Authors: Jill Soffalot
Chapter Eight: Sharing The Wealth
Herrik waited for an interminable stretch of time after desperately searching his cell for a means of escape. The light in the dungeon was dim, but not so unclear that he was left in any doubt about his situation.
He was fucked.
His room was five-by-ten feet, with no light save for the meager glint of a single candle that sputtered ominously in the hall outside his cell. He had tried calling through the thin partition in the heavy oak door when he first woke, but all he received for his efforts was a hoarse throat. The cold in the air was lethal, and the only sound he could hear were the distant wails of the Bower women and their golden guests.
There was no way for him to know whether Andrax was safe. Perhaps he had left Shadehaven when he learned the abominable truth, slipping through the weave before he, too, was overcome. Herrik had faith in his master, but today there were things in the forest that would threaten the sanity of any man or Fay. A thousand disturbing possibilities filled his head, and Herrik’s dread was compounded by the awful truth that no horrifying scenario he imagined was beyond the possible.
Andrax did have Nightgift, a singular animal that seemed to intuit the Overseer’s every demand. The beast was touched by Fay magic, and he could ride for hours without water or rest. Thinking about Nightgift reminded Herrik of the ill-fated Mistsong and the debased Dunder twins, and he closed his eyes to drive back the searing image of Oxell Dunder’s brutish fingers crawling toward Mistsong’s mound. Minutes stretched into hours, and he slept fitfully in the corner of his cell with his arms wrapped tightly around his shivering frame. The somber howl of a dog erupted from somewhere in the castle as he quivered. He was dreaming about baby wood elves with outsized hands and horse’s heads when the door unlocked.
Herrik scurried to the back of the cell when Trixie Bower sauntered into the room with an emerald rapier held before her. The blonde hair and sharp features of the Bowers distinguished them from other Fay. There was outlander blood in their line, and many Shadehaven residents (not a few of which were resentful of the Bower wealth and envious of their high golden walls) muttered that they were gutter Fay with pretensions of superiority. Her green eyes were laced with withering contempt as she studied him, as if his naked body was beneath the honor of her regard.
“You have betrayed us all, Bower. You should be ashamed to call yourself Fay,” he blurted out, the words tasting small and brittle as they passed his lips.
“You think we are alike, forest man?” Trixie Bower giggled as she pressed the point against Herrik’s chest, pricking the skin beneath his nipple till a thin teardrop formed. “I hold the power of life and death in my hand and you think to insult me? Tsk tsk.” She slipped the blade to his crotch and tickled his scrotum, the steel caressing his shriveled cock. “The only thing we have in common is the sinful red that flows in our veins. Don’t make me prove it.”
“Please, you cannot do this! Rorke Bower was a reasonable man, a just man. He shared his wealth with all Fay in Shadehaven.”
“That was grandfather’s great flaw. He tried to assimilate with you lesser Fay, did business with you, put coin in your tattered pockets. Well, not yours, of course.” She flicked the flat of the blade against his exposed ass, and he doubled over in pain.
“Your grandfather…he…loved you…he cared only for your safety and your future…”
Trixie kicked him square in the cock, sending a lance of fire through his groin. Biting back a hot stream of rising bile, Herrik barely had time to flinch before Trixie had the blade against his throat, “Mind your filthy tongue, maggot! You know less than nothing about Rorke Bower and his boundless love. The mighty Bower patriarch was not quite the paragon you envisage. We were not the ones who dismissed his household guard and banished every other soul within these walls. He feared for our maidenhoods and hid us from the world, as if the joys of the flesh were something to conceal and deny. Thank the Moonmother for the tutor.”
“The tutor?” coughed Herrik, as he spit blood onto the stone floor.
“Rorke Bower’s most delicious mistake. He hired the woman to teach us etiquette and the craft of femininity, but she showed us much, much more. She taught us the ancient language of the flesh, revealed the power of the woken cunt. She offered us rapture, in exchange for her use of the castle. When she showed us the treats in store for faithful service, we accepted with relish. The desire our Grandfather had tried so hard to bury was unleashed, and I came when I opened him with this blade.”
She is mad
thought Herrik, but doubted whether that was a wise choice of argument. “Is this teacher behind this? Why would she want to tear down Shadehaven?”
“You are quite nosy, wood elf? She is gone to collect your precious Overseer even as we speak. And she has chosen a most wonderful disguise…”
“Andrax?” asked Herrik incredulously. Then he realized.
This teacher must be the Dark Lady who haunts Andrax’s dreams, who he hunts for in the endless concession of nymphs passing through his ever-spinning doors
“By the way you speak of this outlander, one would swear you were in love. Tell me, pig, will Andrax save you from the wrath of the Dark Lady when she asks for your beating heart? Will the deserter rescue you from the harvest dawn? Sisters!”
Brandi and Halla entered the room behind Trixie, their faces mischievous and spiteful.
“For now, my lovely sisters will have their fun with you. I must confess, I am not so taken by these strapping young lads and their willing cocks, delightful though they may be. I await the cruel tutelage of a more abstract teacher. You see, my sisters are blunt instruments.” She leaned in close, her angular face filling his vision. “They are but children, and their desire remains unfocused, messy. Halla may seem the more vicious, but do not let Brandi’s silence fool you. I sewed her mouth shut for questioning the tutor’s motives. They are compelled by the rigid cock, and nothing will stand in the way of their pleasure. But who am I to judge the needs of the free flesh?” Trixie took her leave then, and left him in the clutches of the younger devotees.
Brandi and Halla descended upon him, wrestling him to the ground with surprising strength. The black stitches that crisscrossed Brandi’s lips grazed his foot as she pulled his legs, and Halla hurled obscenities at him as she grabbed his feet. Together they carried the wood elf to the corpse’s hall.
Rorke Bower still sat on the baroque gold throne, the early morning air around him sweet and cloying. A pole was erected twenty yards from the throne, and Herrik was tied roughly to it so he had a full view of the rotting Fay. He tried to turn his eyes away, but Halla had fastened his head into an elaborate vise that restricted his movement and eliminated all peripheral vision. The world narrowed to a tiny window into the hell unfolding before him. If he closed his eyes, she dug a sharpened fingernail into his anus, so he was forced to watch Rorke Bower’s final indignity.
Brandi walked on her hands across the blood-red carpet, as naked as the seven chiseled young men that stood in the corner of the room. The golden-haired men stared blankly from behind iron muzzles, and Herrik could see no trace of light in their eyes.
All emotion and individuality has been drained from these fine specimens. The boys they may once have been are long dead, and obedience is all that remains.
Brandi leapt back onto her feet and curtsied beneath the lifeless eyes of her grandfather. A chain was tied to the foot of his throne, and it slithered down to a crude manacle on the red floor. Sitting down before the throne, Brandi closed the link around her neck and settled onto her back. She parted her legs and opened her pussy with crude clamps fashioned from moonglass, a rare metal seldom seen in Shadehaven. Her cunt winked at Herrik as she motioned for her sister.
Halla took three of the men and fit leather collars around their throats. Ropes ran from the collars to a black lash. Halla wrapped her fingers around the lash’s handle and pulled, jerking the chosen three from the pack. She led them to her spread-eagled sister, her neck muscles straining as she screamed. “Serve the cunt, you mongrel whores. Get those pricks up and split that pussy open!” She forced them to their knees and pressed one’s face into her sister’s unfurled snatch. The iron of his muzzle ground against her clit, and Brandi thrashed against her restraint.
Halla turned to Herrik and smiled, distractedly twisting a nipple between finger and thumb. “Time you boys put on a show for our curious visitor. Dogs! The last cock outside my sister’s cunt gets chopped! Go!” She released the handle of the chain and let the slaves fight for their stiff young cocks.
The bustling flesh below the throne contrasted starkly with the decaying head of the Bower clan. The pack of human dogs tried to ravage her in mute frenzy, and Brandi’s roars of pleasure echoed chillingly in the hall. Two went for her cunt at the same time, the heads of their cocks colliding just outside their destination. The third spotted his chance and filled Brandi with his furious erection. Brandi yelped, but the words of encouragement remained trapped behind the wire mesh of her lips. The other two pulled the victor off and tore at Brandi’s skin, their asses knocking against each other as they fought for the redemption of her slit.
Halla jumped on the spot like an overexcited child on Yearfall, drawing a jagged blade with a handle of faded bone. The second slave entered Brandi and begun to drive into her ferociously, and Halla raised the knife above her strawberry hair. Silver flashed, and she sliced the third man’s cock off at the base. He howled in agony, so Halla cut his throat. She began to masturbate as the blood poured over the flesh of Brandi and the two men double penetrating her, and she picked up the disconnected cock and pressed the meat to her mouth. She fed.
Is this what is to become of me? Am I to become nothing more than a lapdog of these deranged sisters, licking the mud from their heels and savoring the taste? Could I learn to love their cruelty, could I embrace these sadistic fantasies if the wood elf died and only the animal remained?
The sound of a horn interrupted his musings, and the sudden panic on Brandi’s face indicated that this was not part of the grotesque performance. Trixie Bower surged into the room, eyes lit in elation. She glanced disapprovingly at her red sisters and kicked Halla in the side to disturb her feeding.
“Halla, Brandi, clean up this filth. I fear our guards have fled the battlements, but it is no matter.” She beamed at Herrik. “Put a smile on your face, wood elf! We aim to entertain. The Overseer rides for the gates, and he is not alone.”
Chapter Nine:
Unnatural Excess
Nightgift trotted along the Heartriver’s winding curve, her movement graceful and silent in the morning air. Daylight was breaking along the surface of the water, and the river sparkled like untouched moonglass. Passing silverfish flashed like stars in the clear stream, and luminous blue dragonflies hovered lazily between drooping water lilies. Andrax wondered at how beautiful the world could be even as darkness threatened to engulf it forever.
Herrik sat astride Nightgift with his back to Andrax, so he could warn him of any rear attacks, but the last two hours had been eerily quiet. They had encountered no travelers since they set out for Bower Ridge, and the only sounds were the bubbling river and the buzzing dragonflies. Perhaps the curse is finally lifted and Minerva is sated.
But last night’s dream suggested otherwise…
They had decided to make camp in the green and russet canopy of the great oak. Night had fallen over Shadehaven like a shroud, and neither of them had any desire to face the Fay in darkness. They were both exhausted and famished, and Herrik offered to hunt game while Andrax concealed Nightgift.
A hunter now? He is certainly full of surprises,
thought Andrax as Herrik disappeared into the forest. Andrax hobbled Nightgift and hid the beast in a nearby copse of bramble. All it took was a tender word and Nightgift calmed, his shiny black coat melting into the dense foliage. Andrax silently thanked the Negress for the gift of living night and returned to the base of the tree.
Herrik expertly skinned a rabbit he had trapped in a devious wooden snare while Andrax built a small fire in the hollow trunk of the tree, the flames invisible to passersby. Herrik’s arms were bloody to the elbow as he told of his narrow escape. “I hid in a wheat field while the Fay descended on the paper mill. I watched as a group of sprites carved the skin off a water nymph, trying to ignore her wails as I pressed my head to the dirt.”
Herrik tossed the rabbit into the makeshift oven, licking at the pink tips of his fingers. “It is a sound I will not soon forget, Andrax. She was
laughing
amidst the screams, and they began to fuck her as they wrapped her flayed skin around their faces. That’s when I knew I had to run. I raced along the Heartriver, and Bower Ridge opened its golden gates for me. Luckily there are still some decent Fay left in this cursed corner of the world.”
Herrik’s face was half in darkness, his voice monotone and detached. “When Trixie Bower heard my tidings, she sent me back out with a fresh mount to gather you. Her grandfather had word from the Council that the Dark Lady Minerva had found the Moonheart once more, and that you were the only one who could bring her tyranny to an end. She seeks you now as she always has, and she will let the entire world fall into darkness if it means your return. Unfortunately, I got waylaid in the forest and lost my mount, but Boxer Ridge remains our deliverance.”
So she has found it again.
When Andrax had finally collapsed before the Council with news of his escape, the Negress had stepped inside the weave and banished the Dark Lady from the Ice Mountains, using the subtleties of the weave to obscure the tree’s location. But Minerva was nothing if not persistent, and Andrax knew that Shadehaven could not hope to stand against the divine influence of the tree of flesh.
“I must speak to Rorke Bower. If he is in communication with the Council, I can summon the Negress. She will know what to do, Herrik. She sees all.”
Herrik tilted his head at Andrax, a vague look of distaste on his face. “The Negress, yes. No doubt she sees much, Overseer.” The journey had certainly had a profound effect on Herrik. His eyes were glassy and distant, and his tufts of facial hair were flecked with drying blood. Andrax knew that this was not the same lovable curmudgeon who had served him so faithfully for years.
He is changed, his eyes cannot hide it
Andrax reached out a hand and rested it consolingly on the wood elf’s shoulder, but Herrik turned away brusquely and stared out into the night. “We must ascend. The children of the moon are out tonight.”
They ate the rabbit wordlessly and made for their leafy hideaway. Resting his head against his coarse pillow of bark, Andrax stretched his weary legs and closed his tired blue eyes. Wind whistled through the overhead leaves, and Herrik sat opposite him watching the forest with grey eyes. He had claimed first watch, and Andrax let sleep settle over his drained body.
A beautiful dark-haired woman insinuated her curvaceous body through the pendulous branches, approaching him with feline grace. She was naked, and blue ink flashed above the glossy sheen of her pubic mound. Her blue-black hair brushed his face as she straddled him, locking his body beneath her warm flesh. Andrax tried to resist, tried to call out to his treetop companion, but his words caught in his teeth.
The woman licked the hollow of his throat, an electric trail of wetness that made him moan as he breathed in the florid scent of her hair. Her tongue was practiced, and he grabbed a fistful of indigo and shoved her face down to the swell of his cock. His trousers parted as if the hands of ghosts were pulling at them, and his prick sprang free and bounced against the woman’s lips. She wet the tip with her tongue, a thin line of spit dripping off her mouth. She exhaled cool air on his glistening cock, and he whimpered at the cold sensation. Then she slid her mouth down the entire length of his shaft, so he could feel her lips brushing against his groin. His mind had emptied of all thoughts of Minerva, the Negress, and Shadehaven’s safety. All he wanted was the warm hole in this woman’s splendid face.
She looked up at him with violet cat’s eyes while she deep throated his tumescent cock. He began to thrust his cock in and out of her mouth, face fucking the gagging women. She did not complain however, and the fingers of her right hand began strumming her inflamed clit. He could feel his cock working impossibly deep in her throat while she sucked in a frenzy of saliva and pumping lips. Her esophageal muscles tightened around his cock and pulsated as if she needed his cum to survive. Andrax could feel his orgasm beginning to build so he fucked harder, and the wet finger she jammed in his asshole merely intensified the oncoming tide. She looked up at him with those enchanting eyes just as he began to spray, his head spinning as cum filled her mouth. She smiled around a mouthful of cock and bit, the blue tattoos on her back forming the image of Minerva’s face as he screamed…
Then he had jerked awake in a cold sweat with a cum stain on the front of his pants. The woman was gone, but Herrik was watching him through opaque eyes.
Now they approached the golden hall of Bower Ridge, Andrax puzzling over his bizarre dream.
It had seemed so real.
They crested a low hill along the riverbank, and the castle appeared from the morning mists like an answered prayer. Andrax gasped at the scene before him.
No wonder the woods were so quiet.
Bower Ridge was surrounded by a sea of creatures fucking each other in a living portrait of unnatural excess. Wood elves with cocks sprouting from their eyes drove their heads between the thighs of nymphs, and massive herds of sprites crawled over the distorted bodies of howling Fay. Thousands of the fuck-happy Fay had gathered outside the castle, probably drawn by the scent of untainted flesh. Every known sexual act was being performed (and many that Andrax would never have believed). Nightgift whickered while Andrax scanned the castle walls for any salvation from the rapture.
Herrik turned to survey the debauchery around the castle, his hand shooting from his side. “There, the drawbridge! Ride at once, Overseer!” cried Herrik, and Andrax made for the partially lowered bridge while he wildly spun his cudgel at the surrounding creatures. Mistsong appeared from the press of bodies and pursued them, her grey skin ribbed with foul growths and flaps of green skin. Mistsong was usually no match for Nightgift, but she was enraptured. Andrax bit down hard and spurred Nightgift on, Mistsong snapping at the stallion’s rear legs.
The three-headed monstrosity riding Mistsong slobbered maniacally. Tessyn’s tongue slid out and licked at Mistsong’s mottled flank, the forked point whipping through the air. The heads of the Dunder twins were on either side of Tessyn’s, their teeth clamped on the soft flesh of her ears. Their shared body was a suppurating confusion of gender, with ill-proportioned tits and dozens of scrotums percolating on the churning skin. They neared the bridge just as it began to rise, and Andrax mumbled a prayer as Nightgift took to the air. Nightgift sailed onto the slowly lifting drawbridge while Mistsong and her terrible rider crashed into the moat below.
Riding into Rorke Bower’s inner chambers, Andrax almost trampled a group of fleeing young men with muzzles strapped to their faces. Herrik tensed up behind him, and before Andrax had time to reflect on the surreal departure he was dismounting in Rorke Bower’s hall. The place was a slaughterhouse. Brandi Bower lay before her decomposing grandfather in a pool of blood and viscera. Halla Bower’s dead face stared up at the sky with a bemused expression, a bone-handled knife protruding from her eye socket. Only Tricia Bower remained, screaming as she ran up the dais after a blood-splattered wood elf with a very familiar face…
“Herrik? How did you…?” Andrax turned to the other Herrik alongside him and reeled as the statuesque woman from his dreams struck his face. Everything happened very quickly then.
Nightgift charged at Tricia Bower, grinding to a halt as Tricia caught Herrik by the end of his beard and pulled him toward her. She whipped around and faced Andrax with an emerald rapier at Herrik’s neck. The woman from the trees sent Andrax spinning in the air with a tremendous backhand. She placed a hand to her breast and wet her finger with the white moonblood leaking from her nipple, trying to force the gooey digit into Andrax’s mouth. Andrax leapt to his feet and sidestepped away from the hand, grasping the changeling’s wrists behind her head. She thrashed desperately, but Andrax’s grip was strong.
“Fools! Can’t you be trusted to guard a solitary, unarmed wood elf?!” screamed the woman as Andrax struggled to keep her still. He punched her hard in the side and pulled his cudgel under her chin, pinioning her fast against his body as he faced the lady of the castle.
Trixie Bower looked as if the changeling had struck her in the face. “I beg your forgiveness, my love. The guards abandoned their posts and slipped down the Heartriver when they saw the Fay gathered outside. Then the wood elf slithered through Halla’s fingers. She was still drunk with lust and her hands were shaking when she undid the vise that held his head. He grabbed the knife and… Then he set the slaves on Brandi. We thought we had control…” Tricia howled in rage, drawing blood with the point of her blade. “Unhand her, Overseer, or I will decapitate your wretched wood elf. Quickly, Neora, the slipstream. You must…”
Trixie Bower gasped, a black blade sprouting from her mouth. The final Bower girl fell lifeless to the floor, her blade clattering against the carpet. Herrik ran to embrace Nightgift as Andrax gasped in astonishment. The Negress stood with a thin, black skinblade jutting from the palm of her hand, a seven-foot ebony goddess resplendent in a flowing dress of lace and pearls. Neora collapsed in Andrax’s arms, the fight gone from her limbs.
The Negress’s obsidian skin shone. “Good day, Overseer. You look well. Unhand the bitch. I have some questions for her.”