by Mark Albany
I raised my hand, putting my goblet of wine down next to the quail leg, picked to the bone. None of the others were ready to move out as of yet, which apparently meant that Braire and I were going to be moving on our own.
Norel indicated for us to start our search through the various secret pathways that crisscrossed through the palace. They were rarely used, and then only by servants who needed to move through the place quickly without being seen.
“Once you reach the staircase, just follow it down until you find a door,” Faye said as we were preparing for our mission. “The first door you see should open up to the Emperor’s own quarters, which has its own passage into the throne room, which would be the most logical way to reach it, I think. Considering that it will not be in use until the Emperor’s arrival either.”
Unlike the rest of the place, the tunnels themselves were cramped, tight affairs that only had enough room for one person to move through at a time. They were hidden inside the walls of the building, and therefore couldn’t be too large. I still would have preferred a little more room to move through as we started climbing through the stairs that Norel had said would lead to the throne room.
“Why would they make a place like this?” Braire asked, taking up the front as we moved through the passageways. “Why would you build a building that has so many ways to get from one part of it to another?”
“I assume they did it because the Emperor assumed that there would be people that wanted to move about without being seen,” I replied, running my hands over the exquisite stonework that created these passageways. “And I assume that he would have wanted a roundabout way to escape should he ever be attacked in his own home.”
Braire shook her head in disgust. “I still don’t understand it. I would never want to live in a place where people could skulk around in the shadows.”
“I’m right there with you,” I chuckled. “If I were ever to make a home of my own, I would want something simple and to the point. Less work to keep it maintained. Less time spent in cleaning and walking around from place to place, more time to spend actually living in it, you know?”
“I can only hope that your dream house includes space for four,” Braire grinned, leaning back to gently nudge me in the ribs. “Or five by now, I suppose. Or is it six? Do you plan on trying to get Lyth to join us?”
I narrowed my eyes. “I would have thought that there would be some laws involving elves fucking humans. Especially those elves that are of royal blood, or something.”
“I do recall there being some regulations in place, yes,” Braire said, grinning back at me. “But those that put them in place are all gone and she’s the last of her royal bloodline. She decides whether she wants to put up with some old rules put in place by some dusty old farts, long dead. And we’ve all seen the way that she looks at you.”
“Wait, how does she look at me?” I asked as we reached the first door that we’d seen since we started down these damn steps.
“Well, mostly at your ass,” Braire admitted, gently pressing against the door. Despite the apparent weight of it, it moved almost noiselessly, allowing us to slip through. It led into a hallway that was completely abandoned.
“My ass?” I asked in a hushed voice, so as to hopefully not attract any attention.
“Are you surprised? it’s a nice ass.” Braire grinned over at me.
I nodded, tilting my head. “You know, all the fairy tales I’ve read in the past have had something in them about a stable boy eventually marrying a princess. I know, I was technically never a stable boy…”
“And Lyth isn’t technically a princess,” Braire pointed out. “Like I said, she is the last of her line, which would make her the queen.”
“Really?” I asked. “That’s considerably less like a fairy tale.”
“Considerably more delicious, though,” Braire said with a chuckle. “I assume, anyway.”
I didn’t know what she meant, but I had to assume that she was right, and I nodded in agreement as we kept on moving deeper and deeper into the hallway. It was still abandoned, though there wasn’t a hint of dust. There was the option that there was some magical spell that would keep the place clean and dusted without any work needing to be performed, I supposed. I didn’t think that was the case, though, which meant that there had to be an army of servants keeping the place clean at all times. Or maybe it had just been cleaned over the last few days to prepare for the Emperor’s arrival.
There were a handful of doors all leading into a chamber beyond that I assumed were the Emperor’s chambers. I wasn’t sure what I was going to see on the other side.
I realized that the hallway itself was a part of the room that we were entering at the moment, working as something of an antechamber to quarters that were stepping into. There were terraces from which, even from the doors, we could see the expansive city below, and then the countryside beyond. Heavy black silk drapes covered up the massive entrance to the terrace, framing the view of the sun starting to set over the western mountains. I needed a moment to take in the view, and from the look in Braire’s face, she needed the same.
“Well… if this is the place that the emperor is staying away from, I can’t imagine how beautiful his place on the islands must be,” I said softly, shaking my head. The arching columns made of pale white and black marble, all threaded with gold and silver. There were statues of what looked like past emperors, pushed far into the back where a small banquet hall has been set up. There were heavy curtains in place to pull over to separate that area of the banquet hall to the bedroom.
The floors were all marble as well, all pale white with silver and grey streaking through it, and most of it was covered in what looked to be very expensive rugs and carpets. There was a fireplace fit snugly into the corner between the bed and the main door, with a large bearskin laid out in front of the fire.
“Should we keep moving?” Braire asked. “I mean, that’s the passage into the throne room.”
“You know that for a fact?” I asked, looking over to her, wondering how she would know. Faye hadn’t given us much instruction after we came to the chambers themselves, only that there was a passage in the chambers. Considering how well those passages were hidden, we might well end up searching for the rest of the night.
“Well, I assume,” Braire said with a grin, dropping down onto the bearskin rug, facing the fire and tapping at the spot next to her.
“Don’t we have something that we need to do?” I asked, tilting my head.
“And there will be plenty of time to do that later,” Braire said as I dropped down next to her. “But I think that we’ve just enjoyed a nice meal, we’re in a nice place, looking over a gorgeous view and I think that we should have some to bask in that. The gods know we’ve earned a little break from our seemingly constant state of hunting something to fight or being hunted by something that wants to fight us.“
I nodded, unable to disagree with that as I settled in next to her, wrapping my arm around her shoulder and pulling her in closer to me as we looked out into the sunset.
“It was nice to see your bear come to our rescue back into the tombs,” I said after the silence started to drag on for a bit. “I think he liked me too.”
“Don’t let it get to your head,” Braire grumbled, turning and pressing her face gently into my neck. “My furry friends are connected to me. Not quite like you and I are connected, but it’s still a connection. They know that I like you, and so they feel the same way. Or at least are encouraged by me to feel the same way.”
“Well, that makes me feel so warm inside,” I said with a chuckle. “It’s nice to know that you like me so much that you make everyone connected to you like me too.”
She looked over to me and smirked, shifting around so that she could lay her head on my lap, looking up at me. “Well, that is true enough.”
I smiled down at her, running my fingers through her hair. “You said that you weren’t going to be able to summon the bear unless you were in a particular
state of mind. And not a particularly good one, either. I don’t like to think that… you were in that state, even if it did save my life.”
“I know,” she whispered, running her hand up and down my chest. “I didn’t like it either, but I think I’m all right with it, considering that we all made it out of there alive.”
I nodded. “That is a good point. We did all make it out alive, though I don’t know what our chances were if the bear hadn’t shown up. I’ll have to come up with some way to thank you.”
Braire tilted her head, looking up at me with her eyes narrowed. “Well… now there’s something that I might be interested in. You know, I was in a great deal of discomfort, thinking that you were in danger of dying, and all I could do was follow your mind through our bond. I think I need some comforting.”
I nodded, leaning down to press a light kiss to her lips. “I don’t think there’s any fairy tale that involves fucking on an Emperor’s rug, do you?”
Braire paused to think for a moment as I moved out from under her head on my lap, allowing me to place kisses all the way down her jawline, and then her neck. “I don’t think so,” she finally said with a chuckle. “If there were some fairy tales about it, I think I would have heard of them. Sounds like my kind of story, to be honest.”
I looked up at her, placing a light kiss to her nose, her lips again, and down her neck once more as I found that I was drawn down over her slowly.
“What are you doing?” she asked, propping herself up on her elbows to watch me slowly undressing her, running my tongue lightly over her exposed nipples until I could feel them harden against my lips.
“I just… want to try something,” I grumbled, letting my voice vibrate against her bare skin as she helped me strip the rest of her clothes away. As my lips traveled down to her stomach, she reached down, insistently tugging at my shirt, pulling it up and not giving up until I finally ceded and let her take it off, tossing it aside. My trousers would have to wait for a moment as I drifted my kisses down lower on her stomach, hearing her already moaning softly as her thighs parted, wrapping around me and guiding me down between them as I kissed lower and lower, tasting a light sheen of sweat on her skin.
“Fuck, Grant,” she whispered, one hand moving down to thread through my hair as the other climbed up to play with her breast as she watched me run my tongue down between her lips, feeling that little nub of pleasure there, kissing and toying at it playfully, hearing her soft gasps with each touch from me.
I could feel her arousal growing alongside my own, just as I realized that Aliana, Norel, and now Faye could feel it too. There were questions coming from their end of the bond, but I was too busy to answer them at the moment as my hands brought her thighs up over my shoulders before moving beneath her, gripping her ass firmly and pulling her closer to me as my tongue started working her with a little more aggression, more passion as I moaned softly into her warm sex. She shuddered in response, gasping for breath and letting her fingers dig into my scalp as my tongue slipped inside her.
I looked up, seeing her head dropping back, watching her squeeze and tug at her bare nipple with the hand that wasn’t alternating between playing with my hair and scratching at me. She was whispering something softly, and for a moment, I thought she was just enjoying herself in her own tongue, but after a few moments, I could feel tendrils of pleasure starting creep through my body as well.
Two could play at that game, I thought, pulling her roughly to me, feeling the burn in my left hand, which was still gripping her ass.
“Not fair,” she growled down at me as she started raising her hips up to meet my mouth, her hips squirming in my hands as I continued to apply my lips and tongue to her warm, wet pussy. She shuddered again, another few elvish words escaping her lips, this time I believed in pleasure as her hand dropped away from my head and down to the rug that we were still on, gripping the rug and squeezing it between her fingers.
I smiled, enjoying her reaction. One of my hands moved away from her ass, my fore and middle finger taking the place of my tongue inside her as the latter moved up over her lips, lathering her clit with attention as my fingers moved inside, curling upwards to find that little nub of pleasure that made her shudder under my grasp, her words of pleasure suddenly turning to gibberish as she dropped down on the rug, her back arcing.
“Grant… oh please…” she whispered hoarsely as her thighs wrapped tighter around my head, though I couldn’t tell if her intention was to pull me closer or push me away. I could see her breasts heaving quickly as the sensations spreading from her over to me as I pulled her in closer, not wanting her to try and get away from me as the pleasure crashed over her, causing her to buck her hips up into my face, soft cries of pleasure turning into screams.
My grip on her turned into a vice as I could feel her trying to pull away, not giving her a moment of respite as I pulled her in closer to me, growling softly as I felt her inner muscles tightening around my fingers again, her eyes rolling back behind her head as low, primal moans came from the back of her throat, her whole body tensed up as she lost herself over the edge again.
She knew I wasn’t finished with her, toying with her mercilessly as I was, feeling her pushing toward the edge of her pleasure again, and again, until I could feel her thighs trembling weakly around my head, her hands reaching up to try and pull me away.
And I did pull back. Not at the first tug, and not at the second, but eventually, as she gasped for breath, a sheen of sweat coating her body as I lifted up from her, watching as she settled back down into the rug, breasts rising and falling as she tried to hold her breath.
“You know I’m not finished with you, right?” I asked, licking her juices from my lips and then my fingers.
She didn’t answer, her eyes focusing on me and giving me a gentle nod. An excited smile curved her lips when she saw the runes on my hand glowing.
She showed no sign of resistance as my hands settled on her hips, pulling her in close to me. She started to spread her thighs open around my hips, but let out a soft cry of surprise as I turned her over onto her stomach instead. I moved in closer, straddling myself over her ass as my hands ran up her body, first over her back and the coming over to the front, kneading her breasts greedily as she could feel my arousal pressing into her ass through my trousers, and she let out a soft, plaintive cry.
“Please, Grant,” she whispered, and I dipped my head down, placing a light kiss to her neck as my hands slowly undid my trousers. She could feel my hard cock pressing between her cheeks and she pressed herself up against it, grinding herself slowly against me as I guided it down between her thighs, eliciting more soft sounds of pleading.
“Do you want me inside you?” I whispered against her ear.
“Yes, please,” she nodded, the last syllable dragged in a long, slow moan out of her mouth as I pressed my hips forward, slowly at first, and I could feel her rising herself to meet me, but she found herself being driven back down into the bearskin roughly, drawing out another soft cry from her as she reached around, grabbing at my ass, feeling her gripping and pulling me in and closer. I dipped my head down as she turned to face me, licking her lips as I pulled back and drove down into her again.
“Fuck me, Grant,” she growled, looking up at me with something wild in her eyes. “Hard.”
I was only too happy to comply. My hips rose up and came down over her ass, a loud slap echoing through the Emperor’s chamber as I pushed in deeper, grinding slowly into her for a few long moments, shuddering with pleasure as I felt her tight, warm and drenched pussy wrapping around me tighter and harder, growling softly as I started to push myself into her over and over again.
The sloppy sounds of our sex filled the air as I filled her up with thrust after thrust, roughly pushing her into the rug over and over, feeling her tight walls squeezing me hard each time that I filled her up, feeling her gripping at me each time that I pulled back out again.
She tried to push herself up against me valiantly
, but after a few tries, I could feel her suddenly just laying down against the rug, closing her eyes and focusing on the pleasure, letting it flow through and into me through our body, soft moans from her as she melted into my arms.
I settled my hands over her shoulders, giving me all the leverage I needed to push in deeper and harder inside her, soft grunts and growls coming from me as I started feeling my pleasure starting to crest, pushing me harder and faster into her as she came again. A low roar started to pull up from my chest this time, I couldn’t hold myself back from it.
And honestly, I didn’t really want to.
I pushed in deeper, harder, hips bucking down into her and harder, pulling her into me as my cock twitched inside her, a shudder shared between her and me as I pulled in closer. I was gasping softly as I slowly wound down, dropping down over her, sucking in deep breaths.
Braire was similarly lacking in breath as she reached around, gripping me and pulling me in closer as we both slowly wound down from it.
“Damn,” she whispered, a few aftershocks still rippling through her body. “If you ever feel like trying that again, you let me know.”
I nodded, still not trusting myself to speak as I rolled over from her and dropped down on the rug, sucking in deep breaths as I looked up to the ceiling, feeling myself starting to cool off. The sun had set behind the mountains, and the evening chill started to set into the room. I couldn’t help a small smile as Braire pulled back ground to lay her head on my chest.
I wasn’t usually comfortable in moments of silence, but right now, it felt perfect. Nothing really needed to be said at this point, and all I needed to do at the moment was just stroke her hair tenderly.
“You just couldn’t resist it, could you?”
I snapped my head up, hearing Aliana’s voice as the woman stepped into the room, looking around.
“Well, it just sort of happened,” Braire replied softly, not making any attempt to cover herself, not even as Lyth joined us as well. She didn’t appear to have any shame in looking either, I noted as I quickly pulled my pants up from where they were still lowered. “Totally Grant’s fault though, he started it.”
