by Jack Porter
No.
Yes.
No.
Dammit. I felt like someone else was in my head, screwing with me.
Since Sarina hadn’t said anything else, I finally said, “Sorry. It’s none of my business.”
“You’re right, it isn’t,” she said, with some of her original fire returning. “And it’s a really impertinent question coming from a male, but since it’s you… yes, I am a maiden in the truest sense of the word. I have never been with a man. Or a woman, for that matter.”
“Is it part of your service to the goddess?”
“To the High Priestess.”
“And did you choose to enter her service, or were you born into it, or something else?”
Sarina nodded. “I chose this life.”
“I hope we find your High Priestess,” I said. “And avenge whatever wrongs have been done to her.”
“Me too.” Sarina lifted her chin a bit as she said it, like she couldn’t wait to exact revenge on any who had dared lay hands on her Priestess. I didn’t doubt that it was exactly what she was thinking.
24
We rode for a while in silence. Since there wasn’t much difference between night and day here deep in the forest, the minutes and hours stretched into nothing but black trees and red light and silence. We still heard the occasional rumble far off, but the evil menace I’d felt watching me yesterday had vanished with the hell-fiends. It seemed that we finally had a little breathing room.
“So you can’t tell me the name of your goddess,” I said finally, “but can you tell me what she is the goddess of?”
Sarina shook herself a little, as if she had been thinking of something far off. “Since the Wraith King killed the other gods and goddesses, she is now the goddess of all of Hell. So that makes her not just my goddess, but yours as well.”
“The elves don’t pray to her.”
“No one prays to her, exactly. It is more that they give their service to her with their lives. Not all pledge chastity to a Priestess like I and my fellow adepts do, but in some way, all good people serve the goddess. You are doing so right now.”
“How?”
“By going to rescue those who can’t rescue themselves. Hell is a cruel place, Jon, but it wasn’t always so. Most have forgotten that the goddess and her siblings once lived here among us and kept peace. But my order remembers.”
“How can the Wraith King be powerful enough to murder gods and goddesses? Even if he could raise the dead, wouldn’t he need godlike powers himself?”
Sarina nodded. “That is what the legends say. When he murdered the Divine Ones, he took over Hell. The only reason he doesn’t have complete control is because of the goddess.”
“She keeps him at bay?”
“She aids us in our quest to keep him at bay, as I said before.”
“But then why…” I hesitated, not wanting to offend her once again. However, my need for information was greater now than ever.
“Speak your mind,” Sarina said.
“Why did your village build so close to the Wraith King’s domain? I understand why you had to let the slavers pass through your gates. But why be in that position at all?” I had thought of the villagers as helpless people, but the more I learned, the more I realized my error.
Sarina glanced at the trees as if she was afraid they were listening. “Because someone has to be close to him to find out his comings and goings. How do you think Nya and her people knew the Wraith King was traveling when you first attacked him in the pass south of here?”
I shrugged. “I assumed she had spies.”
“I am certain she does. It is the same among the race of humans. Our village was well-placed all those centuries ago. And, in any event, if we had all tried to leave then, the Wraith King might have stopped us. He has spies, too.”
I didn’t doubt it, and I wondered if one of them was riding with me, with my arm around her.
25
Nothing had changed while we were talking. The trees remained the same. My ass still hurt from riding, and my arm was beginning to cramp from holding the reins while also holding Sarina. Not that she needed the help to ride, but I had to guide the horse somehow. When I thought about that, however, I felt dumb. The horse didn’t need much guidance now. It simply followed Nya’s horse. With the dense trees and treacherous ground on either side of us, there wasn’t much choice.
Feeling useless, I thought about the power that had flowed through me and my inability to control it. “Sarina, can you show me your magic?”
“Now?”
“Do you have something better to do?”
She pursed her lips in a grim line.
“Is it forbidden?” I asked.
“No.”
“Are you angry with me?”
She looked up at me. “I should be, but after what you did for me in the forest, I am only grateful. If it weren’t for you, the beast inside me would have taken over, and I would have been forced to run back to the Wraith King. And he would not have taken kindly to me running away. I managed to escape punishment before because of the chaos of battle. It wouldn’t happen again.”
“Then why won’t you show me some magic? Are you afraid?”
Sarina laughed and shook her head.
“Tired?”
“No, but it is fun that you keep guessing.”
“I know what it is,” I said, smirking. “You don’t know how to teach me. It’s one thing to do it yourself, and another to show someone else.”
Sarina snorted. “I could teach a small child to do simple magic, and if she were quick-witted, I could teach her more. You, however, are not a child, nor are you quick-witted.” She looked me up and down with a smirk on her face.
“Go on,” I challenged. I liked seeing that fire come back to her expression, the one that drove away the haunted look. “Try me and see.”
She held up her bound hands. “With this?”
“Are you saying that someone as proficient as yourself needs your hands?” I raised an eyebrow. “Now you’re just looking for excuses.”
“And why should I help you when you continue to treat me as a prisoner?”
“You have something better to do?”
Sarina looked at me out the corner of her eye, as if deciding whether to spite me. I smiled. Finally, she picked up my right hand.
“Only because it will help prove myself to you,” she said.
I nodded. Sarina manipulated my fingers and hand into a shape. It could have been awkward for her, considering she didn’t have a full range of motion, but she did it without too much trouble.
“You can cast rudimentary spells with runes,” she said. “I’m assuming you know what those are?”
“I know what they are, but I don’t know any.”
“Mm…” she said as if it didn’t surprise her. “So I will show you some basic runes you can use right away. We don’t have years to start at the beginning. And anyway, you already have magic of your own, for reasons I don’t yet understand, so we are only going to try to control it.”
“You mean I get the crash course?” I asked. “Thank you.”
“What is a crash course?”
“A shortcut.”
Sarina narrowed her eyes. “You should never take a shortcut with magic, Jon. I will show you some elemental movements, which you can then build upon if you master them.”
“Okay,” I said, stifling laughter. Then I held my hand like she had shown me. “Now what?”
“That is your symbol for fire, called igni in the common tongue. You will use it to form the rune in the air. Please don’t cast any fire toward our horse. Or toward Her Grace.”
“Preferably not,” Nya called back. So she had been listening.
I smiled. “Okay, ready. Do I have to say the word?”
“No, only make the movement.” Sarina took my wrist and, pointing my arm toward a tree, moved my hand in a complicated arc through the air.
“Nothing happened,” I sai
d.
Sarina shook her head. “You must channel your magic, idiot. Without it, all you are doing is waving your hand around. Let’s try again. Prepare yourself.”
I tried to remember the feeling of power and lust that had overwhelmed me last night. As I did so, Sarina once again moved my hand. To my surprise, a flash of light and an arc of fire shot out of my hand and blasted the tree.
My horse tossed her head and whinnied, and Sarina quickly turned her attention to it, speaking in low tones until it calmed. I looked at my hand, which felt and looked normal. The tree, which we were now passing, had a charred mark from my blast.
“Damn,” I said. “So that’s why everything went wrong last night when I felt that power in my hands? Because I wasn’t making a rune or sign?”
“Correct. Ready to try again?”
“Yes,” I said eagerly. This was beyond cool, and once again I waited patiently while Sarina formed the symbol with my right hand. Then, she pointed my arm at a rock and did the movement while I concentrated. Another jet of light shot out of my hand, this time brighter, and the rock burst apart, startling several horses, including Nya’s stallion.
“Sorry,” I called.
The blond elf turned in her saddle and gave me a dirty look. “Perhaps that is enough for now, before you bring down the mountain on top of us.”
“Could I do that?” I asked.
Nya and Sarina laughed.
“No,” Sarina said, “Not unless you were the Wraith King himself.”
26
For the rest of the day, instead of using magic, I concentrated on memorizing the movements I needed to create it. After a few more tries, and some jokes and snickers from Sarina, she said that my attempts were sufficient enough to try it on my own. But since Nya was now forbidding actual magic, I had to settle for practicing on the sly, making the movement without channeling anything. It was a bit of a gamble, considering how inexperienced I was, but I was eager.
After another hour, Sarina even stopped laughing at my attempts. I grinned at her. “Thank you. Teach me another?”
She taught me the runes for earth, wind, and water, as well. And then a spell to repel fire, which was the same spell that every child in Hell grew up learning alongside how to sanctify the water. And then I practiced all of them throughout the nighttime ride, feeling less inadequate than I had that morning.
I wasn’t sure how they would help me in battle, but it was a start.
Finally, with about four hours of darkness left, we halted to rest the horses. There was a nearby spring which they were able to sanctify for watering the animals and refilling skins, and as everyone took care of that, I took the opportunity to find Ilana. Leaving Sarina in the care of one of Nya’s guard, a dark elf named Teniel, I found Ilana returning from the spring.
“Hey,” I said, following her to her horse.
She turned. “Hello, Jon-man.”
I reached for her, and when she didn’t pull away, I thought that was a good sign. “You okay?”
Ilana planted a kiss on my cheek. “I am fine.”
“Uh oh.”
She raised an eyebrow. “What’s wrong?”
“Usually when a woman says ‘fine,’ she isn’t fine at all and there’s about to be a fight.”
Ilana smiled. “You have the craziest notions, Jon. I am not a human woman, remember, but a succubus. My job is to please you, not to play emotional games. Do I please you?”
“Of course you do. But I hope that I please you, too… What’s this about? Is it Sarina?”
Ilana laughed and shook her head. “No, Jon. I can tell you like her, but you should watch out for that one. I still don’t trust her although I’m not sure why you seem to have power over her.”
After she finished watering her horse, I led Ilana to the base of an enormous tree. We sat down with our backs to it, and I put an arm around her. “I don’t know, either.”
“She couldn’t tell you?”
“She seems to think I have more magic than I do. Anyway, we’ve been working on other things.” I grinned. “I can shoot fire now.”
“I heard.” Ilana smiled, and then surprised me by turning and straddling my hips. “Let’s pass the time with something other than talking.”
“You’re sure we’re okay?” I asked.
In answer, Ilana leaned down and kissed my mouth. Her tongue slid between my lips, and in a few moments, we were breathing heavily. I’d long ago given up the hope of privacy on this trip, but I wasn’t about to let that stop us. With her cloak wrapped around us, my lust returned in full force, and it was all I could do to untie my pants while she pulled off her own. When I entered her, Ilana gasped, her mouth opening in pleasure as she threw her head back.
And then she began to ride me. She moved slowly at first, sensuously rolling her hips so that she pressed against my pelvic bone with each stroke. And she drove me mad. Unable to get enough, I gripped her hips and ground her into me as hard as I could.
Ilana had once told me that she’d been called Pleasure and Desire, among other names, and I believed her. She was all that and more for me. I would never be able to get enough of her, and I knew my desire for her was bordering on obsession. But as I reached up to rip her corset down to free her right breast, I knew that it was exactly how she wanted it. Ilana had said she was bound to me, but I felt bound to her, and maybe that was part of the magic of her.
In any case, she had been encouraging me every step of the way, and I sank deeper into her as she began to moan.
“Come for me, Ilana,” I grunted. “Come for me, baby.”
Suddenly, Ilana leaned down and whispered into my ear. “It is dark and difficult to see who you are with, correct? Pretend I am Sarina. My hair is as red as fire, body long and sinewy with scars.” She then did this amazing thing where she squeezed my cock as she rode me, and I almost saw stars.
An image of Sarina’s face and body flashed into my mind along with her scent, and I came suddenly with a harsh grunt escaping my lips. “Fuck,” I said as Ilana continued to ride me. She bounced up and down a few more times as I held on, and then her orgasm made her body shudder. I held her until she finished, and then she sank against me.
For a moment, neither of us seemed to be able to move.
“What was that?” I asked when I could breathe.
I felt her smile against my neck. “I knew you wanted her.”
“So it was a trick?” I would have been angry, except that it had felt too good.
Ilana raised up and kissed me. “No, Jon-man. I want you to always know who takes care of you.”
I kissed her back. “I haven’t forgotten. Where is this coming from?”
Ilana got off me and found her clothes. “There may come a day when you are tempted to forget. But you have allies, Jon. Ones who will die for you.”
Then, she wrapped her cloak around herself and walked away, leaving me utterly confused.
27
I spent the next morning in silence, so much so that Sarina didn’t turn to me at all as we rode together. Nor did I really want to talk to her just yet. I’d climaxed last night while thinking of her, and although it had been Ilana’s idea, the whole experience had been… weird.
Fantastic, but weird.
And yet, I still didn’t feel exactly sated, and I had to remind myself multiple times that Sarina would not welcome advances from me. She was a virgin, for fuck’s sake. And, pun’s aside, I didn’t want to have anything to do with that situation.
Okay, maybe a part of me did. But the rational side of my brain said that Sarina had been through a lot of trauma, that she was essentially my prisoner, and that I still had no idea what the fuck had happened when she’d almost shifted into a Hellhound.
To even hint at anything sexual seemed to be taking advantage at best, and wildly inappropriate at worst. So instead of talking to her, I spent the morning going through the runes in my mind, forming the movements with my hands without trying to conjure anything, until they b
ecame second nature.
Finally, though, Sarina broached the subject of the strange power that seemed to be running amok within my body.
“Jon.”
“Yes?”
“You said you don’t know how you commanded me to stop shifting into a Hellhound.”
“Right.”
“But how did you vanquish the hell-fiends?”
“I did no such thing. That was the elven magic.”
Sarina shook her head but kept her eyes on Nya riding a few horses ahead. “No,” she whispered. “That was you. When you passed out, the hell-fiends disappeared. And the rock golem fell apart.”
Frowning, I looked at her face to see if she was serious. “Why didn’t anyone say anything?”
“I’m not certain, but Jon, have you noticed how you’re always surrounded by Nya’s guard now?”
I had noticed. Sort of. I often rode with Nya, so having her guard around felt natural. But now that I thought about it, Sarina was correct.
“But if that’s the case,” I said, “then they’re worried I’ll hurt someone. And that means… shit. Those elves were crushed because of me, weren’t they? Because the elves lost control of the rock golem.”
The look in Sarina’s eyes told me all I needed to know.
Shit. Shit shit shit fucking shit.
I felt awful. No, I felt like a monster. What had I been playing at? Why had I even tried such a stupid dumbass trick with power I didn’t know anything about? And then yesterday, I had been playing with more magic, power I didn’t have the first clue about how to control if it went sideways.
“No one said anything…” I began.
“I imagine they are all worried about you.”