“There is no way you are telling me this for no reason.”
“You are correct, human, and I am not even telling you much of what is happening. Just enough to motivate you in the direction I need. The most important thing you should realize is that immortality is leading to the downfall of my species. I and the Controller must stop it.”
“What do you mean?”
“My people have become bored, lazy, and entitled. The lower castes live forever, but they have no way of advancing in a society where no one dies. We do not have young to cultivate, we no longer expand enough to create new opportunities. We have stagnated. The purpose behind my people coming to this world is entertainment.”
“So, you're telling me we are just a game to you?”
“Yes. Or so the ruling council believes, it's a way to weed out the most discontent and give them purpose. They will not age in this world, but they can be killed, which also eliminates the problem as far as the council cares.”
I seethed at the information, but I was powerless here against this… thing.
“So, I guess that you need me to do something for you?”
“Astute human, yes,” Vex said dryly. “I need you to be the instrument of your people's salvation. I want you to kill my people who come here, to deter this experiment from expanding to other worlds just like it.”
“How am I supposed to kill one of these Demigods? They are too strong for even the super powered women here to deal with.”
“Because I have made you just like them.”
“You what?”
“Made you one of them. You have the same powers they do. Actually, you have more power than they do. My benefactor has created a special ability, a blessing if you will, just for you to give you an advantage over my people here.”
This was all coming at me too fast. I was having problems processing the information. “Wait… so you're telling me I need to enslave women to fight them?”
“I am not telling you how to do anything. You already have one of them bound to you, add as many or as few as you like. The more you have, the more power you wield.”
“Oh God, Tyla?” I said, fear shooting through my body.
“She accepted the terms and bound herself to you by choice. You did not even manipulate her into it like Seir does his own slaves. She accepted freely.”
“How can I release her?”
“You can't. Not without killing her. Well, there is another way, but I will get to that later.”
My body slumped against the cold concrete floor of the room. I felt rotten inside. I just bound someone to my will, going against everything that I believed in.
“I must go soon, the power you generated in your copulation will soon run out and I cannot inject my own. It will be up to you to figure out the powers you have, but I can tell you briefly what you are now capable of, and the extra blessings my benefactor has given.”
Unable to speak, shame filling me from top to bottom, I listened to what this bastard told me.
I woke up slowly, briefly forgetting the dreams I had. I was warm, and I wrapped my arms around Tyla. Her breasts pressing against my chest, her leg draped over me in the bedroll we shared.
For a minute, all was perfect, and I was content.
Then, the memories of my talk with the alien asshole came back to me and my eyes shot open.
The first thing I noticed was a blue glow coming off Tyla. It was very subtle, but it radiated out like a halo just over her skin. Something I knew only I could see. A gift, but one I would gladly return if I could.
She was smiling in her sleep, a whisper of a snore escaping as she breathed in and out. Her hair was a mess, tangled from our sweaty lovemaking the night before.
Rather than wake her, though, I just watched her sleep as I processed my inner turmoil.
What should I do?
I should release her… but she may not accept the cost that comes with something like that. I can only offer escape. I can't force anyone to take it.
I can feel the new power we shared coursing through my veins. It was like a current that I can tap into at will now. I need to know how it works.
I am not sure how long we stayed like that, but eventually the blue glow disappeared, and her eyes fluttered awake. When they opened, she spotted me and smiled up at me. Her deep brown eyes showed nothing but happiness.
“Hello my love,” she said.
“Wh… what?”
“What's wrong?” Her smile disappeared and her face became concerned.
“Uh, why did you call me that?”
“What?” she said, confused for a second. “My love? I am… not sure, it just felt right.”
“Do you remember what happened last night?”
“I do, and it was wonderful… Wait, do you regret what happened?”
“I… No, but yes. Do you remember at the end, did anything happen?”
“You mean the offer?” Her eyes blinked a few times. “It was the strangest thing, I was… riding the pleasure you gave me, when I felt a question shoot into my mind, almost as if I could read the words in front of my face. It asked me if I would be yours. I accepted it, then the pleasure exploded inside me more than anything I had ever felt before.”
I sighed. “I need to tell you something and I don't know how you are going to take it. They tricked you.”
“Who did?” She asked.
I went over my conversation with Vex. Everything he told me, but rather than be upset or angry, she seemed calm and accepting through the whole thing.
Finally, when I finished, she spoke. “It's okay. Oddly, I do not feel any different… or that this is a bad thing.”
“How can you say that? They… I… we took away your free will. Wait, it's the… geas or control magic or whatever, you probably can't control it. I am going to put my hand on your forehead, please do not resist me.”
She nodded.
I did what Vex had told me about, focusing on my ability to release her.
Her face contorted in pain from my touch. “It… it really hurts.”
“I know, and I am so sorry. Just try to hold on for a few minutes. If this is working right, it should disrupt the hold I have over you temporarily. I can offer you your freedom from my control, but there is a catch. You will lose your power and become a normal human again. Please, consider this… I don't want you to be a slave because of my poor decisions,” I said, almost pleading.
She shook her head; the pain obviously became unbearable. “No, I will… stick by… my choice. I will be yours. Please, stop.”
Releasing the disruption, I sighed. I had failed. Vex told me you only had one shot to release someone from the geas, and if they did not take it. “I am so sorry, Tyla. I—”
I couldn't speak anymore, just laying on my back, head now on the floor and closed my eyes. Not sure what to do next.
A few moments later, Tyla recovered from the pain. She climbed on top of me, her legs straddling the sides of my chest, still naked. She gazed down into my eyes. “Don't do this to yourself, it was my choice. I may not have known exactly what I chose at the moment, but I am not angry that it did. Even when you… disrupted this connection between us, I felt my place was with you. This way, they can never turn me into one of Seir's servants. I know you will always keep me safe. I felt it when we connected last night.”
I almost argued with her. I wanted to tell her the difference between love and lust. What may have been a survival instinct that cried out she needed protection, or a thousand other things people convinced themselves it was love. But none of it mattered anymore. She may have made the choice, but I still enslaved someone to me.
Even if she had a point about her being safe from anyone else doing the same.
Noticing my hesitation, she reached down and pulled my face so that we were again making eye contact. “Derrick, this is my choice. I want this.” She said, her words almost forceful.
“I… understand. Give me some time to process this, though.
Okay?”
She nodded and leaned forward, kissing me briefly on the lips, then shifted so she was laying down cuddled up against my side.
I was going to have to live with this, but I promised myself that I would treat her with the respect and dignity she deserved, although she would probably do anything I asked of her.
14
Power
Tyla, deciding she was not having any of my poor mood, experimented on me using her mouth to cheer me up.
I must admit; it worked. She was not the most skilled, but she made up for it with an enthusiasm that spoke to the Neanderthal DNA in my nature.
“How do you feel?” Tyla asked after getting dressed.
“Better… but I'll be honest, free will is important to me. I spent years with a personal vendetta against manipulating assholes and I hate that I became one… even unintentionally.”
“Derrick,” she said, “If not for you, I would have been captured and enslaved against my will. Not to mention what those men would have done to me before that. I have felt freer with you running through the forest with no food than I ever was in my mother's estate where I lived in a gilded cage.”
She came over to me and encircled me with her arms, looking up at me with a smile.
“I'll… get over this eventually,” I said. “Just might take a while.”
Tyla lifted on her tiptoes and kissed me on the lips. “Good.”
“Alright, let's clean up. I figure we can spend a day here training before it's time we head to civilization and stock up. Stay in a city or town if we can, run if we need to. First, I am itching to try out these powers I have.”
Tyla nodded. “I have never felt so much power flow through me before… I may now know why Au— I must remember she is not my aunt anymore. Why Josephina may have sought out Seir. This is almost… no it is addicting, like it rewards me with serving you in any way you desire.”
I felt odd at her statement and ignored it for now. Instead, we cleaned up and moved over to the empty hot tub looking hole in the ground. “Vex did not explain how to do this, just what it was. Can you tell me how it works?”
Tyla walked up next to me, putting her hand out in front of her. “There are two types of water magic, as they have taught me in the academy, the internal and then external.”
I nodded. “Is there a difference in how they work?”
“No, not really, at least not with water. I can’t say about the other types. I was always good with the finesse, not the brute strength, so I could easily use the already high concentrations of water inside the body. It was much harder to get the water in the air to do my bidding. However, with this newfound energy I feel… let me try it.”
She closed her eyes and put her palm over the hole. Soon, water appeared to pour from her hand into the bottom like a faucet. It was only about an inch wide, but she held it for several minutes before stopping.
I caught her before she fell. “You alright?”
“Hmm?” she shook her head. “I mean yes, I just… exhausted myself. That was probably ten times what I could have done last night if I were to guess. I can actually feel myself recharging already, much faster than before.”
I closed my eyes. “Yes, I can feel the small drain of power going from my core into you. Minor, but it is there.”
“We should be careful in the future then, until we can study how much you have to give.”
“Vex wasn't specific, but he said it increases with each of those who… bond to me. Though I don't plan on adding anyone to test it.”
“Derrick, you should really reconsider. While a man with multiple women is taboo in this world, I would be fine with it, especially if it leads to you getting stronger.”
“No promises, it's not that I am against multiple women… Where I came from, everyone talked about being monogamous, but most wanted multiple partners, at least in secret. My problem is with the cost that comes with it, to those that would join. I cannot see myself letting someone make that choice to be a slave to my whims.”
“I understand, just… keep an open mind to the possibility.”
Rather than answer, I changed the subject, “So tell me what to do to make water shoot out of my hand.”
She shot me a look but let me have my way.
“Let's first start with the water in your body, it's easier to start with and you can heal yourself if you need to with it. Then you can learn to manipulate it in others, and we can worry about the water in the air later.”
I shrugged, “Fair, is that how they taught you?”
“Yes, I am actually excited that I have the power to use what I have been struggling with in school.” She smiled at that last bit.
“What do I do first?”
“Let’s sit down, touching my knees to yours first.”
I sat, crossing my legs like I did as a school kid so many years ago. Our knees touched, and we smiled at each other.
“Close your eyes,” Tyla said. “First, I am going to push my power into you, and I want you to sense it, see how I use it to move through your body. Do not do anything yet. Just sense, we do not want you to accidentally create a blood clot or something. But this will allow you to see inside yourself using the water magic.
I felt it as the tingling returned to my body. Unlike before, I could tell what she was doing with it rather than just a general sense of it being present. I followed her power as she moved it up my arm and into my chest. She slowly made her way down my stomach and then to my…
“Whoa, there,” I said, opening my eyes in shock.
She was looking at me with an enormous smile on her face.
“Sorry, I couldn't help it,”
“Where did this girl come from?” I laughed. “Funny, but let's do some training first. We have time for the rest after.”
She nodded with a smirk, “Sorry, I don't know if it was because it was my first with a man or what you flooded me with, but… I cannot stop thinking inappropriate thoughts. I will try to focus.”
We closed our eyes again. This time she did not use her senses to feel me up, but I promised myself to return that favor as soon as I figured out how.
“Now focus here on this blood vessel in your foot. I want you to use your own senses to bring it into your mind's eye. It could take a while, but this is where we shall start. It is just a minor part in your extremity, easily fixed if we should mess up.”
I nodded and focused, letting my mind wander into the sensation. After several minutes of trying, I seemed no closer than I was before.
“This took me a week to master this exercise when I first started,” Tyla said. “Do not let frustration slow you down, it takes as long as it takes.”
I took a deep breath and settled in for the long haul.
“Are you ready to go?” I asked, putting the bag on my back and tugging onto the straps.
“I am. How is your arm?”
I sighed, grabbing the bridge of my nose. “You could have warned me before you cut me, you know.”
She laughed. “Then you would have over-thought it. Half of our magic is the ability to do it without thinking. Besides, it was just a minor scratch with a knife.”
“You call that a scratch? Fine, but it still sucked. On Earth, that would have needed stitches at the minimum.”
“You did very well. I am astonished at your speed of learning. You did in a day what I took weeks to learn.”
“Honestly, I think our connection is giving me more than just access to your power, it's like the connection between us is… building.”
“Yes, I can't explain it either. I can almost sense you… feel you when I am not looking.”
“Well, we are pretty much stuck with each other now.” I reached over and grabbed her in a hug. “Thank you for being so understanding.”
We kissed, and it started building.
“You are going to make me take off your clothes again if you don't stop.” She said when we came up for air.
“Mmm, you're right, thi
s is worse than the last time I was in my early twenties. Let's hike, it will give us something to look forward to when we camp next.”
I spent the entire day yesterday practicing my newfound magical skills… and other things of a more intimate nature with Tyla. I finally figured out how to push the cells in the affected parts of my body to heal faster.
It wasn't quite my idea of magical healing. Things did not just glow and then heal like a video game. However, being able to heal a cut to perfect skin in ten minutes was better than several weeks of natural healing.
The water molecules themselves did not really heal the wound, but because water made up every cell, I could… convince it to return to the way it was before the damage.
Honestly, it made little sense to me either. It really was me focusing enough to tell the cells to go back to their former location and shape, and they somehow did.
“So, does a water… mage?” I said, looking at her in question as we walked towards the cave exit.
She shook her head. “Since you are the first man… Well, you are a Demigod, but let us not tell anyone that just yet. Those with magic are women, so they are all Chosen, not mages. I am not sure what we would call you if that term would not apply without saying Demigod. The Chosen are classified by training and power. It goes Apprentice, which is where I was before you… filled me up.” She said and smirked at me. “Then initiate, adept, lady, mistress, and finally matriarch. Though the commoners tend to just call us all witches. Most Chosen consider it a derogatory term and some of them will beat a commoner for saying it in their presence.”
I rolled my eyes at her joke. “I heard what you said there. Anyway, does a water mage, and yes, that's what I am going to call it, live forever? It seems my skin is the same as it was before the cut. The color even matches.”
“We can live longer, and others seek us for age rejuvenation and can actually make a lot of coin doing that. But we are not immortal like the gods, or even ageless mortals like the Demigods. My grandmother, the former Matriarch of Blackrun before my mother, she was also strong in the water element, lived to be one hundred and forty before she died. She looked much younger than that, but even the magic fails, eventually.”
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