When Morpheus lay back against the pillows again, he admired his lap ornament. His long pale fingers lightly stroked her bare thighs. For the moment, Arianda fought him only with rebellion in her eyes. She tried to think of options. Beating him with her manacled hands would surely get her nowhere. He'd simply change the circumstances on her again.

"Dearest Ari, did you not wonder why no fire came to your aid? Or why you could not transform and pad your little feline self away?"

Yes, of course, they were in his world, the dream world, over which he had ultimate control. Well, she might have no more defense than obstinence, but at least she would not give him anything willingly. She took a deep breath, feigning boredom actually, and looked around the room. When she looked back, he was no longer laying beneath her but she soon realized he sat under her and he was without his leggings. The tip of his stiff column peeped between her own parted thighs.

They were no longer in a cabin on a ship, but in a dark grey cavern. There were no lanterns or candles, but the walls emitted a foggy glow. The place was cold and echoing. Nothing was in the chamber except Arianda, and her captor now sitting on his own feet with her sitting in his lap. Her bent legs spread uncomfortably across his muscular thighs. He curled around her, his chilled breath upon her neck. His cold hands raised her trapped wrists and looped her arms back over his head. She was pinned upon him, her whole body splayed within easy reach.

Fingers crept over the tops of her thighs then came up between them. He took one exploratory stroke between her lips then slipped a cool thick finger inside her.

"Seems at least part of you enjoys this," he hissed beneath her ear.

She wriggled against him from renewed anger, rather than physical pleasure. She hissed through her teeth. "What is your demand, Morpheus?"

"Demand?" The hint of innocence in his voice was unconvincing. He shifted to whisper beneath her other ear, "I thought perhaps you would eventually offer... a favor."

Arianda's throat went dry. It was Frost's deep voice that vibrated through her, even the exploration between her thighs continued. With these very words the ice dragon had coaxed her into trying him. Thoughts of their joining shivered through her body. Morpheus could feel the moisture of her memories against his fingers. He knew precisely how to stroke her, how to tease around her hardened nub and then draw softly across it to make her body arch.

"Come, Arianda..." He grinned against her neck at his little pun, made in his own whispered voice, "What stops you from enjoying this little game?"

Her body responded to his expertly questing fingers. Of course he knew precisely what drove those tender nerves to ecstacy. He knew more of her than she herself knew, physically and otherwise. "You are---", her voice hitched into a breathy finish of an edited thought, "...well aware."

"Ah yes, the game perturbs you simply because you are not the game master." Nipping at her neck, making her gasp and curl back against him, defying her conscious will, he corrected, "Or rather, game mistress." With that last hiss, he buried his teeth in the nape of her neck, even as his fingertips brought to a flash point the deep burning within her. He had the power to magnify every move and used it, such that Arianda's moan echoed in the seemingly endless darkness of the cold chamber around them.

Going slack for a moment, the Lady felt her arms being released. The shackles dissolved from her wrists, allowing her arms to limply and slowly descend back against her sides. She was like a puppet whose strings has been cut. She felt her loose body gradually recline upon... some sort of soft, uneven bedding.

As her eyes drifted slowly open, albeit only halfway, the darkness began to glitter. She looked up at silvery light reflecting in uncountable directions around her. One hand stretched out to feel the velvety black cushions upon which she reclined. She was in the Reflection Chamber filled with the ethereal light of the double full moons sparkling into the mirrors.

With a swallow and a slow shake of her head, Arianda's mind tried to erase the illusion. Closing her eyes helped, and though she wasn't sure where he was, she spoke again to her captor. "Morpheus, why must you toy with me in this way? I know you have what you want of me in my unremembered dreams."

"I have a likeness of you, yes, but not you."

Once again she felt him. He crawled upward to bring his body over hers. Her own lace covering was gone. So were his leggings. She felt the bare warmth of stiffness teasing between her thighs as he spread them apart with his own knees. And then, she felt something light and teasing brush across her breasts.

When Arianda opened her eyes, it was Bear's tanned face gazing wantonly back at her, so close, so warm. She even caught the scent of Bear upon him, while long strands of his black hair brushed over her skin.

Looking directly into those grey eyes, unable to see anything but Bear's soul in them, she still tried to speak to Morpheus. "You are cruel to give me what you know I want, for I must awaken to find I no longer have it."

"Cruel? Some might see it as a gift." The words were not Bear's but the warm resonant voice was his.

Again she closed her eyes to remind herself who was actually pressed over her. "You are happy then to have me as another, and not as yourself?"

"Myself? Who or what am I, beyond fragments drawn from the mind of the dreamer?"

"Then," Arianda slowly grinned, her eyes still closed, "I am game mistress after all, and I shall have from you what I greatly wish."

Slowly she looked again and Bear was still there, his face poised close to her face, his hips ready for a push between her thighs. She gazed briefly at their surroundings, at the very image of one Beltane Ritual in the Chamber. She echoed her own words from that night as she gazed again into the depth of grey eyes, "You have been here before, Bear."

Eager to have her joining this game, eager to have her willing participation, Morpheus looked back at her from within the image she expected, the image he'd drawn from her. He applied the voice and words that would seal the illusion, echoing Bear's words on that night, "Never before. Not like this."

Morpheus secretly wished she would close her eyes again, for if she did, she might for one brief second separate him from his mask. But Arianda did not want to look away, for the very same reason. It was Bear's hips that slowly, agonizingly pressed forward, parting her velvet flesh with his smooth warm tip. It was Bear's long slow descent that filled her so deliciously, only to partially withdraw and leave her breathless until his next gradual plunge.

They folded together, moving against each other, slowly increasing the urgency of each completed connection, and the woefulness of each parting. When their individual panting became indistinguishable, one from another, one last thrust of hips locked them together. Only a succession of jerking shudders followed their boisterous moans echoing around the mirrored chamber. Then at last, they collapsed upon the black velvet and the entire scene faded out of existence.

Lady Arianda awoke slowly, with the scent of their spent bodies lingering in her mind. She was wrapped in her twisted sheets, as usual, but not yet ready to fight her way out of them. She merely lay there in the glow of what had not really happened, but was fondly remembered. She might again take issue with Morpheus on some other occasion, but for now her body and spirit were peaceful. Wherever he was, she hoped the same for Bear. At least for this moment, the charade had somewhat quelled her own longing. Illusion or not, she had been with him again, and that felt good.