It was around halfway through, when the audience was at its peak, that I began to see it. Maybe it would have just looked like a haze or glare from the light, but a misty kind of luminance filled the auditorium. In response, the great teardrop that hung above the band started to glow, the cheers from the crowd indicating that this was a normal thing, something they expected. The Changelings seemed to unwind at this, like that kind of coiled, lazy power before was just a pose they could throw off at will. I caught Jake, his laugh crazy, as he smashed out the frenetic opening beat to one of their more current songs. “Running From It” was an ode to commitment-phobes everywhere, about the weird kind of joy people felt doing their damnedest to escape romantic entanglement, while having the best time they could. Girls started throwing bras and underwear up on stage, Billy and Liam doing their best to catch them during the song and hang them from Liam’s mic stand.
And Johnno. All of that panty dampening rock god vibe he’d had before was doubled, trebled on stage. I caught with my lens the way the fans reached out for him, their eyes raking over his now shirtless form, looking at that big muscular body I’d been pressed against. He was tantalisingly out of reach, something they tried desperately to broach, and only the burly bouncers at the edges of the stage were enough to hold people back as the barricades groaned. Then, as if sensing my inspection, he turned towards me.
To the audience, it would have looked like he was prowling across the stage, moving into his brother’s mic to sing backup. I knew differently, though, as the camera gave me the view so crisp and clear. Those golden eyes shone with an unearthly light as he stalked closer, his guitar slung low over his hips. His hands moved without a thought, those sharp sensual notes providing a solid background to Billy’s more acrobatic lead guitar. I went macro, forced to go to a super fast shutter speed to catch those long slender fingers, the veins standing out proud against the back of his hands. I took shot after shot, my camera stroking his body in the absence of my hands. Then they reached out.
An arm went around Johnno’s neck, drawing him closer as a hand touched mine. I glanced back to see Liam had the microphone in hand, ostensibly singing with his brother, but those blue eyes bore into my lens, looking straight into me. I forced my eyes away, unable to take that hot gaze anymore, to see Circe holding up a huge shining stone in her hand.
Jen looked at it, eyes wide, then snatched it away and shoved it into my palm, closing my fingers around it.
“You’re getting some dick tonight,” she said over the noise. Her smile was tremulous and hopeful.
“I need some. I’ve had sex once in the last year.”
“Jesus! That’s some kind of torture to someone newly transitioned. One orgasm!”
“Not one orgasm,” I replied, and her eyebrow shot up, then she laughed. “As long as they look after you. Though you might want to sidle off with one or more of that harem of yours before court. Bleed off some of that energy. Who are you going to choose?”
My eyes went automatically back to the band as Jen chuckled.
When they came running off the stage, thrumming with energy, I felt the same way. I was flicking through the shots on Marlow’s tablet, mentally sorting the good from the bad. That was plucked away and passed over as a hot sweaty body pressed against mine.
“Johnno,” I said before I’d even laid eyes on him. He was leaning over me, and I could feel his panting breath on my face as he smiled. He cloaked me in a sharp woody scent that seemed to pluck at me, at my attention, my nipples, my clit. Fuck, I wanted him.
It’d all come rushing in when I put the camera down, as whatever spell was on that glass dissipated when I replaced it in its bag. I had no buffer—their songs smashed into me, and I walked into each blow.
I’d physically started to do so, and only Aen’s arm snapping out stopped me from stepping out onto the stage in a trance. There was a magic to this primitive rite, something that transcended time, rational thought, and self-preservation. I was just like the crowd, bowing down before their fucking majesty, the sounds they were able to wring from the simple instruments capturing me in a spell that I couldn’t fight anymore. People were touching me, Aen a steady presence, the drainers doing their damnedest to stop the welling surge of power that just kept on building inside me. I felt like my skin was going to burst, and Jen shot me worried looks, snapping orders at the drainers to work faster, but they began to look harried under the onslaught.
“Here,” Marlow said, handing me the tablet, trying to steer me away from the stage. “Look at what you’ve made.” Like a child, my mind grabbed the latest shiny, flicking, flicking through the photos. But it was jerked back pretty damn quick. I could feel it—that selfsame energy pulsing in Johnno as he hung above me, so I reached up and licked the pulse point stuttering with that beat.
“We don’t have time—” Lucas said, shouldering forward.
“Shut up,” Liam said, holding out a hand, but I didn’t give a fuck about them. I slid my mine under Johnno’s, so he held them against the wall, hearing the various mumbled responses from those around me as my back arched up, thrusting my breasts against Johnno’s chest.
“Kira…”
My name was a prayer and a plea, and right now, I couldn’t think of a reason not to answer it.
“C’mon,” I said, tangling my fingers in his and dragging him forward.
We moved with some kind of preternatural speed deeper into the backstage area, past groupies and hangers on, past techs and caterers, until we returned to that little room, where his practice amp and guitar were left, still humming.
“Kira, hang on…”
I pushed him against the wall, his smile broadening, then faltering as my hands went to his waistband.
“Hey, we should—”
I stopped him talking with my mouth, and somehow, I managed to kiss him with everything I had while freeing his hard cock. My lips paused against his when I felt it, long and throbbing in my hand. I needed it—I felt that deep inside me, twisting sharply the longer I waited.
“You don’t have to… Oh fuck!”
His hands went to my hair as I dropped to my knees, taking him in my mouth as far as that fat shaft would go.
“Don’t fight this, brother. This was always on the cards.”
I heard the rustle of many bodies behind me, coming closer and closer as I slid my mouth slowly, from as far down as I could, then a slow, steady suction to the head. I could feel the heat from their bodies as I worked him, feel him harden impossibly further with each stroke.
“No…I…”
His voice came in tight little bursts, coming out when I pulled off the crown of his dick, only to engulf him with my mouth again seconds later.
“You can’t plan this shit, Johnno,” another voice said. “You’ve got all the time in the world to plan moonlit dinners and picnic dates. Come down the pretty girl’s throat. Give her what she wants.”
“So, we’re really doing this?”
“Fuck yeah, we are. She’s not a butterfly. Our girl’s a whole motherfucking world, and I wanna get lost in her. Fuck, Johnno, you’ve got nerves of fucking steel. I’d be coming after the first stroke and then staying hard so I could come again.”