Know Thy Demons

With a small smile, he walks close to the glass. He pulls his shirt over his head and drops it on the floor. "Your turn."

His body is lean and beautiful, smooth muscles dancing beneath ivory skin. A few jet hairs cling to his rose-tinged aureoles and his slender chest is crowned by a thatch of black. When I lift my gaze to his face, his dark blue eyes shine with a childlike earnestness beneath his tousled hair. He's far more attractive than in his mindscapes.

But his dream image probably reflects how he sees himself. Raw-boned with features that are a shade grotesque. In reality, his diamond-shaped face is elegant with a long nose and pointed chin that set it off perfectly. Although he sometimes moves in an awkward manner, his body is statuesque, a perfect example of lithe vigor that would make any figure artist reach for his charcoal.

I'm beguiled. I remove my cloak and put it in the metal drawer. He opens the drawer on his side and puts my cloak in a bag.

He drops to one knee and unlaces his boots. He slips out of one, then the other, and rises to his full height, smiling at me in his sock-feet. I can't help but smirk at him as I pull off my boots. Exactly how far is this little game going to go?

He unbuckles his belt and slips it free of his pants loops. I shrug at him and unclasp the buckle of my own belt. It’s long, and I have to loop it several times to get it to fit in the drawer.

"Now the shirt," he says in a quiet voice devoid of power. My fingers work the buttons loose as if he had given an order. I don't know why I'm doing what he wants. I pull my arms out of the sleeves and place my shirt in the drawer. He retrieves it, places it in the bag, then unbuttons his jeans. He wriggles and pushes the jeans to the floor. They hit the tiles with a tinkle of metal. He lifts a long foot from the pool of fabric, then kicks it to one side.

The scattering of hairs around his navel fall into a silken black line marching into his silvery blue bikini underwear. The ample bulge straining against the silky fabric holds my gaze.

He clears his throat. I find his eyes, bright and midnight blue in his flushed face. "Now you," he says. It's an order, again without power, his voice gentle and tinged with embarrassment.

I remove my breeches and place them in the drawer. I'm completely naked. I always eschew underwear when I wear breeches. His eyes are wide and his face has gone red. Even his ears are blushing.

I can't help the impish smile twisting my mouth. "I believe the turn is yours."

To my complete surprise, he bites his lips together and pushes his underwear partway down, freeing a large, handsome cock that hardens in the air. It's a graceful, pale obelisk, thick and brawny all the way to the neck where a plump, rosy helmet begs to have a warm mouth stretched over it. My lips part slightly with need and my own cock bobs toward the glass between us. We're about the same size, although mine is natural and more tawny than blush with a slight taper.

His gaze falls to the floor as he pushes his hair out of his face. He jerks up his underwear and shimmies into his jeans, keeping his eyes down. He stops dressing to add my breeches to the bag in which he has collected the rest of my clothing. Wordlessly, he puts the garments from DemonCo in the drawer and closes it.

I leave the slave clothes in the drawer, preferring to watch Frank dress. His lovely, sculpted-marble nakedness disappears behind a baggy black tee shirt. He glances up at me, then turns his attention, once again, to the floor. "Um. You can get dressed now."

"Maybe I like being nude."

He doesn't look at me. "Putteth on thy new robes," he orders, power in his voice. The game is over. We are master and servant again. I want to resist but can't. I pull on the clothes. The fabric is soft; the cut is plain. I feel more vulnerable in the prison uniform than I did naked.

“I’m going to lunch,” Frank tells me. His face is red and he’s avoiding looking at me. In a moment he’s gone, the lights are out, the door shut.

During our game, I forgot where I was. But now the present is all over me. Is this my life now? Pajamas, a spot light, a glass cage? A heat I can’t bear and a cold boy I can't reach? I want him to be the boy I loved in the lunaia, but he’s more like the boy who imprisoned me in his mindscapes—something damaged and erratic. He isn’t actually a boy at all. He’s a Necromancer. Why do I still want to love him?