by Marten Norr
Editor’s Note: Dear Reader! This is a bonus story, written by Marten Norr, featuring his characters Mary and Sally from the novel Demon Engine. As this story could be considered a spoiler (and also features the characters in a configuration that does NOT happen in the novel), we recommend that you read this only once you have read Demon Engine! You can return to the book’s main page HERE. If you do indeed want to read the story, simply scroll down.
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The Fancy Strikes
By Marten Norr
The Fancy Strikes
By Marten Norr
Mary had been temporarily demoted from first mate to ‘passenger.’ Sally had been demoted from whatever his position was now to…not that. They were allowed up on deck during the day to take the air. But when Mary spoke up to instruct Redvers that the spool of rope she was carrying should go back in the hold, she discovered that Millard had ordered the crew to reply to any orders she tried to give with “fuck off, McCracken.” Mary was speechless. Sally laughed so hard, he nearly lost consciousness again.
Neither of them had woken up for three days after the Harbinger. A week later, they were still too exhausted to do much other than lie there; Mary could barely keep her eyes open long enough to read a page or two of a novel. Once she could, she quickly grew bored of the stagnation. Dru was in and out, sometimes lingering to play cards on her off hours, other times bringing food and then returning to her duties. Sally seemed content to spend most of his time sleeping—making up for the lost years, he said—until the end of the second week, when he too started growing antsy. They begged Millard to let them resume their duties again. He said not for another week at least.
Even without the necessity of keeping the remora quiet, Sally’s cot had gone unoccupied for so long that they had Dru pack it up and take it back to the hold. They’d both grown too used to sharing Mary’s bed; and, at the thought of rolling over to find that Sally wasn’t there, she was overcome by a strange feeling of panic. Sometimes she woke up clinging to him, as if to keep him from drifting away on the tide.
One of those nights, she awoke to Sally shifting in his sleep. His back was pressed up against her and she was curled around him, which had created an unfortunate circumstance that had not, until now, arisen.
She tried to disentangle herself from him, but he had a hold of her arm like it was a doll.
She cleared her throat. “Um, Sally?” She gently tugged her arm against his grip.
“Wuh?” he mumbled, shifting again. While Mary’s face burned, Sally froze, undoubtedly feeling what the motion had caused. “Oop. Sorry.” He let go of her arm. She had no doubt he was nobly withholding his snickers.
“It’s fine,” she muttered, rolling over and away from him. “Goodnight.”
He raised his head slightly to look at the clock. “Morning, technically. Sun’ll be up soon. I can nip across the hall to the washroom if you need a minute.” A pause. “Do you even do that?”
“Do what?”
“Wank. Or are you ambient about that too?”
Mary buried her face in the pillow. “Ambivalent,” she corrected. “And, yes, sometimes. Why do you want to know?”
Another pause. “Dunno. I were rememberin’ that time we was drunk and I asked if you wanted to do it and you said maybe another time if the fancy struck you. Just wonderin’ if the fancy’s struck you. ’Cause the offer still stands.”
Her first impulse was to demand that they go back to sleep and speak nothing of this conversation ever again. But the part of her that was slowly getting used to not immediately burying her emotions made her pause and consider. She could trust Sally. He may have been extremely forward and quite crass, but that was just because he’d never learned to be bashful about it. Which was probably ideal, all things considered.
She drew a deep breath and lifted her head from the pillow. “Actually? I think perhaps it has struck me.”
Sally propped himself up on his elbow, more enthusiastically than necessary. “Really?”
Mary couldn’t help a laugh. “Why do you sound thrilled?”
“Well, one, I ain’t had no cock goin’ on six months now—”
“You scoundrel!”
“—and two, who wouldn’t be thrilled to get it from Golden Mary?”
“Don’t make me change my mind!”
“Don’t worry,” said Sally, a grin in his voice, “I’ll take it easy on you.”
He reached around her, sliding a hand from the dip between her ribcage and hipbone down her thigh to push up the hem of her nightgown. She caught her breath. I guess he’s getting right into it, she thought, surprised that she wasn’t automatically squirming away out of instinct.
“If you do change your mind,” he said, pausing as he sensed her trepidation, “or if anything feels bad, just say the word, alright?”
“Mm-hmm,” she managed.
“I mean it. This ain’t a competition; you don’t gotta outperform nobody. And if you need to stop, you won’t be disappointin’ nobody neither.”
She snorted. “Sometimes I hate how well you know me.”
“Just sayin’.” He continued, rucking her nightgown over her hipbone. A tiny sound escaped her as his hand wrapped around her and he chuckled, but she didn’t get the sense that he was laughing at her. “Damn. I know I just said it, but I ain’t disappointed.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” She glanced over her shoulder to find him smirking.
“Relax. Means it’s as impressive as the rest of you.”
“Now you’re just pandering to me.”
“You like it.”
She couldn’t really argue with him. Usually taking care of this was almost a chore; something she did only when the need presented itself, so she could get on with the rest of her day or go to sleep. Pleasant, but only just worth the effort. Other sailors talked about their fantasies openly—sweethearts at home, favored whores, mermaids—but Mary had never wished for someone else to be present, because she couldn’t conceive of how that might improve the experience.
And yet Sally’s hand was so much more intense than her own. Maybe it was the feel of his breath tickling her back, or the encouraging little noises of satisfaction he made as she responded more and more. She trembled with sensation. When he released her, she almost protested, but then she reminded herself that this wasn’t all there was to it. Something even more pleasurable, assumedly, was forthcoming.
Sally pushed back the covers and gently lifted Mary’s nightgown over her head and off. Her breath caught in her throat. That first night, months ago now, when they’d first shared the bed, she’d been almost intolerably embarrassed to be seen wearing nothing but her camisole and bloomers. Even once they’d grown comfortable with each other, they still turned around or shut their eyes when the other had to undress completely. But now she was wearing nothing at all, in front of another person, for the first time. And as vulnerable as it felt, it didn’t lessen her interest in seeing this through.
Climbing out of bed, Sally doffed his own nightshirt—purchased at a supply ’stead so he would finally stop sleeping in the same dirty trousers he wore during the day—and then flounced back down onto the pillows with his hands behind his head, smiling unabashedly. For a moment, Mary was too shy to look anywhere but his face, but she couldn’t stop her gaze from wandering over his naked body in curiosity.
Even after several months with regular meals, he was still scrawny, like a seastead’s resident feral cat. Bony ribs, the now-familiar scars, spare muscles all fighting one another. Starting at his navel, a trail of dark hair that ended in a triangle of curls between sharp hipbones and skinny legs.
He gestured toward it. “I figure you know the gist of what to do with this.”
“Generally,” she said, certain that her inexperience was written all over her face. Then, fainter, “In theory.”
Smiling fondly, he took her by the arm and drew her in. “C’mere.” He guided her between his legs. “You’ll know what to do once you’re in, I promise.” His gaze flicked slightly downward, from her face to her chest, and his smile widened. “And let me know soon as you don’t need your focus. ‘Cause I really wanna grab those and I got a feelin’ it’s gonna make you scream.”
Mary hadn’t known her face could get any warmer. “Sally!”
He met her eyes again, playfully. “You don’t want me to grab ’em?”
“You are incorrigible.”
“Nah, just horny.” Sliding a hand to the back of her neck, he pulled her closer.
At first she thought he was going to kiss her, and she almost pulled back to say she wasn’t nearly ready to try that yet—for a reason she couldn’t quite pinpoint—but he brought his mouth to her earlobe and gently sucked. A delightful shiver of pleasure ran down her spine.
Alright, maybe I understand why having a partner might make things more enjoyable.
Sally pulled away slightly to whisper huskily into her ear: “Also I’ve no idea what incorrugatable means.”
Mary laughed again despite her nervousness, relieved when Sally joined her. Growing up, she’d understood sex to be a deeply serious event, done more out of obligation than desire, and that anyone who enjoyed it too much was a libertine. After being around sailors for several years, she’d realized that she was in the minority on the latter point, but she still couldn’t understand how anyone had fun doing it, or why they wanted to do it at all. She knew this wasn’t going to mark a sudden reversal in her practices or her desires, but knowing that it didn’t actually have to be a chore when the fancy struck her was a much happier realization than she would have expected.
And who better to share such a thing with than perhaps the only other person on earth who’d experienced the things she had? The person with whom she’d faced down death itself and things worse than it, the friend whose devotion had long been devoid of any conditions or judgment?
“So…do I just…?” She made an extremely vague gesture.
Miraculously, Sally somehow comprehended her meaning. His confidence was reassuring as he said, “You wanna do fingers first. It’ll make things better for both of us.”
She hesitantly explored for a moment. There was nothing familiar about Sally’s anatomy, but she soon discovered that it was much more straightforward than she’d thought, and wetter, and warmer.
“If you want,” he said, “you can kinda…” He motioned, curling his first two fingers like he was beckoning someone closer. She copied the gesture, fascinated when he reacted by melting into her, pressing against the palm of her hand. His eyelids fluttered closed. “Mm, yeah, like that.”
After a couple of minutes, during which Mary realized that Sally’s reactions and expressions were definitely stirring something fervent in her, he gently put a hand on her wrist and grinned, slightly out of breath.
“Right, if you keep on like that I’ll not be able to keep it together long enough.”
“Sorry,” she said, face warming again.
“What’re you apologizin’ for? I’m sayin’ you’ve got a knack for it.” He drew her closer, holding eye contact in a way that made her heart flutter. “But you’ve waited long enough, haven’t you? Get to it, then. Take it at your own pace.”
They fit together perfectly. She took it slow at first; she wasn’t sure what ‘her’ pace was, but Sally was right—somehow, her body knew what to do. And it felt incredible.
She didn’t exactly scream when he grabbed her breasts and squeezed, but she did emit an entirely involuntary and extremely indecent cry. Sally cackled with delight, but the cackles quickly turned to breathy sighs that somehow gave Mary a rush of gratification as well.
He was wearing a blissful smile she’d never seen on him before. “Saints, Mary,” he murmured, breath hitching. “I didn’t realize how much I needed this.”
She slid an arm under and around his waist, her other hand entwined with his above his head, and returned the smile with a feeling of warm, unbounded happiness in her heart. “I’m beginning to think I did, too.”
“Yeah? You enjoyin’ yourself?”
She nodded. “You?”
“Fuck. Yeah.” He locked his legs around her waist.
She almost lost it instantly. “Saints,” she whispered in surprise, drawing herself back from a precipice she’d reached much more quickly than usual.
Sally’s breaths escaped as puffs of air against her neck. “Sorry. Just gotta have you near.”
She pressed her forehead to his, holding him tighter. “I’m not going anywhere.”
She hadn’t expected there to be something almost sacred in the act of being this close with someone—as close as physically possible. When people waxed poetic about ‘becoming one’ with a lover, she’d never been able to wrap her head around the concept, but now she thought maybe it was everyone else who didn’t grasp the full meaning of the phrase. She and Sally had been through something so singularly strange together that the natural thing to do about it was to become singular. They were inextricable from each other—the tide and the moon and the shore and the harbor, the safe walls that kept the storm from washing the town away and the waves that lapped gently at the sand, and the ship which loved its anchor so much that it made it a home.
“Think you might be, actually,” Sally huffed, with another chuckle. By the time Mary’s brain caught up with her and she realized she had lost too much of her composure to respond, Sally said, “Hang on another minute and I’ll be right there with you.”
She wasn’t sure she could, but making Sally feel as good as she did made her want to try. Before she knew it, she was at the precipice again, and Sally was there too.
“Mary—Mary—Mary—” His fingers dug into her back as he gasped and tightened around her, rendering any further attempts to hold off futile.
She gladly stepped off the edge with him.
She wasn’t aware of much in the next few moments except the sublime pleasure that overtook her, flooding down her legs and through her abdomen. A moan escaped her, one which she was too overwhelmed to suppress, along with an involuntary “F-fuck…”
Her limbs were shaking too much to support her any longer. She all but collapsed onto Sally, her head on his chest, both of them breathing deeply. As her senses returned to her, Sally ran his fingers lightly over her back, giving quiet hums of bliss while they breathed together. Goosebumps rose on her skin under his fingertips. She smiled, a little deliriously, into his shoulder as he folded her into his arms.
“My dredger,” he breathed, voice soft. “Lovely, lovely dredger. You alright?”
She nodded. A floaty, euphoric feeling had washed over her entire body. “Mmhm. I…I liked it when you said my name like that.”
“Clearly.” He gave a small chuckle. “I liked it when you started swearin’ like the sailor you are. Never ’eard you say ‘fuck’ afore.”
“Couldn’t help it.”
“Aye, I ’ave that effect on people.”
They laughed together, bodies still engaged but the mechanism swiftly fading. Finally feeling recovered enough to move, Mary rolled over onto her back beside Sally with a deep sigh. Turning her head toward him, she found him smiling affectionately at her.
She returned the grin. “At the risk of sounding extremely trite…thank you.”
He did not tease her for the inanity of the statement. Instead, he turned on his side and slung an arm over her stomach. “Well, at the risk of soundin’ extremely tripe meself—”
Mary snorted. “Trite.”
“Aye, that’s what I said.”
“You said tripe. In what world would the stomach lining of an ungulate be considered an adjective?”
“Anyway.” Sally pinched her side. “Thank you, is what I’m tryin’ to say. I’m glad we didn’t fuck ’til now.”
She turned her head toward him, perplexed and ready to be a little offended. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that first night, after the shoals, when you thought you had to fuck me to make the remora quiet. I’m glad we didn’t until they were gone, so I could really enjoy it. And so you could too. Y’know?”
Mary nodded, her confusion replaced by relief and fondness. “Yeah. I’m glad, too.”
He gave her a brief squeeze. “It don’t need to change nothin’ between us. I’m ’appy just how it is right now. But I do want you to know…we can do this again, whenever the fancy strikes.”