Black Magic

Wind howled at the gates that barred the way ahead of him. It was fall in Aomori, and the leaves in the mountains were slowing turning gold and orange. Sho Sugiyama gave the spectacle a moment's glance as he climbed off his vintage motorcycle, a Kawasaki Eliminator, and trudged toward the pin-pad. Although Sho was a Tokyo boy by birth, this wasn't his first time seeing the natural beauty of the northeast in Tohoku, nor was it his first visit to the remote mountain mansion that lay beyond the gates. The combination of numbers that opened the gates' automatic lock was written on an old sheet of paper, hastily crammed into one of his jacket pockets.

Sho had first come to the mansion situated on the gently rising slope of Mt. Chosho eight years ago, when he had been no more than twelve years old. As the son of one of oldest clans of Japan's secret magic-users, the onmyou, the time had come for him to develop the talents inherent in his blood by serving as an apprentice to a more experienced wizard. He'd placed with the well-regarded Kagawa Brothers, identical twins who operated out of the rustic Tohoku region. The old mansion on Chosho had been the Kagawa family residence for generations, always granted to the clan's most powerful mages, and Yoshi and Takeru had abilities so even that it was impossible to declare one brother more powerful than the other. So, the two shared it amicably.

The Kagawa were good teachers, and Sho had finished learning all they had to teach him a little less than two years ago. He'd left then to strike out on his own, finding ways to increase his powers and turn a profit off of his abilities. It was rare for a graduated student to ever return to his masters, but Sho was now walking his bike up the long driveway that lead to the mansion because he'd reached an impasse that he did not know how to cross. He'd taken up the role of a “society mage,” telling fortunes and granting favors to upper-middle, and then later, upper-class clients. His clients were usually older women, or couples where an older woman was clearly calling the shots. Sho chalked much of this up to his boyish good looks, a combination of a fine-boned face with wide dark eyes and gently sloping cheekbones, and a height that was just a few inches below average. He didn't mind, since frequently it meant he could gleefully overcharge his clients for spells that were terribly minor affairs, and they'd pay him off with a smile.

One of those connections had resulted in a truly extraordinary client, a French adult film actress who'd used wise investments to turn herself into a billionaire. She had been using plastic surgery to preserve her stunning good looks as she aged, but over time scar tissue was building up that no amount of make-up could hide. Could Sho cast a spell to erase the scars and firm her flesh? If he could, she'd pay him the magnificent sum of two million euro – nearly three hundred million yen – and recommend him to all of her acquaintances. Sho couldn't say no to that, never mind that he didn't actually know the spells she wanted him to cast. For that kind of money, he could learn fast.

He began researching the school of magic that seemed most likely to fulfill the actress' request, an older practice called “flesh-shaping”. It had fallen out of practice shortly after World War II, when the rise of modern medicine had made many of its practices seem obsolete. Still, old prewar texts dealing with flesh-shaping practices had survived, although most were in the hands of private or foreign libraries Sho couldn't hope to access. He finally tracked one copy down to a Tokyo bookstore via a combination of scrying, psychometry, and old-fashioned research.

When he visited the store, though, he found it in the process of closing down. The owner had been recently tried and convicted of murder in connection to the disappearance of a local college student named Daisuke Oda, and the owner's wife was liquidating the business and all of its inventory in the process of getting a divorce from her shameful husband. Sho checked through the store's inventory, but couldn't find the text he needed. When he checked with the clerks overseeing the final liquidation, he could find no record of the sale and no indication that the book had ever been in the store's inventory.

Sho became obsessed with finding that book. Nothing he tried could find a trace of the missing text, called the Tome of Human Alteration, after it was acquired by the bookstore in question. Either someone was going ridiculously out of his way to keep that book from him, or he was experiencing a drastic failure of his magical technique. He strongly suspected the former, but was at a loss for any more options.

So now Sho was storing his bike in the Kagawa mansion garage, and preparing to re-enter the enormous house he'd studied in so long ago. He intended to stay for only a few days at most, so his things for the trip were all crammed in a single small bag. He let himself in the door; his teachers had spells and wards in place that would immediately announce his presence.

The Kagawa Brothers were as Sho remembered them: tall, good-looking men with strong chins, short, dark hair and bright, clever eyes. They were identical twins, but Sho had long ago learned the quirks that made it possible to tell them apart. Takeru had a more sardonic and cynical cast to his expressions, and often fidgeted with impatience. Yoshi's eyes were kinder and he was frequently more patient, though sometimes he could be grossly absent-minded.

They were an impressive duo, and their presence was humbling to Sho. He had always been slightly envious of his teachers, who were broad-shouldered where he was slight and relentlessly confident when he was wracked by self-doubt. Takeru had prepared a dinner for him, and Yoshi had promptly sent Sho away to freshen up before enjoying it with his old teachers in the manner of good friends. But once the conversation turned away from pleasantries to professional matters, Sho found himself frowning over his tea and wishing he had something more important to say.

“Oh, I... no, I don't have a library yet. It's still coming together. Mostly I'm still just trying to get by on my practice...”

Yoshi smiled indulgently. “That's always the hardest step. You've done marvelously to make a living at magic alone for so long.”

Of course, if Sho hadn't been a third son, he'd have inherited most of what he needed. He would've been able to immediately become a scholar, as his oldest brother Mitsuharu had, or to at least build a mundane fortune to add to the family's wealth, as his older brother Izo did. The situation frustrated and vaguely infuriated Sho, but he'd never let that show to his teachers. As a result, they sometimes bruised his feelings more than he let them realize.

Takeru, for instance, couldn't possibly know how sharp his barbs seemed to Sho. “It's not just going to be telling fortunes for widows forever, though, huh?” Takeru said. “If that's all you do, your skills will rot.”

Fortunately one of the non-magical skills Sho had learned from his time with the Kagawa Brothers was how to restrain his temper. “It's like I said when I called. I just need this last job before I can get serious. There's something I want to write.”

He said that on impulse; he hadn't given the least bit of thought to writing a tome of his own, ever. But it seemed like the kind of thing that would impress Takeru and Yoshi, and it was plausible enough for a man of his age and prospects. Mitsuharu had already written two books, after all.

Takeru grinned, eyes lighting up with interest. “So this tome you're after is more than just a shortcut to money, then?”

“Yeah,” Sho lied. “Since it's an obscure topic, I was maybe thinking of writing about it.” The 'maybe' set his conscience at ease.

“That's an interesting idea... I can't remember the last time anyone published about flesh-shaping,” Yoshi said. “But there aren't many flesh-shapers left practicing anywhere in the world, to my knowledge...”

“So who'd want to make one of the few texts about it disappear without a trace?” Takeru finished.

“I don't know... jealous researcher, maybe?” Sho began. “But then why not just purchase the book so rivals would know to back off?”

“For that matter, how would fabricating a disappearance like this be possible?” Yoshi mused. “There shouldn't be many wizards alive powerful enough to shut your scrying out completely.”

Sho couldn't help but enjoy the praise, for all that he knew that Yoshi gave it freely. Takeru's reaction was less optimistic. “Unless he's screwing up. After we clean up, Sho, you're gonna show us your technique.”

“My scrying technique is what you taught me,” Sho said.

“And who knows what kind of bad habits you've picked up since you left?” Takeru said.

“You can argue in the sanctum,” Yoshi said, breaking up the brewing fight. “For now let's put things away, shall we?” By way of example he cast a spell that summoned one of the house's many unseen servants, who promptly began moving plates and cups quietly through the air to the kitchen. The three wizards made short work of the meal's clean-up.

Yoshi lead the way to their sanctum, a room designed as a place for the practice of magic. It was constructed in the most auspicious nexus of ley lines on the property, and in shape much like a library. Shelves lined with magical books were built into the walls of the large, open room. Starlight filtered in through a vaulted ceiling's ornate glass skylight. Tables where Yoshi had neatly arranged equipment like beakers, scales, and crystals filled parts of the room; the center was dominated by an huge, wide-mouthed red-and-black vase. Sho knew it was older than the mansion, probably originating in China or Korea, and very potent. The Kagawa kept it filled with the purest spring water they could acquire. The confluence of starlight and the area's ley lines at the room's center point made it a wonderfully useful mystic tool.

Scrying was a relatively simple task for an experienced wizard, especially someone with Sho's experience and very detailed information about the object he sought. So he fixed all he knew of the Tome and its history in his mind, shut his eyes, and tapped the surface of the water with his thumb. The Kagawa twins watched as the scrying begin, with the form of the Tome taking shape on the shelf of the Tokyo bookstore Sho had described over dinner. Even though his eyes were closed, they knew Sho could see the images clearly in his mind.

Shadowy forms of customers passed the Tome by, ignorant, until a pale hand drew it off the shelves. After that moment, the waters went cloudy, as if being contaminated by poor water or a poor vessel. Sho struggled to keep up the Tome's image, his effort making the water in the vase bubble. Little more of the Tome was visible than the outline of a man's figure, holding it, before the waters went black and Sho had to release the spell.

He found himself bent over the vase, breathing heavily, sweat pouring down his back. Yoshi was saying something to him, sounding concerned. Sho felt the other man's arms on his shoulders. “... Sugiyama-kun? Do you need to sit down...?”

“... fine, fine....” Sho muttered. He wearily pushed himself back up to a standing position, despite Yoshi's fretful look. “... so?”

“You're just...” Takeru shook his head emphatically. “You're getting out-powered by something. A rival wizard, a warding spell, I don't know. I've never seen this before.”

“You seem to be straining the enchantment that's blocking you... you've been fighting it for awhile, haven't you? It seems like it wouldn't take much more to break through,” Yoshi mused.

Takeru frowned. “If it's just power you're lacking, we can scry the damn thing together. That'll probably break us through.”

“But tomorrow. You've spent yourself for tonight, Sugiyama, you need to rest,” Yoshi said.

Sho blinked in surprise at how quickly the Kagawa decided the matter for him. He was grateful, of course; for wizards to communally cast a spell indicated great mutual respect. He never would've expected an offer like that at all. Sho could only thank them again, his words growing increasingly slurred from fatigue, and let Yoshi escort him to a guest room.

He'd pushed himself harder than he'd thought with the night's magic, and his walk was wobbly. He slept heavily and woke up very late the next day. The Kagawa refused his help in any household chores, instead admonishing him to spend the day preparing for the night's spell. Eventually Sho relented and passed most of his day in meditation.

That evening, the three onmyou pooled all of their powers to try and force down the barrier against scrying that had mysteriously enveloped the Tome of Human Alteration. They came very close to success; the cloudy waters began trying to resolve into something with a sense of logic behind it, perhaps the beginnings of a picture.

Yet even Sho and the Kagawa working together proved unequal to the task. The picture that was trying to form in the waters went abruptly pitch-black, and the vase began trembling ominously. Yoshi withdrew from the spell first, and Takeru and Sho were forced to quickly follow. All three men were left as exhausted as Sho had been the day before.

It wasn't until the next morning, over breakfast, that they could discuss their failure. “If it's still a power thing, what can we do about it?” Sho said, laying his chopsticks over his rice bowl. “We're pretty much world-class already, can guys like us even get stronger?”

“You can always get stronger, one way or another,” Yoshi muttered, before taking a long drink of tea. He seemed distracted that morning.

“It's just a matter of how much stronger we need to be, and what you're willing to do to get there,” Takeru nodded. He, if anything, seemed unusually cheerful.

“Serious? Why didn't you guys tell me about this stuff in the first place?” Sho asked.

“It's not that simple... you definitely weren't ready to learn about it when you were younger,” Yoshi said. He frowned and seemed to be growing increasingly unhappy.

Takeru grinned. “And your parents would've killed us.”

Yoshi glared at his brother. Takeru did not appear remorseful.

“Oh, c'mon, like you never thought about it...”

“Takeru! That's enough!”

Sho was feeling very much like the kid at the table, and it was infuriating. “... what? What are you two talking about? If it could help me find out what happened to that damned book, I wanna know.”

Takeru eyed Sho with an expression the younger man couldn't remember seeing on his face before. It was hard to place. “Remember the first thing we taught you about magic?”

“Magic has two faces,” Sho repeated at him, beginning to scowl.

“And?” Yoshi asked.

“At least one of them is always ugly,” Sho repeated again.

“'Ugly' is what we taught you?” Yoshi said. He propped his chin up in one hand, and seemed suddenly distracted. “That's not exactly correct. More like 'uncanny'...”

There was something defensive about Takeru's manner when next he spoke.“The truth about the world isn't the same thing as the truth you can understand when you're twelve.” He paused, then glanced over at his brother again. “But now I think we should tell him.”

“And then what?” Yoshi asked.

“If he wants to? We do it.”

Yoshi seemed flustered again. “That's shameless.”

“We're wizards,” Takeru snorted.

Sho found the entire exchange both frustrating and tantalizing. The forbidden subject had to be some sort of enhancement technique, something they had used, and something that was presumably not very respectable. The thought was terribly exciting. He didn't know much about the seamier side of magic.

“Just tell me!” Sho exclaimed. “You might as well, or I'll just figure it out on my own.”

“Very well,” Yoshi began. “I'll tell you, but I'll warn you right now that you are to treat the topic with the utmost seriousness and confidentiality. This is an esoteric and ancient magical technique. It's not meant for public discussion of any sort. The magic thrives on discretion and secrecy.”

“Black magic?” Sho blurted out.

Yoshi said nothing, but refused to meet Sho's eyes.

Takeru nodded. “Past a point, any wizard worth a damn is going to use some black magic tricks here and there. We're no different.”

“Nobody told me that!” Sho said.

“You weren't worth a damn yet,” Takeru said with a shrug.

Yoshi steepled his fingers, then spoke. “Sugiyama-kun, are you familiar with tantra?”

“Tantra?” Sho's brows knit in confusion. It was about the last thing he'd expected to hear about. “What, you mean, like... Buddhists?”

“In Tibet and Nepal, yes,” Yoshi nodded. “They do practice forms of tantric meditation, although their rites are not true tantra. There's little, if any, real magic to them. The Tibetans who practice them believe tantric rites empower a soul by shocking it with sin. You rush to enlightenment more quickly by rising above temptations and horrors. So a tantric rite, for them, includes things they believe are abhorrent: consuming flesh, handling corpses, killing living beings....”

Sho's eyes widened at the lurid description, even though he technically did those sorts of things all the time without really thinking about it. Like most people, he ate meat, killed offensive insects, and if necessary handled his meat raw before cooking it. Still, he leaned forward, listening attentively.

Yoshi's voice faltered somewhat. “... but these beliefs are founded on a basic misunderstanding about tantric power. The most primal and efficient tantric rite is sexual intercourse. The monks found sex abhorrent, so they assumed the power came from the act's abhorrence. But the truth is that the rite's power is in the act of intercourse itself. Human souls, in joining, illuminate each other.”

“So what does this have to do with us?” Sho asked.

“The Tibetans, as I said, borrowed tantra from wizards and diluted it into their ideas of tantric meditation. Originally...” Yoshi paused for a deep breath, and to steady his nerves. “... tantra was the secret practice, among wizards and mystics, of copulating with each other to enhance their powers.”

“Wait, so you guys... with each other...” Sho stammered.

“Yup,” Takeru said.

“... and you're saying that we....”

“Mm-hmm,” Takeru said again.

Yoshi fell into pained silence. He seemed ashamed, perhaps as much of his brother's flippant attitude than anything else.

Sho had thought he was ready to hear anything, and suddenly his hands were trembling slightly.

“... if you'd rather pretend like you never heard this....” Yoshi began, voice and eyes soft.

“N-no. I just-- I need to think about this for awhile. Excuse me.” Sho got to his feet and stumbled out of the room as awkwardly as his words had stumbled out of his mouth. Sho could hear Yoshi's voice rising at his brother, stern and furious, on the way out.

For awhile he walked the mansion grounds with mind empty, hardly thinking at all. Once he was deep in the mountain woods, he slowed and let himself begin turning over the difficult ramifications of what Yoshi had told him. So if the Kagawa Brothers practiced tantra, did that mean they had practiced it with each other? The mental image of the two identical bodies entwined in a rainbow of compromising positions abruptly flooded his mind. A shock of heat following, coursing through Sho's body at it. Although he was alone, he felt embarrassed. Even if it did amount to fantasizing about incest, thoughts of the Kagawa together were hot.

It was mostly the idea of sex as a business proposition that bothered him, as he turned the issue over in his mind. He was otherwise completely fine with being propositioned by hot identical twins that he knew to be trustworthy, intelligent, and basically interesting people. In general Sho was fine with being propositioned; it actually was a bit of a turn-on for him. But being propositioned because someone thought he had a beautiful body and being propositioned as part of a quest to chase down a magic book were two very different things. The thought of being with someone who didn't actually want him bothered Sho on a very deep personal level.

It would be especially painful with the Kagawa, because the more Sho found himself fantasizing about them, the more he realized he'd always found them exciting. He admired and respected them as onmyou even as he found himself lusting after the prospect of their hands on his body. He had probably wanted that for years and not realized it, other than developing a fondness for menage a trois that he'd mistaken for simple hedonism. Having lukewarm sex with them would be far more devastating than simply rejecting them at this point. Regardless of whether or not it helped him get the Tome, he wasn't going to sleep with the Kagawa if their hearts weren't really in it.

He was so afraid their hearts wouldn't be in it. What if he wasn't up to their standards? What if the sex was so ritualized it was awkward and unsatisfying? Hell, what if they just didn't like how he looked naked? He would have to seem like such a shrimpy bastard after what could have been years and years of basking in their identical perfection.

The thought of the Kagawa stripping each other's robes off abruptly lodged itself in Sho's mind again. He made his way slowly back to the mansion, trying to rehearse some tasteful way of saying, “Yes, I would very much like to fuck with you guys to find that book I'm looking for.”

When he got back into the mansion he couldn't find either of the Kagawa Brothers. An offhanded glance at the porch that stretched out behind the dining room finally lead him to Takeru. The Kagawa mansion was traditional enough to feature a small carp pond seated in the middle of a decorative rock garden, and Takeru was at the moment gazing stonily out across it like an old man. Had he been feeling less tense, Sho would've made fun of him for it.

“Feeling better?” Takeru asked.

“Yeah. I just needed to clear my head,” Sho responded. “Is Yoshi around?”

Takeru huffed a bit at the mention of his brother. “He's hiding in the house somewhere.”

Sho inwardly cringed. “Is he, uh... gonna be all right?”

“Oh, sure. He's just uptight sometimes.” Takeru couldn't keep the annoyance out of his voice as he replied. His tone changed when he tilted his head in Sho's direction. “Are you gonna be all right?”

“Me? Oh, yeah, don't worry. I'm cool. Actually, I think it's a good idea. If you guys still want to, I mean.” Sho hadn't quite been able to make eye contact with Takeru since the conversation began, but at that he experimentally began to look the other man in the face.

Takeru's gaze was dark and as full of amusement as ever, but now it sent a chill up Sho's spine. “I figured you'd see things that way. So how much of it is wanting that book, and how much is wanting the sex?”

Sho didn't think he was a prude, but his jaw nearly dropped open at Takeru's bluntness. “I, uh, I...” he stammered.

“Hah! So you do want it,” Takeru said, taking Sho's embarrassment as his answer.“That's good. Fucking somebody just for power is a pretty depressing thought.”

“Yeah... but it never would've come up if not for the book, though.”

“That's fate,” Takeru shrugged. “It's fine by me. Yoshi's being a little weird about it, though.”

Sho couldn't help but betray some trepidation.“Is it the... ritual or whatever?”

Takeru laughed. “Oh, God, it's not like that. Yoshi's just good at making things sound boring... there's no ritual, it's nothing weird. Look, you're not some kind of virgin or something, right?”

“No!” Sho protested.

Takeru bowed his head and grinned in a way that suggested he had expected as much. “Well, when ordinary people fuck, and it's good, it's good for them. Right? Well, when wizards fuck, it's good on an extra level. That's all there is to it.”

Sho frowned. Takeru's cavalier attitude wasn't helping.

“Go try talking to Yoshi. Maybe you can get through to him.” Takeru sounded a bit dubious about the prospect, though.

“Yeah, yeah....” Sho pushed himself back up to his feet. “Where is Yoshi, anyway?”

“Check the ritual rooms around the sanctum,” Takeru said. “Sometimes he hides out in one and sulks.”

Sho hadn't been in that part of the house very frequently. He wondered if that had slipped Takeru's mind. Most of the ritual rooms had been strictly off-limits to him while he was younger, and at the moment he wasn't sure he wanted to know what might be hidden in them. Protesting would have made him look exceptionally foolish, though, so he simply nodded to Takeru and headed toward the sanctum.

Some of the “ritual rooms”, really little more than bedrooms that had been co-opted into magical service, contained truly marvelous pieces of magical equipment: a set of magic beakers, an enormous enchanted brass gong, magic lanterns, a great stone press for the manufacture of magic woodcut prints. Many rooms contained devices and artifacts that were obviously mystical in nature, but whose true nature was far beyond Sho's comprehension. By the time he found Yoshi, Sho wasn't sure if the Kagawa Brothers had concealed the true extent of their abilities from him, or if he was just exceptionally slow-witted. He'd always taken the brothers at face value.

Yoshi was sitting and meditating in a most unusual room. A focusing circle of some sort, mandala-like, was etched on the enormous carpet that covered the hard wood floor. In the center of the circle was a low, wide mattress covered in a black sheet; on the sheet was black woven coverlet embroidered with another focusing circle. Yoshi was seated in the center of the coverlet, eyes closed, brows knit in concentration. Candles placed in the four corners of the room provided a dim, soft light. Sho found the room made him feel strange, and he briefly considered simply backing away from the door and sneaking down the hallway, leaving Yoshi in peace.

Yoshi's sense of space was far too sensitive to allow that, however. Before Sho could turn to leave, Yoshi's eyes snapped open and locked instantly with Sho's. It was an uncommonly intense gaze, and Sho wilted before it.

“H-hi,” he said. “I, uh... thought we should maybe talk... about this morning?” Sho stepped into the room, trying to act casual.

Yoshi seemed to accept Sho's presence without question. He remained calm and seated upon the mattress, legs crossed. “Of course. I meant to apologize...”

“No, not like that.” Sho paced toward the mattress. “You've got nothing to apologize for. I asked a question and you answered it.”

“I doubt you were expecting that answer.” Yoshi's reply was stiff and distant.

Sho frowned, unsure how to get through that defensive wall. “Well, no, but that doesn't mean anything.”

“It doesn't?”

“No, it doesn't,” Sho repeated. “It's something about magic I didn't know. There's a lot of things like that.... I just forget how much sometimes.”

Yoshi smiled, though his manner was sardonic. “And the carnal nature of the knowledge?”

“Oh, come on,” Sho leaned forward, bracing himself on the mattress with his palms. “Did it ever occur to you to ask me how I felt? What people do behind closed doors is their own damned business.”

As he ranted, he had drawn closer to Yoshi, locking eyes with the other man so he could be more persuasive. Yoshi had leaned forward himself. The two men's faces were now very close. Sho didn't quite realize how close until Yoshi leaned forward and kissed him.

The kiss was an electrical shock. Sho drew back slightly in surprise for a moment, but then leaned into it. His mouth opened. He felt Yoshi's arms around his back, embracing him. Sho slid from emotional intervention to the fine art of seduction quite easily. He moved toward Yoshi so they could be perfectly close, chest to chest; but it also might seem that Yoshi had pulled him near. Perhaps this was merely the logical end of the conversation they'd been having to begin with.

One kiss became two. Yoshi's hands wandered-- over Sho's back, down to his rear. Sho put more of his weight on his knees, raised himself up. The uncertainty of his walk in the woods was gone; now he wanted Yoshi to feel the outline of his body. Sho draped his arms over Yoshi's shoulders and felt the other man's heat sink into the outline of his own body.

Yoshi paused before a third kiss, breathing heavily. His expression was furtive, guilty. “This can stop here...”

Sho leaned forward to speak softly into Yoshi's ear. “That would be boring.” He tried to begin nibbling Yoshi's ear, but the other man pulled him away quickly. He wanted his third kiss now.

The Kagawa Brothers dressed traditionally, so Yoshi wore split-legged hakama over his kimono. Sho dressed in modern, Western types of clothing, though he preferred a single button-up shirt to the layered shirts that Japanese men often preferred.

Soon it became impossible to count Sho and Yoshi's kisses. They began to melt into each other, even to their tongues entwining. Yoshi pushed Sho down onto his back, his fingers unbuttoning Sho's wine-colored shirt and spreading it open with surprising speed. They kissed again, deep and lingering, and rolled so that their positions were reversed. Now Sho lay atop Yoshi, straddling the larger man's body. He felt Yoshi's hands at his fly and arched his back exquisitely to help Yoshi slide his jeans and boxers off of his slim body.

They rolled over again, so now Sho lay on his back beneath Yoshi. The larger man finally left off ravishing Sho's mouth to begin traveling down the rest of his body. His neck was kissed with such passion that reddened marks appeared on his skin; Sho cried out against the intensity of the sensation, voice sweet in Yoshi's ear. Yoshi continued down, nibbling one of his nipples, teasing the central line of Sho's body with his tongue, caressing the hints of v-muscle that appeared around Sho's hips. Sho moaned softly in nameless passion, in anticipation. He had played this game before himself. He knew where Yoshi's hands and lips were likely to take as their final destination. The thought itself was intoxicating. Sho was hard and ready for it.

Yoshi's long fingers caressed the base of Sho's erection, where a soft crown of dark hair joined it to the velvety weight of his testicles. Thumbs stroked the underside while fingers curled around the shaft, coaxing sensation from every inch. One hand moved below his erection to cup and stroke him, and the sensitive skin that lay beyond. Sho's mind was locked by pleasure before Yoshi even brought the tip of his tongue down to it. When Yoshi began working him over in earnest, engulfing his member in his mouth and all but massaging it with his tongue, to bring pre-cum oozing to the tip.

Sho's face flushed with heat, and his tongue tripped as he tried to cry out Yoshi's name. “Y-Yoshi! Not so... not so fast....”

Yoshi raised his head, panting heavily. His mouth was somehow still neat. “Ah? I'm sorry, am I doing something wrong...?”

“N-no, it's... too good,” Sho smiled.

“Ahh... I'm sorry,” Yoshi's face flushed in embarrassment. “How should we...?”

“Fuck me,” Sho whispered. He raised one leg, so the inside of his thigh could slide along Yoshi's leg.

Yoshi's eyes widened. “You want that? Have you done it before?” Sho nodded. Admitting it to the man who had once been his teacher was a surprisingly intense turn-on.

Hearing it seemed to affect Yoshi as deeply. “Give me a minute--” he spoke haltingly, distractedly. “I need to get--”

Yoshi suddenly started and jerked his head around as he felt a hand tap his shoulder lightly.

Takeru stood there, smiling, a capped tube held up in one hand. “Don't worry! I brought lube!”

Yoshi gaped at his brother, speechless. Sho jerked upright in bed in surprise. “How the hell long have you--”

“Long enough,” Takeru grinned. “I figured you'd forget this,” he said said, flipping the tube of lubricant onto the bed, “but I didn't think you'd both try to start the ritual without me. Way to make a guy feel left out.”

Sho, surprisingly, found himself shocked by Takeru's brazenness. “You want to--”

Takeru strode forward and wrapped an arm casually around Yoshi's shoulder, letting his arm hang down freely. He grinned, while his identical brother's expression seemed to melt between embarrassment and arousal. “We share everything good with each other,” Takeru said. He glanced down, his eyes raking Sho's near-naked body. There was a hungry fire in them that made Sho's skin go to goosebumps and his erection throb anew with need.

“It's all right with me, if you don't mind,” Yoshi spoke. His voice was soft, nearly apologetic.

Sho largely wanted to keep from embarrassing himself by orgasming before he got to consummate the incredibly illicit threesome with his apparently incestuous and thoroughly gorgeous former teachers. He tried to stammer through a graceful acceptable without looking too eager. “Well... uh, hey, anything to find that Tome...”

“Right, it's all about getting the book,” Takeru smirked. He loosened the ties holding his hakama on offhandedly, letting them fall to the floor. He wore the kimono beneath sloppily, nearly hanging open, so now it began to fall open freely. At once he crawled onto the mattress toward Sho.

Sho glanced over, curious to see what Takeru had in mind. He drew himself into a seated position near Sho's shoulders. “Don't let me interrupt what you two were already up to... I'll just be taking care of things up here.” With that he leaned forward and all but smothered Sho in a hungry kiss. It wasn't at all like his brother, who had to be coaxed into revealing his full passion; Takeru's mouth was imperious and demanding. Sho closed his eyes and let it consume him, his moan muffled.

Yoshi's need finally outstripped his bashfulness, and he divested himself of his own hakama quickly. He knelt at the foot of the mattress and slicked up two fingers with lubricant. Then, as Takeru's tongue slid over Sho's lips, Yoshi slid his slicked fingers into Sho's body.

Takeru released Sho's mouth to watch his the tableau of his brother nibbling Sho's thighs as his fingers worked to slick him up thoroughly. Takeru could glance down and see the effect upon Sho intimately, the younger man's eyes clouded over with yearning and lost in sensation.

“Mmm,” Takeru murmured approval. He shifted his hips toward Sho, tilting the younger man's head so he had something to focus on. That something was Takeru's own cock, nearly limp. It was beautiful to Sho's eyes, perfectly formed, uncut, sized generously enough for pleasure. Takeru thrust it prominently into Sho's field of view. “Make nice,” he said.

Sho obeyed. His tongue slid down the underside of Takeru's soft member, before he engulfed it completely. He could feel it expand and begin to grow to velvety rigidity in his mouth, a sensation that left him whimpering for more. He sucked on Takeru once he was hard enough, alternating with sliding his lips up and down his length, caressing it with his tongue. As Takeru's erection grew to its full size, it became too much for Sho to fit in his mouth. He moves his hands to Takeru's base, adding the gentle caress of his fingers to his efforts at pleasuring his master. Takeru's breathing slowly became more heavy, his eyes half-lidded, soft groans thrumming.

When Yoshi entered him, Sho's rhythm broke. Yoshi was as slow and careful a lover as anyone could want, and certainly as generously sized s his brother. Sho found himself moaning around Takeru's cock, hips writhing, muscles tensing and releasing around Yoshi as the older man bent over him and slowly drew forward. Yoshi tilted Sho's hips forward and upwards, leaving Sho's ankles propped around his shoulders. It made his current position feel strained. Sho tried to pull away from Takeru, but the other man's hand dipped down to the back of his head, pushing him back down on to his dripping erection. “No, not now, can't stop now...” Takeru breathed.

Sho felt his own erection straining and dripping beneath him. Yoshi finally came close to bottoming out, paused, and then withdrew and thrust into Sho more forcefully. It happened at nearly the same time Takeru was winding fingers in his hair, pushing his mouth back down around his own cock. Sho trembled, eyes wide, at the sudden, deep double penetration. His muscles no longer obeyed his conscious thoughts, and his rational mind dissolved away in a blur of pleasure. Sho surrendered to his partners completely, his body's movements following their own by simple instinct.

Time melted into an indistinct blur of pleasure. Sho almost felt he was somehow standing outside of himself as he made love to his teachers, watching himself writhe in deep sensation as he was fucked from all angles. Yoshi's thrusts grew increasingly wild and passionate, ragged gasps of pleasure tearing out of him with every labored breath. Takeru 's thighs tensed exquisitely, lifting himself slightly so he could possess Sho's mouth down to his very throat. Sho felt his erection stiff and throbbing at the center of his being, the root of a hard, knotted feeling that twisted up from the past of his stomach. It was not something Sho had experienced before in sex, and although it felt almost more real than his physical sensations, it seemed to melt into illusion if he tried to reconcile it with the melted mass of time and experience that most of his physical sensations now sank into. In the back of his head, a picture of the Tome grew from inky darkness to crystal clarity.

Orgasm shattered his warm world of instinct and physical sensation, even as it slaked his lust. At some point Yoshi had favored his bobbing cock with the attentions of one of his long-fingered hands, though Sho somehow had not consciously noticed until he felt his own ejaculate sliding hot over Yoshi's fingers. Awareness in that moment had somehow become strained and perfect. Takeru was already deep inside his mouth, nearly in his throat, hips and perfect buttocks trembling as seed spilled from him. Sho could not even remember tasting any of Takeru's seed in his mouth; he simply surfaced from the musky world of pleasure to find himself swallowing in metered rhythm, heart pounding in his ears. Yoshi's sex was controlled, and Sho dimly thought he might have been able to hold him there all night, fucking him with agonizingly careful motion. Another deep trust shook Sho, then two, three, before he heard Yoshi cry aloud and saw his back arch from the corner of his eye. For a few seconds sex became a frenzy for Yoshi; then just as sharply it ended, the other man spent and half-collapsed onto his lover's body, his own seed leaking from Sho's body and onto the immaculate black sheet beneath them.

A sense of well-being and contentment enveloped Sho completely. His muscles relaxed, he felt almost languid. Color in the room seemed unnaturally intense, then sound, and then suddenly the world took on a shade of startling normality. Sho stared at the ceiling, in his mind's eye seeing the shaded image of the Tome that they had lost when they had scryed the night before. He rolled fully onto his back, a hand burying itself in Yoshi's hair as the other man collapsed forward to bury his face in the hollow of Sho's shoulder. Takeru fell back, freeing Sho's mouth. For a moment Takeru tried to prop himself up with his elbows, but then exhaustion won out and he simply collapsed onto the bed. The three men half-dozed, half-dreamed together for a time. No one thought to ask the others if he had liked it, or how he felt; for a moment in time their hearts beat with one rhythm, and their satisfaction was obvious.

In time reality encroached itself upon their ritual space. They began to talk, and joke, and Yoshi begged for reassurances that Sho was only too happy to give him. They rose and parted ways to shower, to prepare the night's meal, to attend to chores. By dinner the shared world of their bodies had faded away completely, and mundane reality set in. Takeru spoke of materials and techniques they could use to enhance the night's scrying, with only a lewd joke here and there to remind them of the early afternoon. Yoshi scowled at him for them, his academic shell seemingly closed around him. Sho had not experienced anything like this before, because he had never made love outside of fragile social constraints before. He couldn't tell what this meant. Awkwardly, he tried to follow the Brothers lead and act as a professional. In time it became a natural feeling.

The final scrying for the Tome followed that evening, after the dishes were cleared away. It made their previous effort feel strangely primitive and strained. Their energies combined seamlessly in the magic, leaving the pool of water in the urn as still and perfect as a silver mirror. Their spirits roved far, seeking the Tome, and tore down the familiar paths. The image tried to go cloudy before them once again, but the clouds were torn aside like fog in the sun. Cold and perfect, the image of the Tome's location rose up into Sho's mind.

His Tome-- for in Sho's mind, it was already his-- lay on a small round table, a marble top affixed to legs of cold wrought iron. It was put one object of power surrounded by a veritable forest of them, piled carelessly into tall shelves or onto wide tables. Some were stacked on the floors, scrolls and books alongside glassware and strange jewels. It was more raw magical power in one room than Sho could ever hope to see in a lifetime, than had ever existed in one place on Earth. With strange detachment, Sho realized that his Tome had obviously been spirited far from Earth, to a realm superior and remote.

How the Tome had come to be there was revealed only vaguely by the scrying magic, which was reaching its limits. A man, tall and pale and clad in strange, dark clothes had set it there, a minor trophy. The man adjusted his glasses and wove minor spells-- minor to him, at least-- to make sure his book was not followed, then went to turn his attentions to a greater prize, a better prize. Sho strained to see the man more closely, to snatch a name or a history or even a location from the ether that bore the vision to him, but it was too late, and he felt the power at his disposal reaching its limits.

Sho's consciousness collapsed inward on itself, retreating from infinity, but he knew the information he had gained about the Tome's whereabouts would never leave him until he had no further use for it. Exhausted, the darkness of unconsciousness began to slip around Sho. He could feel his legs give way as his body reached its limits of stamina. Still, he could not help but feel like he had attained some great victory.