“What?” he asked. The man below seemed harmless–black robes with “squiggly” tails and red and green cuffs, a six-horned headpiece, and a red beard. Even from a distance, he could see the man’s eyebrows stood up, like flames. Trailing behind him was a young girl, wearing clothes identical to his, but on her back, unlike the folded clothes on the women and girls in the empire, were red, black, and green things that looked like fire. He did not know what that was or what it was made of, but it must have been the stash around her waist that held it in place.

“That’s Aku, Shogun of the Underworld Empire,” his nursemaid whispered.

Shinjiro immediately felt ill. Aku, his father’s greatest enemy, here in the Empire of Japan? They, according to his tutors and astronomer, have been warring nations since Aku came to his throne, when Shinjiro’s own parents became emperor and empress. Many have died in battle, wives and mothers and sisters and daughters absent for months or wearing full mourning clothes for years. Even boys born after he were learning to fight and use swords to carry their fathers,’ grandfathers’, brothers’, uncles’ names at war. Shinjiro glared at the demon–they say his ancestors were born from a meteor and produced offspring unusually–with confidence that he as emperor would slaughter this creature and put an end to this misery.

But what was he doing here?

Once Aku and the girl walked under the balcony, the nursemaid carried Shinjiro back to his room, but he could not go back to playing anymore. Mother and Father were down below with evil. He could not feel anything but pure terror.

It had been later in the day when the guards escorted him down to the master room, where only the Emperor and his councilmen met and he was not allowed in. Aku was there, kneeling at the table with the Emperor and Empress. The little girl had her back to them, facing a corner.

Shinjiro looked at his parents’ faces, his father annoyed and lightly pale, his mother’s eyes wide and her face slightly green. She saw her son and reached for him. “Shinjiro, come here.”

He stood by her side and got a closer look at Aku’s face. The features–curled nose and fiery red eyebrows and beard–were sharper and made him shiver. He slowly lowered himself onto his knees and knelt with his arms and hands in the “appropriate” position. Then he stood up and looked to his parents.

The Emperor took deep breaths before he spoke: “My son, as emperor in the future, when I depart this life”–Shinjiro didn’t like that idea, a life without his father, or mother as well–“it is important that you will be married and have produced at least one heir. The time has come to prepare you for this…um, delicate matter.”

Shinjiro’s eyes widen. He had to be married, already, at age eight? He had not yet even finished his schooling; he was still learning astronomy, and he had much more to learn, as his parents had told him. Aku cleared his throat and turned his upper body to the girl in the corner. “Ashi, I require your presence.”

The girl stood up, and Shinjiro saw her hair was rather odd–spiky on top and a long spike down to between her eyes, and sideburn-like spikes a little past her ears. She did not smile; rather, she looked annoyed and affronted. As she crossed her arms, pressing her tiny red lips together, Shinjiro picked up a vibe from her that she wanted to ask, “What are you looking at?”

Shinjiro stood there in silence and wondered, “Does she ever smile?” He’s never met a child that didn’t smile, nor did he ever see a girl with short hair.

“Shinjiro,” his father said in a shaky voice. It was clear he didn’t want to say whatever he was about to. “This is Ashi. Someday she will be your wife.”

Shinjiro’s stomach, once so ill with fear, nearly ripped apart in shock. He was to marry this girl, this child of his country’s greatest enemy?

Even though he didn’t want to listen, he reluctantly absorbed his mother’s explanation: “As you know, we are warring nations. Shogun Aku”–Shinjiro was surprised at her composure– “has proposed an arranged marriage between our children–you and the eldest of his daughters who are not yet betrothed, in hopes to establish peace and perhaps unify our nations.”

Shinjiro felt paralyzed with shock. A marriage to stop a war that has gone on longer than he had been alive, a marriage to a girl he just met, who didn’t smile, who looked angry to even see him? He was only in his eighth year of life, and his parents had told him whom he was to marry.

He wondered if his own parents had married for love or for any other reasons. Then he wondered if the girl in front of him was even capable of love or even laughing.

“Guards,” his mother said, “please escort my son and…Ashi outside. Shinjiro…you can…get to know your future wife.”

Shinjiro felt dizzy. Half the guards in the palace walked him and…Ashi out of the room and then outside the palace to the fields. On his own, he liked to play amongst the tall grasses, chase crickets and ladybugs, and make toys with long grass. Sometimes village children would be in the fields and get to play with him. Now, although it was a warm day, he shivered as the sunlight hit him. He looked nervously at the girl he would someday wed. “So…do you know how to play?” he asked.

Her nose slightly wrinkled, her arms still crossed. She was either a mute or instructed not to speak. After two minutes of silence, he pointed with his thumb to a pathway. “Can I show you something?” he asked. She briskly followed him, her footsteps like stamping feet. Shinjiro walked ahead of her while the guards, as he could tell, spread out to ensure the safety of the next emperor and empress…Shinjiro felt sick again. He actually had to marry this…creature for political reasons.

Suddenly, he saw a grasshopper fly in front of him. Determination overcame his dread. He had struggled for weeks to capture one to then free, yet for some days none would ever cross his path. He turned excitedly towards Ashi, her face red and swinging her arms even though nothing was in her way. She crossed her arms again at him.

They stood in awkward silence until to both their surprise another grasshopper jumped between them. Though her mouth did not change, her eyes lightly widen, and it hit him that she had probably never seen a grasshopper before. He smiled, put his finger to his lips, and pointed to where the insect had fled.

It took twenty minutes for them to find a grasshopper, one resting on a leaf of grass. He helped her push away the longer strands to stare at it. Perhaps it was sleeping, or waiting for the right time to jump again. They stared until it stood up and jumped away. His smile widen. “Come on,” he whispered, instantly grabbing her arm and leading her to follow him. It sent a shock through her system, his hand touching her, but she had to keep a straight face despite this newfound excitement.

When they saw the grasshopper again, it was in a spacious clearing, and again they pushed aside the grass to watch it rest. Ashi stared at its pale-green body and wondered what its use was. The boy poked her again, and she trembled when she turned to him. To her surprise and confusion, he had something black and red on his finger. “Ladybug,” he said. Ashi watched as it spread its wings, flew from his hand, and landed on his nose. He lightly smiled in a way that she understood that meant it tickled and he had done this activity before. Ashi looked down and saw the grasshopper hadn’t moved.

Chasing insects was new to her, and for the first time in her life, despite her parents’ training to keep a stoic face even in joy, anger, or grief, her mouth twisted into a smile.

Just then, Shinjiro whined and annoyed her for distracting her from the grasshopper. “Aw, it flew away!” She saw he was right, and the ladybug had gone. Behind him, she saw a flicker of red and pointed. He looked over his shoulder and asked with his eyes, to which she nodded with a smile. His own eyes slightly widen–so she did smile–and he kindly took her wrist under her wide sleeve. They spent the afternoon running around in the grass, chasing grasshoppers in both hands and letting them go, letting ladybugs crawl up her arm and his forehead until his mother gently called out for him and Ashi. Running back to the palace was also the first time he heard her giggle, if not for the first time in her life.

He replayed these memories in his sleep for the next several years and thought of seeing her again soon. Although he still played with other girls, and boys, during the day, all of whom were more lively than their someday empress, he missed teaching her to have fun but wondered if she herself remembered what it was like to laugh.

By thirteen, they met again.

The Emperor and Empress requested from his current combat teacher, a wrestler from a land where often times men and wild animals fought to the death for the amusement of others, two days’ rest for Shinjiro’s attendance in a serious meeting. Shinjiro was upset, for he was so close to being done and then learning to shoot a bow and arrow with a “master green archer.”

Again, his parents had him hide in his room while the trumpets blared, but he knew what was going on; his parents told him last night that Aku and Ashi–the future empress–were arriving so the men could discuss battle procedures for when their nations would unite, and in preparation for a potential war with another nation. Ashi, it became clear, was to receive basic training and skills required of an empress. Before the Empress could lead her away, however, Aku insisted his daughter pay attention to what the adults were saying; it was his wish that she remain aware of the troops that protected her and how they would continue to do so should anything happen in the future.

When he saw her at the corner in which he first laid eyes on her, she was struck with how she changed. Her hair was still the same–short with spikes in the same directions, and the robes were similar to hide her feet and most of her hands, but her body had changed. She had curves down her sides, her jaw sharper, and her chest was no longer flat. He could see under the cloth that wrapped around her torso with a collar tight around her neck that she had started developing, though not as much as the other women he had seen in the village and palace.

She was at an age in which she would cease to play outside and her formal schooling; she would have to learn the duties of a royal wife. Much to his displeasure, she looked as if she had not smiled at all ever since their day playing in the field.

They knelt and bowed to each other. Since they had not yet earned the right to sit with the adults, they had to kneel at a distance so that they could hear everything, as the Emperor had motioned. Shinjiro did not listen to the adults as they discussed what a future emperor clearly needed to know. Instead, he kept his eyes on his still-faced future bride, staring at her father and someday in-laws. She had beautiful curves that he might be able to embrace someday, in the privacy of his room. Her chest was blooming; he wondered if they would one day be big enough to hold in his hands. Would she allow him to kiss her neck, her jaw, her cheeks when they were wed?

Might he convince her to let her hair grow out, for him to let hang down her back, to give her face a more flattering frame? He wondered if she had started some “cycle”, as he overheard his mother worriedly express to one of her attendants, that meant she was ready to hold children in her womb. Though the words were new and strange to him, he knew that he would not force her to carry a child yet; he wanted enough time to know and understand his new wife, to love her and make her feel loved.

Suddenly, her eyes dangerously flickered in his direction, and he looked away in terror. He hoped she could not see in his eyes or face what he was thinking about her. Worse, what if she could look into his mind, like a power she had for being half-demon?

They say the Shogun of the Underworld Empire did not have a traditional marriage ceremony as here. Once a new shogun came to be, his councilmen inspected all of the young women who had not reached their twenty-fifth year for the healthiest of them. Once they selected the one of the best health, regardless of whether or not she was married, she became the High Priestess–not only the woman in charge and conductor of worship services, but also his mate and producer of his offspring.

From what Shinjiro heard, the current High Priestess–Ashi’s mother–had produced seven daughters at once, in a childbirth ceremony with all the men and women present–that nearly killed her. Aku, who was in his palace, had her deliver in the cave where all the adults worshipped him, but the councilmen urged him not to attend; the Shogun of the Underworld Empire had to focus on other matters.

It took the High Priestess months to recover, by the time her daughters started to get their first teeth. Shinjiro worried about Ashi herself, if she would deliver seven children and end up dying? What would happen to the peace treaty and their current momentary ceasefire before the wedding?

His mother eventually led Ashi out of the room–perhaps to teach her music–but he continued to pretend listening to the men, for his thoughts were on his beautiful betrothed…and how to make her a more beautiful wife.

When he was eighteen, she was in full bloom.

His parents requested that Ashi arrive one last time before the wedding so she could spend two weeks concentrating on everything she needed to know as empress. He felt slightly satisfied that she did not have to learn everything back in her country, for he wanted to see how much she had changed in five years.

As five years before, he saw her knelt in a corner away from where his parents sat. “Ashi,” her father said.

His future son-in-law could not believe what he saw. Her hairstyle had not changed, but her body had–more curves, more decorative clothing that flattered her figure, and darker eye paint. He had never noticed before that she painted her lids, as some of the wealthier women and girls in the village had.

Shinjiro hurried to his father–the parent closest to him–and forgot about the appearance required of a prince. “Father, Father! She’s beautiful!” he exclaimed while bouncing on his feet. “She’s so beautiful–oh, Father, I love her–”

The more he said it, the more he believed it, that she would make a beautiful wife. His mind soared with thoughts about her and–

His father’s firm hands on his shoulders stopped him, and he did not have to turn to see the look of shock and embarrassment in his mother’s face, horrified with his prince-like behavior. Then he remembered that also presented was his someday father-in-law. He turned red and faced his bride in years to come, who still looked bored. They knelt and bowed to each other, and the Empress walked between them. “Ashi, please follow me,” she said.

Her son’s heart sank. He forgot about her “training” to become the next empress and everything needed of a wife in the empire. Instead, he had to remain at their father’s presence and learn about how the Underworld Empire and Japan would unify following the marriage–marriage to Ashi. He hoped that he would see her during the midday meal, which they would not allow of him before.

At last, his head aching from so much he had to learn about trade and communication interwoven with her, the bell tolled, and the men stood up to walk to the tearoom. The women were already there, and he was shocked to see Ashi’s hair down, barely touching her shoulders and ending in spikes.

Shinjiro noticed how Ashi carefully watched his mother prepare and serve each cup of steaming tea before helping herself. She was slow to drink and set down her cup, still studying how the Empress drank. Shinjiro hoped that his mother treated Ashi well and made her feel at ease with what she was learning.

Ashi, on the other hand, wished he would stop staring at her like that, like an animal pondering its prey before attacking. Her hands and back ached from relearning the tea ceremony, instruction on weaving hats, lessons to play musical instruments, and other duties required of an empress. The worst of it began when she arrived in the room where she was to sleep after her wedding. There had been a large tub and a screen, but she didn’t see the futon or dressing closet.

Two servants extended the screen, but she could see the silhouette of her someday mother-in-law watching her. “This is how we will prepare you for your wedding day, unlike how they bathe you back home,” she said.

Though her mouth was still stoic, Ashi was terrorized. The servants whispered for her to lift her arms so they could undress her piece by piece until she was left to hide her breasts and crotch with her hands. Mother and Father always said that one needed a white gown to bathe in, for nudity was acceptable only at birth and wedding nights.

Her face burning, Ashi entered the tub that was freezing, like melted snow. She couldn’t stop shivering, and her teeth were chattering. “Please put your head under the water, my lady,” the older one said.

It was worse to wet her entire body, and Ashi hid her face under her hand. Then someone’s hands were on her head and apparently tried to wash her hair. It was difficult, Ashi knew. Every six months, a hairdresser styled her and her sisters’ hair in the same style since they first learned to walk and used wax to hold it in place. It used to to hurt so much, but Ashi eventually endured it. The hardest part was washing it all out.

Once her hair was free of the wax, for the servant had coiled as much onto the top of her head, they had her sit on the edge of the tub while they scrubbed her until her skin was red. It gave her pain, and it became harder for her to remain emotionless.

Afterwards, she rinsed off in the cold water and looked away as they patted her dry, but they were kind enough to help her redress into her clothing. The Empress looked displeased to see her hair down, barely touching her shoulders. She rubbed her fingers over the handful of back hair she held. “As empress, as a woman of Japan, you will have to let your hair grow to be styled as I have. Only women without morals have hair this short.”

Ashi hoped the Empress could sense how hurt she felt. Her bitterness helped her remain stoic as she followed the Empress to her lessons.

She had learned rather terrifying expectations to be an obedient wife, to do as he says no matter how unwell or unwilling she was. Her mother had already taught her how a baby came to be, but the Empress expanded her knowledge: To prove she had come to her husband for him alone, on their wedding night, he had to make her bleed as they consummated the marriage. If she did no shed blood, she would have to return to her father in shame, with little to no chance of remarriage. Also, unlike the Underworld Empire, it was expected of her to immediately produce an heir–by this, the Empress meant, a son, for no daughter could inherit the throne. It did not matter how long it would take; she could bear as many as seven daughters until she produced a son. Ashi was too scared to ask what might happen if she died before producing a son.

Upon arrival home, she informed her father that she was now to let her hair grow, as expected of her future people. She tried to envision a life with her hair down her shoulders in her sleep and forever twisted over her head.

Age 20

It felt strange to walk to the palace alone, without her father. She glanced at her future commoners, who still looked as if she was a wild creature from a dirty lake. It was worse that Father was not there. He would have given these people more reason to fear her. Ashi stared ahead and tried not to think of the parents she would never see again, the sisters who could now communicate with her only via letters, the way the sun rose and set from her old bedroom.

Some young girls stepped forward and handed her fistfuls of wildflowers, which she gingerly took. The Emperor and Empress were waiting for her; she knew it was inappropriate for the bride and groom to encounter one another before the wedding.

When she reached the couple, she lightly bent at her waist and stood up straight to follow them inside. The doors closed behind her, making her feel more cut off from the life she used to know.

As taught, she followed the Empress to where she would sleep from now on. There, the woman turned to her. “I hear you have allowed your hair to grow out,” she said, “even after that horrible lice infestation since we last saw you.”

Ashi remembered the pain of blades shedding her hair to nearly birth length and nodded. When the Empress motioned for her to free her hair, she removed the pin that held her locks in its bun and let her black strands fall over her shoulders, reaching towards the middle of her back.

“You look beautiful,” the Empress said. Then she turned and nodded to the ladies-in-waiting.

They pulled out the screen shielding her from the still-watching Empress, and Ashi held out her arms for the servants to undress her, this time knowing what to expect but also sad for the last clothes she ever had from her homeland. As the bride could not retain anything from her birth country, she wished they could just send back her old clothes instead of just burn them. The only thing they could not burn were the horn hair ornaments every daughter of the Shogun of the Underworld Empire had to wear at their weddings, no matter whom she married into. Once the ceremony was over, she was to send the horns to her parents as a sign that their daughter was no longer their own. Now everything she wore had to be like what the Empress wore.

Once she was naked, she resolved that she had to get used to this if this was how to bathe from now on. She was surprised that the water was warmer this time and was quick to wet her head. Also, there was no scrubbing, but rather gentle shampooing and full-body rubs not as harsh as the years prior. Perhaps once they accepted her as their current Empress’s successor, they had to act nicer to her. She took her time rinsing herself and did not feel embarrassed when they patted her dry.

The servants led her into the adjacent room, where, to her surprise, the robes strongly resembled that of her home country’s, with the green, red, and black. Perhaps she would dress more like the Empress only after the ceremony. The plate that shielded her torso and had an arrowhead-shaped point over her breasts was tight but not as much as her hair curled into a shorter twist. She was quick to take control and not show any discomfort until they were done. She was so focused on them applying lip color that she did not feel something being wrapped around her waist. Ashi pressed her lips together and saw they had somehow constructed flames similar to what she wore at home, flames made from the finest wood. She stared sadly at the flames, which they would certainly burn later.

Then the Empress came in, after she stepped into her geta, and Ashi swore the woman had never smiled so much wider. “You look absolutely beautiful,” she spoke as if she was going to cry. Then she saw the younger woman look towards her own back. “Yes, it is customary for any foreign bride to dress in her country’s colors until she becomes a wife.”

Ashi wondered why the Empress had not said that to her earlier. “You must be ready,” the older woman said. She led the bride out of the room to the palace entrance, where the red aisle led to the altar. While the Empress and her servants lined up behind Ashi, she closed her eyes as the men servants opened their umbrellas to shield her from the sun until the doors opened, and the red aisle came into view.

Commoners and people of different garb and skins–they must have been from the nations where Shinjiro learned to fight and use weapons–watched her approach the men in black at the altar. She saw him smile sweetly at her, his mouth only growing the longer he stared. When she reached the altar, she struggled to lift the corners of her mouth, but his smile never faltered as he took her hands.

I pray to protect my father’s people and to serve as a good wife to my new husband and a good mother of the next heir, she thought to herself as the priest began to speak.

They stared at the pristine white sheets over his futon. Her heart pounded when she remembered her mother-in-law’s words to present these sheets in the morning as proof of the marriage consummation. Ashi wondered if the Emperor had informed his son that the bride had to bleed after he entered her. Of course, Ashi had experienced pain before–stubborn hair knots, the shaving her hair, tripping and falling onto her face and knees–but she did not know what it mean to shed blood…other than, of course, when the moons changed, and all demons’ daughters cleansed their bodies to carry children.

The newlyweds bowed before she moved first and lied on her back, still wearing her wedding garment. Although he was still smiling, as he had at the altar, she could see in his eyes the hunger and nervous anticipation for what he had to do as groom. This was it, she thought. She pretended not to think of what his mother told her, but what her own mother said: He would be merciless, touching and squeezing parts of your body so unlike his, enough to give you pain, and he would use you for his own pleasure and give you enough pain to stop you from walking for days.

He had untied what they called her kimono, but she could not contain her emotions anymore. After years of resistance, she gave up and started to cry. She was scared, of this marriage, of this new life, of her in-laws’ expectations and fears of her. She wished her own parents, as cruel as they could be could have attended the wedding, to be with her as she entered her new life, so she wouldn’t have to see them for the last time in a country that was no longer her home, that she would never see again. Now she had to bleed and ignore pain, and to serve as her new husband’s servant for sexual services and to provide an heir–a male heir, the Empress had said–as quickly as possible.

Shinjiro stopped undressing her and stared at her face. “Ashi?”

She wiped her face and shook her head. Not knowing what to do, he slid her hands under her back–she didn’t like it but was too overcome with emotions to fight him off–and pulled her to his chest. Surprisingly, she curled in his arms and sobbed over his heart. He guessed that she was frightened of what they had to do, so he stroked down her hair and kissed her forehead. “It’s all right, Ashi.”

It’s not all right, she wanted to scream. I can’t do this! I can’t do it! This is just too fast! I have to marry someone as a peace treaty for my father’s people, he’s going to value me for my body and has the right to hurt me, maybe even take me against my will, my in-laws are afraid of me, I have to produce a son and they clearly don’t want a grandson of demon heritage, but I can’t control if I have a son ever, I have to wear my hair  up and suffer through horrible headaches for the rest of my life, I…

What stopped her thoughts was a thumb wiping her cheek, but it wasn’t hers. She also felt a set of lips on top of her head, and his hand stroke up her back. “I know you’re scared,” he whispered. “I can tell, but–”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I–I should–shouldn’t even be crying…I’ll–I’ll just…” The words, however, left her throat, and she timidly broke free from his embrace. She rested her head on the end of the futon, flattened her back, and closed her eyes. He was probably annoyed at her enough to brutally ravage her.

But then…why would he hold her, wipe her tears, try to soothe her? Did he really care about her and want to show her he cared, or was he pretending to, trying to calm her down only to use her for his sick pleasures?

She could hear him move and visibly twitched when she sensed him hover over her, but then his hand–so big, so warm–cupped her face, and she didn’t have the heart to scream for him to leave her alone. “Ashi,” he whispered, “I don’t know what they’ve told you…but I know I will not force you into anything.”

When that didn’t ease her, he sighed. “Ashi, could you, you know, do me a quick favor?”

Ashi swallowed but nodded. Then he asked her, oddly, to keep her eyes closed and sit up. Confused, she obeyed but listened to the shuffle of removed clothing. Oh, what was he going to do to her?

“Give me your hand.”

She slowly held up her right arm, which he took in both hands. Would he make her touch or do something sickening with the body part he had to put in her? Her heart fluttered until she felt something bare, smooth, and…fluttering. “Open your eyes.”

Slowly, she lifted her lids and blushed. He had removed his gi and wore only a wrapping around his waist. She had never seen a man nearly naked up close, nor one as muscular. Her hand was on his chest…his heart. He put her hand to feel his heart.

“I can tell you’re scared,” he whispered, and he smiled at her deepening flush; she was clearly struggling to look at his face, but her eyes roamed over his arms, chest, and abdomen. His free hand held her jaw tenderly. “I do not know what to say to make you feel better, but I vow to you that I will be a loving husband to you. Even as children, so young, playing in the fields, I promised myself that as long as we were married, I would make sure you felt loved and comforted as my wife.” He did not mention the first time they met, when he wondered if she ever smiled, that she scared him. That was something he would never tell anyone else.

To his relief, the corners of her mouth slowly lifted into what had to have been the first smile since they played in the fields. “All right,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

He kindly curled his thumb under her bottom lip. “Do you want to wait until the morning or–you decide,” he added gently.

Though her eyes were still flickered with worry her features looked softer. “May I kiss you?” he asked.

She lightly nodded and quickly bit her lower lip. He stared into her eyes as he slowly leaned forward. The first kiss was messy, as he would kiss her cheek by accident or she would push her teeth against his lips, but once they managed, they each felt small senses of accomplishment. They lightly smiled and felt each other do the same. She moved her hands down his bare arms and neck, and he kindly traced up her backbone. She broke away and whispered, “Could we move back a little?”

He felt surprised but gently lowered her onto her back. Her hair looked so pretty fanned around her head. He kissed her with the same gentleness until she motioned for his hands to lower her sleeves off her shoulders. To her relief, he did not look down at the rest of her but kissed every inch of her shoulders, collarbone, and neck. He loved her gasps and moans, her fingers smoothing over his hair. Something slowly poked her between her legs, but he didn’t seem to notice. “How do you feel?” he whispered.

“G-Good,” she said. Her lips ached from the kissing and she loved it. “Do-Do you want to…tonight…”

“Only if you want to,” he said despite the desperate sensation under his ribs and between his legs. What stopped their kissing session was him breaking away to yawn over her head.

She laughed a little. “Maybe morning,” she said. “For now, let’s sleep.”

He kissed her nose and lips one last time. “I love you,” he whispered. Then he moved to her side and pulled the blanket over them, where he wrapped his arm around her waist and positioned his chest against her back. When she turned to sleep against his shoulder, he fell asleep smiling.

When morning came, they took their time kissing and exploring naked bodies. Contrary to what her mother said, he did not paw at her breasts like a feral animal but instead used his lips, teeth, and tongue to give her a sensation she never before felt but could not get enough of. She held the certain body part in both hands and smirked with every shudder and hiss he released. He kissed from her lips down her body to between her legs, but he told her that someday–perhaps even tonight–he would use more of his lips and tongue there.

After they agreed to do it, her eyes paralyzed with fear again, he wrapped his arms under her back with her own around his neck. “I love you,” he whispered one last time before he sealed his mouth over hers and pushed between her legs and into her. She screamed into his mouth and scratched at his upper back with her fingernails, drawing blood. Shame tore at his heart, that he gave his new wife horrible pain even though they both knew it had to be done. He let her adjust to the pain for several minutes, he kissed her trails of tears and jaw, and was slow until she urged him to quicken the pace. She stopped crying and was now begging for more speed, her arms tightening around his back and shoulders. He kept kissing her mouth and neck, complying as best as he could with her requests. Sometimes he kissed and suckled on her breasts to give her more pleasure.

“Are you close?” he asked her when her face contorted and her hands tightened their grip on his back. He moved a little faster until she screeched and smacked her head against the futon, her arms slipping to her sides. Once he saw his stars, and cried out, he stopped himself from collapsing onto her and moved to her side. They panted, stared at the ceiling, taking their time caressing themselves, feeling more beautiful for her and much stronger for him. He turned his head and saw her already staring at him.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

Although he was tired, he cracked his back and pushed himself up to kiss the dried blood between her thighs. “As long as you are,” he said. “I love you.”