JOURNEY OF THE SACRED KING BOOK I: MY SISTER'S KEEPER

by JANRAE FRANK

  "Do you want him? Do you want me to come inside you? Feel how hard I am, how ready." Dynarien brought Birdie's hand to his cock, letting her feel it.

  "Yes," Birdie moaned. "I want you."

  Dynarien kissed her as he entered, thrusting deep and hard. Birdie cried out sharply in pain as her hymen tore, hot sticky blood ran down her thighs. Dynarien, without pausing in his thrusts, levered himself up to stare incredulously at the blood

  "Virgin? To both genders?"

  Birdie, weeping at the pain tearing at her, managed to nod.

  "Oh, my poor, sweet Birdie," Dynarien murmured, thrusting more slowly, more gently, finding a kinder rhythm. "It only hurts the first time..." And how appropriate, a very young, completely untouched virgin to bring Eldarion Havenrain back into the world again. He stiffened suddenly with a moan, rearing back as his seed exploded within Birdie, filling her.

  Eldarion Havenrain's soul curled contently in the soft, warm darkness of Birdie's womb to sleep and dream, to wait for birth and a time when he could once more take the field against the Waejontori.

  * * * *

  They lay together a long time after the child passed to Birdie. Then Dynarien left and Dynanna returned. Birdie had a quick glimpse of them standing together for a moment talking too softly for her to hear. Dynanna lay down beside her to stroke and pat and make small comforting noises: she had never dreamed that Birdie, child of the streets and twice as savvy, was so totally untouched. She glanced at Talons. Maybe I should have given the child to her? Nah! Eldarion Havenrain does not belong in that Guild.

  She made a couple of tries at cleaning Birdie up, but the youth slapped her away each time and Dynanna gave up: Blackbird would probably take one look at the bloody mess between Birdie's thighs, the bruises Dynarien's initial roughness had left, and throw the altar out the window. It would take a tremendous amount of help and booty to get Blackbird to look the other way on this one. The more she thought about it, the more items she summoned into the room; stuff piled up quickly until it was pushing at their feet as well as the ceiling in places.

  Dynanna wondered idly how long it took human women, especially Sharani, to start swelling. "You could kyndi if you don't want to carry him... But my sources say that adds something they can't predict to the sum total of things."

  "If I don't kyndi?" Birdie asked thoughtfully, starting to recover some of her confidence. "Won't he be born azdrin?" The sterile, genderless, disenfranchised hermaphrodites and androgens held in contempt by Sharani society.

  "Nah. He'll be born perfect, no kyndi required."

  "Ishla would know. You could ask her."

  Dynanna levered herself up on her elbow. "And let one of the Big Nine," she left out all reference to the Gods of Light whose ruling pantheon Ishla was part of, "know what this wee godling was up to? Uh Uh! Tried to shut me up in a cave after I cursed that dwarf family with ten generations of six foot children."

  Birdie giggled.

  "Birdie, my sweet wild child, you sure you can handle this?"

  "I can handle anything!" Birdie started to bridle.

  "Okay," Dynanna said, growing thoughtful again. "Pointers. He's a mage, warrior, and magical smith. Get him some good teachers. And... hmn, make him streetwise as hell. No pampering, no overprotecting. Don't make him a wuss."

  "What's his name?"

  "Can't tell you. This has got to be a fresh start."

  Birdie thought about that. "But won't he remember?" She rubbed her belly as she spoke, trying to feel the child inside her.

  "Don't think so. All his powers, skills, instincts, that kind of stuff, will be intact though."

  * * * *

  Dynanna smiled, purring with pleasure at the thought of what a kink this child would put in the Hellgod's plans for the next generation. She had spent much of the last century uncovering various lost soul vaults of the Waejontori necromancers and then figuring out just whose souls she had and which gems they were in. She still had three more heroic souls to place, but had not yet found the right wombs. At least she was getting as much pleasure out of placing them, or Dynarien was, as she had hunting for them. But what she really wanted was the entire contents of the soul vault at Dragonshead, a place she had never been able to break into, where legend had it were stored souls from before the Renewal, followers of the old gods and just maybe an old god or two.

  * * * *

  Half the day had passed before Blackbird got up the courage to check on her daughter and Talons. She opened the door with trepidation. The heady overpowering scent of rose hit Blackbird in the face the moment the door opened halfway. It's too late in the season for roses ... her practical mind thought first and magic second. With the door thrown fully open, Blackbird could see the room was covered in rose petals like a thick layer of blue snow. She hesitated to step on them, thinking for a minute to take off her boots, and then reminding herself – she sometimes forgot how things she once did easily, without a thought, were now difficult such as trying to get her boots on one-handed – because she let it impinge as little as stubbornly possible on her daily life – that she would never get them back on without help.

  Talons still lay sleeping, a blanket thrown thoughtfully over her and a second blanket of rose petals over that. Birdie lay on the cushions, huddled beneath a quilt. Blackbird saw her clothes discarded beside Talons and her heart skipped a beat. She had known for a few months now of Birdie's obstinate virginity; Birdie had always confided the secrets of her heart to Paunys, her wombmother; and Paunys, slowly dying of an incurable degenerative disease, knowing she would not live out the winter, feeling that she had to leave some protection behind for the youth, confided those secrets in turn to Blackbird. She knelt beside her daughter, started to turn back the quilt, but Birdie resisted.

  "Stop that!" Blackbird ordered sternly.

  Birdie released the quilt; Blackbird flipped it back and gasped at the bruises rough sex had left on her daughter's body, at the blood crusting her thighs, the thick mass of congealing seminal fluid. "This is too much!" Blackbird roared, "I want that altar out of here!"

  Birdie caught at her ma'aram. "No. I asked for it. I'm her priest now." She did not mention the pregnancy, which could wait until there was no hiding it.

  "Look!" She waved at the altar. There stood three swords and shields; a mountain of spell cords for binding magic and killing; a pile of strange nets made of silver and spun as soft and supple as silk but stronger than the strongest steel; a box of darts and a blowgun; a silver bow and quiver of arrows; and a stack of pie pans with small holes in their rims (a Badree Nym weapon that reputedly could take the head off a stone troll before returning to its wielder's hand as well as being a very fine cooking vessel). Blackbird went to inspect this incredible pile of loot when she noticed several large chests buried beneath the stuff. She carefully moved things around until she could open them. Three of them were filled with gold coins; two with gems of every description, most of them rare beyond dreaming; and the last with rings, amulets, wands, scrolls and spell books, none of them in anyway identifiable at first glance. "Holy Shit Come Calling!" Just as she thought she'd seen it all, her gaze fastened on a vial of dark blue liquid with a note tied around it.

  Birdie's Ma'aram:

  This is for your mate. One spoonful daily for three days. May the three of you have a long life together.

  Perverse Dynanna

  Blackbird gasped in wonder at this last, certain that it could only be the Sapphire Elixir of Idyn, and clutched the vial to her heart, muttering, "A cure for Paunys?" Hope and fear warred for a moment in the old knight's heart: hope that this would cure her dying na'halaef and fear that it would not be what she thought it was. She rushed down the stairs. Paunys' bedroom lay just off a short corridor on the west end of the house. Blackbird paused at the door to catch her breath before entering.

  The room was dingy and ill lit with a single oil lamp burning on a small table beside the bed. Zarim, their ba'halaef sat in a threadbare chair, spooning b
roth into Paunys' mouth. Zarim was a Jedruan, black skinned with a tight cap of dense curly hair, a large expressive mouth and a broad nose. Paunys and Blackbird purchased him at the Sharani slave market before the war, influenced largely by his people's bedroom reputation, but after a handful of years had freed and married him.

  Paunys rested against pillows piled up to support her back and shoulders. Her disheveled hair, black until just six months past, was a waxy gray. The flesh hung loose on her gaunt face with a grayish-yellow tinge to her skin.

  Zarim looked up and shook his head, indicating that Paunys was no better, and his face so sad it broke Blackbird's heart. They both knew that Paunys would not see their twentieth anniversary on winter's solstice.

  "Give me the spoon," Blackbird said, moving him gently aside. She opened the bottle, poured out a spoonful, and lifted it to Paunys' mouth. Paunys gave her a questioning look: she had tried dozens upon dozens of elixirs and backwoods granny remedies, some of them pretty awful, without success. Blackbird did not argue, just let her eyes plead for her. Paunys sighed wearily and swallowed.

  As they watched in wonder, the color came back in their mate's face, her eyes brightened, and the fever glaze left them. They came together, hugging and weeping, giving thanks to Dynanna while Birdie and Talons went forgotten.

  * * * *

  Birdie made the run with Lizard as backup just as they had done with Ladonys in case things did not go as planned. She had never killed anyone, but she had long ago made peace with the possibility. The decision had been made to draw Sorrow and her allies out into the open, force them to respond in numbers to a perceived threat that would bring them within Talons' reach: no more cat and mouse. She wore a brace of daggers in arm sheaths and another pair in her boots: Their goal was simply to touch Sorrow's bare flesh with the spell cord wrapped around Birdie's left hand and laced through her fingers, making it a grim, potentially deadly game of tag and run.

  They spied Sorrow in a crowd along Silversmith Street. Small and physically immature for her age, Birdie darted through the crowd like a slim dark shadow, felt in passing but taken no more notice of than the average street child who was always running after something. She took a few purses as she went, more from habit than need in light of Dynanna's generosity. She came up beside Sorrow so quickly and quietly the shifter did not notice her, until Birdie's shoulder deliberately caught her in the side, staggering Sorrow an instant before giving her the boot to her hip. The shifter hit the ground hard, rolling onto her side. Ordinarily Birdie would have fled at that moment; instead she lingered, their eyes meeting, locking together like duelists in the instant before their swords engaged.

  Anger burned in Sorrow's glance at the humiliation of her fall into the dirt and garbage strewn street. Dust from the brick paving streaked the woman's long narrow face. "I know you," Sorrow hissed. "I know where you live. Don't mess with me."

  It took all the will power Birdie could muster not to follow her street-trained instincts and simply flee, as she would have had the collision been accidental. Deliberately, Birdie spit in Sorrow's face, completing the insult, provoking the mon past thinking, "Shifter shit!"

  Several things happened at once: the shifter reacted faster than Birdie dreamed possible, faster than anyone the youth had encountered in her thirteen years except Talons. Sorrow grabbed Birdie's shirt, yanking her off balance and down into the dirt. Birdie hit the ground hard, staring up into Sorrow's savage glare. She sensed, rather than saw the blade slide into Sorrow's hand, twisting instinctively so that the blade caught her side instead of her stomach, opening her from just under her ribs to hip, deeply enough at the top to split all the layers of skin and fat, revealing her insides, and going shallow where the cut ended against her hip bone. Dizziness and a burning pain swept over the youth as her blood rushed out to soak her shirt and pants. For just an instant fear paralyzed her, then Birdie's street-honed instincts kicked in, taking over her body and reactions. She shoved her left hand into the shifter's face. The spell cord sparked as it touched the shifter, leaving a burn scar across Sorrow's face. The shifter screamed, releasing Birdie and dropping her blade to clutch at her face.

  A crowd had gathered, watching curiously, but doing nothing to intervene because they all knew the thieving reputations of the street children, especially the Urchins. Birdie rolled to her feet, darting toward the crowd, intending to put a good distance between herself and the shifter's allies. A hard, calloused hand closed on her arm, jerking her off balance. Birdie looked up into the leering face of one of the assassins. She kicked out, catching the mon's shin hard. The mon grunted, thumbing a large ring on her finger. A needle appeared, coated green with some kind of drug or poison. Birdie screamed, thrashing violently. "No! Noooo!" Her shirt tore away in the mon's hands, Birdie twisted loose just as the needle ripped through her arm.

  "She won't get far," the mon muttered at Birdie's retreating back.

  Birdie fled, passing up the nearest alley, pursued by two of the shifter's companions. Her arm and side burned with a terrible intensity. Her running stride had become a staggering walk. The world started to go gray around her. The familiar streets no longer looked familiar, nothing looked right anymore. Was it the second alley or the third she was supposed to go down? Where was she? Was she even in Armaten anymore? Her head was so heavy. It would be so easy, so very easy to let herself fall and not get up.

  She began sucking air deep into her lungs, trying to shake her head and body loose from the deadly lethargy overtaking her. She turned into the next alley. Too late she realized she had gone into the wrong alley: there was no help waiting for her here.

  "Little bitch!" A tall mon chasing her cursed, "Cheap little gutterscrew!" As soon as she stepped into the alley out of sight of the general throng, she drew her blades, knives as long as short swords.

  The alley was a dead end: a crumpling garden wall blocked her escape. Birdie sprang at the wall, catching the top edge, scrabbling to get over. Her weight pulled at the bleeding wound, sending a sharp, unremitting pain through her. Birdie lost her grip, falling hard onto her left shoulder, the impact knocking the breath from her lungs and the feeling from her shoulders to her fingertips. The pain banished some of the drugged fog from her awareness although for several moments she could not move, her lungs sobbing for air, with great effort she dragged herself into the corner of wall and building, drawing a dagger with her right hand.

  "Dynanna. Dynanna," she chanted desperately, unheeded tears sliding down her cheeks as she stared at the two Golds who were going to kill her.

  The second mon entered behind the first. "Give her to Margren? Or gut her here?"

  The first mon's form blurred, then cleared, becoming a large male with violet, white-less eyes. "Let's enjoy her first, we don't get much fun in this god-forsaken realm."

  Birdie clutched her bleeding side with her left hand while her right rubbed her stomach where the special child nestled in her womb. Surely Dynanna would not let her die, if only for the sake of the child. She lunged, slashing at the first one to reach her, but Birdie's reflexes were off and she missed the mon's stomach. The sword came back at her. Birdie ducked, her drug-impaired balance failed her, and she fell, loosing her dagger. Instinctively, she rolled away, causing the shifter's blade to strike short of her. She rose on one knee, glancing quickly around herself: she was nearly at the end of the alley, there was no place left to run. She drew the dagger's mate from her boot, only to have it knocked from her grasp with the flat of a blade. The shifter seized her, dragging her off her feet, and then slamming her down onto her back slicing the lacings of her pants open. Birdie thrashed wildly, screaming imprecations and curses as his weight crushed the breath from her lungs, his knee forcing her legs open. The Waejontori shoved himself into her savagely, tearing at the soft tissues of her womanhood with his member until blood oozed around him.

  Feeling had begun returning to her left hand and a blade slid into it, only to have the second warrior step on her wrist, forcin
g it from her fingers.

  "My turn," said the second mon as the first's seed spilled into her.

  Again the mon's shape shifted and Birdie found herself staring at a second male with violet eyes. Then the second one was on her, pinning her slender body with his weight as he entered. A long shrill scream broke from her. The second one drew his blade, putting it to her throat as he thrust rhythmically within her. She closed her eyes, turned inward, grieving for the child that would not be born.

  The scent of roses filled the alley. The Waejontori paused to glance around them uneasily, recognizing the presence of magic. A strong pale skinned hand caught the Waejontori riding Birdie by the nape of the neck, yanking him off her, his seed fountaining against the nearest wall as the yuwenghau shook him with the careless power and fury of a large dog with a small vermin in its mouth before slamming his face into the side of the brick building. With a sickening crunch, the Waejontori's nose shattered and his forehead cracked. He slid down into an insensate heap as Dynarien released him.

  "This is not allowed!" Dynarien snarled.

  "Bastard! Gutterscrewing Bastard," cursed another soft, familiar voice with more emotion than Birdie believed possible. "Fucking cockwhore!"

  Birdie fainted, too weak to fight whatever it was, drug or poison, raging through her body, wondering in a last flare of fading thought whether she would wake again.

  Talons, claws out, took the eyes of the nearest Waejontori, then stood staring into Dynarien's eyes with cold calculation, measuring and assessing what it would require to take him out. "Who are you?"

  "A friend," Dynarien said gently, his eyes guileless as a child's. He gestured at the Waejontoris, spell cords materialized out of the air, moving like snakes to bind the shifters. "The Urchins are coming. Birdie needs help."