Curse of Magic

by Michael Brightburn

  That of course was the whole point in shaving my head. To dishonor me, to disgrace me, even if they thought the only ones who would see it would be the monsters in the cursed woods I was exiled to. Right before they devoured me.

  But I actually didn’t miss my hair as much as I thought I would.

  It was always getting in the way before. Now the only time I’d thought of it was when reminded by someone thinking me a lowborn.

  “What are we doing?” Vi whispered.

  “What does it look like?” I answered under my breath.

  “How are we going to pay?”

  “Don’t worry about that.”

  “What is she?” Sienna asked, in a voice nowhere near a whisper, staring in wonder at the angel.

  This caused the silaren to glance her way again, amusement on his smooth, scaled face.

  The tailor continued in her measuring, now laying the tape out against the silaren’s feet. She actually measured both.

  Thorough.

  She wasn’t even writing anything down.

  “She’s a divine,” Alva answered.

  “Is that your dryad?” the silaren asked me, finally looking at me.

  “It is,” I said without thinking.

  He nodded. “Any interest in a trade? I’ve got some fine faeries.” He gestured at the cage. “Much more pleasant than her kind.”

  Sienna clutched onto me with her free hand.

  Elaria didn’t allow owning of people, only animals—or monsters if one was daring. Some kingdoms didn’t follow the spirit of this law by having what amounted to slaves who they paid for their service, but Silaris had no such restrictions at all, nor did anywhere else outside of Elaria I was aware of.

  Not even my mother’s home kingdom of Gyead.

  Of course, you could never own a highborn in any kingdom, and not even here, in Silaris.

  But there were no highborn dryad’s. They had no need for kingdoms or possessions. Not even for clothes, usually.

  “She’s not for trade.”

  “What about the little one.”

  This I had to think about. But no, I’d given her my word. “She isn’t either.”

  The silaren shrugged. “Suit yourself. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Those things bite.”

  “And don’t forget it,” Alva said.

  The tailor stood up. “All done. I’ll have your armor ready for you by morning.”

  “You’re amazing, Elanos. When do you sleep?”

  She smiled. “You know I don’t.”

  “Tis too bad. I’d let you share my bed.”

  “I’m sure you would. I’ll see you at sunrise.”

  The silaren nodded and dressed, then left, giving one last look to Vi as he did.

  She growled at him again, though it still appeared to please him.

  “Welcome,” Elanos greeted us. “How can I help you?”

  Great. I was a good politician, but I didn’t expect to have to negotiate with a divine.

  “As you can see, we’re in need of some clothing.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. It’s warm. And I think you look fine as you are.” She studied my body.

  “Uh, well, we aren’t staying here long, and not everywhere is Silaris.”

  “No, it’s not. Well then, come in, sit. I’ll need to take your measurements.”

  “Oh, we don’t need anything tailored. Just a few sets of simple clothes.”

  “I’m a tailor. I only sell tailored items. Everything I sell, I make myself, down to the thread. Now come on, don’t be shy. Unlike your little friend, I don’t bite.”

  16

  “Where are you coming from?” Elanos asked as she took my measurements.

  “The forest,” Sienna answered before I could.

  The tailor wrapped her measuring tape around my waist. “In the cursed lands? Dangerous place.”

  “Where did you come from?” I asked her.

  She knelt before me to measure my leg, her head at crotch level.

  I admired her wings, which were tucked tightly behind her, and tried not to admire any other part of her.

  She was wearing a backless green gown which clung to her body, showing off her curves.

  “Many places,” she answered, standing up and nodding. “Who’s next?” She looked to Vi and then Sienna. “How about you?”

  “Oh, I don’t need any clothes.”

  “Yes she does,” I told Elanos.

  The tailor nodded and got to work measuring her.

  “But my measurements can change,” Sienna protested.

  “Don’t worry,” Elanos told her. “I make all my clothing to exactly accommodate the customer’s needs. What I make you will be perfectly fitted for a dryad.” She glanced at Vi. “And a lycanthrope.”

  She looked to the little vampire in the cage. “Will she be needing anything?”

  I hadn’t considered Alva. I wasn’t even sure how long she’d be with us. “Sure,” I said. It wasn’t like it would take a lot of fabric.

  The tailor moved on to Vi, and I couldn’t help but stare at her ass as she did, her backless gown revealing the top of it, the V of her wings looking designed to draw my gaze there.

  Seeming to sense my attention, she glanced at me, at my manhood, and smiled.

  Then she went back to work.

  Sienna rubbed against me, taking my manhood in her hand.

  But I pushed her away gently, shaking my head. “Not now.”

  She pouted, but obeyed.

  When it came time to measure Alva, she hissed at Elanos.

  “It’s okay little one,” the divine said. “I promise you’ll like what I make you.”

  “We don’t partake of your society or customs.”

  “No, but you do follow the Sira’nov.”

  “How do you know about that?”

  Elanos casually reached through the bars of the cage, which parted for her.

  It was only in doing so that I noticed the cage had no door.

  “I’ll bite you!” the vampire warned, backing away from her hand.

  But she didn’t, and Elanos wrapped her hand around the creature’s naked torso and pulled her out.

  Vi growled as the vampire was brought into the open.

  Alva hissed back at her.

  “Come on you two,” I said.

  “It’s only natural,” Elanos said, setting Alva down on a couch, then putting the tape up to her.

  Despite what Alva’d said, she allowed this and didn’t try to bite the divine.

  “You’re quite pretty,” Elanos told her.

  “I… thank you.”

  This compliment didn’t sit well with Vi, but at least she didn’t attack.

  Her tail was straight down between her legs, and the fur over her crotch was raised—which meant it was lowered, since it pointed up normally.

  Elanos put the vampire back in the cage when she was done, and it was only when the bars reverted to their normal, unbent state that Alva returned to her angry, petulant one. “Hey! Let me out!”

  “It’s not my place little one.” She stood to her full height—which was almost as tall as my own—and addressed me. “I can have your outfits ready before sunrise.”

  “What about the silaren?”

  “Varthek? He’s always late. It’s a silaren thing, or it is when dealing with non-silarens. Even one like me.” She smiled. It was beautiful. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

  “No, thank you. The other things we need wouldn’t be something a tailor could give.”

  “Don’t be so sure about that.”

  “Well, we could use a place to stay.”

  She thought for a moment, then nodded. “I know a place. Let me write you a note.”

  I didn’t know how I was going to pay for any of this, but would figure it out later, as she didn’t seem to take payment until after delivery.

  She wrote something on a sheet of parchment, then folded it in half. She dropped a bit of wax from one of the candle
s onto the edge to seal it and pressed her thumb into the wax.

  Instead of a thumbprint however, there was an elaborate sigil.

  “Make sure it remains sealed until you hand it over,” she said, holding it out to me.

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re quite welcome, Your Majesty.”

  17

  As we walked to the address she’d given us, I thought about how she’d known who I was.

  There was nothing to give it away: my hair was gone, I wore no clothing or armament, had no markings—other than the invisible one High Priest Orathar had marked me with.

  But that was divines.

  Even still, it was quite strange to find one working as a tailor.

  It was said they were immortal. It was said they were protected by the dead gods.

  It was also said that they were cursed by them. Outcast among us mortals.

  The truth was, no one really knew.

  “You’re quiet,” Sienna said, wrapping her arm around my waist as we walked, holding Alva’s cage in her other hand.

  Still keeping me between it and Vi.

  There was that feeling again, that relief at her touch, the contact of our skin.

  I looked down at the dryad and smiled. “Only contemplating things which have no answers.”

  She ran her hand down my stomach, over my manhood and took hold. “How about now?”

  We were still not at our destination, still out in the open, and I still felt watched.

  Up ahead I saw another group entangled with one another as they lay together.

  Perhaps this was what prompted Sienna’s attention.

  An orc sitting on a saloon porch eyed us as we walked by.

  “Let’s wait till we get settled.”

  “Is it me? I feel you’re worried we’re being watched. Is this better?” Her antlers unwound into individual roots, then retracted into her head. The wood texture of her skin faded to near invisibility.

  Now she simply looked like an elf. A particularly pure-blooded one given the size and shape of her ears.

  But this transformation only drew more attention. “We’ll be there soon.”

  She sighed disappointedly, and gave my manhood a few parting strokes before letting it go.

  It didn’t flop back down, as it was now partially engorged.

  I caught Vi looking, and when she noticed this, her yellow eyes locked onto mine. She held them for several moments before looking away.

  We passed the group and their collective moans did little to settle my arousal.

  Nor did the realization that they were all female.

  I felt a hand on my manhood again. “Are you sure you want to wait?” Sienna asked, giving me a squeeze.

  “I’m sure.”

  She let go with a pout.

  Alva had been silent since we’d left the tailor’s, and I glanced at her now.

  She was turned around in her cage, hands on the bars, watching the women as they moved together and pleasured one another.

  Then I looked at Vi, who quickly looked forward.

  She’d been staring at the vampire.

  I sighed.

  How we were going to handle sleeping when two of our number seemed set on either killing or eating the other, I didn’t know. I could only hope for separate rooms.

  Of course, I didn’t even know if where we were headed was an inn. Elanos wouldn’t say, only that it was a “good place to rest.”

  When we finally arrived at the address, we found a massive white building of stone and marble, polished steps leading up to a large stone door.

  “This… is an inn?” Sienna asked in wonder.

  “Let’s find out,” I said, and pushed open the door.

  The lobby was large, seventy or so paces across, and a bit less than that deep.

  To our left was a marble table which two attractive older women stood behind, going over what appeared to be ledgers. They didn’t look up as we entered.

  To our right was a pool populated by several people. Elves and humans, by the look. They were all nude, and several were engaged in sensual acts.

  Directly across from us was a large arched doorway, mirroring the one we’d come through, though this one had no doors.

  A young woman in an elaborate but thin white dress had been standing by this, but now approached to greet us.

  Though as she grew closer, I saw the look on her face wasn’t a welcoming one. “I’m sorry sir, but we don’t allow their kind here.”

  Sir. What an odd thing to be addressed by. Was this what it was like to live as a lowborn?

  I held out the note Elanos had given me. “We were told we could find rest here.”

  The woman was shaking her head as she took the folded parchment, but stopped when she saw the sigil.

  Her eyes widened as she looked up at me, then to my companions. “Oh… of course. Please, accept my deepest apologies. I didn’t realize…” She laughed nervously. “Well… Come, I’ll show you to your quarters.” She turned and hurried away, not even having bothered opening the note.

  I exchanged a look with Vi, who wore her usual expression of either mild suspicion, or annoyance. Hard to say for certain.

  Sienna was focused on the people in the pool and what they were doing to each other, as was Alva in her cage.

  We followed after the woman, Vi having to grab Sienna by the arm to get her moving.

  Sienna was so transfixed by the people and the acts they were engaged in, that she didn’t seem worried Vi had gotten so close to the cage.

  The young proprietor stopped at the large archway so we could catch up to her. “This way my lord.”

  Closer, though still not what I was used to.

  Past the archway were several sets of stairs, and she led us down a wide winding one into an even larger room than the lobby. There was a long pool down the center of this larger area, punctuated on both ends by steaming circular baths, big enough for at least twenty each.

  There were cushioned chaises lining either side of the pool, and further back from the water were massive beds, some with groups of two or three lounging on them.

  The woman led us along the water and through another doorway, taking us up a wide staircase into a long hall.

  There were scant few doors for how long it was.

  We stopped at a door near the end, and she drew a keyring from somewhere under her dress.

  She quickly located the correct key and unlocked the large wooden door, then held out her arm to the room. “Here you are my lord. Shall I have food and drink sent up?”

  I stopped in the doorway. As a king, I was used to lush accommodations. And this was about what I’d expect.

  For a king. Not for someone who looked like a lowborn and had three wilds as companions.

  It was a massive room with a balcony and its own bath. It was larger than the entirety of most any lowborn home.

  I looked at her, my stomach giving a rumble. “Yes, please. Food would be good. For my companions as well.”

  She examined each of them carefully. “Of course. Right away.” She took the key she’d used to unlock the door off the ring and handed it to me before hurrying off.

  “Gods rape me…” Vi said when she got sight of the room beyond the doorway.

  When we were all inside, I closed and locked the door behind us.

  It was large, but it was only one room. Even the bath was out in the open. Given its placement in the center of the room, that seemed intentional.

  Was this a layhouse? We had none in Serekthal, but they weren’t unheard of in Elaria at large, and certainly not outside of it.

  “Wow,” Sienna said. “It’s so… different.” There were large trees on either side of the wood and glass double doors leading to the balcony, and she shoved Alva’s cage at me before running over to one of these and pressing her nose to its leaves, inhaling deeply.

  She turned to me, her face now flushed a deep scarlet. “Oh, the fun that has been had here.”
r />   “I bet.” I went to the large, canopied bed and sat, setting the cage down beside it.

  I let out a sigh of relief. It felt good to finally be sitting. I didn’t do much walking as a king. I worked with the stones to keep my strength, and even sparred with at least some regularity, but this was different.

  “Let me out!” Alva protested.

  “If I do that, Vi will eat you.”

  “You wouldn’t let her!”

  “Even kings must sleep.”

  “Lycanthrope don’t,” Vi said with a wicked grin as she looked at Alva.

  The little vampire cringed away.

  In a large pack they might be formidable, but on their own, they really weren’t scary at all.

  “Yes you must,” Sienna corrected, coming to sit down beside me on the bed. “You’re not a divine.”

  Vi gave her an annoyed look. “Thanks for ruining the joke.”

  “It wasn’t a very funny one.”

  “No it wasn’t,” Alva huffed.

  Vi went to the tub in the center of the room and turned on the tap.

  After a moment, steaming water flowed out.

  Lined up beside the tub were crystal bottles, and Vi picked up and sniffed at these, not bothering to remove their corks, before deciding on a blue bottle in the shape of a dragon.

  She poured from this into the filling tub, then set the bottle down and got in. “Ahh,” she sighed as she settled in. She let her head fall lazily to the side, eyes falling to me. “This is a large bath.”

  “It is,” I agreed.

  She looked like she was about to say something else, but a knock came at the door, interrupting whatever it might have been.

  I got up from the bed with a groan.

  As tired as I was, I was equally hungry.

  As soon as I opened the door the man there bowed deeply. Beside him was a cart made of polished gray stone on some of the smoothest wooden wheels I’d ever seen. “My lord.” Standing, but still keeping his head bowed, he pushed the cart in, nearly knocking it into me in his deference.

  I wondered if they’d opened the letter, and if so, what it had said. The young woman who’d initially rejected us and called me sir began referring to me as lord once she saw the sigil, and this man had called me that again, so if they had read the letter, it wouldn’t have revealed I was a king, for calling a king “lord” was a greater affront than not addressing him with a title at all.