by Russ Primo
I raised my hand to her, and put a finger to my lips, signaling her to be quiet.
At once, Kacie nodded solemnly, before pushing a lock of her hair out of her eyes and back behind her ear.
As we approached the door, the sounds of the fire inside remained soft, quiet and contained.
Has Mira gone and gotten us all stirred up over nothing?
Creeping along to the wide, tall oak front doors, I peeked my head around the frame, to see what sort of trouble we were walking into.
“What do you see, Pryvet?” Mira whispered, behind me.
I heard the soft crackle of a spell being prepared from the top of her staff.
At first, I couldn't make out anything inside, as even with the flames illuminating the interior, and the setting sun dimming the outside world, it was too dark to see much.
But, as my eyes adjusted, I could barely make out the shapely form of what looked like a woman standing before the flames at the other end of the temple.
Due to the poor lighting, she was all in shadow, and I couldn't make out the features of her clothing.
I'd seen enough pretty women, especially over the past few hours, to know what I was looking at, though.
Her waist, even from this distance, was clearly trim. Though, that wasn't to say she was lacking in the butt region.
The garments she wore seemed to hug her body almost as close as fine lingerie would… or at least that was my impression, as she turned towards the door and I got the briefest glimpse of her fantastic rack, huge and high and perky enough to make a 19 year old weep, though her proportions implied she was closer to 40 than to twenty.
Still, as she turned towards me, I had to duck out of the doorway.
Sexy, with a body that might make the most well-endowed woman weep, or not, I had no idea who she was, what she was doing there, or what sort of threat she posed.
I took solace in the fact that her ears hadn't been pointed like an elf’s, at least.
She was, by those first glancing appearances, a Free Woman, like Mira and Kacie.
“What, Pryvet?” Kacie whispered, the rock from the pathway held tight in her fist. “What did you see in there?”
I looked at her and our eyes locked. There was a cunning and a determination in Kacie’s that made me proud to have her along.
I reminded myself that she wanted to be here, with me, even if there was some danger to be had.
But, my answer was not for Kacie, and I shook my head gently to her.
"Mira!" I whispered, gesturing for her to come to the doorway. “You know more about this than I do. Take a look. She doesn’t look like an elf, but is she still dangerous?"
As quietly as a temple mouse, Mira crept over to me, holding her staff aloft, and ready to cast whatever spell she needed to.
From within the temple came sounds of the woman inside, intoning words that I felt I should know, but which were just barely too quiet to place, barely on the wrong side of my known languages to understand.
Slowly, Mira slid her head around the thick door, squinting off into the dark.
Squinting off into the small fire beyond, and the woman stood before it.
Whether she be friend or foe.
Mira’s whole body tensed as she peered into the gloom, so long that I thought she might be checking out the woman by the fire, instead of ascertaining a threat level.
Should I chastise Mira for not taking this seriously? I know, based on her reactions to and comments about Kacie that she’s at least a little into girls, as well as guys (I hope).
Plus, she’s got this weird, sinister-seeming playful side that I really need to figure out.
"Aha!" Mira cheered at last, standing upright and flinging her long red hair around, so that she could address me, her thick black robes hanging loose once more over the breasts within. "It's all right, you two! It's just Mette!"
I gave her a quizzical look.
How could a girl go from one moment being fearful of an attack, and the next be sure that her fears were overblown? Either the elves got to her head, or she was already cracked to begin with.
Standing tall, Mira strode through the doorway as happy as could be, leaving Kacie and me behind, to wonder after her.
Probably cracked to begin with, unfortunately.
"Well that was a whole lot of worry over nothing," Kacie said, coming over to me and laying her thin, feminine fingers on my shoulder. "I wouldn't have expected a girl with Mira's powers to be so nervous about nothing."
"Me neither," I grumbled, straining my ear for sound of struggle inside; something about Mira just seemed a little off enough that I worried it might be a trap after all. "You'd think, anyway, that she'd have just been able to freeze whatever she feared was inside. She froze a bar-full of elves, mages, patrons, and a giant only this morning, after all."
"Wex isn't a giant," Kacie corrected me gently, removing her hand from my shoulder and holding it in front of her chest. "He had to satisfy his Debt, too. Just like all Free Men."
I felt a sting, but shrugged off her correction.
"The important thing isn't whether he's literally a giant," I reasoned. "The important thing is that he's big as Hell, and must take way more magic to freeze still than a petite girl like yourself."
Kacie blushed at my description of her, and I felt the manhood between my legs respond to her demure expression.
"Thanks," she whispered, digging a toe into the gravel path outside the doorway. "We don't get a lot of men, in Clanesse. It's nice to be talked about like that."
Well, now, this is new! On the mainland, a girl might take offense to being called petite.
But, then, on the mainland it's much more dangerous than it is on the Free Isles. Women there need to be big and broad, if they want to survive.
Kacie, though, looks good tiny and demure. It certainly makes her tits seem more prominent, too.
"Don't mention it," I winked at her, my eyes flicking down to her breasts. "Unless, of course, you'd like me to continue talking about you like that."
Kacie looked up at me, with her eyes twinkling.
She opened her mouth to say something, but was cut short by Mira calling to us, from inside the temple.
"Come on, you slowpokes!" Mira cried, her voice coming out to us in weird, echoing bursts as it reflected off of the tall arched ceilings, the wide empty floor. "Come in and meet my mother!"
"It's a pleasure," the busty, older woman cooed to Kacie and myself as we entered through the tall, thick oak doors. "You are Pryvet, then?"
"I am, ma'am," I called to her as Kacie and I made our way across the wide, open building.
"And who is your friend, sweetie?" the well-endowed woman asked Mira.
"That's Kacie," Mira chuckled. "We only just met, but I would say that we're friends, enough."
Kacie looked very put-out, to be talked about like that, and I placed my palm in the center of her shoulders to comfort her.
"At least someone thinks of me fondly," she grumbled to me, nonetheless smiling at my touch as her eyes skated past mine, to take in our surroundings.
The interior of the temple was unlike any I'd ever seen.
And I'd seen a lot of temples.
Faiths, on the mainland, were as numerous as flies on stale meat, and about as useful.
But, this temple, Smoterlich if Mira was to be believed, had them all beat.
We were standing in what I thought must have been the main chamber.
Walls, at least thirty feet high, rose around us with such grandeur and imposition that the small light of Mette’s fire could barely illuminate their terminations at the ceiling. Each of the four surrounding us was made of stone that seemed even smoother and better-laid than a bank’s walls, on the mainland.
As these stone walls reached near to the ceiling, the seemed to fall inwards into each other in the sky-vaulted gloom, like great waves crashing upon the shore, so that they formed odd, soft arches which soared so high above us they were lost entir
ely to the dimness of the temple’s heights.
“It’s so tall, I can barely see the ceiling,” Kacie wondered, her head staring straight up beside me at the vast blackness of the temple’s interior. “I’ve never even heard of a place so tall…”
I let my fingers stroke her back between her shoulder blades, drawing soft coos of delight from her lips, where otherwise there existed only awe and wonder.
On the floor around us, which was made of similarly well-laid stone, there were small, round openings. Each of these was filled with soil, and from each a small, round tree grew.
Really, they looked more like bushes, than trees.
But, between the Tally Branches, the copse of trees beside the temple, and the ancient forests that ringed the islands, I had gotten the distinct feeling that the Free Isles and The Mother had a thing for trees.
Kacie turned her face down from the ceiling, and winked at me.
“Thanks for the comfort, Pryvet,” she sighed. “It’s all so new, even though I’ve lived here my whole life.”
I smiled at her.
“Just imagine how new it is for me then,” I chuckled, making her smile. “But we shouldn’t keep Mira or this woman, Mette, waiting. We did come all this way, after all.”
Nodding, Kacie and I walked up to the woman and Mira, who I realized as we drew closer were standing on a dais, with the burning thing behind them.
"It is simply a pleasure to meet, you, Pryvet," the woman said, bending low and exposing a good swathe of deep cleavage that, owing to the height of the dais, stood only a few feet from my eyes and directly in my line of sight. "And you, as well, young Kacie. I daresay that you'll be able to help Pryvet pay off his Debt, with how pretty you are."
Thanks to my eyes adjusting to the dimness, and the fire burning behind the woman, I could see Kacie blush a crimson furious enough to match Mira's bright red hair. I could also make out the small smile on her lips, as though she loved to be talked about as a tool for me to use in repaying my Debt.
The Free Isles had many strange people on it, and I doubted if I’d ever understand the women here. Not that I was complaining, of course.
But, the proximity to the temple’s only light source also mean that I could start to make out the woman better, too.
Hot Damn.
I wonder if every temple priestess looks this good, or if it’s just her.
If they do, I’ll have a hard time giving any other woman my attention.
Got to remember that bedding these priestesses probably won’t count towards my Debt total, after all.
Still, could be fun as a side-show sort of endeavor. Just have to make sure it doesn’t distract from the circus, though, as the saying goes.
Needless to say, I liked what I saw.
While Mira and Kacie were about my age, and so had the assets of girls the same, I felt more certain than ever that I was right about this woman's age, and about the variety of clothing that she wore.
She wore a deep, black dress, fringed with strips of white like many of the priestesses on the mainland. Unlike those other priestesses, though, whose dresses were baggy and loose and still managed to have collars so high that their bagginess didn't even give you a glimpse of breast, this woman's vestments were very nearly skin-tight.
And, oh, how much lower could that neckline be?
It plunged so low on her chest that I got a glimpse of some very frilly underwear beneath it, which caressed her full breasts as close as I wanted my fingers to.
Her face was soft and round, though her body wasn't large (any extra plump would have shown clearly through that tight little number that she wore), and framed by straight black hack that lay aside her cheeks beautifully.
What's more, she had on deep, blood-red lipstick that made her mouth look like it was as hot as the flames behind her.
Oh, I'd love to put out those lips with my tongue, darling.
Glancing from her face down the length of her body, I noted that the dress clung just as tightly to her strong, powerful legs, legs that were propped into flexing even more than usual by a pair of tall, black heels.
When my eyes travelled back up her length, I noticed that she'd added a devilish smile to those burning lips.
"Now, now," she chuckled, purposefully glancing down at her big, full tits and the bra that held them up. "I was speaking about the pretty little Kacie there, Pryvet. Mira and I are, I'm sure she's told you, sworn to chastity. We’ll be no good at servicing your… your Debt, young man.”
She winked at me as she grasped the fabric of her dress between two fingers and drew it up over her lacey bra, standing upright again and removing her cleavage from my sight.
"About that," I said, lifting my Tally Branch, so that she could see it better. "I was under the impression that, as this sort of Debt only usually applied to Free Men, and as I'm a Foreigner, I am in something of a good position, to bargain for a good reward, after satisfying this unreasonable imposition."
The woman tilted her head at the Tally Branch and clucked her tongue, as though she were expecting something else entirely.
"Yes," she said, crossing her arms beneath her large, soft breasts. "Well, I will be honest, The Mother did not tell me that your… Debt would be so substantial. I don't know that I am able to bargain with you, on her behalf."
"Oh!" Mira exclaimed, beside the woman. "Mette, would having your staff help?"
Mira was practically bouncing on the balls of her feet, holding the staff up to the woman, with a big grin plastered onto her face.
"Thank you, Mira," Mette said, taking it from her and turning back to the fire behind her. “But a woman like me can only handle so much Debt, you know. If it gets too large, we’re unable to really deal with it, no matter what variety of aid that we employ. Still, I will see if it… opens my mind wide enough to accept Pryvet’s Debt into me. Only then will I be able to barter for his reward on his behalf.”
It can’t just be me, noticing these double entendres flying around the place. Big Debts, and women needing help to handle them.
I mean, come on!
I’m surprised she hasn’t made some comment yet about the fire behind her being the heat of her desire, or something like that.
With a start, I realized that what was burning behind the woman was one of those small, round trees that were laid out throughout the temple periodically.
"You have to sacrifice one every time you want to talk to The Mother," Mira explained, folding her petite hands behind her back and beaming at me. "But, it's easier if you have your staff. And Mette sent me with hers, when I went to come get you, Pryvet."
Beside Mira, Mette raised the staff imperiously above her, and turned back to the fire, intoning some deep words of a language that sounded almost like the one that the Free Isles used, but far enough away that I could only guess at its meaning.
The small, burning tree lit up even brighter than it had before, the flames which burst from its branches stretching themselves up higher and higher, until the great pyre rose some fifteen feet, straight up into the temple's cold, dark air, casting deep shadows over everything around us.
Mira turned to watch Mette work, admiration spinning to life on her youthful face.
Kacie turned to me, to see how I'd react, confusion unfurling itself across her sky-blue eyes.
I shrugged to Kacie, and turned to watch what Mette was doing, having no better way to occupy myself at the moment.
Mette's body shook as her voice boomed out, rising up to the tower of flames, and sending sparks bursting forth from it to land around us, hissing on the stone floor.
Kacie edged closer to me, and wrapped her arm around mine, clutching me tight, as though I alone could protect her from the forces that danced and laughed in this temple.
"Tell The Mother that I want a good return for all my sacrifice!" I growled to Mette, when there was a lull in her intoning. "If I'm going to have this many children, then I want magic commensurate with that. Power over time, the sea
sons, I'd like fire magic like that tree. And Ice. And Earth. I have a debt of my own that I need to satisfy, a mage who could kill me with a glance, if I don’t have power to reckon his. If The Mother promises that, then I will fulfill my Debt.”
The spout of flames bursting forth from the burning tree arced higher into the dark air, flicking itself against the roof and, or so I thought, resolving into a pretty, feminine, and obviously flaming face for just a few moments.
The feminine fire-face scowled down at me, then at Mette, or seemed to for the briefest of moments before crashing back down into the tree. The flames returned to their original size.
Mette raised the staff higher, intoning deeply again until the flames returned to the fifteen-or-so feet they’d been moments before.
She clucked her tongue impatiently.
"It's not an unusual request, Pryvet," she said, glancing back at me and giving me a good view of her deep brown eyes, with the flames dancing in them. "But, know that you needn't raise the children you will sire. They are The Mother's to raise, and she will take care of them for you, after birth. So, your position may not be as lucrative as you thought.
“Still, it is a larger Debt than I’ve seen in all my years as a priestess. I will do my best to argue your case.”
Kacie edged still closer against me, pressing her soft, supple breasts into my arm as she sought the safety of my presence.
Well, that makes this whole affair easier. At least I won't have to worry about the kids, after I impregnate these women. That could really have taken it out of me!
Suddenly, the flames shot downwards, back into the burning tree, extinguishing themselves in a blast of hot smoke, until only embers remained of the burned-up tree stump.
Mette gasped, and clutched her warm hands to her breasts.
She whispered something I could not hear into the flames and Mira gave me a dark look.
"Well?" I said, advancing towards the dais, "How did it go?"
Mette turned to me, her chest heaving with exertion and making her large bosom rise and fall with every breath, quite entrancingly.
