by D. R. Rosier
She wasn’t sure exactly what Cassie was doing, when the light blonde sorceress muttered, “Break.” Sy’lia felt magic power flow from Cassie’s staff and slam into the tank’s shields.
At the same time, she felt Sean’s power hit the shield like a battering ram, and both Emily and Mara surrounded them all in a shield of white glowing power and protection. The twins just looked alert, but the soldiers seemed far more worried about the undead in their midst cutting them down than the eight of them standing just a hundred feet ahead of them.
Over half the enemy had been cut down before they started fighting back. Mostly because the zombies were wickedly fast and strong.
That’s when things went a little wrong. The tank’s turret glowed a cherry red, and then fired a massive fireball. The tank’s shields also felt strong to her, they’d obviously underestimated the strength of magical power in the thing.
The fireball whooshed and exploded brightly. She wasn’t burned, so Emily’s and Mara’s shield held, but the bright flash of light blinded her. The magical explosion also disoriented her sense of surroundings, and she felt a shiver of fear go down her spine. She’d never been in a battle before and prayed to her goddess for strength as she fought off waves of vertigo.
She was trying to figure out what was going on around her with her eyes shut and tearing from the pain of the bright light, just by the feel of the magic. She could feel all her companions still trying to break the tanks shields, and that’s when the world exploded as the second fireball fired from the tank and blew right through the shields. Every nerve in her whole body screamed at her mind with agonized pain as the fire plumed around her.
She wasn’t sure what to do, and she froze when Sean screamed to get down. It was only a second later when strong arms went around her from behind, and she was slammed into the ground. She heard Cassie yell something she couldn’t make out, and also felt a surge of magic from both Emily and Mara.
She gasped, when she felt Sean’s life magic dive inside her body. It made her stomach warm, and her whole body tingled pleasantly as the pain of the burns faded. It was completely absurd, but she felt completely safe in that moment despite the threat of imminent death. His magic was warm, and his arms cradled her.
Then she felt something else, something large growing against her ass. My goddess, was his cock really that big? She was absolutely mortified when the sensations of his warm magic surging through her made her back arch and she push her ass up against his cock. Clearly, it was the magic, and had nothing to do with her reluctant attraction to the confident and well-muscled life sorcerer.
Lori felt a little breathy, and her pussy moistened at the horrific screams of the enemy. She couldn’t help it, whenever she used her shadows to harm and kill it sent a delicious sensation of pleasure through her body, more so than normally wielding magic did. By about ten times. She likened it to Sean’s darker magic, when he used it suck out life force. Apparently, all magic wielders had a darker side to their magic, that was rather tempting and addicting.
She imagined if she even stroked her clit once it would send her off into delightful spasms and powerful waves of euphoria. She resisted the urge, and she killed the remaining soldiers as quickly as possible. She was as merciful as possible, but her magic didn’t kill immediately, and that meant bearing the sick twisted pleasure of it for several seconds.
Although, as far as she knew, Cassie, Mara, and Emily didn’t have that challenge, but maybe they just hadn’t triggered it yet with the magic they used. For sorcerers it was mind control, something Cassie didn’t ever do. Perhaps, the goddesses of light magic didn’t have a dark side at all, or they just hadn’t discovered one yet? She didn’t know, and she wasn’t going to worry about it. If they ever did find it, that was their cross to bear, she had her own.
As the last soldier fell dead to the ground, and the pleasure stopped racing through her body, she felt a sense of disappointment there was no one else to kill. She felt the sharp loss of the pleasure.
The tank itself was a smoldering ruin. They’d underestimated the danger of it badly. The first attack had demolished the protective shields, though it kept them from being burned. When the second fireball had been sent their way, everyone had scattered except for the stupid elf, for some dumb ass reason she wasn’t sure of. Either Sy’lia had been frozen in fear, or she’d been blinded and hadn’t seen the danger coming.
The tank had gotten off one more fireball, and Sy’lia would be dead if Sean hadn’t tackled her behind the car. As it was, his own back was badly burned, though she could see it healing already even as the elven priestess healed under his touch.
After their magical attack had gotten them exactly nowhere, Sean must’ve realized the tank was specifically designed to resist enemy magic users and take them out. His zombie army had disengaged with the soldiers and went after the tank, which had surprisingly worked very well. So well in fact, that the tank had exploded, killing the occupants and destroying all of his zombies in the explosion.
It was why she’d had to finish off the last fifteen or so of the enemy platoon.
She took a deep breath and tried to relax, as her mind wished there were more people to kill so she could feel that deep pleasure again. She’d just have to wait until they got home, and Emily, Betty, and Nancy could take care of her itch the old-fashioned way.
But she’d be damned if she wasn’t tempted to rub one out right there, it really would help, she thought.
Chapter Eight
Her sweet scent was of the forest, of wildflowers, loam, and a honeyed feminine scent that engendered a deep protectiveness and attraction inside his chest, even above the smell of burnt clothes and singed flesh. Sy’lia’s tight and willowy dancer’s body was soft beneath his, supple and far more alluring than it had any right to be in the middle of so much death and destruction.
She might be incredibly skinny and lithe, but her gentle curves were very soft and undoubtably feminine.
It was the first time he’d healed another with his magic, and between her body and the warm sensation of using his magic for such a task he couldn’t help but grow hard against her. He froze, when her back arched and her soft but tight and supple pear-shaped ass cheeks pushed up against his cock hard through their clothes. His hard cock had slipped slightly to the side, perfectly fitting between said cheeks, and the teasing sensations had sent a thrill down his spine. It was shocking to say the least, especially with the needy and sensually musical moan that had escaped her lips.
He was more than a little disturbed, because the hot and sexy elf really did piss him off. He’d just saved her life and healed her, and she had to torment him with her perfect ass like that?
He chuckled low at the ridiculous thought, torment certainly wasn’t the right word for it. A chuckle which made her tremble beneath him. He disengaged his arms and stood up, then stared at the destroyed tank as he helped a blushingly mortified hot elf to her feet.
He really needed to stop thinking of her that way, she did have a name. But he couldn’t help it, she was an annoyingly hot elf.
“What happened? It was kind of a desperate idea to have my people attack it. Why did it explode like that?”
He raised up forty-two of the corpses, there were enough for that, and they claimed the long daggers among the wreckage and burnt corpses. The rest of the battles against the southern group had gone incredibly well, much better than theirs had with no magic to face, and they were moving his way at a run.
Cassie said, “I think they managed what I tried to do. The magical batteries or engines, whatever you want to call them, depend on relatively flawless gems and the precisely formed precious metals that contain them. At a guess, one of their long daggers broke the engine, and it exploded killing everyone around it and in it.”
He nodded, “It seems clear I need to throw away ten or so zombies on those things, we don’t need to face them again ourselves. We almost lost Sy’lia.”
Sy’lia blushed, “The
first fireball blinded me. I’m not even sure what happened after that. I was so disoriented. Thanks, for healing me I mean, and saving my life.”
He nodded as neutrally as possible, and he tried to forget how good his cock had felt nestled in between her ass cheeks. She really was stunning, but the last thing he’d ever do is cheat on his women for the thrill of a little strange, even if she was extremely exotic and painfully beautiful. Not that she was offering either, her ass grind aside. The magic surely had something to do with it too, he wasn’t just a pervert that wanted what he couldn’t have. He was older, in control of those baser instincts for over twenty years now, and more mature than that, usually.
Cassie replied, “Actually, I have a good idea how to take it down with a single spell now that we know its weaknesses. The tanks are obviously vulnerable to physical attack near the engine core in the back. The blade must’ve cracked or broken the golden disk. An indirect spell from behind should take it out, without sacrificing a bunch of zombies.”
The rest of the thousand zombies started to converge on them, and he raised the corpses they were carrying to replace the numbers lost. It wasn’t long before they were situated with their own long knives and they were ready to move out. One thousand strong once again.
He said, “The eastern group is in retreat, as is the single support platoon around that second tank. The rest of the northern group is dead. They lost a little over two hundred of our troops, but they’re carrying replacements and swords our way.”
Lin frowned, “You don’t think they’re giving up, do you?”
He shook his head, “No such luck. They launched more troops from the ship, and another two magical tanks. I suspect they’re just slowing down. They’ll claim the beach with the big ass ship close enough to be on overwatch and support them. They’ll come up with a new plan eventually to combat my undead army. Then they’ll try to claim a large area before they finish unloading the ship.”
Lori nodded, “That’s what I’d be doing. I’d be working on a way to magically dispel your zombies, so they aren’t a threat at all. Then try to secure the larger perimeter again.”
Cassie frowned, “That’s possible. I could probably work up an enchantment to de-power zombies. Without a soul to guard that life energy and hold it in the body zealously, it would be relatively easy to cleanse their bodies of it. The enchantments would just have to be powerful enough to break through the dagger enchantments.”
That sounded right to him, or at least that’s what he’d be doing if he were them.
He nodded, “Alright, here’s the plan. As soon as the rest of my army arrives, we take out the eastern group in retreat. We should be able to catch them before they make back into range of the ship’s weapons. We’ll have to let the tank and sixty soldiers left in the north go, we don’t have time to do both so we’ll go for the bigger target. Then my zombies set up our own perimeter, out of view of the beach and that ship. Then we go home and rest, and we need to figure out how to take that ship down before they figure out how to take my zombie army down.”
Kim asked, “Anyone got a meteor handy?”
He chuckled, since she wasn’t far wrong. How the hell was he going to take down that ship?
The troops finally arrived, and after getting them back up to two thousand and armed with long daggers, they ran to the north. With Sy’lia’s enhancement magic they didn’t even slow down the zombies all that much as they stalked north and then turned west to hit the third retreating enemy line from behind.
Each time they saw a company of enemy soldiers eighty of his zombies peeled and charged them from behind. By the third group the warning cries and sounds of battle had clued the enemy into their attack on their south-east flank as they ran mostly north and west.
The enemy troops were ready, and sent some arrows their way, but for the most part the zombies just ignored the wounds and kept going. A lucky arrow took one or two in the head or heart as they charged, but otherwise his undead troops barely noticed the damage and hit the platoon hard at thirty miles an hour with increased strength and cut them down. He’d have a few replacements to make, but for the first time his zombies were outnumbering the enemy and they were cut down fast. A few arrows were shot into the main group that ran past, but the few which even came near them bounced off of Mara’s and Emily’s shields. Cassie could shield from arrows as well, but she didn’t bother to conserve her magic use. There were different kinds of limits on the priestesses, so it made sense to let them handle the group’s defense.
It was the eleventh platoon that had the tank, and they cut off with the other eighty zombies who ran toward the flanks. The rest of the zombies kept going and they had their orders and knew what to do to take down the rest of this third group of platoons.
Cassie yelled, “Toss it, now!”
Lin who had been lugging about twenty pounds of steel from the destroyed tank the whole time, tossed it up into the air. He’d been wondering what that was about, and he was about to find out.
Lin tossed it up and Cassie barked two words, “Molten, projectile.”
The metal turned cherry hot as it flipped into the air, and it melted and formed into a large ball of molten metal, then he heard it hiss angrily and cut through the air as it headed for the tank.
The second tank went down much easier than the first had. Cassie hit it hard in the ass with a ball of molten metal flying at a very fast speed he wasn’t sure he could calculate. The magic stopped cold at their shields, but the liquid steel cannonball ripped right through them and destroyed the magical battery, releasing all that stored magic explosively. Their tanks were awesome against magic, but they seemed to be total death traps for their sorcerers and priests when it came to purely physical damage. They did have physical protections, probably more than good enough to deflect arrows or a human with a sword, but they surely hadn’t taken into account the strength of several zombies or a ball of molten metal which had broken through easily.
He smirked, “Nice, Cassie. You okay?”
Cassie nodded, “That took a lot, but I can get us home still, no more fighting today though. Not for me anyway.”
He smiled, and Lin screamed, “Look out!”
He spun in confusion, but the next thing he knew something hit him in the side like a Mack truck. He went flying away and spun as he arced away, and he turned his head to get eyes on his attacker. He’d turned just in time to see Lin’s body get cut in half by a hail of ice blades that would’ve hit him, and her blood sprayed and misted as her body was thrown in two different directions.
He felt her link die as the light went out in her eyes, and he fucking lost his mind as he slammed hard into the ground and rolled. He turned in the direction the ice blades came from as he rolled to his feet with a snarl and pulled hard on the life force in his zombies as he saw two enemy mages and priests. Those fuckers must’ve teleported out of the tank before it blew up, probably forewarned from the first tank’s destruction. Then they’d snuck up and tried to cut him in half while he was too fucking busy patting himself on the back for their successful strategy.
Lin was gone, and it hurt, his rage spilled out of him as he sent a tsunami of life force at those four bastards. He was dimly aware of Lori’s cry of anger as she sent shadows their way, and of Emily’s and Mara’s power snapping back up with even more power than earlier.
But it was only Kim’s scream of enraged loss that even came close to equaling his as she charged the bastards.
He could only take in and channel so much life energy at once, but he knew his limits, and that his head probably wouldn’t explode from the heat he felt as it poured out of him in a torrent and slammed into their shields. The cleric’s shields were blown away like tissue paper in a storm, and then started ablating the sorcerer’s personal shields, even as the cleric’s life force was grabbed and squeezed.
They fell to the ground screaming. He refused to take their lifeforce yet, because that would cut down the torrent of power hitting
the sorcerers, so instead he tortured them. Kim knew the score, and her blades took their heads virtually simultaneously with a fierce predatory grace that would’ve impressed him and turned him on if he wasn’t so lost in the rage. The life force of priest was huge, and she’d just taken two in, which actually more than made up for the life energy his blowing in that moment of insanity, and he was about to get two more.
The sorcerers got off a desperate spell, but ready for it that time Mara’s and Emily’s protections held.
Lori’s shadows hit their shields too, and that seemed to mean the difference, though he would suspect later he’d have broken through just a second or two later. His head felt like it might explode, as he wrapped the assholes in his power even as the shadows dove in their bodies and made them scream.
Kim took them out though, before they screamed too long.
He turned away, not caring he’d gotten back more than he’d blown, until he looked at Lin and felt it. Lin hadn’t been decapitated, and her life force hadn’t been cleansed, she’d been cut in half by magically created ice, but not magic.
He gasped in a harsh breath, and then fell to his knees as a wave of relief blasted through him. His throat closed up, and he couldn’t speak. His power reached out for that blank spot, fed it, fanned it, and filled it with life force. But… would it still be Lin? He wasn’t entirely sure. He’d reanimated a lot of zombies that had been killed, but never one so lifelike, so independent and vivaciously alive. The bottom half of her body regrew as he poured in more and more life, he didn’t care how much it cost.
Kim asked, “Lin?”
Lin’s eyes fluttered, and then her eyes widened, “Why am I half naked?”
“Lin?” he asked questioningly.
Lin tilted her head, looked at him like he was a moron, “Master?”
He laughed a bit hysterically, as a wave of powerful emotions went through his chest that he wasn’t even going to try to analyze. In fact, his man-card was in danger, because men didn’t cry, and they sure as hell didn’t cry in relief.
