Sweaty and flushed with heat, I pushed open the doors to my room – well, the room I shared with my wives -- which was rapidly growing insufficient in terms of space. Maybe I’ll look into knocking down the wall and connecting it to the guest room next door. Four people on a bed is too much of a crowd.

The chimes atop the door-frame tinkled, announcing my entry but I found the bedroom empty. Hadn't they returned? I wondered. But the lit smokeless torches told me otherwise.

Unbuttoning my sweat-soaked shirt which was sticking to my skin and stepping out of my equally drenched trousers, I folded them up and was about to deposit them into the laundry basket when I noticed Deimos’ clothes scrunched up into a ball and tossed in there. I shook my head in amusement. A leopard can't change its spots and neither can my spoilt cheetah. Phobos would have her ear for that.

My smile turned horizontal. Well, she probably wouldn't even notice with how she was these days. Sighing, I picked up the skirt and folded it properly before depositing it along with my discarded clothes into the basket.

Grabbing a towel from the stack nearby, I tied it off around my waist before shedding my underpants and dropping them off into the basket as well. Walking over to the bathroom, I deliberately rattled the handle before entering, giving Deimos enough time to protest if she was doing something inconvenient.

The shower was on, the water cascading down on Deimos as she bathed with her back turned to me. The droplets splashed off her elastic honey brown skin and onto the floor and sparse wisps of steam wound around her form, blurring the edges of her curves.

She was beautiful. I made to speak... and paused. There were things I wanted to say, promises that I wanted to make. But the words just wouldn't leave my mouth.

Instead, untying my towel I hung it up on a hook and walked under to the shower, hugging her from behind and resting my chin on her head. She leant back into my chest and I could feel the taut muscles of her back relaxing as she melted into the embrace. My arms tightened around her waist, hugging her closer as the warm water pattered on me, drenching my hair and running down my body in streams that seemed to carry my exhaustion from my training away.

Turning her head sideways, she rubbed her cheek into my chest. Her hands covered mine that lay flat on her stomach and our fingers intertwined. We stood there, the two of us, isolated from the world by a curtain of water – she listening to the beat of my heart and I inhaling the scent of her freshly soaped hair mixed with the light sulfurous smell of the hot spring water being channeled to our shower.

For the first time in days, I was at complete ease.

Deimos was the first one to break the silence as she buried her face into my chest and toyed with my fingers. Her voice came out slightly muffled as her lips brushed against my skin and her warm breath tickled me. “She’s really pitiful, ya?”

I could only nod, my chin conveying the motion to her head.

The fingers of her left hand clenched into our joined palms, letting me know how agitated she was. “How could he?” she whispered. “Master, how could he?!”

I shook my head. I didn’t know. I don’t think I ever will. Abandoning one's other half for the sake of one's greed? I can't harden my heart to that extent.

Turning in my embrace to face me, Deimos wrapped her arms around my neck. Gripping my hair in her fists, she bent my head down and standing on the tip of her toes, she pressed her lips up against mine.

We kissed. Chastely, softly, without tongue, just her lips against mine. All the while, her large, soulful green eyes reflected my crimson ones. I didn’t know what she was searching for in my eyes but I found myself in hers. Her silver lashes shivered, then as a droplet of water splashed on them, instinctively, she closed her lids, locking a part of me away in her forever.

We kissed again. This time, with fervour, with lust. I tasted her tongue as she tasted mine, entwining, entangling in a battle more intense than I ever remember.

Jumping up into my embrace, throwing her legs around my waist and locking them tight. Embracing my neck with her arms, Deimos hugged me tight, as though wishing to rub herself into me, to merge into one organic whole. Any separation was torture.

My palms slid up her slippery wet back as her soft breasts deformed against my chest, her nipples hard nubs against my pecs. My nails trailed up her spine and she shivered in my grasp and broke our kiss. Her tail wrapped around my wrist.

Forehead to forehead, we stared at each other, breathing hard, water running down our hair, our eyelashes, our noses, our lips.

Deimos let loose her legs around my waist, putting her feet on the ground. She stepped back, keeping her eyes on mine, her eyelids shivering slightly as the tip of my erect member slid up her slit.

Reaching down to position me, she slowly stepped back in and took me inside her. We were one.

She hugged me, her palms laid flat against my back, her cheek pressed up against my chest, her ear laid flat on my chest.

We stood in that position, enjoying the contour of the other’s body, engraving it into our minds. Reaching out behind her, I twisted the knob, turning the shower off.

Sliding my hands down her back, I supported her thighs. Coordinating me, she locked her legs around me yet again, her insides moving pleasurably around my member with the shift. I shuddered as a tingle of electricity ran up my spine.

I looked down into those green eyes and smiled. Deimos smiled back.

The moisture slid off our skin with a slight application of water mana, leaving only our hair wet. Supporting her with one arm, I grabbed the towel and exited the bathroom, every step causing me to move inside her. Biting down on her lip, Deimos refused to make a sound.

The torches guttered and died under my influence, plunging the room into darkness except for the silver moonlight streaming through the window. Deimos eyes glowed in the dark as I sat down cross legged on the bed with her seated in my lap. Throwing the towel over our heads, I rubbed her hair dry, gently unraveling the tangles in her white hair that shone silver under the moonlight. She returned the favour, drying my short russet curls for me.

We stopped.

Forehead to forehead, hidden under the cover of the towel, tasting the other’s breath. I rocked slightly, moving gently back and forth inside her, driving us slowly but surely up the stairs to climax.

Our breaths quickened, our hearts hammered in our chests and shivers ran up our spines.

We reached the peak together. It wasn’t violent, but a gentle sustained plateau that reverberated in our bodies, minds and hearts for what seemed like an eternity.

The towel had slipped off at some point of time, revealing us to the glowing moonlight and it illuminated her face as she looked up at me, her eyes half-lidded in satisfaction, and her voice heavy with contentment.

“Master… never, never leave us, ya?”

“Never.” I promised and in the depths of the void of my mind, a rose-red flame, with tongues of pink, burnt a bit brighter.