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She was everything. In Her presence, which Gale knew to be only a fraction of Her true presence, he could hardly breathe. So overwhelming and awe inspiring, She was the weave, magic itself, and She was here, with Gale. Or more accurately, Gale was here with Her. For to describe someone, something, a Goddess, his Goddess, in relation to Her juxtaposition with a mortal, even a talented and powerful and educated and hardworking mortal such as Gale, was as much an inaccuracy as it was sacrilege. Gale was with Her and he was still standing. It was the most of Her presence that She’d allowed him yet.
She’d invited him, brought him, taken him, to this place and now he was here. He didn’t know where here was, exactly, perhaps he was inside of the weave, within his Goddess Herself. He couldn’t comprehend how much of Her was with him, and he couldn’t get enough. He needed to comprehend— Needed to know— Needed more— Needed—
“Breathe,” Her voice commanded him, and Gale drew breath.
Gale exhaled, focusing on the infinite cosmos, endless questions and not enough answers stretching out before him. It was easier to breathe, to obey Her command, when he was not trying to focus, to comprehend the endless beauty and perfection of Her.
“Look at me Gale,” She commanded him, and Gale looked.
She was awe inspiring. Beautiful could not begin to describe Her but with Gale’s mortal vocabulary he didn’t know where else to start. She shone with the light of Her power. Under the shimmering beauty there was, what appeared to be, a woman. The woman that Gale had seen so many times before, first as Elminster’s friend, then as teacher, as the Goddess She was, and, though he would only think it for saying it was too much to bear, his friend as well. But this time was different. She was More this time, or more accurately, she was letting Gale see More of Her. And She was…magnificent.
When She had offered to bring Gale here, to teach him more than just the ways of the weave and magic. To teach him love and devotion and worship from an entirely new angle. Gale hadn’t believed that someone as young as he had been capable enough to catch Her eye in such a way. And yet, here he was, beside, beneath, and among, his Goddess in what had to be Her own realm.
He was student, devotee, worshipper, supplicant, and nervous inexperienced lover. He hadn’t felt this inexperienced when he had been approached by his first lover, when he had been 14 and truly inexperienced in such matters. But this was different and Gale was truly out of his depth. He would pray for Mystra to anchor his thoughts and heart and mind. For her logic and reason and magic being to soothe the knowledge of his own inadequacies from his heart. But She was right here.
He stood before Her, and though he knew She would take mercy on him, he did not have to pray, he could simply speak. If he could convince his tangled tongue to cooperate instead of going slack at the incomprehensible wonders surrounding him. Gale was not afraid of power, he was well versed in its use, confident in his own abilities. Power through the weave was something he understood when nothing else made sense.
So why was he so afraid now? He was, excited, in more ways than one, more than he was afraid, yes. But still the knowledge that he could, that he would, become the lover of his goddess, of Mystra, of the weave itself, somehow sparked a current of fear that ran deep below his excitement. He needed Her to soothe his fear, to reassure him that this was what he needed, what She wanted. He needed—
“Kneel before me, sweet Gale, and let your mind be soothed,” She commanded and Gale knelt.
His mind, as she promised, overwhelmed by the majesty of Her presence and Her power and Her choice of him as a lover. All the doubt washed away and there was only Mystra, Her thumb rubbing gently at his chin. She was his goddess, and he would obey, and She would bless him. That was the way things had been since he had been a child, not even 8 years past. That was the way things would always be. And he was no child now. He had grown in body and mind and aptitude, and now She required more of him. More of him that Gale was happy to give.
She pressed Her thumb against his lips, and his lips obeyed Her unspoken command, parting for Her. She pressed two fingers into his mouth, and he closed his mouth around them, sucking at the divine digits as if it were his greatest ambition and greater responsibility.
“Eager and talented in this as well,” She praised.
He felt fingers in his hair, brushing gently through it. Gale felt himself relax, his world revolving around only Her and Her touch as the center of the universe that She allowed him to set foot in.
“Good,” She breathed, “now I will show you more. A talent like yours deserves a reward beyond his mortal flesh, hmm?”
Gale wanted to reply, wanted to assure Her that he would not dare ask for more from Her than the gifts She had already bestowed upon him. Her attention, Her presence, and now Her affection. His body thrummed with molten desire brought to the surface by Her will and Her touch.
But he could not answer without abandoning the task She had set him to, and He wanted to fail Her far less than he wanted to answer. If She required his answer, She would allow him to speak. As his mouth was currently well occupied, it was safe to assume that his input was not required. If She felt he deserved to be rewarded, he would accept her judgement. If She felt otherwise, he would do the same. For She was his goddess and he could not possibly dispute Her decisions. The fact that this decision centered around his body was inconsequential.
“Look at me,” She commanded him, and Gale wondered how his eyes had ever rested upon anything else and felt even a modicum of satisfaction.
Rapidly, but not abruptly, a soft blue light flowed from the top of Her head down throughout the rest of Her body. Gale felt the warmth where the light pulsed and pressed against him, and then he felt that warmth spread through him. He looked down to see that he was alight with the same magical energy, his body almost unknown to him visually, but familiar in feeling.
Mystra made a disappointed sound and Gale’s heart fled from his body, ice crystallizing throughout his very veins, collapsing under the weight of Her disappointment. She withdrew Her fingers, and Gale’s mouth was left empty and desperate, for Her attention, Her affection, Her notice and approval.
“I instructed you to look at me did I not?” She asked coolly.
Gale felt the icy core of the universe cling to his soul and drag him down, down, down. He felt anchored to something ancient and deep and horrible. He was falling with the weight of his failure, but to not answer would be yet another betrayal, and he could not fail Her further.
“You did, Mystra,” he breathed, his voice shaking with the cosmic weight of Her disapproval.
“I did,” she confirmed, Her voice weighted with Her disappointment. “I will give you another chance to follow simple instructions. I am trying to reward you, Gale, stop making it difficult to do so.”
She fisted a hand in his hair and pulled, Gale whined. It hurt, but beneath the pain something within him reveled in the touch. Whatever She allowed him was a gift, he knew that. The sharp tugging at the roots of his hair let his mind convert his agony at disappointing Her into something physical, something he could understand more than the mental anguish of failure.
She used his hair to direct his gaze back to Her.
“This time, do not look away.” She said firmly.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Gale breathed earnestly.
He kept his eyes on Her. Her hand rooted in his hair was a firm reminder to Obey, to Worship. A reminder that everything that was Gale was at Her command for eternity.
He felt Her touch him, trailing what felt like a finger down from his bellybutton lower, tracing a line firmly down the length of his— oh— it felt like the universe was expanding beneath Her touch. Gale wanted to look, to see where She touched him, but Her hand pulling at his hair kept his eyes where She wanted them, the pain becoming background noise that anchored him in his obedience.
Gale whined as Her hand grasped him, and then another hand— he had not known She was not limited to just two— pressed at his mouth once more and he opened, determined not to lose the privilege of the weight of Her fingers on his tongue again. Distantly, it occurred to him that it was foolish to have thought Her limited to any number of limbs, She was a goddess, in complete control of Her form. That She chose to allow him to experience three of Her arms— and then a fourth hand was brushing across his chest and Gale cried out, trembling with the effort to keep himself still for he had not been invited to move.
“Stop thinking, Gale,” She chided, “if I require something of you, I will command it, otherwise, just feel.”
And Gale obeyed. For the first time in his life, Gale’s mind went silent and slack, processing nothing but the way it felt when She touched him.
She released Her grip on his hair and drew him up, against Her chest, Her fingers still in his mouth, Her hand still gripping his cock, sliding and moving at her whims.Her arms embraced him. Fireworks danced across his skin and Gale screamed through his goddess’s fingers in his mouth, overwhelmed by pure pleasure and pure sensation.
And She moved his arms to embrace Her, and to touch Her chest, and to bring Her the pleasure she desired. And Gale found that he had enough arms to be everywhere She wanted him. But he couldn’t count them, because counting would be thinking and to think was to disobey.
As commanded, Gale felt. He felt the way Her form pressed against him, and how the edges blurred between them in time and space and pure energy. And how that energy was the greatest pleasure he had ever, could ever, would ever, feel. And how his every nerve ending screamed with the all encompassing overwhelming pleasure that overtook him again and again until he couldn’t remember where the pleasure ended and She began. Couldn’t remember where She began and he ended.
And then Gale was no more, he was one with the universe, with the stars, beyond the planes, he was an indescribable moment in time and space. He was a star burning so bright it was about to explode. He was a star in the death throes of explosion. He was the moment in which a star ends and nothingness begins. He was a black hole pulling in sensations far faster than energy or light or matter.
He was a speck of cosmic dust, adrift in the astral plane, empty of thought, or feeling. A single particle, unmoored, unrooted, impossibly small, painfully inconsequential and unable to even comprehend its inconsequentiality.
And then Mystra’s hand stroked down his body with such gentleness, that Gale came into being again. She commanded that he exist, and so he did.
He was lying on the cool blue infinity that passed for ground here, in this place where She had invited him. She sat next to him, and Her form was the one he’d seen before. The blue light suffusing Her with an overwhelming aura of power had dissipated, and She had the number of limbs that Gale had come to expect. One of Her arms was gently caressing his body.
“There you are,” She said, and there was an unmistakable fondness in Her voice.
Gale could feel his body now, exhausted and sated and painfully separate from Mystra. Now that he had experienced Her love like this, he would hunger for it forever more. There he was indeed, a pathetic, mortal, separate thing once again.
“Did I do good?” He whispered, startled at the hoarse sound of his own voice.
She leant down then and kissed him, and while he wanted to revel in the blessing of Her affection, it only highlighted that he was suddenly aware that he was drowning in the insignificance of mortality. He hadn’t known, before this glimpse of something else, how lacking he truly was. And now he knew, and it was the greatest blessing he had ever been honored with, and the greatest curse he had ever been burdened with.
“You did well, my Gale,” She whispered against his lips. “Get some rest.”
And then Gale was in his own room, in his own bed, and the empty loneliness that filled him had him clinging to his knees and sobbing. It had been so good, he was so blessed, so lucky. And now the blessing had faded, and he was simply Gale Dekarios again, and for the first time in his life, that wasn’t enough.
Gale sobbed until he collapsed into cold, dreamless sleep from the exhaustion, only one truth suffusing the very core of his being. Gale would do anything to experience Her love and infinite pleasure once again. He had to overcome his own insignificance at any cost.