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Title: Gold
Author: Chris Cook (Artemis)
Rating: NC-17
Summary: On an ordinary day, Willow has an extraordinary experience.
Spoilers: None.
Copyright: Based on characters from
Buffy The Vampire Slayer, created by Joss Whedon and his minionators. All original material is copyright 2005 Chris Cook.
Feedback: Yes please!
Note: Without giving anything away, this story is... how should I put this?... the smut is, well, 'conceptually adventurous'. Very much not of the vanilla kind. I have been assured by the other writers on the Elemental project that there's nothing icky about it, it's just quite out of the ordinary.
Thanks: To all the other Elementalists: writers, betas, and organisers.
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GOLD[/center]
Willow picked up a tarnished old tankard, examined it briefly, and put it back with a sigh.
'Can't exactly see myself hauling that out for tea,' she mused as she allowed herself to drift with the moderate crowd, on to another stall.
Friday at the street market was something of a tradition, though today it was - at least, she intended it to be - more of a comfort. Every Friday, with the week's work done and plenty of time later to worry about the
next week, she would meander and dawdle and pick through the oddments and cheap antiques and bric-a-brac and what-nots, and forget everything else. It was a habit she had picked up from Xander, her one-and-only boyfriend - pre-gay - and best friend from that few weeks in the tenth grade onwards. His forays to the markets were more focused, specifically on Star Wars toys, which he rarely found but never stopped looking for. Willow had little interest in Luke Skywalker and Han Solo - though her fascination with Princess Leia in her metal bikini should perhaps have given her a clue, earlier than the tenth grade - but as a faithful best friend she had always tagged along, and browsed randomly in his wake as he inspected packagings and compared production years stamped on figures' legs. Her bedroom, formerly a bastion of Spartan functionality, began to acquire a collection of random items Willow found attractive - or junk, as her mother had put it. 'The collection' had made its way with Willow across the city when she moved out, and now brightened, or at least filled, her home.
She paused to run a finger along the edge of a ceramic bowl, then decided she didn't like the pattern and moved on.
'Wish Xander was here,' she thought glumly. He always knew how to 'turn her frown upside-down,' even if it did sometimes involve manually pushing the corners of her mouth up. Willow's frown was today downside-down, and seemed likely to remain so. It had been that kind of a day.
A necklace held Willow's attention for a moment, before proving on closer inspection to be rather gaudy.
This Friday hadn't been disastrous, by any means. But it was the little things, and they had piled up. Breakfast cereal that had, against all reason, managed to arrange itself in its plastic storage box such that all the sultanas and apricot bits had already gone, and all that remained were bland wheat flakes. A sore back, presumably acquired sometime during the night from tossing and turning, god only knew how, that made her morning exercises test her patience. Morning radio during said exercises, which managed to play not one, not two, but
three songs which irritated her unduly, forcing her to switch the damned thing off. Clients at work deciding that, actually, while they
had specified exactly what sort of program they wanted - a process which had taken its sweet time and put various projects back to begin with - they
now realised that what they
actually wanted was something completely different...
And lunch, Willow recalled with a grimace. She had to stop letting Buffy set her up on dates. The girl was... cheerful. Disposed to smile, at anything and anyone, so much so that by the end of the meal Willow had sincerely wished she would lose her temper and have a tantrum, just for variety. Or at least to talk about something other than clothes, cheerleading - Willow hadn't even realised there
were professional cheerleaders - and Lindsay Lohan's boobs. It was as if she was a lesbian version of the gaggle of girls Willow remembered, with disdain, from her school days, the ones whose conversations consisted mainly of "
Oooh, he's so
dreamy..." Note to self, she had decided, no more Buffy-arranged blind dates. Something in her personal trainer's mental circuitry seemed to go haywire when she turned her keen focus onto matters of her heart - Willow's or her own, to judge by the string of odd boyfriends she had been in undying, true love with, and thoroughly sick of a month later.
A wooden chicken, no doubt intended to brighten any kitchen with an aura of farm-y wholesomeness, gave Willow cause to wonder if the carver had been ill.
She decided it was time to face the facts - God, fate, the powers that be, blind chance, and/or whoever was idly mucking about with a planet-sized game of The Sims had decided that today would be a write-off for Willow Rosenberg, and nothing she might find during an after-work trawl through the street market was going to change that, not even the deep golden mirror peeking out at her from behind a box of old records...
Willow stood as close as she could, her hips bumping the edge of the table, and leaned over, peering at the disc. It was a foot across, slightly convex, polished to a fine finish but dimmed with age, decorated at its edges with abstract, embossed patterns.
'Must be an imitation,' Willow mused, staring into the dull reflection of her own form, leaning forward.
'A copy of some old antique... I mean, it looks like it's made of gold, no-one would put it out here if it was [i]really gold. Still... real or copy, what's the difference if it looks good?'[/i]
"How much for this?" she asked the woman behind the table, who was chatting with a friend beside her.
"That old thing?" she asked, glancing down at the mirror. "It's a fake, you know?"
"I figured," Willow nodded. "How much?"
"Sixty-five," the woman suggested, as a first offer. Willow had done her share of good-natured haggling, and knew how the game was played.
"Done," her mouth said before the rest of her could stop it.
The woman gave a look of mild surprise, then shrugged, wrapped the mirror in tissue paper, taped it up, and slid it into a paper bag.
[hr]
Willow's phone rang - or rather, played a tinny rendition of the theme to 'Fraggle Rock' - just as she reached her door, somewhat damp, but not drenched. It had begun to sprinkle on the way home, making Willow regret her choice to walk, despite it being her favourite mode of transport. Finding the mirror had cheered her somewhat, though, and she felt it would be best to take advantage of her good mood. She had ended up carrying the wrapped mirror in both arms, like a baby, unwilling to trust its fate to the strength of a damp paper bag. All in all, she had to concede a bus may have been preferable.
'Lucky the rain's as half-hearted as everything else today,' Willow griped silently, balancing the phone between her ear and her shoulder as she searched for her keys.
"Hello? Oh, hi Buff... Yes I met her. What?" she asked defensively, opening the door to her modest house and kicking it closed behind her as she entered. "I do
not have an I-knew-it-would-be-a-disaster voice... okay, it
was a disaster. I'm strenuously resisting the temptation to say I told you so... Because she's just not my type- Yes I know it's a cliché. Well maybe it got to be a cliché from being true a lot of the time, which is why people kept saying it..."
She put the package on her dinner table and moved on to the kitchenette in search of coffee.
"No, I think I'll stay in tonight, watch a DVD or something... I know, I
promise I'm not being moody stay-at-home girl, I just feel like staying at home...
not moody, I said! The home part is pure coincidence. Look you go have fun, you're still meeting that Irish guy? Well there you go, you'd be better off without a chaperone, wouldn't you?" She gave a brief laugh at something Buffy said, but the laugh didn't reach her eyes.
"Okay... yeah I'll call you tomorrow, or Sunday. No I'm fine, I've got a new antique from the market to play with...
antique, Buffy, not junk. You have your wardrobe, I have my ju- collection. Yep. Okay, see you. Bye."
Willow gave a sigh and a wry smile as she hung up, left the kettle heating up, and returned to the dining room to investigate her new purchase. The tape holding the tissue paper closed proved to be fingernail-resistant, so she spent a moment hunting for an extraordinarily thick Swiss army knife, spent another moment searching among its fifty or so attachments for a knife, and then slit the tape down the centre.
'One of these days I'll get into the habit of just tearing stuff open,' she promised herself.
"Okay mirror, come to momma." She lifted the object out of its resting place and held it carefully by the edges, keeping her fingertips away from the polished surface. She studied her reflection in it, going slightly cross-eyed to try to make it out.
"Needs a bit of polish," she concluded, noting her reflected features were distorted slightly, changing the shape of her face. Of course, the metal imbued her image with a golden tinge, but that was to be expected... Even so, she mused, it wasn't an unattractive piece... in fact, as she stared into it further, she could see it having a place somewhere in her home, in the bedroom, perhaps. She smiled slightly at the thought. It wouldn't be much good as a functional mirror - even if the slight distortions in its surface were worked out, which she was by no means sure she wanted to go to the trouble of doing, it was still not flat, and the wrong colour. But the thought of having this curious artefact on her dresser appealed to what she liked to consider her 'sense of eccentricity'.
[hr]
Willow went through her usual evening routine, but found herself starved of vitality - dinner seemed uninteresting, to cook and eat, nothing in her DVD collection seemed particularly noteworthy tonight, and the television on offer was the usual bland fare. With the mood of the day lingering over her, Willow was tempted to just throw in the towel and go to bed early - everything seemed grey and disinterested.
Except the mirror, which was what kept her from doing so. She was curious about it - she knew nothing, save that it was different, out of the ordinary, and - the more she glanced at it through the evening - beautiful.
She ended up, inevitably it seemed, sitting at the table with the mirror propped up on a stack of books, with her laptop open beside it. Knowing so little of it to begin with, it proved difficult to find any information at all. Strangely, she didn't find this frustrating - she would stop now and then, to stare into the golden surface, and feel a kind of peace descend over her as she studied her faint reflection in it.
At last, with her cup of tea cold and forgotten by her side, she turned up a promising lead, and pursued it through various searches and websites until she found a photo of what seemed to be the same mirror.
'Must be the original it was made to look like,' she told herself. Intrigued, she read on, about the artefact's origin in ancient Persia, the discovery of various like it, among the treasure troves of the rich and prosperous, the stories about them... it began to seem like it had come from Ali Baba's cave itself.
They were referred to, in the flowery tales associated with it, as 'mirror' or 'well' - 'well of life', in one instance. One account, from a website more interested in myth than fact, but which Willow nonetheless read for entertainment, told of the artefacts being used to summon djinns, genies, brought forth as if from a magic bottle. Those blessed with a visit from these spirits were made rich, but not with three wishes - rather, the tale went, they were made rich in spirit, their souls rejuvenated, and though they came away from the experience no more prosperous or fortunate than they had been before, they lived happily to the end of their days.
Willow smiled wanly, and gave the mirror a quick rub.
"No genie?" she said. "Oh well... not an original." She looked around the quiet interior of her home, and sighed. "Pity."
[hr]
Willow cleaned up dinner, washed her dishes, had a shower, and was getting ready for bed when her eye fell on the plain mirror adorning the wall above her dresser, and she decided on a whim to put her new possession in place. She took down the old mirror and found an old frame for holding portrait photographs upright which, she judged, would do for the mirror after a little dusting.
It was while she was carefully settling the mirror onto its new frame on top of the dresser that she noticed a curious thing about it - while its reflection of her was indistinct, and coloured gold by the metal, it didn't seem to be reflecting the room around her at all. She spent a moment peering into it from different angles, walking to the other side of the room and looking back, and even found a torch to shine into it. Still, she was the only thing that had a reflection.
'Am I some kind of reverse-vampire now?' she wondered, putting the torch away. She hazarded a guess that it had something to do with light levels - or perhaps the reflection was so indistinct that it was only the fact that she, and thus her reflection, were moving that allowed her to make it out. Still, it seemed odd. Odd and intriguing, she concluded as she stared at herself, able to dimly make out her features, her hair - which seemed a deep blonde, in the gold metal - her figure, the loose track pants and t-shirt she wore as she was preparing to go to sleep. Her form seemed different, somehow - which she put down to the slight imperfections in the mirror's curved surface - not so slim, more sensual. She noticed with a grin that her reflection had curvier hips than she did, like a subtle version of a fairground mirror stretching her reflection.
'Maybe I should get more of these... I wouldn't mind having hot hips on a regular basis.'
Gazing at her reflection, for no good reason she could discern, she found herself studying her form, posing provocatively. With a shy grin at herself, and having double-checked that the blinds were properly closed, she stripped off her clothing and stood, hands on hips, surveying herself.
"Not bad," she conceded, thinking back to her college days. "Red Hot Rosenberg's still around, huh?" She trailed a hand across her stomach, remembering what it had felt like to be touched, various caresses both shy and bold, and sighed forlornly as she turned to her empty queen-sized bed and pulled back the covers.
Behind her, unseen, her reflection watched her as she moved away.
[hr]
It was fifteen minutes later that Willow dropped her book on the bedside table and reached for the switch on her lamp. With a click the room fell into darkness, and Willow settled down to sleep, the covers rumpling slightly as she wriggled into a comfortable spot. Finally there was silence, broken only by her slow breathing. Five, ten seconds it stretched on - then, a voice.
"Willow."
There was a sharp intake of breath, then a thud, and the sound of Willow's hand scrabbling in the dark for the lamp switch. After a few seconds light bathed the room, revealing Willow sitting up, naked with the blankets pooled around her waist, and the source of the voice.
There was an old, faded lounge chair in the corner of the bedroom, by the windows which, when the blinds were open, looked out onto the small patio and back yard. A stack of books rested on a side table; on lazy afternoons Willow was in the habit of sitting there, in the sun, curled up in the chair which was just large enough to accommodate her folded legs comfortably, and reading something old and familiar.
The chair's current occupant was neither old nor familiar. Her appearance, and the soft glow of her skin, spoke of youth, yet there was an attractive maturity to her - in her clear blue eyes, and her proud, prominent cheekbones and lips, which perhaps might have made her face seem somewhat angular had the overall effect not been so elegant. Blonde hair, a deep, rich golden blonde, framed her face on either side and spilled over her shoulders, falling straight and luxurious, the edge of the light from Willow's lamp catching its highlights. She sat comfortably, at ease, with her elbows resting on the chair's armrests, one hand laid flat on the rest, the other draped down enough that her fingertips touched her hip, and her right leg was drawn up slightly, nestled in the crook of the armrest beside it, with her ankle resting behind her other calf.
She was extraordinarily beautiful, so much so that it was a moment before Willow realised that she was also extraordinarily naked, and another moment still before she realised that there was, indeed - beauty and nakedness aside - a complete stranger in her bedroom.
"What?" she demanded, while her thoughts scurried around haphazard in her head. "Who are you? What do you want?" She felt cool air across her chest and snatched up the edge of the top blanket to cover herself, suddenly realising her acute vulnerability.
"I've got a gun in here," she lied, moving her hand to the bedside table's single drawer. "And I know how to defend myself!" That, at least, was true, thanks to Buffy's fascination with martial arts. "So," she finished, hoping she sounded unafraid, "you'd just better leave, if you know what's good for you. Got it?"
'My home,' she wanted to say.
'Mine. No strange people, no matter how naked.' The initial shock having passed, Willow frowned, wondering what would come next, and stared intently at the intruder.
'Holy yipes, she's really
naked...'
"I mean you no harm," the stranger said, keeping carefully still. "None at all, and I promise to leave, if that's what you want. But you did call for me. I'm Gold."
It took Willow a few silent seconds to realise she was using the word as a name.
"Gold," she said flatly, without really thinking further. The self-proclaimed Gold nodded once, calmly.
"I'm pretty sure I didn't call you," Willow said levelly, hoping that, at some point, the direction the conversation should take would become apparent. Gold turned her head and nodded again, towards the dresser. Willow glanced quickly at it, and the mirror atop it.
"What?" she asked. "I-it's not yours, is it?" She cringed inwardly.
'What sort of idiot question is that, under the circumstances?'
"No," Gold replied. "No, in fact, it would be more accurate to say that I belong to it. And tonight, to you."
Willow stared at her in confusion, trying to think of the sensible thing to say. Gold's nakedness - and sensual figure - wasn't helping her clarity. She somehow didn't feel threatened - she didn't honestly know
what she felt.
"Could you perhaps explain that?" she hazarded. Gold nodded again.
"I am Gold," she said again. "I go where I'm called, through the well. As a well yields water to replenish life, I yield pleasure to replenish souls. You called to me, Willow - your sadness, the dull ache you felt at the greyness of the world around you. I realise, now, you didn't know it at the time, but you called to me to give you back colour, and vibrancy, and... and to fill your soul. To help you remember how beautiful the world can be, if you let it."
"Oooooo-kay," Willow said slowly. "You're... a, a genie in a bottle?" Gold laughed softly - a rich laugh that touched Willow and forced her to suppress a grin.
"In a sense," Gold smiled.
"Okay," Willow nodded. "See, here's the thing: you could
actually be Barbara Eden, and just popped out of a mirror to say hi... naked..." she gulped, "or, and this is the bit that's kind of on my mind a bit, you could not be? And being that you're here, and here is my bedroom where normally people wouldn't be without at least letting me know beforehand, I'm wondering. Yeah?"
"Of course," Gold said soothingly. "You didn't know... perhaps it will help if you looked in the 'mirror'?"
"Come over there, you mean?" Willow asked warily. Gold, slowly so as not to startle Willow, shifted in the chair, crossing her legs, and placing her hands together in her lap.
"I won't move," she promised, and Willow was inclined to believe her. She couldn't put a finger on the reason, but the woman just didn't seem dangerous. And, now that the redhead thought about it, she had somehow appeared, in the space of a few seconds, in a room Willow
knew to be empty when she turned out the light, without - she glanced around quickly to check, before returning her gaze to her companion - disturbing the blinds covering the closed glass door to the patio, or moving the t-shirt which Willow had hung on the knob of the door leading to the living room. There was definitely something not adding up with the 'crazy intruder' theory, no matter how much didn't add up on the face of the 'genie in a bottle' theory pitted against it.
At least the latter makes sense internally, once you get past the nonexistent part of it.
Willow leaned forward and pulled up the old dressing gown, which she kept near the foot of the bed on top of the blankets, covering herself without taking her eyes off Gold. Cautiously she abandoned the presumed safety of the bed, on the side opposite her visitor, and walked to the dresser.
"You want me to look in the mirror," she said - a statement, not a question. Gold nodded.
Willow glanced at the mirror, keeping Gold's naked, motionless form in the periphery of her vision.
"I don't see anything," she said carefully.
"Nothing at all," Gold agreed. "No reflection." Willow looked again, and frowned, confusion making her momentarily forget to keep an eye on Gold. She had no reflection - she was as invisible as the rest of the room, and the surface now seemed to be nothing more than a polished disc, smooth but not reflective enough to be of any use as a mirror at all.
"May I move?" Gold asked, startling Willow. She looked quickly at the naked woman, who had remained motionless.
"Why?" she asked.
"To demonstrate," Gold replied. Willow backed away, and nodded before she realised it. Gold slowly stood - her motions were as smooth as ripples on a calm ocean - and took a few paces to stand in front of the dresser. She held out an arm to the mirror, touched its surface with her fingertips, then reached further, and to Willow's amazement her hand passed through the metal.
"Wha..." she gasped. "How are you...?" Stunned curiosity overriding her lingering suspicion she quickly moved closer, and leaned over the dresser to look behind it. Gold's hand was nowhere to be seen. She leaned back to look at the mirror side-on. Gold's arm simply vanished at the wrist - not through the mirror, but
into it.
"How are you doing that?" she demanded.
"I came from the well," Gold said simply. "Its light is my source. I can return... if that's what you want."
Willow stared at her, a million questions fighting for space in her head. For some reason the one that came out first was:
"Suppose I don't... then what?"
Gold slowly drew her hand back out of the mirror, took a step back, then turned and seated herself elegantly on the edge of the bed before looking back up at Willow.
"If you permit me," she said quietly, "I'll please you."
"How?" Willow asked, again with her mouth voicing the question before the rest of her had made up its mind.
"Any way you want," Gold said, with the ghost of a smile touching her lips. Willow stared at her, while half her thoughts whirled around uncomprehendingly, and the other half comprehended all too well and presented a number of fascinating, distracting possibilities. She found herself moved to join Gold, sitting with her on the bed, with a decent distance between them... yet, closer. Gold's scent reached her, subtle yet powerful, a perfume that carried with it whispered tales of passion and magic.
"This is crazy," Willow said feebly.
"You've never noticed the world being crazy before?" Gold asked, one side of her mouth turning up impishly.
"Well when you put it like that," Willow agreed before she could help herself. "You really... you want to...?" She met Gold's stare, and was stunned by what she saw - Gold
did want to. Willow had seen similar gazes before, partly shrouded by indecision or confusion, but Gold's eyes hid nothing. Gold wanted, completely, passionately, and simply, to make love to her.
"I do," the naked woman said, unnecessarily.
"How can you..." Willow asked in a whisper. "I mean, you... you don't even know me, how can you
want..."
"I do know you," Gold assured her calmingly. "I am... what I have been, forever. At many times, in many places, with many people. But the well shows your desire - what
you desire, and that's the form I take. As you see me now, the... the person I am, I am newborn, virgin, and for you alone. I'm your desire - this is how I am, and how I'll remain until the morning's light." She ventured a smile. "So, naturally... I want to... with you. You see?"
"Until morning?" Willow asked. Gold nodded.
"And then, what?"
"Then," Gold replied, "I return to the well.
This Gold," she placed a hand softly on her chest, which Willow had to fight not to stare at, "will have been, and the essence of me that is forever will wait to become another."
"A-and," Willow said slowly, marshalling her courage to believe, perhaps, that something extraordinary was happening, "you're... my desire?"
Gold seemed to sense the tentative change in Willow's demeanour, and smiled more broadly. Slowly, so as not to startle Willow, she moved herself further onto the bed and leant back, folding one arm beneath her head like a pillow, while her other hand trailed down from her chest across her stomach, and came to rest on her hip, her fingertips pointing provocatively inwards.
"Aren't I?" she asked quietly.
She held Willow's gaze, then glanced down at herself, silently giving Willow permission to do likewise. Willow helplessly took in her smooth neck, the collarbones spreading to the curve of her shoulders, her generous breasts pillowing softly on her chest, nipples erect, her flawless stomach, her exquisitely womanly hips, and - she couldn't stop herself - the dark gold thatch of hair at the apex of her thighs, growing from tiny, thin hairs to thick curls as Willow's gaze neared her centre, before travelling on to encompass shapely legs, with firm thighs, elegant calves, and finally her smooth feet resting on the edge of the bed.
Three thoughts were paramount in Willow's mind. The first and most obvious was that this was entirely too implausible to be real. The second was that Gold was, without a doubt, the sum total of all her fantasies, and that from the top of her head to the tips of her toes, there wasn't an inch of her that disproved her extraordinary claim to be tailored exactly to Willow's own desires. The third was that, if she
did tell Gold to go away, and the strange woman did so, she, Willow, would very probably regret it for the rest of her life.
"You are," she whispered, making up her mind.
Gold slowly sat up, resting on one elbow.
"May I touch you?" she asked gently. Willow hesitated, unable to go further and unwilling to go back.
"May I touch your hand?" Gold said after a moment's indecisive silence.
'Seems safe enough,' Willow thought absently, as she nodded. Gold gave a grateful nod in reply, and reached out the arm she wasn't using to prop herself up, taking Willow's hand gently in hers. Willow half-turned to watch more closely as Gold drew her hand closer to herself, and finally placed it against her shoulder, sliding Willow's fingertips across her skin at a snail's pace.
"Is this alright?" she asked, as she brought Willow's hand to the side of her neck.
"Sh-shouldn't I be asking you that?" Willow asked with a hesitant smile, her voice sounding jarringly loud to her own ears in the hushed silence between them.
"You can if you want," Gold replied with a chuckle. "But the answer will always be the same."
Willow couldn't think of a response to that, so she watched in silence as her hand was gently guided up Gold's smooth neck, beneath her jaw as the woman tilted her head back, and over her chin to her mouth. Her blue eyes fluttered closed as her lips parted beneath Willow's fingertips - not quite kissing, but touching, yielding beneath Willow's touch. She felt Gold's sigh caress her fingers, and the whisper-touch of breath on her fingertips travelled straight to her core.
Gold did kiss her then, lifting her fingers and pressing her lips beneath the redhead's knuckles, before guiding Willow in exploring the rest of her face. As if in a dream Willow watched and felt Gold's smooth cheeks, her forehead, her temple, with golden hair silkily caressing the back of her hand. The tiny hairs of Gold's eyebrow tickled Willow's fingertips, and she couldn't suppress a sigh as she felt the woman's soft eyelashes move, and her hand was guided back down to Gold's lips as she once more revealed her hypnotic blue eyes.
"More," she whispered into Willow's palm, "please?"
"More," Willow echoed.
Gold let go of her hand and leant back, rolling over and rising to her hands and knees. Like a big cat she prowled towards Willow, leaning forward to stroke her face against the redhead's thigh, nudging the edge of her dressing gown a few inches higher. She slowly rose up before Willow, on her knees, and in one fluid motion straddled her and began to gently, patiently push her to the bed. Willow gasped as she felt Gold's hands move from her shoulders to her chest, taking the edges of her dressing gown and beginning to move them slowly back. Gold's hands stilled at the sound, withdrew, and she looked down into Willow's eyes questioningly.
Willow stared at the face she had never seen before this night, but had explored by touch, and which now gazed at her with such devotion and desire, while she inhaled Gold's sweet aroma... before she knew it her own hands were replacing Gold's on her dressing gown, and she was baring her body to her. Gold looked down, slowly, unashamed of the liberties her eyes were taking with Willow's modest, firm breasts, and the flat expanse of her stomach, then she caught Willow's eye again and leant down to kiss her.
Willow was no stranger to kisses, but this was unlike any she had known before. Gold's lips parted easily, as did her own, responding instinctively to the softness. Then Gold's tongue was searching out hers, the tips touching, then stroking the length of Willow's tongue, caressing it. Willow moaned as she tasted Gold, honey and spice melding into a flavour that mingled innocence and lust. She felt the woman's breasts on hers, felt a burning, moist sensation on her waist, and the touch of Gold's thighs on her hips, but the kiss swept everything else away, and Willow found herself lustily drinking Gold's flavour, without hesitation.
It seemed an age before Gold withdrew, and Willow raised herself up, craning her neck at first then pushing up on her elbows, to win a few more seconds of Gold's divine lips. She opened her eyes, pleading silently, when the contact broke. Gold was staring at her, her skin flushed, her breathing quick and heavy, her eyes half-closed, and with pupils threatening to overtake the crystal blue of her irises.
'Afterglow,' Willow thought instantly, noting a second later how moist her stomach was where the woman's soft sex was pressing against her,
'did she...? My god...'
"More?" Gold asked in a husky whisper. Willow nodded quickly, urgently.
Gold leant back down, but instead of capturing Willow's lips her tongue snuck beneath the redhead's chin, and gently tilted her head back. Willow lay back down, delighting in the feel of Gold's tongue on her skin, as the woman moved slowly down and parted her lips wider, covering the front of Willow's neck and kissing her. It was something Willow had never felt before - it was primal, animal, but she felt no fear as she surrendered, as she felt the echo of a predator in Gold's mouth on her vulnerable neck.
Gold left her gasping as she moved on again, leaving a trail of lusty kisses across the hollow of Willow's throat, down to her chest. Willow heard, and felt on her skin, Gold moan as she neared her left nipple. Then her mouth opened again, and Willow was engulfed, and could no longer stifle the squeal of delight that erupted from her.
Gold suckled at her voraciously - her tongue drew Willow's engorged nipple deep, caressing, spiralling around the nub, as the suction from her mouth yearned for something from Willow's body to fill her. And by the way she resumed grinding her hips against Willow's lower stomach, she was finding it, and revelling in drinking her fill. Willow, slightly more clear-headed, having reached a kind of plateau after the initial desperate shock of unbridled desire had passed into her, realised her earlier suspicion was true: Gold was about to climax, again she believed - the blonde writhed and thrust her soaking, yielding flesh against Willow's skin, held herself in needful agony for an instant as she abandoned Willow's left breast for her right, and gave a mighty shudder as she began to repeat her attentions there.
Willow arched her back sharply, lifting herself up off the bed on her shoulders and hips, and Gold's hands flew to her back, holding her up as she eagerly devoured her breasts, licking, sucking, nibbling, spreading her lips open over mouthfuls of soft flesh again and again. Willow desperately needed relief - it was too much pleasure to bear without letting it burst out of her, and she moaned plaintively and squirmed her hips, unable to form words to express her need. She didn't need to though, for Gold seemed at once to understand, and relinquishing her straddling position above Willow, her mouth began to travel down over Willow's stomach, while her strong arms moved down also, lifting Willow's hips from the bed.
"Please," Willow heard herself moan, as Gold's arms wrapped around her hips and pulled the redhead's needy opening up to press to her abdomen, anointing herself with Willow's copious juices. She pressed her mouth to Willow's navel and extended her tongue as deep as the tiny hollow would allow, wriggling luxuriantly about as she drank in the remnants of her own earlier climax - a prelude which had Willow sobbing with desire for the consummation.
Gold obliged, dramatically. Willow felt her shift on the bed, then her arms were once more beneath her back, cradling her, supporting her with wide-splayed fingers, and with seemingly no effort at all she lifted Willow bodily off the bed until her thighs found themselves resting on Gold's shoulders, and her arms swung beneath her, fingertips trailing across the bedclothes. Willow had no time to be amazed at the sheer power in Gold's modest frame; she felt Gold's breath on her sex, and all thoughts of her novel position abandoned her as she spread her legs wide. There was a pressure, gentle against her swollen lips, an unfamiliar feeling - Willow lifted her head and gazed down the length of her body, shining with sweat and the trail of Gold's lips, to see the woman resting her forehead against her sex. She lifted her head slowly, allowing Willow to see and feel as her face slid through her silky, slick folds, and finally stared up at her, blue eyes burning bright in a face gleaming with Willow's passion.
The moment her eyes locked with Willow's she opened her mouth wide, yawning wide, and engulfed Willow's sex in heat and sensation and lust. Willow couldn't hold on - her head lolled back, eyes closed, and she moaned incoherently, ceaselessly, as Gold's tongue explored her. She felt herself begin to orgasm - hesitated a moment, wanting to prolong the exquisite feeling, but her body would not be held back. It made no difference, as Gold showed no sign of slowing as Willow's dam burst into her mouth. She feasted thirstily on Willow's nectar, and searched for more even as the thick gush of moisture was flowing down her throat.
Willow felt as if she were flying - she lost track of where the bed was beneath her, of what exactly Gold's mouth and tongue were doing, and felt only the devouring, incessant stimulation that held her in thrall. It felt as though Gold was everywhere, circling her clit, suckling on it like she had her nipples, and within her too, deep inside, calling another climax into being.
If Willow had had any thoughts, she would have been grateful she lived in a house, not an apartment with other people on the other side of thin walls. But she had no thoughts, only deep, throaty screams of joy as she burst again, and felt her flood cascade into Gold, joining them as her sweet nectar flowed through the seamless passage created from her centre and Gold's mouth. It seemed never-ending - Gold kept licking, sucking, wanting, and Willow rode the crest of a thundering, uncontrollable wave as her body kept giving, again, and again, and again... screaming pleasure, and again...
I like a 'show not tell' format for that kind of stuff. There was little need to get into the Coalition and the societal structure of the universe, in general, because this section focused more on W/T and her home world. That kind of stuff should come into play at a later date. 
) so the words mean even more.
i'll never be looking at old mirrors on sale the same way again! where can i buy one like it? is it on e-bay? wow! what i wouldn't give to have my very own gold!
, conveyed early on and her eventual exuberance at life and all its wonder, especially how Gold/Tara helped in that transformation. the scene where they floated above Earth was inspiring while the naming at the end was really sweet. thanks.
the fantasy aspect of this story, it was so very clever. 
