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Perhaps Gale should have tried to stop Parsipan, been faster to respond when he saw the telltale signs of those dark compulsions rising to the surface. Perhaps not; it wouldn't make a difference in the long term, and it was best not to tempt those compulsions back on himself again when there was a solution to all of his problems — their problems — dancing just beyond his grasp on fate's horizon. What was one more life lost, so long as Gale stayed his course? He would never verbalise something so crass, and it wasn't that he necessarily approved of what had happened and the way it had happened, but it was only a Pixie, more likely to return to leading innocent travellers astray into dangerous woods than it was to do anything particularly helpful, much as Mystra was fond of them. They made very powerful magical components, when required. He had, in his time before as a Chosen, found himself disappointed when realising he ought not make use of said components anymore (regardless of how long ago they had been harvested) lest he raise Mystra's ire. Regardless, that was then, this was now, and it had all happened so quickly. Even if he had attempted something, it was doubtful he would have moved in time.
…And it had brought unexpected benefits.
They had just exited Moonrise Towers for the last time, the prospect of a long walk, trailing behind (and ideally overtaking) the now leaderless army ahead of them, all the way to Baldur's Gate. They'd no time to delay, which meant no time to rest before nightfall, tired as they all were. They were intact, and as long as Shadowheart held Shar's favour as a justiciar, and Gale held a fragment of the Shadow Weave's power at his command, the shadow curse and its denizens would not bother them. Unless that army made some comically incompetent loop and came straight back, they'd nothing to fear. For now. It was there, not far beyond the tower walls, that they all heard it. The smallest tapping of limb against glass, and a shaky, exhaustion-filled voice begging for help. The drider's lantern, thrown from the rooftop during their first fray with Ketheric, twisted but miraculously intact upon the ground. Gale's eyes followed the most likely arc of movement back in reverse, and concluded that it must have been slowed and saved from heavy impact by the smashed branches of the nearest tree. Terrifically lucky.
He passed his own lantern to Astarion, and picked up the mangled steel frame, holding it up to eye level to inspect its contents. Bound to a narrow metal pole in the middle by her waist and wrists, her wings crumpled and feet tucked up away from the spikes at the bottom of the cage, the ragged pixie glared out at him.
"This pixie is still alive," he announced, amazed at her fortitude.
"Let me see," Parsipan said.
It was then that Gale made what was, perhaps, a mistake. Parsipan had developed his healing spells significantly during their time here. Gale thus assumed, naturally, that Parsipan intended to heal the pixie. So he handed the lantern down to his troubled lover without hesitation. And perhaps, mistake or not, perhaps Parsipan had intended to do just that.
After all, Parsipan did let the pixie out. He did let her fly up from the open lantern to hover in front of his face, where she offered him a boon for saving her — and that was despite the amount of time it had taken them to do so.
And Parsipan did take a breath in, as if he were about to say something. But then he paused, for the most fractal of moments. His expression went misty, his muscles tensed, and-
"Well?" the pixie demanded, impatient and unaware.
Well.
All at once there was a tiny scream, a wet crunch, and a blinding flash of fey light, swirling into glitter that faded into the dark just like any of the cloying dust that rode on the air here did. The pixie was gone, eaten, her tired little body crammed into a single bite. Far more importantly to Gale, Parsipan was gone. Panic overrode any possible frustration with the senseless death. Another soul sacrificed on the pyre of Parsipan's dark curse or what-have-you, certainly, but so what? Gale had already chosen the chance at a life with Parsipan above the chance to destroy the brain in its lair. People (and pixies, apparently) were going to die as a result. It was simply the raw fact of the matter. But so long as he had Parsipan and there was even a chance that they could both pull through their respective woes and retire to his tower, safe and sound forever, it would be worth it all.
But now Parsipan was gone, the echoing outline of where he once stood like a shadow on Gale's eyelids, carved there by the light of the pixie's last stand. Astarion began to laugh, giddy and obnoxious, which could only register to Gale as a surreal, cruel response to the tragedy they had all just witnessed. What was wrong with that man?
"Oh no," Shadowheart said, hand over her mouth, but her tone was amused as well, which surprised Gale enough to bring him back from his shock to the present. He followed her gaze, right down to the ground where Parsipan had been standing. When the red shadow of the light faded from his view enough that he could actually see what they were all looking at, relief rushed in, chased by a coupled wave of concern and mirth.
Parsipan was perfectly fine. If more than a tad shorter than usual.
Gale crouched, and held out a flat palm for Parsipan to climb atop. His tall-for-a-gnome 3'11" had shrunk to an estimated 0'5", give or take, the lower half of his face caked in a blast mark of shining white glitter.
"Oh, my poor love," Gale murmured, rising to his feet with a grunt of effort and Parsipan gently, securely, adorably cradled in his palm. "…On the bright side, it will be very difficult for you to kill me in your sleep now, if that wicked apparition of yours gets any more ideas about me. Are you alright?" he asked, retrieving his handkerchief from an inner pocket of his robes to wipe the smeared glitter away.
Parsipan replied, but it was too quiet to be intelligible as his perpetually weak voice couldn't carry far enough. His eyes were wide in awe, looking Gale up and down over the hem of the handkerchief as if he'd just been given the greatest present of his life rather than struck by yet another curse. Something they might explore later, under better and more private circumstances, Gale thought. He could duplicate this effect with his own magic easily, when time was not so scarce and having a heavily weakened party member did not put their lives at risk.
"I can't hear you," he admitted. "You're too small."
Parsipan gave two thumbs up, which was answer enough, and Gale turned to Shadowheart and Minthara.
"Would either of you be able to revert this? I could certainly work to solve it myself, however…"
It was true that curse-breaking was something that Gale could do, given enough time and study of the curse involved, but it was difficult work, and could be both costly and dangerous to himself and his subject if not performed correctly. Casters whose magic derived from divine sources held the advantage in this field, much as they did any healing magic, and Gale was more than happy to admit this: the difference between the wizard who broke curses and the cleric who broke curses was that the cleric's work was done largely by their god. For a god to be capable of seeing all factors of a curse and to head off any potential ill effects of its dispersal was a given. And, though he would not ever say it to Minthara for the certainty it would cause offence, paladins technically received the same help through whichever god found their oath most pleasing. Usually Tyr, in Gale's understanding, though he doubted it was Tyr who was humouring Minthara at present. If he had to hazard a guess, it might have been Hoar.
"No," Minthara said simply. "I am inclined to place curses, not resolve them."
"I'm sorry," Shadowheart shook her head. "I'm tapped, I don't think it's a good idea for me to try until tomorrow."
"Perhaps," Minthara began, "if you are so confident in your own abilities to attend and defend Parsipan's wellbeing that we are merely conveniences to you, you ought to prove it. We've a long road ahead of us, yes? Or are weeks not time enough for you to do what Shadowheart might accomplish in minutes?"
Gale recognised that she was attempting to bait him. She still bristled against his informal position as Parsipan's second in command.
"Perhaps I shall," he said, and she scoffed.
Recognition did not always translate to an ability or willingness to resist said bait. He would still speak to Shadowheart in the morning; he didn't have any real intention of putting his ego before Parsipan's welfare.
"For now," Jaheira interrupted. "Rather than bickering over who gets to clean up this little mistake, we might consider continuing to walk, no? I will take lead in guiding us until Parsipan can resume his duty. The army will not have made it difficult to follow their tracks. Much as these achy bones would like to lay about, we already agreed that we do not have the time to delay."
The group acquiesced, and Gale spent the rest of the afternoon at the hind of the party, carrying a silently enraptured Parsipan and taking the opportunity to explain to him the mechanics of form-shifting spells in enlightening detail. He didn't dare grasp him in case it caused serious injury, so he kept his palm open, a flat platform at the level of his sternum, and had to transfer Parsipan between his palms whenever each arm started to grow tired of being held aloft.
It did not take the intelligence of an archwizard to guess Parsipan's opinion on all of this, and the gnome's unique predilections were probably well known by the entire group by this point, so Gale deftly avoided referring to any cases where size-altering spells had been used to controlling or deadly effect. That was a conversation for the privacy of his tent. It kept a thin veneer of appropriateness to his lecture, for whatever that was worth.
Come time for camp, many hours later, Parsipan remained pixie-sized. Gale fed him a dinner consisting of two whole spoonfuls of soup, and anticipating that Parsipan would be eager to retire early (he hadn't shifted his focus from Gale for even a minute) bid the others good night 'so that he could puzzle over the best approach to fixing the issue, if all else failed come tomorrow'. It was a lie, obviously, but what else could he say? 'Do excuse me, as I've no further camp chores to complete, I'm going to go and discover what it feels like to have a very small and dexterous man attending to my privates'? No!
After placing Parsipan at the head of his bedroll, Gale made certain he had applied a silencing barrier charm to the space to preserve their privacy, and an alarm spell that would ring a mental chime if anybody approached within four metres of the tent walls. He didn't expect to be interrupted or spied on, but one could never be sure, and there was always the possibility of Scratch or the owlbear seeking their attention. Better safe than sorry.
When he turned back, Parsipan was already nude and brushing his hair out of its braid with his equally shrunken pocket comb. Eager as ever.
<IF YOU GIVE ME ILLUSORY WINGS, WE CAN PRETEND I'M A PIXIE THAT YOU'VE TRAPPED,> Parsipan suggested through the tadpole, which made Gale jump. He would never get used to how loud Parsipan's mental voice was. <SORRY,> he added.
"We'll see," Gale replied. "Was that your only request, or have you been considering anything else? I must insist no serious rough play when you're this small, but if there's anything you'd like me to threaten to do, you need only ask."
Gale did enjoy the position they had found themselves in, which was not a new idea to him — he'd had these sorts of fantasies about partners before, and had once or twice found (or rather felt) himself to be the far smaller player with Mystra, an inevitability given the great vastness of the Weave — and he was excited by the chance to finally fill the role of all-powerful giant himself. But even more so, he was excited by Parsipan's excitement.
He glanced at the tuft of hair between Parsipan's legs, wondering if he was already wet behind that orange fuzz. No matter how slick he had become, at this scale it could no doubt all be swept away with a single fingertip.
<EAT ME?> Parsipan suggested.
"I suspected that would be on the list. Anything else?"
<OR STEP ON ME. SIT ON ME…? CRUSH ME, OR CRUSH ME AND THEN EAT ME.>
"Mhm."
<TURN ME INTO SPELL COMPONENTS! AND THEN MIX THEM WITH YOUR CU->
"I think I understand, thank you. Again, we'll see how far we're able to get." Gale removed his boots, leaving them by the entryway to return to the bedroll and sit beside his miniaturised lover. Parsipan moved to close the distance, but Gale placed a hand between them as a barrier. "Patience, my love, much as I always appreciate your enthusiasm. My request is that we don't use our tadpoles any further tonight. Pixies aren't psionic creatures. And I, ah, want to see if we can get anything audible out of you at this scale."
(And he didn't want to develop a headache.)
"Only use it if I'm hurting you or you want to stop," he instructed, as if Parsipan had ever wanted to stop even once in all their times together thus far. "Here," he added, and with a practised flourish he summoned an illusory — but wholly tactile — rose in full ruby bloom, oversized enough that it could near envelop Parsipan. Simultaneously, the torn stubs of ruined wings now jutted from between Parsipan's shoulder blades. "For you. A fitting chair."
Parsipan fell back onto the rose without hesitation, sinking into its centre as a dropped pebble might a bowl of flour, and Gale laid down to closer watch. The role of pixie suited Parsipan immensely, he decided. Vivid orange hair and warm purple skin were together far more fey than gnomish. He was viewing living art, an embodiment of a sunset in sprite form. He admittedly always thought of Parsipan along similar lines, but in this moment where it felt very much as if he owned him, as one would own a piece of art, with Parsipan so reliant on Gale for safety and satiety, and entirely at his mercy on even a raw physical level, it felt…
Gale felt powerful, and the stirring between his legs betrayed his appetite for that power. He couldn't help it, it was human nature, and he believed it was a matter of fact that most men would feel the same in his position. It wasn't as if he was actually holding Parsipan captive for his own amusement, unlike how certain other archmages handled their love lives.
"Keep going." Gale pointed to the comb still in Parsipan's hand, then to the hair flowing over the petals of the rose. Parsipan wriggled into a more upright position and obediently began to comb his hair in an exaggerated display for Gale's benefit.
"When I was at the height of my power as Chosen," Gale began, his tone intentionally casual, "I was on occasion asked by the Watchful Order for assistance with more serious incidents within the city for which they needed the power and expertise of a better wizard than themselves. One of those incidents was how I learnt of Mystra's fondness for pixies; There was a mage, an immigrant from Thay, who was working as an alchemist — his identity beyond that isn't important, but he was a terribly nasty fellow, never much for pleasantries when I'd visited his store once or twice as a customer — who had created a hidden vault of illicit magical substances beneath his shopfront. The Order had called me in to assist in dispelling the complex, or, to be honest not too complex by my standards, but I digress: the semi-complex wards he had in place that had stymied the Order from entering and investigating. We discovered inside that not only had he a store of substances classed as incredibly illegal within Waterdeep, but that he had created a set of… farms, so to speak, in order to breed rare magical beings for culling and processing."
Parsipan's combing slowed, predictably entranced. He shifted in place, but he dutifully refrained from abandoning his task. Gale knew exactly where his lover would rather have his hands for this, and as grim as it was, if he intended to indulge Parsipan's most perverse fixations then this sort of framing was the key. This was a celebration for the both of them: Gale was alive, and this would be the first of many more nights together after his choice to disobey Mystra and forsake his one final opportunity at the pleasant afterlife he had once expected to receive as a matter of course if he failed to obtain immortality. If he could sacrifice all that, he could sacrifice some propriety.
"I couldn't tell you much in detail about the breeding aspect, as I was not required for the entire investigation afterwards, but I could tell you that one of his ventures was for dust of disappearance, which takes fifty whole pixie wings to create each dose. And difficult to achieve with wild caught pixies. Luckily for this fellow, despite their exceptional lifespan, pixies only take about five years to mature and do not gestate for very long, so in combination with a particular automatic teleportation-based trap he had created to capture pixies from the feywild, he was able to amass many hundreds by the time he was found out. He had them all in group cages, about…" Gale trailed off to add another illusion to their play — a square, iron cage, barely tall enough for Parsipan to stand upright if he so chose, with narrowly-gapped bars. With it came a simple iron choker that sat around Parsipan's neck. "…This large, and each was given a silencing collar to stifle their magic. Fey are only sensitive to cold iron, so I presume he forged it all with his own spells."
He stopped, then, examining Parsipan's reaction, and was satisfied to see his cheeks were flushed and his breathing had picked up. He squirmed in place, 'subtly' rubbing his thighs together for some faint friction. Gale opened the door to the cage, which was just large enough for his hand to fit through, and used his fingertip to guide Parsipan's legs apart again.
"Patience," he chided, but traced his fingertip up one inner thigh, brushed across the dewdrop sized patch of wetness between, then traced back down the other thigh. A thin trail of arousal followed on the withdrawal and left a short smear down Parsipan's inner thigh, glistening in the low tent light. He brought the fingertip behind Parsipan's back, pressing between skin and the rose chair to stroke the skin around the broken wing joints. Parsipan wouldn't be able to feel it any differently than he normally did, but Gale trusted the mental stimulation would be enough. "After he harvested the wings he would use the bodies in parts. Some to feed his other captives, some to grind down into an amplifying paste for the base of some of his more powerful potions." Stage set, Gale began in earnest: "Unlike him, I have no intent to throw you away, wingless as you now are. Why else would I give you that rose? You and I will stay together as lovers, and I will ensure you are well cared for. Kept safe in my study, all to myself. How does that sound to you?"
The question was genuine, couched as it was in the roleplay. A chance for Parsipan to back out, or correct his direction. He did not: in a show of very obviously fake reluctance, Parsipan leaned away from the finger while spreading his legs even wider. He was speaking, but again it was unintelligible. No matter — his desires were clear as day.
"I should say, it isn't as if you have any choice but to obey me. The pixies were freed at the time, but they were not the commodity that he was being investigated for," Gale noted, then explained further, delighting in the minute shivers of excitement that it elicited. "Pixie dust is profitable because it is rare, not because it is an illegal substance in Waterdeep, and there is no specific law against its production as long as the pixie is not also considered a citizen of the city, which none of them were. Had it been his only operation, I expect that he would still be farming pixies to this day. The same would apply to us. None will save you from me."
It was little wonder that so many of the unlettered public distrusted powerful wizards with such behaviour being so common amongst their highest ranks. It wasn't as if anybody ordinary could stop an archwizard from doing as he pleased, so these sorts of things proceeded near entirely unchecked depending on one's social circle, and there was no good way to put an end to it. Which was not to say that Gale approved of such things, obviously he didn't, but that it was an inevitability with the availability of magic. Always a bad apple in every basket, and so forth. Personally, he much preferred his partners to be wholly willing (and his spell components to be comparatively ethical). What was the point if they did not adore him? If they were not impressed by everything he could do with or to them? Where was the romantic excitement in a cold shoulder? The sensual fulfilment in a terrified flinch?
Were Parsipan a better actor, Gale would not have near half as much fun with these theoretical scenes. Luckily for them both, he was atrocious, so Gale could have his cake and eat it too with being both the impressive and all-powerful mage and the adored lover, and not experience a lick of guilt about indulging that natural ambition for control.
"Let me prove to you why you should be grateful for my affection."
He returned his finger to the crux between Parsipan's legs and began to rub back and forth. There was no shot he could stimulate Parsipan more precisely unless he wanted to try pinching (there was a thought!), but that wasn't necessary. Parsipan melted beneath his touch, grinding his hips against the fingertip with a satisfied, quiet sigh. The comb fell to land on the bedding below, dropped in that arch of pleasure; Gale appreciated that it had taken so long for Parsipan to abandon the request. He adjusted himself through his trousers with his spare hand, ensuring he would remain comfortable despite his arousal, then settled in, laying on his side with his head propped up on one hand and the other still stroking between Parsipan's legs in slow, slick circles. All of his lover's reactions, every little sign of pleasure — the grasping hands that crushed dewy bruises into the rose petals beneath, the parted lips that allowed the faintest of faint squeaking little gasps to escape, the curling toes and rolling hips and stiffened nipples — presented to him in one compact, vulnerable display.
Ordinarily, Parsipan was an indomitable force. Gale had seen enough to prove to him that whatever Parsipan's origins were, there was very little for the gnome to fear from mundane injury. And so, ordinarily, Gale understood that there was (thankfully) next to nothing he could do that would legitimately hurt him. Parsipan's submission was given freely, and could be taken back at any time. He could not easily be controlled physically through force, nor magically through enchantment spells (with the unfortunate exception of whatever curse it was that compelled him to violence, so there must be some magic that Gale might find that would stick). However Parsipan had come to be as he was, the individual or individuals responsible had done an exceptional job.
But that was only ordinarily. Who could have guessed that all the people they had faced and killed together had needed to avert their dooms was the power of a single desperate pixie? How little force would they have needed to apply to crush Parsipan as he was now? For the first time in all the time that they had known each other, Gale truly could do anything to him. Alone, here, nobody could or would stop him. Least of all Parsipan.
He was effectively unto Parsipan a god. A merciful, doting god.
He imagined how powerful he must look from Parsipan's perspective. Immense and insuperable. A curl of pleasure wove down through his chest to settle into his already comfortably aching need, companion to the idle friction of his underwear. He waited until he saw the telltale signs of Parsipan's oncoming peak — heaving breaths that at correct scale would have held the ghost of broken, forceful moaning despite his ruined vocal cords — and lifted his finger from between those fragile little legs, delighting in the disappointed wriggle it evoked. His helpless, adoring doll, entirely at his mercy.
He returned the finger, but not where Parsipan wished for it. Stroking up the side of his torso, across the winding rose vine tattoo that adorned his freckled skin, over the peak of a nipple — dragging there with just enough pressure to roll it beneath his fingertip — over his scarred neck to rest beneath his chin, guiding Parsipan's face to look him in the eyes through the cage bars.
Parsipan kissed the peak of Gale's fingerpad, small breath ghosting over his skin and an even smaller smudge of lipstick left behind to mark him. Gale placed the very tip of his finger against Parsipan's lips.
"Suck," he suggested. "Show me how thankful you are that I am merciful."
Parsipan obeyed, tender gaze never leaving Gale's as he licked and suckled on the skin there, mouth too small to fit the tip inside. Worshipful, passionate, an open-mouthed kiss as eager as any Parsipan had ever given his lips. He wrapped his hands around Gale's finger, massaging up and down the length of it in smooth, suggestive strokes. Plum lipstick smeared across it, recording the path of Parsipan's oral affections like a wet, shining bruise.
Never once had Gale had to question Parsipan's trust in him; never once had Parsipan not given him control when asked. Here where the lines between bedroom play and real threat were blurred there was no hesitation to Parsipan's devotion. If Gale were to make a sudden movement, to abruptly push his finger forward too roughly, Parsipan's neck could be seriously injured. He knew without asking that from Parsipan's perspective, these risks had also been considered. Concerningly enthusiastically, perhaps, but that was an aside to the real crux of the matter for Gale:
Parsipan understood that he was a kind and fair man when given such power, and that there was no reason to deny him his ambitions for it. Despite his position as a veritable god, nothing had changed between them.
(Had Mystra cared for him truly, she would have recognised this also; Gale had been no different to Azuth in his ambitions and dedication.)
He pressed the tip of his finger against Parsipan's mouth with slowly climbing firmness, pushing him off balance against the rose. Were he pressed but a millimetre further he would tumble from his seat, the flower overturned with him in a backwards somersault. Still Parsipan obeyed. Still Parsipan worshipped with mouth and hands and eyes as soothing as warm honey. Still Parsipan kissed and stroked and licked and kept his thighs spread for Gale's viewing pleasure and rolled his hips futily against unfulfilling, unstimulating air. He made no move to right himself or regain balance.
Gale drew his finger back to release the pressure, allowing Parsipan and the rose beneath to come back into a more secure position. He lifted it from Parsipan's mouth to stroke the side of his face.
"Exceptional," he praised. He could hear in that word his own arousal, the low strain it added to his voice. "You are a sight beyond belief. How blessed I am to have you… And I have a reward for you. For your devotion."
He caressed Parsipan's ear between thumb and finger, and Parsipan leant in to the sensation as anticipated. Gale sometimes wondered exactly how it felt for the long-eared races to derive such purportedly keen erogenous bliss from having their pointed tips handled.
He pinched. Hard.
Parsipan released a staccato squeak, and his hips swung upwards as his whole body arched in pleasure.
Mindful not to put pressure on his piercings lest they warp and get stuck, Gale rolled the sensitive flesh in an unrelenting grip. Parsipan continued to buck his hips, mouth drawn into a wide O and eyes completely unfocused. Overwhelmed by algolagnic euphoria, he tore a long line into one of the rose petals in his shuddering grasp.
Gale released him, and he squeaked again, dropping limp. When Gale's offending fingers moved between his legs, he did not resist, raising them again in willing surrender. He was soaked. Gale gently rolled his stiff, minuscule need between his fingers, coating the swollen head in Parsipan's slick.
"…And this is adorable. What a lovely emblem of how suited you are for being kept as a trinket. Useless, but a darling sight nonetheless. If I ever let you leave to chase your desires elsewhere, do you believe you could fill so much as a lily of the valley blossom with this?"
He pinched, and Parsipan trembled beneath his hand, shaking his head in dazed reply. He could not move his hips due to the firmness of his grip, but oh how he tried, thrusting against Gale's fingers like a desperate beast in rut. There was a gush — more like a dribble, at this size — of liquid from behind the captured nub. Parsipan had near immediately climaxed from having his clitoris crushed.
"That's it," Gale praised, keeping the pressure constant through each shiver of pleasure that rolled over his lover's tiny body. He was unable (and unwilling) to keep the smugness from his voice: "Aren't I a generous warden?"
Parsipan nodded, stupidly and slack-jawed, still attempting to thrust with each echo of his orgasm even after Gale loosened his grip.
He was terribly easy to please, and it never ceased to be refreshing. If Gale wanted, he could have stopped here and sent Parsipan to bed. Parsipan would not complain. He was sexually fixated on being mistreated, felt most pain as if it were pleasure, and had begged Gale to treat him more and more roughly as their relationship progressed.
Gale of Waterdeep was not, to be absolutely clear, the sort of man who wanted his partner to be harmed, and certainly not by his hands. What he wanted was for his partner to be overcome by pleasure under his ministrations. To be impressed by what he could do to their body, and how well he could exploit their weaknesses.
It just so happened that Parsipan's weakness was for being physically abused, and that they had already come a long way together from hickeys and light spankings. As Parsipan always reacted so enthusiastically, Gale had comfortably settled with the idea that contextually it was no different to indulging a request such as tickling or massages or lingerie. Some preferred a light touch. Parsipan did not.
As for what Gale preferred…
He lifted Parsipan from the rose, withdrawing him from the illusory cage. Acquiescent and content, Parsipan wrapped his arms around Gale's thumb as he was brought up to Gale's face. Gale rolled onto his back, drinking in Parsipan's dishevelled appearance up close.
"Though if you ever tire of being my lover, or I yours, perhaps I shall eat you," he murmured. "It would be very easy. Here: try not to slip, hm?"
He placed Parsipan atop his face, directing him through touch to kneel, legs spread wide, above his mouth. His slick sex resting directly atop Gale's lower lip. He held his pointer and middle finger in a V shape, horizontal like a makeshift armrest, and positioned them beneath Parsipan's arms so that the gnome's upper back was resting against the crux between the two fingers, his hair was lifted out of the way across Gale's knuckles, and he had something to hold for what was coming next.
It wouldn't do for Parsipan to fall off. Or in, as it were.
Gale parted his lips, purposefully dragging against the slick mound above, and licked, groaning at the taste. The faint traces of sweat, blood, and battle grime from their trek through the core of Moonrise. The dominating metallic sweetness that was Parsipan's slick, cutting through it all. It was a pity that Parsipan could not produce more of it at this scale, but that he could taste all of Parsipan's arousal and have the entire bearded iris (so to speak) encapsulated all in one swipe of his tongue was intoxicating in its own way. And he could certainly hear Parsipan more clearly when he was this close. Shaky breaths, stunted gasps. Gale kept his motions even — deep, scooping passes over abused and sensitive flesh, interspersed with soft kisses. He did try to angle his tongue such that it would part the folds and make more concentrated contact, but it was much like trying to fix one's teeth without a mirror. He'd very little sense of whether this or that direction was making any difference, as Parsipan's response was equally positive to both angles. There was always the psychological element to consider…
"Delicious," he praised, allowing his teeth to make brief contact as he did.
Parsipan arched his back yet again, gripping Gale's fingers tightly.
"I could swallow you whole."
This was not true, Parsipan was more than a touch too big for that, but the threat alone gave Gale more of what he wanted — Parsipan's desire wetting his praise-hungry lips. The minute clenching and excited twitches that let him directly feel the impact he was having on Parsipan's arousal. The emphatic rapture of a devotee receiving his god's undivided attention. The thrill that Gale received in turn from the knowledge that his mouth and words alone were enough to leave his lover shuddering at his command.
His free hand wandered downwards, idly undoing the clips and knots that held his robes, trousers, and undergarments together, baring his chest and stomach to the temperate night air.
…As much as he would have liked to keep this going, bringing Parsipan to his peak as many times as he could manage before his lover insisted he cease and move on, he had no intent to tire Parsipan out too much tonight — too risky, both for Parsipan's wellbeing and Gale's own chances to last long enough for Parsipan to return the favour. Who knew if this curse would even last to morning? His own need had been aching the entire time, and this close visual of Parsipan, helpless atop his lips, clinging desperately to his hand to keep balance, was doing even more for Gale than he had expected it would. On any average night, he would be willing to let it happen, but… he needed to see- needed to experience- needed his little apostle's best efforts at pleasing him in turn.
And thankfully — predictably — for him, Parsipan's second peak of the evening had been fast approaching ever since Gale had employed that teasing scrape of teeth. Parsipan squeaked, a new dribble of warm liquid coating Gale's tastebuds. A hole too small and tight for even his smallest finger to fit, fluttering in a nigh-hypnotic pattern at the very tip of his tongue.
Gale groaned again, swallowing the gift he'd been given with a contented — and perhaps slightly smug — smile.
"Upsy-daisy," he warned, breath shaky with desire, after placing one final kiss in the crux between Parsipan's legs. He lifted the still recovering Parsipan up, relocating him to the centre of his sternum. Parsipan slumped there on hands and knees, and Gale withdrew his own hands. The skin from the inner side of his knees to the bottom of his navel was drenched wet with Gale's saliva — he hadn't realised he had been making such a mess of it in his fervency during the fact. In a show of reassuring enthusiasm, Parsipan looked up at him and wiggled his hips cutely.
"Now…" Gale paused, considering the most eloquent way to make his next request. Something that was not crude, but still grim enough to keep up the play. He knew very well by now that he could never ask too much of Parsipan, that no desire of his, no matter how he stated it, would ever be too demeaning or obscene. Parsipan would not abandon or reject him. Would never laugh or look at him with awkward pity or embarrassment. However, Gale still had his own sensibilities to grapple with, and they had prickled their way to the centre of his chest in a flash to temper his fun with doubt. Parsipan took the initiative, lowering himself into full, face-down kneeling submission and peppering Gale's chest with reverent, reassuring kisses. Yes, he was happy to be here, yes, he wished to continue, yes, he wanted to indulge Gale's most wicked, selfish impulses. Yes, he wanted to give Gale everything he deserved for all the work he had put towards becoming a generous and attentive lover. He wished to serve, so if Gale wished to please him, he need only please himself.
Yes, preemptive and greedy.
"Now," Gale started again, raising his hips just enough to push his trousers and underwear down to mid-thigh, freeing his stiff need. "I have… a task for you. And if you perform, or- serve well enough, I should say, then… I, will, ah, reward you. With a taste of your new, dedicated diet. So, unless you intend to starve…"
Parsipan had ceased the kisses and looked over his shoulder at the reveal, visibly captivated by his looming task, pre already beading at the head.
"Do your best."
He hoped Parsipan had gathered the implication that this theoretical captor intended for his prisoner to subsist solely on seminal fluid.
(Were there any existing spells that temporarily allowed for such a thing…? Parsipan would no doubt be interested.)
"I'm sure you can overcome any… obstacle that arises."
The sensation of Parsipan standing on him and beginning the 'long' walk down was fascinating all on its own — through the day he'd grown used to the feeling of Parsipan in his palms, but the pressure of a body concentrated on such small feet tickled. He tensed his abdominals before Parsipan reached the border of his ribs, well habituated to bracing himself against the intrusion of feline paws seeking to use his stomach as a bridge, but he needn't have bothered. He relaxed: Parsipan was much too light to cause any discomfort no matter how his reduced weight was distributed.
A flare of mischief bubbled up at the sight of Parsipan's cautious steps over soft, living ground. That warm, arousing feeling of unfettered authority returned. In a moment of pure impulse, he reached in without warning and stroked Parsipan's leg, hooking his fingertip on the ankle to trip him over. Down he went onto hands and knees, the impact as gentle to Gale as a click of his fingers would be against his palm. Parsipan froze, shocked. Or so the stiff-as-a-rod form of his back seemed. And understandably so, as Gale had never done anything so drastic without warning before. There was no reason for him to fear reprisal — he could see plain as day Parsipan's quivering hand stroking down the freckled and scarred expanse of his own torso and stopping just shy of the exquisite, intimate view that had been fully exposed for Gale's appraisal by his fall. Parsipan's fingers hovered still between his legs, just shy of contact with that fount of pleasure. He was not mad at Gale for tripping him. He was not in any measure upset. He wanted to touch himself, but knew better than to do so without his master's permission.
"Why have you stopped moving?" Gale asked. "You've still quite the way to go."
The little hand reluctantly withdrew, and Parsipan returned to his feet. He had barely taken three steps when Gale hooked his same finger on that same ankle and sent Parsipan back down.
Parsipan kissed Gale's stomach, and stood.
Three more steps, finger on ankle, down he went.
"You are terribly clumsy for a pixie, aren't you? It must be difficult to balance without your wings, I suppose. Perhaps… Perhaps I should forbid you from walking for your own safety," Gale remarked. He pursed his lips, as if to whistle, and blew a cool jet of air towards Parsipan's exposed behind.
Parsipan again struggled delightfully to not give up and resort to self-stimulation, swaying his hips and tensing his shoulders.
Gale blew once more.
"Go ahead."
Parsipan got the message this time, and crawled for the rest of his journey southwards. Gale relented on his teasing, content to watch and commit the sight to memory. In their time together Gale had seen Parsipan break bones with his bare hands, rend tough dwarven flesh with his teeth; this man could survive life threatening injury in the wilderness with nothing more than his own wit and wills. And here he was, reduced, crawling on his hands and knees just for a taste of Gale. It was an intoxicating vision, to say the least — who would not be thrilled to have such an independent and powerful man at their mercy?
When he reached the round of thicker hair that surrounded his goal, Parsipan graduated to shuffling forward on his knees. He did not stand again until he was directly beside it, both hands on the shaft for stability. Gale had already estimated it to be the case, but seeing the direct evidence that Parsipan stood a full head shorter than his member when it was fully roused was enough to make him groan. Effectively a world away, Parsipan tilted his head, considering his current predicament. He looked up to the tip, then down to the base, then started a slow, open-palmed massage to approximate stroking it. Reverential, he leant in to kiss its side, then breathed in deeply, his forehead pressed against it as he did so — not unlike when they would both sit forehead-to-forehead after a shared kiss. Overcome with his arousal, Gale's shaft involuntarily twitched, hitting Parsipan in the face with what he could only assume was a fair amount of force at his current size. Rather than apologise, as he could see Parsipan was not deterred and had not ceased the gentle stroking of his palms against the shaft, he clenched his muscles to intentionally repeat the action. Alongside Parsipan's lipstick, a fractional little smudge of his eyeshadow now decorated the point of impact.
Parsipan made no move to resist the degradation, and instead deepened the kiss, open-mouthed and suckling and as passionate as he had been with Gale's fingertip earlier. Physically, it was a ticklish, pleasant sensation. Gale had not anticipated that the tangible portion of this would amount to very much comparative to Parsipan's full-sized attentions, so he was not surprised. Visually, it was spectacular.
Parsipan rose to his tip-toes, reaching one splayed palm up to rub the head with all the teasing pressure of a gentle fingertip, and Gale's hips stuttered upwards in a barely suppressed thrust — he didn't want to knock Parsipan over.
"Oh, that's- goodness, that's it," he exhaled. While he was fond (very fond) of Parsipan's usual firm, controlled grasp, a light touch applied to exactly the correct place at the correct time could be just as stimulating as a heavy hand. In the arena of pleasurable overstimulation, there was nothing that quite compared to a featherlight teasing stroke in the throes of passion.
When Parsipan's fingers reached his urethra, and one dipped in to caress the inner rim, Gale reflexively moaned. Part of him wanted to let his eyes fall shut, to lose himself in focus on that feeling, but his desire to watch was greater.
To watch and to bask in the power differential.
"No wings… No fey magic," he said between heavy breaths. "Fragile as a porcelain doll… Not only are you entirely reliant on mm- hm- my care… but I believe we've found… Ah- your sole remaining talent. All you're good for, hm?"
Parsipan nodded in a pause between kisses without withdrawing from his task, which meant that he was rubbing his face against the side of Gale's shaft as he did so.
What a damned shame Parsipan couldn't audibly thank him for the privilege of being the illustrious Gale of Waterdeep's personal pleasure slave. He would have to find a way to magnify Parsipan's voice if, or rather when, they tried this again. A true god would be able to hear a grovelling worshipper if and when he so desired to.
"Here, emmbrhgh- embrace your master properly," Gale said, commanding through choked desperation, and deigned to finally assist by taking hold of his own member and pressing it down to a diagonal angle so Parsipan could reach the tip with more than just his hands. Dutifully, Parsipan backed up until he was face-to-face with the head (or… face-to-hole…?) and resumed his open-mouthed ministrations there, lapping at the pre that was all but oozing out in Gale's excitement. Warm tongue and clever fingers now in concert at that most sensitive locus of his anatomy, Gale was treated to a sensation that very few men ever had or would ever have the fortuity to experience.
"Touch yourself. One hand," he ordered, seeking to perfect the living artwork before him. Parsipan obeyed, his (comparatively) free hand falling from Gale's shaft to set a furious pace between his legs; he even arched his back and widened his stance to better display this subservience to Gale. His gaze never leaving his pet's willing debasement, Gale used his pointer and middle finger to massage circles into his own base, right at the join between shaft and sack, assisting Parsipan with a firmer form of stimulation. He could feel the end coming, and he knew he ought to warn Parsipan. He really, really ought to. If he didn't then Parsipan might choke if he did not hold his breath in time, or it might get in his eyes. Potential harms aside, there was no reasonable way he would be able to swallow it neatly, or even to avoid a portion of the overflow going up his nose.
Silently — or, comparatively so, he did moan — Gale climaxed. Parsipan tensed in the onslaught of acrid, Netherese-tainted seed, but (quite heroically!) did not back down from his task. He stood firm, tongue and fingers still delicately stimulating Gale as his face was coated with each flood of off-white; once, twice, thrice, and a much diminished final fourth dribble that nevertheless did its best to add another layer to his jaw and neck. The only signal that he was in any way distressed by what had just occurred to him was an indeterminate shudder, which looked to Gale like a cough.
As Parsipan kept going still, Gale was forced to hunch forward bit by bit, nervous system captivated by the overwhelming sensation even as his mind regained its wits from the fog of lust.
"Please, that's enough," he grunted, pulling Parsipan away from his softening member and collapsing back onto the bedroll to catch his breath and calm his thudding heart, the hand containing his lover caged loosely on his chest. He felt a clumsy squirming, and raised his hand to see Parsipan scooping his seed away from his face to thrust between his thighs. He had not finished his self-pleasuring before Gale ended his fun, and he was clearly determined to chase his climax.
Gale watched limply as, as soon as he had transferred the material from head to hind, his body was wracked with a telltale shiver and he too collapsed as limply as Gale felt, the rise and fall of his little chest the only sign he was alive.
Some surreal moments, whoever knew how long, oozed by like half-crystallised honey.
Parsipan sneezed. Twice.
"My beloved, are you alright? You weren't hurt?" Gale couched his need for reassurance in a bid to to ensure Parsipan was unharmed by his recklessness.
Parsipan raised a hand as he sat up, a pitiable mess of sticky emissions: thumbs up, all clear, nothing to worry about. A languid flourish of Gale's hand and he was cleaned head-to-toe by a cantrip.
"If you enjoyed yourself, perhaps we might try that again at some point in the future," Gale said. "I trust you were satisfied with the performance...?"
Parsipan nodded, and blew him an exhausted, guilt-assuaging kiss. Obviously. Obviously. There was no need to be concerned. Parsipan was more than happy to give Gale the trust he had always deserved, and Gale knew exactly what Parsipan wanted in return. He'd made no mistakes today.