With help from Jed.

Written for a theme zine in which every story had to include the phrase "right down to the belt."
With fond apologies to Fanny Adams, Jane of Australia, Lily, and all other writers of pagan-magical B/D...including myself.

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"Um...you sure about this?" Bodie was not used to feeling ill-at-ease, and regarded his partner, the cause of his discomfort, with wariness.

Doyle, busily hauling items of an astonishing variety from loaded shopping bags to dump them haphazardly on Bodie's coffee table, scarcely looked up. "Course I'm sure. Keep telling you I'm a witch, don't I? An' you know witches have powers. 'S what makes us witches. An' you want this as much as I do, right? Well, then!" He flourished something in his right hand; peering cautiously, Bodie identified it as a bottle of Scotch. Things were looking up.

And right down again, as the whiskey was followed by an unmarked pint jar of something red and viscous. Bodie gulped and vowed not to ask after the stray cat Doyle had been feeding. Doyle opened the jar, dipped a finger in and licked it clean. "Mmm. Right down to the wire, but it's not gone sour yet. Here," and he dipped the finger again and offered it to Bodie.

Commanding his belt to hold his stomach down, Bodie sucked it in.

Raspberry puree.

By now, Doyle had finished emptying the bags he had brought, leaving them crumpled on the floor and Bodie's living room littered with, among other things, candles, jars of liquid, bottles of liquid (Bodie quite liked the look of some of them) and, of all things, a brazier. One of the unidentifiables turned out to be a stick of incense, which Doyle lit before turning to his partner.

"Okay. Strip."

"What, right down?" Bodie reflexively checked that the shades were drawn.

"Nah, to the belt." Doyle grinned sideways. "The rest comes later."

Bodie began unbuttoning his shirt. "Um... look, Doyle--I mean, I've got nothing against a bit of kinky sex and all that, but are you sure...?"

Slender fingers pushed his own aside. "Look, Bodie," Doyle said, working much faster that Bodie had been, "you wanna make sure we stay together, right? That one of us doesn't go down, an' leave the other one alone, alive? Well, I can do it. I can tie us together, make sure it doesn't happen."

"So can I," muttered Bodie, who had known for almost a year what he would do in such a case. Doyle had pulled his partner's shirt off and was making quick work of his own. "But I didn't expect some kind of religious rite. You sure you got this down?"

Green eyes glared at him. "I've never done it before, if that's what you mean. But yes, I've 'got it down.' All right?"

"Can I have a drink?" Bodie asked meekly, then cut his eyes toward the scotch when Doyle didn't immediately catch on.

"Oh, yeah, sure. Go ahead," he added when Bodie hesitated in reaching for the bottle. While his partner drank, Doyle busied himself lighting the candles; their sweet smell mingled with the clove-like scent of the incense. "Just a few more things to do--" he was across the room, turning off the lights, until the candles and the evening twilight through the shades were the only source of light in the room-- "and then we'll be ready--" a handful of something that glinted silver was carefully arranged on the carpet in no pattern Bodie could discern-- "to begin."

"What shall I do?" asked Bodie, who was feeling much better for having downed a good belt.

"Get down. Right." Doyle pulled his partner until they sat cross-legged on the carpet, facing each other. He reached up to the table for the jar of berry juice and set it beside them.

"We have to mark each other as ours," he explained. "Use the juice and a finger; draw something on me. Something that has meaning to you, something that will make me yours. I'll do the same to you."

"Draw?" echoed Bodie, confused and somewhat embarrassed. "You're the one who went to art school, mate."

"Then write something." Doyle was already dipping his right forefinger in the jar, considering Bodie's chest for all the world like da Vinci sizing up a new canvas. At least, Bodie hoped that that was the right metaphor. He wasn't ready for Picasso.

"What?"

"Anything that has meaning for you. Write down to the belt; cover my chest and both arms. We'll take turns on the backs." Bodie abruptly discovered that the juice was cold, as Doyle's finger swept across him from nipple to puckering nipple.

All right. He thought a moment, resolutely not wondering what the bizarre design taking shape on his chest was meant to be, and dipped a finger in the jar. Carefully, as Doyle held his left arm out and steady for him, he wrote his name--his full name--from shoulder to wrist. Turning the proffered arm slightly, he rewet his finger and wrote "Raymond Doyle" along its underside. Then he wrote his initials on the back of Ray's hand, and Ray's on top of them. More juice went to inscribe the word "Bodie" arching from nipple to nipple, his finger tangling in crinkly chest hair.

He was enjoying himself. He tattooed Doyle from collarbone to navel with their names, belted him round about with "William Raymond Andrew Doyle Philip Bodie Bodie Bodie," and managed to think only occasionally of the bright red berry pulp from Doyle's own efforts dripping onto the waistband of his slacks. And his carpet.

Doyle, having accidentally smeared a design on Bodie's cheek, leaned forward to lick off the offending smudge. Bodie adroitly turned his head, and the ceremony entered a new phase as their mouths met. Doyle tasted of raspberries, and every time Bodie touched him he blurred their names together. He liked the symbolism of that.

"Okay," Doyle said, breathless, after some time of kissing. "Let's get down to the rite."

"You mean we haven't started yet?"

"Not quite." Doyle gave a lewd grin, and Bodie found a raspberry handprint on the crotch of his trousers. He'd never be able to face his dry cleaner. "Lie down. Right," and Doyle pulled Bodie on top of him, full length on the carpet.

Bodie began licking his way down Doyle's chest, tasting sweat and raspberries, nuzzling at the hair that twisted around his tongue. So soft, he thought, and silky...like down, right to the belt...

He was pulled around, head to toe with his partner; fingers were at his waistband, and he set himself to Doyle's, worrying at it with lips and teeth and the hand that wasn't teasing the other man's nipples. "Ray," he mumbled, then let the buckle out of his mouth and tried again. "Ray, we've done this plenty of times. Not that I don't like it, but what makes it special this time? Where's the magic?"

"You're downright suspicious, mate," Doyle responded absently, prodding with interest at the partially freed swelling before him. "Shh. Let's get down to it."

"Down to what?"

"Belt up, Bodie."

Abashed and somewhat hurt, Bodie obediently pulled away and began rebuckling himself. Doyle shoved his hands aside. "No, you idiot. Belt up, trousers down." Bodie was about to protest the practical impossibility of this when speech became impossible as his cock was sucked into warm, wet heaven. He bucked and grabbed at Doyle's buttocks, pressing his face into his lover's crotch.

"Downright evil, you are," he managed to gasp after a moment.

"No way. Strictly white witchcraft here." Doyle let go for a moment, and then Bodie discovered what one of the other mysterious jars contained, as an oiled finger slipped into his ass. He trembled helplessly and moaned.

Then the hands and mouth drew away, and after a moment the white light faded from behind his eyelids. "Down, boy." Doyle's voice held amusement. "If we're gonna get right down to it, seems to me this rite needs some other things taken down--like my pants, right?" Teeth nipped lightly at Bodie's testicles. "Take the hint, partner."

Nothing loath, Bodie pulled trousers and belt right down and away, lifted underpants and slid them aside, and drew a swath of berry juice the length of Doyle's erection, and then promptly licked it off. Doyle's sharp indrawn breath was quite satisfactory.

Mouth to cock and cock to mouth they lay, sucking greedily at each other; unable to reach the jar of oil Bodie found that raspberry puree made a perfectly acceptable substitute, and he finger-fucked Doyle until his hands began to tremble with the onslaught of orgasm. Doyle's finger drove right up inside him; his other arm belted Bodie's waist and Bodie stiffened and came, mouth opening in a great cry that almost lost him Doyle's first hot pulse; then he swallowed the spurting cock again and nursed at it through the spasms that racked them both.

Eventually, the knotted muscles in his legs relaxed, and he let Doyle's limp cock fall from his mouth. Doyle's heaving breath blew across his stomach, and they were both sticky with illegible raspberry hieroglyphs.

"Is that it, then?" he murmured. "Are we linked?"

Doyle began to tremble. Alarmed, Bodie sat up and looked at him, then realized with dawning apprehension that Doyle was laughing. Muffled at first, one hand over his mouth; the chuckling leaked out, growing louder and louder until he was helpless with mirth, curled on the floor clutching his stomach and choking on the hysterics. Tears leaked from his eyes, and Bodie stared at him malevolently.

"Christ, Bodie," he managed eventually, and almost cracked up again. "Christ, you'll believe anything, won't you?" Correctly reading Bodie's expression as an intent to do murder, he scrambled to his knees, red-splotched arms extended in defense. Trying vainly to stifle the giggles that still burst from him, he hurriedly went on, "No, really, Bodie, I didn't mean any harm, I just--would you believe I'm kinky for raspberries? No, but--I wanted to--it was the drawing on you, and you writing on me, and--" He wiped the tears from his eyes, leaving a red trail that made it look as though he were weeping blood. Bodie approved the image.

"Bodie, I'm sorry. I wasn't trying to make fun of you--at least, not all the time--and... well, I wanted to do it. This. All this. I didn't think you'd let me, otherwise." Panting, he lowered his hands and watched Bodie's face.

Bodie had by now decided that murder was too good for him. Doyle would pay, he'd see to that. But for now, with his own image in tatters, Bodie had only one thing left to do. And with all the self-composure he could muster, Bodie did it.

Quite calmly, and with a grand disregard for the carpet, Bodie lifted the jar of raspberry puree and upended it over his partner's head, drenching him in a bright red, sticky deluge. Right down to his feet.

-- THE END --

1990