Piers Anthony - Phaze Doubt

“Bright lad! Thou dost owe me a mountain o’ them! Come, Flach, I will hurt thee not. I want only to play with thee.”

“But why? I be o’ no interest to thee!”

“Because,” she said seriously, “an I practice with thee, and find what works, mayhap I can surmount my curse and nab a good match of my own kind.”

“Tell me thy curse, and mayhap I can make a spell to abate it,” he offered hopefully.

“Come to my arms, and I will tell thee, though I owe thee not.”

Flach got down on the bed beside her. She turned over, caught his shoulder and rolled him into her. She was amazingly pleasant to He against. His spell served as a barrier against heat leakage, so that neither could hurt the other, but it allowed all other aspects of touch to register. It enabled him to catch a tactile glimpse of what grown folk found in each other, physically.

“Four times have suitors come my father deemed worthy,” she said. She took a breath, and her softness pressed caressingly against him. “Each were eager to be close to me. But each were stricken at the moment he sought to do with me as I would do with thee. Two died, one went lunatic, and one be yet in coma. Now the suitors be nay so eager, and I fear the onset o’ being an old demoness. It be the curse, that strikes down any who would love me.”

“I checked thee for malign influence when I met thee,” Flach said, trying to focus on his words instead of on her breathing. “That be no distrust o’ thee, but ‘cause my mission be dire, and I fear bad magic ‘gainst me. There be no curse on thee I can fathom, Icy.”

“Kind of thee to say so, Adept,” she said. “But then what struck those suitors?”

“Mayhap I can fathom that. I should be proof ‘gainst it, ‘cause o’ my magic, youth, and not being thy kind.” He hoped; that sounded like a dreadful curse, and the qualities he had named were barely protecting him from her wiles. If the curse turned out to be stronger than her blessings, even his magic might not be enough, since he did not want to make a big splash. “Exactly how did it happen?”

“When I get a demon close,” she said, “and I kiss him like this”—she kissed him on the mouth, and if her prior kiss on his cheek had been pleasant, this was so much more so as to resemble Adept magic instead of minor peasant spells to ward off flies. “And I squeeze him like this”—she pressed him in to the length of her body, and the length of his body responded with such a warm surge of feeling that he feared it would break across the protective spell. “And I whisper in his handsome frozen ear an endearment.” She put her lips to his ear, and breathed, “I love thee,” and though he knew it was merely a demonstration, his heart seemed to swell and burst with responding passion. To love such a woman! What could anything else matter, after that?

“Oh!” she squeaked, horrified.

Flach rolled away and scrambled to his feet, afraid of what had happened. Sure enough, there was a melted streak the length of her beautiful body. His burgeoning heat had broken through and touched her, horribly.

“O, Icy, I be sorry!” he said. “I will make magic to mend thee!”

“The pain be awful,” she gasped. “An thou canst—“

“The burn dispel, and make her well,” he singsonged, willing the healing power. This was stronger magic than he liked to use, but he felt guilty for hurting her, and had to make it right.

A small cloud of freezing vapor appeared, and coalesced against her body. The meltline disappeared. Icy relaxed.

“Ah, thy magic be profound!” she said. “The burn be gone as it never were. I thank thee, I thank thee!”

“Nay, it were my fault I hurt thee. Thy kiss, thine embrace, thy words, they heated me so it burst through the spell, and I harmed thee awfully. I beg thy forgiveness, lovely creature!”

“Nay, apologize not to me!” she exclaimed, sitting up. “I led thee to it, with my foolish game. I tried to make thee hot, as I made the others—“

She broke off, staring. Flach came to the same realization. “The heat!” he exclaimed. “I be warm, but I be but a child. An thou couldst do that to me, what couldst thou do to a grown man?”

“Well, they be o’ ice, like me—“

“But an they heated, they could melt!” he said. “That be no curse—that be o’erabundance o’ passion!”

“But such ne’er happ’d before to demonesses!” she protested.

“There was ne’er a snow creature nor as lovely neither passionate as thee before!”

“Aye,” she breathed, appreciating the validity of his observation. “Then love be my curse.”

“But now the cause be known, can we mute it,” he said. “Needs must I merely put a spell on thee to cap the intensity o’ thy effect on others. Then canst thou love freely and safely.”

“Safe love,” she agreed, delighting in the concept. “Canst do it to me now?”

Even in her innocent expressions, she’s sexy! Nepe noted jealously.

“Aye.” Flach pondered briefly, then singsonged: “Let the lady’s love be cool, not hot; his passion be but half she’s got.” As verse it was nothing, but his concept was true: any male approaching her would find his ardor muted to about fifty per cent, which should be survivable. At the very least it would slow things, and give her time to choke down her intensity if she saw the male becoming uncomfortable.

“But I feel not different,” she said.

“The effect be on thy lover, not thee,” he explained.

“Needs must I verify this,” she decided. “Come here, Adept.”

Oops. And you thought you’d gotten out of it! Nepe laughed.

Well, there were worse fates. Flach lay down beside her again, on the bed of snow. “Mayhap I should increase the power o’ my barrier spell,” he said. “I want not to melt thee again.”

“An thy magic work, no need,” she pointed out. “Thou willst not heat enough to break through. We have found the same passion which melted demons caused thee to melt me; an thou no longer melt me, nor will they melt. That be the test. I want to damp them not down more than be needful.”

He had to concede it was a fair test. Too much damping would be deleterious to her romance.

She took hold of him again and pressed him close. He felt as if he were aging several years: good, manly ones. She kissed him. He felt as if he were floating through a golden radiance of delight. She touched her ice-perfect lips to his ear and whispered, “I love thee, Adept, for the favor thou has done me.” He felt as if he were floating through a golden radiance of delight.

What? That was the last feeling! What about his heart swelling and bursting with responding passion?

It’s the feeling-cap, dummy! Nepe reminded him.

Oh. Of course. “I think thou dost be wonderful,” he told Icy. “But that be the limit.”

“Be that so?” she inquired, feeling challenged. “Mayhap I can show thee a thing or two.” She rolled him over on top of her, spread her legs, and wrapped them around his hips. The legs were evidently the two things she was showing him. She inhaled, causing his body to be lifted by cushions. That made two more things. She kissed him in a way he had not realized was possible. That was two more things, her lips, more amazing than either of the prior sets. “Where be thy limit now?” she whispered.

“I be floating on golden clouds,” he said. “And gazing at a hea’en I long to reach, but can not. I love thee, demoness, but can feel only the part o’ it. I beg thee, tease me not further, lest I find ne’er in the rest o’ my life the like!”

“Then I be proof ‘gainst heating my man!” she exclaimed, delighted. “An this not heat thee, naught will!” She flexed her legs a bit, and took another breath, and squeezed him miraculously tight yet gentle, sending him for a ride on another golden cloud.