Doppelganger

by Logan Jacobs

  Then she immediately got back in position and quickly impaled herself on me. As soon as I was deep within her, she tipped her head back and let out a thankful gasp of relief as her body quavered.

  I slid my hands up underneath the surcoat and gripped her by the waist in order to slide her up and down the slick length of my shaft. Lizzy braced herself by placing her hands on my shoulders, and she moaned softly when my hands moved up to scrape against the nipples of her full breasts.

  Then she took control of the situation and started jacking her hips back and forth. She used my body to pleasure herself as she lowered her head to my neck and started biting it. I squeezed one of her full breasts in my hand while I lowered my other hand to her ass. Then I pulled the surcoat off over her head so that I could see her breasts bouncing, and her stomach and thigh muscles clenching and unclenching as she rode the long length of my cock.

  She started to yelp with each thrust loudly enough that I feared the ponies would be spooked. Then we both climaxed explosively, and Lizzy collapsed against me.

  “Woooow,” she groaned between her gasping breaths.

  “Yeah, that was great,” my other self shouted from where I controlled the ponies from the driver’s seat, since the one Lizzy had just made love with inside the carriage was still recovering breath.

  Lizzy slid herself off me and knelt to lick me clean. Then, since the inside of her thighs were also slick with my seed, she wiped it off with her hand, stared into my eyes, and licked every drop from her fingers and palm.

  When she rose back up, I inserted my finger between her legs and rocked her vigorously until she came again, very quickly that time since her body was still pulsing with the after effects of our first bout.

  Through my other pair of eyes I saw Ilandere and Willobee approaching the carriage.

  “They’re coming back,” I told Lizzy, and she groaned and pulled the surcoat back over her head while I pulled my pants back up.

  We disentangled ourselves, but there was no way that the musty smell filling the inside of the carriage would not give us away if Willobee reentered any time soon, so I hoped Ilandere wouldn’t mind carrying him around on her back for a little while longer. I knew that the gnome for his part would not be in any hurry at all to dismount until he was obliged to.

  Ilandere trotted up alongside the carriage with Willobee clinging onto her, and I opened the door to ventilate the carriage.

  Both the centaur and the gnome looked windswept and refreshed and Willobee especially was positively beaming with joy.

  “There is a fork in the road a mile up ahead, Vander,” Ilandere told me. “Which branch do you want us to take?”

  “The left,” my self that was driving the carriage said immediately. I knew that from what the novices who had made the journey before had told me. “We are very close to Nillibet’s temple now.”

  “Oh, hurrah.” She trotted up next to Chrysanthemum and scratched the pony under the chin. “Race you there!”

  “Ilandere, no!” I protested, but the wind sucked away my words. I barely managed to drag the carriage door shut before we started rattling along at a clip that might otherwise have torn it from its hinges.

  As we rode along, I tried to remember everything I had heard about the temple of Nillibet, goddess of chastity and baking. The vestals who lived there ranged from young teenagers placed there by their families to old women who had either never known any other kind of existence, or had turned to the temple as a kind of sanctuary after the trials of their previous lives had become too much for them to bear. The fact that no men were allowed within the walls of the complex except as prescreened and closely supervised short-term guests was a major selling point for women with fathers or husbands whose behavior had turned them against the entire male sex. So, leering at any of the vestals or even so much as raising your voice at one was the quickest way to get booted out the door on your ass.

  I’d have to hope that Willobee and Lizzy would not cause Nillibet’s followers any offense, but Ilandere on the other hand might help our party’s cause, since the vestals were known to be fiercely protective of fragile young things like her that could claim victimhood of any stripe. I’d have to be sure to bring up the Osric incident in conversation.

  “Lizzy,” I asked, “so what do you know about the Order of Nillibet?”

  “I know they’re a bunch of fat virgins who like to eat their feelings,” Lizzy answered immediately.

  “Oh... Um... When we get there, I was thinking that, maybe, well, you should let me do most of the talking,” I suggested. “Seeing as my order was friendly with them and all. As friendly as any co-ed order could be, that is.”

  “Sure thing,” Lizzy agreed with a shrug. “What could they possibly have to talk about, anyway?”

  That was when, outside, I started to hear singing. It was a mournful chorus of female voices droning on in what sounded a great deal like a funeral dirge.

  “Vander, what is that sound?” Ilandere asked me.

  “A lot of unhappy women,” Willobee answered nervously from her back. “Ilandere, maybe you had better put me back in the carriage.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” I said quickly because the carriage still smelled strongly of Lizzy’s and my recent activities. “I’m sure that must just be a party from Nillibet’s temple. Perhaps one of the vestals recently passed on. We will go and offer them our condolences.”

  When we crested the next hill, the singing party came into sight. It was a procession of about thirty women all dressed in long robes and veils of varying shades of pink. They moved very slowly. Some of them were weeping and blowing their noses into pink handkerchiefs. In the middle of the group four of the processioners were carrying a curtained litter. In the back of the group, they were trailed by eight extremely overburdened mules.

  We rode down to meet them.

  While I stayed inside the carriage with Lizzy and motioned for her to keep quiet, my other self jumped down from the driver’s bench and walked up to the elderly wimpled woman who was leading the procession. She was flanked by two younger attendants, and they all eyed me suspiciously.

  “Good morning, Mother Georgina,” I said politely. That, if I recalled correctly, was the name of Nillibet’s current high priestess.

  “Good morning, son,” the high priestess replied. She looked behind me at Ilandere and Willobee and her brow furrowed in distaste. “You are using a woman as a beast of burden?”

  “H-he is my friend,” Ilandere stammered in confusion. Willobee seemed to be trying to make himself as small as possible behind her back, and I wondered why he didn’t start spinning clever words out of his ass to try to win over or otherwise bamboozle Mother Georgina as was his usual habit with strangers.

  “She does not even know that she is oppressed.” The high priestess sighed. “Well, what is it, son?” She looked at our carriage and frowned in apparent annoyance at the fact that it was blocking most of the road.

  “We were just heading to your temple to ask for your help,” I replied.

  “What sort of help do you require?” she asked suspiciously. “As you can see, we are not in much of a position right now to help anyone. We are fleeing a grievous catastrophe.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, Mother,” I said. Maybe I had been wrong about the funeral assumption then. “What kind of catastrophe might that be?”

  “We received word that the villainous blackguards who call themselves Thorvinians are currently rampaging across the countryside, murdering everyone in their path,” the high priestess replied. She paused for dramatic effect. “And that we, as if we have not been persecuted enough, were their next target!”

  “Well, that makes us allies then,” I announced.

  “What makes you say that?” the high priestess asked.

  “The Order of Thorvinius attacked my temple and slaughtered all my people the night before last,” I answered. “I already crushed the raiding party that committed this massacre, but I will not r
est until I have obliterated Thorvinius’ entire order from the face of the earth.”

  Judging from her expression, Mother Georgina actually seemed to warm to me a little at that. “Well then. I suppose we are indeed allies. And may I ask who you are, son?”

  “I am--” of the Order of Qaar’endoth, I was about to say. But that order no longer existed. It would never exist again unless and until my selves rebuilt it from the ashes.

  My other self stepped out from the carriage and completed the sentence, “Qaar’endoth.”

  “You, Qaar’endoth?” the high priestess scoffed. “Pah! Male arrogance never ceases to astound.”

  “Only the Qaar’endothi can double in that way, Mother,” whispered one of the attendants beside the old woman.

  “Oh, I can tell he is Qaar’endothi sure enough,” Mother Georgina snapped, “but does being the high priestess of our order make me thrice-blessed Nillibet herself? Hmm?”

  “Well, n-no, Mother,” the attendant admitted.

  “You do not have to believe me,” I said from both of my mouths. “I do not really need your help or the rest of your vestals’ for that matter. I only need to speak with Meline. Where is she?”

  “The oracle Meline is resting,” Mother Georgina replied. “The move this morning has been very stressful for her. She does not need to be disturbed by some novice with delusions of grandeur. Or two novices. However you like to think of yourself.” She waved her gnarled hand at both of me dismissively.

  “Well,” both of my voices said in perfect unison, “tell Meline that Qaar’endoth, or a Qaar’endothi novice, if you do not believe me, is here and would like to consult with her about a prophecy pronounced by Aurelana before she died. That he seeks her advice regarding a quest to destroy our common enemy and make the world safe for the innocent again. Let her make her own choice about whether she will speak to me.”

  “Aurelana is dead?” the high priestess’ other attendant gasped.

  Mother Georgina looked somewhat chastened too. “Aurelana was a friend to this temple, but if Meline is to interact with a man, there are purification rituals that will be necessary, and we have many miles to go before we reach the safety of our sisters’ walls.”

  “Oh for fuck’s sake,” Lizzy exclaimed as she leapt out of the carriage. The high priestess’ eyes narrowed as I guessed she drew some obvious conclusions about the surcoat Lizzy was wearing as her sole garment. “Let him talk to the oracle, or I will fucking eat all you fucks.”

  One of Mother Georgina’s attendants fainted at the foul worded threat coming from the wolf-woman’s mouth. This occasioned a lot of squealing among her sister vestals, and I cast Lizzy a reproachful glare.

  “Diplomacy was clearly not getting you anywhere,” the she-wolf said defensively. “You’re too nice, Vander. You just have to put your foot down with people like them.”

  “In the name of Nillibet, I order you to step aside and let us pass now,” Mother Georgina said icily. Her vivid magenta robes and wimple gave her the effect of a flower in full bloom. Her aged face, however, bore more of a resemblance to a flower that belonged in a bowl of potpourri.

  “Or what? You’ll pie me in the face?” Lizzy guffawed.

  Suddenly, vestals farther back in the procession started to shriek.

  “It’s the Thorvinians!”

  “The Thorvinians are here!”

  “We’re all going to die!”

  “Why did you take so long doing your hair this morning, you bitch?”

  “Nerissa is the one who couldn’t find her fucking veil! This is not my fault, you hag!”

  I scanned the landscape and spotted the threat that they were referring to. About a quarter of a mile away a mounted band of about a dozen men galloped hard toward us. Six spread out along each side to trap the procession between closing jaws, and I guessed we had a few moments to prepare for their attack.

  Their armor was painted black, a few carried bows, and most carried spears. But they did not carry Thorvinius’ banner, and they were not screaming any of Thorvinius’ mantras. Instead they were yipping some kind of wordless war cry at the top of their lungs that just sounded like, “Yiyiyiyiyiyiyiyiyiyiyi!”

  Lizzy tipped her head back and let out a bloodcurdling howl in answer, and another two vestals fainted in pink billows of fabric like sails catching wind.

  “Lizzy, you take nine o’clock to one o’clock,” I ordered. “I’ll take one to five and five to nine. Ilandere, take Willobee to safety. Now.” I pointed in the opposite direction as the one from which the attackers were bearing down on us. I had the impulse to send her off with a smack to the rump as one might do with a horse, but recognized in time that that was liable to be misinterpreted. It wasn’t necessary anyway since the beautiful centaur nodded fearfully and galloped off to be quickly lost from sight, the gnome clinging fast to her waist. The unusual properties of his vomit could have been useful, I suppose, but that really seemed to be more of a defensive mechanism than an offensive one.

  “Give me a weapon,” Lizzy said.

  “What do you mean? Aren’t you going to morph?” I asked.

  “How am I supposed to do that? It’s broad daylight,” Lizzy said as if I should have known.

  “Oh, you can’t-- Then get back in the carriage,” I said. “I’ll handle this.”

  “I,” she hissed as she jabbed a claw at her leather-clad chest, “am not one of them, Vander.” She jabbed the claw at the procession of pink-clad vestals. “In case you hadn’t noticed. Now give me a fucking weapon.”

  “As my lady commands,” I said sarcastically. There was no time to argue with her, and probably nothing I could do to make her obey, short of tying her up in the carriage. So I tossed her the sword that wasn’t Polliver, and the two of me plus her spread out to defend the whole group.

  One of the riders barreled down on me with his spear extended, but I sidestepped, grabbed the haft of his weapon, and pulled the man off the horse along with it. As soon as he landed, I kicked him in the chest to detach his grip from his weapon. Then I spun it around and skewered him with it.

  The next closest rider was shooting arrows at me, and one of the arrows ruffled my hair as it went by. I took one of the daggers that were strapped to my wrists and threw it with a thunk into his face. That made it look like he had a hilt for a nose, and while it was an interesting decorative touch, it compromised the structural integrity of the surrounding face significantly, and his face poured blood as he died.

  My other self had already jumped in the air and cut an attacker in half with Polliver, and then I pulled another from his horse when I landed. He let out a scream when he fell, but then I cut his throat out with my magical blade before turning to a third attacker. This one was charging wildly at me with his axe raised, but I tossed myself the spear I had taken from the first brigand as I tossed myself Polliver. Then I flipped the spear around in my hand, threw it, and impaled the axe-man before his horse reached me.

  “Why, if it isn’t Lizzy Longshanks of the Dungville Dastards,” exclaimed the man that Lizzy was fighting nearby. “You look as ravishing as ever, Liz. I like the new dress. If you can call it that. Like the tail too. Always did.”

  “The Dungville Dastards were two crews ago, Frank,” she yelled. “Things have changed. I’ve grown up some.”

  “I guess I prob’ly shoulda killed you with the rest,” Frank sighed, “but what’s done is done. And you was such a sweet slip of a thing, I just plain didn’t want to. But I shoulda known you’d never come to any good, Liz.”

  “Yeah, you shoulda,” she agreed.

  Frank cracked her in the side of the head with the hilt of his sword, a solid blow that knocked her flying. He threw himself forward on top of her with his sword poised for a final strike, but the tip of the blade she had borrowed from me burst through his back as she impaled him through the chest, and she shoved his body off her.

  “You know these men, Lizzy?” I shouted as I scissored off a head between two daggers.
>
  “Mildly acquainted,” she shouted back as she sprang to her feet. “Don’t be shy with the stabbing.”

  Two of the remaining riders converged on me, one with a bow and the other with a spear. The one with the spear got there first. I leapt behind his horse just in time as his idiot friend proceeded to twang two arrows in a row directly into the poor beast’s flank. The horse screamed in pain and bucked its rider off, whereupon I drove Polliver downward into his unarmored throat. As he gurgled his last breath, I took his spear and threw it at the archer.

  My spear punched through his shoulder, but it was enough to disable him and keep him from drawing the bow again, so I sprinted up to him, yanked him down from his horse by the dangling haft of the spear, and then my other self stomped his skull like a hardboiled egg. As soon as he was dead I grabbed the reins of the now unoccupied horse, and my other body gave me a quick foot lift so I could swing myself into the saddle faster.

  “Watch out, Lizzy!” I yelled, and then I trampled straight over her current opponent after she scrambled out of the way.

  I slowed the horse down and circled back to confirm with Lizzy. “That the last one?”

  “Last one, Vander,” she said and licked her lips. “I weren’t gonna make the same mistake Frank made with me.”

  “Frank… killed your people?” I asked. “I’m sorry that happened to you, Lizzy.”

  “It were many years ago,” she said nonchalantly, “and it weren’t ah-nothing like with your people, where you all depended on and loved each other and whatnot. All it took was one too many drinks or one too few shares of loot to make one Dungville Dastard turn on another. That’s what made them so weak.”

  I heard the sound of more hoofbeats headed our way, but these were more of pattering hoofbeats instead of thundering ones. I looked up, and there were Ilandere and Willobee.

  Ilandere bent slightly and threw her slim arms around me in a hug that nearly dislodged Willobee from his seat. “I was so worried,” she exclaimed. “We were watching the whole thing from that hill over there.”