The Taming of the Shrew - Wizard Style - COMPLETE

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6-18-10 F


A heartfelt hank you to all my faithful reviewers. You have made this story better for your comments and showing your appreciation has made me very, very happy.


One more chapter after this one - the epilogue. For this chapter... well, all I can say is, payback's a bitch.


Much humor, although I'm not sure Lucius would agree, heh, heh.

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Chapter Fifty-Four


What Goes Round…


Six months later –


“Do I have to wear this collar? It’s unmanly,” Lucius whinged.

“I wear your collar, so you can wear mine,” Hermione retorted, unimpressed with her husband’s weak reasoning.

“But it’s pink. I look washed out in pink.” Lucius couldn’t help chuckling a bit at that ridiculous comment and Hermione smiled in return.

“Please?” he begged. “I can’t be seen in this. It’s bad enough that it’s pink. Why did you have to put rhinestones on it? I look like a pet poodle!”

“Who is going to see you besides me?” asked his wife reasonably. “I think the glitter of the rhinestones looks very erotic on you and I like pink. I’m thinking of adding rhinestones to your cock ring, too. Something to look at while I’m swallowing you whole.” Hermione grinned at the look of horror that spread over Lucius’ face.

“My Gods! Not that. I couldn’t even get it up if you did that.” Lucius yanked on his handcuffs, “My wrists are chafing. When are you going to get to the good part?”

“Lucius, when you wear my collar, you’re mine. I don’t ask for the controlling position too often, so quit whinging or I’ll pierce your ears for more rhinestones. At his indrawn gasp, Hermione nodded. Maybe this time she had made her point. But it wouldn’t last long.

She sighed. Trying to make Lucius into even a facsimile of servile in their games was practically useless. He always had good intentions, but his ego, not to mention his unending desire to command and control the sex, got in the way too often to count. That he was even starting to complain about her favorite domination of him by anal penetration, which he adored, told her that any form of submission was hard on him.

In a quiet moment he’d confided that his years of subjugation to Voldemort’s every whim had given him a distaste for losing control over any situation, edging on fear. Hermione understood, but also needed not to entirely give up her enjoyment of being in charge once in a while. She was not Voldemort and Lucius needed to come to terms with her wielding the crop occasionally as fun, not subjugation. He was trying. She snickered to herself, yes, he was sometimes very trying, but she loved him. She knew that the only reason he gave her the dominant role occasionally was because he loved her in return, rather desperately. A soft smile stole over her face, knowing what a jewel she had in her husband – usually. A swift stroke from her riding crop hit his rear.

“OW! Bloody hell, wench, that stung!” Lucius roared. He was bound wrists and ankles with the handcuffs he’d so obligingly given Hermione for Step Six. The trussed wizard always rethought his generosity whenever his brain changed residence from his cock to his throbbing and striped tush.

His naked, golden-skinned body was splayed out over the same piece of furniture that the Room of Requirement had duplicated when Lucius took her there. The padded, half-moon-shaped surface of the table over which he was draped and fastened, face down and legs apart, displayed his firmly muscled backside perfectly. His wife could also reach under the hollow half-round to easily touch his beautifully revealed prick and suspended balls hanging down through the hole she had modified in the divan to accommodate her husband’s equipment. The hole was both for his comfort and to keep him from deviously petting himself by removing his ability to hump the padding at his groin. He hadn’t liked her modification at all.

“That last stripe was for trying to hurry my turn at domination. You are accumulating quite a collection back here. And what did you call me?” Hermione’s light voice was subtly threatening.

“Wench. We’re supposed to be on a pirate ship so I improvised. You don’t have to hit so hard.”

“I know you don’t really like to be the submissive one, Sweet Pea, but occasionally it’s good for your soul. And my right bicep,” she grinned, flexing the riding crop. His beautiful male glutes were turning a perfect shade of red to match his swollen penis. She suspected he liked being swatted much more than he let on verbally. His penis never lied. Not like its owner who could spin a fabrication faster than a garden gnome could down a horklump.

Hermione came round her husband’s tied down form to view his face. “Aw, lover, is that a hint of a pout on those wicked lips?”

“I am not pouting,” her mate immediately sucked in his lower lip. “Malfoys never pout.” The majestic mane of pale hair swung over his shoulder blades as his chin rose in the air. Then his body slumped and he whinged, “Are you finished?”

“Perhaps another hour, give or take,” she estimated, amused.

“A whole hour? You said you were taking me on a cruise. This is blatant misrepresentation. I’ve been shanghaied into servitude,” Lucius huffed.

“Hmm, rather like you taking over my marriage contract. That turned out rather well, so I imagine this ship sport will, too.” She reached under the table and petted his hanging balls lightly, then pressed just behind them and was rewarded with a mighty jerk of her husband’s trussed body as his sac tightened. His moan of tortured approval turned them both on.

“If you fondle my prow any more, this sea voyage is going to come to an inglorious end. How long has it been now? I think an hour is too long. I’m getting a rash on my stomach.”

Hermione rolled her eyes, but she had a hard time not laughing out loud. Trying to make her voice severe, she huffed, “Lucius, you have more excuses than a millipede has legs. What a sissy slave you make! And I told you what you have to call me. Use it! Now!”

“Mistress Captain,” Lucius mumbled, but he couldn’t stay in his subservient role even for a moment when he had a grievance to be aired. “Ever since we tried Step Six for Satisfying Slytherins and you developed your unnatural taste for bondage,” he grumped, “you’ve been a one-note siren. And may I point out that Step Seven was supposed to be me using you anally, which I accomplished, not you reaming me out day after week after month.”

Hermione stepped behind her husband, a fond grin decorating her face where he couldn’t see her. Her wizard would never really enjoy being the meek, subjugated one, even in their role-playing games, but fair was fair. She wasn’t meek by nature either and she got tied up, paddled and ordered around much more than he did. And whichever way they played, when they were finished his pleasure was always as intense as hers. He knew that – it was his loss of control that ate at him.

“I missed my title in your latest little diatribe, slave. Say it again,” Hermione demanded, swatting him across his tush once more with the riding crop she preferred to use.

“Mistress Captain,” Lucius groused, yanking on his wrists, testing the bonds. As usual, his wife had been thorough with the restraints. “I won’t be able to perform if you lay that crop on any harder,” the handcuffed blond warned, hoping for some lenience.

“Bosh,” she said. “You’ll be so hot to fuck me, you’ll probably come before you even get it in.” She moved around to the side of her captive, trailing the riding crop along his flank, then reached under the arched table to tap it delicately on Lucius’ exposed, protruding erection, watching the stiff rod bounce before running it under his balls again; the balls tightened ominously. “You may not even make it out of the restraints before you spill.”

“Blasphemy… Mistress Captain,” the honorific was grumpily dragged from him. “I’ve never once lost my load except when I’m servicing you or you give me permission in role-playing - and I make sure I please you after. I resent that unmerited aspersion on my technique.” Lucius felt the flexible crop as it circled his erection and lifted his balls, trying to lean down into the pressure that only teased, but didn’t satisfy.

“You’re not allowed to resent anything, Lucius. You’re a slave tonight. You may walk the plank yet, boyo. Remember the time I was paddled mercilessly because I had the temerity to tell you your Muggle tee shirt was on backwards? You said I hadn’t permission to address you and I got punished, and yet here you are, blathering on like your tongue has wheels, correcting me, your Mistress Captain.”

Lucius grinned, recalling that night and his role as a rough chav, happily playing a street tough lover chastising his chavette. Hermione had chosen that odd set of roles and had given him the tee shirt, a few tawdry necklaces and some sort of pants with stripes down the legs. He’d refused the strange plaid cap, but really got into his part that night after she explained what he was pretending to be. It had been quite liberating, acting out his idea of a rebellious, working-class Muggle teen. He wouldn’t mind playing that role again.

She laughed as she also remembered Lucius trying to be a chav. He’d actually done a decent job for a man who couldn’t be anything but elegant and sophisticated, even in the outré outfit. “And,” she mischievously added, “remember the time you screamed like a girl?”

“Once, dammit! It was only once and it was because I was so surprised you would do that. Back then I never would have imagined you’d push your finger into my arse. Plus, you didn’t use any lubricant.” His good mood evaporated and he glared, angling his head in a futile attempt to see her, his cuffs rattling again, “Are you going to bring that incident up over and over?”

“Probably,” she replied smugly. “It was so unusual for you. It’s become one of my fondest memories, your shocked reaction, and one of the few times I knew your behavior was unrehearsed. Hmm, that also counts as a time you lost your load before you serviced me.” They both smiled at the memory of Hermione looking shocked with crème de Lucius plastered all over her face and hair. “And,” she stopped caressing his waving willy and balls and instead rose and began drawing the riding crop slowly down the center of his back, “nowhere in that magazine article did it say only the man has the woman anally.”

Lucius yanked yet again on his restraints, then raised his chin when he couldn’t do anything else. “It was definitely implied. It said satisfying a Slytherin. I’m the Slytherin!”

“And each time I bring you to a shattering orgasm, I’ve been satisfying you. But for argument’s sake, what if it were a female Slytherin a lover had to satisfy? See? Your argument becomes nonsensical.”

“On the contrary,” Lucius argued. “What wizard would read the tripe in the Witch Weekly? That article was for witches to please their wizards, not the other way round.”

“You certainly read the article fast enough. And you gave it to Severus, too. Narcissa told me. If you thought it was tripe, why did you want to do the seven steps?” She dropped the crop in front of Lucius’ face on the floor and wandered away, meandering around the playroom, teasingly running her hands over various implements in pretended absorption as Lucius watched her the best he could from his splayed position, either hissing in disapproval or nodded enthusiastically if she fondled a sex toy he particularly favored. When she stopped at one display, Lucius groaned ostentatiously, “You always choose that one. Haven’t we just had that argument?”

“Don’t you like it?” she fluttered her eyelashes, projecting fond concern that didn’t fool either of them.

Lucius groaned again, “Yes, but I’m worried that you’re starting to like it a bit too much.”

Hermione picked up her choice, earning another mock groan from her mate at the size. She stuffed the toy into her black leather and red lace bustier, crowding her breasts, then stood back to admire the view of a finely sculpted male torso topping tautly muscled legs. She was daily thankful for Lucius’ adherence to his exercise routine and fondness for riding his thestrals.

“Oh?” she said innocently. “You mean I always like giving you anal like the way you always choose the fierce, physical roles, like the vicious brigand to my fiery Spanish senorita, or the conquering Norman to my comely yet impertinent serf, or Zeus to my voluptuous Greek slave girl? I play my part, fighting your attractions, fighting you, and getting wrestled, subdued and punished-”

“Well, now you’ve subverted one of my favorites.” Lucius interrupted, his voice reproachful. “You know I like to play a fearsome pirate to the sweet, ruffle-dressed maiden.”

“Ah, but you wouldn’t have done justice to this bustier I’m poured into,” Hermione preened, laughing. “I don’t think this pirate queen costume you made is very authentic, but I like it. Maybe you can make the bodice of my senorita dress like this.” She ran a hand down the curve of her nice slim waist, happy to have finally returned to her pre-pregnancy size.

“I’ve been meaning to mention,” Lucius broke in again, “you really need to work on your Spanish accent. It sounds more Russian to me. Maybe we could do a Tsar and lowly, sensual barbarian woman with furs and tents. Although I do especially like the Greek role-playing. Those togas are so easy to slip my hands into.”

Hermione woke to the fact that her slave was out of character once more. Belatedly annoyed, she rebuked her errant captive, “Well, tonight, slave, you can just be quiet and get reamed out – again – because I like it.” Next time, she promised herself, her husband was going wear his pirate neckerchief as a gag.

“At least position the cheval mirrors so I can watch.” Lucius attempted to sound cranky, but already his blood was rushing hard to his cock in hot anticipation, causing it to swell almost painfully. Hermione threw her hands up in defeat, abandoning their bickering and complied, setting the mirrors and letting Lucius see the stripes decorating his bum from his earlier chastisement. “No!” he barked, but it was too late. Hermione was already scraping her fingernail along the worst of the welts, exciting a hot pulse from the former dull throb. “That was uncalled for,” Lucius flexed his butt muscles to try to soothe the sharp reminder of his less than sterling performance as a ship’s slave.

“Tut, tut, giving me orders again. Next time ask about the mirrors, don’t command me. And,” Hermione picked up the riding crop from the floor and brandished it in front of her autocratic slave’s nose, “that was uncalled for…what?”

“Uncalled for…Mistress Captain,” Lucius’ body slumped over the arched and padded half-moon table as he relaxed, his cheek resting on the padding. It was his signal he was ready for his next ‘punishment’, not that either of them could quite call it that when they both knew Lucius prized what he was waiting for.

The bound blond sighed in pleasurable anticipation. He’d liked anal penetration for years, but had no outlet for it after his first marriage ended. He refused to ask it of a one-night stand and never visited prostitutes after his youthful experience. Hermione’s willingness (and lately preference) for giving him that experience had made him nearly delirious with happiness. If she just wouldn’t be so…so… dominant.

His hard, masculine, red-welted bum was displayed enticingly up in the air over the hump, while his straining cock had no purchase for the broad, ruddy tip he so longed to rub on or in anything. Lucius hid his smile in the padding, but his eager cock proclaimed his deepening arousal. Gods, he loved this. Then he frowned. His little firebrand was becoming just a hair too enamored of reaming him out. He tensed for a moment, then relaxed again, shrugging. There was no sense in not enjoying what was currently on offer. He could think about her emerging tendency to savor his anal subjugation later. She was becoming a little too much like him.

Hermione retrieved the sex toy from her cleavage and stepped over to a small table, grabbed up some lubricating cream and slathered it on the implement, a long, molded piece of rubber in the form of a penis that she’d ordered from an ad in the back of a Playwizard magazine. The rubber had been re-colored from the original uninspired beige to beautiful, shimmering stripes down its length, alternating emerald green and silver. Lucius’ groans were pure window dressing; he loved his toy because Hermione had given it to him for a gift and because it fit him perfectly. It had a handle, but the business end was long enough and thick enough to make Lucius see stars when Hermione used it. And she’d been using it quite a lot lately.

The rubber was slightly flexible, giving Hermione the ability to use varying pressures on his prostate, either withholding his pleasure or making him bellow. It annoyed her, he knew, that she hadn’t made him scream like a girl ever again. His petite witch wife had a mean streak in her. Lucius positively reveled in that.

He suddenly went rigid for a second, then yelled, tossing his head up off the table, “Dammit, Hermione! Give me some warning when you’re going to evacuate my guts.” Her garden hose analogy was an eerie feeling even if one knew it was coming. “Ouch!” The riding crop came down on his blooming rear, adding another stripe to the red map lines of his several transgressions. “Sweet hell…Mistress Captain!” Lucius groaned. Being the submissive one fed her fantasies much more than his. “Please give me a warning next time.”

He liked the anal sex and her occasional, creative forays into more bizarre enterprises, like the time she’d tied him up and put henna marks all over his prick. She’d drawn a strutting peacock on the glans, the feathers spreading over the crown, and snakes winding up his length. The stuff had itched horribly until she had finished and aimed a drying spell on his abused organ, then peeled off the detritus.

The effect was erotically pleasing he had to admit. He’d taken it out a few times when he was alone just to stare at the artwork, and pissing became an entertainment in itself. They both liked to watch the snakes undulate as he got an erection. Unfortunately, it had taken a couple of weeks for the reddish hue to wear off and Draco had wondered why his father was suddenly so shy about skinny dipping in the indoor pool. But Hermione had loved sucking on his peacock.

“Ready?” Mistress Captain Hermione, Pirate Lord and Scourge of the Seven Seas queried sarcastically, raising her see-through eye patch and re-settling it up on her forehead. It had looked like fun on the costume hanger, but the thing was a nuisance. “I wouldn’t want to start before you give me the command.” Her voice dripped irony.

Her sarcasm rolled right off Lucius who had a more immediate concern, “The mirrors aren’t quite right. I can’t see everything.” Lucius twisted his head, trying to get a better line of sight to his naked glutes.

“Is it my imagination, or are you becoming even more kinky in your old age?” Hermione slightly adjusted the mirrors for her husband’s enjoyment while alluding to his Achilles heel, his age, in retaliation.

“I am not old!” Lucius wrestled with his restraints again. “You are on borrowed time, Mistress Captain. Remember that.”

Hermione ignored her husband’s empty threats, standing by the mirrors, waiting to see if he now had the view he wanted. When she got an impatient nod, she moved back behind him and went to work, rubbing the lubricant around his back door and just inside with a finger, before aiming the pretty green and silver sex toy at her target. Slowly she introduced the column, being sure to keep her arms and hands to the side so Lucius could watch, too, in the mirrors. She felt him push out his bum muscles to help her insert the tool and suddenly it breached the opening and slid in an inch.

“Yesss,” hissed Lucius. “Gods, that always feels so good. More,” he ordered imperiously.

“Whap!” The riding crop descended on the backs of his thighs. “You may show your pleasure vocally, but if I hear one more command, this toy goes back on the rack.” Hermione was getting irritated at being given so little submission. It was just a game, but she sensed Lucius had scant respect for her being in control when it was her turn.

Lucius glowered at his mate in the mirror, his toy hanging precariously out of his derriere in subtle threat. The randy wizard closed his eyes in an attempt to relax and look more meek, hoping she would continue with her tantalizing mission.

He knew he was pushing away her superior role as his owner tonight; it was his nature to find the boundaries from time to time, but tonight he’d been especially contrary and she had a right to upbraid him. Severus had been correct – as usual – he was not a submissive, and the position often irked him until…gahhhh…yes, until she did that. The green and silver dildo was cruising into his favorite territory now, nearing the spot that made all of the rest supportable. He quit worrying and sank into the moment, the slide of the cool toy into his hot depths so lasciviously erotic he wondered why he complained. And yet he did, more and more.

The bound wizard watched the green and silver stripes flow in and out of him with each press of his wife’s hand, the escalating rhythm sending his pulse scurrying to match it. He wanted to close his eyes and concentrate on the invading sensation, but he couldn’t stop watching his petite mate working the implement into him, splaying her hand on his butt cheek to gain more leverage. When she unconsciously dug her fingernails into the muscle there to gain purchase, he had to bite his lip to stay the urge to spill himself. She had more yet to come in her repertoire and he wanted to experience it all.

His penis throbbed wildly in unison with the internal scoring of his body, but Lucius waited, needing the tempo to increase, the tip of the toy to prod his prostate, which his Mistress Captain was withholding from him for now. She knew how to make him suffer beautifully, his chest expanding with his labored breathing, his every muscle tensing tighter with each insertion, his hands folding into fists as the green and silver thrusts quested nearer and nearer that magical spot inside.

And then, “Aaaah, Gods, yes! Yes! There! Pleeeease,” his voice went to a ragged whisper as his mind and body both reached for that perfect pinpoint of pressure within him, each deep touch on his prostate whirling him higher and higher until he was nearly lightheaded from the intense physical sensations. Breathing erratically, the blond gasped, “Her...mione?”

His wife knew what he was asking, as incoherent as it was and she reached once more under the table. “Permission granted, slave,” and she stretched the skin of his cock back from the crown, holding it as the tremors began. Two more taps of his prostate and Lucius went rigid, his back muscles trying to push his groin down through the hole and into his mate’s small hand as she stroked both the sex toy and his staff in unison.

“Gahhhhh!! Tight…er!” he rasped and when the elegant, bound slave felt small fingers close tighter around his tool as they moved on its length, his control hit its explosive peak and the ship’s slave went overboard into an endlessly quaking orgasm, cresting wave after wave of the most exquisite pleasure, pleasure that only she gave him.

Hermione released the handcuffs, which were only charmed with a safe word. Lucius could have said the word at any time and been instantly free. She watched as her husband lay trembling and semiconscious for several moments, his breathing deep as though he couldn’t get enough air. Finally, he languidly turned on his side to look at his sweet wife who had been standing and gently petting his back. “You get better every time, Mistress Captain,” Lucius said sleepily.

“It’s because I don’t show any mercy. You were really pushing me tonight, but you find more release when you can’t intimidate me. I think you know that as well as I, but is there something else, Lucius?”

Lucius just shook his head, sat up and extended his hand asking for hers. Her hand slipped into his and he Apparated them to their bedroom, helping her remove the bustier. Within five minutes they were in bed and Lucius was returning to his wife all the immensely erotic sensations she had given him, delving his tongue into her woman’s core, then sucking hard on her rigid little nerve bud as his fingers found her inner, sensitive spot. He avoided her breasts, which were still in operation for the twins. It took no time for her to reach her own pleasure, as keyed up and aroused as she had been by her role as the dominant one. She screamed one of her ear-splitting shrieks, then slumped against her husband, done in.

Time passed as they both dozed, warmly cocooned in their bed, tucked up in each other’s arms after their very satisfying ‘voyage’ on their imaginary pirate ship, the “Jolly Rogering”. At length the little witch was roused by her husband’s voice, “Hermione…?”

“Hmm?”

Lucius’ lips pinched as if to keep the words in his mouth, but then he drew in a deep breath and blurted, “How does one know if one loves too much?”

His wife woke more thoroughly, leaned back and gazed into Lucius’ eyes for a moment, then inquired, “Does your question have personal application or is it a general inquiry?”

He looked at his wife in annoyance with her making him define what he’d rather not. “Personal,” he growled, then shrugged, trying to throw off an air of nonchalance.

“Are you worried I love you too much, Lucius?” Hermione took one of his larger hands in her small ones.

“No!” Why did she always take what he said in a direction he’d never anticipated? “I… I’m…”

Hermione’s brows drew together in confusion, then her expression cleared. “Oh! Oh, Lucius, no. You mustn’t worry about that. You think you’re vulnerable to me, don’t you. You think you’re weakened by letting me role-play the leader sometimes? Does that bother you so much?” She silently vowed not to refer to his age any more if that was what had set him off this badly.

“When you put it like that it sounds stupid. No, that’s not it. I just wonder if one can love too much.”

Hermione felt his hand tremble slightly in hers and knew this was a very important question for him. She gave it some careful thought, then said, “In my opinion, no, you can’t. Not if it is true love. True love means that you always want the best for the loved one. To protect them and yet let them be themselves; trust them. You have proven that over and over. I think you are still just feeling a little adrift in your new reality. You’ve protected your heart for many years and it must be odd and maybe uncomfortable knowing you’ve admitted someone else into your longtime circle of one,” she smiled. “So – are you afraid you’ll run out of love because you’re using it up too fast?”

Lucius frowned, “It’s not so very many years; you make it sound like an eon. And my circle is bigger than one. That was a joke, I assume. We do have the twins, you know. And besides you there is Draco and…” Lucius trailed off, mumbling what Hermione thought were Sev and Cissy, but she wasn’t sure. His voice volume rose again, “You’re saying it's a renewable commodity?”

Hermione decided not to ask Lucius to repeat whom the others in his circle were. It might end this conversation before she got to whatever was bothering him. And definitely no more jabs at his age; he couldn’t take that even in jest. “Love has infinite, never-ending forms. In our marriage, for example, it can actually be fueled by occasional swats of the riding crop or hairbrush. It’s why I love you so much,” she teased and got a half-hearted smile. She was beginning to see he wasn’t bothered that he was expending too much love, but rather that he was doing it wrong. Silly man.

“Maybe I ask too much of you. In bed. In role-playing. In the rough sex?” Lucius essayed his worry as a question.

She wrapped her arms about her worried spouse, “Lucius, if I don’t want to do something, I’m quite capable of saying no. With a Cruciatus if necessary, not that you’d ever need one.”

Oddly, the threat of the Crucio put Lucius’ mind more at rest, knowing his wife was strong-willed enough to do it. That was familiar territory to him and he was astute enough to realize Hermione had used that example as something he could gratefully accept as a protection for her.

“I have an idea,” she said, snuggling into his arms. ”Why don’t you take care of the finances and I’ll take care of the emotions. You let me know if we’ve lost all our Galleons and have to move to a dingy apartment in Knockturn Alley and take in laundry, and I’ll let you know if we are having any marital problems and need to see a counselor. Otherwise you just behave as you wish toward me and I’ll spend what money I wish of yours. You may wind up with a striped bottom occasionally, but I think that is a fair trade.” She added, “You do know, I hope, that I would move with you to that dingy apartment. I love you.”

Lucius bridled at her even suggesting that he would ever take such poor care of her financially, but then he saw the soft honesty in her face and brightened, relief flooding him and dispersing any lingering uncertainties. He wouldn‘t have to solve the puzzle he figured he’d never understand if given a millennium – female feelings, particularly hers. He had trouble enough with Severus’. He had worried that he might be overwhelming her with his tendency to smother her with gifts, trips, clothing and a myriad of other trinkets as well as the frequent sex and rough play. His poor showings as the servile one in their bedroom games made him anxious that she wouldn’t accept his admittedly sorry attempts.

But most of all he worried about his inability to stay away from her for very long. He knew he disturbed her research sometimes. But if she was willing to be in charge of their emotional relationship, he could relax and not agonize over each little thing he did for and to her. She would let him know if what he did was good or wrong or too much. She certainly let him know when his excesses as a father were too much.

Lucius’ mercurial temperament shot upward and his wife was pleased to see one of his purely happy smiles bloom on his face, chasing away his anxiety. “If you’re sure, then, yes, I’m happy to split those responsibilities. We’ll share our strengths.”

In the early days of their marriage he’d come to know she was the stronger-willed of the two of them, but now she liked him to be nominally in charge – mostly - and that suited his dynastic soul. He still had trouble letting go of the power in their intimacies, but she was letting him be himself; she trusted him and now he had her strength to keep him from failing at the emotional mazes that always seemed to trap him. He sifted his fingers through her soft curls the way he loved to do as a calm certitude invaded his heart. She truly, truly loved him as he was. And Gods, how he loved her.

THE END


BUT - Not quite the end. Epilogue to come.


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http://labibliographe.livejournal.com/70625.html

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