Mikhail treaded water. “What are you doing out here?”
“What are you doing in there?”
“Swimming,” he answered. “What does it look like?”
“It looks silly. Cool, but silly.”
She couldn’t swim, he thought. Had she followed him from the white palace? “It is cool,” he told her. “Especially after you run.” He could tell that Alekza had been running; her body was moist with a fine sheen of sweat.
Alekza carefully eased down on the rock, reached forward, and cupped a hand into the water. She lifted it to her mouth and lapped it like an animal, then poured the rest of it over the golden down between her thighs. “Oh yes,” she said, and smiled at him. “It is cool, isn’t it?”
Mikhail was beginning to feel much warmer. He swam away from her, but it was a small pond. He swam in circles, pretending that he didn’t even notice as she stretched out against the rock and offered her body to the sun. And, of course, to his gaze. He averted his face. What was wrong with him? Lately, through the spring and now into the summer, Alekza had been much on his mind. Her blond hair, her ice-blue eyes when she was in her human form, her blond fur and proud tail when she was wolfen. The mystery between her thighs pulled at him. He’d had dreams… no, no, those were indecent.
“You have a beautiful back,” she told him. Her voice was soft; there was something pliable in it. “It looks so strong.”
He swam a little faster. Maybe to make the muscles of his back tense, maybe not.
“When you come out,” Alekza said, “I’ll dry you off.”
Mikhail’s penis had already guessed at how that was to be accomplished and grown hard as the rock Alekza perched on. He kept swimming as Alekza sunned herself and waited.
He could stay in the pond until she got tired and went back home, he thought. She was an animaclass="underline" that’s what Renati said about her. But, as Mikhail’s swimming began to slow and his heart pounded with an unknown passion, he knew his time with Alekza would be soon, if not today. She wanted him, wanted what he had. And he was curious; there were lessons Wiktor could not teach. Alekza was waiting, and the sun was hot. Its glare off the water made him feel dizzy. He made two more circles, turning the situation over in his mind. A vital part of him had already made its decision.
He pulled himself out of the water, feeling a mixture of longing and fear as he watched Alekza stand up, her breasts drawing tight as she looked at what he offered. She came down off the rock, and he stood in the grass and waited.
She took his hand, guided him into the shade, and there he lay down on a bed of moss. She knelt beside him. Alekza was beautiful, though up close Mikhail could see that lines had deepened around her eyes and at the corners of her mouth. The wolf’s life was hard, and Alekza was no longer a maiden. But her ice-blue eyes promised pleasures beyond his dreams, and she leaned forward and pressed her lips against his. He had a lot to learn about the art of love; his first lesson had begun.
Alekza made good her promise to dry him off, using her tongue. She began at the south and crawled ever so slowly northward, licking dry his legs, slowly lapping the water that beaded on his shivering skin.
She came to his blood-gorged center, and there she displayed the true quality of an animaclass="underline" the love of fresh meat. Alekza engulfed him, as Mikhail moaned and sank his fingers into her hair. Like an animal also, she was fond of using her teeth, and she bit and licked up and down as pressure rapidly built in his loins. He heard a roaring in his head, and luminous streaks leaped through his brain like summer lightning. Alekza’s warm mouth held him, her fingers squeezing at the base of his testicles. He felt his body convulse, a movement that was beyond his control, and for a number of seconds his muscles tensed as if they were about to rip through the flesh. The lightning in his brain danced, striking his nerves and flaming them. He groaned: a bestial sound.
Alekza released her grip on him and watched the seed fountain from Mikhail’s body. He convulsed a second time, and delivered another hot white explosion. She smiled, proud of her power over this young flesh; then, as Mikhail’s banner began to droop, she continued her journey of the tongue across his stomach, over his chest, and playing circles around and around on his skin. Goose bumps seethed in the wake of her passage. Mikhail began to harden again, and as his mind cleared from its initial delirium he realized now that there was more to be learned than the monks had ever dreamed.
Their mouths met, and lingered. Alekza bit at his tongue and lips, she grasped his hands and placed them on her breasts, and then she sat astride his thighs and eased herself down on him. They were connected, a pulse clenched within moist heat. Alekza’s hips began a slow rhythm that gradually increased in power and intensity, her eyes staring into his and her face and breasts glistening with sweat. Mikhail was a fast student; he rocked deeper into her, meeting her movements, and as their thrusts became harder and more urgent, Alekza threw back her head, her golden hair cascading around her shoulders, and cried out with joy.
He felt her shudder, her eyes closed and her lips making soft moaning noises. She offered her breasts to his kisses, her hips moving in tight, hard circles, and then Mikhail was overcome by that uncontrollable convulsion again. As his muscles tensed and the blood roared through his veins, a bounty of his essence exploded into Alekza’s warm wetness. He felt stretched, his bones throbbing with swampy heat. The sky might have crashed down on his face like blue glass, and he wouldn’t have cared. He drifted in an unknown land, but one thing he was certain of: he liked this place, very much. And he wanted to go back again as soon as he could manage the journey.
He was ready again faster than he would have thought. Body to body, he and Alekza rolled over the bed of moss, out of the shade and into the sunlight. Now she was underneath him, her legs up over his hips, and she laughed at his eagerness as he plunged deep again. This was better than swimming; he couldn’t find the bottom of Alekza’s pond. The sun beat down on them, its heat making their flesh wet and melding them together. It burned away the last vestiges of Mikhail’s shyness, as well, and he met her thrusts with steady power. Her thighs were pressed against his sides, her mouth urging at his tongue, his back arching as he stroked in her depths.
As their bodies moved again through tension toward release, it happened without warning. Blond hair scurried over Alekza’s stomach, over her thighs and arms. She gasped, her eyes dazed with pleasure, and Mikhail caught her wild, pungent odor. That smell triggered the wolf in him, and black hair rippled over his back, underneath her clenching fingers. Alekza contorted and began to change, her gritted teeth lengthening into fangs, her beautiful face taking on another form of beauty. Mikhail, still embraced within her, let himself go, too; black hair emerged over his shoulders, his arms, buttocks, and legs. Their bodies writhed in a mingling of passion and pain, and they turned and angled so the body that was becoming a black wolf was mounting the emergent blond wolf from behind. And in the instant before the change became complete, Mikhail shuddered as his seed entered Alekza. The pleasure overwhelmed him, and he threw back his head and howled. Alekza joined his singing, their voices combining in harmony, breaking apart and combining again: another kind of lovemaking.
Mikhail pulled out of her. The spirit was still willing, but the black-haired testicles were drained. Alekza rolled in the grass, then jumped up and ran in circles, snapping at her tail. Mikhail tried to run, too, but his legs gave way and he lay in the sun with his tongue hanging out. Alekza nuzzled him, rolled him over, and licked his belly. He basked in the attention, his eyes heavy-lidded, and he thought that there would never be another day like this one.