by Simon Archer
“Move, Will,” she pleaded, and it was all I needed to hear.
I rolled my hips up sharply, drawing out a hard moan from Shikun, and then did it again and again until she was bouncing on my cock in a steady rhythm. Each motion was fluid, like an erotic dance that was made just for the two of us, and with each beat, another fracture appeared in the chain. Our deep affection for one another and the love we were making was setting her free of her bonds, and I was determined to destroy that nasty thing once and for all. Shikun deserved better than the life she had lived thus far, and I was going to give that to her.
As our love filled the tent, so did a peculiar pink glow. It was emanating from Shikun. Her scales, though normally dark red and black in color, were so heated and driven by her lust that she had started to give off a soft light. It was more raspberry in color, but I also noted that her horns also took a golden hue. Was this normal for dragonkin? I didn’t know, but I took it as a sign of Shikun letting go of the fear and darkness inside of her, and it was absolutely stunning.
“You’re beautiful,” I complimented through my ragged panting and wrapped a hand around her neck to tug her down for a fiery kiss.
Shikun moaned against my lips and pressed her forehead to mine as I continued to thrust into her wildly, spreading her open wider and wider. I entertained the idea of Petra crawling into the tent to see Shikun so vulnerable and imagined how wickedly turned on she would be, but only for a brief moment. That fantasy would be lived out another time, I was sure. For now, this was all about Shikun.
If she had anything to say against my praise, she didn’t speak them. That, or she was too gone to argue. Her moans had turned to drawn out cries, and though she tried to conceal them into the crook of my neck, there was no doubt in my mind that everyone could hear us. It bothered me none, and I wasn’t about to tell Shikun, not if it meant she would close herself off again.
“I-I’m…” she stammered as her pussy began to tighten around my cock. She was getting close.
“It’s okay,” I whispered and placed a kiss to her temple. “Let go.”
I wrapped my arms around her and held her to me, reassuring her that she was okay and that I was here. This seemed to encourage her, and she frantically pushed back against me, desperate for release.
When she came, it was the most beautiful scene I’d ever witnessed. She broke my hold on her, and she shot upright, releasing her sweet juices and soaking the sheet. The entire tent was filled with that bright pink light, and her horns and spikes turned full gold. A staggered, beautiful moan tore through the camp that almost sounded more like a roar, and with her orgasm, the chain that bound her to her past shattered into dust. She was free.
I shot up into her once more before I followed suit, coming deep inside of her with a strangled noise before the both of us collapsed back to the ground. We lay in silence for a long moment, simply content to listen to the rise and fall of the other’s chest. The pink and gold hues subsided, and her pupils constricted again, revealing the gold flecks once more.
“How do you feel?” I asked as I brushed my fingers through her hair.
Shikun took a moment to respond, but when she did, it was the happiest I’d heard her since we first met.
“Liberated.”
10
When the morning came, I did not rise with it at first. In fact, I was the last of our circle to leave the tent. In my defense, I tried to go to bed early the night before, but Petra and Shikun are very appreciative ladies. A lot of iron chains dissolved that night. And I was still trying to recover from fighting that Great Beast owlbear. So, in summary, I was understandably exhausted, but in a good way.
I grabbed Libritas and my clothes and shambled my way to the tent’s entrance. Fortunately, Petra had some fresh-from-the-beetle zym, boiled by Shikun’s flames, ready for me when I finally was roused from my slumber.
“By Jove, the man lives!” Reggie said with a laugh as soon as I sat down next to Shikun and Petra. Amalthea sat behind us as I rested my back on her, only half-listening to Mr. Thorpe’s diatribe. “You could have slept through our invasion of the capital, and we would have dealt with it all without your knowledge. What has you so dog-tired?”
“Reggie, please,” I took a long sip of my zym, “Don’t tell me you’re still that heavy of a sleeper!”
“I don’t see what that has to do with anything!” Reggie said, indignant at the accurate accusation. Shikun and Petra giggled, and I could feel Amalthea stifle a chuckle in her chest. “I could have been ready at a moment’s notice had danger arrived. Unlike some people!”
Somehow, I doubted that. Shikun was not quiet.
Sir Reginald pulled out his dagger as he “displayed what he would have done to those nasty villains” and pretended to sword fight with Silver, the little wingless dragon playfully snapping at his knife. I kept sipping my zym.
“The knight does raise a good point,” Shikun admitted. “We shouldn’t use any more time than we need to.”
“Then we won’t.” I sat up and stood, maybe a little bit sorer than I was willing to let on. “We should head out. Petra, get rid of the tents. Shikun, gather up our things, Amalthea, see if you can get some intel on where we’re headed. Reggie--” I saw him still trying to defeat Silver in swordplay. And losing to Silver’s cuteness. “You just wait until we’re done, then.”
“En Garde!” Reggie took a few more thrusts at Silver, who just stepped around him and started wrestling with his leg. I thought Silver only came up about shin high before, but now he was up to Reggie’s knee. Rockwyrms grew faster than I imagined.
When we finally packed up, along with packing up Reggie and Silver, we started making headway to the west.
“From what I can find,” Amalthea said as she came over to me, “we can expect many wetland terraces, with irrigation tunnels and canals connecting them. These records are from a few decicycles ago, so there’s no way to tell the current state of it.”
“More importantly, we can expect trouble,” I stated. “And probably some crocasaurs.”
“Don’t forget one dastardly terrestrial cephalopod!” Reggie added in.
“At least one dastardly terres… terre… ceffala…” Shikun tried to repeat Sir Reginald’s vocabulary. “At least one latopus. If not more.”
“We need only find Atroclus,” Libritas reminded me. “We don’t have to waste our time with any of the wild animals under the savage influence.”
“Problem is,” I said as I looked out westward, toward where the irrigation terraces were just barely in view, “that latopus is going to have himself surrounded just like Chimarra. And I don’t think we can get as lucky with wyrm-fire in a wetland.”
“But you are very clever, Will.” Petra came to my side. Will was a new nickname. I didn’t think anyone had called me that in at least a decade, if ever. “If anyone can find a way through this, it’s you.”
“Thanks, Petra.” I held the hand she put on my shoulder. “But we may just need another miracle.”
A good old-fashioned nature-hike later, we were at the wetlands that Atroclus made his home. Like a staircase for a titan, the terraces leveled off like platforms stretching far into the west, reaching up to the size of a small mountain to the edges of the Marches. Each terrace was covered in wetlands, much like a rice paddy field.
And they were crawling with crocasaurs.
Like Amalthea had said earlier, crocasaurs were like crocodiles in many ways. The jaws could bite down harder than a vice, they could swim alarmingly fast, and they weren’t as slow as you’d think on land. Differences were, crocasaurs were better crocodile things than a crocodile, and had a build more like a Komodo dragon or a dinosaur, complete with longer legs, sharper spines, and a generally more colossal size. They were like a fishing boat that could swallow you whole.
And these crocasaurs were no exception. They practically covered the surface of the terrace we were approaching and were literally crawling over each other farther in. Thousands, if n
ot tens of thousands, blanketed the wetland like giant reptile-skin leather bags. I found myself spying on one that was thrashing particularly violently closer to us in the less dense area. It whipped itself so hard that it smashed against a stone sticking out of the water. There was red bleeding out from it, spreading through the wetland. That’s when my circle started looking at them, too.
Without a moment to breathe, the surrounding crocasaurs flew into a wild frenzy, latching onto the wounded crocasaur and tearing it limb from limb, flesh from bone. The wounded one completely disappeared under the flood of slimy lizard scales and leather, and in less than a minute, the crocasaurs dissolved their feeding frenzy, still staying somewhat congregated in that spot. I could see the remains of the crocasaur floating on top of the water. As I looked upon the pieces remaining, I realized that they belonged to two different crocasaurs. Another must have gotten bit during the frenzy and was eaten along with the original.
“That’s not good,” Petra said solemnly.
“That is the opposite of good,” Reggie agreed.
“That is very good,” I countered, much to the circle’s surprise. They gave me horrified looks like I was in that frenzy, too. “Hold on, let me explain. They obviously are obsessed with any meat, right?”
“Of which most of us are primarily composed of, William,” Reggie pointed out.”
Oh, ye of little faith, Sir Reginald Thorpe.
“Yes, well, all we have to do is get a piece of one of them,” I explained. “We can then get one of our flyers to take some meat and distract the crocasaurs away from where Atroclus is.”
“And you happen to know that?” Shikun asked.
“He’s going to be where the crocasaurs are densest as a natural barrier, like with Chimarra and the bears,” I answered. “Our flyer then throws the meat far away and flies back, and we’re all in the clear to find that latopus.”
“This is still an incredibly dangerous plan,” Libritas said. “Even I’m not sure I could survive the jaws of one of those creatures.”
“Yeah, it’s not ideal,” I assured her personally, “but it’s either distract the horde or fight them. And I like the odds of fighting them even less.”
“Okay,” Libritas relented. “But please be careful. We can’t afford to lose you.” She warmed up in my hand in what could only be her form of a blush. “I can’t afford to lose you.”
“We’ve got nothing to worry about,” I said, trying hard not to sweat about actively agitating a nest of primal predators. “We’ve got strong people here.”
“And you can trust them, William.” Libritas’s heat turned into a comforting warmth. “They can be as much of an asset to you as I am.”
“I’m counting on it.” I motioned to Amalthea. “We’re going to be the flying distraction. As soon as we kill a crocosaur, we’ve got to immediately head to the densest part of the swarm, then out to the edge of one of these terraces. With any luck, we can get a few to fall off the cliff as we throw it.”
“That should be simple enough,” Amalthea stated proudly. “Traveling with that much weight may be slower than I usually fly, but I think I can keep you far away from their grasp, at least.”
“Maybe I should fly you,” Shikun said, her fear for me obvious in her tone. “Not to undermine Amalthea’s skills, but I fly more nimbly than she can.”
“I thought of that, already,” I told her, “but I don’t know how much crocasaur meat we’re going to need to distract the lot of them, and Amalthea can carry the most out of all of us.”
“Okay,” Shikun relented, still distraught at my jumping into danger. “If you really think that it’s best, I will not argue.”
“Shikun, your job is just as important.” I grabbed her hands in mine. “You must fly Petra, Reggie, and Silver above the swarm as soon as we get the crocasaur to bleed. If Amalthea and I haven’t distracted enough of them, you can keep them out of danger.”
Shikun perked up at the importance of her station. “They will never come to harm, William. I swear it!”
“I have no doubts about it, Shikun,” Petra added in. “I can’t wait to see what flying is like.”
“If it’s anything like flying in a plane without the plane,” Reggie said with a twinkle in his eye, “It’ll be like nothing else we’ve experienced.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that.” Petra gave me a wink. That made me blush, possibly for the first time since I’ve known her.
“Before we get ahead of ourselves,” I calmed everyone down, “we have to single out one of the crocasaurs.”
“I think I can handle that.” The dryad stood triumphantly. She placed both her hands down low, her palms facing up. “Amalthea, get ready to catch one.”
“Petra has grown to be quite feisty in our company, hasn’t she?” Libritas commented to me.
And she really had. It’s been happening to all of the girls, but Petra the most prominently since she’d been with me the longest. Honestly, they all just seemed to be getting happier. It was amazing what a little chain-breaking could do.
“I think she was put in a good mood today,” I said, mentally winking at Libritas as I headed over to where Amalthea stood.
Petra’s quick command caught Amalthea off guard, but when she saw the determination in Petra’s eyes, she snapped to the ready. Like the lioness she was, she was poised and ready to pounce on some unsuspecting crocasaur like it was an unlucky mouse.
“I suggest you get on, my savior,” Amalthea told me. “Something tells me our fair dryad is getting impatient.”
You didn’t need a magical record of all writing to know that the look in Petra’s eyes meant she was a hair-trigger’s pull away from unleashing her magic. I was already heading to mount Amalthea when Petra got into her stance. As I climbed aboard the sphinx. I braced myself for the whiplash of a lifetime.
“Go now!” Petra said, lifting her arms up in the air like she was flipping a table. At the same time, a flurry of bark, branch, seaweed, lily pad, and vine exploded out of the ground right underneath one of the crocasaurs, launching it skyward. Without a moment’s hesitation, Amalthea speed towards the airborne lizard, flying almost faster than I could brace myself for. Clinging for dear life onto Amalthea’s shoulders, I clutched Libritas tightly as we shot like a bullet towards our target. In the blink of an eye, we made contact with the crocasaur as it reached the apex of its flight.
Amalthea latched onto the barely conscious crocasaur, and I prepped Libritas for a killing thrust. She blazed with an intense yellow heat as I swung myself down onto one of Amalthea’s arms, simultaneously burning a hole right through the crocasaur’s throat. I then reduced the heat dramatically as I dug the Brand deeper into the crocasaur before immediately pulling it out again, and some of the clotted blood with it. It began to pour like a dripping faucet. As the other crocasaurs sniffed around, they snapped their gaze and their jaws at us, immediately bursting into a frenzy like before. That could not have gone better.
These crocasaurs had a trick up their sleeve, though. And by a trick, I mean a complete fluke no one could have guessed coming. As they snapped and clawed at us aimlessly, their claws dug into each other. Their clawing and gnawing began to build upon each other, the pile of slithering scales building upon themselves. With rapid and alarming speed, the mound crawled upward into the sky, topped with chomping crocasaur teeth. Somehow, as the pile was growing upward, it was moving toward us as well.
And they were starting to gain on us.
“You got another Khalati chat room ready for us?” I said to Amalthea.
“Already on it,” the great sphinx called back in my head. The fountain of knowledge spiked in my brain, the same as before. I had to ignore the flying words appearing in the air to focus on the growing crocasaur pile. It was already halfway up to us in height, and almost right below us. That had to take either a serious amount of coordination, which I doubted the crocasaurs had, or just a blind stubbornness for a taste of something. I would have put my money on
the latter.
“Shikun, can you hear me?” I called out to her. I looked over behind the crocasaur pile to see the flying Amazon holding a very terrified British soldier by the armpits, who was himself holding an obliviously playful rock wyrm, topped off by a dryad backpacked onto the draconian by vines, carrying four vine whips in four arms, two of which were clearly recently grown.
Could Petra change her body before? Was it just me, or were these ladies getting exponentially more powerful by the day?
I didn’t even have to hear Libritias in my head to feel the coy look she would be giving me if she had a face now. Yes, I knew her rune was unlocking their inner potential. I was just remarking at the rate of new powers being so high.
“That would be you’re doing, dear William,” Libritas explained. “You’ve been marvelous about breaking the remnants of those chains.”
“Yes, I can hear you, William,” Shikun responded in my head, bringing me back to focus. Luckily, mind speech is much faster than talking. “Are you okay?”
“We will be, just hold tight,” I said back as I readied the Brand of Freedom. “Once we steer the bulk of these things away, find a spot out of reach and hide there until we call for you.”
“Don’t be rash, Will,” Petra seemed to whisper in my ear. “If we need to, we can fight these things together.”
“It won’t come to that,” I promised her. “Amalthea, disconnect us and save your strength.” At my command, Amalthea’s eyes glowed with runic symbols etched into her irises, and a moment later, the knowledge ebbed away.
The crocasaurs were still steadily gaining. Now that we had passed the largest bulk of them, the swarming pile started to grow even faster. It was now far too close for comfort, as the distance between Amalthea’s feet and the pile could easily be closed by a particularly ballsy crocasaur.
“Can you fly higher, Amalthea?” I asked her, already guessing the answer.
“I can…” Amalthea paused to catch her breath. “I can try, my savior.”