Ellery's Duty

“Mr. Ellery!”

Marlin Ellery turned his face toward the voice, as if there was some chance that the leather blindfold some fool had tied over his eyes would conveniently disappear. Of course, it didn’t. Ellery remained surrounded by darkness and an unknown number of men.

Rough hands pressed down on his shoulders, forcing him to his knees. A thick rug softened his landing. A second pair of hands wrapped around his right arm and stopped him from falling flat on his face. Neither of those facts provided a great deal of consolation.

He was bound, blindfolded, naked and now he was on his knees in front of a room full of men. The sudden realization that the men weren’t all strangers to him, wasn’t a blessing.

The voice finally matched itself with a name in the back of his mind. “Marrick?”

“You know him?” one of the men who’d led Ellery into the room demanded.

“Yeah. From the clubs. He’s a…dominant.” That was Marrick’s voice again, stumbling over the term as he tried to make the title fit the man kneeling before him.

Ellery’s hackles rose. His hands tightened into fists behind his back. After so many visits to those local clubs, the boy should have more sense than to think the trimmings could make so much difference to the man.

Holding back a string of curses, Ellery did his best to console himself with the knowledge he was definitely in the right place. This was definitely the lions’ den that the local subs kept disappearing to. All he had to do now was keep his temper, and everything would be fine.

“He’s a what? How do you know him?” One of the men who’d dragged Ellery into the room demanded, from his left.

“Um…are you two sure you got the right guy?” someone cut in from the far side of the room.

“How many men do you think land on our doorstep dressed like this by accident?” Marrick’s friend snarled.

“He’s not very like the other sacrifices…” That was Mr. Worried from the corner again.

And suddenly everyone was talking at once. Voices chased each other back and forth above Ellery’s head. He did his best to build some sort of mental map of the room, but there were too many people, and they moved around too damn much. It was impossible for him to even be sure of the number of men present, let alone calculate which really were men and how many were actually werelions.

“He’s older than most of the other sacrifices…

“Bigger…”

“Stronger…”

“Not very pet like…”

“He’s beautiful…”

The last two words were softly spoken, yet they seemed to catch the attention of everyone present. Silence fell over the room until a log crackled in the fire.

Nothing else was said, but Ellery still got the distinct impression that someone was creeping cautiously closer to him.

Fingers stroked very softly down his cheek, caressing Ellery’s skin more gently than he’d ever have believed possible. Against all logic, he found himself remaining still and simply accepting the other man’s touch.

“Kefir?”

The man in front of Ellery spoke up in response to the query. All he managed was a hesitant little “I…” but it was enough to confirm a name at least.

Kefir snatched his touch away from Ellery’s face. The dominant sensed him retreat.

“You know what you need to say?” It was the same voice that had said Kefir’s name.

The speaker sounded older than the men who had been arguing with each other a few moments before, his voice was deeper, richer. Even though he seemed to be making an effort to speak gently, his voice was still strong and confident—a natural inclination to dominance still came through loud and clear.

Ellery’s spine straightened, as he realized he’d just met the leader of the pride.

“You can’t be serious!” Marrick’s friend cut in from Ellery’s left, before Kefir had a chance to speak again.

“Are you declaring an interest in him, Blaine?” the leader demanded.

“No, but—”

“Then be silent!” The older voice made no attempt to speak gently to the dissenter in his ranks.

“But—”

A roar echoed through the room. Primal instinct kicked in. A shudder tried to run through Ellery’s body, but he stopped it in its tracks, unwilling to show any such weakness before the assembled lions. Anyway, he could hardly blame the lions’ leader for losing patience. Marrick obviously belonged to a brat.

“Let him go, both of you.”

The hands that had led Ellery into the room disappeared. He sensed the lions they belonged to stepped away from him. Bare skin brushed against Ellery’s knee as Kefir crept closer again.

“You know what you need to say?” the leader asked Kefir again.

“If you say ‘shield’, you’re free to go,” Kefir whispered, making no attempt to make his voice sound deeper, or more dominant, the way Blaine had.

Ellery was so focused on the beautiful, submissive quality in his tone, it took a moment for the meaning of the shifter’s statement to sink in. The lions knew about safe words, then?

An answer appeared to be required. “I understand.”

“Neatly done, Kefir.” The leader sounded very pleased with him. “He’s yours for the night.”

“But—”

The leader didn’t give the brat a chance to say another word. “The decision’s been made. There will be no argument.”

Other words floated through the darkness surrounding Ellery, infantile silliness warring with impatience at every turn, but they grew fainter as the men speaking walked away from the fireside, to another part of the room.

The only presence Ellery sensed remaining close to him was Kefir’s.

“No one will hurt you,” his new friend whispered to him. “You don’t need to be afraid.”

“I’m not.” Ellery’s jaw clenched at the very idea.

Fingertips touched his cheek again, stroking over the tensed muscles, before hesitating. “May I…?”

A great many widely varying possibilities had made their way through Ellery’s mind when he decided, in his infinite wisdom, to volunteer to be thrown to the lions. But the idea that he could somehow end up being handed over to a submissive feline, had never even occurred to him.

The shifter’s hand disappeared from his skin when Ellery failed to provide immediate permission for it to linger there.

“You may.”

“You’re sure you don’t mind?”

“I don’t give orders I’m not sure of,” Ellery informed him, a touch of irritation seeping into his words.

The fingers hadn’t come back, and the dominant suddenly realized that he wanted them to return far more than he should. Unable to reach out and make that very clear to the other man, he chafed at the bondage and the stupidity of the situation more than ever.

Several seconds passed. Ellery couldn’t even be sure if the other man was still there. In the darkness of the blindfold, he silently spat out a string of curses that might even have had a few of the mechanics in his bike shop blushing.

Finally, the lion’s touch came to rest against him again, not on his cheek this time, but on his collar bone. The shifter’s hand stroked across his shoulder and down his arm, tracing out the lines of muscle as if quite fascinated by them.

Kefir’s hand didn’t feel overly large. That wasn’t exactly conclusive evidence of anything, but Ellery had no choice but to piece together whatever he could from the scant clues at his disposal.

A small hand belonging to a relatively small man? He sounded quite young. Most lions were fair haired.

The shifter came closer as he started to explore Ellery’s body a little more confidently, his knees brushed against Ellery’s leg. He did his best to picture the man kneeling in front of him, but it was all just guess work.

“You’re very beautiful.”

Behind the blindfold, Ellery raised an eyebrow. He’d been a newbie on the scene the last time someone had tried to speak to him as if he was some pretty little sub. In the decades that had passed since then, no one would have dared. Yet, the anger Ellery expected to flood through his veins failed to materialize.

The boy sounded so earnest, it was hard to be anything other than amused by him. “If you take the blindfold off, I might be able to say the same about you,” he suggested. A strange desperation to see the lion flooded through him. It was more luck than judgment that kept most of it out of his voice.

The shifter’s hand faltered in his caress. “We’re not supposed to do that.”

The only man his submissives needed permission from to do anything at all, was him. Ellery somehow managed to stay silent, and keep that fact to himself, but he couldn’t stop his wrists pulling irritably at the cuffs behind his back.

Kefir’s attention transferred from Ellery’s arm to his chest. The dominant couldn’t be sure if the man was trying to tease or not, but as the lion stroked his way over his skin, every sensation rushed straight to Ellery’s cock. In spite of everything, he started to stiffen.

As best as he could tell from the younger man’s continued explorations, Kefir didn’t notice that for some time. As the lion’s touch hesitated half way down his abs, Ellery had the distinct feeling that the penny had finally dropped. He waited, blind and impatient, for the shifter’s reaction.

A fingertip brushed delicately against the tip of his hardening cock.

Ellery tensed. His hips attempted to rock forward. He locked his joints and refused them permission, unwilling to put on such a show for anyone who might be watching.

“Do humans like the same kind of touch as a lion would enjoy?”

“That rather depends upon how lions like to be touched,” Ellery informed him, keeping his voice steady through sheer force of will.

For what felt like a long time, Kefir remained very still, very silent. Eventually, Ellery felt the other man’s hand wrap around his shaft. The boy’s touch became a little stronger as he seemed to gain confidence. Apparently, lions liked to jack off just as much as humans did.

It wasn’t the kind of information Ellery had been searching for when he volunteered to play the sacrifice, but as the lion’s thumb rubbed back and forth across the head of his cock, he couldn’t quite manage to feel annoyed by the diversion.

Pre-cum began to leak from the tip, slicking the other man’s hand. The shifter was just beginning to build up a pleasant rhythm when he took his hand away without explanation or warning. His fingers transferred their attention to Ellery’s leg.

“What—?”

Ellery quickly cut himself short, but the shifter’s hand still hesitated against his thigh. “Do you mind?”

The question was so softly spoken, so uncertain of anything and everything in the whole damn world, Ellery couldn’t help but think it was the younger man who was really out of his depth and his comfort zone.

“Your choice,” Ellery said. He sounded as if he meant it. In some way, he did. He wasn’t going to order the boy to keep going just because he wanted to come, not when he couldn’t even look into Kefir’s eyes and see what the hell was going on with the sub.

Dominance was dominance. Being cuffed and blindfolded didn’t change anything. It didn’t excuse a dominant from doing his duty and taking appropriate care with the man under his control. It just made it a damn sight more difficult to enjoy the process.

Ellery forced himself to remain still and impassive as the younger man’s exploration of him resumed. He’d gone over dozens of submissives’ bodies that way over the years. He knew how to make them squirm, with pleasure or with frustration, depending on how well they had behaved up until that point.

He knew how a blindfold could alter a submissive’s experience of the world, how it could heighten each sensation, how it could encourage them to give up control and rely on their master. Trust could come quickly to a man who couldn’t rely on his own senses to take care of him.

Being vulnerable before another man pulled something out of a submissive.

But he wasn’t a submissive, he was a dominant who happened to be in a difficult situation for a while—a dominant who’d given a submissive permission to explore his body.

There was no reason to freak out about it all, like a silly little novice. No reason to get all hot and bothered over what amounted to an incredibly mild scene.

Squaring his shoulders a little, Ellery took a deep breath and chased the tension out of his muscles. The very fact he relaxed and seemed more willing to accept his explorations seemed to give the other man some extra confidence.

A breath caressed his shoulder as Ellery felt the man lean toward him. A moment later, a rough tongue lapped at his skin.

“You taste nice.”

It was said so politely, Ellery had to bite back a chuckle. “Thank you.”

The shifter moved to kneel at his side. Kefir’s hands began to explore his dominant’s back with just as much interested as he’d inspected the rest of him. Kefir’s fingers stroked down his spine until they reached his bound wrists. He hesitated as he touched the cuffs.

He was going to undo them. Ellery had no doubt about that.

“Kefir.”

Ellery mentally cursed as Kefir snatched his hands away from the restraints at the interruption.

“The food’s about to be brought in.”

Ellery had the distinct feeling that some silent look passed between Kefir and the leader of the pride at that point. The younger lion’s hands didn’t return to his wrists when the brief exchange ended.

“There’s a sofa,” Kefir suggested, softly.

With his knees already protesting and his legs cramping in the unfamiliar position, Ellery didn’t need to be coaxed. He quickly nodded his approval of the idea.

The shifter’s hands slid against his skin as Kefir helped him to his feet. Ellery no longer had any hesitation in thinking of the other man as smaller than him then. As their bodies brushed together, he was left in little doubt that he was a good head taller than Kefir—or that the little lion’s cock was just as hard as his own.