Needs

	This is, strangely enough, a Mononoke Hime lemon. (If any Miyazaki fans are
reading this, please don�t kill me.) The idea just came to me while I was
watching the pirated VCD version of it (yes, don�t kill me again, especially
if you did it the first time) especially during Ashitaka�s "sonata ga
utsukushii" (you�re beautiful) comment, and I thought I�d write it. Yes -
this is an extreme departure from my normal work, but hey, it�s a whim. And
as a whim, it�s not being subjected to my usual multiple re-reads, so please
be gentle with it.

	Last note - I was not understanding A LOT of the film, owing to the lousy
Chinese subtitling and the fact that almost everyone was speaking a rural
Japanese dialect, which I am not surprisingly, lousy at. Please excuse any
errors. 

	Hmm. Not that it�s likely there�ll be any - it�s a lemon anyway. ^_^

Cue soft version of the theme tune (nice overland riff) as you will.

******

	Night.

	True night, not the pale, everyday semblance of the force, the entity that
came only sparingly to bless the earth with it�s presence. True night was
more - a dark cloak of velvet blackness that permeated the very earth and
sky with it�s essence and set the stars sparkling with white fire, light
against the cool shade of day�s end. A more that only a few could sense, let
alone experience. 

	To the lone figure making it�s lonely way up the mountain road, it was more
than enough. He reveled in it, exulted in the grace it lent every aspect of
his steady, slow upwards motion, one leg falling in ceaseless step behind
the other. Because for him it was relief enough to be in the wild - again,
the true wild. The place blessed by the Beast God, not merely a few
scattered animals and plants. More.

	Like her. Just like she was more than all this, the wind that sighed above
and over the verdant plain around him, more than the sky and the clouds�
eternal dance. More than just the fact the wind smelled of her. 
She was everything here, separate but same...somehow more than all of it.

	He smiled once, a smile of slow, budding, joy. 

	He needed her. He had only realized that over the last few months,
cloistered in the East Ward of Tokyo as he was, fending of the needless
attentions of courtier and courtesan alike. He needed her as he had never
had before, even when they were fighting for their lives, or when she was
feeding him that leaf. Need had raged within, a pure primal force that had
shaken off the shackles of civilization and brought him back here. To her.
For her. 

	The wind soughed again, the grass rippling before him in slow, fluid waves.
So beautiful - how could anyone seek to despoil this? One had, he knew, too
well. Had tried. But that was the past. The past was for forgetting, for
remembering, sometimes. For not thinking, for simply knowing, the animal
way. He smiled again. Her scent was higher now, fainter as the updrafts
carried it away, but clearer, too. Closer.

	Another smile. The hunt was on.

	With a howl of ecstasy he took to his feet, letting the cry peal out into
the night, running faster and faster and faster and finally falling to all
fours, only to rise again and run and cry and scream his joy to the
blackness, the warm comforting embrace of nature all around him. He was
home, and he needed her. And she would come. He needed her as he needed his
arm, his legs, his eyes. As he would a mate. He never paused to consider the
why or how of it - just ran.

	He ran and he cried out again, this time from the sheer pleasure of the
earth pounding beneath his feet, his muscles playing beneath his skin and
the sky above his head. Slowly, then with increasing rapidity, the ground
fell away from him, the distance between the hilltop and him shortening with
every step - 

	...and then in one final leap he was there. Her smell struck him like a
physical blow - hot, damp and musky with just the slightest whiff of
fragrance. He paused, looking, panting from the long run up, but saw no one.
Where was she? 

	For a moment, doubt. Then instinct overcame him - "San?"

	Silence. The wind, the sky and the air. The grass around. The muted buzz
and chirp of night insects, the muffled myriad noises of animals. Nothing else. 

	Then - "Ashitaka?"

	She barreled into him even as he turned to her, their mutual embrace
turning stronger, fiercer, as they tumbled down the hill, gasping and
shrieking from the touch of the other, the cold air and the feeling of cloth
and skin on the bare ground - his hands meeting hers, then shifting down for
better purchase, her breath hot against his neck, wild, flashing eyes -

	Then it was quiet again, and she was staring at him. Wild eyes - wolf eyes,
he realized.

	*I�m not a human! I�m a mountain wolf! Afraid, hesitant, yet fiercely
defiant.* He had always wondered if that was the moment he had fallen in
love with her, when she had forced him to confront his own humanity. But then...

	*I love you, Ashitaka. But I cannot forgive the humans.* Was that it? Her
face had haunted him for months later, eyes soft but still hard with
restrained anger, body quick, supple and strong like the wind. Like a wolf.
No...that wasn�t it.

	"San..." his voice came out as a rasp. "I missed you."

	A flicker of recognition, the beginning of a smile - yes, a smile, he knew
that he had never seen her smile - and then she turned away.

	Later, then. Months, as the memories and the small scar the Shishigami had
left on his left hand faded. Years later, as he went to Tokyo to live, still
remembering. Knowing that he had left a part of himself back with her, a
princess by her wolf�s side. Needing something more.

	Now the tears. Despair and uncertainty ran rampant through him as he stood
speechless, the wind whistling mournful through the trees, her back to him.
Cool rivers ran down his cheeks, thoughts forgotten - could she have known
why he came? Because this time he came with a need primal in nature...not
human. Perhaps that was it. He was human, and therefore cut off from her. 

	"Ashitaka." Her voice...different, somehow, as she turned back to him.
Older, stronger. He tried to ignore the feelings it evoked from him, the
burning fires it lit, and looked instead at the smooth play of her back
muscles, the long mane of ebony hair cascading down from her shoulders. Her
scent returned - more forceful, seeking, full of a insistent hunger. The air
was chill as he knelt beside her.

	"Ashitaka..." Again, his name. He whispered hers back as her arms snaked
around his, slowly and then gently - eyes, again, as he looked at her. Wolf
eyes, brown flecked with gray. Their gazes locked, the moments stretching
into a distance far beyond what lay between them. He couldn�t resist, he...

	"...sonata ga utsukushii. Hontou ni." 

	Silence, for a while, again. He fought back the need, content to rest near
her, to take in every aspect of her being, the slender strength beneath the
even now small, lithe frame. His name escaped her one last time, a hiss,
almost unbelieving, when she turned her head away again.

	He knew what to do this time - it was the animal way, after all. 

	"San...I�m here." Simple words, fingers reaching to her, heart quickening
at the feel of skin against skin. "I never knew when you became shy."
Laughing slightly now, pressing her against him more, scent and feeling
threatening his feeble control, almost unbearable. "I..." he left it at that
and let the wind sing out instead. She would know.

	Shifting to see him. Wolf but human eyes, and a longing hidden deep within.
She was beautiful, and now, older, his breath caught in his throat to see
her anew. Need rose and he beat it back down, amazed at her, how she had
grown, changed. And then...

	"Ashitaka...I..." Shy. Almost shy, almost human, her voice was.
Gentle...searching. "I...want you. I wanted you back."

	This time there were no words - only skin against skin and flesh against
flesh and the sky above and ground below as they embraced.

	Eyes as she reached out wonderingly to caress his face, and eyes again as
he did hers, aware now of the heat building between them. Eyes a last final
time as their embrace tightened, deepened with unspoken need, and then his
mouth met hers, slowly, ever so exquisitely slowly, pushing him down to the
cool earth, body and mind in mutual harmony. He had not needed to worry -
she had known. Animal but human...gentle yet fierce - his San, he realized.
Years of unrealized longing came back in a flare of passion, and then they
were rolling together, shedding clothes haphazardly among the leaves and
flowers. He was brought up short next to her, amazed at their shared passion.

	Eyes as they looked up to each other, green to almost-gray, a locked stare
that changed to shy caresses, hands roaming down each other. No words were
needed - all his explanations, his reasons, tumbling away in the light of
San�s soft but insistent touch. Hands, this time, tracing myriad swirling
paths along each other, and hands, yes, oh-so responsive hands that brushed
aside his hair and clothes and stroked him time and time again.

	It was sheer bliss for a while, the world receding into nothing but a
background blur as they rubbed and pushed against the other. Then she spoke,
whispering. "Why did you come back, Ashitaka?" Stopping, waiting for his
answer, hands still restless upon his back. So very, very beautiful - black
hair like a waterfall, body incredibly, utterly alive under him. Eyes deep
and promising, promising more. He found himself suddenly thinking if she
thought him attractive as well, and...

	He understood, then. She was not a mountain wolf, yes, but not truly human
either - rather, a cross, a perfect union of the two. His San...his Mononoke
Hime, a princess with her wolf eyes. She needed him, he needed her; the
animal way, certainly, but humans needed something more. The more that had
brought him back here, that answered her question - the more called love.

	Moments which stretched to eternity and beyond as they stared. He willed
her to understand, to feel, what he was thinking. Why he had come back.

	*I hate humans!*

	*I�m a human too.*	

	Need reached out, scents twining and merging. And then, she, too, understood.

	Passion flamed again, unrestrained and full of wildness as their last bits
of clothes came off, his breeches forming a tangled mass with her shirt - he
paused suddenly, at once amazed and a bit frightened at the sudden sight of
her two well-formed breasts. Then she leapt onto him, her mouth finding his,
and indecision vanished in the blaze of pure need. Pure, primal wanting...he
let his thoughts dissolve to nothing, his inhibitions falling away as he
surrendered his very being to the undefinable *rightness* of being close to her.

	No more eyes - they were past the stage of such affirmations of love; now
it was only body to body contact, heat blossoming from them and the sweet
headiness of desire. Their kiss broke, he now barely aware of the surging
ardor from his loins, as he brought his hands up to caress her - moans from
the two as they descended ever lower, pausing, now and then, to listen, to
savor the cries of the other. The sudden clarity of everything happening
broke like a wave upon him, and then it all seemed so much more wonderful.

	They stopped, each panting heavily from exertion and sweat; he favored him
with a small, shy smile, and he gave her one in return, tracing a finger
tenderly down her jaw. It had been so long...and yet, this was different
from the sadness that had overtaken him at her leaving, or the slow ache for
her that had grown over 
the years. This was dreams realized and hope made and skin on skin and more.
She gave a low growl of pleasure and turned on her back - he gasped at the
change from heat to coolness - then smiled back at her grin.

	It began again, slower, more purposeful and hungrier, in a way, both now in
complete and wordless understanding. His hands latched on to her breasts
seemingly of their own accord, and he delighted in her soft whimpers of
ecstacy as his hands stroked the yielding softness, her nipples forming
rock-hard points almost instantly. With exquisite care he brought them
lower, then lower again, her cries turning to low moans - then up once more,
stroking fast and harder, smiling. This was what he wanted to give her; a
more human, slower kind of loving, in tune with the desire of both.

	But she had other ideas. The next second she was all over him, then on him,
her mouth fastened to his and then her own scent and hungry *need* hit him,
and then all was lost. He was rolled then pushed over, her sweaty slick body
so maddeningly close to his own, hair and arms flying wildly, and then
before he was aware of anything else she had righted herself and forced him
down and was on him and then in...

	He had barely enough time to gasp out before the world exploded in front of
him, his vision blurring with the sheer force of their joining. She had let
out her own sounds as well, grunting, whining and growling softly, and his
dazed mind had to admit that yes - her own way had its merits. Then it was
only her and him; no eyes no hands and nothing else. Two bodies moving in
sweet, eternal rhythm...slowly he whispered her name, letting each syllable
escape in a rush of air, and she reared back, arching her beautiful body and
smiled at him - a night goddess astride her stallion...

	And then they were moving again, the insistent yearning rushing steadily to
it�s conclusion, hips moving furiously with strands of both their hair
plastered to sweaty bodies - he gasped and moaned with her as they rode the
need, the swift onrushing wave of mutual pleasure, to it�s climax. She dug
into his back, alternately shrieking and whimpering softly, while he pressed
into her as hard as he could...gods, he thought, so soft and so very, very
good. Every stroke seemed to bring new wave of incredible bodily sensation -
rushing, no, *flowing* from his loins to break over him - he moaned;
couldn�t hold out for much longer, filled with such intense, bursting need,
her now long, passion-filled cries only serving to spur him on, faster, ever
faster -

	The wave blossomed, swelled into a tsunami and then he was lost, both
shouting out in release, sounds merging as their bodies had into a note of
fulfillment that spiraled high into the clouds above. His entire body was
sweat-soaked, hair hanging in limp, damp strands down his eyes, as he looked
up at her own contented gaze. And then smiled - and gasped in shock as she
brought her face down for a slow, lingering kiss. He relaxed, smelling her
own wet hair and feeling her body, hot and alive against his.

	But it seemed that she wasn�t finished. Almost immediately her kiss turned
from languid to forceful, once again full of hungry longing, and she was
pushing against him in small ways, her hands finding places on his back and
legs, her breasts brushing his chest - her smell rose to become heady with
sheer desire, and he realized in startled surprise that she was quite
probably in heat. Strangely enough, that prospect didn�t seem to deter his
interest in the least; it instead spurred him on to return the caresses she
was already giving him. He didn�t stop to question the lack of tiredness he
felt, just gave in to heat and the not inconsiderable still remaining desire. 

	The second time, if possible, was even better than the first. She rode him
with a passion bordering on ferocity, but what made it all the more
wonderful was the expression of utter rapture she had while she did it - the
little side trips her hands made down all over him, the secret feral smiles
she gave him and her gentle licking near his neck...like an animal, he
realized, but he didn�t care. And with that thought he came again,
uncontrollably, that she was his San, his dear, longed-for San and his mate
as well. And then they have rolled over and did it a third time, this time
with him on top - he found the position gave him a lot more control, an
advantage which he put to good use...

	Later, as they lay cooling in the night breeze, she cuddled nearer to him.
He turned to admire her face in the darkness - eyes. Eyes full of happiness.
He snaked an arm around her and pulled her closer, pausing only once to
indulge in another kiss. Even her lips, he found, tasted slightly different.
Sated, contented. Joyful.

	And wasn�t that what he loved about her? He regarded her, silent and full
of untamed beauty, as she sighed softly and moved ever closer. That she was
like this, feral and full of the essence of nature. That was his need, the
first part of which was gone but the second essential part remaining - he
was human, after all. He still needed her in another way.

	She reaffirmed that need the next second, in a long, searching gaze and
soulful kiss. He lay back, accepting and giving, and then there was nothing
else for him to want or desire. He had his lover by his side and the night,
and the fresh air and nothing else did he need. They lay like that for a
time, peaceful and without care.

	Then slowly, smiling, he sneaked his fingers behind her back and began to
knead lightly. Her response was somewhere halfway between a purr and a
murmur, but her continuing rubbing against him showed her evident affection
for his motions. He began to rub more gently, then alternatively harder and
deeper in circles than widened across the smooth texture of her back,
pausing only to flick back a strand of damp hair from her back and tenderly
run one finger through the tangled black mass.

	And then his hands were crossing her front in strong yet delicate caresses
that made her squirm and cry out anew - he teased her nipples unmercifully,
then cupped the soft flesh and began to knead it. He smiled again at her low
growl and shifted his path down, over her thighs and then back higher to her
shoulders in quick, deft motions. She pushed against him, almost angry at
his playing with her - then gasped as he slipped in his need between her
legs and pressed it nearer hers.
	
	From then on he was able to take his time - she acquiesced readily enough
to his delicate ministrations across her slender frame, and her occasional
whispers and moans only spurred him on to greater efforts. But she seemed to
know what he was doing, what he wanted to give her - a slower, gentler and
ultimately more human kind of loving than the wild animal passion before.
Not that he hadn�t liked it; he found himself sorely tempted to give in to
his desires and he watched her writhe and twist before him, but he had also
discovered how very exciting it was to prolong the wait.

	Finally, he relented, ceasing his hands� motions and pressing her to him as
she tried to both kiss him fiercely and wrap her long legs around his -
failing miserably due to feelings renewed from his body�s sudden contact.
Maybe there was something to be said about waiting even longer, he thought
mischievously, bracing himself against her and continuing the interrupted
kiss. He felt her soft breasts under him again, now hot and from exertion,
and licked them tenderly - she arched her back, spurring him on to tweak the
hard nipples, then stroke her to higher heights of passion. She tried but
could not stop his relentless assault; whether it was instinct or simply
luck, he seemed to know exactly where to touch at the right time. Sweat
bathed the two, and he found himself not totally immune to her legs hooking
themselves to his, the incredibly potent smell of her, wet mound against
him, her licking of his neck and least of all her long, frustrated moans.
Their actions continued, becoming alternately more and less frenzied,
varying in intensity and rhythm till both couldn�t stand it any longer - she
was just about ready to claw him, and the rush of blood to his head was
making him feel faint.

	So he shifted to his side, pausing only to savor one last lingering caress
over her lithe frame, and rolled over. In a flash she was astride him again,
only to pull him away, growling softly as she let him fit himself between
her legs. He let his fingers trail down her thighs and up her sides one last
time and smiled - she returned the gesture with a grin and quick movement
forwards that left him gasping for breath. Suddenly, it all hit him, here on
the grass with his lover, his mate that he had been waiting for for such a
long, long time, and all his muted and suppressed need came to the fore and
with his own cry of desire he thrust into her, heedless of her ululating
wail of delight or lines of blood that she drew down his back. And then he
was only aware of how good it was, and how tight and close she was to him -
need rose and he moved again, and again and again once more into a series of
long, slow thrusts. She clamped her legs to him and raising one hand to
stroke his cheek�he smiled down and somehow managed to bring his hands into
play through the haze of sweet pleasure that enveloped him, heightened by
both her complementing motions and own active hands.

	They moved against each other until finally they were both at the brink, to
that last moment of giving and taking. He realized how close she was to him
and on impulse kissed her gently - and then it broke upon him and his whole
body was singing in release as he emptied himself into her and felt her own
desire reach and crest it�s peak - and he was still kissing her, and she
him, with tender softness. They lay in each other�s arms, letting the
bittersweet ache from their limbs fade and exchanging an occasional kiss,
cuddle or caress now and then. No words - only eyes and the great
star-studded canopy above.

	"Ashitaka." He turned to meet her. "San?"

	"No�nothing." But he knew, and held her as they cooled from their loving in
the night air. And they lay side by side as the day dawned.

******

	If I�m not mistaken, this also makes me the youngest lemon writer ever, at
age 16. (Would have been 15, since I started this three days before my
birthday, but I guess we�re being chronologically accurate here.) Of course,
if it�s not immediately apparent, this was also written without any
practical experience whatsoever. ^_^

	Couldn�t find any other way to end it; sorry. In any case, please enjoy!
C&C is much appreciated, as usual.
Zhou Tai An (kain@pacific.net.sg) 

"There is no one simple truth." - Rune Walsh