‘You are a beast,’ Caralissa told him. ‘An animal, with not a shred of respect or honour for a lady.’
He looked up at her where she knelt. ‘It is your heated sex which speaks so harshly, on account of your heavy need,’ he explained, running a hand against the lips of her nether opening, inducing a new round of shudders. ‘Serve me now and well, and perhaps we shall allow you an orgasm.’
‘How magnanimous,’ she said bitterly, lowering her head to his crotch. ‘I don’t know how I’ll repay you.’
Varik seized her hair, preventing further downward motion. ‘Begin this time at my feet,’ he ordered. ‘Work your way up, using your tongue and lips and fingertips.’
Caralissa did as she was told, grateful not to have to make eye contact for the moment. If she were not careful she would wind up being impaled yet. Her progress proved to be surprisingly slow, especially as he made her begin over two times, on account of what he felt were half-hearted efforts, hardly worthy of comparison with the services of his slaves in the homeland of his people.
Which, incidentally, was precisely where she wished he would return at this very moment, he and his infernal barbarian army. Let him have the rest of the world - why did he have to trouble her little kingdom?
‘Do not be discouraged,’ he told her, as if somehow it bothered her that she’d no idea what she was doing. ‘You are inexperienced and lacking in incentive. Tomorrow we shall undertake some training exercises and you shall see the difference.’
Caralissa clenched her thighs. No man would ever train her, despite the yearning induced by the very word. She would sooner find herself a pole and conduct her own impalement. ‘Tomorrow you will be occupied,’ she informed him. ‘Fighting my army.’
Varik took her hand and placed it upon his throbbing shaft. ‘And you too will be occupied pleasuring me with your body.’
‘Why do you not take me?’ she demanded, stroking him lightly, ‘and get it over with?’
‘I shall not force from you anything you will not give me, Little Flame. When it is time you will come to me yourself, begging for a cock between your legs, mine or the lowest ranking of my soldiers. It will matter not so great will be your need to be possessed.’
Caralissa spat at him, full in the face.
‘There will be punishment for that,’ he told her. ‘Tomorrow. In the meantime, you will clean me with your tongue.’
Caralissa gave no argument. In order to clean his cheek fully she needed to move herself to several angles, all of which compelled her to compress her breasts against various parts of his hard flesh. His skin was smooth under her subjugated tongue. He smelled of scented leather, tinged with honey.
Varik remained expressionless as she carried out her punishment duty. Her readiness for breeching was painfully apparent, she feared, by her colouring and her odour, it would have taken an imbecile not to see she was begging to be taken, having insulted him so that he might be roused to overpower her.
‘That is enough,’ he told her. ‘It is time to prepare yourself for my second emission.’
She dropped her head efficiently to his lap, drawing him in with a single caress, soft and wet. For some reason, in the midst of all of the confusion and anguish, this one act, servile and perverted as it was, was beginning to make sense to her. It was almost as if it gave her an anchor, a sense of being and purpose. Gingerly now, reverently, she accepted him, allowing him to move her head to suit him as he settled himself in deep, groaning from the contact, from the sweet urgent sucking. When he filled her at last, rewarding her with a load nearly as thick and full as the first, she let loose with a new trickling of tears though this time she understood not from whence they came. For it was not exactly sadness she felt.
‘Lie beside me, Little Flame,’ he said when he was satisfied.
Slowly, painfully, on pins and needles, Caralissa lowered her fevered body. She desired neither contact nor comfort, but he was insistent, his large hand cradling her belly.
‘Put your hands above your head,’ he instructed, ‘palms up.’
The position was one of helplessness, but also one of extreme feminine beauty. She’d seen the dancers conclude their performances this way, in the pleasure-houses.
‘Do not fight me,’ Varik said, as his hand began its inevitable journey southward. ‘If you surrender completely to me you shall find your bliss.’
Caralissa arched her back, instantly transformed into a wanton she-beast. His hand poised, Varik held her at the brink.
‘So long as you are with me, Caralissa,’ he whispered, warming her with the sound of her name on his lips. ‘You belong to me. As do your orgasms. When I choose to pluck one from you, as I do now, it is for my joy not yours. Do you understand?’
‘Yes,’ she agreed, though at the moment she knew nothing except the razor-edge of need, the precipice of desire over which she yearned to plummet. ‘I am yours.’
Varik finished her off, neither one of them troubled over the possibility of the perfidy of her statement. In this context, in the middle of this darkened mystical night, she was his and whatever the light of day might bring she would bear his brand upon her heart forever because of it. Caralissa was sure her screams of pleasure, her pent-up passion would awaken his soldiers, perhaps even the spirits of the dead inhabiting the nearby villages.
In the end, however, no one came upon them and the moment remained private. A tableau made of two souls. The barbarian overlord, insatiable and pining for risk and the virgin queen teetering on the edge of fatal submission; the pair of them together for an uncertain number of nows, moments to be counted and allocated, their nature as yet un-revealed.
Shivering and naked Caralissa sank back into the exigencies of the hour; a thousand forgotten worries jockeying themselves for position, the chief among them being escape, revenge and mayhem, in that order.
‘We will rest now,’ he said imperiously as he rose to his feet to fetch a cord of leather.
‘This is for your protection,’ Varik explained, winding the cord about her wrist, knotting it firmly. ‘If you manage to run from me, which you no doubt will do after I fall asleep, you are liable to fall afoul of my archers, or else stumble into the tiger pit. This way we shall both sleep well and awaken fresh in the morning.’
Caralissa watched in disbelief as he wound the free end round his fist, securing her as though on a leash. He offered for her to remain on the furs at his side, but she refused, preferring the honesty of the cold autumn ground to the embrace of a despicable coward and bully. Taking full advantage of her lead, stretching it to its maximum, she found a spot for herself a foot away from him.
She watched in fury as he began to snore happily, his skin toasty warm in the furs. The sword, she thought, why can’t I reach the sword? Teeth chattering, miserable and cold, she tried to think of tomorrow and the freedom she would win as her troops discovered her absence and began their bold assault on the Rashal encampment.
Bold assault. Who was she kidding? The Orencian military was a shambles, a joke, thanks to Romila’s meddling and that of Telos, her foppish idiotic lover whom she kept trying to foist into high places. Telos was more intent on breeching Caralissa’s defences than those of any enemy, real or imagined.
A pitiful sound escaped her lips. She couldn’t endure the ground. It wasn’t fair, wasn’t right. Intently, Caralissa watched the sex-sated barbarian, waiting for signs of deep sleep.
When at last he seemed fully removed from reality, unable to witness her shameful surrender, she crawled stealthily to the furs, thrusting her tired, nerve-wracked body under the warm material. She would remain there a few moments only, she promised herself, and then she’d return to the ground, to the dignity of her self-imposed exile, away from his arrogant male beauty and his smug snores.
She was counting down the seconds, halfway to the sixty she’d allotted herself, when it hit her. Fatigue,
overwhelming and irresistible. Unconsciousness was overtaking her, the closest thing to death one may know on this side of the grave and every bit as powerful. Still muttering a tiny oath to the goddess, she fell then into sleep, deep and dreamless, full of every good hope.
Hope for the morrow, hope for Orencia. Hope for a miracle. And for revenge.
Chapter Two
Caralissa awoke with a heavy weight across her chest. She dreamed it was a tree, downed in a powerful storm, but when the rasping blow of air came to her ears, tickling her to consciousness, the memories flooded back. It was Varik, on his back, his head next to hers, his oversized arm draped insolently across her breasts, the hand trailing down with disgusting familiarity to the bridge of her thighs.
Insolent pig! Somehow she’d fallen asleep on his furs and now he was holding her, like he owned her. Trembling ever so slightly Caralissa relived the orgasm, the overwhelming flood and degradation. She was sore. Her thighs, her buttocks beneath her, even her jaws ached. He’d been a beast, treating her like a domestic animal, a mere slave. In Orencia if a man were to even think such things with regard to her royal person, let alone attempt them, he would be put to death. Merely to gaze admiringly at the red-haired queen from afar was a delight many of her citizens would savour for a lifetime, a privilege not to be abused.
Varik mumbled something and moved against her. How she hated the man! By the goddess, why was this happening to her? She had prayed, taken augers and even consulted the high priest to insure the success of her journey; what more could she have done? Caralissa drew a troubled breath, giving herself a moment to absorb it all - the terrible calamity of her failed mission, Varik’s surprise capture of her, his degrading ‘punishments’ and worst of all, the prospect of a new day dawning with her as a prisoner in the camp of a powerful enemy.
Very slowly and carefully, using her free hand, Caralissa tried to extract herself from under her sleeping tormentor. His breathing was undeservedly easy, like a baby’s. Hopefully he would not rouse himself seemingly from the dead, leaping upon her a second time, terrifying her nearly to the point of ghost-hood. Squirming on her tender buttocks she began to slide away from him, inch by inch. Like an avalanche his flesh seemed to follow, re-pinning her with each motion. The arm. She needed to move the damned arm. It may as well have been a tree trunk, just as she dreamed, for all its lifeless weight.
There! She was almost free. Now to release her other hand, the one he was still lying on. But wait - why was it stuck like that?
The cord! She forgot about the cord. Flexing her unseen hand, which was obscured beneath him, she realised to her horror it was still there, unbreakable. The miserable piece of leather he’d dared to impose on her flesh. Sick with rage she replayed his words in her mind.
‘This is for your protection,’ he’d told her, his voice oozing paternalistic smugness. ‘So we will both awaken fresh in the morning.’
Caralissa decided his death would be slow. And there would be torture, both of a conventional kind and a more intimate, sexual kind. Idly she scanned the interior of Varik’s tent, looking for suitable weapons. The enclosure was square, made of thick orange-red material held aloft by poles, one at each corner, with a large opening in the roof. It was a barbarian structure, of course, unfit for civilised persons. There wasn’t even any proper furniture, only these furs, and in the corner a sort of high wooden stool on which was placed a helmet, badly dented with a plume of black feathers. How charming.
Then there was the sword, the one she saw last night, huge and deadly, the scabbard inscribed with symbols, presumably from his nonsensical language. And don’t forget the axe and bits of armour hung from the poles, a chest plate, knee protectors and things she couldn’t even identify.
For a wardrobe he boasted several tunics that were flung over the top of a spear, which in turn was thrust into the ground at an angle. She made a sarcastic mental note to consult the man’s decorator to help her at the castle. That is, if she ever got back there again. Food. She needed food. Was there something to eat, amidst the small wooden boxes, carved and decorated, or perhaps in the woollen sacks lying hither and thither across the trampled ground, the grass, largely ruined now - her grass, the grass of her fathers?
The sword. She must find a way to levitate it to her, dangling it in mid-air above them, and then release it so it fell between them, cutting the cord. And then she’d use it on him to...
Caralissa froze her thoughts. There was a low growl, very faint, to her right. And eyes; she sensed eyes. Slowly, very slowly she turned. The huge cat was sitting on its haunches, watching her. The tail was flicking, almost as if it were a household pet, one of the small furry things that were forever under foot at home. Except this feline looked to weigh hundreds of pounds. Its paws alone were the size of saucers.
The thing blinked, as if deciding on its course of action. Caralissa glared at it, mesmerised. Its fur was the colour of black pearl, mixed with irregular cloud-like patches of grey and white. The teeth were large and curved, spectacularly white. Whiskers bristled along either side of its pink nostrils. Its muscles were lean and with a single swipe of its claws, she was quite certain the creature could end her life or Varik’s.
She should scream, and yet any sudden noise might set it off. Caralissa gasped. The cat was getting up on its feet, moving silently on the pads. No wonder she didn’t hear it come in; it was quiet as a mouse. By the goddess, it was coming straight for them!
‘Varik,’ she whispered, her voice a study of compressed intensity. ‘Wake up. There’s a wild animal.’
He muttered something, shifting so that his hand clamped her breast.
‘Wake up, you fool! We’re going to be mauled!’
‘Why do you disturb my sleep, woman?’ he enquired, his face nuzzled at her shoulder, his eyes as yet unopened.
Caralissa exhaled, put her hand to her face. It was too late. The creature was upon them. The last thing she saw was the paw, coming straight at her, pressing down towards her bare, unprotected flesh.
‘Ahzur, stop that nonsense...’ Varik grumbled.
Caralissa opened her eyes. The animal was leaning across her, ignoring her as it licked Varik’s face and head, slobbering him noisily with its huge sandpaper tongue. The drool fell in droplets, pebble-sized upon her head.
‘Varik!’ she screamed, anger replacing mortal terror. ‘Get this filthy creature off me!’
The Rashal warlord sat up, his hair hanging about him in tangles. ‘Can a man get no sleep in his own tent?’
Caralissa was on her feet, tugging at the tether which bound them wrist-to-wrist. If need be she would tear his arm off and hers to get to the sword or the tent flap, whichever came first.
‘Ahzur,’ Varik barked, seeing the purpose of her action. ‘Lah-ka.’
The cat lowered its head, gingerly taking the cord between its teeth. With a single bite, neat and clean, the tensely drawn leather was severed. Caralissa fell on her behind. Recovering almost immediately she rose again, running for the sword.
‘The water jug is to the left,’ he said. ‘You can fill it at the stream.’
Intrigued as always by his audacity, she gave pause. ‘Excuse me?’
Varik was on his back once more, the cat lying beside him, occupying her place. ‘You will fetch water for my breakfast, using the jug,’ he said, as though it were something patently obvious.
Caralissa’s mouth hung open. ‘You’re not serious?’
‘I am. And if I were you I would hurry. With each passing minute more soldiers awaken. They should know to leave you be, but there are one or two bad apples in every barbarian horde, as you can imagine.’
She regarded him, sprawled in his insolent nudity. Her mind turning like lightning she considered her options. She could fight him on the matter, but that would likely wind her up over his lap once more, or else slobbering over one of his incessant erections. Alterna
tively she might simply try to kill him, though the odds of disabling the combined weight of the man and his beast were not good. Or she could take the bucket and run. In broad daylight this would be no easy matter, but if she were to be killed - which she would be inevitably - better to have it come at the hands of some unknown swordsman or archer than from this conceited, ignorant chieftain.
‘I have no clothes to wear,’ she said, deciding it would be inconvenient to attempt escape in the nude.
‘You may borrow one of my tunics.’
She was able to pull one down from the spear. It hung to mid-thigh and when cinched with one of the leather cords that seemed to exist in endless supply, Caralissa was able to make a feasible garment for herself. It was tight at her waist and cut low at the neck, which meant it revealed a substantial percent of her charms. It might come in handy, she thought, for enacting help in getting out of the camp.
She would have liked to have her boots, but when she went to put them on she saw they were wet and gnarled, presumably from Ahzur, who may well have come in and out several times while they slept. Oh well, a barefoot escape it would have to be.
‘Hurry back, Little Flame,’ he called out to her as she left the tent. ‘When you return I will begin your training.’
‘Oh goodie,’ she snapped sarcastically, knowing full well that once she was out of the man’s tent she would never see his face again.
Caralissa blinked, her eyes temporarily dazzled by the morning sun. As her vision adjusted she saw she was being watched, this time by men not beasts. There were a dozen or more warriors, standing in small groups, some shirtless, others with vests of mail or chest armour. All of them wore boots and breeches and were huge like Varik, though their eyes seemed colder, unforgiving. Their conversations halted as they beheld the scantily clad beauty, the shapely redhead lithely emerging from the chieftain’s tent.
Caralissa's Conquest Page 3
