Divine Debtor

by Russ Primo

  "I do not…" she began, before raising a hand to lay flat across the tight black fabric over her breasts, "Your Debt is larger than any I have bargained for, Pryvet. But, I think I can get what you desire, in return for its repayment. Only, I will need some more time to reason with Her."

  Mira looked on towards Mette with her mouth hanging so open that I thought her jaw might fall off.

  "I've never seen them that… big, Mette!" she exclaimed. "You must really be arguing hard for Pryvet!"

  "Yes, well…" Mette's voice trailed off as her eyes swept over me, taking in my whole body with the visual equivalent of downing an entire ale in one gulp, before they came to rest on my Tally Branch, and the signifier of how many women I would have to impregnate, in order to satisfy the Debt. "His Debt is large, and I've never seen a foreigner saddled with Debt at all before. Though The Mother loves us, I think that, sometimes, she may make mistakes. Foolhardiness is of her nature, after all, dear Mira."

  Mira nodded in a way that she must have thought was sagely, for her eyes took on a serious look.

  It was too bad that her mouth remained hanging open wide enough for a horse to ride through.

  Who could blame me for chuckling at her?

  Mira shot me a quick, embarrassed look, as she closed her mouth up tight, folding her pink lips together like she was sealing a letter.

  "We are not done negotiations yet, though," Mette continued. "Mira, why don't you, your friend, and Pryvet go put the horses in, and then you can show them to the sleeping room?"

  Mira's eyes lit up like they were just as on fire as the tree had been.

  "Sure, Mette!" she squealed, delightedly. "Pryvet, Kacie! Come on!"

  "Just leave you Tally Branch with me, Pryvet," Mette said, turning back to the smoldering little tree. "I'll need it, to continue negotiations."

  Chapter Eight

  It was half an hour, at least, before we'd gotten the horses into the stables.

  By that time, my thighs were really starting to feel the day's adventures.

  My arms, likewise, were stiff, my back was sore, and my calves felt like dry wheat, after so long on a horse.

  The Free Isles were not, usually, too dangerous of a place. Nor were the towns, usually, so spread out as they appeared to be this close to the center of the islands.

  Horses were used for draft animals, but I liked my feet too much to not use them.

  So, of course I was unused to riding.

  And, I was wont to be grumpy.

  Fortunately for me, our sleeping arrangements banished all thoughts of disappointment from my mind immediately.

  "Here we are!" Mira cried delightedly as she swung open the small door to a little, cloister-like room connected to the main temple. "This is where we'll kip tonight!"

  To say that the room was small would be to miss the point, or at least the point that my mind jumped to, looking in on it.

  It was perhaps fifteen feet wide, and that again as long, which meant that there wasn't space for more than two beds, which meant that some of us would have to share.

  And that means…

  "Kacie, you can sleep in my bed with me!" Mira exclaimed, waltzing through the doorway and over to the low, small bed pushed up against the left wall. "We have our own mirror, if you want to clean yourself up, too!"

  Kacie gave me a look that said, "I'd rather be sleeping in your bed, Pryvet," but, probably owing to Mira's excitement, said nothing other than, "Thanks, Mira."

  Well, If Mira's going to rod-block me, at least I'll get to sleep knowing that two hot babes are sleeping together right across the room from me. Should help to take the edge off.

  "And, Pryvet," Mira continued, dancing over the mirror and pursing her lips in front of it, as though miming kisses, "You can sleep with Mette in her bed!"

  Kacie turned and gave me a pout that Mira didn't see, so occupied was she with her reflection in the mirror.

  I shot her a fiendish smile in return.

  It'll be good for her to get used to me sleeping with other women. And a celibate one is best to start with, to train Kacie’s expectation.

  After all, if I'm to get out of this Debt situation, I'll have to do a lot of sleeping around…

  "Well," I groaned, feeling the exhaustion keenly spreading across my tired body, and stretching my arms up high above my head until my shoulders and my elbows, popped, "I am tired as a dog! And, with how soft this bed looks, I want to make sure it's warmed up enough, by the time that Mette crawls in next to me!"

  The pout on Kacie's face turned sour and she looked despondently at her toes.

  I kind of hope she does keep us this act, as I start satisfying my Debt, though. She looks absurdly cute with that pout on her face.

  "That's fine, Pryvet!" Mira declared, turning from her mirror and fixing me with a wide, happy look so open and welcoming that I thought, instinctively, there must be something behind it. "Do you want to change into you bed clothes?"

  I cocked an eyebrow at her, saying, "Mira, I'm a foreign traveller who came into town with only what he could carry. Do you think I'd waste bag space on things like bed clothes?"

  Though even I could tell that my voice was tinged with anger (after all, I was exhausted after a morning's discovery of my Debt, a noontime's brawl, an afternoon's long ride, and now an evening's frustration), Mira appeared simply too pleased to care.

  "That's all right, then," she laughed, turning and taking Kacie's hand in her own. "Kacie, it looks like you don’t have any, either. But, girls like us need a little love and attention at night, unlike men like Pryvet. Do you want to borrow a pair?”

  Well, that hardly seems fair. I like to be as comfortable as the next guy, after all.

  Kacie, for her part, looked completely flustered at Mira's change of attitude. The whole afternoon, she'd been aloof and fickle with Kacie.

  But, now, it seemed as though she thought that she and Kacie were like sisters.

  "I have a pretty blue set, if you'd like!" Mira continued, diving into the chest of drawers below the mirror. "It would bring out your eyes!"

  When she popped back up, I was, I'll admit, a little surprised to see that the 'bedclothes' she held was simply a set of spectacularly strappy, frilly lingerie pieces. It even came complete with stockings and a garter belt.

  Now, I didn't know too much about the Free Isles), but I never in all my days expected that they'd be so different from the mainland.

  Perhaps it was that it was rarely cold here, or perhaps it was down to the small, thick-grated fireplace set into a little alcove in the corner of the bedroom.

  Or, perhaps it was down to their whole religion seeming to revolve around men claiming women for child-bearing as a right, and women therefore needing to be as pretty as possible at all times.

  Whatever the case, it got my blood pumping.

  On the mainland, or at least in my village, where the snows came in the late Autumn, and last until early in the spring, a set of women's bed clothes wouldn't be half so revealing.

  Nor, half so obviously erotic.

  The girls that I'd been with, their bedclothes were downright staid in comparison: more like long, brown tunics that could keep you warm through the cold night, than strappy, drool-inducing pieces that (I suppose if nothing else) were designed to lure an unwitting man into your bed.

  I supposed that, if you had a man to warm you in bed, there was little reason to need the long, tunic variety that was good only for warming yourself.

  After all, I at least, was a right furnace overnight.

  Which was nice, when the women I seduced in my travels on the mainland would lose their tunics and press their girlish rears up against me, their skin tingling at the warmth that radiated from me.

  "Wow!" Kacie exclaimed, her eyes snapping from my face to the petite thing that Mira held in her hand. "Mira, that's gorgeous! How on the Isles did you afford it?"

  Mira blushed a bright, tickling pink.

  "We are servants of the Mother,
Kacie," she explained, tugging her collar away from her brightening skin. "We've got to remember what She requires of us, even if She disallows us from partaking in it.”

  "What?" Kacie wondered, her eyes flicking from the lacey number to what I thought was my crotch. "Sex?"

  Mira nodded, her eyes flicking to me as well, as she handed the garment over to Kacie.

  I smiled a wide smile, pulling my knee up onto the edge of the bed with me, and resting an elbow upon it.

  "Oh, the horror," I chided Mira. "To have someone like me in the room with you, to have your very bedclothes remind you of the Mother's purpose for your body, and to be unable to do anything with that knowledge!"

  Mira pouted at the clothes in Kacie's hands, and Kacie shot me a wicked smile like I'd never seen her wear before.

  "It must be exceptionally difficult for you!" I finished.

  Mira looked despondently from my face to the dresser and started rummaging around inside it for something.

  After a moment or two of rummaging, during which time I looked at Kacie's sky blue eyes and the bright, pretty underwear she held, thinking that they would indeed bring out her eyes, if I would ever be able to take mine away from her body, Mira stood upright as stiff as a board and holding something in her hands.

  She looked so uncomfortable with herself that I actually wondered, in spite of the blood surging to my member, whether my joking had gone too far.

  Though I hadn't known Mira for that long, I felt that she should have been able to handle a good-natured ribbing a little better than she was.

  To my surprise, I was right.

  She whipped around with a wicked smile on her face, holding what at first I thought was a few scraps of red cloth in her fingers.

  "It will be difficult, indeed, Pryvet," she half preened. "Though I think it will be more-so for you, knowing that you can't touch me!"

  I cocked my head at her as the realization that the scraps of red cloth she held in her hands were actually her own bedclothes settled onto my shoulders

  And, looking between them, they made Kacie's seem as substantial as those tunics to which I was accustomed.

  Shit. Well, she's certainly got me there.

  "Now then, Kacie," Mira chimed, bouncing over onto the bed where Kacie sat, "Shall we get changed? I know Pryvet won't mind."

  My heart hammered in my chest, at the prospect of watching these two girls in the sexiest outfits my feeble male brain could envision.

  "It wouldn't be good," Mira continued, turning a devilish grin on me, "for a man with such a large… Debt, to get any ideas about a servant of The Mother. Surely, Pryvet, any funny business would make the negotiations go poorly for you, if the Mother discovers that you've been thinking dirty thoughts about one of her servants.”

  Oh, that really is wicked, Mira!

  I shook my head, desperately trying to banish the lizard part of my brain that simply wanted to jump on these two beauties, as I reminded myself that she was correct.

  After all, if banging Mira meant that I may not get the magic I was owed, then I'd just have to settle for not fooling with her.

  Now Kacie, on the other hand, would be lovely to run my hands over…

  It would have to happen later, though.

  "You're right, of course," I said, as lightly as I could manage, to Mira. "I wouldn't want you to think that your body was more appealing than the prospect of gaining magical powers! It would probably go to your head!”

  I got a quick, glorious glimpse of her face deflating in defeat as I slipped off my shirt, my pants, threw back the covers and closed my eyes.

  "I suppose that," I said contemplatively, "By the time Mette comes into my bed, the arrangement will already be struck though. I don't think I'll have to worry about upsetting the Mother by then. And her body certainly has curves that yours doesn’t!"

  I heard Mira grumble softly and Kacie giggle girlishly as I drifted off into what would prove to be a short sleep.

  Chapter Nine

  In spite of all the tender foreplay, I slept like a log that night.

  Or, at least I slept like a log until I woke up in the dead of it, to a blue, flickering light coming through the doorway that led to the temple proper.

  “What in the Hell,” I wondered softly to myself. “What is that blue light from?”

  I didn’t want to wake Mira and Kacie for no reason, so I stayed as quiet as possible.

  Blinking against the dark, and against the surprisingly harsh glare of the blue light, which through the thin space under the doorway was as fierce as full day through door-slats in a dark house, I tried to ascertain the time.

  Insects are, as those night-owls among us will be well aware, mostly asleep at night. Birds, too, who would be loud in the crepuscular hours, need their shut-eye.

  Straining my ears against the dark, the only sounds that I picked up were the light breathing and gentle snoring of Kacie and Mira, curled up in the bed across the room.

  I wonder which is the breather and which the snorer? Would be good to know, if I get the chance to bed Mira.

  Wouldn’t want her waking the neighbors, as it were.

  Then, my attention returned to the weird light from under the door.

  As a mainlander, I had precious little experience with magic, save for extraordinary circumstances.

  Among those was the attack on my village which set me to wandering at all.

  It was led by a tall, gaunt wizard who rode into town on a bright morning, asking for directions further inland.

  "I am traveling from the Arbor–" which is one of the famous trading ports with the Free Isles "–inland to the swamp, if any can point me the way?"

  We were a happy, trusting people, and anyway it was known that you couldn't deny a wizard anything.

  So, we told him, and he declared that he'd stay for the night, and rest his weary knees.

  Our whole town remained on edge, hoping that he'd continue on his way soon, as wizards were known to bring trouble.

  But, aside from paying less than we thought he should for our ale, he was a decent guest.

  The only sign that something was amiss were the golems who were spotted roaming the road, with eyes as blue as the wizard's garments…

  Shaking my head, I reminded myself that it did not do to dwell on the past. At least, it didn’t until I’d bartered magic from The Mother, and could do something about it.

  Even if that past included many, many dead.

  I would win the same magic from the Mother, and then would have my revenge.

  Climbing lightly out of bed, I slid my pants and shirt back on to take the room's small chill off my skin.

  In the other bed, I could barely make out Mira and Kacie, cuddled close to one another, their bodies warming one another's.

  Chuckling to myself at how rapidly they'd become friends, in spite of the prior day's tribulations, I pushed open the old, creaky door to the temple and crossed the threshold, closing it behind me as gently as I could, so that I wouldn't wake the sleeping beauties.

  For such a large temple, I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised at how circuitous it was, getting from the bedroom to the main hall, where the blue, flickering light clearly came from.

  The stone floor was just as well laid beneath my feet, but the small corridor through which I walked twisted and turned uncomfortably as I followed the light.

  First a right, then a left, then two rights, then another left (the Mother must have made this corridor of magic, as there's no way I haven't walked across six fields by now), then a right, then…

  With a start, I walked out straight from the cramped, narrow corridor that led from the bedroom, our into the soaring, high ceilings, the quiet, airy space of the temple proper.

  Though I quickly ascertained the location of the blue light (Mette crouched low over the burning tree that had provided voice to the Mother earlier), I found my eyes more entranced by the room itself.

  “It seems even bigger now, in the full ni
ght,” I mused to myself, “than it did earlier, when it was only just-past dusk.”

  The temple had seemed a tall, impressive place in the afternoon's light, with its ceiling arching over us like waves crashing upon some celestial shore, with its large columns holding aloft stonework of a finer quality than any I'd seen before.

  In the dark, blue light that held sway in it now, it seemed endless.

  The cold blue sparkled on the polished stones, and the high, stained-glass windows, but seemed unable to penetrate the arched ceiling high above us.

  Looking up into the surprising dark, I thought that, perhaps I could see stars shimmering up there.

  Though I knew, in my analytical mind, that the supposed stars were assuredly the blue light flickering off of high imperfections in the stone, the part of my brain that was more attuned to the temple's possible magic registered the ceiling as having vanished.

  To that part of my mind, the sparkling specks were stars of the high heavens, some magic or other having transported the ceiling way high up above them.

  It felt as though the weight of all that empty air weighed down upon me, and I knew that this meant the haggling was almost finished.

  So, I turned my attention to the burning tree, and to Mette's low, full frame crouched before it.

  Approaching her quietly from behind, I heard Mette utter some words that sounded similar to her chanting from earlier.

  "Mette," I whispered, during a lull in her speech, and laying a hand on her shoulder. "Are we almost finished?”

  Mette gave a start at my voice, jerking away from my hand and slinging her face around to mine, with a frightened expression.

  "Oh," she sighed when she realized who I was, "Yes, Pryvet. I am almost done. And I think I've gotten just what you wanted."

  Though this was good news, the only thing that I could think about was her wondrous cleavage in those tight vestments of hers.