===== 08/07/02 === 11:10:26 p.m. =====

This piece is basically a spinoff from my Edodale premise, which is why Rurouni 
Kenshin characters are (kind of) talking and acting as if they were modern-day characters 
from Buffy. If you really need to know more about the basic setup, hey, "Edodale" is here 
on ff.n too. This may possibly end up being an optional chapter for that story, but 
possibly not. 

In the Forests of the Night 
By wombat


"You're a right mess, aren't you?" The man studied Kaoru as she lay in a heap where he'd 
set her down. When she made a feeble attempt at sitting up, her hair left a broad 
brushstroke of blood-streaked grime on the floor beneath her cheek. "Jineh never was 
much of a sport. Bloke never seems to understand that hostages are only useful when you 
keep them alive. You all right, then?" 

"I-- I think so," Kaoru said uncertainly, but when she tried to stand, her knees went all 
wobbly beneath her and she fell down again. "Maybe I twisted an ankle, but it'll be 
okay." 

"Look, why don't you wash up while I brew a cuppa to get you warm. Make you feel a bit 
better, hey?" 

She looked down at herself: jeans caked with half-frozen mud, torn-sleeved jacket soaked 
with zombie slush, hair trailing raggedly out of her ponytail and sodden with both. "Um. 
If you have some clothes I could borrow, that would be great. Can I call my friends first 
to tell them I'm okay?" 

"Let them wait a bit. Look at you, you're shivering so hard that mud is flaking off you in 
pieces. Get on with you into the tub, second door around the corner. Plenty of soap and 
towels in there, and I'll see what else I can find." 

Plenty of hot water too, and a good thing. She wasn't used to washing in just a tub instead 
of a shower, and she had to drain and refill it several times before the water stayed clean. 
The cake of soap had a nice, solid feel against her skin, and a pleasant scent of 
sandalwood and bergamot. Once she felt clean, she settled down into the water, 
submerging her head nearly up to the level of her nose and watching the ripples from her 
breath. With her ears underwater, she didn't hear his knock at the door, but she was both 
too exhausted and too drowsy to be terribly startled when he poked his head in. He 
must've had a clear view of her body through the water, but he didn't show much interest 
beyond a cursory glance. He left a bundle of clothing on the counter beside the sink and 
disappeared again. 

She supposed that was a hint. She wasn't sure how long she'd been soaking, but her 
fingers and toes had the slightly wrinkled, bright pink look of umeboshi. Still a little 
dizzy, she braced herself slowly up on the edge of the tub and climbed over it onto the 
bathmat. His towels were nice too: thick and velvety, in a deep shade of teal. When she'd 
dried herself enough that her hair was only damp, not dripping, she shook out the 
clothing and boggled slightly. 

It was a formal kimono set. It was a pretty nice kimono, too-- it felt like real silk, in a 
pale shade of rose like winter dawn. She didn't know how to put on a kimono by herself, 
and she wasn't even sure when was the last time her mother had dressed her up in one for 
a festival. Well, he'd taken her own clothing, probably to go stress out his washing 
machine, so she'd just have to make do for now. 

She didn't feel like bothering with the three different cotton undergarments, or even all of 
the belty things, so she just pulled on the tabi socks, wrapped the kimono around her, and 
tied it closed with the crimson gauze undersash. The kimono trailed beyond her feet, but 
she held the hem up out of her way as she walked out, the rest of the bundle tucked under 
her arm. 

He was pouring out some tea at the low table in the corner, but when he looked up at her, 
he actually laughed. "Crikey, they don't teach girls how to wear things proper any more, 
do they?" He set the teapot down and got to his feet to take the bundle from her and 
spread it out on a sideboard. 

"That's all wrong, you know. Might as well look decent while you're at it. Don't you 
worry, I helped my sister for years with the same set you're wearing. Or at least wearing 
bits of." He set aside the underkimono as well as the camisole and half-slip that should've 
wrapped around her waist beneath it. "Don't even want to bother with the susoyoke? Oh 
well. Not like she'll be worrying about water spots on the silk where she is now." 

"Was she--" Kaoru faltered. "Did something happen to her?" 

His face was carefully expressionless. "She was taken away from me untimely, let's say." 

"I'm sorry." 

"'Tisn't your fault, pet. Turn your back and hike up your hem so I can tie your waist up." 
Once she had a good grip on the front panels of the kimono, he whipped the crimson 
undersash back off, then tied a braided cord around her waist. "Drop the overlap to fall 
over the cord, now, and hold onto these bits of padding so I can fasten the waistband over 
them. Should ought go under the kimono, but too late for that. All right then, here comes 
the obi, so round and round we go." The dark blue brocade looped around her several 
times. 

"Right, hang onto this end and I'll pop in the padding for the bow, and trade you 
that obi end while you hold onto both ends of the undersash again. Bow's all tied up 
around the padding back here, lovely red cord around the obi, and now all we have to do 
is tuck the undersash into your front. That's better, innit? Here, might as well tie your hair 
up, too." 

Embarrassed by all this attention, she snatched the ribbon, his fingers brushing the back 
of her neck as she sidestepped him to tie up her damp hair herself. The ribbon was a 
darker shade of rose than the kimono and too narrow to make the kind of big floppy bow 
she liked, but there was certainly enough of it to manage her usual ponytail. As a last 
touch, he dropped a long shawl around her shoulders, a pale blue-violet like the ghost of 
iris petals. "That'll help keep the chill off. Ready for that cuppa now?" 

She followed him to the cushions at the table and surreptitiously wiggled around to find a 
way to kneel on hers that wouldn't put too much weight on her ankle. The motion made 
her uncomfortably aware of the kimono, if that was the right adverb. Its pale silk was 
maddeningly smooth against her bare skin, caressing every slight motion she made, and 
its liquid flow was accentuated by the stricture of the wide obi, all the way from her hips 
over her lower ribs. 

"Well then," he said, handing her some tea. "You're tidied up, and I've had a chance to 
send more of my blokes after Jineh, so let's have a chat. He's a right bugger and no 
mistake, but why was he after you?" 

"He wasn't," Kaoru said. "I went after him. Didn't expect him to have that many helpers 
around, though, or I would've brought my friends." 

"Fierce little bird, aren't you? What do you want with the likes of him?" 

She hesitated, but this man had saved her from Jineh, after all, and he hadn't seemed very 
surprised by the zombies. His accent and his little wire glasses kind of reminded her of 
Hiko, so maybe he was another guy from Okusofodo who'd come to help track down the 
hellblades. "He killed my dad and took his sword. It's a special one, made of silver, and I 
want to get it back." 

"You don't say." He did seem slightly surprised now, but not completely confused, so he 
already knew about at least some of what she was talking about. "Seems we skipped the 
introductions in all the rush. What's your name, pet?" 

"I'm Kaoru Kamiya-Summers." 

"You don't say," he repeated thoughtfully. He raised his cup to his face and took a long 
sip, letting the steam fog up his glasses to the same pale silver as his hair. He set down 
the cup, fanned the steam away, and took her hand. "Think we already know each other 
by reputation, then. You're Battousai's little bluebird, not that it's kept him from being too 
hungry to take my dove away from me. And you know who I am, don't you?" 

She tried to pull away, but while his grip wasn't cruel, it was firm enough to prevent 
casual escape. The same was true of his turquoise gaze. "You're Yukishiro Enishi. 
Tomoe's brother." 

"Too right I am." Ironically, he raised her hand to his lips for a kiss. "So, little bluebird, 
what should I do with you now?"

---

She really was a fierce little thing, Enishi thought, smaller than Tomoe or even Battousai. 
Easy enough to see where her nickname had come from, too, with those deep blue eyes 
blazing out at him from her face, still pink from her bath. After trying to tug free, she 
reached for the hot tea with her other hand. Lazily, he leaned across the table to whisk it 
out of range. "You weren't thinking of throwing that at me, now were you? Coz that just 
might make me cross, and you don't want that to happen." 

"Let go of me." Her voice was perfectly calm. No panic or pleading from her, at least not 
yet. Oh, this really would be a pleasure. 

"So you can go back to being one of Battousai's girls? Does he still play the knife game? 
I came up with that for Yumi, you know. Used it on your mum to make your dad give us 
the sakabatou." He traced the curve of her cheekbone. "You've your mother's lovely skin, 
you know. Didn't scar at all, did it?" 

She bit him. In his moment of surprise, Kaoru scrambled up and around him, limping for 
the door. Shaking his head, he simply drew his sheathed watou out from under the table 
and tripped her with it, then smacked it back down over her body to keep her pinned. He 
stood back up with his foot on the hilt, weighting it down. 

"My friends know where I went," she said, glaring at him over her shoulder. She still 
didn't look afraid, which disappointed him. "They're going to come look for me. That 
includes Kenshin." 

"Blimey, you're right. Too bad they won't have anything leading them from Jineh's place 
to here. Likely enough even you don't even know where we are, unless you sat up to look 
through the car window after all." 

Now that was a really luscious little growl in her throat. "They'll find some way to figure 
out where I am. Eventually." 

"Oh, eventually, and then Bob's your uncle. But I just wonder, whatever shall we do until 
then?" She squirmed very prettily under the watou, too, enough to blunt his guard with 
enjoyment. Just as he was wondering how far she was willing to kick the kimono's hem 
up, she got her arms free and shoved the watou sideways into his ankle, knocking him to 
the floor as well. 

This was even better than he'd hoped. He didn't even bother to get up, leaning back on his 
elbows as he watched her stagger to her feet. She was holding his watou. He grinned up 
at her. "Now, what's a little thing like you going to do with that?" 

She loosened the hilt. "Take a guess," she said. 

"I guess you're going to have trouble unsheathing that." 

Although the balance of the long blade was clearly difficult for her, she whipped it to the 
side and sent the sheath flying off. "Guess again." 

"Oh, let me think. Ceiling's too low for you to get a really nice overhead swing. Walls are 
a bit too close too, unless you're good with your off side." 

She wrapped the iris-petal shawl around her hand to protect it before gripping the blade 
about halfway down and bringing its point to his neck. "Well?" 

"Third time's the charm, they say. I guess you want to kill me." She drove the blade down 
through his throat, and he sprawled back onto the floor..

---

Her clothes. She had to get out of this distractingly clingy kimono, find her own clothes 
and get out of here, wherever here was. But they'd taken a long elevator ride up and that 
should mean they were on top of a tall building. There weren't that many tall buildings in 
Edodale. She'd better still be in Edodale. 

She left Enishi on the floor with the sword still skewered through him and started to limp 
around looking for his laundry machines before a horrible thought occurred to her. This 
was a nice place he had, with lots of gleaming woodwork, plush elaborate carpets, and 
weird art things scattered around. A really nice place. The sort of place where maids 
come in to do all the dusting and polishing, and take away the laundry to be dry-cleaned. 
But he hadn't known who she was when he brought her back here, and he'd seemed 
sincere enough about helping her, so what would he have done with her clothes? 

Finally, she found them further down the hall, in another bathroom. It looked like he'd 
rinsed them out in the sink before hanging them up over the shower curtain. He wasn't 
nearly as good at it as Kenshin. Well, fine, she'd just bring them with her wrapped up in a 
towel and find something else to wear. Maybe she could just cover up the kimono with 
the long leather coat Enishi had left by the front door; that might keep her warm enough 
while she tried to get away. What about shoes? 

A wardrobe in the bedroom outside had more folded kimono visible through the half-
open door. That must be where he kept Tomoe's things, so maybe some of her shoes were 
still there. She rummaged around, hoping to find something warmer than geta. And then 
she heard a throat being cleared behind her. 

Enishi was leaning back against the closed bedroom door, barring the way back to the 
hallway. He looked exceptionally pleased with himself, not even with the decency to still 
have a hole in his throat. "Forgot about something, pet, didn't you? I've seen the trick you 
lot played on my little dove, stabbing her with her own knife to make her mortal again. 
But her knife was blooded. My watou isn't. Won't do you a bit of good to poke at me with 
it, nor not much else besides the sakabatou." 

He caught the geta she threw at him, then simply tossed it aside to pull her away from her 
mad rush at the doorknob. His grip around her ribs kept sliding the kimono silk all over 
her body, for what felt like forever. Her hair shook loose from the ribbon, falling into her 
face. When she stopped struggling against him, it was almost as much to stop the 
unwanted arousal as to acknowledge that she couldn't get away. He turned her around by 
the shoulders, but she ducked her head, folding her arms tightly around herself. He saw 
anyway. 

"So that's how it is, is it?" Enishi sounded almost amused, but not quite, and slid a hand 
from her shoulder against the side of her throat, and across the slope of her breasts to a 
sharply outlined tip, nudging aside the elbow she'd tried to cover it with. 

She made a half-hearted sound of indignation, swaying on her feet. "Don't do that." 

"Why not? Got 'Property of Battousai' stamped on your girly bits, have you?" 

"No," she whispered. "No, he never-- Kenshin hasn't done anything like this." 

"Kenshin." He snorted. "Little bluebird, the only reason Battousai won't kill you is 
because of how much he wants you. You telling me there's no reason for that?" Despite 
his rough words, his fingers were gentle, pressing and sliding the silk against her in 
dizzying, breathless waves of sensation. She was barely able to wrench free, huddling 
away from him in rejection, but he simply tsked. "Not good enough." He pulled her back, 
crushing her obi's bow against his body as he held her fast, first to keep her from 
struggling away again, and then to keep her from falling faint with desire as he resumed 
his attentions. 

But she didn't want him, did she? She didn't know; she just wanted him to keep touching 
her, each silken stroke against her breasts as tender and soft as any caress Kenshin had 
ever given her hair, or her wrist, or at most, the hollow of her throat. She choked back 
another gasp, but his fingers pressed a little harder. "Come on and sing for me, little 
bird," he coaxed. 

She couldn't help it; she leaned into his hand, moaning and sobbing for breath. The curve 
of his fingers, the sword calluses on his palm, even the rounded ridge of his knuckles 
running lightly against the silk-- oh, she didn't care any more whose hands were making 
her feel this way, as long as they didn't stop. 

When they did, she sagged back limply against him. His chest vibrated with a chuckle 
against her head, and she felt her feet trail against the floor as he took a few steps 
backward with her and sat down on the bed, perching her on his lap and waiting until she 
opened her eyes again. He was studying her again, a bit more broodingly this time. 

"You look a bit dazed," he said. "More than Tomoe whenever Battousai did that to her. 
Either he's lost the knack or I'm better at it now, though she'd never let me try it on her, 
and Yumi usually didn't have the patience. Or maybe this is new to you after all. Did he 
just do you the way Yumi liked it, hard and fast?" 

"I told you, he never--" She shook her head, unable to say anything else. 

"Hm." Enishi's eyes narrowed. "You know, Battousai's taken Tomoe from me twice now. 
First he changed her before I could follow, and now he's changed her back. And she 
never would with me, you know. Never seemed fair to me that Battousai had his pick of 
them both. Not that I ever went wanting with Yumi, but a bloke likes a change once in a 
while. And he took back Yumi first anyway, so now I've got no choice at all, have I?" 

"What kind of choice?" Maybe she shouldn't have asked that. 

" I think I ought to take you away from him, little bluebird." 

"What--" She had to moisten her lips. His eyes flicked down to watch her tongue's 
nervous motion. "What are you going to do?" 

With an easy motion, he stood up, sliding her off his lap, and then sat down again, 
nudging her knees up onto the bed with his hip and leaning over her to pin her down. 
"Oh, nothing you need worry about," he said. "Won't hurt you, except for the traditional 
twinge. I'll make it as nice as you like, even. But he'll never have your first time now. If 
he ever gets around to it, you'll be comparing him to me." Before she could protest-- did 
she even want to protest?-- his hands were inside the kimono's neckline, warmer and 
more immediate than through the silk. She cried out, arching her throat back. 

"None of that, now. You're not closing your eyes to pretend it's him, are you?" His touch 
was just skimming against her now, dipping and circling like dragonflies over a pond. 
"You keep your eyes open and look at me, bluebird, or else." 

Obediently, she opened her eyes, or tried to. Her lids kept fluttering as wildly as her 
heartbeat. "Or else... or else what?" 

He raised an eyebrow at her challenge, and then peeled back one side of the kimono, 
pulling it up from the top of the obi to fall back behind her shoulder. His head dipped 
down, and his warm tongue curled around her nipple. She could feel his lips smile at her 
surge of response, and their more complex movements when he spoke. "Or I'll stop." 

"Oh," she breathed. "I-- oh, I can't, please--" She arched up into his mouth, but he pressed 
her flat down with a hand against her chest, waiting for her to look at him again. 

When she could, he seemed oddly pensive. His eyes had darkened, no longer pale 
turquoise but nearly deep ultramarine. "Hungry little bird. Been starving you on crumbs, 
has he? You don't even know what to do with your arms, flopping around like a baby 
chick dropped out of the nest." Self-consciously, she let him nudge his elbows under her 
fingers. 

"Have to take things more slowly on you, then, or you won't know what's happening. And 
I want you to know every bit, so you'll remember, and he'll know every time he touches 
you that I did it for you first. Easy then, love," he said softly, and returned to the 
dragonfly glide he'd used before, running his fingertips up the slope of the bared breast 
with only the faintest hint of pressure, stopping just short of the peak and sliding down 
again at a slight angle, as if he were tracing chrysanthemum petals all around. Every so 
often, he glanced up to make sure she was still watching him, then rewarded her with a 
soft puff of breath against her nipple, a cloud of warmth disappearing almost as soon as 
she felt it. Every time he did that, she made a little moan in her throat, the sort of sound a 
flute might have made from the same slight gust. 

He seemed prepared to do this for hours, never speeding up or increasing the intensity, 
and after a while, her hands moved up to his shoulders as she pulled at him, wordlessly 
urging him to press harder and faster, to bring his mouth back to her body. By the time 
her fingers had slid up into his pale hair, she was writhing blindly again, and this time he 
didn't stop the wonderful velvet wave of his tongue, wet and alive against her flesh. 
Crazily, she thought that it was mirroring her heart on the other side of her skin, pulsing 
hard against it as if to melt into that thin barrier. He was murmuring something to her 
now, but she was past understanding, and the low throb of his voice sent her over the 
edge.

Shuddering uncontrollably, she arched up again, holding him tight against her. His arms 
went behind her, cushioning her fall back into the sheets. As she collapsed in a boneless 
heap, he rolled both of them over to nestle her head against his shoulder. His breath 
seemed unsteady too, his chest rising and falling against her in short bursts. His voice still 
had that detached note, though. "I said, you have very strong hands for such a little bird." 

"Oh," she said. Even that short word seemed to take a ridiculous amount of effort right 
now. Maybe she could get more mileage by fueling words with the yawn that was 
bubbling up. "Sorry 'bout that." 

He snorted. "And here you are apologizing to me, too. Next thing you'll be telling me 
how grateful you are to me for ravishing you. Better you should be telling that to 
Battousai once I'm done." 

Kaoru tensed very slightly. She certainly hadn't been thinking about Kenshin at all just 
now. But she did remember something Yumi had said when Kaoru had gone to her for 
advice, increasingly frustrated by Kenshin's refusal to advance his courtship. "Sex and 
love ain't the same thing, but they're not opposites, either. If you can get them both 
together, sure, that's wicked keen. But if you can only get one, might as well enjoy it by 
itself instead of ruining it by wishing or pretending you had them both." Kaoru hadn't 
agreed with this at the time. But she knew that despite the tender ministrations Enishi was 
giving her body, he wasn't doing it out of love for her. He was doing it to ruin her own 
love for Kenshin, and she wasn't going to let that happen. She was going to accept the 
pleasure Enishi gave her, and afterward, let it cleanly wash away. 

She tilted her head to see Enishi caressing her bare shoulder, tracing the kimono's edge as 
it draped down over her arm. The dark turquoise eyes were half-lidded, absently staring 
off into space. "This was Tomoe's favorite outfit," he said. "Still has a bit of her perfume. 
I remember when I was just a wee tyke, and she left home wearing this to find Battousai 
and get rid of him. Didn't see her again for years, and by then I was older than her, and 
she'd been his for all that time. She must've been wearing this the first time he took her, 
or just had it stripped off. He ever talk about those years with you, little bluebird?" 

"Don't call me that," she said. "It's Battousai's name for me, not Kenshin's." 

As she expected, that simply goaded him back into action. He sat up, dumping her head 
off his shoulder, and dropped to lie over her crosswise, with her obi pressed flat beneath 
his chest. "Battousai, Kenshin, it's all the same," he said conversationally, propped up on 
his near elbow. He moved the other one up from the same side of her waist to rest against 
his hip and over hers, and began to casually spread open the kimono's bottom half to bare 
her legs. "What's important is that I've got a fair trade with him now, dove for bluebird. 
Bird in the hand, hey?" 

He chuckled again at her startled gasp when his fingers began to slide up her thighs. 
Again, he was using only enough pressure to let her feel it, relying on her own yearning 
to make her legs slide apart from each other. He didn't have to tell her to sing for him 
again, her soft moans sounding like an entire flock of sleepy doves. She was vaguely 
nonplussed that he didn't bother to watch his own work, keeping his eyes fixed on hers 
instead. Whenever her lids closed or her head whipped away for more than a few 
seconds, he'd stop again. 

When his hand reached the top, he didn't even try to probe into her, simply stroking the 
tender cleavage of her labia, up and back and over and down. If she wanted more or 
different sensations, the only way she could get it was by moving her hips into that 
maddeningly light touch, straining them up and around beneath his weight. But he still 
wouldn't press deeply enough to part those increasingly sensitive folds, no matter how 
much she twisted or screamed. Of course, when she collapsed back onto the pillow with 
her head lolling to the side to break their locked gaze, his hand pulled away. 

"What-- what are you waiting for?" she gasped. 

"Hungry little bird," he said again. His voice sounded strained too, though. "I don't think 
you're ready yet, that's all." Shifting his weight, he reached up toward her hair. She'd 
accidentally pinned herself down by falling back onto it, and he gently tugged it free to 
spread across the pillow. 

A little crossly, she asked, "And when is that supposed to be?" 

"Oh, just a bit more, I think." He shifted his weight again, and when his hand returned to 
its former place, her eyes flew back open, shocked at a new sensation. His touch was 
wetly slippery now, as warm and slick as his tongue, and his fingers dipped easily 
between her parted lips. 

"Ah," he said. "There we go. Lined your snug warm nest for me now, haven't you? And 
there should be a lovely pink egg here, ready to hatch." His fingers moved forward, and 
she had no idea what happened for the next few minutes except for a delirious blur of 
sound and motion. 

By the time she was even remotely conscious again, he was lying beside her, idly licking 
his fingers. He was wearing fewer clothes than she remembered, and her kimono was all 
bunched up around her waist from above and below, held on only by the still tightly-
wrapped obi. On observing her recovery, he rolled to lie over her again, this time with his 
knees between hers. "All right then, bluebird. Spread your wings for me and I'll show you 
how to fly." 

Despite her resolve, she started to panic as he moved into position, not exactly fighting 
him but freezing into wide-eyed tension. He actually sighed, though she could feel his 
rigid tip already poised in place, pulsing with the same hard heartbeat she could see at his 
throat. Laying his silver head down against her breasts, he carefully reached between 
their bodies and slid his thumb against the same spot he'd touched before, this time in 
short jolts. Whenever she relaxed between spasms, he pushed into her a bit deeper, until 
despite her frantic attempts to help pull him in, there was obviously no further progress. 
He took a deep breath, flexed his whole hand around that little pearl in a wild flow, and 
drove his hips all the way down into her as she arched up to meet him, screaming. 

"Little bird," he breathed, bringing that hand back up to touch her face. His entire weight 
was pinning her down now, making it nearly impossible for her to move, though she was 
still trying anyway. "Sweet little bird. Didn't hurt you, did I? Here now, stop flapping 
your poor arms around like that. Think of it like dancing. You hold my hand up here, out 
by your shoulder, and your other arm goes around my neck. That's it. Now, away we go." 
His other arm slid down behind her obi, pulling her waist up toward him. 

Though trying to absorb the strange new mechanics in play-- where should her feet go 
now, behind his knees?-- she was soon too overwhelmed to understand any of it. Her 
breasts were crushed up against the texture of his shirt, the little loops and knots of the 
fasteners sliding roughly between them as he nipped little kisses at the base and side of 
her throat. His hair was soft against her mouth, with his soap's scent underlaid with a 
rising note of clean male animal. He reached back to scoop up her knee into his elbow 
before sliding that arm back under her waist, and the deep sliding friction kept driving 
sounds up out of her that she never knew she could make. 

She twisted in a certain direction and felt him tense, with a low groan of forced restraint. 
Ooh, that was interesting. It was almost like the yoga exercise from gym class that some 
of the girls kept giggling about. Did that really work the way they said it did? She flexed 
experimentally. Oh good, she could get him to make funny noises too. Not only that, but 
it felt very nice indeed. She flexed harder and got a coughing growl like a tiger on the 
hunt, followed by a deeper lunge that made her struggle for breath, involuntarily tensing 
around him again. A certain pattern developed along these lines, destroying any lingering 
formality to their posture. 

His back was so warm and smooth beneath his shirt, except where her nails bit through 
his skin. She had a more difficult time establishing a foothold behind him, with his bare 
flesh slick with exertion, and she had to keep arching her neck up above his shoulder to 
breathe, which tensed her body further up against his chest. Not that this was a bad thing. 
She could get used to this, she thought. Seeming to sense her burgeoning complacence, 
he shifted his angle slightly, and suddenly everything changed. 

She'd felt the same hard shudders before, but now they were even stronger. Instead of just 
his thumb or his hand, the full force of his body was rubbing and pressing against her 
now, parting every fold wide open, and he'd found a place deep inside that was just as 
sensitive. The shudders kept sweeping through her, more and faster, tumbling into each 
other until suddenly the river of sensation seemed to shoot off a cliff, leaving her 
suspended in free-fall for a few seconds, a dizzying, breathless drop back to earth. 

Sprawled inelegantly beneath him, she had a weird impression of being stuck in a coyote-
shaped crater. He'd stopped again, still joined to her and lying motionless, with every 
muscle tensed. Feebly, she spat some of her hair out of her mouth and had to cough a 
little before she could make actual word-shaped noises again. "Are-- does that mean 
we're done now?" 

"Ready to be rid of me, then?" His expression had gone a bit prickly. 

"No, I just--" She looked aside, embarrassed. "Can you do that again?" 

At her question, his hips twitched forward, making her squeak. His voice was low and 
strained. "Not for much longer, bluebird. Maybe for you it's been since never, but it's 
been a while for me as well. Just thought I'd make sure you're still all right before I'm 
done." 

"I'm fine, thanks," she said, immediately appalling herself with the sheer banality of that 
answer. "But-- " 

She squeaked again as he adjusted his weight. "But what? Hurry up, haven't got all day 
here." 

"Don't call me bluebird any more. At least use my name." He didn't say anything 
immediately, so she looked back up at him. His eyes were half-lidded into turquoise 
crescents, and his hair had been ruffled up into a silver storm by her own hands. 
"Please?" 

"All right," he finally said. "But I want you to say mine first. Right now, while I'm 
moving inside you." And he was again, slowly. 

"Oh," she whispered. "Oh, Enishi." 

"Kaoru. Tell me you want me, love. Come on, say it for me." 

She smiled a little. "No. I don't think you could stop now anyway," she said, and gave 
him that delicate inner squeeze again. As it turned out, she was right.

-----

(I just had to get a smut biscuit off my chest after trying so hard to keep the rest of the 
Edodale project around PG-level. That feels much better now. Ahhh. I should probably 
note that after I started to develop this plotbunny but before I'd written much of it down, I 
decided to check what other E/K lemons were already around, and realized that Gracey's 
marvelous "Jinchuu" has a similar premise, though much more firmly anchored in RK 
canon and characterization. All I can say is I guess there're a limited number of obvious 
setups for this sort of thing, and go read "Jinchuu" too ^_^ )