by Cebelius
The blaze of light died away, revealing the Mor's toothy smile once more as she gleefully said, "I told you, template. I win."
Then the Mor's smile vanished, and she went completely still. It took Abram a long moment to notice the tiny little blade pressed firmly to the hobgoblin's neck, and only did so after a drop of her blood oozed down her throat to point it out.
The voice that broke the stillness was one he had never heard before. It was melodious, sweet, and completely self-satisfied.
"Actually ... I win."
28
The End of the Beginning, or
"Abram?"
Abram blinked in confusion. He was certain he had never heard this voice before, but whoever owned it knew his name.
"Yes?"
"You have a choice to make. I will try and make it an easy choice, but the consequences are dire either way so do consider it carefully."
His fear had receded somewhat, but there was a cold emptiness in its place that made thinking at all extremely difficult. He could feel the pain in his maimed hand now but it was at a distance, almost as though it belonged to someone else. The feel of his blood oozing down his arm as he cradled it actually bothered him more than the wound itself.
"I'm listening," he said at last, blinking to clear the last of his tears away.
"Agree to make me one of your bonds and I will complete her capture. Refuse and I will let her complete yours."
The voice was cultured, but carried undertones of careless sensuality that tugged at Abram's baser instincts. He could see nothing of who she was, knew her only by voice and the threat she posed. That she was blatantly extorting him didn't bother him a bit, because she wasn't really offering him a choice. She was offering him the Mor.
"Agreed," he said quietly.
"Oh? So quickly. You must want her very badly."
The feminine voice was teasing, but he didn't mind. Instead, he nodded, cradling his maimed right hand with his left as he looked up into the Mor's eyes. He still could see nothing of his benefactor, so he stared at her instead. The hate in her eyes was incalculable, as was the frustration in her expression. He savored them both as he said, "Yes."
"What will you do with her, I wonder?" the voice asked.
"The mind boggles trying to consider only one of the many, many torments I have in store for her," Abram said quietly. "I want to make her suffering a legend."
"Mmmm."
His unknown rescuer sounded as though she were being caressed by a lover. It was intensely sexual, and Abram smiled slightly as he said, "Perhaps you'd like to help."
"Oooh, we barely know one another, and already I receive precious gifts from my soon-to-be lover. It just wouldn't be right to keep you in suspense."
Abram's eyes widened slightly as he saw flickers of movement to either side of the Mor, who was holding very still. Where his magic had failed, the tiny little dagger pressed to her throat succeeded. The movement resolved itself into myriad tails. Very fluffy tails.
He blinked as, with supernatural grace, a slight woman wearing a cheongsam of superlative quality stepped around the still body of the Mor only to curl in against her front. Her hair was white, and bracketed by erect, vulpine ears. The whites of her eyes were faintly luminescent and contrasted starkly with eyes so dark that her pupils were practically invisible. Her features were Asian and unnaturally perfect. The cheongsam itself drew the eye, bade it follow the sensual curve of her body all the way down.
Her tails whisked, weaving to and fro in something like a peacock's display as the fox woman leaned back against the Mor, tipping her head back to kiss the underside of the hobgoblin woman's jaw. All the while, her knife never wavered, and blood continued to ooze from where it contacted flesh. The woman tilted her head coquettishly to look at him with a sultry smile as she asked, "So? Does my lord approve?"
"Oh my god."
She was so beautiful, so sensual in the way she held the knife to the Mor's throat. Her eyes made so many promises, and Abram realized she was making him hard. The blood flowing from his injured hand had slowed to a trickle, but the injury by itself should have captivated his attention. Instead, she captivated him, and her smile told him without words that she knew it.
"Careful Abram, I just might be," she murmured.
Their eyes met, and he lost himself for long moments in their depthless darkness. It was only when she languidly blinked that he came back to himself enough to notice that the Mor's expression had changed.
The hobgoblin woman's eyes were drooping, and a moment later she sagged to her knees as the fox woman slipped effortlessly away. The Mor's head drooped to her chest, her swords fell from nerveless fingers, and she slumped over her own belly, clearly unconscious.
"You poisoned her," Abram guessed.
"Yes. She will live, but will not wake for some time. We are alone, Abram ... I would have you fulfill your end of the bargain."
"Here and now?" he asked, glancing down at his maimed hand, at the still smoldering corpses of the gnoll and his ill-fated hobgoblin guards.
"Oh yes," she sighed, reaching down to offer him the hand that had so recently held the knife. "There is no better capstone to a great victory than sex." He noted absently that some of the Mor's blood was smeared across those delicate fingers, but even the way they crooked just slightly invited his touch in a way that went beyond even the gesture itself.
Again, his eyes traced the lines of her, followed her arm to her shoulder, then down. The cheongsam both contained and showcased a body made to seduce, to sin, yet showed no trace of dissipation, no hint of age.
The beauty that stood before him was eternal ... but not untouchable.
He reached out to her, realizing too late that he'd offered her his maimed right hand. He paused, but she smoothly took his hand and leaned down to kiss the gore-spattered cut with lips that pillowed on contact with his flesh.
He was enchanted, unable to pull away as he watched her tongue smooth over the gash to come away blood-soaked. She pulled it back in, closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. That only drew his eyes past her outstretched hand to her chest, at the way the cheongsam strained to contain what lay beyond.
He wasn't getting hard anymore. He was so rigid that his readiness bordered on pain.
Her eyes opened again as she pulled him to his feet and he wanted to drown in them, but couldn't because there was so much more of her he wanted to see. His uninjured left slid over her hip, felt silk beneath his fingertips as she leaned in and kissed him.
The feel of her lips on his was like nothing he'd ever felt before. She was softer than clouds, hotter than steam, with a taste like blood and cherries.
The next moments blurred in Abram's mind because in those moments there were no distinct thoughts, only a sensational flow of such liquid delight that he would later wonder how she'd gotten his robes off him. There was no way he did it himself.
Yet he lay atop them with the corpses of the slain on either side, watching her as her body gyrated before him with slow sensuality. Her left hand drifted up her right side before guiding her now open dress out across the line of her throat.
Her smile was sultry and knowing, her eyes seemed to pierce him as the dress unwound. Yet his view remained obstructed by its remaining fold and the artful drape of her right hand as she slipped her left out of the sleeveless silken confection.
She paused, her smile coy as she tilted her hips and seemed to swing more than turn into a languid spin that sent her myriad tails whisking across his legs, his hips and thighs, obscuring his view of her for the barest instant before she faced him again in full, glorious nudity.
Her breasts were full and perfect, nipples tiny and taut. Her stomach had neither hard planes nor sag, only subtle definition that led his eyes down to a single wisp of hair like a candle's flame that stood out against her olive skin.
The inviting cleft of her sex was framed by smoothly flaring hips that led the eye to softly rounded thighs. She wound her hands together o
ver her head and set one foot artfully before the other as she stretched, showing him all of herself without a trace of modesty.
"You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen," he breathed, and there was no doubt in his mind as he spoke. Modesty could only diminish this woman, and it was obvious she knew it.
"Soon to be the most beautiful woman you will ever have," she murmured, her voice a silken caress as her hands fell, one to rake through her hair as the other dropped between her thighs. He gaped as her fingertip slipped into the cleft of her sex and drew forth a glistening strand that clung to her finger as her eyes found his. Her expression filled with satisfaction at the unabashed desire in his own. She whirled again for no reason he could fathom save that her tails whisked once more over his legs and thighs. The move dropped her to her hands and knees and with wide eyes he watched her stalk him, her gaze glinting with a feral light as her smile turned predatory.
In that moment, he would have made of himself a willing meal in any sense for the woman crawling up the length of his body, her every move a sensual delight. Her tails fanned out behind her, framing her in his view. He lay before her and found himself wanting nothing more than to see her pleasure as she writhed atop him.
"Soon," she crooned to him, lowering herself to kiss his stomach, lips so close to his cock that his breath hitched in his throat. The want of her was so acute that it was all he could do not to moan with need. He managed somehow to keep his silence, watching as her lips played over his stomach and up, tasting him without slowing. He couldn't help but notice the slow switch of her hips, the sensual flick of her many tails. Some of them were brushing once more over his legs as she finally reached him, kissed him, and once more he lost himself to the flavor of blood and cherries.
The feel of liquid heat and silk as she slid down his shaft forced a gasp from him. He had expected further teasing. Instead, she filled herself with him and leaned up to listen with half-lidded eyes as he moaned for her. She pressed her hands delicately to his chest and shaped her breasts with her upper arms as she rolled her hips in tiny circles.
Abram was lost in sensation once more. Liquid heat and heavenly softness, the fur of her tails and the silk of her sex. The sensual way her hands curled into his chest, their nails digging in ever so slightly as his eyes remained glued to the curious delight of her chest as her breasts played against both the cage of her arms and each other. Her nipples were a perfect contrast of hard against the soft rounded flesh from which they rose. He wanted to touch her, but only distantly. In that moment he lay truly paralyzed by the flow of sensations from her to him.
A tiny part of him realized it was too much, but he couldn't bring himself to care. She was the very meaning of sex. She was glory, and as she rode him, her very presence and pleasure made him glorious in turn.
Her lips were parted, her eyes pleading as her moans slid into his feelings and tightened them, drew them down, and focused them more and more at their most intimate contact.
Then she spoke, and her words were breathy and desperate with pleasure.
"Abram ... I am yours if you would only spend in me. Bathe me in your pleasure. Mark me, give me everything and I will stay with you until the very end ... I swear it."
He had neither the will nor the ability to resist her.
His orgasm had the strength of revelation and his entire body arched up underneath her, lifting her as she threw her head back and cried out in unabashed ecstasy. He could feel her slit pulsing around him, squeezing him, milking him of every drop. As his body lost its strength and his hips came to ground she rolled her own atop him, moaning deliriously, one hand gripping and pulling her hair as she wantonly sucked the blood from the other, eyes shut with bliss.
Her body shuddered once, and then she fell forward. Her breasts pillowed against his chest as she laid her head on his shoulder and coiled her arms around him, covering them both with her many tails as she shivered and murmured, "Yes ... you're mine, Abram. Now, and forevermore, you belong to Daji."
Abram's eyes widened.
His pleasure undiminished, he nevertheless felt again traces of fear. He knew that name, just as he now knew that the woman who lay atop him was no playful spirit, but a wanton demon.
Then he relaxed. It was easy to do. The weary bliss of orgasm was still on him, and the feel of her velvet slit promised much more pleasure to come. He might be in danger, but that was always true here on Celestine.
It was only a game, after all.
29
Council of Elders
Yuri Kolenko sat quietly as he waited for the council to call upon him.
He was a tiger kin, six feet tall and broad-shouldered, with years of experience behind him that had culminated just days ago in his being made chieftain of his tribe. As a chief, his new responsibilities had kept him busy, but there was one lingering concern from earlier adventures that remained to be addressed. For that purpose, he had sought out one of the carnivals the tauren were constantly holding out on the steppe.
Carnivals were opportunities for the herds to exchange news and membership, engage in trade and — when necessary — deal with matters that were larger than any one herd. Yuri had such a matter, and it was at his behest that a council of elders had been called.
The tiger kin had been on the Eastern Steppe for generations, but were not a part of the tauren council. Their presence was tolerated, and so it was that — though a chief himself — Yuri waited on the outskirts while the formalities and initial business of the council were handled. He was a supplicant here, and waited patiently.
His thoughts roamed to other matters while he waited and he couldn't help but wonder where his erstwhile companions were now.
The template, Terry Mack, had used the ceremony during which Yuri had been made chief to make good his escape. He had taken some, but not all, of his bonded women with him, including Yuri's little sister: Mila.
That they had gone without him left him with mixed emotions. On the one hand, he had been prepared to take his people to war. On the other, he had never seen what possible difference his tribe might make against the vast resources of the Twilight Zone. That Terry had taken the decision from him was both a relief ... and a source of guilt.
Yet while Yuri's part in the template's business might very well be done, there remained a crucial detail that required his attention, and he carried the evidence of that in a sack by his side.
A young minotaur came to him and gestured for him to rise and approach. He stood, dusted his pantaloons and picked up his burden.
He had left his two-handed sword behind, but wore a breastplate and bracers, along with his customary leather belt. It had a silver buckle studded with rubies, and had been his since he'd acquired it during his very first dungeon delve.
His green eyes reflected the firelight as he approached the council, and one of the tauren — a thick-set fellow whose name Yuri didn't know — spoke.
"We have convened this council at your behest, Chieftain Kolenko. What is it you wish to bring before us?"
It was not lost on Yuri that no time had been wasted on pleasantries. The rumors had no doubt already made the rounds. Even had they not, the fact that Yuri had arrived that morning in the claws of a gargantuan red-scaled dragon had probably made a definite impression.
As he glanced around, he realized he recognized one of the tauren chiefs, and found his presence surprising.
Yesun Tege was chieftain of the Temujin herd. He sat quietly, his fur-lined armor a stark contrast to the more sedate regalia of the other herd masters and mistresses. His weapons were not in evidence, but after what had happened to the man the last time Yuri had passed his way, he wasn't surprised at the borderline hostile look in the big minotaur's eyes. He looked older, as though what had happened then and since had pre-maturely aged him.
The man's eyes bore into Yuri, who broke eye contact with an effort of will to speak.
"I come to inform the herds that there is a dire threat on the border of
the Eastern Steppes, in the Kaldebrekka."
As he spoke, Yuri undid the knot holding the sack closed. He reached in and pulled out the head of the Halfrekkr, displaying it without ceremony. It was beginning to rot but was still recognizable, and as he held it aloft he said, "This was their warlord, but there are still hobgoblins alive in Svartheim. If an expedition is not mounted to find and finish them, they will inevitably swarm out onto the steppe. There are also undead nesting in what was once the city of Torp, controlled by a necromancer of unknown aim but great power."
Murmurs swept the council, and Yuri judged by the general mood that his news was unwelcome, to say the least. He put the head back in the bag, lips peeling back with distaste as he re-knotted it and dropped it to the side. He had carried that head hundreds of miles for the sake of proving his claim, and it had served its purpose.
Hobgoblins were not known to any living mortals of the steppe save Yuri and a minotress named Laina Lowe, for she had also participated in the expedition that had netted the Halfrekkr's head.
Hobgoblins were creatures that arose periodically from goblins, and were exterminated with extreme prejudice whenever they were encountered. Unlike their lesser cousins, hobgoblins were larger, stronger, smarter, more disciplined, and had a penchant for conquest. With the same fecundity as their lesser kin, they could raise armies in two years instead of twenty. If they were not wiped out, they would inevitably spread, multiplying and overwhelming all opposition.
They were a plague, and news of an outbreak was never welcome, however necessary it might be.
"Why did you not finish them yourself?"
Yuri turned to look at Yesun and answered honestly. "By the time we accomplished our own objectives, only two of us were left standing. To continue on would have been suicide."
Yesun's lips peeled back, and he shook his head. The two made eye contact, and it was an effort on Yuri's part to break it again. There was a time not so long ago when such a challenge would not have gone unanswered, but Yuri had been forced to rearrange the way he thought about a great many things. The last thing he wanted was to antagonize the tauren, particularly the Temujin, who were one of the premiere warrior herds on the Eastern Steppe. His own tribe had been ravaged by recent events and were in no fit condition either to fight or flee. In order to preserve them, he must put aside his masculine pride and be as diplomatic as it was possible to be.
