Hunger of the Eldritch Fiend

by Amanda Clover

  “Mmmnnn,” she whimpered as her fingers quickened their pace. Moving faster. Faster. Her hips began to lazily buck, her chest thrust out, nipples tingling in the cool stroke of air. Oh gods. Oh gods she was so close. She was so close, and Ser Raymond was right outside the door. Standing at attention. Her guardian. He saw her naked already. What would happen if she called him in? Summoned him to watch her hump her own hand, fucking herself. Reaching her peak in an explosion of pleasure.

  “Mmm… mnnnn!” Her teeth bit down painfully on her hand, her body trembling as she at last reached the orgasm teased to her by the succubus. That hot pleasure that thumped through her, her hips trembling as her juices squirted from her lush cunt.

  “Mmm… ha… hnnnn…” Damera removed her hand from her mouth, her breasts heaving with the strain of her orgasm. She rolled back onto her back, her body still achingly sensitive, but the infernal lust no longer burned in her veins quite so strong.

  But as her eyes closed, wrapping her in an exhausted sleep, it was Ser Raymond’s face she saw in her dreams, and put a small smile on her lips.

  Battle of the Ruins

  The battlements were like ragged teeth. The inner keep had collapsed long ago. Ruarn Castle climbed out of the mountainside a hollowed skull, and for the first time in centuries, it once more teemed with life.

  Damera stood on the battlements, watching the last of her army march slowly through the old gate. The castle was old and sundered, but its walls were still sure and its gate sturdy enough for her purposes. The sappers had been at work all day shoring it up, and now their work would be put to the test.

  A cold wind blew, rustling her cape. She gripped her sword tightly, feeling the ruby beneath her thumb. She had swept across eastern Istanov like a wave of steel and soldiery. Many beasts and monsters had been caught in the threshing teeth of her army’s swords, their advance relentless. Twice night assaults had been foiled. She’d lost count of the number of times the Red Mages had ferreted out mimics and other creatures infiltrating her troops. The tactics that had brought her brother down had failed.

  And so, the time had come.

  She’d known the Duke was readying himself when the scattered bands of monsters no longer were found as the army advanced. When her scouts began to go missing, she guessed the cause, and hastily began seeking a location to make her stand. The maps had shown Ruarn, and she had marched her armies to it.

  Just in time.

  She watched as the day bled away, grim clouds gathering on the horizon, painting the sky a steely gray. She felt it. Felt the coming of the enemy in the pricking of goosebumps up her arms. On the rising hair on the back of her neck and quickening of that nameless dread. The forests came nearly to the edge of the walls, but across the rocky slope tall grass waved in ways it shouldn’t.

  “They’re here. Aren’t they?”

  Beside her, the Red Mage grandmaster nodded.

  Damera straightened, glancing across the age worn battlements. Archers shifted in their positions and soldiers mustered in the walls behind them. Here and there, the droning voice of a priest and gentle murmur of a priestess rose in prayers of protection for their troops.

  “Ready yourselves!” Damera shouted. “The monsters who have attacked your homes, killed your brothers, taken your sisters come to face us now! Fight, soldiers of the empire. Fight for them! For your empress! For Istanov!”

  The steel in her voice straightened the back of the hesitant and firmed the purpose of the questioning. Magnified by the Red Mage’s spell, her voice carried far across the keep.

  And as the echoes died away, darkness boiled from the trees.

  Orcs in scattered armor slowly stepped into the open. Gertlings rose from the tall grass. Wulfen, minotaurs, beasts and monsters of legends and horrors stepped out of the forest, the lust for blood and the lives of men glowing in their eyes.

  A screech of almost human quality rang through the stillness as the shapes of harpies and demons winged into the air from the trees, painting patterns against the dark sky.

  But one figure called all the attention. Dressed all in black, his staff topped with the figure of a staring eye, he stepped from the monster’s ranks. His hood was up, shadowing his face, but Damera could feel his eyes upon her. Those gleaming eyes were filled with hatred beyond that of the most bestial of monsters beside him.

  Damera knew she faced the Duke of Ashes at long last. His stare seemed to pierce her like a silver blade.

  “I see you empress,” the Duke of Ashes said, his voice carrying strangely in the strange wind, loaded with a venomous hate that struck her even there. “I see you. Welcome to your final stand. I hope it will be everything you wanted.”

  Damera frowned. “Traitor!” she shouted. “You will not break humanity here!”

  The Duke laughed. “It’s been broken. You and your empire are done! It’s the age of monsters now. And today, we write the final chapter of man!” He raised his staff, the symbol of the eye etched on it flaring with a terrible light. “Witness it!”

  The spell washed forward like a wave. Horror. Fear. Weakness and terror struck the hearts of every man on the walls. A shudder coursed through them, armor clattering as the men within quailed to their very souls.

  Damera winced as the spell hit her. She grasped her sword, firming herself with the hard steel. “Do it!” she snapped.

  Across the walls, Red Mages gestured. The air filled with a sudden tension, then snapped! The spell broke in a gasp. The Duke of Ashes staggered at the recoil of the spell. He shook his head, recovering, and cast his staff again towards the walls.

  The horde with him let loose a howl of hate and bloodlust. Like a tide the monstrous host rolled forward, gamboling and charging.

  “Archers!” Damera shouted. “Loose!”

  Bowstrings twanged and arrows fell like rain. Shaggy form went down, pinioned with shafts. But the monsters came on. Relentless and impossible to deny. Again, a shower of arrows fell among them, but still they charged, heedless of their losses, their eyes only on those who stood against them.

  The air crackled as the Red Mages worked their spells. Fireballs soared through the air like comets. Explosions rocked the landscape in blistering bursts.

  Screams heralded demons and harpies and the winged horrors swooping from the sky, plucking struggling soldiers from their posts, tearing them apart or flinging them off the walls to land among the charging monsters. Arrows peppered the sky to down these creatures, and in the lull, monsters reached the walls. Gertlings found niches and cracks in the ancient stone, scaling alongside strange monsters whose tentacles adhered to the cracked rock and dragged them up. Stones were hurled down on the creatures, but their aim was accomplished, the archers were occupied.

  With a bellowing roar a minotaur charged the gate, the massive brute smashing into the old wood, splintering it with the impact. Damera grimaced. The gate wouldn’t hold long. It had been a miracle they’d even managed to repair it in time. She turned and hurried off the wall, heading down with her bodyguards to the courtyard.

  She arrived among the waiting soldiers as the gate buckled under another crushing blow from the minotaur. Men were hurled back before rushing forward to brace the gate once more. Thunder rumbled overhead, a sharp sound laced with the essence of magic as the Red Mages battled the spells of the Duke of Ashes and his sorcerous monsters. Without waiting Damera grabbed her horse, swinging herself into the saddle and joining a phalanx of waiting knights.

  No sooner was she in the saddle than the doors, with a splintering crash, gave way. They fell heavily with a boom that kicked up a cloud of dust. Out of it surged the bellowing minotaur, just in time for a dozen archers to loose a storm of arrows right into him. With a howl of pain the creature fell, shattering the shafts that jutted from his chest, but his broad form had acted a fine shield, and over his corpse came the bellowing ranks of orcs.

  Archers fell back, spears came down.

  “Charge, soldiers of Istanov! Chaaaarge!” Dam
era roared.

  The soldiers echoed her cry, rushing forward, skewering the first of the brutish creatures. But more came. Like the breach of a dam, orcs rushed past, goblins skittering around their feet and other monsters charging in. An ogre, with a swipe of a club made from a tree, sent three men flying away like broken toys before a Red Mage’s spell blasted the brute’s head off in a fountain of blood. Ghouls hurled themselves on swords and still they clawed at the eyes of the soldiers.

  “Lines! Fall!” Damera shouted.

  The ranks of her soldiers opened. Heeling her steed, Damera surged forward. “For Istanov!” she cried, her sword forward, flashing with power like it was wrapped in scarlet flames.

  The thunder of hooves followed her cry. Knights raced behind her, lances low. They struck the startled front ranks of the monsters like a thunderbolt, the beasts crumbling under their assault. It carried them past the first ranks of the monstrous host, out the broken gates and into the thick of the blood-soaked field. Their charge cut through the monsters like a spear, carving straight through the monster ranks.

  Against an army of men, such a thing would have broken them. But she did not fight men, but things of nightmares and horrors. Wulfen threw themselves at knights, dragging them from their saddles. Minotaurs struck charging horses headlong, hurling mount and ride to the ground. Damera brought her charge about, but the ranks behind her had closed. The monsters had gained the courtyard, the bloody work of hand to hand fighting consuming the walls and inner court of the ruined castle of a long dead kingdom.

  And still the monsters came on.

  They seemed endless. They filled the field, crowding it, rushing forward to join the others. To kill. To rend. To conquer. They could taste victory on the wind. The blood of men spilled richly on the grass. A final triumph. The greatest of all.

  Damera stood with her bodyguard as the monsters crowded to rush into the keep, her riders alone in a small clearing among the dark horde, already beginning to close it, close upon her and her riders.

  Damera wheeled her horse about to face the dark cloaked figure standing atop a stone.

  “Take the empress alive,” the Duke of Ashes said, his eyes glittering in the shadow of his hood. A cruel smile turned his lip. “Whoever takes her gets to keep her as their breeding slut.”

  Monsters crowded nearer; eyes hungry for her. She drew back, her horse nickering in fear.

  Through the sounds of battle, a horn blew.

  Damera turned towards the east. Silver shimmered in the dark, and from the wood’s horses burst free. The Duke swung about in shock as Ser Raymond charged from the treeline, his sword drawn, three hundred armored knights of the Order of the Shield at his back. The hill sloped down towards the ranks of the monsters, building the speed of the charge. The charging knights smashed into the unexpected flank of the monsters like a hammer. Goblins and gertlings squealed as hooves shod with steel trampled them. Orcs bellowed in pain as lances impaled their thrashing bodies.

  The ferocity of the human charge against their unguarded flank sent a waver through the monsters. Disorganized at the best of times, merely a horde of teeth and claws and fury, the first broke. Gertlings, never courageous at the best of times, shattered first. They fled, screaming to the safety of the forest. Lesser monsters, unbound by clan or loyalty, soon followed.

  The Duke of Ashes watched, stunned, as his monster army broke or turned to face this new foe as best they could, trapped between the hammer of the cavalry and the anvil of the old castle. Every moment more monsters fled or died.

  And the tide of the battle shifted.

  The Duke turned towards Damera, and even through his hood she could feel his fury at her. But he tore his eyes from her, swinging himself astride a slavering warg. He raced through his crumbling lines and charged into the woods.

  Damera cursed. “After him!” she roared, knowing the Duke was the key to the threat her empire faced. That without him, the monsters had nothing that held them together as a true menace. Her bodyguard rallied about her and followed her, charging after the Duke, cutting down the frantic defence raised by the remaining monsters before plunging into the forest in pursuit.

  Grim Encounters

  The primordial dark of the swamp closed around them in a stifling shroud. Damera panted, her grip on her horse’s reins as tight as iron bands. Beside and behind her she heard the huffing of her bodyguard’s horses and the drumming of their hooves as they raced after the elusive shape of the Duke of Ashes, flickering just at the edge of sight. She grabbed her bow and fitted an arrow. As she rode she straightened, aiming as best she could, waiting for the moment her horse’s stride evened…

  There!

  Her arrow loosed, cutting through the air with a hum. A howl of pain went up from ahead. Damera grinned.

  Something swiped at her from the branches.

  Damera cursed, ducked. A knight behind her screamed. She glanced back to see a horse charge past, saddle empty.

  Worry tightened Damera’s chest. She dropped her bow and grabbed her family’s blade, drawing it. The strange sorcery worked in the steel flickered along the edge as she pushed herself forward once more. More shouts came from behind her. Gasps cut short. The faint clash of steel.

  Silence.

  Damera came to the sudden realization that she rode alone through the dark, only the sound of her horse’s hooves breaking the stillness, kicking up mud and splashing in the brackish pools of the swamp. She shivered and spurred her mount on through the growing mists.

  She broke suddenly into an open space. Her horse nickered, dancing. A lake spread out before her, reeds bursting from the edges flattened under the warg the Duke had ridden, dead, the arrow she had shot jutting from its flank.

  Damera kneed her horse, who snorted, tossed its head and refused to go on. Cursing the beast, she swung from the saddle and took a wary step forward. She approached the body of the warg as she kept a wary eye towards the licking mists and skeletal trees. She knelt beside the beast to ensure it was indeed dead, then rose again, squinting against the cloying wisps of fog. She had struck the giant canine between its ribs and skewered its heart with her arrow and still it had run on, dying, for a hundred more paces.

  “You think you’ve won?”

  She turned sharply, and there he was. The Duke of Ashes stood on a small rise of mud, water rippling around his robes. His eyes gleamed from his hood, red with hate, the pale hand gripping his twisted staff so tight the wood creaked in his grasp.

  “Your monsters are bested,” Damera said carefully, slowly making her way forward. The mud sucked at her boots, but she dared not take her eyes from the dark figure before her. “You’ve lost.”

  “I admit this is a setback,” the Duke said. “But I am far from lost. You’ve won the battle, empress, but the war will be mine. We started this war with nothing but the monsters lurking in the dark. And we’ll finish it the same.”

  “You won’t win,” Damera said. “Humanity is stronger than that.”

  “Oh yes,” the Duke said. “How powerful. Your men bested. Your women conquered. Forgive me if I’m less than impressed.” He tilted his head towards her. She could just make out his face, pale as chalk, his eyes filled with the horrible intensity of the truly mad. His piercing eyes fixed on the stone set in her blade. “And look. You’ve brought the last jewel. The kingdom never added to the Heart of the Empire.”

  The sword in Damera’s grasp seemed to pulse. She glanced at it in surprise, then back to the Duke.

  “Oh no. They didn’t give you the satisfaction, did they? They resisted to the end, truly. And you and your empire were more than happy to bring it. Weren’t they? How glorious your great triumph was. And now you brought it to finish its work.” the Duke said, his hand flexing on the twisting wood of his staff. “Came to finish the line your family tried to stamp out so long ago? It will do you no good. Your empire is finished. Your people are dead. Used as breeding vessels to revive the monsters your empire tried so hard to kill.�
��

  Damera’s eyes narrowed. “Who are you?” she said. She was close. Nearly in striking distance.

  “I’m the last of a dead people,” the Duke of Ashes hissed. “I’m the one your empire sought to destroy. Who you burned to ashes in the name of conquest! And before I’m done, all that your empire is will be gone. Humanity will be taken and used to bring in the new age. This war isn’t over, empress. It won’t be until every human in Istanov is dead!”

  “You first!” Damera cried and lunged for the Duke.

  His staff came about, parrying her blade. Crimson light flashed as they clashed, sparks raining down to sizzle in the lake. And even as he stepped back, the waters of the swamp exploded.

  Damera whirled about as a fleshy mass rose out of the lake, dark tentacles writhing in the air. The Duke of Ashes retreated back as those rubbery limbs lashed at her. With a shout of surprise Damera brought about her blade in a frantic defense against the reaching limbs, slicing through one with a meaty thunk, the monster howling, limbs retreating for a moment before resuming their assault.

  “You were a fool, empress!” the Duke said, receding into the shadows, the mists rising to engulf him like ghostly arms. “I am not done. I will not be done until Istanov is destroyed. But you’ll never see that day. Enjoy your new life in the morraf’s belly!”

  Damera turned to try and face the Duke, but in that moment of distraction one of the dark tentacles wrapped around her sword arm. She cursed, trying to yank it free, but the slithering limb held her arm fast. Helpless. Without her sword, tethered to the creature, she was easy prey to more of the dark limbs, the rubbery flesh wrapping around her legs, her waist, her other arm, binding her totally in its clutches.

  “Let me go!” Damera howled as she was lifted into the air above the dark mass of the creature. “Let me go!”

  Fury turned to horror however as the dark flesh opened, revealing a vast, fleshy mouth. Damera’s eyes widened and she struggled furiously in the grasp of the monster, but none of her efforts gained her freedom. Her kicking feet first met the pink, undulating flesh of the horror, pulled together by the sucking damp flesh. The hiss of the acidic reached her ears, and quite quickly her toes. She shuddered as a warm, viscous substance melted away her armor, slickening her bared feet.