Wanderers 4: A Tough Act to Follow (The Wanderers)

by Richard Bamberg

  I took out my grimoire and turned to the first tattoo that I needed to restore. Tess had recently burned the same spell, but the last time I’d done this Nixon was still in the White House. I looked at the pattern for a few minutes, examining the spell’s twists and turns and realized it’d take me hours to memorize it well enough to burn it in one sitting.

  I sighed deeply.

  “What is it?” Tess asked.

  “This will take weeks if I can only memorize one spell per day. One of the purposes of the tats was so that I didn’t have to keep them memorized.”

  “So, what are you going to do?” Cris asked.

  “Tess, give me your grimoire. I’ll use the recall spell you got from Joe.”

  My apprentice grinned and dug her grimoire from a jacket pocket. I insisted we keep our leathers on while training and this was a similar situation.

  “So, the master learns from the student,” Tess smirked as she handed it over.

  “Don’t get cocky or I’ll paddle someone’s behind,” I said with a return smirk.

  “Ooh,” Cris said. “This sounds like fun.”

  Tess and I both stared at her.

  “What?”

  “I was joking,” I said.

  Cris raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Never say never.”

  She grinned coyly and I remembered her swatting my bare butt back in Huntsville. It’d been hard enough to leave a brilliant red handprint.

  “That reminds me. I think I still owe you one.”

  Her eyes widened and then she blinked enough for me to think she was batting her lashes at me.

  “I’d forgotten about that,” Cris said softly.

  “So had I. Thanks for reminding me,” I said with a wink toward Tess.

  She patted Cris’s thigh and said, “Don’t worry; he doesn’t know how to be rough.”

  “He’s a cupcake,” Cris said.

  “A puppy dog,” Tess added.

  “A warm cuddly teddy bear.”

  “A–”

  “Excuse me,” I interrupted. “I’m trying to work here. Can we save the pillow talk for the bedroom?”

  The girls eyed me and giggled together.

  “Yes, Boss. We’ll behave,” Tess said in a tone that dripped sarcasm.

  These two were going to be too much to handle.

  Clearing my throat, I said, “Show me what I seek.”

  Tess’s grimoire flipped open and turned a few pages to the remembrance spell she had gotten from Joe Leatherneck.

  “How does this one work?” I asked. It wasn’t a familiar spell and in fact I’d not let Tess use it while studying the tattoos I’d wanted her to burn in her flesh.

  “Easy peasy. Just read the spell aloud and then read it a second time. The first time means that everything for the next minute or so will become unforgettable to you. The second time will let you memorize the spell with no effort. Then you speak it once, just before studying the tattoos you want to relearn.”

  I pursed my lips. That was no way to do magic. It was too easy. Magic needed to be learned, to be mastered. Short cuts were not the way to learn.

  I sighed again. It wasn’t as if I had much choice in the matter. I needed my tats back.

  I set the book on the floor in front of me. “Okay, let’s mesh.”

  I held out my hands and they each took one.

  Tess and I meshed in seconds as we shared thoughts, auras, and emotions. For Cris to join in took a couple of minutes, but eventually she was there with us. Our breath and even our heartbeats synced. I felt their warmth, the emotions they each shared for me and I echoed them.

  “Excellent,” I said. “First step, activate the circle.

  As one, we applied power to the circle and a dome of energy snapped into place above us. Now safe from interference, we could get to work.

  I read the remembrance spell once and fell a tingle as its power activated. I read it again and there was another snap of power. I realized that the spell had done more than let me remember it. It had made this moment in my life unforgettable. I would always be able to recall this moment in time, sitting here, meshed with the two women in my life. A hundred years from now, the memory would be as fresh as now. I would always recall the gaze of these two on my face, the slight movement of their hair in the ceiling fan’s breeze. The pressure of their knees against mine, the gentle rise and fall of their breasts as they breathed together and their feelings for me. This was a moment to treasure.

  We released hands simultaneously as they realized my next step as soon as I did. They each raised a hand to help pull first my jacket and then my shirt from my shoulders. I rolled those items into a small pillow and picked up my grimoire while Tess returned hers to her jacket. They slid back to give me room and I stretched out prone between them.

  Setting my grimoire in front of my face, I said, “Show me what I seek.”

  The book flipped open to the enhanced senses tattoo I’d first burned before I turned twenty.

  I recited the remembrance spell and felt the snap of power that announced its completion. Then I concentrated on the image in front of me. In less than a minute, I could almost feel the pattern being burned into my memory.

  “This is too easy,” I said.

  I felt the amusement sweep through both girls at my statement.

  “Okay, now comes the fun part,” I said through gritted teeth.

  Focusing on a spot on my lower back that I could see through both Tess and Cris’s eyes, I steeled myself. I gathered my power and pictured the tattoo being burned into my flesh again. Then I unleashed that energy.

  Blinding, crippling pain shot through me and I knew it had been equally felt by both Tess and Cris. I held my focus for as long as I dared and then relaxed. The pain lessened in intensity. Sweat had beaded up on my forehead and run down into my eyes. My entire body was flush with heat and sweat.

  I felt Tess activate her senses tat and suddenly I could see and feel at much higher levels.

  “Gees, turn off that tattoo,” I said.

  “Sorry, I didn’t think it would affect pain,” Tess said. “Rafe, did you mean for that to happen?”

  “What happened?” But then I remembered what she’d seen in my back.

  The last time and every earlier time I had burned a tattoo, I drew it like a line through my flesh, following the pattern through its twist and turns just as if I were casting the spell without a tattoo. This time I’d burned the entire tat at once. From what I’d seen, the lines were thinner and smaller in diameter than the original one, but it was intact. Now to see if it functioned.

  My thinking about it was loud enough for both Cris and Tess to understand and realize that it hadn’t been my intention to burn the tat at once.

  “I think the difference is that remembrance spell. I’ve always pictured a tattoo in the same way you would cast the spell if you didn’t have one. You start at the beginning of the spell’s pattern and weave it into your flesh just as if you were casting it. With the remembrance spell holding the pattern completely in my memory, without thinking about it, I just burned the entire thing at once.”

  “Are they always that painful?” Cris asked.

  I shook my head. “No, I want to thank you two for sharing that with me. I can’t imagine how bad it would have been if I’d done it without your assistance with the pain.”

  “I should have thought to tell you, but I guess I’d forgot how it was the one time you weren’t around to stop me from using that spell to memorize another spell,” Tess said.

  “When you burned that temblor spell. Is that what it was like?”

  I felt Tess’s acknowledgement.

  “Do you understand now why I didn’t want you to use shortcuts?”

  “Sometimes, it’s the only way to get something done,” Tess said.

  “Like now,” Cris agreed. “You’ve already said that you’ll never get your tats back quickly enough if you don’t use it.”

  “Just because I recognize the necessity, doe
sn’t mean I like it or that I want my apprentice using it.”

  “Does it work?” Tess asked.

  I focused on the new tattoo and it glowed to life in their vision. Instantly, my senses expanded into extra visual wavelengths, a wider audio spectrum, and my nerve endings exploded once again in pain.

  “Damn!” I said, cancelling the tat’s energy and shaking myself to distract my body from the pain.

  “Ouch,” Tess said. “Yeah, it works, but don’t use it until you’re feeling better. Okay?”

  “I second that,” Cris said.

  “Sorry, ladies, but you asked if it worked.”

  “So, are you going to add another or wait until the pain from this one has faded?” Tess asked.

  I thought about how much pain I had shared with them and frowned. “No, not until it fades. I’m pretty good at ignoring pain, but this is ridiculous. Next time, I’ll do it by myself.”

  “But you said you couldn’t have completed it without our being meshed together,” Cris said.

  “The way I did it, you’re right. But I think I can still burn it the way I’ve always done it. I’ll just concentrate on following the spell’s pattern rather than picturing the entire pattern at once.”

  “You don’t have to do that, Rafe. We don’t mind the pain,” Tess said.

  “That’s both brave and kind, but they are my tattoos. I can’t ask you to share the pain with me.”

  I rolled onto my back and stared up at them.

  Simultaneously, they leaned down and kissed each side of my face. I put out my hands, cupping the back of their heads; I gripped their hair and pulled first Cris, and then Tess, to my lips in long kisses.

  When done, I released my grip on each of them and tried to sit up. Both ladies placed a hand on my bare chest and held me down.

  I felt their hot emotion passing through them and into me.

  “I was thinking of showering to get this sweat off me before we did anything else,” I said.

  They held me down a moment longer and I felt an agreement of some kind pass through them. They stood easily and then offered me hands. I took them and let them help me to my feet.

  “Let’s go check out that shower,” they said in unison.

  “Sounds like a plan,” I agreed.

  Still holding my hands, they collapsed the circle we’d erected and then pulled me toward the master bedroom. There, they turned my back to the bed and pushed me back onto it. I reached for them and they stepped back out of my reach.

  “Not yet, there’s no rush,” Cris said.

  “I’m a patient man,” I said with a leer.

  “Hah, neither of us believes that,” Tess said.

  They turned to face each other and my curiosity peaked. What were they up to?

  Cris slowly slid the zipper of Tess’s jacket down. My eyebrows went up.

  When the jacket was unzipped, Cris slid it from Tess shoulders, gathered it in one hand, and tossed it onto a chair. Today, Tess wore a simple gray tee shirt beneath her jacket. The grey was dark from sweat under the arms and around the collar. Cris pulled the tail of the tee shirt from its tucked in position, gripped both sides in her hands and slid it up Tess’s body with a slow and deliberate motion. Tess raised her arms straight up until the shirt cleared her head and then lowered them so Cris could slip the shirt past her hands. A second later, the tee shirt joined Tess’s jacket in the chair, leaving Tess bare to the waist except for her black sports bra.

  Cris stepped closer to Tess; close enough to bring their lips together in a long, passionate kiss. My pulse rate rose simultaneously with the girls’ own heartbeats. Almost unnoticed by me, I was concentrating on their kiss, Cris snaked her hands behind Tess and unfastened her bra. As the kiss broke, Cris stepped back with Tess’s bra. Tess’s nipples were erect and tantalizing. The bra joined Tess’s other clothes.

  I waited for what came next, eagerly anticipating whatever else these vixens had in store for me.

  For a moment, the ladies stared at each other while I tried not to drool. Then Tess stepped up to Cris and began unbuttoning her blouse. Her fingers moved dexterously, but also slowly and deliberately. Finally, she reached the last button, raised her hands, and drew the blouse down from Cris’s shoulders. With a snap of her wrist, Tess threw the blouse into the same chair that held her own clothes. In contrast to Tess’s sports bra, Cris had on a dainty white bralette similar to the one she’d purchased this afternoon.

  Tess stepped into Cris and repeated the other woman’s bra removal method. I had to adjust my pants.

  Both ladies, naked to the waist, stepped back from each other again. They hadn’t looked in my direction since they began their strip tease, but we were still meshed and I could feel every emotion, every sensation as their fingers and lips touched.

  Cris knelt in front of Tess and reached for the snap on her leathers. A second later, the zipper made a long sigh as it parted. Grasping the waist, Cris pulled down on the form fitting leathers, slowly revealing more of Tess’s skin and her high-cut black panties.

  As Tess lifted one foot after the other, Cris pulled the leather pants off her feet. As she stood, Cris tossed the pants in the growing pile of laundry. Once more, Cris took a single step back and waited. Tess knelt at her feet and reached for the buckle of her jeans. Repeating Cris’s actions, Tess seemed to move even slower and more delicately, as though this was some kind of contest for my benefit. Well, I certainly wasn’t objecting.

  Tess tossed Cris’s jeans with everything else, but they slid onto the floor, which I’m ashamed to say that I noticed. Rather than standing, Tess clutched Cris’s tiny silk panties and drew them down her thighs with a motion that bordered on glacial in its slowness. This revealed the small, heart-shaped patch of trimmed fur that I’d worshipped last night. As the panties passed the midpoint of Cris’s thighs, Tess placed a soft kiss, just beneath the junction of those beautiful legs. Cris placed a hand on Tess’s head for balance when the panties reached her ankles and lifted each foot in turn to let Tess pull the silk past Cris’s toes.

  I was almost choking on my own saliva by this point.

  As Tess stood, she tossed the panties, not toward the chair, but toward me. I sat still for a moment, my vision blocked by musk scented silk. Then I raised my hand and slowly dragged the panties down my face, revealing the two women still facing each other, still ignoring my presence.

  Cris slowly dropped to her knees in front of Tess. For a long moment, she stared upwards into Tess’s face, and then she gripped the sides of Tess’s panties and pulled them, millimeter by millimeter, toward the earth. Tess’s own well-trimmed pubic came into view and as it did, Cris leaned forward and placed a long kiss just above the junction of Tess’s thighs.

  I swallowed hard and had to force myself to remain sitting. The emotions swirling through the three of us were pounding my heart against my ribcage as if it were an animal trying to escape.

  I blinked as another pair of panties landed on my face.

  Before I could remove them, hands pushed me back, flat onto the bed. Fingers played at my waist and I felt my zipper sliding past the bulge in my shorts. A moment later, I had to grip the covers as my leathers were yanked down, past my knees, past my ankles.

  The tent in my shorts was painful, but it was a joyous pain.

  These two naked temptresses were going to give this old man a stroke.

  I tried to rise as my shorts disappeared from view, but they each placed a hand on my chest and held me prone. I reached for them, but they moved their hands from my chest to my arms, keeping them where they were.

  Just as I thought I could take it no longer, they finally looked at me. Their eyes were filled with the same lust that surged through my veins.

  Their grips shifted and they pulled me from the bed, backing toward the bathroom, dragging their willing victim behind them.

  Chapter 35

  raphael

  I awoke to a dark unfamiliar room, not an unusual thing in my life. I felt n
aked sweaty flesh sticking hotly to either side of me and damp sheets beneath me. The pleasures of the evening came back to me. They brought a smile to my lips and a swelling in my loins. I was spooned against one body, my erection poking someone’s cheeks, while generous breasts pressed into my back. It took several seconds to understand what had awakened me and even then, my mind wanted to ignore it and slake my lust once again. I cupped a perfect breast in my palm and my fingers gently toyed with a nipple that grew rigid immediately.

  I heard a low growl and it took me a second to realize it was Bruno. I looked toward the sound. He was on the window ledge and his mouth was glowing red. What was bothering the little wyvern?

  Then I felt the warning ping against my wards.

  Frak! Could we not find a place where these foes could not find us?

  I shook both girls and tried to sit up.

  “Hmmm? Already? Gees, Rafe, having two women doesn’t wear you out?” Cris asked as she pressed her backside into my erection.

  “Get up, both of you. We have company,” I said as I squeezed out from the nicest prison of flesh I’d ever been trapped in.

  “What?” Tess said while tossing covers to the side and swinging her feet to the pine floor.

  “Company,” I repeated. “Something serious, pull on some clothes and be ready to shield. Cris, you stay between us so our shields will cover you.”

  I hadn’t gotten back to burning tats last night, someone distracted me, and I was afraid I was going to regret that oversight. At least I had my old Omega watch with the shield spell etched in its case.

  There was a flurry of motion as both women ran for the chair where they’d discarded their clothing. I triggered my enhanced senses tat and in the dark room, spotted my leather pants. I retrieved them and then tried to get both feet in at the same time. It’s not that easy if you can’t levitate. I fell back onto the bed, raised my feet into the air, and slid the leather up my legs.

  There came a thud that shook the log walls of the cabin and dust drifted down from the ceiling. The ward we’d placed on the cabin flexed with some kind of blow for a second time.