Sword of the Beast - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Alex Cayne watched the cab pull off into the Prague night and adjusted her black evening gown. It was cut to show off her cleavage, and slit high on her thighs, both to show off her legs and to allow her maximum freedom if the unexpected happened. But if the unexpected happens so often that you expect it, what is it, then? she mused to herself as walked up the cobblestone drive and rang the doorbell in the arched doorway of the grey stone mansion.

The heavy oak door opened, only to be replaced by a doorway-filling figure. He loomed half a head taller than Alex, broad shouldered, and obviously muscled under his finely-tailored suit. His face was handsome in a direct, brutal way, like an ancient sculpture crudely hacked from granite, topped with thick, black hair. His dark eyes swept over Alex, and his mouth, framed with a mustache and short, trimmed beard, quirked upward.

"Baron Vukvrag, I presume?" she said.

"Technically, yes, but do such titles truly mean anything in our modern world, Lady Cayne?" he said, with a mock-courtly bow and a slight but unmistakable Slavic accent. "If you must stand on formality, Mr. Vukvrag will do. If not, I would be pleased if you would call me Dragos."

"I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Vukvrag," she said. She held forth her hand, which he swept up for a kiss. "I think I must stand on formality." She smiled. "For now."

He waved her inside, his eyes tracking her as she walked by. "Proper as well as punctual, then," he said. "Come, dinner has just now been served."

She walked slightly behind him and evaluated the man. The offer she had received from him just a week ago had been quite attention-getting but she still knew little about him. Although his family has been a reasonably prominent one in his homeland several decades and a number of revolutions ago, she had turned up very little on the man himself. As a result she had braced herself to deal with some inbred fossil or useless piece of Eurotrash, but the reality was already proving quite different. The man exuded power, but not like a politician or a business tycoon would. No, his power was more physical, direct, dark, primal. She watched his well-built body move with interest. This was a man who could kill, who perhaps had killed. A dangerous man to be around. Very dangerous. Alex felt her heart speed up, her own primal responses rise. She smiled at her own reaction.

She was careful to return to a neutral expression as he turned to usher through a door leading out of the vestibule, but was nearly shocked out of it by the quickly-masked flash of hunger in his own glance. More than one primal urge was stirring now. I might enjoy this meeting after all, she thought.

They passed through a series of rooms and hallways, nearly empty and smelling faintly of dust. She paused briefly to look at one of the few points of interest, a fragment of Roman mosaic displayed on a small table. A pair of women in short tunics stood back to back before the stands of an amphitheater. A length of chain connected the collars on their necks, and the spears they carried were thrust out toward the pair of wolves leaping toward them. "Ah, yes," Dragos said from behind her. "That came into my possession just the other day. Supposedly from a villa on the Danube, but who can say?"

"If it's a forgery, it's a good one," she said. "The technique certainly looks second century."

"As does the subject matter," he said. "The Roman were looking for a bit of, ah, novelty in their games by then, were they not? But come, dinner is waiting."

Dinner was indeed being set on a table in the mansion's grand dining room by a remarkable large and ugly manservant and a rather pretty blonde teenage maid. They silently withdrew as Alex and Dragos entered. In the candlelight Alex could see the wood-panned walls were bare, the high-peaked windows lacked curtains, and that the room almost empty, except for the long oak table, and two overstuffed red velvet chairs, and a large, bearskin run spread on the hardwood floor before a huge fireplace where a roaring fire blazed. "You must forgive me, Lady Cayne," Dragos said and he pulled out her chair and ushered her into her seat. "Prague is not my primary home, so the furnishings here are a bit, ah, Spartan. My staff is also limited, and was preoccupied with this dinner, which was why I played my own butler tonight."

Dinner was a salad, which she was amused to see Dragos soaked in oil and vinegar and then barely picked at, an excellent steak, if perhaps a bit rare, and a fine red wine. "You intrigue me, Lady Alexa Cayne," Dragos said, as he swirled the last of the wine in his glass. "I have done my research. American father, English mother. Both wealthy, your father a successful businessman with a somewhat colorful reputation, your mother the sole child of a peer with an estate in Yorkshire. Their only daughter was raised in America, schooled in Europe. Excelled in academics and sport, including target shooting. Your father's influence, I suppose."

"Mother's, actually," Alex interjected. "Grandfather was engaged in some...government work. Passed some of his passions along to Mother. She was a sport shooter. Olympic medalist."

"Ah. Forgive the assumption. American stereotypes clogging the brain, I fear," Dragos continued. "In any case, you went on to study archeology and anthropology, were working on your masters while engaging in quite a bit of travel and, I believe they call them extreme sports? Then the unfortunate accident with your parents." He paused. "I do not wish to expose old wounds, but not long after that you left academia and began your, well, unusual career."

"Oh, I was never really cut out for academia," she said. "As you gathered, neither of my parents were conventional people, and I suppose I was never destined for a life of convention. The accident...well, it rather impressed the shortness of life on me. After some consideration, I realized I was one of the fortunate few with the means and abilities to get exactly what I want out of life. And so I have."

"And what is it you want, Lady Cayne?" Dragos asked, leaning forward. "Your inheritance has left you the means to live the rest of your life in idle hedonism, but you do not. You might have continued your studies, taken any number of legitimate paths into legitimate fields, but you have not done that either. Instead you...find things. You seek objects, valuable objects, sometimes dubious objects. Sometimes found in dangerous places, sometimes owned by dangerous people. You find these things, and bring them to your clients. And what does Lady Cayne get in the exchange?"

"Excitement," she answered.

As they had spoken the servants had brought dishes of strawberries and cream for dessert, cleared most of the remains of dinner and withdrawn.

Alex watched them leave the room and turned back to Dragos. "Thank you for an excellent meal, Mr. Vukvrag. But I do have some questions about your, well, extraordinary proposal."

"What is so extraordinary about it?" he asked, leaning back in his chair.

"I am to understand that you want me to retrieve your own treasure from your own castle?" she said.

"My ancestral treasure from my ancestral castle," he corrected.

"Why not simply go yourself?" she said.

"I have no doubt you have researched me as thoroughly as I have researched you, so you know my family has, at times if not at the present, held a certain prominence in our homeland," he said. "And as you also likely know, it is a, let us say, unsettled place at present. In bad times, old names carry weight. I have no interest in regaining my family's former position, but some might see my return to our ancestral lands as proof otherwise. Those persons might be inspired to take...unfortunate actions."

"Well then, why hire me?" she pressed. "Surely for my price you could hire enough movers to bring the whole castle here."

"It is not a place you can simply send a moving van and expect it to come back," he said with a chuckle. "It lies in a disputed borderland, where the law has very little meaning. The mountain clans are more than happy to turn bandit when they are not occupied by their own feuds. An unarmed group would be robbed blind if they were lucky. Sending a body of armed men would attract the unwelcome attention I mentioned earlier."

He paused and smiled. "However, a person of your, ah, formidable talents could slip beneath attention, brave the dangers, and retrieve the heirloom I seek," he said.

"Ah, yes, the ‘Sword of the Beast,'" she said. "Legendary blade of the ‘Beast of Vukathia.'" Tell me about the Beast."

"It is a tale of one of my supposed ancestors. Not a terribly original one, I'm afraid," he said with another chuckle. "Once, seven or eight hundred years ago, perhaps, a nobleman sold his soul to the Devil. The Devil gave him power, not least of which was the power to assume the shape of a monstrous wolf. He sought out the most evil men of the land and shared that power with them, bound their souls and fates with his own, and together they ravaged the countryside. A bold hero came and struck him down, but he could not die, not really. They say he sleeps still, in the mountains, and awakes sometimes to spread his evil anew."

"But this is but a legend," he continued. "I hardly think you need to stock up on silver bullets for this expedition."

"Oh, I don't know. It's a strange world out there," Alex replied. "There's more truth in old legends than most people think."

"But these are just fairy tales. ‘Behave, or the Beast will get you!'" he said. "Of course, that is a warning given most often to, ah, young women. The Beast's evil was said to be equaled only by his...appetites."

"Oh?" Alex said, quirking an eyebrow. "Is it such an evil thing to have an...appetite?"

"Some say so, yes," Dragos said. He plucked a strawberry from the dish, popped it in his mouth, and bit down. "I myself see no wrong. If one has hungers, one should satisfy them."

"I've always thought so," Alex said. She took a strawberry from her own dish and put it to her parted lips before pulling it back. "But sometimes one must restrain ones' appetite."

Dragos stood up, and began to walk around the table. "I never saw the point. If you hunger, and a tasty morsel presents itself, then you should snap it up."

"But anticipation makes the morsel sweeter," she said, running the strawberry over her full lips. As he approached her, she extending her tongue and slowly licked the plump fruit. As she completed her second lazy circuit of the fruit, he suddenly grabbed her wrist, pulling it and her toward him. As she rose, his head darted down and his mouth snatched it from her fingers. He swallowed it whole as their eyes locked.

After a moment, Alex pushed herself away. "Perhaps, Mr. Vukvrag, you could use a lesson in restraint," she said, turning from him and walking, swaying, toward the fireplace. As she walked, she unfastened the strap and belt of her gown, and when she reached the bearskin rug and turned, the dress fell in a black pool at her feet.

She stood for a moment illuminated by the firelight in a black lace bra and panties, watching Dragos approach. As he walked toward her, he tossed his jacket to the side and tore open his shirt, careless of the ripped fabric and flying buttons. "You are playing a dangerous game, Lady Cayne," he growled. His eyes raked her body, blazing with lust. "I am not accustomed to...restraint."

"But a game is worthless without a challenge," she replied sweetly, reaching behind herself to undo her bra. It fell free, revealing her magnificent breasts, their nipples fully erect. "And if a game has no danger, where is the thrill?"

Dragos surged forward and locked Alex into a tight embrace. Their lips crashed together and their tongues intertwined as Alex slipped her arms free and unbuckled his belt. She tugged down his pants and shorts, feeling his cock spring free between them, hard as a rod of iron. Before he could react, her hands were on his shoulders pushing him down and back. "Down," she intoned.

She could feel his muscles tense, but he obeyed and slowly sank to his knees in front of her. She stepped back and slowly pulled her panties down, until she stood before him stark naked, staring down, legs slightly spread. He did not need a command this time as he grabbed her buttocks and dragged his tongue along the lips of Alex's pussy. It was longer and stronger than she had expected. "Mmmm, good boy," she exhaled.

Sooner than she expected, she felt her knees buckle under the treatment. He lapped at her pussy lips with enthusiasm, practically penetrating her with his tongue. She was growing lightheaded, and knew she would have to sit down or fall down. Instead, she fell forward, pushing him back onto the bearskin. She fell to her knees between his, and used her feet to shove his pants the rest of the way off as she began to slink up his body.

His cock stood from his crotch like a tower, long and thick and painfully erect. She have the tip the lightest possible lick as she went past before engulfing in with her breasts as she moved up his body. As she lifted her body further up, he craned his neck forward, and she allowed his marvelously agile tongue to flick first one nipple, then the other, until she felt they would burst and her thighs began to tremble, partially from the effort of holding herself just above his cock, and partially from anticipation.

She cooed softly to herself as she lowered her body onto his cock, feeling it push into her soaked pussy, in an in and in, filling her completely. She bounced slightly as she hit bottom, and then began to slowly, rhythmically move up and down. Her eyes unfocused and slid half-closed, and she moaned as she felt his member rubbing her clit.

Suddenly, his hand shot out and gripped her hips with tremendous strength, and Alex's eyes shot open as she felt herself thrust down, hard. A jolt of energy rushed up her spine, and she looked down into Dragos' dark eyes. They speared through her with a look of pure lust, and her body shuddered with the intensity of the stare. She involuntarily quickened her thrusts, and felt Dragos' hips rise to meet her downward push.

Her whole body was tingling now, and thoughts of control fled her brain. Her orgasm was like a runaway train, roaring at her, driven by the speeding piston of her body on the shaft of his cock, its blazing light filling her vision. "Oh God," she breathed. "Oh God. OH FUCKING GOD!" she screamed as the fireworks went off in her body, in her head, and she felt Dragos cum inside her.

Alex slid off him, and lay beside him on the rug, panting slightly. Both of them stared at the ceiling silently for a few long minutes, before Dragos rolled over to face her. "Now, Lady Cayne, it is my turn," he said, unceremoniously grabbing her shoulders and pushing her down toward his crotch, where she was surprised to see his cock was already stirring back to life. She reached out for it with her tongue, giving it a playful lick that sent it swelling back to its full size. After a few more licks, Dragos gave a growl and shoved her head forwards, sending his cock between her full lips into her willing mouth. She found herself fighting her gag reflex as his cock grew hard again.

She was breathing hard through her nose by the time he pulled out. As she gasped, he unceremoniously rolled on top of her, lined his cock up with her still-dripping slit, and thrust. She moaned, and her entire body shuddered as she felt it slip in. He began to pump in and out, in and out, starting slowly but building speed, and Alex felt her own heat building again, felt herself climbing back to the peak she had mounted minutes earlier.

That peak was in sight, shining in a blazing sun, when she felt Dragos slow. She rocked her own hips more, trying to keep the rhythm going, but instead he pulled out entirely. She looked up at him, his erect cock glistening with her juices, and gave a moan of disappointment.

"Beg," he growled.

Alex hesitated, as pride and lust went to war within her. In such conflicts the pride of Lady Alexa Cayne, renowned adventurer, almost never lost. Almost. But lust was strong, and orgasm was near, so very near... Pride bowed its head. "Please," she mewled. "Please, fuck me, fuck me, please."

He drew near, and she squirmed in anticipation as she felt his hands on her back. She yelped in surprise as those hands suddenly flipped her over and she landed on her hands and knees, her ass raised in the air. He gripped her hips, and she had just worked out what he intended when his cock plowed into her pussy from behind.

"UHH YESS!" she yelled as she felt his member drive into her, deeper than it had gone before. In the back of her mind, she thought of the bruises she would have in the morning from the vise-like grip his hands had on her hips, but the pain of the here-and-now was overwhelmed by the feelings Dragos was giving her. Her arms buckled, and she fell forward, rubbing her breasts against the rough fur of the rug and mewling like a cat.

Her reaction seemed to drive him wilder. Snarling like a beast, he grabbed her hair and yanked her head back, all the while driving herself into her deeper and deeper. Her shriek at the sudden yank turned back into louder moans, then she, too, reverted to animal grunts as the shock of pain fed into the sensation building between her legs, building all over her body.

Drago's massive member was driving deeper and deeper into her pussy, faster and faster, and Alex's senses began to go into overload. She abandoned herself to the sensations of fucking. There was no room left in her brain for thought, only animal lust. She was a beast rutting with another beast.

Dragos' motions were event faster now, more frantic. She would have bruises on more than her hips now, but the sex-beast that was Alex didn't care. Her orgasm was almost there. She could see it, taste it, smell it, feel it. It felt like her body was about to explode.

Then, it did. This time, it wasn't fireworks. It was an atomic bomb. She heard incoherent screeches coming from her mouth as she lost all control of her thrashing body. She could feel her gyrations push Dragos over the edge, and he gave a yell, almost a howl, as he came like a hot fountain inside her.

She didn't know how long she lay there, panting, her sweat-slick skin glistening in the firelight under Dragos' massive form, until she came back into her own mind. The orgasm that had screamed through her body had turned her muscles to jelly and her voice into a whimper. Oh my God, she thought. Another one like that could kill me.

Then she felt Dragos stir above her, and felt his member, unbelievably, miraculously, stirring too. A thrill ran up her spine, and her body shuddered with uncontrollable desire. Well, you have to go sometime, she thought.

It was her last coherent thought for the night.

Continued in Chapter 3

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