[REPRINT FRIDAYS] "Your Luminous Heart, Bound in Red"
Full text of my werewolf rope bondage story "Your Luminous Heart, Bound in Red" first published in Asimov's September/October 2021.
This week's story is the werewolf bondage fiction that I somehow managed to sell to Asimov's of all markets. Truly my finest example of "Don't self-reject. Let the editor decide if it fits."
I had originally written this story for an anthology called Speculative Masculinities, which never materialized. But the exploration of masculinity as a tangible thing in itself, its own set of, ahem, constraints, its own set of challenges, is something I'm deeply interested in.
I don't like thinking of masculinity as the default from which everything else diverges, or assuming that masculinity inherently puts someone in an oppressor position, or that masculinity, especially cis manhood, means people don't have problems, or have lesser problems.
It's more complicated than that. Manhood gives people privilege in most societies, but also a kind of silence and invisibility. Within every yang, there is yin. And oppression isn't an inevitability—there are other ways to think of pairs of identities, pairs of roles.
I could write essays on this, but I don't have the brain cells today—I have a huge project of cleaning out my storage unit this weekend as a birthday present to myself, because apparently I can't just have a chill birthday celebration. Reprinting this story is also part of my celebration though, because it's one of my favorites that's been less accessible, and I want it to be more widely available and read.
So, I'll just leave my preface at that. Remind me to expound some other time on my feelings about masculinity and gender. (I have so many feelings.)
Enjoy!
If you would prefer to read this story in your browser, please visit my site: https://s.qiouyi.lu/fiction/your-luminous-heart/
Your Luminous Heart, Bound in Red
by S. Qiouyi Lu
You walk into the club dressed in swagger and confidence. It’s the waxing gibbous moon: your senses are heightened, your night vision rich, letting you pick out details in the dim light—the curves of bodies, the shine of dark irises. You plunge yourself into the scent of adrenaline, of sweat and passion. Every sound is louder now, the live music thrumming through your bones, the smack of a bare palm against flesh cutting through the quavering air.
You belong here.
You don’t crave the hunt though, not tonight, not in this form. You crave something more abstract. There is, of course, a carnal aspect to the way your eyes traverse the room. But, when your gaze falls upon a lone woman sitting at the bar, her dress the vivid red of slaughter, your heart races not with the thrill of sex, but with the anticipation of power.
You want to dominate her.
In a moment, you’re beside her, close enough to brush against the bubble of her personal space. Even with this distance between you, the honey-tobacco scent on her skin is heady, redolent. She pays you no mind, but it would be no fun if she submitted to you so quickly anyway.
“Enjoying yourself?” you say, putting on your most charming grin. You slip into this act easily, suaveness fitting you like a well-tailored suit. You know you’re handsome. You just have to get her to look at you.
And she does. A quick glance, like she’s swatting away a fly.
“Mmm.”
She takes a sip of her drink. When you’re this close to someone and in this state, you can usually pick up the scent of alcohol if there is any, but that harshness is absent now. Still, she makes the drink look wicked, as if it were intoxicating. She uncrosses and crosses her legs again, the long lines of them enough to make a lesser man break into a sweat. She lowers her gaze, as if the scratched wooden bar counter is a hundred times more interesting than you.
But you’re not so easily deterred. You pull up a chair, sit and spread yourself out to take up the space beside her. Languid yet willful, a casual exertion that’s been enough to turn heads before.
“I know how to take care of girls,” you say, your grin taking on an edge of sin. “I can show you a good time.”
That usually gets them: an intrigued look, an I’ll bet you could. But she simply swirls her glass, lets the ice clink around, takes another drink. Licks her lips as if to taste every last drop, but it only serves to make her cupid’s bow shine brighter. She sets the glass down deliberately, her fingers graceful as they linger on the rim. When she finally meets your gaze, your throat tightens with the intensity of it, like there’s a chasm hidden behind the look she gives you.
“You,” she says softly, but you hear every word, cling to every syllable, “need a good beating.”
A jolt passes through you, as if she’s slapped you across the face; your mouth hangs slack, your composure wrecked. You don’t know how to respond—this isn’t how this was supposed to go. Part of you is furious at her for even suggesting such a thing, for having the gall to express such a challenge, for insulting you in this way. But the rest of you, the hunger unfurling in you to raze your inhibitions, to release something pent-up inside you, speaks.
“Yes,” you say, your voice hoarse.
She smiles.
“Let’s get out of here.”
You thought it was a one-time thing. You, on your knees, breathing thank you as you rested your cheek against her thigh, ran your hands down her skin, your back still smarting with the echoes of impact. You thought it was a weakness, that you'd wake the next morning feeling a deep shame seated within you, that she'd leave you after seeing you display something as humiliating as vulnerability.
But it turns into something else. Something more. Slowly, then all at once.
It takes you some time to fall into it. I have to go, you say, the first time the sun starts to set, the first time your blood begins to boil. Before, you might have fantasized about ravaging her, about letting her witness your transformation, the violence its own power, the heat pulsing through you its own thrill. But the way she holds you in her eyes, her hand gentle against your cheek, so grounding—
You leave. You can’t deal with this. Somehow, around her, the brute force you command loses its appeal. You’re teetering at the edge of a cliff, looking down at some depth you can’t comprehend, and you’ll never tell her that you’re scared of taking the plunge.
So you run.
The sun’s rays arc long and low over the horizon. You snarl, your brown eyes going gold, everything too much, too much. You leave the city, hurl yourself into the forest, where everything is quieter, where the smells aren’t so overwhelming. You wore the clothes you don’t care about today because you woke with an ache like your whole body was being squeezed, crushed, and you knew it would happen tonight. You knew you had to be prepared for when your hands turn into claws that shred the cotton away from your chest when your whole body shudders, trembles, transforms—
You take a deep breath, and, as the sky goes from crimson to an inky purple-blue, you howl.
She finds you the next day, human again, blood crusted black against your wounds. You’re curled up in a fetal position, your phantom tail between your legs; the forest floor is misted with dew, blanketed with a light fog. You would've been pleased to have your naked body on display for her under any other circumstances, but now you only feel shame. You shouldn’t let her see you like this: bruised, broken, raw.
“Langxin,” she says. The adrenaline has worn off enough, the wolf-edge of your mind faded enough, that you recognize your own name. “Come with me.”
She reaches out to you. You’ve been transforming since you were twelve years old. The viciousness of it has worn grooved scars into your heart: the hunt, the slaughter, the blood, unending. You don’t want to bring someone into it, someone who could never understand, someone who should be kept safe.
“You need help,” she says.
Her voice is soft, yet firm. It’s that admission that undoes you, sparks a shift inside you, like two tectonic plates driving against each other in opposite directions. This, her outstretched hand, her ability to see what you won’t admit to yourself—it’s a schism, a cataclysm, one that would leave you gasping if you’d let yourself.
You take her hand.
A record plays softly in the background, something with the elegant plucked notes of a guzheng. The curtains drawn, her living room is dim, even as the morning sun shines outside. You’re grateful for the darkness, the way the curtains muffle the noise of the city; your head is still pounding.
“How often does this happen?” she asks. Her voice is free of judgment, but you’re already on the defensive. You shrug, avoiding her eyes.
“Once a month, more or less.”
“The fights, I mean,” she says. “The injuries.”
You’re even more resolute as you avoid her gaze.
“Once a month, more or less.”
A long pause stretches out between the two of you. For a second, you think that she’ll strike you. Funny, how you beg her to strike you for the pleasure of it, but a strike now would only make you feel shame. Now, with the curtains drawn, with your eyes lowered, you aren’t her pet or toy, but some broken man she’s taken in out of whatever pity her heart’s spared.
“That’s no way to live.”
You close your eyes and take a deep breath.
“What other choice do I have?”
She takes a long look at you, as if to let herself hear your words, before she goes off to the kitchen, where she bustles around opening and closing cabinets, the clatter of glass and metal filling the small space. She returns soon with a wash basin, wisps of scented steam unfurling in the air. She dips a towel into the hot water, wrings it out, and places it against you, letting it sit there for a moment to soften the clots of blood still clinging to your skin before wiping, lightly so as to not reopen the wounds.
It stings. You hiss.
“Like that. Keep toweling off the rest of the cuts, or else you’ll get infections.”
“I haven’t died yet.”
“Hush. Isn’t there any treatment?” she asks.
You snort.
“Of course there is. But I hate it,” you say. You try to keep the venom out of your voice, but some of it still vents out from between your teeth.
“You’d rather tear yourself apart month after month?” She doesn’t say it harshly, but the words still sting, more than they should. You clench your jaw. What would she know? How can you put this in terms she'd understand? Maybe you shouldn’t; maybe you should just let the words hang unspoken in the air. But she could have left you bleeding; she took you in and is letting you get patched up. You owe her at least this much.
“If it means not taking wolfsbane?” Your lips twist into a humorless smile. “Yes. Wolfsbane robs me of my sharpness. It clouds my senses. It keeps me from hurting myself, but I can’t feel much else, either.”
You’d rather destroy yourself than give up control like that.
Your senses heighten like they always do when you grow irritable. The steaming bath in the wash basin smells bitter, herbal, a dozen overlapping scents that you can’t identify beyond root _and _bark and seed.
“Maybe you should give it another chance.”
You meet her eyes this time, and you’re snarling without even realizing it. If she’s taken aback, she doesn’t show it. Instead, her hand only pauses.
The words tumble out of your mouth before you can stop them.
“I’ve been giving it chances since I was twelve. One year on, six months off, two years on, three years off. Over and over,” you say. “Works great for my father, works great for my cousin, but it just won’t work for me. Some of us get fucked over no matter how hard we’ve tried. And I’ve tried so many goddamn times, Chi.”
She nods. Takes the washcloth, wets it again in the basin, diverts her eyes as the water clouds with red.
“I shouldn’t have pushed,” she says. “It’s your choice.”
Your heart is racing, erratic in your chest. You take a deep breath to calm yourself, ease the trembling out of your hands. Anger can solve things with other people, but you don’t want to be so quick to react that way with Chi, anger your only response, the only way you’ll be heard.
“I’m sorry,” you reply. “For snapping at you.”
She wrings out the towel again, presses it to you with the same care as before, places your hand over the towel. You go back to the motions of sponging yourself off.
“It’s only natural,” she says. “I imagine you’ve heard that a lot.”
You deflate. “I have.”
As the blood softens into coagulated clots and the cloth begins to touch your raw skin, the intensity of the medicinal sting sharpens. You let out another hiss.
“Can’t I just use plain water?”
“This will speed up your healing,” she says. “I know it stings, but it’s better than taking it orally and feeling the nausea.”
You close your eyes. You’ll endure it, then. You want so desperately to stop for just a moment. To tell her you’re tired of being the beast, or of being nothing at all, and of having no other option in between. But you don’t know how ready you are to express such a thing yet, to show her your own tenderness, your own shifting uncertainty.
“Is it only available orally?” she says, interrupting you from settling into a meditative state.
“What?” You look up at her, confused, but she’s turned away to empty the washbasin and grab a box of bandages.
“The wolfsbane,” she says.
You think about it. You’ve only taken it orally yourself, either as a pill, or by the more traditional method—simmering the root in water for hours until it distills into a strong brew that you’d then have to choke down. Your cousin does it that way still, sucks on a hard candy afterward as a reward for enduring the bitterness.
“I think so, yes.”
She’s lost in thought after that, even as she instructs you on the proper way to bandage yourself rather than the haphazard way you’ve made do with until now. When she’s done, and you cup her face, one large palm on either side, and offer her a kiss as your thanks, the conversation slips from your mind.
It was her idea to try the rope.
“Maybe the wolfsbane could still have an effect topically,” she’d said, then smiled. “And this would be far more fun than a compress, or a patch.”
You’re familiar with rope bondage, of course: you’ve seen people in the clubs with knotted rope wrapped around them, rendering them immobile. But if you ever had an interest in it, you always thought that you’d be the one doing the tying. To be on the other end of that—to so fully trust someone else, let them make the decisions, give them control…
You were reluctant at first. Tried to scoff at the idea, but she saw right through that, the same way she saw through you the first time you met. She explained that you’d still have control over the situation: you'd set boundaries; in fact, she encourages you to set boundaries. It’s not about forcing you into a role or making you don a collar of subservience you don’t want to wear. It’s simply something to try.
So you acquiesced.
“I’ve never done this before,” you say, hoping your voice doesn’t betray your nervousness.
“That’s fine,” she responds. “We can do something simple, just to see how you like it.”
It’s the new moon, the safest time to introduce wolfsbane to your system. She’d spent the evening before brewing the wolfsbane, dosing the concentration by consulting standard prescriptions for other decoctions with oral and topical versions, then extrapolating the ratios and differences from them.
“Working at an apothecary has its benefits,” she’d said, smiling when you told her you were impressed. She’d dyed the rope with the decoction this morning; she unwinds those hanks of red rope now.
She has you tug your shirt over your head, has you unbutton and pull off your pants until you’re left just in your underwear, has you kneel on the soft rug before her. Meanwhile, she strips off her dress until she’s left wearing just an undershirt, the red silk of the halter top covering her front and leaving her back mostly bare but for the tied closure, the thin fabric of her underwear clinging to her hips.
“Any triggers or conditions I should know about?”
You flash her a wry grin. “Besides the lycanthropy?”
“Don’t get smart with me, boy.”
A shiver runs down your spine and you sit up straighter. “No, ma’am.”
She smiles. You lap up her approval.
“Any spots I should avoid? Any injuries?”
You stretch and take stock of your body. You’re still sore from the fight a couple weeks ago, the skin stitched back together but still tight and scabbed.
“Just the shoulder.”
She lays a hand on your injured shoulder, the touch possessive. You lean into it and look up at her. Her expression is impassive and makes you want to squirm under the intensity of it, but you keep yourself still and wait for her next words.
“Same safewords as before: ‘stop’ if you want me to stop, ‘mercy’ if you want me to slow down, and ‘keep going’ if everything is fine,” she says. “Is that okay?”
You nod.
“Yes ma’am.”
“And,” she says, pressing a small, cold item into your hand, “if you find you can’t speak, drop this.”
You look at what she’s given you. It’s a small bell, polished and golden; you nod again as you close your fingers around it.
“Yes ma’am.”
She kneels behind you. Your breaths are already coming more quickly now, your skin warm with anticipation. She leans forward, her exhales fluttering against your ear, and lets her black hair fall to tickle your shoulder.
“Breathe.”
You do. One deep breath, and then another. She holds the rope in a loose bundle and brushes it against you, not yet tying, only teasing, as if she’s allowing you to acclimate yourself to just the feeling of the rope. It’s rough, hemp if you were to guess, but her touch is so delicate it feels like fingernails grazing your skin, leaving goosebumps in their wake. There’s another sensation too, a bite that gets sharper when she presses the rope harder to your skin as she runs it all over your chest, your nipples, your back, your torso: teeth catching on you, the sting of what must be the wolfsbane. The whole experience is the other end of the spectrum from impact, the subtlety of the touch making you feel as if you could burst with want, with the desire for more.
When she begins to use the rope as a restraint instead of as a toy, it’s not a quick journey through the scaffolds of knotwork, doing and undoing. Instead, she takes her time, tells you to breathe again. In that moment, her hand rubbing up and down your arm, a soft reassurance, inhale exhale, you finally allow yourself to give her your trust, truly and genuinely, for the first time. Your mind goes blank, as if a switch has flipped within you, the only language you have the soft sighs falling past your lips, the way your body eases into hers, like the tide reaching toward the moon.
She takes a length of rope, runs it along your collarbones, until she has one hand fisted around an end on either side of you, the red a border hugging your chest. Without warning, she tugs, manhandling you back toward her, and the unexpected pleasure that gesture brings wrenches a groan from you. Your back is pressed up against her chest, her warmth radiating through you, her skin so soft in the places where the two of you touch.
She transfers the end of the rope so that she’s holding both in one hand. With her free hand, she tugs at your hair, baring your throat. A moment of panic flashes through you—you’re exposed; you never let yourself be this vulnerable—before the sensation of having your hair pulled drowns out your anxiety. Your whole scalp tingles as you surrender to her, let her open you to the world.
“How are you doing?” she murmurs. It’s all you can do to nod, your words lost. She strokes your cheek, the touch making you shudder with how much you love it, how much you’ve craved it, how good it feels when you allow yourself this.
She releases her hold on your hair, releases the rope from around you.
“Hands together in front of you,” she says. You obey, like you’re praying to some unknown god as she deftly knots bars around your arms, pulls a harness around your chest, all the while letting the rope drag across your skin, sinking you further and further into the quiet space in your head where you can let everything go.
She comes around to kneel before you, tips your chin up so that you’re looking into her eyes. You hope your expression holds half the awe, the adoration thrumming through your body.
“You’re doing so well,” she whispers. A warm fondness blossoms in your chest. In a state like this, you don’t have it in you to clamp down on such a feeling. She runs her thumb along your lower lip, and your mouth falls open instinctively, your breaths shallow.
“Such a good boy,” she says, making that warmth unfurl more, spread until even your fingertips tingle with the pleasure of it. She stands, steps to position herself behind you again. The rope follows her movements, trails against your throat. Tightens, just the slightest. Your breath catches, fear rising in you, but you tell yourself that she won’t hurt you.
She releases the rope and pulls it back; it disappears behind you, brushing against you as she does something with it. When the rope comes back into view, there’s a thick button knot in the middle of it, twisted and intricate. She traces the knot against your lips. You tremble, a sudden cold washing over you, but you want to be good for her. Want to be so good for her, want to please her; you let your lips part, let the rope drag harder against you.
She pulls on the rope until the knot is settled between your teeth, holding your mouth open. She tilts your head back again. Your hands are bound, your mouth gagged. Your breath hitches in your chest, catching once, twice; you won’t let yourself move. Your eyes flutter shut.
You can’t look.
Your heart stutters against your ribs as your breathing stops. Tenseness creeps over your shoulders. The warm openness you were feeling before constricts into a tightness in your chest, an unbearable pressure; your shoulders stiffen, and maybe if you were in another state you’d recognize your body’s reactions more clearly.
“...Langxin…?”
Like you’re underwater, your hearing fades in and out, everything muffled; your head feels light.
“...Langxin…? How are you doing?”
She eases the pressure from the knot, tugs it from your mouth so you can speak, but instead of responding, you clench your jaw, let your head tip forward. You’re shaking, squeezing your eyes more tightly shut, willing yourself to go back to the quiet space instead of the chaos, the noise, the memories that are starting to break in through the cracks at the edge of your mind.
You don’t speak.
“Stop,” she says.
Your eyes snap open and you take in a shuddering gasp. Chi is kneeling before you, the rope with the button knot cast to the side; she’s untying you, deftly and without any of the sensuality from before.
“...did I do something wrong?” you say finally, when your words come back, and the smallness of your voice scares you.
“No,” she replies, the word gentle. She sits cross-legged before you, peering into your face. “I just lost you for a moment. Thought I might have pushed too far and wanted to stop things before I did any lasting damage.”
Your cheeks are damp. It takes you a moment to realize that they’re tears. You turn your face away, as if doing so will hide the tracks on your skin.
“Talk to me,” Chi says, her voice soft. “It’s okay.”
“I didn’t realize…” You let the bell fall to the floor and scrub your face with your hands as you take a deep breath. “I didn’t realize I’d react that way.”
She nods. “It’s okay. We don’t have to do it again.”
You shake your head and turn to face her again. “No, I… it was good. It was just the last part.”
She leans in.
“May I touch you?”
You nod. That, at least, you can answer without any hesitation or uncertainty—you welcome her touch. She places a hand on your uninjured shoulder, traces soothing circles against your skin.
“What didn’t you like about the last part?”
You look away again, choosing a spot on the rug to focus on. When her touch has soothed most of the tension from you, when your breathing has evened out, you trust yourself to speak.
“The times I didn’t take wolfsbane… well, there are a couple ways to deal with the transformation.”
You smile, but it’s rueful.
“The first, of course, is how you found me. Go wild, go feral, and let it run its course. But someone inevitably gets hurt.”
You pause and trace the crimson latticework on the edges of the rug with your eyes. Delicate, curved flowers nestle in an angular maze. You’ll tell her, because you’ve trusted her this much, and she hasn’t yet abandoned you for lowering your walls.
“The second method is what we used through most of my childhood and my young adulthood.” You look back at her then, her warm brown eyes soothing as she listens. “Silver muzzle. Silver choke collar. Tethered for the whole transformation.”
Her eyes widen. She covers her mouth, at a loss for words; a moment later, she reaches out again and puts a hand over yours.
“I’m so sorry.”
You close your eyes and let yourself feel her warmth.
“It’s okay. I don’t have to go through that anymore. I just didn’t realize my body still remembers.”
She reaches up to cup your cheek, then places a gentle kiss on your forehead.
“We don’t have to—”
You shake your head.
“No, I want to try again,” you say. “I can control it.”
She nods.
“If you’re sure.”
You smile and lean in to kiss her, the gesture a reassurance to you both.
“I am.”
The rope becomes a ritual: practice, at first, before it transforms into something deeper. A meditation. You and Chi still lead separate lives, but every week, every few days, you come together like comets pulled into each other’s orbits. When she orders you on your knees, your hands held before you as if waiting to be shackled, the tension melts from your body, and the rest of the world’s concerns fade away. Here, it’s only you and her, only the safety of submission, of allowing someone else to take the reins.
The wolfsbane seems to be having an effect, too. You’re taking it through the rope sessions, but also through the decorative harnesses she sometimes ties that you can wear under your clothes: ties not meant to restrict, only to allow the wolfsbane to diffuse, for you to have that roughness grounding you. Your next two transformations are not as violent as the one where she found you feeding the earth with your blood.
You’re seated with her on her bed, the curtains drawn back to let the light of the lamps and the gibbous moon stream in. You idly trace the carvings on the red wooden bedframe with one hand, your other arm draped around her. She’s dressed in a thin robe, her dark hair pooling over her shoulder as she leans against your chest and reads a book. The golden tones of the lamps blend together with the silver light of the moon, catching the curves and peaks of her body: the fine edges of her collarbones, the gentle swell of her chest.
You’ve kissed her many times, rested the palm of your hand against the small of her back, but it strikes you then that you’ve never seen her completely undressed. You’re not sure you even want to—it wouldn’t be unwelcome, but it’s not the nature of your relationship. It's based on something else: you don’t know if it’s love, but if it is, it’s not a romantic love. It’s something platonic, but deeply intimate: an inversion of every other relationship you’ve been in, a place you are allowed to be yin and she is allowed to be yang.
You should be happy about what you have with Chi. You’ve never had someone purposely knock down your façades to see your true self, and to like that version of you, and there’s certainly part of you that’s grateful for the positive changes you see in yourself with her.
Another part of you, that irrational voice so thoroughly trained by your instincts you once thought natural and biological, pushes back, says you’re complacent, soft, weak. You haven’t told anyone else about this, after all: if what you do with Chi were something to be proud of, wouldn’t you tell someone else about it? The most you’ve ever said is that you’re seeing someone.
You’re better at parsing your emotions now, articulating them clearly—Chi glares at you if you try to be vague—so you recognize what you’re feeling now isn’t actually shame.
It’s fear.
You’ve worn your wolfskin for so long, draped over your human form as protection. As insurance. Who are you without it but another human whose flesh is soft, whose heart can break? Before, you’d rather die than admit you’re just as fragile inside as anyone else. The acknowledgement that you can be fractured inside, the thought that others can see that too and judge you for it—
It’s terrifying. You thought your wolfskin gave you power, but it was another binding, loosening now. You learned to be so helpless you’re not sure how to live without it.
Chi snaps her book shut, pulling you back to the present.
“I can’t concentrate. You’re thinking too loudly,” she says. “What’s on your mind?”
“It’s nothing,” you say, automatically. Chi gives you an unimpressed look, but you stand your ground. “Really.”
“Well,” she says, “you seem to be doing better lately. I didn’t even need the big bandages last time. Just the small ones.”
Part of you wants to snap at her teasing tone, but the rest of you knows it’s good-natured.
“Could we do more with it?” she says. “Make the wolfsbane more effective?”
“I suppose,” you say. It hits you in a single, overwhelming wave: what you’re feeling isn’t just fear, but guilt, intensified whenever you face her willingness to help you. Your words tumble out in a burst: “Why, though? Why do you even try? Why do you care?”
You leave unspoken the words and why me?, but you imagine she picks them up. She’s quiet for a moment as she runs her fingers over the cover of her book.
“I have to be useful,” she says. “For anyone to keep me around.”
You stare at her, not sure how to respond to either her frankness or this revelation.
“But you’re beautiful,” you say. “Sharp as a knife, a heart big enough to harbor wrecks like me. Only a fool wouldn’t want to keep you around.”
She laughs at that.
“Really? You think so?” she says.
“I know so.”
“You,” she says, taking you by the chin, a smile spreading on her red lips, “must be a fool, then.”
You’re not sure what to make of that statement. Your confusion must show on your face, because Chi laughs again and sits back, giving you a look that has layers to it, appreciation on the surface, sadness rippling underneath.
“I had the biggest crush on you in secondary, you know that?”
Your face goes through a series of expressions before finally settling on bewildered as you say, “What?”
“We were in the same year at Dame Qīngshān Secondary. Everyone knew you. I wasn’t a loner, but you never noticed me back then, either. When I saw you at the club, I thought I’d hop on the chance to get closure about a petty old flame, but.” She smiles wryly. “Guess I got attached somewhere.”
“Wait…” Hazy memories bubble to the surface. You take a close look at Chi’s face. She’s changed her hair from a bob to longer waves, and her cheeks have rounded out a bit, but her eyes are the same beautiful willow-leaf shape. “Chi, like the president of theater club? I always wanted to try out for a play, but…”
Chi nodded. “A guy like you doesn’t do stuff like that?”
“That’s what everyone said.”
Chi changes the topic then, but it doesn’t escape your notice how Chi’s lips quirked into the tiniest smile when you brought up that she was president of the theater club.
You sleep beside her that night, bodies curled together like an eddy. When you wake, the familiar ache has settled into your bones, the tenderness in your flesh radiating out so that every movement makes you wince. It’s a tension coiled up in the pit of your stomach, ready to break. When you sit up, her eyes flutter open.
“Don’t go,” she murmurs, her voice heavy with sleep.
“I have to. I’m going to shift tonight.”
“No,” she says, turning to face you better, the sheets rustling. “I want to try something.”
You furrow your brow. “What do you want to try?”
She sits up too and takes your hands in hers, her palms calloused with years of working with knots.
“Using the rope when you’re about to transform.”
You frown.
“I…” You pause. Maybe it could work as a restraint, but it very well could go disastrously. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“We can try it in the forest, where neither of us can be cornered in a room,” she says. “I have a knife that can cut through the rope if we need it, in case it’s too much for you and we have to stop early to give each other space while you ride it out.”
You’d do a lot for her, but would you be able to live with yourself if you hurt her? You’ve tossed other relationships aside like carcasses. How deeply that damage runs, how much you’ve used your pain as a weapon; you know now how much you don’t want Chi to endure that.
But if it works, if you keep yourself fully in check, if this potential for hurt weren’t part of your life… the possibility of real freedom is dizzying. You touch your forehead to hers and stay there for a moment as you let your eyelids close, your heart considering the decision.
“Okay. But I need a little time today to prepare.”
You return to Chi’s home in the late afternoon, the golden light of the sun infusing everything with warmth. The clay brew pot that has been simmering on the stove for hours fills Chi’s home with the bitter scent of wolfsbane, decocted into a stronger concentration this time. She takes the lengths of rope and curls them into the water, letting them soak through.
The sun’s rays are longer and lower by the time the two of you reach the forest, the leaves and twigs rustling underfoot. Your whole body trembles with energy, but you’re not at the cusp between human and wolf—you have a couple hours longer. You’re not attuned enough to your body to time it down to the minute, but you’ve gotten better at sensing your transformation over the years.
You come to a clearing, the canopy filtering the light like a kaleidoscope, dappling the ground with spots of gold. Chi sets down the basket with the still-damp rope; you set down your bag. You pull off your shirt and kneel; she stands before you and threads a hand through your hair, gently this time, a reassurance. You close your eyes and swallow.
“Chi,” you say. “I need you to be safe.”
You inhale deeply and look up at her. Your senses are already heightening again, almost painfully so, bordering on overload. She’s wearing her honey-tobacco perfume again, the scent of it inundating every other scent in the forest. She’s in the leaves, in the light, in the dirt, in the bark.
In the wolfsbane.
“I can call it off early enough to give you time to get to safety, but I want to be completely certain that nothing will happen to you. So…”
You pull the bag to you and undo the clasps. With shaking hands, you pull out the contents and lay them out before you: the silver muzzle, the silver choke chain, both like shocks to your fingertips.
“No,” Chi says. “I can’t do that to you.”
“I can tell when I’m about to tip over. I can tell if I’m losing it.” You let out a long exhale. “So if I tell you to muzzle me… please, do it.”
“Langxin—”
You give her a hard look, and the words die in her throat.
“I need this in place for us. I’d rather go through this and deal with the aftermath than injure you or kill you. A very real possibility.”
Her gaze is unreadable. Moments pass between you, only the rustling of the wind and a stray chirp of a grasshopper breaking the silence.
“Okay,” she says. “Show me how.”
You show her how to put on the muzzle, the chain. You keep your breathing deliberate. It only takes her a couple tries to get the hang of putting it on and taking it off. She sets the devices aside and gets on her knees too, pulling you close and smoothing your hair.
“You know I only like restraining you when you enjoy it too, right?”
You bark out a laugh.
“I know.”
The exchange eases some of the tension. Even though your blood simmers and your heart thuds painfully against your chest, when Chi takes out the rope and touches its rough texture to your skin, you feel the world fade out. Everything reduces to the red of the rope, the golden tone of her skin, the black of her hair, the red of her dress and lips.
“Breathe.”
You breathe. The heavier concentration of wolfsbane makes the rope come even more alive when it touches your skin, leaving trails of fire that your hypersensitivity only intensifies. Still, it’s not unwelcome. The sensation drowns out any other thought.
Chi unwinds the rope, folds it in half, and takes the bight in one hand. You’re barely watching her. The golden light has faded. Chi smells so human, so strong and so uniquely her, the unmistakable olfactory print of her suffusing through her perfume.
“Please,” you whisper, your words beginning to leave you. “Don’t tease. I need it.”
So she obliges you: she works quicker than usual, sensing the urgency. The rope whips across your skin. Your breathing hitches, comes out ragged, raw; you flex your hands, curl them into fists. Blood rushes through your ears. Every vessel and nerve yearns to cave into a frenzied churning, and it takes all you have to keep breathing. You focus on Chi, on the rope: her grounding presence, the sensations thrumming through you.
She finishes the harness around your chest and arms, makes a few quick ties across your thighs and ankles. The wolfsbane sinks deeper into you, roots transforming from fire to a dull, smoldering ember beneath your skin. Your whole body throbs and hums.
“You’re doing so well,” she murmurs.
Something ebbs within you. The bloodrush quiets. The clearing is dappled now in silver light, soft and cool, captured in Chi’s dark eyes. You wonder if your own eyes reflect the moonlight. If, for once, you can tip your head back and drink it in instead of letting loose the howl that always builds up in your lungs.
But your blood is still simmering. Could boil over at any moment, is starting to increase in urgency again. You close your eyes. You want this to work so badly, but as your body responds, coming undone again in the moonlight, you know it’s not going to be that easy.
“Cut the rope,” you choke out. “I can’t. Not this time.”
“Do you need the muzzle?” she says. She has the knife out already, the metal of it glinting.
You pause to take in how you’re feeling: that urge to be feral stretches tense like a wire, but taking deep, steady breaths, you can ease some of that pressure and pull yourself back from the brink. You’ve still got some semblance of control, enough to keep yourself in check as she makes her way to safety.
You shake your head. “No. But I need you to keep your distance.”
It takes only a couple swift movements of the knife to cut through the rope. Your muscles already pulsing, your body blazing with transformation, you cling to being human for a few moments longer. Chi stands, tensed as if she’s ready to run.
You don’t want Chi to see this side of you, but it’s too late to keep this from her now. You stagger away from her, your bones creaking with change; the wolf-mind bleeds into your whole being.
“Run,” you say, your voice a growl, before the wolf-mind erases this word from you. The rest of the transformation shears through you; you fall onto all fours, your eyes sharp in the dark.
When you scan the clearing you find a human a few body lengths away from you, staring wide-eyed. The language of her muscles, universal, mammalian: rooted to the spot by fear, despite her urgency to flee.
Prey, to be hunted.
You stalk toward her. One step, another. She trembles. Your nose twitches as you sniff the air. When you breathe in the scent of honey and tobacco intermingled with a familiar human smell, you pause.
Something inside you tells you to resist this hunt. To pull back, to go against your instinct for the first time. Your wolf-mind doesn’t understand this impulse, but your body obeys. Your tail lowers. Your heart thuds against your ribs. Although it murmurs hunt, hunt, hunt, you sit before this strange human instead.
Her body relaxes, ever so slightly. She finally moves—not to escape. She steps forward, lifts a hand slowly. You don’t react. Another step: the space between you contracts. Her shallow, tentative breaths fill your ears as moonlight drenches the clearing.
She bites her lip and places her hand on your forehead, her fingers trembling. A gentle touch, light and tentative; a strange touch—you’ve never felt human skin against your fur like this. Some part of you tells you now, now’s your chance; she’s so close, here in front of you. Sink your teeth into her throat, have your kill, satisfy the bloodlust in you.
Part of you resists. No. Unfamiliar to your wolf-mind. You wait. Both parts of you fight. Your tail swishes as a conflicted energy pulses through you.
“Langxin,” she says, deepening her touch.
Your ears perk and twitch. That sound, familiar, brings you a deep satisfaction, an urge to be good, to rein yourself in, to protect her and protect yourself.
“My beautiful, wolf-hearted boy,” she whispers.
You are at the chasm within you, looking down into the bottomless black. Did that darkness hold death, an end, as you once thought? As you close your eyes, your human-mind surfaces in the sea of your wolf-mind. The depth isn’t an end, but an exit. A new way.
The voice that says hunt fades to a faint mutter.
You lean in to her touch.
Many thanks to the late Xan West of Kink Praxis for their suggestions on safer depiction of bondage. I added a nonverbal safe word protocol based on their feedback.