Weasel Presents (5 page)

Mishel looked up at him with a grin. “I think my lord is ready,” he said, drawing a finger up Jherik’s dripping erection. “And I nearly am as well.” He slathered a paw with his saliva and gently pushed Jherik’s paw out from under his tail, rubbing there himself with his eyes closed in pleasure.

Jherik focused on the coyote’s length, brushing the pad and back of his paw alternately up and down it. A moment later, Mishel opened his eyes and smiled into Jherik’s. He swung one leg over the cougar’s lap, and adjusted himself until Jherik was positioned just against his tail hole. Jherik put his paws on Mishel’s thighs, trying to hold him like the bear in the book, but Mishel was far too heavy and the angle too awkward. He settled for holding the coyote’s sheath in his paw as Mishel lowered himself and the tightness of him pressed against, then around Jherik.

“Ahhh...” he panted, looking down at Jherik. His blissful expression mirrored Jherik’s feelings exactly. The cougar wanted to press the coyote down, to plunge deep into him and feel him all along his length. He started to stroke Mishel up and down quickly in his excitement. Mishel responded by lowering himself further, with a deep moan of pleasure. Jherik could see the tautness in the muscles rippling down the coyote’s naked body as he raised and lowered himself, each stroke a blaze of delight radiating out from his sheath to his chest and paws.

He explored each inch of Mishel’s length, and felt a small knot growing larger as the coyote became more aroused. The more he stroked, the more Mishel moaned and the faster he raised and lowered himself on Jherik’s shaft. Jherik was surprised at how easily he slid in and out; he’d never penetrated another before, and he had worried it might be more difficult. But it was marvelous, especially when he arched his hips to drive himself further into the gorgeous creature on his lap.

Mishel was beautiful, and he knew it. He showed off the creamy white fur and perfect arc of his chest with every movement, held his arms behind his head to accentuate their muscles, flexed his legs while showing off his balance, and arched his tail behind him, swinging it from side to side so Jherik could see it. Jherik wanted to rub his paws all over the coyote, but the urgency of the moment kept one paw on the perfectly formed shaft, stroking it up and down, and while the other roamed erratically over the ivory landscape in front of him.

He heard the clang of the bell announcing bed check, and though Mishel didn’t say anything, he started to lift and lower himself more quickly, squeezing Jherik’s erection tightly with his muscular rear. The cougar thrust upwards, moaning, his whole body alight, and noticed that the knot beneath his wildly stroking paw was very large now. A moment later, Mishel growled, arched his back so that all his muscles stood out, and his seed spurted out over Jherik’s paw and stomach. He kept growling, head thrown back, eyes closed, and his member covered Jherik’s paw in his seed.

Jherik felt himself on the edge, and a moment later he felt as though he were falling over the edge for an eternity. Then he hit bottom and clutched at Mishel’s legs as his moans echoed off the trees, and his member emptied itself into the willing coyote.

For a moment he felt truly joined to Mishel, holding him as their bodies shared that pleasure. The moment faded, then ended as Mishel stood slowly up, shivering as Jherik slid out of him.

“My lord...”

“I know,” Jherik smiled. “Bed check.” He brushed Mishel’s still-rigid member with a sticky paw.

Mishel bowed, pulling on his shorts and shirt. “Tomorrow night?”

“I’ll see you here, then.”

Jherik watched the coyote walk back to the barracks until he was just a shadow against the dark building. He sighed, not wanting to put his clothes on just yet. His sticky paw rested on the sticky fur of his abdomen, and he chuckled. He would definitely have to use the baths tonight.

By the time he pushed on the door of the practice room about an hour later, he was quite clean. Benton was exercising; he turned and said, “Hello, sir,” as Jherik entered the room, then went back to his practice.

Jherik resumed their lesson, beginning to teach Benton basic moves to block attacks. After several attempts to explain how the attacks would come, he walked over to the weapons rack and took down two wooden swords. “It will be easier if I show you.”

“Really?” Benton lowered the sword he was holding. “I don’t know if...I mean...” His ears canted uncertainly.

“Nobody’s going to know.” They had better not; Jherik was not allowed to be sparring with Benton. He held out one of the swords to him. “You’ll do fine. I promise I’ll go easy.”

Benton walked back to the rack and replaced the sword he’d been using, then took the wooden one. “What do I do?”

“Just try to hit me.” Jherik smiled. “I’ll demonstrate the blocks, then we can switch.”

For about fifteen minutes, he turned away Benton’s tentative attacks with ease. He could sense the fox getting frustrated, so he held up a paw. “You need to be more assertive. Don’t worry. You can’t hurt me with these. What you need to be aware of is what I’m going to do in response to you.” He assumed the ready stance again and guided Benton through some attacks.

The fox obviously learned faster than he could execute. He hissed in displeasure at himself when his body failed to obey him quickly enough. Jherik empathized, but knew the only way to improve that was to train until the movements became second nature, and he told Benton that.

“I don’t feel like I’ll ever learn it,” the fox said dispiritedly while they were taking a break.

“You will.” Jherik’s paw fit around Benton’s shoulder nicely, but he couldn’t help contrasting its boniness to the muscles on Mishel’s shoulder. “You’ve only been training a couple days. Give it time.”

“I suppose so.” Benton sighed. He tapped the edge of the sword on the ground. “I’m starting so late, though. Most of the other recruits at my level are thirteen and fourteen. I feel old.”

Jherik had to laugh, and Benton gave him a flop-eared scowl before chuckling himself. “I guess it is pretty silly.”

“Yeah. If
you’re
old, what does that make
me
?”

“Wonderful.”

Jherik blinked at the fox, who’d laid his ears back. “For taking the time to teach me, I mean. Most instructors wouldn’t bother beyond just letting me find my own way. I really appreciate it, sir.”

“Oh, that’s okay.” But the words warmed him inside. His tail curled behind him, and despite the late hour, he didn’t feel tired. “Shall we go on?”

“Sure.” Benton smiled.

When the fox was clearly too tired to go on and Jherik felt himself flagging, he called an end to it. Benton was panting, but his ears were up and he looked happy with the progress he’d made. He put both practice swords away.

“Thank you again, sir,” he whispered as they walked down the corridor.

“My pleasure, Benton.” Jherik patted the fox on the back. “Good night.”

It was nearly one in the morning. The quarter moon shone on Jherik’s path as he made his way back to his bed in the manor. His life had suddenly become full, and even the prospect of starting his day in his father’s office couldn’t dull his suddenly high spirits. His tail twitched excitedly all the way to bed.

He felt very differently the next morning, when Yakua woke him at sunrise. Bleary-eyed, he staggered down to breakfast and shoveled down some food he barely tasted. By the time he had followed his father up to the room where that morning’s lesson would take place, he felt awake, albeit heavy-eyed.

His father had a meeting with the mayor of the southern town, so Jherik sat in, listened to the elderly bobcat complain about the recent recruiting, and stopped daydreaming long enough to hear his father promise the return of five soldiers to join the town’s depleted guard. As soon as the meeting was over, he fled, grabbed lunch, and ran down to the barracks to help with another training session.

The four soldiers in this training were less advanced than Cherruf and Barbric had been, and Jherik noted several pointers he could pass on to Benton. After the session, he and Master Winson talked for half an hour about what to work on with the four, and Master Winson actually thanked him as he left for dinner.

After dinner, he padded down to the stand of trees and waited for Mishel. The coyote turned up soon after wearing only his shorts, his white fur pink in the fading sunlight. As he walked up to Jherik, he eased his shorts down and kicked them off, and Jherik unfastened his pants at the same time. Naked, they embraced, then moved on to stickier pleasures.

He was amazed he was still upright, he reflected an hour later as he slipped into the practice room. Benton drank in the advice he had to give and improved slightly during the hour and a half they practiced. Jherik bid him good night, went back to his quarters, and fell into bed.

The next day, the fatigue started to catch up to him. When he met Mishel in the trees, he took the coyote into his lap again, but it seemed to take him several long minutes of thrusting up into Mishel to reach orgasm. The slow, languid pace was new to him, and not unpleasant, but he thought he saw Mishel wince as he stood up. When he looked up at the long muzzle, though, the coyote was smiling and leaned over to touch noses before running back to the barracks. Jherik was confused about why Mishel was running, until he vaguely remembered hearing the bed check bell several minutes before.

Jherik licked his sticky paw twice, but even just holding it up to his muzzle seemed like a lot of effort. I’ll just nap for half an hour and then go in and bathe, he told himself. Eyes closed, he let the smells and sounds of the night wash over him. Distantly, he heard the call of an owl.

When he opened his eyes again, the moon was high in the sky. He could tell by the taste in his muzzle that he’d been asleep for a while. His paw was stuck to his belly fur, but both were nearly dry. With an effort, he pulled the paw free and licked it clean. Maybe I’ll just skip the bath and go up to bed, he thought, and stood up yawning.

The shape of the barracks as he walked towards it tugged at his memory. There was some reason he was supposed to be taking a bath there. He paused, frowning, and tried to shake the sleep fog from his head.

Benton!

He glanced up at the moon again. It was close to midnight, or soon after, he thought, running to the door. Hopefully the fox would still be there.

When Jherik pushed open the door to the practice room, Benton was there, just replacing his sword on the rack.

“I’m sorry,” Jherik said, blurting out the apology despite the differences in their station. “I fell asleep.”

Benton shrugged. “You have no obligation to me, sir.”

Jherik walked to the weapons rack, chewing on that. His brain was still muddled from sleep. “But I promised I would come back, so I do have an obligation. Even if you’re just a valet--a recruit. My promise is my obligation.”

That didn’t seem to cheer up the fox. “It’s all right,” he said. “I understand you have more important things to do.”

“But I really enjoy teaching you,” Jherik protested, only faintly wondering at how odd it seemed for him to be justifying himself to a soldier, and one who’d previously served his family, at that. “I think it’s as important as anything else I do.”

That brought a small spark from the fox. He smiled slightly and turned to Jherik. “Really?”

“Of course! Well, I do some teaching in the afternoons, too, but I’m just assisting there. And the morning stuff with my father is boring. I’ll never use it. Marhik will be back soon and he’ll take over--but you know that too. I mean, you know Marhik.”

“Yes,” Benton agreed, and for the moment, he stood still.

Jherik fingered the weapons rack. “Hey, someone fixed this. Barbric broke it the other day.”

Benton didn’t say anything. Jherik looked at the new piece. “This is nice work. I wonder how Master Winson got it done so quickly. Usually it takes a couple weeks to get anything from the woodworkers.”

“I did it,” Benton said, so quietly that Jherik wasn’t sure he’d heard him properly.

“Excuse me?”

“I did it,” the fox said, more clearly, his ears flicking back.

“You?” Jherik ran his paws over the small piece. It was smooth and fit perfectly into the rack. If he hadn’t seen it broken two days before, he wouldn’t have known it had been replaced. “That’s amazing. How long have you been doing woodworking?”

“Few years. I used to go down to the shop and help out when I was done with your brother’s duties. He never made me clean or anything, so I had a few hours every day and Master Stephan let me learn as long as I helped with projects.” He shrugged. “I liked it, so I kept doing it. Master Winson counts that as my castle duties, so I don’t have to help in the kitchen or with building repairs.”

“It’s really nice work. Have you done anything else?”

Benton looked away, his tail twitching. Jherik realized that it was because he was uncomfortable with the attention, and he found that for some reason extraordinarily adorable. “I did handles for some daggers...and once I did a crossbow. I like doing weapons, but there isn’t much I can do with wood.”

“Crossbow--you made Marhik’s crossbow?”

Benton nodded. “I gave it to him as thanks for letting me work in the shop.”

“I
loved
that crossbow! I pestered him for weeks to tell me where he got it, but he wouldn’t!”

“I know. I asked him not to.”

“Why not? You do really good work.”

Benton shrugged. “I’m glad you liked it,” he said softly.

Jherik saw the sagging in the fox’s posture and put a paw on his shoulder. “You must be pretty tired. Go ahead to bed. I’ll be here tomorrow night. I promise. I won’t miss another night.”

“You don’t have to promise me,” Benton said. “I’m just a soldier.” But his ears had perked up some.

“I want to promise you. You want to be taught and I want to teach you.” He smiled. “Besides, you’re full of surprises. I’m looking forward to seeing what other talents you have that you haven’t told me about. Hey, are you okay?”

The fox had doubled over coughing. He straightened up, avoiding Jherik’s gaze. “I’m okay,” he choked out. “I’ll get a drink of water and get to bed.”