin gripped the edge of the shelf to explore the titles. “Science, science, history, farming, history. Yawn, yawn, yawn, each yawnier than the last. Where are the novels? Where are the torrid stories of illicit coupling? Your mind must be sorely lacking in key areas. No wonder you didn’t understand the romance of our situation in the woods.” Efrosin’s laughter took the sting from his words, and he pushed off the shelf with enough force to catapult through the air until he grabbed the post at the foot of the bed. He held on with one hand, and with the other began to remove his clothes. “Such a silly Dmitri.”

  Efrosin’s body sank about a foot suddenly, and his brow furrowed, but then he was back to floating near the ceiling as his hand gripped the post. He kicked off again, and he hooked a leg around the post, so that it appeared as though he was standing upright in mid-air on one pointed toe.

  “Shall we then?” he asked.

  Chapter Three

  Dmitri’s mouth went dry as he watched Efrosin’s long, lovely fingers open the buttons of his shirt, revealing creamy skin and small, budded nipples. Dmitri could not tear his eyes away from the light golden hair on Efrosin’s chest that was followed by a thicker patch leading from his navel down to where his hand was now working to open the drawstring of his white and silver-edged pants.

  Dmitri licked his lips at the sight of the

  wet spot staining the silk.Are you really goingto bugger him? Incredulity and common

  sense threatened to overpower his lust.It’s a dream. A strange but powerful dream. Whyever not? When you wake, you’ll be quite sorry if you don’t.

  But he was not convinced. There was nothing aside from the unlikeliness of it all that spoke to it being a dream.

  “Dmitri,” Efrosin said, and he sank down the bed post a bit. “I order you under penalty of death to rid me of my cursed virginity.” His laughter and inability to say it with a straight face didn’t impress anything upon Dmitri other than Prince Efrosin was not afraid to be debauched.

  It’s what he wants. And you’re his subject— of course you’ll obey.

  But being Efrosin’s subject was less of a consideration to Dmitri than the knowledge that he might never get a chance to screw someone again, much less someone as beautiful as Efrosin. And for some unknown reason, Efrosin seemed to feel the same way, given how desperate he was to be plowed immediately and in any way possible, and that need pulled at Dmitri, winding through him like siren song, impossible to ignore.

  Dumbstruck, Dmitri watched as Efrosin kicked his pants free, and his body—too masculine to be called delicate, but still compact and slender—was exposed in its considerable beauty. Dmitri’s blood thundered at the vision of Efrosin’s cock, gorgeous and nothing like Dmitri’s own. It was flushed and long, with a rosy, thick head and a slimmer girth. His thighs were sprinkled with that same golden hair from his chest, and his arms and legs were muscular but lean.

  “Don’t you—do you not think we should —” Dmitri didn’t get any more words out, his cock aching and pushing against his breeches painfully. “Oh God forgive me,” he muttered, tearing his shirt over his head and casting it aside, his eyes greedily raking over Efrosin’s form, taking in every inch of him that was on offer. He ripped open his pants, kicked them off and lunged at Efrosin.

  “Forget God,” Efrosin said, eyes alight with excitement, and deep laughter rumbling up from his chest. “What has He got to do with anything?”

  Dmitri had no thought left in his mind to be appalled at the blasphemy as he grabbed hold of Efrosin’s floating ankle and jerked him effortlessly down. He gasped, finding Efrosin quite firm and solid in his arms. His skin was softer than he’d thought possible, but his muscles and bones stronger than expected. Efrosin’s laughter was intoxicating against Dmitri’s mouth, bubbling into his throat and filling him with a giddy need that felt too good to bear.

  “Brilliant,” Efrosin cried, as Dmitri threw Efrosin to the bed and captured him there beneath his own body.

  Bloody brilliant indeed. He attached his mouth to Efrosin’s neck, biting gently, and smoothed his palms over every bit of skin he could. Now, if only he wouldn’t lose his mind and shoot his seed too soon. His skin tingled and his prick throbbed with his heartbeat as a reedy desperation drove him onward, overcome with a need to fulfill Efrosin’s urgent lust, dimly aware beneath his own screaming desire that he would only be truly content again upon Efrosin’s satisfaction.

  * * * * *

  Efrosin had never felt such a delicious sense of weight. Even when he’d been held down forcibly in the past, it had not been like this. Of course it hadn’t. He’d never been naked, hard and rutting together with another man in desperate, grasping need. Dmitri was bigger than he was. Taller, and could cover him with his entire body, which made Efrosin feel that most delightful thing of all—safe.

  As lust-soaked moans filled the tiny room, Dmitri pinned him, their arms and legs tangled, mouths open and tasting everything in reach. Efrosin quickly lost track of whether his mouth was on Dmitri’s arm, neck, cheek, ear or chest, only knowing that Dmitri tasted of earth and skin. It was good—so very good—that Efrosin wasn’t even laughing. But before he could fully realize that oddity, he was again enraptured by the intense sensation of flesh sliding on flesh, cock against cock.

  Efrosin had never had a moment of modesty in his life, but rocking beneath Dmitri, he suddenly felt shy and hid his face in the crook of Dmitri’s neck. It was fragility and solidity combined. He tingled, aware of where his body rubbed against Dmitri’s, and he swallowed against the strange thickness in his throat that felt like trapped laughter. Why did it not come out? Usually, no sooner did it bubble up in him than it spilled free.

  Dmitri was also clearly overwhelmed, moaning most delightfully as his hands ran everywhere over Efrosin’s body, his mouth following, wet and hot, kissing Efrosin’s neck and sucking his collar bone before biting down against Efrosin’s pink, tight nipple. Dmitri’s mouth came back to fit against Efrosin’s own, his tongue licking lightly at his lips, until Efrosin grabbed him by the nape of his neck, and forced him into a harder, deeper kiss.

  Dmitri groaned and gasped, clasping Efrosin tighter, his fingers digging into Efrosin’s buttocks, pulling their hips flush. Efrosin threw his legs around Dmitri’s heaving back, hooking his ankles and holding on as best he could as they writhed together.

  His tutor had educated him on the theory, but the reality was beyond Efrosin’s imagining. There was no space between them at all, and Efrosin’s world narrowed down to their desperate grappling, the scent of their lust permeating the air between them as they
grunted and whimpered. Efrosin’s pulse beat in his ears, and he quivered as he felt their cocks throb against each other, foreshadowing oncoming climaxes that promised to be so much that Efrosin quaked in fear and longing for it.

  His balls drew up with a shocking wrench in his gut, and he held on tight, tangling his fingers into Dmitri’s dark hair, kissing him again, running the tip of his tongue along the roof of Dmitri’s mouth. And then, faster than he wanted, it was over.

  Efrosin arched, his toes flexed, and as his cock rubbed alongside Dmitri’s, slick with their sweat and over-eager seed, he felt something hard and heavy drag up through him, as if from an internal depth he never knew existed. It settled in his gut, burning and weighing there, before he screamed.

  Afraid and ecstatic, he clawed at Dmitri’s back and shoulders as he pulsed, his cock spurting and his eyes locked in shock on Dmitri’s own. It was like nothing he’d ever felt before, and he shook, wondering if his heart would stop from the immense wonder of it.

  Dmitri kissed him again, a sharp moan in his throat, more like a desperate plea, before thrusting his prick against Efrosin’s stomach, now sloppy with Efrosin’s spendings. He jerked, shaking on top of Efrosin as bursts of wet heat shot over Efrosin’s stomach and chest.

  “Oh,” Efrosin cried, still shivering and watching in delight as Dmitri’s face contorted in pleasure. “Was that…is that…?” Efrosin was breathless. He felt addled, confused and utterly deconstructed.

  Dmitri pulled back to look at the mess between their bodies and, with a groan, unloaded a last, surprising shot of seed onto Efrosin’s stomach. Dmitri’s pupils were blown wide and he stared open-mouthed and panting at Efrosin.

  “That was ravishing then? No wonder it is so highly recommended by romance novels and plays.”

  Dmitri nodded, wordless and still shuddering.

  Efrosin’s mouth seemed to have found words, even if his mind was yet lost in orbit. He shifted beneath Dmitri, a subtle shivery tingle filling him up again like a tide or eddy, and then pulling away, leaving him breathless and limp. “It was frightening, but really quite wonderful. Is the end always like that? I was afraid I’d come apart. I almost could not bear it.”