by Sarah Hawke
“She was planning to. If we hadn’t escaped when we did…”
Valuri nodded soberly. “If it’s any consolation, she will be severely punished when she returns to the Castarium. Hell, she might even be executed.”
“She’s already dead,” Serrane said. “Tahira killed her.”
Valuri blinked. “Really? How?”
“She unleashed a blast of magic…it was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. Lasille couldn’t absorb it. She just…disintegrated.”
“Strange,” Valuri muttered, frowning. “I should have met this ‘priestess’ before we left.”
“She is definitely not what I expected,” Serrane said. “I only wish we knew more about her powers. It’s hard to believe a cultist could be the city’s only salvation.”
“Only because you and I haven’t gotten started yet,” Valuri said, smirking. “Come on, we should keep moving.”
“Agreed.”
They continued west through the sparse forest, the jagged silhouette of the Shattered Peaks growing larger and larger until the sun finally drooped behind them. Valuri’s map was rough, but Serrane knew this terrain better than anyone. Finding a path up the rocky outskirts was easily enough, and they traveled up a few more miles before they finally decided to set up camp for the night.
“The clouds make it difficult, but I’m reasonably sure I saw something big flying farther up behind that peak,” Valuri said, pointing upwards while Serrane cobbled together wood for a small fire. “Maybe we’re on the right track after all.”
“Assuming your information is correct, it will be a rough trek tomorrow,” Serrane said. “We’ll be lucky to reach the summit by nightfall.”
“Without men to slow us down, I’m sure it will be no trouble.”
Serrane snorted softly. “They aren’t always cumbersome oafs.”
“Just most of the time.”
“Exactly,” the ranger replied with a wry smirk.
Valuri squatted next to the small fire pit and fanned out her fingers in front of the flames. “You must have it the worst. I assume you have to work with Silver Fist knights often.”
“Too often,” Serrane murmured. “Thankfully, Captain Cassel isn’t as arrogant or clumsy as the rest.”
The Huntress turned and cocked an eyebrow. “You’ve mentioned him a lot today. Are the two of you…?”
“We’re…” Serrane paused and bit down on her lip. Even after all this time she still felt compelled to lie about her relationships for some reason. It was a stupid, entrenched habit and she really needed to get over it. “We’re together.”
Valuri snickered. “Let me guess: he’s tall, dark, and/or handsome?”
“All three.”
“Lucky bastard. I bet he doesn’t know how good he has it.”
“Actually…I think he does,” Serrane said. “He’s not like most of the other knights.”
“Good, because I hate paladins.”
“So do I.”
They shared girlish grins before Valuri finally sat all the way down. Her green eyes were so bright in the flames they almost looked elven.
“Earlier you said your knight friend was up to something with this Eternal Priestess,” Valuri prompted.
Serrane nodded. “It’s a long shot, but they’re on their way to the Silver Tower in the northeast. The paladins in the city refuse to even consider talking to her…they practically accused Julian of heresy for bringing her into Highwind. But he believes that the officers outside the city are more likely to see reason, so he’s taking Tahira right to the source. If his plan works, he could return with a large enough contingent of knights to break the siege.”
“That would definitely make a huge difference,” Valuri said. “What are the odds he can actually pull it off?”
“Honestly? I have no idea. I have faith in Julian, but we still don’t know much about the girl. Her powers seem unpredictable, and frankly I’m still a little suspicious about her motives.”
“Funny, we met someone just like that recently.”
Serrane frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Never mind,” Valuri said, waving her hand dismissively. “So you’re not the least bit concerned that your man is out there alone with this pretty little priestess?”
“Julian has his powers back—he can take care of himself.”
“I wasn’t talking about his safety. Paladins around these parts have a reputation for thinking with their codpieces, and everyone has heard about the, uh, wiles of the Eternal cultists.”
Serrane snorted. “Tahira is human.”
Valuri arched an inquisitive eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Julian would never—” Serrane cut herself off, and she felt a sudden rush of embarrassed heat in her cheeks. “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to offend you. I just meant—”
“That frumpy human girls can’t compete with fair elf maidens?” Valuri said, crossing her arms.
“No, that’s not…” Serrane closed her eyes and swore under her breath. She had walked right into that chasm. “All I meant was that Julian and I have an understanding. My people rarely marry and consider human concepts like ‘monogamy’ foolish.”
“Uh huh.”
“Truly!” Serrane insisted. “I wasn’t implying anything else. Human women can be quite attractive. I mean you’re obviously very…”
The Huntress arched her second eyebrow. “Very…?”
“Pretty,” Serrane breathed, running a hand back through her hair. “I’m sorry, I’m never going to dig my way out of this, am I?”
Valuri snorted and burst into throaty laugh. “Oh, gods, I knew you would be fun,” she said, rubbing a tear from her eye. “You’ll have to work a lot harder than that to offend me, honey.”
A tiny smile tugged at the elf’s lips as the other woman continued cackling. “So, what, you were just teasing me?”
“Teasing, tormenting, whatever,” Valuri said, waving her hand dramatically. “I’m a bitch and I know it. I’m told it is part of my charm.”
“By whom?”
“Me, mostly.” The Huntress snickered again before she stretched her hands back over the fire. “Anyway, if you think I’m annoying now, just wait until we spend a few more days together. I figure you’ll either want to kill me, or we’ll fall in love.”
Serrane’s smile widened at roughly the same rate her embarrassment faded. “You’re starting to remind me of my best friend.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“You shouldn’t. Aluriel is very…impish. Usually to a fault.”
“I like her already.”
Serrane grunted and glanced back down the mountain path. “I sent her back to Icewatch not long after Julian and I returned to Highwind. At this point, she’s probably safer than the rest of us…though I still worry.”
Valuri nodded solemnly, and her devilish grin finally faded. After a few minutes of silence, she shuffled closer to the fire and actually shivered.
“Are you that cold?” Serrane asked.
“I’ll be fine,” the Huntress said. “It’s just the curse of my Senosi ‘gifts.’ I can’t block out the cold with magic, the longer I go without feeding the harder it is to stay warm the normal way.”
“We brought plenty of rations.”
“It’s not that kind of hunger,” Valuri said, smiling again. “I’m sure I’ll be fine, I’ve just gotten used to feeding every day…sometimes multiple times a day. With Jorem and Red around, I can be as gluttonous as I want.”
“Can I help somehow?”
“I’ll be fine,” Valuri said. “Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the offer, but it seems like a breach of etiquette to ask the Ranger-General for a taste of her blood.”
Serrane nibbled at her lower lip and glanced away. For some inexplicable reason her stomach had begun fluttering anxiously. Did she actually want Valuri to feed on her? That made no sense at all.
Of course it does. Every time you remember that she is
a Senosi, you can’t help but think about Lasille. You can feel her arms holding you down, her tongue at your throat, her fingers in your quim…
“Your curse must be a tremendous burden,” Serrane said, shuffling her legs closer together in the hopes of smothering the sudden, unexpected fire in her quim.
“I’ve never thought of it that way,” Valuri said. “All power comes with a price, and frankly ours isn’t that steep. Shivering a bit here and there is no big deal.”
Serrane studied the other woman for a long moment, wondering what her tattoos would look like beneath her pale skin. She really was quite attractive, and her irreverent swagger did have a certain charm. Aluriel definitely would have been trying to crawl beneath Valuri’s legs already.
But you’re not Aluriel, and this mission is far too important for silly distractions. The fate of Highwind could literally depend on whether or not you can stop those wyverns.
“Back in Hastien’s Fall, the other Huntress fed off me a few times,” Serrane said, staring into the flames. “The process was…strange. I couldn’t believe how strong it made her.”
“We get compared to vampires pretty often, and honestly it hits closer to home than I sometimes like to admit,” Valuri said. “Right after feeding, I usually feel strong enough to punch through a stone wall. The rush fades slowly, but after a couple days I start to feel as weak as a kitten.”
Serrane glanced up to the jagged peaks silhouetted on the moonlit horizon. “We won’t reach the summit until tomorrow night at the earliest. Won’t you be starving by then?”
“I’ll manage,” Valuri repeated. “For all we know the Inquisitrix will have several of her new channelers up there. Once they try and blast me, I’ll be strong enough to throw them off the damn mountain.”
“If the difference in your abilities is that significant, it would be foolish not to keep you at full strength,” Serrane said, her heart suddenly pounding in her chest. “You should feed off me now and then again before we reach the hatchery.”
Valuri arched an eyebrow again. “I appreciate the offer, General, I really do. But I can’t ask you to—”
“You don’t have to ask—I’m offering.” Serrane paused and glanced over at her bow. “I could conjure an arrow and shoot you, but that seems…awkward, to put it mildly.”
“I can absorb the energy without you shooting me, don’t worry,” Valuri said. “That should give me enough power to last for a while.”
“Just for a while?”
“The transference is less…direct,” Valuri said. “Feeding off of magical attacks is less efficient than tapping directly in the source. But that doesn’t mean—”
“So you need sorcerous blood, then,” Serrane said a little too quickly. What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you getting soaked just thinking about her holding you down and feeding off your blood?
“It does last the longest,” the Huntress conceded.
“Well, I brought plenty of healing salves,” Serrane told her. “You can take what you need.”
Valuri paused and eyed her for a long moment. “Are you absolutely sure about this?”
“Somehow I doubt you brought me all the way up her to kill me,” Serrane murmured, shuffling to the side until her back was pressed against a boulder. Turning her head to the side, she grabbed a handful of her blonde hair and pulled it out of the way. “This mission is too important for us not to exploit every possible advantage.”
Valuri continued looking at her for a moment, her lips parted ever so slightly. She was obviously trying to restrain herself, but Serrane could feel the Huntress’s hunger no matter how much she tried to hide it. The subtle dilation of her pupils, the intermittent twitching of her fingers…
It’s just like Lasille. She was practically drooling at the sight of you, and deep down you liked it. You enjoy being prey—you enjoy being treated like a piece of meat.
“Well, I suppose a hungry girl should never turn away an offer of a free meal,” Valuri said, licking her lips and slowly creeping closer. “There’s, uh…there’s no way to do this that isn’t awkward.”
“Do whatever you need,” Serrane breathed.
Nodding, Valuri slung her leg over the elf’s lap and straddled her. Serrane’s heart wouldn’t stop thumping and her quim wouldn’t stop burning, especially when the Huntress brought her lips in close.
“Just try and stay still,” Valuri said, unsheathing one of the claws from her gauntlet. “This is going to hurt a little.”
Gods, I hope it hurts a lot.
“I can take it,” Serrane said. “Just get it over with so we can sleep.”
She closed her eyes and held her breath. Her skin tingled, her toes curled, and she clenched her teeth in anticipation when the cold metal touched her skin. She gasped when the blade sliced a thin gash in her flesh, and then again when she felt Valuri’s lips press against her throat. Every twinge of pain instantly transformed into a shudder of pleasure, and she squeezed her knees together in a desperate attempt to smother the raging fire in her quim.
You really are a submissive slut. You barely know this woman and you already want her to hold you down and dominate you over and over again just like Lasille…
Serrane grimaced. Her mind was desperately hoping that her arousal wasn’t obvious, but her body desperately hoping for the opposite. Valuri certainly wasn’t making it easy to resist; her arm clutched around the small of Serrane’s back, pulling her in closer and closer. She didn’t seem like she was going to stop feeding anytime soon, either. She kept sucking harder and harder and harder…
Valuri finally pulled away with a gasp, tiny trickles of blood still spattered across her lips. The tattoos beneath her skin glowed so brightly they were almost painful to look at, and her thighs gripped Serrane’s body in an ironclad hold as she shuddered from an obvious climax.
“Shit,” she rasped when she finally came down. Her green eyes were glowing even more intensely than her tattoos. “Gods, I’m sorry. I just…I’ve never fed off an elf before. You’re so fucking sweet…”
Serrane swallowed heavily as she struggled to catch her breath. The pain in her neck was like a tiny pinprick compared to the raging inferno in her quim. “Are you…are you sated?”
Valuri glanced down and studied the elven woman clutched between her thighs. Her eyes glimmered ravenously, her lips curled into a mischievous smile, and she leaned back down until her mouth was back upon Serrane’s neck. “Not quite yet…”
She suckled at the wound for an instant as if she might keep feeding, but then her lips began slowly nibbling their way up the elven woman’s throat and across her jawline and cheek. Valuri hovered so close to Serrane’s mouth they shared desperate, yearning breaths for what felt like a small eternity before she gently leaned in and brought their lips together.
Serrane melted. Valuri’s thighs clamped even harder, and her tongue hungrily plunged into the elven woman’s mouth. Serrane could taste the faintest hint of her own blood, and for some reason it made her even hotter. Her hips began rhythmically churning in the desperate hope she might extinguish her molten quim, but it only stoked the flames…
Valuri eventually pulled back and gasped for breath. Her fingers crawled up Serrane’s bare midriff and began unclasping the straps of her cropped breastplate. “You know, I think you may have been right,” she whispered. “Apparently I was a lot hungrier than I realized.”
“That’s all right,” Serrane whimpered. “Take whatever you need…”
The Huntress’s grin turned almost sadistic as she hurled the ranger’s breastplate aside and practically lunged for her freshly freed tits. Valuri’s mouth and tongue instantly made it clear that they knew precisely what they were doing; they licked, sucked, and nibbled with the targeted precision that only another woman could possibly hope to achieve.
Meanwhile, the Huntress’s hands expertly worked their way beneath Serrane’s leather skirt, stripping off her panties and pushing up the leather straps of her skirt until the
cool night air could chill her searing quim. Valuri didn’t leave the embers burning for long; she promptly kissed her way down the ranger’s flat stomach, pushed up her slender thighs, and dove in for a second feast.
“Faarea!” Serrane cried out so loudly that half the orcs in the mountain probably heard her. Once again Valuri quickly proved her expertise; her tongue and fingers took turns plunging into the elf’s sodden quim, and she knew exactly when and how to lick, nibble, and finger-fuck to drive Serrane to shuddering climax after shuddering climax. She was even more skilled than Julian and Aluriel, as impossible as that seemed…
Valuri’s own climax paralyzed her barely a minute into her feast. Her eyes and tattoos had never completely stopped glowing, but they exploded in full force yet again when they tasted sorcerous nectar. She bucked and seized in place, her lips and cheeks glistening with Serrane’s juices, and for a moment the Huntress genuinely looked like she might pass out.
“Oh, fuck!” she cried out. “Gods, you’re even sweeter than Red…”
As the two women both panted, desperate for air, Valuri crawled back up Serrane’s body to kiss her on the lips again. The ranger eagerly reciprocated, apparently unaware of just how badly she had missed the touch of another woman these past few weeks.
But you still want more. You don’t just want her to feed upon you—you want her to hold you down and take you over and over just like Lasille…
When Valuri finally pulled away, she smiled and gently kissed the tip of Serrane’s nose. “You know, I think I’m still up for some desert if you are.”
The ranger nodded, and her entire body tensed in anticipation. “Absolutely.”
***
Valuri stared down in wonder at the breathless, mostly naked elven woman beneath her. Just twenty minutes ago, Serrane had been a completely different person: calm, collected, and exuding an unmistakable aura of competent, borderline ruthless professionalism. But now that same woman was little more than a quivering slab of flesh just waiting—no, begging—to be thoroughly ravaged in every one of her tight elven holes.