Beyond me stretched a grassy plain and large lake. Purple mountains rose in the distance and animals I’d never seen before grazed together on the lush grass. I walked forward on bare feet, Teagan’s body limp in my arms.
Ahead of me, the purple lady beckoned, “Place her in the water, and I will explain while she rests and heals.”
This new faith bid me do as she said. I knew her. How I did not know, but I did. I walked forward into the water until warm water surrounded us.
“Join Thalakar,” she said, turning to Lyros and Syl’ta.
“How do you know us?” Syl’ta demanded.
“Stop, Syl’ta. You’ve done enough for one day,” Lyros snapped at Syl. They stood facing one another with a threat of violence between them. I did not know who this woman was, but violence was what brought us here, and I feared it would also get us expelled.
“Stop. Both of you,” I said. “Come into the water.” I looked around as it turned pink with blood and hoped the lady did not lie. Teagan felt dead in my arms. She did not move, and if she breathed, I could not tell.
My brothers took in the scene before them and silently joined me, surrounding the wounded warrior in my arms. Syl’ta cupped water over the parts of her that were exposed, and we watched as bloody water ran in rivulets through the channels of her marked, naked skin. We watched as it slowly knit together.
The silver lady stood on the bank watching us. Her gown moved about her in a way that made it look like mist and not fabric at all. “Lyrolas, Syl’ta, and Thalakar, you may call me Dani. I am friend to Teagan and Mother to you all. Look into your hearts and feel the truth of my words.”
We did. Warm water embraced us while a soft, sweet breeze surrounded us, and I knew we were home. I opened my eyes and saw her smiling at me.
“I don’t believe you,” Lyros said.
Of course, he did.
“Lyros, shut up,” I demanded.
“Lyros,” the little woman said. “All your life, you have felt split in two. You’ve been disjointed and disconnected; have you not? You have felt as if you were missing a piece of your soul.” She turned her lovely gaze to my brother, and when he shrank under it, I knew she spoke the truth.
“How did you know?” he whispered, not with reverence but with fear.
“Because I made you.” She snapped her fingers and where a man once stood a wolf swam. It was the biggest wolf I ever saw. His fur was white, and Lyros’s gray eyes looked from his face. I cried out and shielded Teagan from the beast that ate my brother and stole his eyes.
“Come,” Dani walked forward, and the wolf went to her side, sitting at her heel. He was so large his head matched hers, and they looked eye to eye.
Something passed between them, and the wolf whined then lay down, crying into his paws. I looked down at Teagan, and her lovely amber eyes were open. A soft smile lit her face, and I leaned down to kiss her lips. She opened her mouth, kissing me back.
I had never kissed. Slaves are not allowed to touch a warrior's lips with theirs. Only women can share that intimacy. Something came over me, and I kissed her harder. She responded, opening my mouth with her tongue and letting it dance with mine. I never danced before either, but it was wonderous, and I let it build.
A chuckle caused me to break the kiss, and I looked up to see Dani standing there watching with a twinkle in her eye. My arms dropped, and Teagan rolled from me to dive under the water and swim away like a sea creature.
“You’re a Goddess,” I said, feeling the truth of the answer settle in my soul.
“I’m The Goddess, dear, but don’t get caught up in semantics. And call me Dani. I insist,” she said, watching Teagan float and heal in the waters beyond us.
Her bloody marks were gone, leaving bumpy, raised scars. I hoped they would heal too, as I hated for her to bear any mark brought on by our behavior. The wolf watched her swim as well, and I saw the sentience in his eyes. I watched as the wolf wondered off, sniffing everything.
I eased out of the water, giving the Goddess a wide berth. Syl followed, using me as a shield.
“You need not fear me,” Dani said, turning to face us once we were clear of the lake’s shore. “Had your people not forgotten me millennia ago, Lyros would have been changing his form since childhood. Kharis let you forget me so that she could be unrivaled. You know nothing else. Feel the power in the land. Let it make you free men.
Syl’ta cried out, dropping to his knees. I turned and watched in horror as blue flames licked over his tattoos, racing from his feet upward until they consumed him. From the fire came a silver fox, and I could not help but cry out in fear. I stumbled back against the Goddess and bounced forward to the silver fox with blue eyes and a black streak down its back.
“You are not a fox, Kar, and you are not a wolf,” said The Goddess, taking a step toward me. I watched the fox run to the wolf, and together they rolled and played across the deep grass of the meadow. I backed up a step. Her power rolled over me, and I dropped to my knees. Frozen in place, I watched as she walked to me. “Your power goes deeper than that, had your people embraced who they are from the beginning, you would have moved mountains and built a paradise. Someday you will rebuild your kingdom into something new, something better.”
I cried out as golden flames took me and molten, red, liquid raced up my body. The ground trembled under me and liquified. I fought to rise, only to be pulled deeper into it. Struggling made it worse, and quickly I was buried alive.
I fought to breathe and dig my way up. Above me, excited yips and a long, low howl rent the silence, and I tried harder to reach them. Warmth spread through my limbs, and I felt the earth surround me in a soothing embrace, and I stilled.
All my life, I’d been a prisoner. All my life, I had been a slave. The energy that surrounded me began to move through me, and I calmed, breathing in to fill my lungs. I breathed in deeply again and moved to straighten my limbs. As Teagan moved through the water like a sea creature, I swam through the earth. Never had I felt freer.
I felt sentience in the power around me, and I let it mark me however it wanted. I know my brothers care for me, but this feeling? This thing I felt? I didn’t know it existed.
Without Teagan, it wouldn’t have been possible.
Power coursed through me, and I accepted it; it equalized and balanced. I pushed off the ground below me, and the earth parted. I surfaced reborn. I never knew my mother, only Syl’ta did. I knew my mother now; she was the ground beneath my feet and the power that moved my limbs. She was the breeze that ruffled my hair and the sun that lit my face. And I knew her.
“Teagan will never again feel the bite of Cold Iron, and you will forever have the power of your mother in your soul. Lyros is whole as he should have been from the beginning, and Syl’ta will move silent as air through your enemies,” The Goddess said when I regained my ability to hear. Her look was the steel upon which battle plans are made. I stood naked before her, as the earth had stripped me of everything.
Teagan walked from the water like a slow, happy dream. Water streamed down her perfect skin, and her tattoos flashed silver. She shook her head, causing her curls to plump again as the water flew off. Peaked, light brown nipples pebbled at the change in temperature. She was healed. “Thank you, Dani,” she said, kneeling before the little Goddess.
“You take a beating that would have killed any other and thank me, Teagan. The world will bow to you someday,” she said, resting her hand on Teagan’s wild curls.
“I don’t want the world to bow to me, Dani. I want Eregion to stand with me.” Teagan rose, tilting her head back so that the warm sun fully hit her face.
“And that is why you are destiny, Teagan. That is why.” The Goddess turned and was gone. Not walking away, simply no longer there.
I turned to catch Teagan sinking to the ground. She stretched her limbs and let the sun warm her naked skin. I drank her in. Long lashes kissed her cheeks, and her chest rose and fell slowly, showing the faint curve of her rib a
s she breathed. Short, dark curls framed the dip of her sex between the curves of her hips and strong, muscular legs extended to pointed toes. She looked utterly relaxed and lethal as a blade lying there.
My cock stirred, and I looked down, stunned. I couldn’t remember the last time my cock had risen of its own accord. Usually, I had to manipulate it. Yet now, it bounced against my stomach, and I stared at it in prepubescent wonder. I looked up and caught Teagan staring wide-eyed but unashamedly.
The bar all male slaves are given at the onset of adulthood still pierced my cock front to back. The earth had not taken my nipple rings either, and I wondered what she thought of them. She smiled in what I hoped was an invitation, and I went to her.
I lay down, stretching my body alongside hers. She was hot. Her warm skin sizzled against mine, not in the way of illness, but in a manner I didn’t fully understand. She rolled to me, feeling so perfect tucked into my arms. Until that moment, I hadn’t appreciated how good a woman could feel. Trained to give pleasure, that one small movement of her flesh pressed against mine gave me more joy than anything had.
The wolf and the fox came, sniffing at us. Lyros let out a soft whine, and I shooed him away. Let him be a man again and say his piece. Otherwise, I was ignoring him.
She tilted her lips, and I kissed her. Her hot tongue melded with mine, and her hands roamed my body. Her light touches tentative and exploring, and I worried. No female moved this way. I pulled from her and watched her face.
“What?” she said, trailing her fingers over the muscles in my chest and stopping at my nipple rings to slide her fingers over them. “Do these hurt? If they do, take them out,” she said, her voice more breath than sound.
“They do not hurt, Mistress,” I answered, clutching her hands in mine. “Have you…?” I asked, uncertain about how to finish the question.
“I’m not your Mistress, Thalakar. We are equals,” she said, flashing her amber eyes at me even as her chin sunk deeper into my chest.
“My Lady, even in another land, we would not be equal. You are a Goddess,” I said, with a soft chuckle, adding a nuzzle to the top of her head.
“You’ve met The Goddess,” she countered. “I am no Goddess.” She slid her hands from mine and began her gentle perusal of my flesh. “You’re so beautiful,” she said, and I couldn’t help but bark a laugh.
“Me? I am beautiful? The sun doesn’t shine if your face is hidden, My Lady. Now answer the question.” Taking one hand, I tilted her chin upward to see her eyes better.
“No, I have not. I will not go to some female warrior to train for this. I will not. It’s not my way. You will train me if training is needed, Kar,” she said, bringing her lips to mine more firmly this time.
“Teagan. It’s forbidden.”
It was her turn to bark out a laugh. She tilted her head back and howled with laughter until she had to stop and catch her breath. “Thalakar, look around you. You are in The Goddess’s paradise, she gave you the power of the earth, and you are holding a magically healed woman in your arms whilst a fox and wolf who were once men stalk us. Yet, you claim taking my virginity is forbidden?” She reached up and wiped away the little tears laughter causes.
I turned her to her back, and she inhaled sharply. “Perhaps you’re right,” I snarled at her neck.
In this land, I was a free man. In this land, I could do as I wished, and I very much wanted to sink my cock into the yielding warrior beneath me. “My piercing might hurt you,” I said, giving her one last opportunity to turn me away.
“Does that steel rod please you?” she asked, and the look of pure innocence on her face melted the last of the wall around my heart.
“It does,” I whispered, watching her face in wonder.
“Then wield it expertly,” she said, trailing her tongue down my neck.
I bent to kiss her again, letting it build. She tasted sweet. We are rarely allowed dessert; to my limited knowledge, she tasted like cherries and fresh cream. It was a fight to pull my mouth from hers, and when I did, she groaned.
Trailing kisses down her neck and up again, I latched on to her earlobe and pulled it lightly. Her breath hitched and back arched. Even that small thing was new to her, and I wondered how she got so far in life with so little experience. I vowed to give her my best.
I slid my fingertips in the lightest touch possible down her sides so that gooseflesh raised and her nipples pulled impossibly tight. While I explored her body with my hand, I kissed across her collarbones and down the vee between her breasts, purposefully avoiding them. I raised her arms over her head, bringing kisses to the forgotten flesh under them, and she cried out.
Behind us, the fox yipped and growled, and I chuckled. Raising my hand, I pushed out power the Mother had given me, sending the fox rolling with a yip.
Teagan said at the ceremony that she would take Syl’ta first. She said it out of bravado and the need to say something to the Queen, who suggested she use me as I was bland and boring but pleasingly silent.
I was neither bland nor boring; I just never cared before. I did the minimum required to avoid punishment. Pleasing women who cared for nothing was like banging your head against the wall to create change. The exercise was futile and only earned you a headache.
Teagan’s body under mine did things to me I didn’t understand and made me feel something for which I had no reference. I wanted nothing more than to please her, and that feeling turned the slave into a man.
I nuzzled her breast with the side of my face before latching onto her nipple and sucking the hard peak, pulling it tight, only to let it go and grab it again. She cried out, grabbing the top of my head. “I can’t,” she said, “It’s too much,” she whimpered.
“Oh, Teagan. Teagan,” I purred. “If you can still speak, it’s not nearly enough. When I’m through, you will have no voice. Hush now.” I silenced her with a kiss and thrilled when she went still under me.
I went to her other breast and pulled the nipple into my teeth, biting hard, but not too hard. There’s a line between pleasure and pain, how well we slaves know it. I toed the line with her, sucking and biting her nipples until she whimpered. I kept her arms pulled over her head and only let them go so that I could dip my hand between her legs and flick that tender bud until she begged me to stop, bucking her hips. She clutched my arms, trying to pull me from her and failing.
She scratched me with kitten claws, pulling at my hair to try to dislodge my mouth from her nipple, then, with a sigh, she went limp. I slid my fingers up her bud, and a shiver went through her. I dipped my finger in the wetness pooling under her, using it to trace the tender skin around her opening then moved a circle back up to the bud. I completed the loop multiple times until it was hard, and she shook against me. Her eyes opened and locked onto mine.
She came, her amber eyes flaring wide and fluttering closed. A scream ripped from her, and she rose her hips to meet my hand. I plunged first one finger, then two into her and slid them in and out, making her cries sharper and more frantic. Sweat beaded on her forehead, and her eyes rolled back as the last of the orgasm clenched my fingers so tightly only wetness allowed them to move. I slipped in a third finger. Her body lost all tone, and her arms went to her sides. Her breathing shuddered before evening out.
It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. She was so fierce in her ways and so innocent in pleasure. Her face was an open book, and I had never seen anything more lovely.
All slaves are built for pleasure. Men who do not develop ample cocks are sent back to the villages. You can teach the tongue, but the cock must be grown. I wanted her ready and needed her wet and open, or mine would cause her pain.
The piercing at the tip gave intense pleasure, but if not ready, it would just hurt. Kissing a line down her belly, I spread her limp legs wide enough to accommodate my body. I ran my tongue along the same path my finger traced earlier. Like a livewire, she moved. Her body tightened around me, legs coming over my back on instinct. I smiled into her sw
eetness, sucking her bud with varying pressure. I lapped at it with my tongue until her heels came to my head, holding me tight to her.
I applied pressure to her core with my thumb, freezing her orgasm at its apex, and shifted my position to cover her. I angled my cock and slid into her wet heat in one long, smooth stroke, releasing her core as I went. She screamed when I breached her, and again when the bar hit her deepest parts. She begged me to stop. She said she was dying.
One cannot die from pleasure; I know that.
I did not stop. I pulled out and pushed back in. Her back curled in fixed ecstasy, her mouth froze in a wide O. The orgasm I held off took her, and she clamped around me with the strength of a fist, and I let out a startled umph.
Bringing my lips to hers, I kissed her mouth. She tangled her hands in my hair and clawed at the back of my head, kissing me hard and deep. I moved in her with inspiration, and her hips met mine in hard slaps.
She tangled her feet around my calves and held on as I gave her every pleasure I knew. I shifted her hips under me, grabbing a handful of her ass cheeks and forcing my piercing onto the spot that makes a woman see into forever. I used my cock to teach her what that spot was meant for.
When she cried out again, her voice hoarse from her passion, I covered her mouth. Of everything I have ever done to a woman, kissing is the most intimate. Your eyes can see into them, and your every breath is theirs. Her tongue fit mine to perfection and her lovely cries filled the empty places in my soul.
So tight was she around my cock that the piercing pulled me taut, causing intense pleasure. It rolled down my spine, and my balls tightened to my body in anticipation. I held off, bringing her one more time before I allowed myself release.
A slave must remove his cock and spend his seed anywhere but inside his mistress unless she asks specifically for it. As a new man, I plunged deep inside Teagan and claimed her as mine, bathing her womb with the result of the most intense orgasm I have known.
It was a first for both of us.
Placing my forehead on hers, I fought to catch my breath and bring my heart back to a regular rhythm. I kissed along Teagan’s jaw and cheeks, finding her mouth again. She sighed under me, holding my eyes with hers. She smiled, slow and sated, and I knew I had not lied to her earlier. She looked well and truly pleased.
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