by A. C. Ellas
“I believe that Lord Scorth is the murderer,” Vrathis stated. “I have an order to arrest Lord Scorth. By refusing to answer my questions, and for concealing the accused’s whereabouts, I could charge you also, with conspiracy. Even envoy status will not protect you from a charge of conspiracy against the Crown.”
“I do not see that it matters, Commander. Let us say that I give you Scorth. You put him on trial based only on suspicion, he is found guilty due to prejudice rather than evidence and killed. That will kill me as well, for we are soul-bonded,” said Rak absent-mindedly, as he glanced over his scroll. The displaced cat gave up winding about his legs and leaped into his lap. Rak’s free hand rubbed the cat’s ears. “Or you can try to charge me. You bring me to trial, and I shall demand my full rights and summon the Council of Creation to hear my case. The Judgment of the Gods is the only judgment I will accept. And then once I am cleared of your spurious charge, I shall demand a reckoning. Your kingdom would be laid waste, and you still would not have your murderer.”
The commander’s mouth worked fishlike for several moments. He growled, “Are you threatening me, priest?”
“Threatening? Ix, not in the least. I do not threaten. I am stating the fact of my intentions should you try to push me further. If that threatens you, perhaps you need to rethink your approach.”
“You are soul-bonded to Lord Scorth?”
Rak looked up at that, back and wings tensing. Had he admitted that to this man? Mentally reviewing his words, he realized that he had. How could he have made such a grave error? He pursed his lips, refusing to answer. He picked up an ink-quill and checked the tip.
A large, calloused hand gripped his wrist, and once more, Rak looked up, meeting Vrathis’s gaze.
“I asked, are you soul-bonded to Lord Scorth?”
“I heard you the first time. Let go of me.”
A thin smile answered. “No. You are going to come with me.”
“I will not.”
The commander tried to pull Rak up by the pinned wrist. Rage flared in Rak, and with the anger came the darkness. It was as if the sun streaming in the windows had been eclipsed. The cat on his lap streaked to the far side of the room. As the light vanished, Rak stood, the center of a storm of dark fire and green lightning.
Vrathis was forced to let go or risk being struck. The commander stumbled back, eyes widened and fearful.
Power filled Rak, familiar power and an equally familiar Presence. From the terror on the faces of the watch as well as the fear of the palace guards, he knew that the signs of his avatar state were perfectly visible even to laypeople. The Lord of Night spoke through the vessel he provided. “Leave. Now. Or face My wrath.”
Vrathis and his men couldn’t get out of the parlor fast enough, and the palace guards set to watch him and Ioli were right on their heels. The doorway wasn’t wide enough to accommodate all of them at once, and Rak wondered, bemusedly, if he was about to witness a death via trampling. But all of the men kept to their feet as they stampeded through the choke point. Once the last man jangled and clanked out of the parlor, the power storm faded, as did his sense of Zotien’s presence.
As suddenly as the night had arrived, it departed. As sunlight once more brightened the parlor, Rak sat down, feeling half stunned. “You would think that I would be used to that by now.” Shaking his head in an attempt to clear it didn’t help much.
“Aren’t you?” asked Ioli’s impertinent fingers.
Rak laughed. “Ix. He takes me by surprise every time He does that to me. Our Lord speaks through me when He wills, and He isn’t in the habit of asking first.” Picking up the discarded quill, he was proud that his hand only shook a little bit.
Despite his display of power, Rak didn’t fool himself into thinking that this was even close to being over. At least Scorth was out of danger, soaring high above the mountains in his natural form, but Okyro needed to be informed of this new development. He offered the quill to Ioli. “I must send a report to Okyro. They need to know about this.”
His writing was like his reading—slow and labored. As a result, he tended toward extreme brevity in his missives. That was one reason he had Ioli for an assistant. The younger priest had learned reading and writing as a child, and so the words flowed from his fingers naturally. Rak hadn’t learned to read until well after he’d achieved adulthood, as a newly freed slave in the Novitiate of the Brotherhood of the Dark Servants.
The Brotherhood had taken him in, an escaped Royal Dancer, despite knowing what he had been. They’d helped him learn to speak properly, to read, to write, and many other skills besides. And over all of that, there was the God Himself. The thought of the Lord of Night caused Rak to smile even in the midst of his dictation.
Once the report was written, Rak signed it then sealed the scroll with a drop of black wax pressed to the parchment with his ring, and then, he carried it into the chapel. He set the scroll on the altar stone before he looked up. The disc of the God seemed to float in the air above the altar, though he knew that it was held in place by a pair of chains. Why waste power on something so simply accomplished?
The dark servants used their power for utility, not for display. He set his hands on the altar and concentrated, reaching out to touch the Divine Essence. He couldn’t say if that reaching was inwards or outwards, it could have been both. Familiar darkness flowed about him as the altar engaged. A heartbeat passed then another. Rak removed his hands from the empty stone surface and walked out of the chapel.
* * * *
Ravinia picked up a scroll resting on the altar in the Thezi commons. “S’Rianz, look. News from Koilatha.”
“Are you certain it’s from S’Rak?” asked the bronze-skinned priest.
“Ai, at least, it is his seal on the wax.” Ravinia cracked the seal as Rianz came to stand beside her. Together, they read about the second murder and the arrest order for Scorth.
Epilogue
In a place beyond time, Rak undressed before the two beings who watched him. As each garment was removed, it floated down only to disappear in the mists swirling at their feet, the mists that were somehow supporting them as they stood there. Naked but for the chain locked about his waist, Rak presented himself before the pair, crossing his wrists behind his neck with his legs spread widely enough to give them easy access to his body. “If it please You, my Lords, accept this offering of myself.”
The pair moved closer. One stepped behind him, the other remained before him. Rak gasped as their hands touched him and stroked his flesh. Aid he had asked for, knowing full well there would be a price to pay. Aid had been granted, and now, the price for their help came due. It mattered not that either of them could have asked this of him anytime they wished. It mattered not that both of them had taken him before, many times before. This was sacred, this was the repayment of a debt. Never had they taken him at the same time. Rak knew what was coming and part of him yearned for it even as part of him feared it.
Traespo spoke first. “I accept.” His hands massaged Rak’s cheeks.
“I accept,” Zotien echoed. His hands massaged Rak’s belly, causing the kironi opening to blossom.
Rak bowed his head as delightful sensations coursed through him from only the touch of their divine hands. “It pleases me to please You, my Lords. I pray You find joy in the use of my body, for it is Yours as I am Yours.”
“No,” rumbled Traespo in his ear. “Your body belongs to Jisten. But Our claim supersedes his in this instance.” Traespo grasped the chain encircling Rak’s waist as His cock pressed against Rak’s back entry. Slowly, the massive spear penetrated, pushing the tight tissues aside and rearranging Rak’s insides to suit itself.
“I could kill him for this,” Zotien mused, fingering the chain Himself.
“I was willing,” Rak replied between the gasps caused by Traespo’s entry.
Zotien let it go, but He didn’t let Rak go. A moment later, Zotien’s cock slid into Rak’s kironi opening.
Rak gas
ped, or tried to, rendered breathless by the extremely intense sensations flooding him. At this level, the distinction between pain and pleasure was meaningless, both were beyond his human endurance to bear, but he felt the mental presence of both gods now, supporting his fragile mind and body as they both took and gave pleasure to his very soul. The pleasure went on and on as the gods pumped in and out of his body, filling him with Their power, Their essence, Their love and lust and need. Rak sensed himself responding, knew that he was pleasing Them, but he also knew that he was changing, that They were changing him, and he wondered what their purpose was.
The kironi magic also grew immensely in strength, and Rak now clearly felt that bond to the sire of the baby. He knew that this would be the only time Zotien would need to do this; there was power enough already to see the baby to full term. And what a baby He would be—already Rak could glimpse the future ahead for his son, and it was beautiful.
Zotien’s action in his kironi opening went on and on, and Rak reveled in it. This was so different from every other time, every other use, and finally, Rak let go of the past. How could this be a freak hole if his God, Zotien himself, was pleased to use it? The Valers had been right all along. If his opening hadn’t been sacred before, it certainly was now. Rak threw himself into giving pleasure back to Zotien, without neglecting Traespo behind him. He thought idly that he’d been born for this and this alone: to please and be pleased by the gods themselves.
Traespo gave a last thrust and filled Rak with His divine seed, His cock buried balls deep in Rak as it rhythmically throbbed and squirted out its load. Rak had thought he couldn’t feel pleasure more intense than what he was already suffering. He was mistaken. He felt as if his entire being, body and soul, had been filled and overfilled with power, so much so that it was bursting out of him, shattering all he was and scattering his psyche on the winds.
Zotien came a moment later, His seed bathing and strengthening the baby Rak carried for Him, filling Rak with even more pleasure, more power. The gods contained Rak, holding him together by the strength of their wills, not allowing him to escape. They stepped back, and now, they were elsewhere. Elegant columns rose about them, the mists froze into glass, a smooth, level expanse of slightly glowing floor. Above, the stars shone down in all their glory, the wheeling galaxies plain to see even to the naked eye.
Rak was dressed in dancing silks; there were short swords in his hands. Music played, a familiar, driving melody, and he danced, spinning out the power that still filled him. He presented the path of water as Varkaris had taught him, turning the forms into actual art. He whirled, he floated, he flowed through the measures, each move both subtle and precise, powerful and sensual.
Zotien flowed into the dance with him, opposite him and mirroring him, his perfect partner in the dance, the only one who could match him movement for movement, step for step. Not even Varkaris could do what Zotien did so easily, and Rak wished that the old Valer dance master could see the perfect sword dance he’d envisioned but had never realized. The power spun from their feet and settled into the pattern of creation, repairing any damage, strengthening anything that was weakening, and giving it the seeds of new growth.
The music changed, becoming primal, and the swords were gone from Rak’s hands, the silks were gone from his body. Rak and Zotien danced skin to skin, closer and closer as they moved to the primal rhythm and accepted the primal imperative. Zotien entered Rak once more, this time from behind, and consummated the dance, locking the power into place. Rak accepted it, giving Zotien everything he had, pumping himself urgently on the divine cock. Zotien held him as they writhed together, held his body, his mind, and his soul, keeping Rak in the here and now, keeping Rak together and coherent, until a wave of transcendental pleasure crashed down on Rak at the moment of Zotien’s climax.
Rak opened his eyes as mortal hands touched him. He was laying on the tiled floor of the reception chamber in the envoy suite, belly down and butt naked—except for the chain around his waist. Jisten’s hands stroked his body, Jisten’s cock thrust into his opening. As Jisten started to pump him urgently, Rak reveled now in mortality, celebrating it for the fleeting gift it was even as he wondered how much longer he would remain on this plane of existence.
Jisten’s long, thick pole soon drove such thoughts from his mind. He worked himself lustily, as an obedient wife should, to increase Jisten’s pleasure. Not even the gods had protested Jisten’s claim. Zotien hadn’t cared that Jisten had claimed him as wife, he’d only cared about the chain, and that due to the first law. Since Rak had been willing, was still willing, the chain remained and Jisten’s rights were indisputable.
Jisten grunted as he came, resting atop Rak as his seed filled Rak’s tunnel. Rak’s body would absorb the seed that filled him, both drawing strength from it and using it to better learn to please its progenitor. The pleasure Jisten gave him was of a different flavor than that of the gods, much earthier and easier to cope with, and Rak returned that pleasure with gratitude for the very humanness of it.
Jisten remained in him even as he softened. Rak lay beneath him, accepting. To Rak’s silent amusement, Jisten began to oil his wings. Rak allowed his body to play as Jisten worked, massaging Jisten’s cock back to erection, then working himself on the stiffened pole in a slow, undulating action that was designed to maximize Jisten’s pleasure at being sheathed in Rak.
Jisten had a startling ability to hold off his climax as he worked, and it pleased Jisten that Rak should offer this submissive pleasure until the wing oiling was done. Rak knew Jisten liked it, of course, and knew that Jisten wouldn’t reward him with a climax until he was done. Rak kept working his ass and his internal muscles through the entire hour Jisten took on his wings.
When the wing oiling was done, however, Jisten pulled out of Rak, flipped the smaller man onto his back, and straddled him before Rak could start to panic. “Now, neka, I am claiming my right as your husband.” Jisten’s cock, hard and heavy, slid into Rak’s kironi hole.
Rak gasped in surprise as Jisten entered him there. He’d have thought that passage would be sealed. But Jisten was already pumping his hips, thrusting into Rak’s kironi opening with long, deep strokes, the kind Rak had always liked best. Rak felt himself responding, felt his body working to aid Jisten, and wondered.
He doubted even Si’Yeni could change the paternity of this particular baby, but it was entirely possible that Zotien was permitting this as a sort of camouflage. If everyone, including Jisten, thought the baby was Jisten’s…well, the baby would be that much safer. And Jisten truly enjoyed taking him this way. The Valer would never question it. Jisten climaxed a second time, and Rak felt a weak echo, a strange echo along the kironi bond.
“There,” Jisten said, his voice thick with pleasure. “Now I’ll have a son who’s entirely mine and nothing will interfere with this pregnancy.”
To be continued...
About the Author
A.C. Ellas has long since embraced her inner nerd. She revels in her Greekness and in her Geekness. She has two lives—the mundane reality of life here on earth and the far more interesting life in her head. She is fascinated by ancient history, ancient forms of combat, target archery, sabre fencing, the equestrian sports and all things equine, dragons, spaceships, time travel, organic food and sustainable farming. Above all, she loves science fiction and fantasy of all varieties, especially conventions, which are the only gatherings on earth where she can find many people just as strange as she is.
You can contact her at [email protected] or through her website www.ac-ellas.com
Please follow @Dark_Servant on twitter and like her on facebook http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Dark-Servant/340617732680081
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