Nota bene: the chapter features mature content!
I blush and freeze under Hebe. Now I definitely want to just pamper with her. Unfortunately, having said these shockingly pleasant words that she likes looking at me during orgasm, Hebe jumps out of bed like a spring, runs up to the hefty wardrobe, and spins like a child in front of the mirror that is set on one of its massive doors. She’s fixing her strands, although she looked no less charming with slightly disheveled hair.
I sit gently and gingerly on the bed. The idea to fix my hair is useless... I open my mouth, ready to say something, but I stop when she once again pierces me with her cold eyes. I find it difficult to cope with my emotions after what just happened, and I want to cry and laugh at the same time – some kind of strange feeling.
"Hebe," I start uncertainly.
"I know, I know, you want to chat about feelings?" the girl interrupts me mockingly.
"No," I answer angrily (I’m not a bloody teen anymore to speak to me like that!). "I wanted to ask you out... But I don't know how to get out of this forest... It feels that there’s only One. Big. Forest. And I don't know how this should happen between us, between women on a date..." Well, let’s admit: I still behave like an inexperienced teenager! Damn, damn, damn...
Hebe is looking at me without blinking for a few seconds, and then she starts laughing, wiping away the tears that have come out of her eyes. I look at her with horror, realizing what stupidity I have just said. The girl, still choking with laughter, quickly comes up to me and suddenly takes my face in her hands (Again!).
"Oh, you are so cute and funny!"
"Stop it!" I grab her wrists and try to take her hands off my face. "If you think my proposal is so ridiculous, just tell me honestly! There is no need in this silly baby talking! I’m not a child!"
The witch smiles sadly.
"I don't mind at all! And I will save you from your torment and doubts about the traditional gender roles in relations between two women – just be yourself, do not play anyone on purpose, and I will take you to my favorite place, not because I’m playing the role of man, but because I can and I want to treat you..."
She finally gets her hands off my face, and runs her thumb over my lower lip, and then kisses it, but not for long, almost immediately she takes her lips away forcing me to stupidly pull my face towards her face.
"Get up!" she says cheerfully and pulls my hand.
"Do you live in the forest of this "sleeve"?"
"Uhum. Our houses are scattered around the Forest. I staked out the forester's house long time ago when I was a child. I kept on running away and coming here when they started to make me mad."
"Do you always live here, in the Forest?"
"There are many "sleeves" and there are many clans united by different covens. It's impossible to stay in the Forest all the time, you know, and I often go out of here into the outside world. We also have a number of responsibilities there. In the outside world witches from different clans control both territories and the most important enterprises and companies for humans. Of course, it seems to you humans, that you are in charge, but in fact witches are commanding a parade like grey cardinals."
She walks again with a springy gait to the mirror, and I look at her buns in her loose "boyfriend" jeans. "Better than Dasha's buns," I notice it to myself out of sudden, and I immediately feel ashamed of my thoughts. I'm not some kind of a nasty, pimply boy who needs only one thing! And what does Dasha have to do with it!? Why am I thinking about her now!
"Here, the secret portal!" Hebe points to the mirror on the back side of the door of a monstrous wardrobe (it looks so unbelievably old, that it could have been made in some tsar times!). She does it in a very funny way, like a flight attendant who is pointing to an emergency exit. I can't help smiling.
"I thought that all mirrors could serve as portals."
"This one serves me and only me. When I got this izba, the first thing I learned about this place was that the doors in the wardrobe could not be opened. Many witches kept on saying, "Girl, strong witches were not able to open it, and you would never be able to do it too!" And you know what? I started trying even harder. It took me more than one year! The crucial point was leshy. I started feeding him like a stray dog. Poor, naive creature told me where the key was hidden!" the witch exclaims triumphantly. "It was as difficult to find it as Koschei’s death*! For a whole week I was dangling in the mini "sleeves" of the Forest, until I found the right oak tree and the right branch... I almost died of joy when it opened a hidden door, and there was a key!" She proudly shows me a small key tattoo on her wrist. It is so thin and almost colorless that it completely merges with the bizarre lines on her smooth skin.
"Sooo, now I am the proud mistress of the wardrobe, and you, madam, is honored to be the first guest of my portal!" she mockingly depicts something like a cocky curtsy, and then with a laugh she grabs me by the shoulders and pins me up against the mirror. I could not help smiling. I am in the same position as when we first met: between Hebe and the mirror, but now I am relaxed, and my body is willingly reaching for hers.
"Is it just me, or is your portal not working?" I say as it seems to me calmly, but my voice is still trembling.
"Why do you think so?" she says, leaning slightly closer so that our breasts touch. I bite my lip when I feel her nipples touching mine. I can definitely feel them even through the fabric of our clothes. Hebe ignores the existence of bras. And why should she wear them? Her breasts are amazingly resilient...
"We are still here, and I am still starving. I really hope that wherever you take me, there will be some excellent food, but not the cottage cheese!"
"Certainly not this rubbish! I promise I will not disappoint you. I just wanted to stay alone a little bit longer, but I don’t want to starve you. We witches love feeding capricious baby dolls like you."
"Do you know how all fairytales about these witches end?" I ask sarcastically.
"Do you mean the fairytales with happy ends, which you naively treat your human children at night before going to bed? But I can tell you what really happens between witches and humans," she speaks to my neck, and then the witch opens her mouth and lightly scratches my neck and shoulder with her teeth. "Shall I show you how everything happens in real life, girl?"
I don't know how she does it every time. One second I think I understand her and stop being afraid of her, and a moment later I feel terribly scared and want to shrink or run away.
"Hebe, you're scaring me," I say, stiffing in her arms. "Please, stop..." I really think that she is about to bite me like a vampire, and it never seems sexy for me either in vampire romance sagas that some of my childhood friends used to love or being pinned up and submissively exposed now.
"Fine," Hebe mutters and pulls away; she seems disappointed.
I wonder how quickly she gets bored with me if I whine like a child every time. I only want to know if she's joking or if she really wants to hurt me! I understand that she did not do anything terrible at that moment, but something is "clicking" in me when I’m close to witches, something that makes chill run up my body.
We stand silently at elbow's distance. The witch keeps her hands on her perfect hips looking out the window, and I, as always, regret all my words. She’d better bite or even devour me! I can’t stand watching her indifferent expression... The witch's black T-shirt is out of her jeans; I have noticed that she prefers to tuck it into her pants in front, and she keeps it dangling from behind. I lower my eyes and tuck it slowly and slightly. I can't see the reaction in the witch's eyes, but I can feel her getting all tense as my fingers lightly touch her hard abs.
"Kiss me," the witch asks quietly, "Just like you did last time."
I hesitate for a couple of seconds, but then I obediently put my hands on her shoulders and gently kiss Hebe with my trembling lips. She responds tenderly, running her long fingers through my hair. Then she suddenly breaks the kiss, "Let me fix your hair." The girl gently runs her fingers over my waves, humming some unknown melody. "It’s beautiful," she says gently.
"Thank you," I'm pipping like a nestling.
I have thick and wavy hair, and it has long bloody feud with combs. I still remember how my parents by hook or by crook persuaded me to comb it. Dad, whom I graciously allowed to brush my hair sometimes, often promised to buy me Barbie or some other nonsense, if only I could tell where I hid all the combs in the house. Thanks to my stubbornness, I really had a lot of toys. Mom simply turned a blind eye to the flourishing bribery, regarding my ‘hairdressing business’ with dad as an affectionate relationship between father and daughter. Getting older, I start trusting my hair only to Dasha. I always love when she does my hair or style my waves in curls: I could close my eyes and breathe in the smell of her favorite strawberry shower gel... I suddenly feel that it’s embarrassing to think about Dasha (My best friend, by the way!) especially in the presence of Hebe.
"What’s wrong? Are you upset or did I accidentally pull your hair?"
"No, no, I just really want to eat," I do really want to have breakfast: my traitorous stomach is growling.
"Damn, you're definitely hungry!" Hebe says with concern in her voice.
"Am I properly dressed for the place where we are going?" I look at my soft, leisure pants and bare toes.
"Don't worry about it!"
"Is this place in the Forest?"
"You will see everything yourself."
"I didn’t understand where we are and what a “sleeve” is. If this is not a parallel universe, not another planet, then what?"
"How to best explain... Imagine that you are driving fast along a straight road, and you do not look around, only forward: this road is the outside world, but suddenly you decide to stop and look around. Taking a closer look, you notice a bunch of small paths and trails on both sides of the road. Some of them are not visible because of the bushes, others are hidden behind dense grass, but most of them are so small that only a mouse can slip by. These paths are "sleeves", "curvatures": they are nearby, but not everyone sees them, and not everyone can get inside.
"Do mirrored portals serve as doors to these "sleeves"?"
"Right. Sometimes they are doors, sometimes they are compasses, and sometimes – terrible reflections, leading to the darkest horror. Like two mirrors that are standing opposite each other show a black corridor of reflections that is going into an endless abyss... As I’ve already told you, you should not stay there or go deeper. The surest way is to jump from one place to another immediately: quickly and easily.
"Like that repeating room that was getting darker and more silent every time I opened the door and got inside?" I feel very uncomfortable. What if I had disobeyed her then and would have run further, going deeper into the endless darkness?
I nestle up to the witch like a child without wrapping my arms around her. In turn, she slightly touches my back.
"Let's get you fed."
* an archetypal male antagonist in Russian folklore. His most common feature is a spell which prevents him from being killed. He hides his soul inside nested objects to protect it.
Comments (10)
See all