House of Eros Stardust Chapter 4 Onew/Taemin R
Title: House of Eros - Stardust - Chapter 4
Pairing: Onew/Taemin
Length: 5300
Genre: AU/Romance/Angst
Rating: R
Summary: Onew has come up with a strategy to help Taemin finally tell him the truth about his former Master.. Please see stardust tag for previous chapters.
A/N:Maestro is Italian for Master (usually Master of arts but we won't quibble)
A/N Old: Taemin is 20 in this, Onew is 27. The House of Eros is a combination dating service/scening facility/social club for the Kink Oriented. Piccolo stella is Italian for little star. Italian is one of the chief languages Opera is sung in. Title refers in a roundabout fashion to We Are All Made of Stars by Moby
Please also see my new Disclaimer of Doom if you like
Warning: This is a BDSM fic. In this chapter, there is whipping, psychological stress, reference to past forced sex etc. It is not an easy chapter. I cried while writing it.
Onew has come to one unwanted but certain conclusion. The only way he's ever going to find out from Taemin exactly what happened to him so that Onew can heal the wounds instead of just bandaging them over, is to insist that Taemin tell him in such a fashion that Taemin's resistance is down.
It makes Onew's chest ache to think about it. Two months now they've been together and for the most part, those two months have been some of the happiest of his life. Not even when he got his first lead role, not even when he won his first award was he this simply and steadily happy. Taemin is perfect. There are still flashes of resistance, and times when Onew is sure that one more word, one more touch will send his beloved boy running away from him.
Beloved. That's one of the things he can't tell Taemin. How loved he is, how much more than a contract that Onew wants from him. There's a ring in Onew's safe, a piece of jewelry that would annoy Taemin even more than his formal collar does. It's an old antique piece made over, centered with a large blue topaz because that's Onew's birth stone and the wide band set with rows of rubies because those are Taemin's birth stone interspersed with diamonds. The whole thing is meant to convey what Taemin cannot believe on his own. How precious he is, how much Onew loves him, how he would beg, borrow, steal or kill if that is what it took to give Taemin peace and happiness.
It takes days for Onew to reconcile himself to what he has to do. He spends one night at Yunho and Max's place all but crying into his soju in a mixture of fear and revulsion. In the two months he and Taemin have been together, Onew has never truly forced his boy to do anything. And now he has to, if he's going to get Taemin free of the prison in his own head. The thought hurts, but not as much as the fear that doing this thing that has to be done will send Taemin running from him for good.
He already knows who the walking dead man is that hurt Taemin so badly because Yunho, of course, knows the name of Taemin's subsequent Master. It's not hard either, to figure out who helped the bastard crush Taemin's self-worth and heart and trust. Onew uses the rage now to give him strength because compassion from him now is not what his boy needs. In a million small subtle ways that perhaps Taemin is unconscious of himself, he's been asking Onew to help him, trusting him if only a little to release him from his pain. Onew has no right to cringe away from what Taemin needs from him, not and call himself his Maestro one moment longer.
He sends a carefully handwritten note to Taemin, the night his boy returns from a week long work-study out of town and allows himself one small glass of liquid courage as he stares into his own anguished eyes in the mirror. As he turns away, Onew slams the glass hard against the mirror and ignores the cracking and breaking of the mirror and the glass, or even the cut across his left palm.
....
Taemin is puzzled as he drops his suitcase and backpack on the floor just inside of his Maestro's richly appointed suite at Eros. He stays there most nights, even when Onew is not even there. It fulfills the terms of the contract and there's also something comforting about being surrounded by things that his Maestro chose, and by his scent, his very presence.
Usually if one of them has been away, there's a bit of a welcome home when he gets back. At least that's been the case in the last two months. At first he can't understand what Onew means by losing patience, and then he feels a chill slide up his spine and spread like a headache across his brow. Onew has to know that there are very few things that Taemin would ever deny him. Even though his feelings remain safely unspoken, Taemin knows he loves the older man and has tentatively begun to trust him with more than just his body. Therefore, there can only be one thing Onew means by this.
Taemin looks at his own socked feet on the floor then gathers up his bags to haul them down the corridor and into the room that has been set aside for Taemin's stuff. It's not his bedroom since he and Onew usually sleep together. Even if all they do is sleep, Onew doesn't tolerate Taemin being out of his reach at night. Taemin half smiles as he remembers being rather forcefully cuffed to the giant canopy bed more than once until he'd gotten the message.
This, this is something different and he's not sure how to handle it. Taemin toys briefly with the notion of safe wording right here and now before whatever is going to happen begins. But if he does, Onew won't let him off the hook without demanding to know why he's doing it. And if he wants to go further than that...then that means he's leaving Onew and Taemin's eyes prick with tears at the very thought.
So, he has only three choices. Trust his Maestro who has done nothing to betray his trust. Safe word and then have to be harangued about why he's doing it. Or leave his Maestro, perhaps forever. Taemin knows his choice as he moves for the bathroom. He needs a shower, a very thorough one, before he meets Onew at ten pm.
...
At precisely ten minutes before ten pm, Taemin knocks briskly on the simple looking wood door of scening room seven which evidently is on the lowest subfloor of the entire Eros building/complex. There's just the elevator, a corridor and the door down here. Taemin shivers, trying not to wonder about what that might mean.
"Enter," Taemin hears his Maestro's voice from beyond the wood, crisp and cool and powerful. All those qualities can be good things, but there's something harsher laced into the gorgeous deep voice and that makes Taemin tremble harder.
He pads into the room on lightly slippered feet, taking only a few steps before he pauses to slip out of the shoes and then kneel gracefully on the hard wood floor. Taemin doesn't look around him, yet, keeping his eyes locked firmly on the polished wood in front of his knees. Whatever else this meeting is about, Onew has made it clear there's formality about it which means Taemin is going to be on his best submissive manners. Even if what he really wants to do is peek at Onew's handsome face, the set of his shoulders and the way he holds his hands to try to discern his Maestro's mood.
"Good boy," Onew's voice floats to him a little dryly. "Come to me," he adds and Taemin can almost picture the wave of his hand beckoning his boy to his side.
"Yes, Maestro. Thank you Maestro," Taemin answers softly but clearly. He gets to his feet and only then lifts his eyes to see Onew on the other side of the room. There's a ....well it isn't a bed and it isn't a couch but it also isn't ...Taemin's not exactly sure what it is. But Onew is sitting on it with his deceptively casual grace. Taemin's eyes narrow slightly even though he smiles at Onew warmly.
...
Onew dressed very carefully for this scene. He's always precise in the matter of costume as in much else besides, but this time...it's different. Which is why his clothing consists of ebony leather pants with studs running up his calves and thighs and matching boots with an open shirt of the same inky color if lighter almost gauzy material.
His heart aches again as Taemin slips into the room and takes the precisely right position just inside the door. His Taemin is so beautiful, Onew thinks, not moving a muscle though he wants to. The perfect graceful kneel, the sweetly lowered eyes, the stillness of Taemin's slender body wrapped in nothing more than a pair of loosely slung white drawstring pants. The pants are silk, Onew knows, because he ordered at least half a dozen pairs of them. Something about seeing Taemin's bare skin and his small bare feet never fails to move him. He resists the urge to sigh, instead greeting his boy and beckoning him forward.
The words about to come out of his mouth are like acid on his tongue but he says them anyway. "You've seriously displeased me, Taemin."
It hurts to see the blank look of astonishment cross Taemin's luminous brown eyes, to see the curve of his lips which was soft with warmth go tight with shock...and worse fear. Onew pretends to ignore that look, reaching instead for a loop of leather to replace the much complained about formal collar of velvet and diamonds around Taemin's neck.
"You are very beautiful and you obey me quite well," Onew says before Taemin has a chance to speak. "But I require truth from you also."
...
Taemin wants to whimper and grovel immediately at Onew's feet. There was a time when he would have done that without so much as a second thought. Fear keeps him from doing that now. This situation is far too eerily similar to one that is stuck in his memory like sand in an oyster shell, always causing him pain and irritation no matter how peaceful he thinks he is. The shock of the coldness in Onew's voice is the worst part, how could his Maestro ever sound like that? As if he didn't care when Taemin knows...thinks he knows anyway that his Maestro does care.
Tears prick his eyes but he keeps his chin up. "I'm sorry to have displeased you Maestro," he manages, forcing a volume that is something above a whisper somehow. "Please let me make amends," he asks a moment later when Onew begins to outline his transgression.
"I am truthful with you Maestro," Taemin protests, feeling as if all of his limbs are coating with ice with the fear beating and beating inside his brain and body. "I have never lied to you, I swear to you I haven't." Oh, God, it hurts so badly to face Onew's cold and steely stare. This is not his Maestro, it just isn't and something in Taemin begins to shrivel in anticipation of the sickness that comes next.
Onew can't bear it any more, the way he can see Taemin withdrawing into himself every second in anticipation that his Maestro intends to abuse him beyond his bearing. "Omission, is also a form of untruth," he says a little more gently, reaching out and running the back of his fingers against Taemin's porcelain pale cheek.
"I must have the truth from you, my boy. Everything." he states next, pulling his hand away and stepping around Taemin.
Taemin feels as if he might have been given a reprieve from a death sentence. He pushes himself into that fleeting touch, comforts himself with the slight return of warmth in his Maestro's voice. Tears again well in his eyes and this time they spill over unheeded.
"I want to tell you, Maestro. I swear I do. There is no one else I could tell if not you. I just...I can't..."
"I know, Taemin," Onew says firmly. "I have to make it easier for you to tell me than it is to not tell me."
In a way, it's a relief to Taemin to feel that he is still in his Maestro's regard. There's a kind of comfort in the realization that Onew is still taking responsibility for him, even now. It lets him look up at the older man despite the tears on his face. "How?" he asks softly.
There's a long pause as Onew gently eases off his formal collar and replaces it with the simple leather band with a few rings dangling from it. Taemin senses that his Maestro is thinking hard, and perhaps troubled in spirit because his usually nimble touch seems more clumsy than usual. His desire to serve comes to the fore of his mind and he almost offers to do the fastening himself. Except another peek at his Maestro's hard face tells him that won't be a good idea.
...
Onew's fingers are shaking and he curses them as he fastens the leather collar on Taemin's lovely neck. The tears on his boys face accuse him and there are so many more tears to come yet. He knows he's doing this for Taemin's ultimate benefit - he's never really had a taste for pain games, he'd rather torment with pleasure every time. He's only grateful that Key and Minho will be around later, because both he and Taemin are going to need all the help they can get before the nights over.
He drops to one knee in front of Taemin's still kneeling form and sighs. "I have to punish you for lying to me, my boy," he says quietly. "It will be painful, and intense, and it may pause, but it will not stop until you speak."
Taemin knows Onew now. He knows, for example, that his Maestro is a man of his word, a man of great self control and determination, a man of iron will when it gets down to it. He knows that Onew will do exactly as he has said he is going to which leaves Taemin, again, with only three choices. The same ones he had upstairs.
A rush of sheer emotional strain makes him shiver. He looks into Onew's eyes and understands that his Maestro, as always, is trying to take care of him. The thought, the knowledge strengthens him in some fashion Taemin can't really pinpoint. He just feels it.
"I'm scared," Taemin confesses and leans forward until his brow is against Onew's shoulder.
My darling boy, I'm fucking terrified. Onew thinks and reaches up, petting his hand through Taemin's hair just once before he pushes him back.
"I will be here. All you have to do is start talking...and it's over." He doesn't smile as he speaks and stands up, moving towards the center of the room. There's a lot of paraphernalia along the walls but after some consultations, and a lot of thought, he's chosen this. It'll be harder on Taemin's body and strength, which he hopes will only make it easier for Taemin to let go.
"Come here," Onew adds more sharply, walking as carefully as he can the fine line between withdrawing from Taemin's pain which would make this easier on him and remaining stern so that Taemin can feel not just hear his determination. Every move he makes fills him with guilt even as he reaches up to where leather cuffs dangle from chains hanging from the ceiling.
Something in him twists sharply when Taemin steps forward, eyes only on his face and slowly lifts his arms up to be cuffed without being asked. It is as if his boy senses how difficult this is for him, when he...Onew, should be the strong one. Onew clenches his jaw tightly to hold back the gasp of shock.
"I trust you, Maestro," Taemin says clearly. As frightened as he is, the pain that seems to come off his Maestro like a scent reaches him. He is the one causing his Maestro this pain. Heis the cause of this anguish. Knowing that in some way he could never articulate changes everything. No one else would do this, would care enough to do something that every sense tells them to resist. Taemin has nothing else to give, but the simple words he says. "I trust you," he repeats softly and stands quiet.
"My boy, my beautiful Taemin," Onew answers in a whisper. He brushes a kiss over Taemin's shoulder then steps away. He takes a long deep breath, holding it as he pushes a button that causes the chains overhead to move. The cuffs are padded leather, designed not to cause damage to the prisoner. However, the strain of standing on tiptoe as Taemin is forced to do by his bonds creates a physical and emotional weakness.
Onew has never hated himself so much in his life. How can he know these things? The elements of psychological and physical torture are anathema to him...especially when used against his boy. And yet, without this knowledge, without this training - how could he ever give Taemin what he needs now. How could he be the Dominant Taemin needs without it? The thought comforts him, at least a little.
"You know your choices, my Taemin," Onew says quietly, breathing deeply behind the words to keep his voice from trembling. "You can speak. You can safe word, with an explanation. Or you can ask to be released. This goes on until you do one of those things."
Taemin looks into his Maestro's stern face, taking deep breaths so that he realizes the older man is doing the same thing. If there is one thing he has learned about Onew, it is that his Maestro never does anything without a reason, nor is he sadistic in any way shape or form, just as he promised. This punishment will give his Maestro no pleasure whatsoever and that alone makes Taemin's guilt taste like blood in his mouth.
"I understand Maestro," he answers as calmly as he can.
Onew nods once and steps around behind Taemin. He's already chosen what he's going to use and he doesn't want Taemin to see it before hand. His mentor had taught him several things he considered truisms. He was using one of the fruits of those truisms today.
You can't be a decent Dominant if you don't fucking know how to use a whip. The old man had growled at him when he'd shyed away from the evil looking thing. "Whether you use it or not, you have to know how to use it and use it well. Using it badly can hurt someone irreparably."
Onew sighs as he remembers that conversation and the hours and hours of practice he'd got in until he could flick a playing card out of someone's hand without touching their skin at all. He was going to touch skin now. He steps back a few paces and stares at Taemin's flawless back and shoulders.
He grinds his teeth and lets the whip in his hand fly, letting it crack against the floor to one side of Taemin's feet. The sound is loud and shocking in the quiet room and he sees Taemin's startled jump and the soft groan as this puts pressure on Taemin's wrists, shoulders and arms. He's keeping track the length of time Taemin's standing that way. He'll have to let his boy stand flat footed again soon to avoid too much strain.
There's another crack, on the other side of Taemin's feet and this time Onew doesn't watch the jump. "I know who the fool was who hurt you, Taemin," he says quietly. "You aren't protecting him any more. Tell me what he did to you." His voice is without emphasis, simple, direct, insistent.
"Maestro, please, don't ask me." Taemin begs helplessly. The whip cracks against the polished floor have his heart pounding and he twists against the padded cuffs so the chains above him rattle. He can barely stay on his toes and keep himself balanced. So much is happening and Onew hasn't even touched him with the whip yet.
"I need to know. What did he do? What did he require from you?"
Onew forces himself not to hesitate. Making Taemin wait for the first hot lick of the whip on his skin is just prolonging the torture. His arm extends, his wrist rotates and the whip flicks out and strikes like a snake. He makes himself look at the red mark that blooms like a cut across Taemin's pale skin, relieved that at least he hasn't made his boy bleed. Yet. The welt rises almost instantly and Onew wants to cry as if the whip had touched him and not Taemin. Please let this work, he prays.
Taemin's cry is high and thin and tears fill his eyes. For a moment he can't think around the bright white pain that cuts like a laser beam through his senses. It seems as if his entire being is nothing but pain and this is only the first blow. His emotions tangle, and he lets his head hang a little bit.
Onew knows how strong Taemin is, even the cry of pain which burns in his ears tells him Taemin is no where near his real limits. His jaw aches he's grinding his teeth so hard but he lets the whip fly again, creating another welt that crosses the first, and then another, and another. He pauses when Taemin loses his balance, swinging loosely from the cuffs.
"Tell me what happened, my boy," Onew says softly, coaxingly, as he steps around and uses the mechanism that lowers the chains until Taemin can find his feet again. "Let it go, let it out...don't let it hurt you any more."
Taemin is shivering, tears seeping down his face as he struggles to stand again. His back seems to be on fire, burning and burning until it's difficult for him to concentrate on anything else. His Maestro is there suddenly in front of him, as if he walked out of the air and Taemin stares at him. His Maestro is so beautiful, has he ever told him that?
"You'll hate me," he says, without any voluntary intention of saying that. "You'll never want to touch me again." Taemin frowns or tries to. His voice seems so small and broken, as if it doesn't even belong to him. His mind shies away from memories, of worse, letting those memories free for Onew to hear.
"No, darling boy. That's not possible. It could never happen, nothing anyone did to you or forced you to do could ever possibly change what I feel about you." Onew's voice shakes despite every bit of vocal training he's had in his life. Taemin's plaintive protest hits him in a way no whip ever could.
"You're so perfect," Taemin says next, almost a complaint. "It's not fair. How can you be so perfect and want me?"
Onew realizes that both adrenalin and something more has taken over for Taemin. He finds it surprising but also comforting. If Taemin can start to fall into the dizzy peace of sub space, even a little, at this point... he'll have to think about it later.
"Because you are beautiful, my Taemin, and strong and wise and warm," he says quietly and kisses Taemin's tear stained cheek. "Piccolo stella."
"Stars are bright and white and pure," Taemin protests. He feels sick and dizzy and burning with pain, pain, pain but not all of that pain comes from his back where he can count fiery stripes on his skin. "I'm not pure, Maestro. Not...white and bright and..." he breaks off with a little sob.
Onew's heart aches at the tiny voice, the words Taemin uses to describe his anguish. He doesn't bother to argue, arguing with Taemin's belief about himself will not release him from those beliefs. "Tell me what makes you think that," he orders instead, circling around Taemin as he speaks and satisfying himself that his whip has not done too much damage.
Taemin starts to sob softly. "I can't. You won't want me any more and I love you." The words slip out so easily. He never meant to say them. Yet they feel so good on his tongue, like something sweet and rich and strangely powerful and comforting. "I love you. I love you. I love you." Taemin repeats, soothed by the small release of something held back for so long and that sense of power within this pain.
Onew sighs and runs his fingers through Taemin's sweat damp hair. "I will always want you, piccolo stella. Until the last star burns out of the sky and the world lies in darkness."
"No, no, no," Taemin sobs, shaking his head a little.
Onew doesn't protest though it costs him something to keep quiet. "You have to let it out, Taemin. I demand it," he says instead. The words are back to stern insistence, letting Taemin know that his Maestro is still strong for him and hopefully that he is safe. The older man steps back the proper distance and shakes out the whip, eyeing Taemin's back.
"I insist that you tell me the truth, my boy," Onew adds. In Taemin's state of mind, among all the rest, it's his job to keep Taemin on track. To keep his mind worrying at the self-inflicted mental bonds until they come free.
"I...he...it's..." Taemin stutters, his voice full of revulsion and loathing. He's so dizzy, and so frightened. He's confessed his love to his Maestro. Promises are so easy to make. The pain of his back is nothing to the agony that makes him feel so broken.
"You are stronger than he is, Taemin. Believe me," Onew urges and steps up close to his boy, speaking near his ear from behind without touching the welted skin.
Taemin feels that thought shimmer through his being like a drink of strong wine and it makes him shudder which hurts terribly but the thought remains. Almost without realizing it, he starts to talk. Every word burns on his tongue but he hugs Onew's statement to himself, even as he sobs with pain and self-hatred.
"He...he wasn't like you, Maestro. He wasn't satisfied with my pleasing only him. It wasn't enough. I wasn't enough," Taemin says, sobbing and shaking between words, letting them slip through and trying hard not to think about them much. He keeps hearing his Maestro's voice, telling him he is special, wanted, strong and that more than the pain that throbs through him like a heartbeat keeps him talking.
"I wanted to be good, I wanted to be so good. Not to disgrace my Mark...I didn't want to ask to be released, I tried so hard."
Onew lets the whip drop with a small sense of relief, petting at Taemin's untouched hip or his sweat damp hair as his boy talks. At this moment, he doesn't let the facts that Taemin is spilling free faster and faster between agonized sobs reach his conscious mind. He'll sift over them and deal with them later. His boy needs him more than he needs to understand that boy's true torment.
"Nothing was ever enough, ever, ever. He could tear me to pieces with just the things he said. So when he wanted me to please his friends, have these parties, called me... called me his private slut...I just...I did what he wanted....whatever he wanted."
Onew speaks softly, soothingly to Taemin, as best he can without breaking the chain of words that come out of Taemin like infection from a horrible wound.
At one point, he reaches into his pocket with one hand as the arm supports Taemin so he can lean against himself. "Help us," he says simply and let's the phone snap closed and the plastic thing hit the hardwood floor.
It doesn't take long for Key and his lover to get to them and Onew jerks his head towards the mechanism on the wall. He couldn't leave Taemin long enough to hit the button so the chains would let Taemin's strained arms drop. He whispers softly to Taemin, soothingly as the flood of words begins to ease up even though Taemin is still weeping as if he's broken beyond repair.
He's relieved that Key and Minho don't speak, though he feels his friend hug him hard from behind at one point while Minho works on the cuffs to let Taemin's arms drop. Later, later, he promises himself, pushing his own emotions aside for now. He glares at Minho when the tall man moves as if to pick up Taemin. No one is touching his boy ever again except himself.
He bends carefully, letting Taemin's shaking form drop over his back. This way will put the least pressure on Taemin's welts. "I have you my piccolo stella, I have you." he tells Taemin.
Taemin feels himself falling apart and at first he resists it as he always has. Coming undone is weakness he cannot afford, that's what he's always told himself. Keeping the door firmly shut on his experiences and his last Master, allowed him to function, let him keep breathing. But now, Onew is there and his mind flashes like a camera over images of his Maestro. Onew is .... he has no way of defining now just what Onew is...except everything.
Suddenly, letting go is so easy. It's such a relief as he talks and talks and everything hurts but it feels wonderful at the same time and he's crying so hard but that feels good too and his Maestro is there, still, against all his fears. He feels the big warm hand caressing him gently, brushing through his hair. He hears the deep voice in his ears and relief is followed by a strange dizzy peace.
Nothing else that happens even matters. He know's he's carried, and softly bathed of the sweat that covers his body. He knows also that his Maestro is there, holding his hand as he is given a glass of something sweet to drink. Key is there too, Taemin realizes blearily and tries to smile at the older man but he's just too tired.
Onew sits beside Taemin and watches as his boy finally fades into a heavy sleep. He's starting to shake with stress but he doesn't dare leave Taemin alone for even a moment. He stares at the pale face turned towards him as Taemin lays on his stomach.
"I'm going to ruin this fucker," he says simply into the silence.
Key and Minho simply turn towards him. "Whatever you need to do, hyung," Minho says solemnly, his face serious and quiet. He's one of the best lawyers in the city when he's not crawling at the end of Key's pink leopard leash. The thought, the incongruity would make Onew smile but right now he's not sure he can ever smile properly again.
"Kibum, will you stay with Taemin? I need to shower and I don't want him alone for a moment." He can't seem to focus with his usual acuteness.
"Don't be stupid, Lee Jinki. Of course we'll both stay as long as either of you need us." For once, Key is not at all flamboyant. He hugs Onew hard enough that it hurts and kisses his cheek. The other man is one of the few who remembers Onew's real name and uses it on a regular basis.
"Do you need help? You don't look too steady on your feet," Key comments when he pulls back to look into Onew's eyes.
"I'll be all right. Can you call HeeChul hyung, too? I was careful but it'd be good if he looked Taemin over, while he's asleep."
Somehow Onew misses Key's response and doesn't care. He finds himself in the big bathroom and turns on the water in the shower to scalding hot. Feeling his self-control starting to break, he starts to shiver and steps into the water fully clothed. Shaking, he finally lets himself remember Taemin's broken words and begins to cry in hard racking heaves that become the heaves of vomiting though there's virtually nothing in his stomach to bring up. He pounds on the tiled walls until his knuckles are bruised and the skin is broken in places.
He used my boy like some kind of street whore, this disgusting piece of walking excrement. He made Taemin feel lower than the lowest...like it was his duty....this .... Onew's thoughts are almost incoherent with rage and pain. I will make him pay for what he has done.
Pairing: Onew/Taemin
Length: 5300
Genre: AU/Romance/Angst
Rating: R
Summary: Onew has come up with a strategy to help Taemin finally tell him the truth about his former Master.. Please see stardust tag for previous chapters.
A/N:Maestro is Italian for Master (usually Master of arts but we won't quibble)
A/N Old: Taemin is 20 in this, Onew is 27. The House of Eros is a combination dating service/scening facility/social club for the Kink Oriented. Piccolo stella is Italian for little star. Italian is one of the chief languages Opera is sung in. Title refers in a roundabout fashion to We Are All Made of Stars by Moby
Please also see my new Disclaimer of Doom if you like
Warning: This is a BDSM fic. In this chapter, there is whipping, psychological stress, reference to past forced sex etc. It is not an easy chapter. I cried while writing it.
Onew has come to one unwanted but certain conclusion. The only way he's ever going to find out from Taemin exactly what happened to him so that Onew can heal the wounds instead of just bandaging them over, is to insist that Taemin tell him in such a fashion that Taemin's resistance is down.
It makes Onew's chest ache to think about it. Two months now they've been together and for the most part, those two months have been some of the happiest of his life. Not even when he got his first lead role, not even when he won his first award was he this simply and steadily happy. Taemin is perfect. There are still flashes of resistance, and times when Onew is sure that one more word, one more touch will send his beloved boy running away from him.
Beloved. That's one of the things he can't tell Taemin. How loved he is, how much more than a contract that Onew wants from him. There's a ring in Onew's safe, a piece of jewelry that would annoy Taemin even more than his formal collar does. It's an old antique piece made over, centered with a large blue topaz because that's Onew's birth stone and the wide band set with rows of rubies because those are Taemin's birth stone interspersed with diamonds. The whole thing is meant to convey what Taemin cannot believe on his own. How precious he is, how much Onew loves him, how he would beg, borrow, steal or kill if that is what it took to give Taemin peace and happiness.
It takes days for Onew to reconcile himself to what he has to do. He spends one night at Yunho and Max's place all but crying into his soju in a mixture of fear and revulsion. In the two months he and Taemin have been together, Onew has never truly forced his boy to do anything. And now he has to, if he's going to get Taemin free of the prison in his own head. The thought hurts, but not as much as the fear that doing this thing that has to be done will send Taemin running from him for good.
He already knows who the walking dead man is that hurt Taemin so badly because Yunho, of course, knows the name of Taemin's subsequent Master. It's not hard either, to figure out who helped the bastard crush Taemin's self-worth and heart and trust. Onew uses the rage now to give him strength because compassion from him now is not what his boy needs. In a million small subtle ways that perhaps Taemin is unconscious of himself, he's been asking Onew to help him, trusting him if only a little to release him from his pain. Onew has no right to cringe away from what Taemin needs from him, not and call himself his Maestro one moment longer.
He sends a carefully handwritten note to Taemin, the night his boy returns from a week long work-study out of town and allows himself one small glass of liquid courage as he stares into his own anguished eyes in the mirror. As he turns away, Onew slams the glass hard against the mirror and ignores the cracking and breaking of the mirror and the glass, or even the cut across his left palm.
....
Taemin is puzzled as he drops his suitcase and backpack on the floor just inside of his Maestro's richly appointed suite at Eros. He stays there most nights, even when Onew is not even there. It fulfills the terms of the contract and there's also something comforting about being surrounded by things that his Maestro chose, and by his scent, his very presence.
Usually if one of them has been away, there's a bit of a welcome home when he gets back. At least that's been the case in the last two months. At first he can't understand what Onew means by losing patience, and then he feels a chill slide up his spine and spread like a headache across his brow. Onew has to know that there are very few things that Taemin would ever deny him. Even though his feelings remain safely unspoken, Taemin knows he loves the older man and has tentatively begun to trust him with more than just his body. Therefore, there can only be one thing Onew means by this.
Taemin looks at his own socked feet on the floor then gathers up his bags to haul them down the corridor and into the room that has been set aside for Taemin's stuff. It's not his bedroom since he and Onew usually sleep together. Even if all they do is sleep, Onew doesn't tolerate Taemin being out of his reach at night. Taemin half smiles as he remembers being rather forcefully cuffed to the giant canopy bed more than once until he'd gotten the message.
This, this is something different and he's not sure how to handle it. Taemin toys briefly with the notion of safe wording right here and now before whatever is going to happen begins. But if he does, Onew won't let him off the hook without demanding to know why he's doing it. And if he wants to go further than that...then that means he's leaving Onew and Taemin's eyes prick with tears at the very thought.
So, he has only three choices. Trust his Maestro who has done nothing to betray his trust. Safe word and then have to be harangued about why he's doing it. Or leave his Maestro, perhaps forever. Taemin knows his choice as he moves for the bathroom. He needs a shower, a very thorough one, before he meets Onew at ten pm.
...
At precisely ten minutes before ten pm, Taemin knocks briskly on the simple looking wood door of scening room seven which evidently is on the lowest subfloor of the entire Eros building/complex. There's just the elevator, a corridor and the door down here. Taemin shivers, trying not to wonder about what that might mean.
"Enter," Taemin hears his Maestro's voice from beyond the wood, crisp and cool and powerful. All those qualities can be good things, but there's something harsher laced into the gorgeous deep voice and that makes Taemin tremble harder.
He pads into the room on lightly slippered feet, taking only a few steps before he pauses to slip out of the shoes and then kneel gracefully on the hard wood floor. Taemin doesn't look around him, yet, keeping his eyes locked firmly on the polished wood in front of his knees. Whatever else this meeting is about, Onew has made it clear there's formality about it which means Taemin is going to be on his best submissive manners. Even if what he really wants to do is peek at Onew's handsome face, the set of his shoulders and the way he holds his hands to try to discern his Maestro's mood.
"Good boy," Onew's voice floats to him a little dryly. "Come to me," he adds and Taemin can almost picture the wave of his hand beckoning his boy to his side.
"Yes, Maestro. Thank you Maestro," Taemin answers softly but clearly. He gets to his feet and only then lifts his eyes to see Onew on the other side of the room. There's a ....well it isn't a bed and it isn't a couch but it also isn't ...Taemin's not exactly sure what it is. But Onew is sitting on it with his deceptively casual grace. Taemin's eyes narrow slightly even though he smiles at Onew warmly.
...
Onew dressed very carefully for this scene. He's always precise in the matter of costume as in much else besides, but this time...it's different. Which is why his clothing consists of ebony leather pants with studs running up his calves and thighs and matching boots with an open shirt of the same inky color if lighter almost gauzy material.
His heart aches again as Taemin slips into the room and takes the precisely right position just inside the door. His Taemin is so beautiful, Onew thinks, not moving a muscle though he wants to. The perfect graceful kneel, the sweetly lowered eyes, the stillness of Taemin's slender body wrapped in nothing more than a pair of loosely slung white drawstring pants. The pants are silk, Onew knows, because he ordered at least half a dozen pairs of them. Something about seeing Taemin's bare skin and his small bare feet never fails to move him. He resists the urge to sigh, instead greeting his boy and beckoning him forward.
The words about to come out of his mouth are like acid on his tongue but he says them anyway. "You've seriously displeased me, Taemin."
It hurts to see the blank look of astonishment cross Taemin's luminous brown eyes, to see the curve of his lips which was soft with warmth go tight with shock...and worse fear. Onew pretends to ignore that look, reaching instead for a loop of leather to replace the much complained about formal collar of velvet and diamonds around Taemin's neck.
"You are very beautiful and you obey me quite well," Onew says before Taemin has a chance to speak. "But I require truth from you also."
...
Taemin wants to whimper and grovel immediately at Onew's feet. There was a time when he would have done that without so much as a second thought. Fear keeps him from doing that now. This situation is far too eerily similar to one that is stuck in his memory like sand in an oyster shell, always causing him pain and irritation no matter how peaceful he thinks he is. The shock of the coldness in Onew's voice is the worst part, how could his Maestro ever sound like that? As if he didn't care when Taemin knows...thinks he knows anyway that his Maestro does care.
Tears prick his eyes but he keeps his chin up. "I'm sorry to have displeased you Maestro," he manages, forcing a volume that is something above a whisper somehow. "Please let me make amends," he asks a moment later when Onew begins to outline his transgression.
"I am truthful with you Maestro," Taemin protests, feeling as if all of his limbs are coating with ice with the fear beating and beating inside his brain and body. "I have never lied to you, I swear to you I haven't." Oh, God, it hurts so badly to face Onew's cold and steely stare. This is not his Maestro, it just isn't and something in Taemin begins to shrivel in anticipation of the sickness that comes next.
Onew can't bear it any more, the way he can see Taemin withdrawing into himself every second in anticipation that his Maestro intends to abuse him beyond his bearing. "Omission, is also a form of untruth," he says a little more gently, reaching out and running the back of his fingers against Taemin's porcelain pale cheek.
"I must have the truth from you, my boy. Everything." he states next, pulling his hand away and stepping around Taemin.
Taemin feels as if he might have been given a reprieve from a death sentence. He pushes himself into that fleeting touch, comforts himself with the slight return of warmth in his Maestro's voice. Tears again well in his eyes and this time they spill over unheeded.
"I want to tell you, Maestro. I swear I do. There is no one else I could tell if not you. I just...I can't..."
"I know, Taemin," Onew says firmly. "I have to make it easier for you to tell me than it is to not tell me."
In a way, it's a relief to Taemin to feel that he is still in his Maestro's regard. There's a kind of comfort in the realization that Onew is still taking responsibility for him, even now. It lets him look up at the older man despite the tears on his face. "How?" he asks softly.
There's a long pause as Onew gently eases off his formal collar and replaces it with the simple leather band with a few rings dangling from it. Taemin senses that his Maestro is thinking hard, and perhaps troubled in spirit because his usually nimble touch seems more clumsy than usual. His desire to serve comes to the fore of his mind and he almost offers to do the fastening himself. Except another peek at his Maestro's hard face tells him that won't be a good idea.
...
Onew's fingers are shaking and he curses them as he fastens the leather collar on Taemin's lovely neck. The tears on his boys face accuse him and there are so many more tears to come yet. He knows he's doing this for Taemin's ultimate benefit - he's never really had a taste for pain games, he'd rather torment with pleasure every time. He's only grateful that Key and Minho will be around later, because both he and Taemin are going to need all the help they can get before the nights over.
He drops to one knee in front of Taemin's still kneeling form and sighs. "I have to punish you for lying to me, my boy," he says quietly. "It will be painful, and intense, and it may pause, but it will not stop until you speak."
Taemin knows Onew now. He knows, for example, that his Maestro is a man of his word, a man of great self control and determination, a man of iron will when it gets down to it. He knows that Onew will do exactly as he has said he is going to which leaves Taemin, again, with only three choices. The same ones he had upstairs.
A rush of sheer emotional strain makes him shiver. He looks into Onew's eyes and understands that his Maestro, as always, is trying to take care of him. The thought, the knowledge strengthens him in some fashion Taemin can't really pinpoint. He just feels it.
"I'm scared," Taemin confesses and leans forward until his brow is against Onew's shoulder.
My darling boy, I'm fucking terrified. Onew thinks and reaches up, petting his hand through Taemin's hair just once before he pushes him back.
"I will be here. All you have to do is start talking...and it's over." He doesn't smile as he speaks and stands up, moving towards the center of the room. There's a lot of paraphernalia along the walls but after some consultations, and a lot of thought, he's chosen this. It'll be harder on Taemin's body and strength, which he hopes will only make it easier for Taemin to let go.
"Come here," Onew adds more sharply, walking as carefully as he can the fine line between withdrawing from Taemin's pain which would make this easier on him and remaining stern so that Taemin can feel not just hear his determination. Every move he makes fills him with guilt even as he reaches up to where leather cuffs dangle from chains hanging from the ceiling.
Something in him twists sharply when Taemin steps forward, eyes only on his face and slowly lifts his arms up to be cuffed without being asked. It is as if his boy senses how difficult this is for him, when he...Onew, should be the strong one. Onew clenches his jaw tightly to hold back the gasp of shock.
"I trust you, Maestro," Taemin says clearly. As frightened as he is, the pain that seems to come off his Maestro like a scent reaches him. He is the one causing his Maestro this pain. Heis the cause of this anguish. Knowing that in some way he could never articulate changes everything. No one else would do this, would care enough to do something that every sense tells them to resist. Taemin has nothing else to give, but the simple words he says. "I trust you," he repeats softly and stands quiet.
"My boy, my beautiful Taemin," Onew answers in a whisper. He brushes a kiss over Taemin's shoulder then steps away. He takes a long deep breath, holding it as he pushes a button that causes the chains overhead to move. The cuffs are padded leather, designed not to cause damage to the prisoner. However, the strain of standing on tiptoe as Taemin is forced to do by his bonds creates a physical and emotional weakness.
Onew has never hated himself so much in his life. How can he know these things? The elements of psychological and physical torture are anathema to him...especially when used against his boy. And yet, without this knowledge, without this training - how could he ever give Taemin what he needs now. How could he be the Dominant Taemin needs without it? The thought comforts him, at least a little.
"You know your choices, my Taemin," Onew says quietly, breathing deeply behind the words to keep his voice from trembling. "You can speak. You can safe word, with an explanation. Or you can ask to be released. This goes on until you do one of those things."
Taemin looks into his Maestro's stern face, taking deep breaths so that he realizes the older man is doing the same thing. If there is one thing he has learned about Onew, it is that his Maestro never does anything without a reason, nor is he sadistic in any way shape or form, just as he promised. This punishment will give his Maestro no pleasure whatsoever and that alone makes Taemin's guilt taste like blood in his mouth.
"I understand Maestro," he answers as calmly as he can.
Onew nods once and steps around behind Taemin. He's already chosen what he's going to use and he doesn't want Taemin to see it before hand. His mentor had taught him several things he considered truisms. He was using one of the fruits of those truisms today.
You can't be a decent Dominant if you don't fucking know how to use a whip. The old man had growled at him when he'd shyed away from the evil looking thing. "Whether you use it or not, you have to know how to use it and use it well. Using it badly can hurt someone irreparably."
Onew sighs as he remembers that conversation and the hours and hours of practice he'd got in until he could flick a playing card out of someone's hand without touching their skin at all. He was going to touch skin now. He steps back a few paces and stares at Taemin's flawless back and shoulders.
He grinds his teeth and lets the whip in his hand fly, letting it crack against the floor to one side of Taemin's feet. The sound is loud and shocking in the quiet room and he sees Taemin's startled jump and the soft groan as this puts pressure on Taemin's wrists, shoulders and arms. He's keeping track the length of time Taemin's standing that way. He'll have to let his boy stand flat footed again soon to avoid too much strain.
There's another crack, on the other side of Taemin's feet and this time Onew doesn't watch the jump. "I know who the fool was who hurt you, Taemin," he says quietly. "You aren't protecting him any more. Tell me what he did to you." His voice is without emphasis, simple, direct, insistent.
"Maestro, please, don't ask me." Taemin begs helplessly. The whip cracks against the polished floor have his heart pounding and he twists against the padded cuffs so the chains above him rattle. He can barely stay on his toes and keep himself balanced. So much is happening and Onew hasn't even touched him with the whip yet.
"I need to know. What did he do? What did he require from you?"
Onew forces himself not to hesitate. Making Taemin wait for the first hot lick of the whip on his skin is just prolonging the torture. His arm extends, his wrist rotates and the whip flicks out and strikes like a snake. He makes himself look at the red mark that blooms like a cut across Taemin's pale skin, relieved that at least he hasn't made his boy bleed. Yet. The welt rises almost instantly and Onew wants to cry as if the whip had touched him and not Taemin. Please let this work, he prays.
Taemin's cry is high and thin and tears fill his eyes. For a moment he can't think around the bright white pain that cuts like a laser beam through his senses. It seems as if his entire being is nothing but pain and this is only the first blow. His emotions tangle, and he lets his head hang a little bit.
Onew knows how strong Taemin is, even the cry of pain which burns in his ears tells him Taemin is no where near his real limits. His jaw aches he's grinding his teeth so hard but he lets the whip fly again, creating another welt that crosses the first, and then another, and another. He pauses when Taemin loses his balance, swinging loosely from the cuffs.
"Tell me what happened, my boy," Onew says softly, coaxingly, as he steps around and uses the mechanism that lowers the chains until Taemin can find his feet again. "Let it go, let it out...don't let it hurt you any more."
Taemin is shivering, tears seeping down his face as he struggles to stand again. His back seems to be on fire, burning and burning until it's difficult for him to concentrate on anything else. His Maestro is there suddenly in front of him, as if he walked out of the air and Taemin stares at him. His Maestro is so beautiful, has he ever told him that?
"You'll hate me," he says, without any voluntary intention of saying that. "You'll never want to touch me again." Taemin frowns or tries to. His voice seems so small and broken, as if it doesn't even belong to him. His mind shies away from memories, of worse, letting those memories free for Onew to hear.
"No, darling boy. That's not possible. It could never happen, nothing anyone did to you or forced you to do could ever possibly change what I feel about you." Onew's voice shakes despite every bit of vocal training he's had in his life. Taemin's plaintive protest hits him in a way no whip ever could.
"You're so perfect," Taemin says next, almost a complaint. "It's not fair. How can you be so perfect and want me?"
Onew realizes that both adrenalin and something more has taken over for Taemin. He finds it surprising but also comforting. If Taemin can start to fall into the dizzy peace of sub space, even a little, at this point... he'll have to think about it later.
"Because you are beautiful, my Taemin, and strong and wise and warm," he says quietly and kisses Taemin's tear stained cheek. "Piccolo stella."
"Stars are bright and white and pure," Taemin protests. He feels sick and dizzy and burning with pain, pain, pain but not all of that pain comes from his back where he can count fiery stripes on his skin. "I'm not pure, Maestro. Not...white and bright and..." he breaks off with a little sob.
Onew's heart aches at the tiny voice, the words Taemin uses to describe his anguish. He doesn't bother to argue, arguing with Taemin's belief about himself will not release him from those beliefs. "Tell me what makes you think that," he orders instead, circling around Taemin as he speaks and satisfying himself that his whip has not done too much damage.
Taemin starts to sob softly. "I can't. You won't want me any more and I love you." The words slip out so easily. He never meant to say them. Yet they feel so good on his tongue, like something sweet and rich and strangely powerful and comforting. "I love you. I love you. I love you." Taemin repeats, soothed by the small release of something held back for so long and that sense of power within this pain.
Onew sighs and runs his fingers through Taemin's sweat damp hair. "I will always want you, piccolo stella. Until the last star burns out of the sky and the world lies in darkness."
"No, no, no," Taemin sobs, shaking his head a little.
Onew doesn't protest though it costs him something to keep quiet. "You have to let it out, Taemin. I demand it," he says instead. The words are back to stern insistence, letting Taemin know that his Maestro is still strong for him and hopefully that he is safe. The older man steps back the proper distance and shakes out the whip, eyeing Taemin's back.
"I insist that you tell me the truth, my boy," Onew adds. In Taemin's state of mind, among all the rest, it's his job to keep Taemin on track. To keep his mind worrying at the self-inflicted mental bonds until they come free.
"I...he...it's..." Taemin stutters, his voice full of revulsion and loathing. He's so dizzy, and so frightened. He's confessed his love to his Maestro. Promises are so easy to make. The pain of his back is nothing to the agony that makes him feel so broken.
"You are stronger than he is, Taemin. Believe me," Onew urges and steps up close to his boy, speaking near his ear from behind without touching the welted skin.
Taemin feels that thought shimmer through his being like a drink of strong wine and it makes him shudder which hurts terribly but the thought remains. Almost without realizing it, he starts to talk. Every word burns on his tongue but he hugs Onew's statement to himself, even as he sobs with pain and self-hatred.
"He...he wasn't like you, Maestro. He wasn't satisfied with my pleasing only him. It wasn't enough. I wasn't enough," Taemin says, sobbing and shaking between words, letting them slip through and trying hard not to think about them much. He keeps hearing his Maestro's voice, telling him he is special, wanted, strong and that more than the pain that throbs through him like a heartbeat keeps him talking.
"I wanted to be good, I wanted to be so good. Not to disgrace my Mark...I didn't want to ask to be released, I tried so hard."
Onew lets the whip drop with a small sense of relief, petting at Taemin's untouched hip or his sweat damp hair as his boy talks. At this moment, he doesn't let the facts that Taemin is spilling free faster and faster between agonized sobs reach his conscious mind. He'll sift over them and deal with them later. His boy needs him more than he needs to understand that boy's true torment.
"Nothing was ever enough, ever, ever. He could tear me to pieces with just the things he said. So when he wanted me to please his friends, have these parties, called me... called me his private slut...I just...I did what he wanted....whatever he wanted."
Onew speaks softly, soothingly to Taemin, as best he can without breaking the chain of words that come out of Taemin like infection from a horrible wound.
At one point, he reaches into his pocket with one hand as the arm supports Taemin so he can lean against himself. "Help us," he says simply and let's the phone snap closed and the plastic thing hit the hardwood floor.
It doesn't take long for Key and his lover to get to them and Onew jerks his head towards the mechanism on the wall. He couldn't leave Taemin long enough to hit the button so the chains would let Taemin's strained arms drop. He whispers softly to Taemin, soothingly as the flood of words begins to ease up even though Taemin is still weeping as if he's broken beyond repair.
He's relieved that Key and Minho don't speak, though he feels his friend hug him hard from behind at one point while Minho works on the cuffs to let Taemin's arms drop. Later, later, he promises himself, pushing his own emotions aside for now. He glares at Minho when the tall man moves as if to pick up Taemin. No one is touching his boy ever again except himself.
He bends carefully, letting Taemin's shaking form drop over his back. This way will put the least pressure on Taemin's welts. "I have you my piccolo stella, I have you." he tells Taemin.
Taemin feels himself falling apart and at first he resists it as he always has. Coming undone is weakness he cannot afford, that's what he's always told himself. Keeping the door firmly shut on his experiences and his last Master, allowed him to function, let him keep breathing. But now, Onew is there and his mind flashes like a camera over images of his Maestro. Onew is .... he has no way of defining now just what Onew is...except everything.
Suddenly, letting go is so easy. It's such a relief as he talks and talks and everything hurts but it feels wonderful at the same time and he's crying so hard but that feels good too and his Maestro is there, still, against all his fears. He feels the big warm hand caressing him gently, brushing through his hair. He hears the deep voice in his ears and relief is followed by a strange dizzy peace.
Nothing else that happens even matters. He know's he's carried, and softly bathed of the sweat that covers his body. He knows also that his Maestro is there, holding his hand as he is given a glass of something sweet to drink. Key is there too, Taemin realizes blearily and tries to smile at the older man but he's just too tired.
Onew sits beside Taemin and watches as his boy finally fades into a heavy sleep. He's starting to shake with stress but he doesn't dare leave Taemin alone for even a moment. He stares at the pale face turned towards him as Taemin lays on his stomach.
"I'm going to ruin this fucker," he says simply into the silence.
Key and Minho simply turn towards him. "Whatever you need to do, hyung," Minho says solemnly, his face serious and quiet. He's one of the best lawyers in the city when he's not crawling at the end of Key's pink leopard leash. The thought, the incongruity would make Onew smile but right now he's not sure he can ever smile properly again.
"Kibum, will you stay with Taemin? I need to shower and I don't want him alone for a moment." He can't seem to focus with his usual acuteness.
"Don't be stupid, Lee Jinki. Of course we'll both stay as long as either of you need us." For once, Key is not at all flamboyant. He hugs Onew hard enough that it hurts and kisses his cheek. The other man is one of the few who remembers Onew's real name and uses it on a regular basis.
"Do you need help? You don't look too steady on your feet," Key comments when he pulls back to look into Onew's eyes.
"I'll be all right. Can you call HeeChul hyung, too? I was careful but it'd be good if he looked Taemin over, while he's asleep."
Somehow Onew misses Key's response and doesn't care. He finds himself in the big bathroom and turns on the water in the shower to scalding hot. Feeling his self-control starting to break, he starts to shiver and steps into the water fully clothed. Shaking, he finally lets himself remember Taemin's broken words and begins to cry in hard racking heaves that become the heaves of vomiting though there's virtually nothing in his stomach to bring up. He pounds on the tiled walls until his knuckles are bruised and the skin is broken in places.
He used my boy like some kind of street whore, this disgusting piece of walking excrement. He made Taemin feel lower than the lowest...like it was his duty....this .... Onew's thoughts are almost incoherent with rage and pain. I will make him pay for what he has done.