The Pillaging of an Empire

by Amanda Clover

  “Oh?” Stella breathed, tilting her head. “What does it do?”

  Arven shook his head. “I’m afraid I cannot say, my dear.”

  “Really?” Stella said. “Why not?”

  Arven chuckled, lifting a large piece of vellum and scrutinizing it intently. “Stella, you are a bright young thing. But you’d need a lifetime of schooling in magic to make sense of it.”

  Stella perked up intently. “Sounds complicated.”

  “Yes. Hence why I need to work on it.”

  “Oh of course, my lord. But… perhaps you can work better… if you take a break?”

  Arven lifted his eyes once more, and they didn’t go back down. Stella had shrugged off her cloak, revealing the fact she was entirely naked. She gave him a smoky look, lifting one of her plump, full breasts. Arven swallowed thickly as her pink lips parted, took a hardened nipple between them, and gave a needy suck.

  Arven shifted where he sat. “My dear… really…”

  Her lips popped off her nipple. “Is something the matter, my lord?” Stella asked impishly as she switched to her other breast, giving that nipple a lingering suck, her tongue dancing around the plump bud of female flesh. “Something… uncomfortable? If so, you know how eager I am to assist you, my lord.”

  Arven took off his spectacles, rose. “Tease,” he growled as he moved out from behind the desk.

  Stella giggled, then saw his hand move, tracing a pattern of sorcery. She gasped as ghostly touches slid along her thighs and breasts. “Oh!” she panted as those ghostly hands found her breasts, kneading her soft, tender flesh, finding the peaks and giving them a teasing pinch. “Ah!”

  He fell back onto the bed, squirming, flushed and breathless as the invisible hands continued their assault on her shapely form. Stroking and teasing and grasping lush breasts and soft bottom. She moaned as one slid up and down her slit, as tender as a lover’s touch.

  Arven was suddenly looming over her, a playful smile on his lips, arms crossed imperiously. “Silly girl. Did you really think you could get away with distracting me and not pay a price?”

  “Ohhhh my lord!” she squeaked, writhing in giggling delight. “Oh please! Nnn! Forgive me!”

  “No no, my dear,” Arven said, opening his robes, unlacing his pants. “I fear you must pay the price for your infraction.”

  “Pleeeeease!” Stella moaned, writhing in pleasured ecstasy, trapped and panting by the clever touches that stroked and teased her. “Oh please my lord! Punish meeeeee!”

  “So glad you agree,” Arven chuckled, pulling free his cock.

  Stella bucked as hands of flesh joined those of sorcery, grasped her hips and pulling her to the edge of the bed. She rocked her hips, lifting her ass and drooling pussy for him. Her voice rising in a keening cry as he thrust forward, filling her with his cock.

  “Oooooh my looooord! Yesssss!” she cried out.

  “Nnnn! Gods, Stella!” he gasped.

  “Fuck! Please! Fuck me!”

  She hadn’t long to wait before he gave her what she needed. Within moments he was hammering her into the bed, his cock sloshing in and out of her dripping cunny. Stella rocked against him, pushing her hips to meet him, squirming under the tender touches of his spell.

  “Yes! Yes! Arven! Mooooore!”

  “Gods, Stella! Take it!”

  “Yessss!” she screamed. “Please Give me your cock! Give me more! Take me! Fuck me! Use meeeee! Aaaaaahhhhh!”

  Her voice rose in a scream of purest pleasure as she came, her cunt quivering around his cock. Too much for him, Arven gave a moan as he came with her, filling her once again.

  Panting, she fell back onto the bed, her head spinning with bliss. Arven sighed, pulling free of her with a heavy grunt. He looked down at her and shook his head.

  “My dear. You are simply a mess.”

  She giggled, arching like a cat, pushing out her plump teats. “Mmm. And who’s fault is that, my lord?”

  He chuckled. “Too true. I’d best clean up.”

  “Shall I join you?” she said, her eyes sparkling.

  He laughed again. “No, my dear. I fear that if you did, it would rather defeat the purpose.”

  “Can I be blamed for how much you love to fuck my tender bottom?” she asked, batting her lashes innocently.

  He smirked and waved a careless hand at her as he moved to the door she knew the wash basin lay in. She smiled at him, but when the door closed and she heard him set his mask aside she did not waste a second to stand and move about the room.

  Her bare feet padded on the cold stone floor. Though she was naked, she paid it no mind. She had to be quick. As finnicky as Arven was for cleanliness, she hadn’t long. She knew from experience. She dashed to the desk where he had been working and peered over the papers. She didn’t understand any of them, of course. Written in code and the tongue of magic, she couldn’t make hide nor hair of the words etched on the velum. She picked up one, scanning it with a grimace. As Arven had said, she couldn’t make hide nor hair of it.

  And yet…

  She squinted, tilting her head. Some of the symbols were… familiar. She’d looked through Arven’s papers often since she had become his lover, but was able to retain remarkably little of what she’d read. Still… there was something more than that here. Something that itched at her mind, and yet she couldn’t place for the life of her.

  She pouted, lowering the page.

  And saw the stone.

  The slab had been there so long, it had become more a piece of furniture to her than some mystical working. To be sure it lacked the obvious arcane purpose of the globes, the bottles and the scrolls. And yet, looking at the massive rock, she suddenly realized it was there she had seen the symbols on the page.

  Her eyes flicked around to them, down to the page. The designs were very different, but the markings repeated often in the spiralling rings that had been written on the scroll. She turned it over and found yet more writing. A cascade of words in what she had since come to understand was Arven’s code.

  Before she could do more, she heard the water from the wash room trickle off. Her eyes flashed up and she hastily put down the scroll. She bounded across the room and back to the bed, hurling herself onto it seconds before the door opened and Arven appeared, once more wearing his mask. He smiled fondly at her, and she struggled to mirror it.

  “My dear. It’s all yours.”

  “Thank you, my lord,” Stella said, hastily standing and entering the room. In the past, when she entered that gleaming washroom, she’d lingered, always in awe at the cleanliness of the tiles. The shine of the mirrors and the almost ethereal whiteness that the room was worked in. But not today. As she washed and cleansed herself in the waters of the pool, she couldn’t help but return to the scroll she’d looked at and the slab of stone. Something about the two felt different from the rest that Stella had seen. Something strange. Something that tickled at the back of her mind. A sensation like when she had first met Arven, when he had wielded his sorcery against the monsters.

  Thoughts whirled in her head as she lingered in the basin. She only realized how long had past when the waters turned cold. Startled, she climbed out, water dripping off her curves as she hastily dried herself. She hesitated at the door, but finally pushed it open, and returned to the room.

  Arven had retaken his place behind the desk. If he’d noticed that the papers had moved he gave no sign of it. When Stella entered the room he raised his head, smiling, then frowned.

  “Stella?” he said, removing his glasses once more. “Is everything quite alright?”

  Stella bit her lower lip. “Yes, Arven. Everything is… is fine.”

  His frown deepened. He rose and crossed the room. She felt a shiver race down her spine as he touched her shoulders. “It is not fine. What’s the matter, my dear? I’ve never seen you so unnerved.”

  Stella shifted from side to side. “Arven,” she said, meeting his eyes. “Will the walls fall?”

  “Is that w
hat’s been bothering you?”

  She shrugged, unconvincing. “It’s just… on my mind, is all. The Duke. The monsters… We’re going to lose, aren’t we? We’re going to die.”

  Arven’s frown melted into a look of pity. His arms moved about her, pulling the startled woman into a hug. “Stella,” he said softly, stroking her hair. “Don’t worry. The Duke of Ashes will not win. This is not a war he can win.”

  She stiffened, but as the warm crimson of his robes engulfed her, she seemed to melt, leaning against him and the comfort that he presented. “How can he not?” she asked, her voice soft. “How can he not win? His monsters rampage outside the walls. Istanov has fallen from every coast. We’ve been conquered. Killed. The empire… the capital is surrounded. We’re doomed, Arven.”

  The words poured from her, and by the end she realized she was crying. Now she realized why the nobles of the empire engaged in such willful debauchery. Why they moved in a haze of drugs and wine and decadence. Better that than face the truth. A truth that was in everyone’s minds.

  Arven’s hand gently brushed her hair. “It will be alright, Stella. It will be alright. The Red Mages won’t let the Duke win. He’s lost already. He just doesn’t know it yet.”

  “How?” she asked, looking up at his bald head. “How, Arven?”

  His smile was compassionate. But more. Confident. “Believe in me, Stella. The Duke shall never have the empire.”

  And despite her fears. Her certainty. Her confidence in their doom, Stella did believe him. She threw her arms around him, returning his hug fiercely, her shapely naked frame pressing against him tightly.

  And for a moment, she felt safe. For the first time in so very long.

  Truths and Lies

  The gemstone glowed as Stella brought it out and whispered those spidery words into the surface. Gently, she put it on her bed, stepped back, and waited. She hadn’t long before the emerald flash lit up the modest room, and before her sat Reegan once again.

  “How goes the quest?” the sorceress asked, crossing her legs and easing back on the bed. “Better than the last bit of nothing you brought, I hope.”

  “Yes,” Stella said, quickly going to her knees before the sultry sorceress. “I mean, of course, mistress.”

  “Do tell.”

  “Arven has been working on something for the Red Mages. Something big, mistress.”

  Reegan perked up. She leaned forward intently, her hair cascading over her shoulder. “Oh?” she said.

  “Yes. He told me that it was a spell. Something that would stop the Duke of Ashes from ever claiming Istanov. That would defeat the monster hordes.”

  “I knew it,” Reegan hissed.

  Stella lifted her head, startled. She’d never heard such passion in the sorceress’s voice. Not even when Stella was between the shapely woman’s thighs, licking her out. But there Reegan was, her eyes fairly glowing with delight, her lips lifted in a hungry smile. “What else did you find, Stella? Tell me everything! Out with it now!”

  “He… he didn’t say much more, mistress. But when he was washing after… after we’d finished relaxing, I managed to get to his desk. There was some kind of runic circle being charted. It was… it was very complicated. I couldn’t read it.”

  “I sense an ‘and’ here,” Reegan said.

  Stella squirmed uncomfortably. “I… I got a look at it. There is a stone in his workshop. A big one. It looks very old. Ancient, even. Some of the symbols on the stone are in the circle.”

  “What symbols? Show me.”

  Stella found herself curiously reluctant to do so. But nonetheless she fetched out a piece of paper and nub of charcoal. Screwing up her lips in concentration, she attempted to replicate the runes she’d seen on the stone and parchment as best she could.

  No sooner had she finished Reegan snatched the paper from her. The sorceress’s impressive breasts swelled with her heavy breathing, her eyes fiery with focus as she traced the designs.

  “Yesss,” Reegan hissed. “I knew it! The bastards actually have it. And plan to use it!”

  “Mistress?”

  Reegan glanced back down at her. “You will steal that parchment for me, Stella.”

  She recoiled. “What?” Stella gasped. “Mistress, I… I can’t!”

  “What do you mean you can’t?” Reegan said. “I know you can get into that room easily enough. Just snatch the scroll and bring it here.”

  “But… but mistress. I… I can’t betray Arven.”

  Reegan quirked a brow. Stella slapped a hand over her mouth, stunned by her own admission. Yet, as she thought about it, she realized it was true. She cared deeply for the sorcerer. The man who had treated her like more than a pleasure thrall. Who had protected her and shared his room and arms. She felt her cheeks warm as she thought of him.

  “What did you say?” Reegan said.

  Stella bit her lip, lowering her eyes. “I’m… I’m sorry, mistress. I can’t do as you ask.”

  Reegan took a deep breath, released it. “Stella. Stella, Stella, Stella.”

  Stella winced. She heard the shift of fabric as the sorceress rose. The click of heels as Reegan approached. She forced herself to remain still as Reegan’s hand landed on her head, fingertips gently kneading Stella’s scalp. Even though she had refused the seductress, Stella couldn’t help but shiver in pleasure at that soft touch. Lean in to the hand like a cat being stroked.

  “Stella. You don’t quite understand. I don’t want you to steal it for me. But for your empire.”

  “M-mistress?”

  Reegan slowly lowered herself to her knees. Her hand touched Stella’s chin, lifting the girl’s head so she was looking directly into the other woman’s eyes. “Stella,” Reegan murmured. “That spell is not what you think it is. It’s not a magic that will defeat the Duke.”

  “N-no?”

  “No, my dear. It’s something far, far worse. It’s a curse. A curse on the very lands of Istanov.”

  Stella blinked. “It… it what?”

  “Oh yes. It was cast a very, very long time ago, Stella. Millenia before your first ancestors even set foot on Istanov’s soil. A curse that purged the entire land of life and hope.”

  Stella shivered. “Wh-what?”

  “The Red Mages aren’t interested in defeating the Duke of Ashes. No. They want to destroy him. And the only way to do that, is to turn all of Istanov into a wasteland.”

  “N-no! It can’t be!”

  “Do you really think it would be different?”

  Stella opened her mouth, but gazing into Reegan’s glowing eyes, she couldn’t find the words to refute her. “I…I don’t believe you?”

  Reegan smirked. “Clever girl. But in this, I’m telling the truth. Stella,” she breathed, drawing the young woman into her arms, pressing Stella’s face into the sorceress’s plush breasts, her hand stroking Stella’s hair soothingly. “Do this for me, my beloved servant. Get me that scroll containing Arven’s recording of the tablet. I can work a counter spell. I can save your lands from the blight. And I will reward you.”

  Stella shivered, and yet she pressed herself more frantically against the sorceress, into those plush curves and firm arms. Such confidence was so terribly seductive. So wonderfully enthralling. Did she trust Reegan? She knew she couldn’t. And yet she yearned to. She buried her face between Reegan’s breasts, panting.

  “I don’t know what to do,” she moaned.

  “Then let me guide you,” Reegan said.

  Stella didn’t know how it happened. But in the next moment her lips were locked with the sorceress’s. Clothes were gone, vanishing like smoke, and they were on the bed. Stella whimpered as Reegan delicately licked and nipped the curvy serving girl’s hardened nipples, even as her fingers toyed with Stella’s heated cunt.

  Stella was lost. Trapped. Bound by lies and loyalty. She moaned, bucking as she came, her juices splattering over the sheets. Yet Reegan’s fingers didn’t withdraw from her tender cunny. Instead they continue
d to drive into her.

  “Will you do it, Stella?” Reegan murmured, softly nibbling on Stella’s ear. “Will you get me the scroll?”

  “Mistress,” Stella moaned. “Oh gods, mistress… I… nnn!”

  Reegan smirked, and Stella screamed in delight as the sorceress’s fingers suddenly sparked inside her, filling her with a surge of sweetest ecstasy. She bucked as she came, her core surging with the heavenly sensation, her hands tightening on the blankets as her voice rose in a cry of delight.

  “For me, Stella,” Reegan breathed. “For your empire. For your family.”

  “Yes!” Stella cried, fairly sobbing at the intensity of her pleasure. “Gods, yes! Mistress, I’ll get it… get it for… for… youuuuuu!”

  Reegan smiled as Stella came a third time in as many minutes, helpless to the pleasure searing her veins. “Good girl,” Reegan purred. “And now, for your reward.”

  Stella hadn’t any resistance left. When those lips locked with hers once more, she didn’t struggle. She submitted meekly to the domineering woman’s lips. Her tongue delving into Stella’s mouth, swirling, deepening the kiss beyond anything that Stella had experienced before.

  She was helpless. Lost. Putty in the knowing hands of the sultry sorceress. Her every inch tingled with pleasured delight. Her breasts rose and fell with fevered panting. Her ass tightened, her hips rising to meet Reegan’s fingers anew.

  Reegan broke the kiss, withdrew her fingers from Stella’s cunt. The maidservant lay there, panting, limp with exhausted pleasure. For a moment she almost thought to refuse Reegan again. But then the sorceress’s knees were beside her head. The pale woman’s curvy rump was above her, descending, and Stella’s mouth was occupied with kissing her mistress’s ass.

  It felt so good for her to drive her tongue into that puckered dark star. To moan and grasp Reegan’s hips, pulling her plush ass further down onto her face. Stella knew she was weak. That she yearned to be put in her place. Dominated by the mighty. A slave to the strong. Reegan knew it too, and played the poor girl like a fiddle. Every touch stroking another string, causing Stella to sing out, her cries muffled in the plush rear of her mistress, her world surrounded by the curves of her mistress’s ass.