IsabellaRose

Lara melted, not because the magic made her, she understood that now, in the warm golden clarity blooming through her body. The fae hadn't taken anything from her. They'd given something back. The door they'd opened only led to a room that had always been hers, locked away by a lifetime of cold nights and her mother's careful silences, and standing on the threshold of it now, breathless and flushed and wanting, Lara made her choice with both eyes open. She turned her cheek into the dark-haired fairy's palm and pressed a kiss to the center of it. "Show me," she whispered. "All of it. I'm ready." The fairy's grin softened into something hungrier. "Good girl," she said like a purr, and the words sent a fresh shiver curling down Lara's spine, pooling low and hot in her belly. "She learns." The other three drew in close, a circle of warm luminous skin and fluttering wings, and Lara felt hands settle on her, at her waist, her shoulders, smoothing up the curve of her back. Gentle, patient, teaching hands. "First," the leader murmured, fingers finding the laces of Lara's bodice, "we let you breathe." The cord pulled loose. The constraint that had pressed against her all day eased, and Lara gasped as cool forest air met newly-bared skin, every nerve singing awake under the attention of four sets of bottomless black eyes. "There she is," one breathed reverently. Lara had never in her life been looked at like this, like something wanted, something worth unwrapping slowly, and the strange thing, the wonderful thing, was that she didn't shrink from it. She leaned in. The shame she'd braced for never came, only heat, hunger, and a dizzying sense of finally, finally belonging somewhere. The dark-haired fairy tilted Lara's chin up. "The first lesson," she said, lips a breath from Lara's own, "is that you're allowed to want this. Say it." Lara breathed. "I want this," she said, in a barely audible whisper. "Again." "I want this." Louder this time, firmer. The fairy kissed her then, a soft press of lips against her own, but slowly, tenderly, the kiss deepened, and Lara's whole world narrowed to the press of those lips against hers. Oh. That was the only thought she could form at first, a small, stunned syllable, lost somewhere behind her ribs. Oh, so this is what it's like. She'd kissed exactly one boy in her life, a fumbling thing behind the goat shed when she was sixteen, all clacked teeth and panic. This was nothing like that. This was slow. The dark-haired fairy kissed her the way honey pours, unhurried, inevitable, coating every part of her it touched. There was no rush in her at all, and that patience undid Lara more than any urgency could have. A warm hand cradled the back of her neck, fingers threading up into her hair, holding her just so, and Lara felt herself make a sound she'd never made before, a soft, helpless little hum into the fairy's mouth. I made that sound. That was me. She'd spent her whole life keeping quiet... quiet on the farm, quiet in her grief, quiet in the dark when her own hands wandered and shame chased the pleasure away before it could finish blooming. But here, now, the sound had simply escaped her, and instead of shame there was only the fairy's answering murmur of approval, a low pleased rumble against her lips that told her, yes, more of that, give me more of that. The fairy's tongue traced the seam of her mouth, asking, and Lara opened to her without thinking, and that... yes, that. Heat lanced down through the center of her, throat to belly to the ache between her thighs, and her knees actually buckled. The hand in her hair tightened, holding her up, and the dark-haired fairy laughed softly into the kiss, not cruel, not now, just delighted. "Easy," she breathed against Lara's mouth, pulling back just far enough that their lips still brushed when she spoke. "We have all the time you need. There's no hurry here, half-blood. No one's coming. Nothing to do but feel." The words triggered something deep. Nothing to do but feel. Lara's entire life had been doing... milking, mending, burying, surviving. She had never once in twenty years been told she could simply stop and feel, and that the feeling was allowed. Her eyes stung with something that wasn't quite arousal and wasn't quite grief, and the fairy must have seen it, because she smoothed a thumb across Lara's cheekbone with surprising tenderness. "I know," she murmured. "I know. Let it go. All of it. You don't have to hold anything anymore." And Lara, trembling, let herself be kissed again. This time the fairy's free hand began to move... down the line of her throat, slow as dripping wax, fingertips reading her like something precious. Across the wing of her collarbone... down, over the loosened bodice, to the bare swell of her chest where the laces had fallen open. The touch wasn't grasping. It grazed, feather-light, tracing the upper curve of her breast in a slow half-circle, and Lara's breath stuttered into nothing. Why does that... why does barely anything feel like everything? Her skin had woken, just as they'd promised. Every nerve stood at attention, and the lightest brush of a fingertip sent ripples of sensation cascading outward, overlapping, building. She found herself arching, pressing up into a touch that retreated the instant she chased it, the fairy denying her with a knowing little smile. "Slow," the fairy reminded her, voice like dark silk. "We're not skipping a single page of this lesson. You've waited your whole life. What's a few moments more?" She's right. I've waited my whole life. I can wait. I want to wait. I want to feel every... The fairy's fingertip lingered at the edge of Lara's loosened bodice, and there it stopped. "Patience," she breathed, and withdrew her hand entirely. Lara nearly sobbed at the loss. No... come back, please... she thought, but the dark-haired fairy only smiled and took a slow step back, her black eyes traveling down the length of Lara's body with frank, unhurried appraisal, as if she had all the centuries of the wood to look her fill. "You're going to learn something, half-blood," she said. "The wanting is the gift. The ache before. The waiting. Most rush past it like it's a toll to be paid. We're going to live in it." She circled, slow, a predator with no need to hurry because the prey had already surrendered. Lara felt the heat of the other three at her back, watching, waiting, a warm presence that should have made her shy and instead made her bold. Four sets of eyes on her bare skin, and she didn't cover herself. She let them look. I let them look. And I like that they're looking. Is this who I am? Is this who I've always been, under all of it? Her thoughts were a mix of awe and dawning awareness. "The first layer," the fairy murmured, coming round to face her again, "is already gone." Her gaze dropped to the loosened laces, the bodice gaping open over the chemise beneath. "But there are so many more. Layers of cloth. Layers of you. We'll take them one at a time." She reached out and, with a single finger, hooked the shoulder of Lara's cloak. The heavy wool slid down her arm, slow and deliberate, and pooled at her feet with a soft whump of fabric. It was just her cloak, nothing more, and yet the loss of it left Lara feeling stripped already, the cool forest air finding her bared shoulders, raising gooseflesh that the fairy traced with one fingertip. "There," she purred. "Cold?" Lara nodded, trembling. "Good. The cold makes the warm sweeter." The fairy leaned in and pressed her lips, not to Lara's mouth this time, but to the curve of her bared shoulder, a single kiss, soft and lingering, there and then gone. Lara's breath left her in a shudder. One kiss. One. And I feel it everywhere. The fairy's mouth moved a hair's breadth at a time along the slope of her shoulder toward her throat. Each kiss was its own small eternity, set down with the care of someone painting. Lara's hands hung useless at her sides, then rose, fluttering, unsure, and the fairy caught one without breaking her slow ascent, lacing their fingers together, anchoring her. She's holding my hand. Why does that make my chest ache more than anything else? Because no one had touched her with tenderness in years. Because she had been alone, so completely alone, and now there were warm hands and warm mouths and warm eyes and someone holding on to her like she was worth holding. The pleasure and the loneliness braided together until Lara couldn't tell where one ended and the other began, and she let out a small broken sound that was half a moan and half a sob. The fairy paused at the hollow of her throat. Looked up. Read everything written on Lara's flushed, overwhelmed face. "There," she whispered. "That's the door opening all the way. Don't fight it. Don't hold a single thing back." Her free hand rose to the top lace of the chemise, the last real layer between Lara and the air. "Shall I?" Lara's heart hammered. Her whole body sang with the ache, the waiting, the wanting they'd promised would become a gift. She swallowed hard. "Yes," she breathed. "Please." The fairy's smile was the slowest thing of all as she drew the first lace loose.

Lara was insatiably curious. Could it be true? Was she part fae? She knew fairies were tricksters, knew they took more than they gave, and what they gave was never what you thought you were getting, but... She spoke before thinking, words spinning directly out into the world. "What will it… feel like? What will it do to me?" She was breathless and excited, hopeful but frightened. She remembered all the stories of fairies... but still... The fairy's black eyes softened, and her voice dropped to something almost tender... almost... as the golden light hovered warm against Lara's throat. "What will it feel like?" she echoed, and the other three sighed in unison, a sound like wind through reeds. "Like the first warm day after a long winter. Like sinking into a bath drawn just right. It starts here..." the fingertip drifted, not quite touching, tracing the air down the line of Lara's throat to the swell of her chest. "It starts as heat, blooming slow, spreading out through every part of you that's been cold and asleep." "Your skin will wake up," another whispered, circling behind her. "Every inch of it. You'll feel the breeze like a lover's breath. The brush of your own dress will make you shiver." Lara's breath hitched. She could already feel it, or imagined she could, a flush crawling up from her collar, a tightness low in her belly she had no name for, an ache she'd only ever felt in the dark, alone, half-ashamed. "What will it do?" The leader smiled, sweet and terrible. "It will unlock what you already are, underneath. It strips away the fear, the shame, all that human knotting-up. You'll want things, pretty thing. You'll want them openly, and the wanting won't frighten you anymore... it'll feel like coming home." "It won't change your face," one promised. "Won't change your healing," said another. "Only opens the door," the leader breathed, "to the part of you that blooms. The part that draws every eye... and welcomes it." She paused, and a flicker of that cruelty glinted through. "The stories are true, half-blood. Fae bargains always cost. This one will make you... hungrier... than you've ever been. Hungry for touch... for more. Some would call that the price. You might call it the gift." Her grin returned, full and sharp. "We won't lie and say you'll be the same after. You won't. But you'll be happy. And you'll be warm. And you'll be fed." The light pulsed, patient, a hairsbreadth from her skin. "So. Knowing all of it now... do you still say yes?" Lara thought about it. If it was just going to make her more... her... then what could she lose? "If it’s my true nature… if you’re not lying about that, then... yes. But you must stay with me until it’s over. Be my teacher, show me what it means, how it works." She’d heard stories of fae growing to human size and taking human lovers… if they were going to awaken what it seems like they intended to awaken, she wanted them to show her how to... be like that. What to do. The fairy's grin turned radiant, triumphant, even, and the golden light flared bright between them. "Yes," she breathed, and all four chorused it, a shivering harmony that seemed to ripple through the trees themselves. "She says yes!" "And asks us to stay," another marveled, delighted. "To teach her. Oh, she's a clever one..." "A greedy one," purred the third, and it sounded like the highest praise. "Then it's struck," the leader declared. "Witnessed by root and branch and the old dark between. A teacher you asked for, and a teacher you'll have." She pressed her glowing fingertip to the hollow of Lara's throat. The touch was tiny, no larger than a raindrop, but the heat that poured from it was anything but. It sank beneath her skin like sunlight through water, spreading down her chest, blooming outward in slow golden waves. Lara gasped, her knees going soft, her hands flying out to catch herself against the nearest tree as warmth unfurled through every cold and sleeping part of her. It was exactly as they'd promised. Her skin woke. The brush of her cloak against her shoulders sent a shiver racing down her spine. The breeze found the bare skin of her throat and she felt it like fingertips. Her bodice suddenly seemed too tight, the laces an unbearable constraint against a chest that rose and fell faster with every breath. ...and the fairies were growing. It happened the way frost melts, slowly at first, gradual, then all at once. The little glittering shapes stretched and unfolded, gossamer wings widening, tiny limbs lengthening, until four lithe figures stood in the dappled light where the sprites had hovered. They were woman-shaped now, woman-sized, their skin faintly luminous and dusted with that same gold, their black eyes bottomless, their grins unchanged. The leader was the tallest, dark-haired, wild, and beautiful in a way that made Lara's breath stutter. She reached out with a full-sized hand now and cupped Lara's flushed cheek. "Easy, half-blood," she murmured, voice low and rich where before it had been a sparrow's chirp. "The door is open. Feel it? That ache? That's the truth of you, waking up at last." Her thumb traced Lara's lower lip. "Now. Let your teachers show you what it's for." ...and Lara melted.

Author's Note: This is some really derivative stuff I'm writing right now, trying to make the words cooperate with my intent. I'm trying to make it sexy in an interesting way, but I don't know how it's going to turn out. So... read at your own risk, I guess. - - - - - - - - - - - The morning Lara left, the sky was the color of old bruises with grey clouds bleeding into the pale promise of dawn. She'd buried her mother beneath the crooked oak three weeks past, and the last of the goats had died two days ago, its body slick with the same black-veined sickness that had taken the rest. Nothing held her to the farm now but ghosts. She shouldered the worn leather pack that contained everything she owned in the world: a change of clothes, her mother's silver hand mirror, half a loaf of bread, some dried apples, a waterskin, and the small skinning knife strapped to her thigh beneath her skirt. It wasn't much against three days of wilderness, but she was strong from a life of labor, and she healed fast. She'd always healed fast. Cuts closed in hours, bruises faded by morning. Her mother had called it a blessing and never explained it further. The dirt road wound east, swallowed quickly by the treeline. The forest stood waiting... ancient, dense, and far too quiet. Lara pulled her cloak tighter over her simple linen dress, the bodice laced snug over a chest that strained the fabric no matter how she dressed it down. She'd learned long ago that there was no hiding the way she was made. Even alone, the woods seemed to notice her. She swallowed her fear, whispered a prayer to gods she wasn't sure listened, and stepped beneath the canopy. The light dimmed. The road narrowed to a footpath. She walked into the shade of the forest, the sunlight pastures soon only a memory beyond the constant green and tree trunks. She went on for at least an hour, her nerves easing as the birds sang all around and small things scurried through undergrowth. But then, somewhere deeper in, a branch snapped. It was too deliberate to be the wind, too heavy to have been made by a chipmunk or squirrel. Lara forced her legs to keep moving, one laced boot after another, telling herself it was a deer... just a deer. They spooked easy and crashed off through the underbrush. That was all this was. But the forest didn't return to its rustling calm. It stayed quiet, the wrong kind of quiet, where the birds have gone silent because something larger has entered their world. Her senses strained. Every snap of a twig beneath her own feet made her flinch. From the corner of her eye she caught movement, low to the ground, off to her right, keeping pace just beyond the ferns. Then it was gone. Then it was to her left. Whatever it was, there was more than one, and they were circling. A giggle drifted through the trees, high, light, and almost musical, but with a cruel edge underneath it, like children who'd learned a game that wasn't kind. Then a voice, no bigger than a sparrow's, sing-songed from somewhere above her... "Pretty thing, pretty thing, walking all alone... smells like flowers and spring, smells like fae bone." A tiny shape darted across the path ahead. It was no taller than her forearm, with gossamer wings that caught the dim light in flashes of green and gold... a fairy. But not the gentle storybook kind her mother had hummed about. Its grin was too wide, its eyes too black, and three more flickered into view behind it, hovering at the height of her face, studying her the way a cat studies a wounded bird. "She's one of ours, almost," one buzzed, drifting close enough that Lara could feel the flutter of its wings against her cheek. "Half-blood. Watered down. But oh, she'll bloom if we play with her right..." The path ahead was blocked by their dancing little bodies. The path behind felt suddenly very far away. Panic gripped Lara's heart like a fist of ice, but the words of the fairy made a question form in her mind. She planted her feet, summoning more courage than she felt, and fixed the nearest fairy with a hard stare. "What do you mean, half-blood? I'm human." Her voice wavered only a little. "And I've no time to play games, so unless you've food and shelter for me, I'll be on my way." The fairies erupted into peals of laughter, tumbling through the air like windblown petals, clutching their tiny sides. "*Human!*" one shrieked with delight, spinning a loop. "She thinks she's human!" "Smells the truth right off her skin," another buzzed, darting in to hover beneath her jaw, inhaling deep through a button nose. "Fae in the blood, fae in the marrow. Diluted, oh yes, three or four generations down... but it's there. It's why you heal, isn't it, pretty thing? Cut yourself and watch it close? Mother never told you why?" Lara was surprised by that. How could they know that? Her hand drifted unconsciously toward the faint, long-faded scar on her forearm, a gash from a scythe at twelve that should have crippled her, gone by supper. The first fairy, the boldest, alighted on a low branch at eye level and folded her gossamer wings prim against her back. Her grin sharpened. "Food and shelter, she says. Bold thing. Demanding thing." She tilted her head. "We've both, as it happens. A warm hollow, dry and soft, and berries sweeter than anything that grows in your dull dirt. We'll guide you there, safe from the goblins that prowl these paths and the troll that haunts the foothills." The other three giggled behind their hands. "But fae don't give gifts, little half-blood," she purred. "We trade. Everything in these woods has a price. You'll want to hear ours before you take a single berry from our hands." She leaned forward, black eyes glittering. "Shall we name it?" "Aye," Lara said, matter of fact. "Name your price, fairy." The fairy's grin split wider, far too wide for so small a face, revealing a row of tiny needle-sharp teeth. "Oh, she's eager," she sang, and her three sisters drifted closer, ringing Lara in a slow, lazy orbit. "Brave half-blood. Hungry half-blood. Listen well, then, and we'll deal fair. Fae always deal fair, even when we deal cruel." She rose from the branch and hovered before Lara's nose, close enough that the heat of her tiny body warmed the tip of it. "The hollow, the berries, safe-guiding you past goblins and troll... these are all yours. And in trade..." A long, theatrical pause. The forest seemed to lean in to listen. "...you let us wake what's sleeping in your blood. Just a touch. Just a taste. A little fae magic, drawn up to the surface where it belongs, instead of buried under all that dull human clay." "It won't hurt," another purred from behind her ear. "It'll feel good. Better than good. You've never felt anything like it, locked up tight on that lonely little farm. We'll open you up like a flower in the sun." "You'll be warmer," the third whispered. "Softer," breathed the fourth. "More yourself," the leader finished, eyes glittering black. "The self your mother was so afraid of she never spoke its name." A bead of golden light gathered at the fairy's fingertip, pulsing, sweet-smelling, like honey and warm skin and something headier underneath that made Lara's breath go shallow and her cheeks flush without her permission. "One touch," the fairy coaxed, drifting that glowing fingertip toward the bare skin of Lara's throat, the hollow above her laced bodice. "And the bargain is struck. Say yes, pretty thing." The light hovered a hairsbreadth from her skin, waiting. Lara held her breath. Dare she trust these fairies?

ground control

infected toe

big game

high praise

listens to crickets

pull back the covers and make a little invitation motion to join me in bed

Why so serious... in my pants?

Granted, but it includes hugs, sex, and any human touch... you will never feel another human touch. I wish to be able to make the best waffles in the world.

I would not push the button... those decisions are the original authors, regardless of my personal feelings. Push the button to be able to heal anyone with a touch, but you slowly become more hideous each time you do so.

hand job

granted, but only in your toes - super strong toe grip! I want the ability to cast actual magic spells.

are you judging our forbidden human/robot love?

flip the "Austin Powers" switch so the lights go low, the music kicks on, and the bed starts rotating

Not guilty. I don't know that I have any shredded cheese :( The next person has been to another continent than the one upon which they were born.

Fuck because I don't believe in marriage and we're all going to die anyway.

It's taken a while!

THE CHALLENGE It's been a few months since I posted a new challenge. Sorry, folks! Things went sideways for a bit, but I'm back on track now. For this challenge, tell us about a steamy encounter somewhere they definitely shouldn’t be doing it. The only constraint is that it has to be someplace public! Deadline Midnight (EST) Saturday 13 Jun, 2026 Limits 1 entry per person keep it around 2,000 words, no penalty for going a little over but remember, everyone has to read these to vote Prizes 1st Place: 4,000 EcchiCredits 2nd Place: 2,000 EcchiCredits 3rd Place: 1,000 EcchiCredits

Thank you. I re-read that. I really need to stop being so dramatic. Sheesh.