Ascendant of Aldrya

by Northwest Grant

  Bel cried out, and a wyrmkin running toward Emma changed its mind and charged the archer. Taunt practice might not be what one wanted for a healer, but it was helpful now. Bel drew her dagger.

  Nigel parried a spear and blocked another with his shield. He slashed, catching one wyrmkin in the throat, and kicked another where nuts would be if it was a human. The creature doubled over in pain and crumpled to the ground. Nigel didn’t have time to savor the triumph because another three were on Nigel immediately. He couldn't spare a moment to see how everyone else was doing; he had to assume they were managing. They had damaged most of the wyrmkin, and it didn't take much more to kill them. Their stone spears had trouble with his metal armor. Bel and Emma weren't as protected, so he needed to stay on the offensive.

  He saw a stream of water go by, and hope surged. Khoraja was up, and she behind all the Wyrmkin. They wouldn't see what hit them. A spearhead deflected off the steel covering his shoulder, and he repaid it with a quick stab through a reptilian abdomen.

  The remaining wyrmkin turned and fled. Nigel looked around. Khoraja was standing and casting. Emma hunched over, grabbing her belly, but Bel was healing her. He tried to give chase, but the wyrmkin moved better over the uneven ground than he did, so he stopped after a few steps.

  Khoraja caught two with a fireball. She also set a cow on fire.

  "You okay, Emma?"

  "I'm okay," said Emma. "Just took a spear in an uncomfortable spot. Thanks Bel," she added, as another heal hit her. "Khory, sister..."

  "Yes?"

  "I like my steak medium rare," Emma said with a grim smile, nodding toward the flaming cow.

  If she could tell a joke, she was going to be okay. Nigel counted the bodies. There were the first two, plus one he'd kicked, and two he'd killed with a sword. Bel had killed one as they charged, as had Emma. Khoraja nailed the one who had speared Emma with freezing water, and had killed two more with the fireball at the end. Ten. Exactly the right number. Which was good, because the Wyrmkin were alerted to their presence now.

  "We done here?" asked Khoraja.

  "Yes," Nigel said.

  "Should I torch more of their food, before we run for it?"

  "Definitely not. Shortage of food will drive them to seek for it elsewhere." He had no desire for more killing, human, animal, or wyrmkin. He didn't imagine he'd helped the wyrmkin's opinion of humans much, but he had thinned down the herd.

  "I think we should wipe them out," said Emma. "Make sure they never endanger these farmers again."

  Nigel supposed that if he'd spent a lot of time with the farmers, he might feel the same way. But he didn't. "They will be prepared now. It's possible we can return sometime, but right now they are on their guard and we'd be in extra danger." He didn't really intend to come back, but other adventurers might.

  They headed back to the hills and returned to the farmstead before nightfall.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  They stayed overnight in the farmstead, much to Greta's annoyance and the pleasure of Vorm and his sons. Bel's healing was not as popular as Emma's, probably because it lacked a sexual charge. Nigel suspected some of the thorn scratches might have been intentional, and if they stayed the menfolk of the farm would have more scratches the next day. So even though they were tired and would have liked a day to rest, the group headed back toward Belden after breakfast. The road back was well-worn, with farmland on each side. If everyone was right about the wyrmkin the farms would be safe for a while. Nigel had visions of dozens of wyrmkin on a revenge-fueled rampage, but apparently that was not how wyrmkin behaved.

  They had only traveled a mile when Bel saw smoke south of the road and pointed it out to the others.

  "Might be a bonfire," Emma said.

  "In the morning, with the sun up? For what purpose?" asked Khoraja.

  "Maybe they are getting rid of some chaff or something," Bel said. "Isn't there stuff left over from farming that's flammable?"

  "Were any of you born in farm families?" Nigel said.

  "I was a blacksmith's kid," Bel said.

  "I was the daughter of a clerk," Emma said.

  Emma shook her head. "Elves don't farm. We gather what we need from the forest."

  "Me neither," he said. "And I don't know why there would be smoke. We could go look, I suppose. It's probably nothing."

  A lone figure ran across the fields toward them, coming from the direction of the smoke. As the runner got closer, Nigel recognized Alys. A quick look at her terrified expression, and he knew things were neither normal nor okay.

  "What's happening?" Nigel asked.

  "Fire. Demons." Alys pointed. "Frida."

  "Slow down," Emma said. "Tell us more."

  "Demons!" Alys said again. "At the Banneker place!"

  Bel had already taken off in the direction Alys had pointed. Nigel jogged in the smoke's direction. Maybe they could get Alys to give them a detailed explanation, and maybe they couldn't, but any time spent getting the story out of her was time others were in danger. It was too far to sprint, but he wanted to get there fast with enough energy to react to whatever he discovered. Khoraja followed him, and after a moment's hesitation, so did Emma who ran faster to catch up.

  They ran through empty fields of oats, and Bel slowed down enough to let him catch up to her. Presumably whoever was farming there had either gone to investigate the smoke, or had run in the other direction. An earthen berm about six feet high separated the oat field from the next one, but it wasn't hard to climb. The top gave a better view.

  Two small gray demons with horns were scampering around tossing fireballs at the crops, a barn, and a small house. In the center of the fields was a much more imposing demon, nearly ten feet tall. She had the upper body of a naked and well-endowed woman, and the lower body of a thick snake. She carried a flaming sword in each of her hands. Her lower body narrowed to a tail the width of an anaconda, twenty feet long, which was constricting a man in farm overalls. All of which should have struck the remaining farmers with terror, but it didn't. A middle-aged woman had taken her clothes off and was riding a man cowgirl-style, and Frida was sucking the cock of a young man as if her life depended on extracting his seed. The young man seemed to have some sense left, as he was trying to push her away, but he didn't look committed to it.

  "Lust spell," said Emma. "Like the fear. Resist it."

  Nigel paused just long enough to lay out a plan before running forward. "Khoraja, you and Emma take out the little imps. Bel and I will take on the big bad. Join us in the fight when you can." He didn't stop to see what they did before breaking into a sprint. Frida's virtue would have been a lot safer back with us. But maybe if we distract it, they'll come to their senses and get away.

  "Ah, you!" shouted the demon, staring straight at Nigel. "My master sends his greetings!" Her body shimmered, and for a moment Nigel was transfixed by the size of her breasts, the creamy skin, and the tight pink nipples. He wondered what she had below, hidden by the scales, and how it would feel to plunge his instantly hard cock deep into the wet softness he hoped to find there.

  Then he felt a hand lifting his kilt. Bel wrapped her arm around his body, and squeezed his cock with the other hand. Her slender body pressed against him from behind, grinding against his ass. It took his mind off the demon. He turned, grabbed Bel's jerkin, and yanked it open, freeing her small, pert breasts.

  "Yesss," she hissed, and kissed him ferociously. What she lacked in technique she made up with in enthusiasm, thrusting her tongue inside his mouth like she was trying to fuck him with it.

  A white glow surrounded them. They both recoiled and stared, not with lust but horror. "What the hell are you doing?" asked Bel.

  Nigel turned and raced toward the demon. His erection faded as quickly as it had arrived. Fighting a giant snake demon wasn't as scary as explaining to Bel why he'd ripped off her clothes, although from the lust and eagerness that had been in her eyes he suspected she would realize what had gotten into him.

  "Ha
!" said the demon, giving the farmer one last squeeze before letting him go. She turned to face Nigel. A well-placed arrow got there before he did, hitting her right in the forehead. That shot would have killed any human, but the demon tilted her head and the arrow fell to the ground. She swung a sword at Nigel, which he blocked with his shield. Another, and he parried it. The flaming swords radiated intense heat, and sweat ran down his face. Even if he blocked all the blows, he'd tire quickly. Fighting the squamous monstrosity was like doing a workout in front of an open oven.

  He wasn't alone, however. As he blocked and parried, arrows struck the creature. Bolts of freezing water turned to steam as they struck the demon's body, and divine energy glowed and made the demon writhe with pain. His job was to ward off the creature's attacks while the women took the thing down. He could do that. He had faith in them, and faith in their ability to heal them.

  He'd not reckoned on Frida, however. Apparently her beau had gotten away, and she, still crazed with lust, went straight for the nearest man. Which was him. She grabbed him from behind and threw him to the ground with the advantage of surprise and perhaps more than her normal strength. As he fell, a flaming sword lashed across his chest. The metal armor he'd gotten from Garrett protected him from most of the blade, although it was still like a hit from a big metal club. He'd have a hell of a bruise. But the amulet Windstar gave him protected him completely from the fire. Frida pulled his kilt up and tried to mount him. She looked disappointed, and for once in his life he was glad he wasn't hard for a woman. He grabbed her and threw her to the side. A heal hit him a moment later, and then another. One from Emma, one from Bel. He scrambled to his feet.

  The demon had seen enough of the battle, apparently. She fled with surprising speed, slithering on the ground like a snake. Bel, still topless, gave chase. She fired arrows as she ran, but the demon slid through the grain much faster than a human could run, and her low silhouette made her a much smaller target than it had been. Bel had only her lower body to fire at, and the arrows deflected off the creature's scales.

  But not its effects. The older couple were still fucking. And Frida was taking off her clothes, looking at Nigel like a cat looks at a mouse. Frida was beautiful, her young ripe body fully on display as she stalked toward Nigel.

  "Emma," Nigel said. "Can you take care of her?" His chest still hurt but Frida's condition seemed more urgent.

  "Of course," Emma said, and Frida glowed white for a moment. A second after that, she glowed red, blushing from head to toe.

  "Get your clothes on, and go home," Nigel said. "And we won't say anything about what happened to your parents."

  Frida nodded, grabbed her dress, and ran. Apparently even putting it on in front of him was too embarrassing.

  "What about those two?" asked Emma.

  "They look like they are having fun," said Nigel. "I imagine it wears off eventually. But I suppose we should clear the lust from them, too. Mind giving me a heal first? And Khoraja, could you use your spells to put out some fires?"

  "With pleasure," said Khoraja.

  Emma healed him and then bent down to check out the farmer who'd been constricted. "Dead," she announced.

  Bel walked back. "She got away. How the hell does she move so fast?"

  "I don't know," Nigel said. "But I hope never to see her again. Umm... you might want to button your top."

  Bel looked down. "Oh. Yeah." She pulled the jerkin shut and redid the one button he hadn't ripped off.

  "Sorry about that," Nigel said. "I--"

  "Hush," said Bel. "I wanted you, right then. I would have stripped myself if you hadn't beaten me to it. And I know what it's like to be overcome with emotion from a demon."

  "According to Sivestara," Emma said, "demons can only prey on emotions already within us. If we're unafraid, a fear demon won't do a thing -- but most people are afraid of demons, so they can use that. A lust demon can't make you feel lust for someone you don't desire."

  Bel looked at Nigel, and then away. "I don't want to have this conversation. All I have to say is that if that's true, and Vorm and Greta are smart, they will lock up that girl of theirs." She walked away, toward the body of an imp. They'd been easy to dispatch, as Nigel had hoped. Emma and Khoraja must have killed them with one or two spells each to have joined the fray against the snake demon so quickly.

  Nigel turned to Emma. They watched Khoraja run from fire to fire, putting them out with cold water. He wondered if she would get skill-ups from all of that, but it needed doing. The farmer couple had disentangled and were doing their best to put out small fires by smothering them with their clothes. "So how were you affected by the demon's lust?"

  "Well," said Emma, "Khoraja was closest, and I turned to her for a moment. She looked at me. But you'd given us orders, and well -- following your orders turns me on. So we focused on the imps."

  "Good thing," said Nigel. He stared off into space for a moment, contemplating Emma's words about following orders. Then he spotted something else.

  "More smoke," Nigel said. "Let's go." Khoraja had succeeded at putting out the major fires, and the rest the Bannekers could presumably handle. The smoke was a few miles away, toward Belden. Too far to run, but they had to hurry.

  "Nigel," Khoraja said. "That demon focused on you."

  "Maybe because I was the only male in our group?"

  "Maybe," said Khoraja. "But maybe something else. Her master sent greetings," she said. "Presumably Deluca. Who killed that girl who was, well, like you. He might be trying to kill you. I think this raid was a trap for us. If we'd been fighting with only the skills we had when we were ambushed in the Burning Wastes, I don't think we would have beaten that giant snake woman."

  "Wait a second. Why would Deluca want to kill Nightwolf, in particular?" asked Bel.

  "Because he's a hero," Emma said.

  Bel looked at Emma with a look that made it clear the priestess wasn't fooling her. "No, I really want to know."

  "If there's something about someone that makes other people want to kill them, they don't necessarily want to spread it around," Khoraja said. "So let's leave it at that."

  Nigel expected Bel to argue that she had a right to know, and he would have agreed with her. Her life was on the line when people tried to kill him. But she shrugged. "Makes sense."

  They walked in silence while Nigel tried to figure it out. Deluca wanted to kill ascendants, for whatever reason. Possibly he was one himself and didn't want the competition. But how would he know Nigel was? Possibly he spotted him talking to Windstar and knew what that meant, but then Deluca would have been after him earlier. Nigel thought it was more likely the actions of the group, rather than his own ascendancy that had gotten Deluca's attention.

  But why not send overwhelming force? Nigel could think of three explanations. One was that Deluca thought the demon was an overwhelming force, which was reasonable. Possibly he was toying with Nigel. But maybe this was all Deluca could spare. They didn't know what they'd find at the next farm.

  It turned out to be a few imps. They quickly dispatched them, and then helped the farmers put out the fire, Khoraja doing most of the work. Nigel took a moment to check out character sheets.

  Emma's Divine Blast was a 3 now. And Khoraja had Freezing Bolt at a 3 and Cone of Cold at a 2, possibly because of all the work she'd done putting out fires. That was serious progress. And if Bel's heals were keeping pace, her healing might be as good as Emma's non-sexual healing had been when they started. Would that be enough? There was no way to know.

  There was more smoke on the horizon, but they found more of the same. The imps were intent on property damage, not killing people, although there were at least two farmer fatalities beside the one strangled by the snake woman.

  He looked at his own character sheet. The women were killing imps before he could even get to them, so he didn't expect much in the way of skill improvements. He was surprised to find the character sheet neatly ordered, from highest skill to lowest. That pushed all th
e zeroes and ones to the bottom.

  One-Handed Sword 8

  Shield 6

  Unarmed Combat 6

  Two-Handed Sword 4

  Sex 4

  ...

  Character Sheet 2

  He'd not noticed the latter skill amongst all the ones. How was Character Sheet a skill? He appreciated the neat ordering, and he'd find out more about himself and others later. He aimed a thought at the sheet and it re-organized, with combat skills and non-combat skills in separate columns. Then he did the same for Emma's character sheet, which had the side effect of moving the sexual skills from the top. He was amazed he had an appetite for any other woman, given how good she was in bed, but apparently he had a yen for variety he hadn't known of back on Earth.

  He clicked on Bel's tab, just in case he could see anything there, and to his surprise he could see her whole character sheet. He couldn't sort, the way he could with Emma's and Khoraja's, but he could scan through and scan for the skills that weren't 1's and 0's.

  Strength 13

  Dexterity 19

  Intelligence 13

  Constitution 13

  Wow, a 19. Nigel had been assuming that stats capped out at 18, like in a popular table top game, but he supposed there was nothing magical about that. He was substantially less impressed by his own 17 strength.

  Bow 8

  Claw 6

  Stealth 5

  Bite 4

  Running 4

  Wilderness Survival 4

  Dagger 3

  Tracking 3

  Enchant Arrow 2

  Heal 3

  Dodge 3

  Awareness 3

  Wait. Claw and Bite?

  He scrolled up to the top, to where it said "Elf" on Khoraja's character sheet, and "Human" on his and Emma's.

  Were-panther.

  Maybe that was why she let things slide rather than continuing to press about Nigel's secret. She had quite a secret of her own. Nigel felt a little bad having invaded her privacy like that, but it was useful to know everyone's skills. The others looked to him for leadership. Whether that was because he was Khoraja and Emma's common romantic interest, sexism, or some actual ability he had, he didn't know. But being able to see character sheets and understand the relative strengths of everyone definitely gave him an advantage.