Tales of Dylak-Leem - Chapter 9

Chapter 9 - Missing Persons

In the autumn, the sun went down early in the wild hills and valleys that loomed around Dylak-Leem. Scattered around them were the city's various burial grounds, all now cloaked in darkness, none a wise place to linger after sunset without good reason. Some were relatively tame and well-maintained, but others had an evil reputation and had fallen largely into disuse. Of these, perhaps the most shunned was Ghasthauver Cemetary, that former burial ground for the wealthy and powerful. Its star had fallen since those days, fallen into a blackness of fear and whispered tales, and now everyone with any sense avoided it. Even the great barges grew silent and pensive when they passed it by on the Kesarde River.

In the tomb of Countess Amelie D'Bastian, candles had been lit. The dust had been swept off the floor, and certain unpleasant stains washed away. A corpse that had been discreetly left in a corner was collected, taken outside, and dumped in the river. There is really only so much that can be done to tidy a crypt for visitors, but it had been done.

The Countess stood in the middle of the main burial chamber, her back to an ornate coffin. Her hair was long and pure white, her appearance that of a commanding woman in her late thirties. She had drunk long and well earlier, more than was usual for her, and so her skin was pale but not corpselike. Aside from jewelry, she was nude; a gold belt of burial links around her upper hips, jeweled rings, a necklace of blood rubies, and golden armlets with a snake motif. Her right hand rested on the head of the woman on her knees before her, stroking the lank black hair. "Stop fidgeting, little mouse. You will make Mistress Coursi's task more difficult."

"Yes, Master," Keo said, tonelessly. Like Amelie, she was naked. Unlike the countess, she had no jewelry, just a festive red bow tied round one thigh. Hatred seethed off of her like steam off a boiling pot.

"It's all right, as long as they're small motions." Justine Coursi was sweating behind her easel. Her skin was too dark to go pale with fear, but the Abois painter and pornographer was clearly frightened. It didn't slow down the motions of her brush on the canvas, though. "As long as I have examples of the desired scene, a few shifts of position won't do any harm. Posing can be uncomfortable."

"Did you hear that, my dear one? She requires examples of the desired scene." The Countess smiled. "Use your tongue again."

"Yes, Master," Keo gritted. Leaning forward, the black-eyed thief brought her reluctant lips to Amelie's hairless labia. Eyes burning, she slowly stuck out her tongue and began to lick the purple folds.

"Very good, little mouse." Amelie ruffled Keo's hair fondly. "You drank it greedily the day I bound you to me. Now it does not call to you as a living woman's would, but even that is a pleasure, yes? To have desire free of the hunger?" She pressed Keo's head closer to her cleft, giving a long sigh as the short woman's tongue slipped inside her vagina. "Are you getting this, Mistress Coursi?"

"Yes, m-my lady," Justine said, voice strained. "Ah... forgive me, Countess, I don't mean to be impudent, but I have a... a question about the work..."

"By all means, ask."

"When I execute the faces... should I... forgive me... should I show the relationship dynamic as it, ah, ACTUALLY IS, or as it, uh, SHOULD BE? I... what I mean to say is..."

The Countess laughed. "I understand you, clever painter. As it actually is, without question. I would not recognize my little mouse if she were not brimming with resentment and barely contained fury." She arched her back slightly, the hand on Keo's head moving down to caress the thief's cheek as Keo ate her out. "It is adorable, how she fumes, how she struggles, how she sullenly obeys in the end. She knows I am her fated lover, her destiny, and she HATES it. But it is true nonetheless! We have spent so many days together, sealing our love and our hate. She flees at night, but she will always return, and I will always be waiting, with open arms. And legs."

Keo pulled her face away, eyes blazing. "Not forever," she snarled, Amelie's slickness dripping from her chin. "This won't last forever."

"Will you escape me, then?" the Countess asked playfully.

"Escape you or end you. Either will do."

"It is good to have dreams, even after death," Amelie said, sounding amused. "But, little mouse, you have stopped pleasing me with your tongue. What are you going to resume doing?"

Keo started to say something, and Amelie's left hand moved in a complex pattern. The black-eyed thief started to snarl something, then ground to a choking halt. Spasms of pain rocked her, and one hand went up to claw at her throat.

"What are you going to resume doing?" the Countess asked again, voice gently reproving.

Agony etched on her face, Keo lurched forward and put her mouth back to her master's waiting slit. Her tongue desperately delved into Amelie's pussy, prompting a pleased murmur from the Countess.

"Very good. Was that so hard, little mouse?" The elder vampire stroked her thrall's hair fondly. "You always obey in the end. You work yourself up into such a state, and you always obey in the end. Because you know this is what you were meant for."

Sheer fury made Keo's naked body quiver as she ate the undead pussy, her eyes promising violent retribution at the first possible instant. It only seemed to delight Amelie more, which in turn made Keo even angrier.

Justine painted away at her bench, intent on her work, obviously trying not to think about what might happen to her when she was finished. She was doing the finishing touches when she suddenly slumped forward in her seat, then jumped out of her chair like a jack-in-the-box, wearing a manic grin.

"Hello!" she squealed. "I am the genius Abois painter! I'm here to paint Keo munching her girlfriend's twat with enthusiasm! Look at me!"

The two vampires stared at her for a second, and then both of their faces twisted in annoyance.

"Damn it, Lise!" Keo snarled, taking her mouth from her cuntal meal. "Shut the fuck up!"

"What's the matter, partner?" the ghost said through the possessed painter's mouth. "Truth stings?" She looked down at herself. "Huh. It's true about Abois girls. She's wearing a bra and some sort of fancy underwear. I feel like a high-class whore now." She grinned at Keo, and bared one of Justine's breasts. "What do you say, Keo, fancy any dark meat? You can drink me dry and kill me again. You know, like you did."

"Ghost, do not mistake my tolerance of you for permission to do whatever you like," the Countess said testily. "I am still using the painter. You are getting in my way. There are many, many worse things that can happen to you than dying, and you are walking very close to discovering what they are."

"Vampires. No fucking fun." Justine's head slumped, and then jerked back upright, a panicked look in her eyes. "W-what... what happened... I thought..."

"Just a pest, Mistress Coursi. Pay it no mind and finish your painting."

Trembling, Justine pulled her blouse back over her breast and sat back down. She resumed painting, after some hesitation.

"Fuck you, Lise. Obsessive bitch," Keo muttered sourly. Amelie's hand turned her head insistently back, and with a silent curse she resumed tonguing the Countess's taint.

The ghost manifested next to her head, a glowing outline of her former partner in crime, leering. "Lick that pussy, Keo. We both know you love it. You love it so much you killed me for it. I like the bow. And I like how she orders you to munch her muff and you do it like a good little whore." One transparent hand moved to 'touch' Keo's own cleft. "Starting to get wet, hmmm?"

Keo snapped something harsh and obscene around a mouthful of Amelie's labia. The Countess sighed. "Ghost. Leave us. Now."

The translucent Lise laughed horribly. "Maybe I'll go find someone to ride. I feel like being alive for a bit. Bye, Keo. Keep up the good work." She vanished.

Sighing, Amelie stroked Keo's cheek. "My poor little mouse. She is so cruel to you. So unjust. If she grows too wearisome for you, just tell me. There are things we can do to her that she will not enjoy. Or maybe she will; she seems like a girl with odd tastes. But you do not need to be tormented by anyone but me, dear one. I will always look after you if you ask me to."

Keo's eyes closed and she shuddered.

After a time, Justine reluctantly put her paintbrush down. "It is finished, Lady D'Bastian. I hope you are pleased with it."

"Yes, you should so hope." Stepping away from Keo, the Countess strolled over to look at the canvas. She examined it for a long time, and then smiled. "Magnificent. You have captured my darling's spirit precisely. It is harder to judge myself, but I am not displeased with how I am shown, and that is the important part. You have done well, painter. I am pleased with you."

"P-please accept it as a gift." Justine's voice was subdued, her face frightened. "I don't ask for any-"

"Oh, nonsense, of course you must be paid." The countess walked over to the coffin, pulled a leather bag out of it, and tossed it to Justine. "One must always pay the help. I will hang this in a place where the weather will not get at it, so that I can remember the early days of our love."

"Yes, my lady. Uh... pardon, my lady... I am not entirely sure where you've brought me..."

"Yes, yes. You are not far from the city. Keo will take you back into town after she dresses. She has the nights off, and spends them in Dylak-Leem indulging in the fancies of the young and newly-buried." She looked over to where Keo still stood on her knees. "We are done here, little mouse. You are free to go about your evening after you drop off Mistress Coursi."

Immediately Keo sprang to her feet. Ripping the red bow off her thigh with a curse, she swiftly strode over to a small chest in one corner of the tomb. From it, she took black leathers, a belt with pouches and two daggers, soft leather shoes, and a long black hooded cloak. She dressed swiftly, fuming.

Amelie stepped closer. "Your time is your own, of course, but just a word of advice. In our circles, it is considered gauche to dine on a tradesman whom one has engaged. You should probably just take her home, unless you are so hungry you can't help yourself."

"Understood," Keo grated. Straightening, she walked across the crypt, took Justine firmly by the arm, and dragged her up the dimly-lit stone stairs.

They emerged into a fog-covered graveyard, the moon riding high. Justine swallowed. "Are we far from the city? Will we have to walk long?"

"We're not walking." Keo took out a corroded whistle and blew it. There was a distant whinny, and slowly a spectral coach, drawn by two mostly skeletal horses, shimmered into view. The thief reached out and took hold of one semi-transparent door, and tugged it open. "After you."

"W-we're riding in that?"

"Would you prefer I leave you here for the ghouls to eat? There's a pack of them gathering."

Justine hurriedly climbed into the ghostly coach. With a smirk, Keo joined her. "Dylak-Leem," she called out the window. "Go."

The coach rattled into motion, the horses shrieking. The two women sat facing each other in uncomfortable silence, listening to the rattling of the wheels.

"It's hers," Keo said finally. "She lets me use it so that I can get to and from the city without it taking half the night."

"Oh. Um. How did you meet?"

"I tried to rob her and she raped and killed me."

"Oh." Justine twitched. "My condolences."

"If you say anything about tonight to anyone, I will hunt you down and murder you."

"I won't say anything!" Justine said hurriedly. "In my profession, you learn discretion when it comes to clients. Even strange clients. ESPECIALLY strange clients."

Keo stared at her moodily. "I hate that fucking bitch. Having me painted like that. I need to see that destroyed."

Justine winced. "It's a very good piece, if you'll forgive me for saying so."

"How would YOU like to be painted having sex against your will?" Keo snarled.

"Done that. It was a great canvas. It's in a private collection now."

Keo frowned. "With a vampire, though?"

"With two bullywugs." Justine winced in memory. "At once."

Staring, Keo shook her head. "Never mind. That might be worse than her."

"Do you even like women?" Justine asked, curious.

"I don't like anyone," Keo said bleakly. "Sex is disgusting. I just get hungry. It's sort of like lust, I guess. It leads to the same place, anyway."

"Is it pleasurable? For you and the vic-... er... the other person?"

"Yes. I was a drug addict for a little while, when I was a teenager. It's a lot like that. It's intoxicating. My meal usually finds it sexually fulfilling, for a while." Keo turned to glance out the window. "Why? You offering?"

"It had occurred to me," Justine admitted. "I'm a romantic artist. Inspiration comes from new and different experiences."

Keo smiled humorlessly. "I am hungry. I should mention, though, that when I begin to feed on you, the odds are that I won't be able to stop. You'll find it extremely pleasurable right up to the point where you die of blood loss. I'll dump your empty, half-naked body in a ditch by the roadside and go on about my evening. Still interested?"

Justine shook her head, fear in her eyes. "No."

Keo leaned forward. "And what if I decide to anyway? I told you I was hungry."

Shrinking back against her seat, Justine looked wildly around, as if for an escape. There was none. "Please, miss..."

"How does Abois taste? Any different? Will I have trouble getting your underwear off to get to my meal?" Keo was half out of her seat now, eyes glowing a dull red. "Any last words before we begin?"

Justine screamed. Keo opened her mouth wide, faked a lunge at her, and then settled back into her seat.

"Just kidding." The black-haired vampire smiled, lazily amused. "Don't fuck around with the undead, painter. You don't want to be mixed up in this shit. It's like living in a nightmare. Also, I really am hungry and on another occasion might have had you there on the seat, but I'm trying my best not to kill people unless they deserve it. It's a bit like being an alcoholic."

Too shaken to talk, Justine just nodded.

There was silence thereafter, as the coach clattered and bounced along the hilly road to the city.

---

The Wanton Wench was half-empty when Keo crept in. The patrons' conversation quieted a bit as she stepped through the door and surveyed the room; they shot dubious glances her way. Everyone agreed that something was off with her since she stopped running with Lise, something important and a little unnerving. Theories differed as to what it could be.

Keo's gaze quickly confirmed that most of the people here tonight were has-beens, would-bes, hangers-on, and perfectly competent people who only did respectable work. About the only one of interest was Egrid Hardtusk, who was nursing a glass of wine by the bar. Keo walked over, and slid onto the stool next to her.

The half-orc glanced over. "Hello, Keo. Don't see you much any more."

"Only work nights now." She doffed her hood. "Days are taken."

"Huh. What ever happened to Lise, anyway? You two used to be a team. I haven't seen her in ages."

"She's out of the business," Keo said shortly. "She had a bad experience in a graveyard."

"That doesn't entirely surprise me," Egrid said, nodding. "I always thought you guys were a little reckless. And grave robbing can go incredibly bad very fast."

"Yeah." Keo closed her eyes. "You're right. We were stupid."

"You still doing grave robbing?"

"No. I'm freelance now. Urban jobs of various descriptions, solo or as part of a team. As long as they happen at night. And pay well, of course."

"Of course." Egrid took another sip of wine. "I still do the odd freelance gig myself. Don't need to any more, though, with the steady paycheck from Urdo. Something to be said for being on salary. Has it's downsides, granted, but they're pretty minor all things considered. You should try it."

"Maybe." Keo glanced about the room. "You have a job lined up, or just here for a drink?"

"Just here for a drink. Instead of what I want to be doing."

"Oh?"

Egrid took another sip of her drink, and sighed. "I have this woman I'm in sort of an open relationship with. At first it was just casual sex. Really good casual sex, but hey. Then we became friends. Now... I'm spending almost as many nights in her bed as my own. I think I have feelings for her, you know? And I don't know if that level of commitment is mutual. Hells, I'm not even sure if I'm comfortable with it myself. So I came here tonight instead of going to her place and getting laid."

Keo gave a hollow chuckle. "You're the last person I would expect to fall for someone, Egrid. Is she another half-orc, or a fullblood human?"

"An elf. A highborn elf." Egrid sounded wondering. "And like a deranged anaconda in the sack."

"Well, the only positive sexual experience of my life was with an elf, so I can't fault your tastes," Keo muttered. "I didn't know elves went for orc."

"This one does," Egrid said smugly. "Oh gods, does she."

"So what are you going to do?"

"I don't know." Egrid took a long drink. "It's complicated by the fact that I work with her sister, and she would go through the roof if she ever found out. If it weren't for that... I think I might actually propose. An orcish mating, of course; open relationship, multiple partners. But still a real wedding. I think I'd like that."

"Invite me to the ceremony. As long as it's at night."

"You can't get away days at all, huh?" Egrid asked curiously.

"No," Keo replied bitterly. "Not at all."

"That must suck."

"You have no idea."

"Is it a second job?" Egrid asked, sipping her wine.

"No. More like a curse."

"Magic shit?"

"Something like that," Keo said tiredly. "Don't really want to talk about it."

Egrid held up her hands. "Sorry, sorry. Was just curious. I once had a mage curse me with some geas that prevented me from being able to tell if I was wearing pants. Made for a difficult week before it wore off, I can tell you."

"Mages," Keo muttered. "Untrustworthy. Expensive."

"That sums it up, yup," Egrid agreed. Then her head turned. "Speak of the devil. Look who's here."

Keo glanced over to the door, and her expression darkened. The wizard Miria had entered the tavern, her blue robes somewhat disheveled. The white-blond mage's aquiline facial features were screwed up in an uncharacteristically frantic look, and her head snapped round the room, checking to see who was there. Her gaze fastened on the two of them, and she quickly hurried over to where they sat at the bar.

"Egrid, Keo, I need to hire you both for a night's work," Miria said curtly. "We can discuss the details at my tower."

"Fuck you," Keo bluntly told her. "You're the one who sold Lise the key to that tomb. I don't want anything to do with your shit."

"I'm kinda just here to drink tonight, Miria," Egrid said mildly. "You want to join us? Maybe some other night I'll be up for-"

"I'm paying one thousand gold per person," Miria said.

"I'm in," Keo amended.

"Me too," Egrid said, putting her wine down. "Shall we get going?"

"Yes. Hold still." The blond mage put a hand of each of their shoulders, and incanted a harsh string of syllables. The world blurred and twisted around them, and then they found themselves seated in Miria's casting chamber on chairs that no longer were there. Both of them fell on their asses, Egrid cursing, Keo just giving a pained hiss.

"You could have warned us," Egrid complained, getting to her feet. "I thought you told me once teleporting back here was expensive?"

"It is, but time could be a factor and this is important to me," Miria snapped. "I need you two to find a being for me."

"Being? Not person?" Keo asked suspiciously. "What do you mean?"

"I have a flesh construct, a golem, who's services I make use of," Miria said. She ran a hand through her short blond hair. "I got careless and I didn't put it back in stasis immediately after I was done using it. Something came up, the Tho'Lateyeh enchantment web began to fibrillate because of the spell I was working on, and I had to create an entire rune matrix to stabilize..." 

She saw their rapidly glazing eyes and looks of blank incomprehension, and sighed. "Big magic start go bad. Pretty mage need fix big magic. Take looooooong time."

"And while you were doing that, your golem..." Keo began, a slight smirk on her face.

"...walked off, yes." Miria finished unhappily. "I didn't think it had the initiative to leave on its own. It's always been so obedient!"

"So this golem is out walking around Dylak-Leem?" Egrid said, brow furrowed. "And you need us to what, kill it before it hurts anyone?"

"No, Egrid, you fucking idiot!" Miria screamed. "Kill it? Gods save us, do you know how LONG it took me to make? I want you to bring it back unharmed! I don't much give a fuck if anyone else is hurt. I don't expect anyone would be though. It's not violent and it's not particularly dangerous." She clenched her hands into fists, getting her temper under control.

Egrid just blinked, not used to the usually icy mage being so volatile.

"Does it possess any mode of transportation other than walking?" Keo asked. "For that matter, where are we now, and when did it leave?"

"Just its feet," Miria replied. "We're in my tower in the University Quarter, and it has about a three hour head start. It took a while for me to notice it was gone."

"So we find it and bring it back, and that's one thousand each?" Keo asked.

"Yes."

Keo smiled. "I like it. What does this thing look like, exactly? Do you have a picture or a sketch you could show us?"

"It looks exactly like me," Miria said. "If you put us next to each other you would be unable to tell the difference."

"Well, that makes it easier," Egrid said, pleased. "I was worried it would have some generic looks and we'd wind up running around checking people to see if they were a golem. Does this thing have a name that it answers to?"

"Mmm, yes," Miria admitted.

They waited.

"Miria, what is the name that it answers to?" Egrid finally asked.

"Fuckslave," Miria replied, not looking at her.

There was a second of silence.

"Ugh," Keo said, wrinkling her nose.

Egrid just buried her face in one large palm. "Oh Miria," she said sadly. "Fuckslave? Really?"

"I have needs," the blond mage said defensively. "It's not my fault nobody else is as attractive and wonderful as me."

"But 'Fuckslave'? You named her Fuckslave? Not even a proper name?"

"Constructs have got to know their place!" Miria shrilled. "If you give them a real name, they start getting ideas above their station! They start thinking they're PEOPLE! Then they run away! And I have to use the kindly whip to correct them!"

"Hot," Egrid admitted.

"Shut up!"

"More than I needed to know," Keo muttered. "Let's just find this golem and get paid, Egrid. If the mage wants to fuck herself, it's none of my business."

"That's right!" Miria snapped. "Get out there and run it down. I'll be back here trying to locate it by magic. If I find her, I'll send you a message. That or I'll just do it myself and save me two thousand gold."

"Let's go," Egrid said hurriedly. The two made their way down a flight of stairs, through a hall, and out the door to the tower. It slammed shut behind them on its own.

"'Fuckslave'. What a bitch," Keo said, shaking her head. "Degenerate AND scummy."

"Not Miria's greatest moment," Egrid admitted. "But you have to admit, the picture of Miria-on-Miria action is pretty hot."

"No, I don't," Keo told her crankily. "In fact, I'm trying not to think about it, and instead think about my thousand gold."

"Think about how we're going to find this golem," Egrid advised. "You have any way to track her, or do we just do the old standby of wandering around and asking people if they've seen her?"

"The latter. Depending on how much she was wearing, someone's got to remember seeing her."

"Maybe she's just getting some Shen-Lagathi food at a student takeaway," Egrid said hopefully. "Maybe this will be a milk run."

Keo said nothing, but the expression on her face made it clear she thought the odds of that were slim to none.

It took nearly half an hour of wandering the seedy byways of the University Quarter and accosting students, tutors, or merchants to find any leads. Most of the people they stopped mistook them for touts, peddlers, or prostitutes, and were confused when they went on to ask about a blond woman. Keo wound up punching one student in the nose who couldn't figure out that they were not offering to sell him a threesome.

Finally, though, a seller of herbal concoctions to improve concentration and wakefulness had some information for them. "Sure, I saw her," he told them. "She came by here about two hours back, gawking around. Headed down Ladygrave Road. I thought that was odd; she didn't look the type, you know?"

"Thanks." Egrid gave him a few coins, and glanced at Keo. "She headed straight into the Rat Quarter. That's probably not good."

"Mmm, no shit." Keo made a choppy motion with one hand, and the two began to walk swiftly. "Wonder if Miria will pay us anything if we just bring back a body."

"I'm guessing no. Not unless she's into dead people."

Keo started to say something, then thought better of it.

Egrid dodged around a pushcart full of ducks in cages. "I have to admit, I don't go into the Rat Quarter much. I know an artist who grew up there, but she doesn't talk about it much. I just know she was glad to get out. What about you?"

"I grew up poor. While my parents lived, one of their major focuses was staying out of the Rat Quarter." Keo shook her head. "There are slums in other parts of the city... I grew up in one... but the Rat Quarter is like it's own little world, a special sort of hell for people who have nothing or who society won't have. The Watch doesn't go in there. Everything is the gangs or the Cult of the Rat God or both; half the gangs owe allegiance to the cult."

"I wouldn't have thought the Rat God would have so much appeal," Egrid said curiously. "I know my friend was a part of his cult, but it didn't sound like she'd kept up after she got out."

"It's purely a matter of survival. If you join the cult, they'll feed you and give you a roof over your head, a few coppers to spend. The deeper into it you go, the more you get. It's not a matter of actual devotion, although there's some of that too." Keo's lip curled in contempt. "Most dogs love the hand that feeds them."

"Gotcha." Egrid grunted. "Doesn't some like a healthy place for our golem."

"We're probably going to have to fight whoever's in the process of gangraping her," Keo said flatly. "Since they've had two hours, she may be in rough shape by now, assuming she's still alive."

Egrid just sighed, and quickened her pace.

The University Quarter's border was marked by a ivy-covered gate manned by two thuggish looking proctors. The two adventurers walked through it without comment. The other side was notably shoddier. 

They continued down the street, noses crinkling from the smells that now assailed them. The drains and sewers here clearly weren't of the same quality as the rest of the city, and trash lay in the gutters. In contrast to the bustling streets of the University Quarter, Ladygrave Road here was empty. They were the only people walking down the street, but both of them could tell that they weren't alone. There were eyes all around, watching them from shadows or windows, gauging them.

"Fuck me, we just got here and they're sizing us up to jump us," Egrid muttered. "What a shithole."

"Most of them are cowards," Keo said, unworried. "They're trying to decide if we're the real thing. We are. Once they figure that out, they'll pull back and wait to see what we're here for."

"They'd better if they know what's good for them," Egrid rumbled. She kept one hand on her swordhilt.

They reached a small market square, and for the first time saw people. Not many, but a few. Urchins squatted against a wall, watching them with dark eyes. A gaunt young woman peddled moldy apples from a barrel; two hooded men sold a variety of cheap and damaged gear. Some of it bore recent bloodstains. Young men in gang colors lounged around a broken fountain, keeping an eye on business.

Egrid led the way over to the apple seller. "'Cuse me, miss," she said. "Seen a young lady with white-blonde hair pass through here, looking a little out of place for the neighborhood?"

The woman just stared mutely at her. Egrid grunted, took out five silver coins, and placed them on the apple barrel.

The coins vanished. "She came through an hour or two past," the woman said. "Taker's Crew took her."

"Where'd they take her?"

Silence. Five more coins went on the barrel.

"Temple of the Rat God. The smaller one, down off the market on Eastpenny Lane."

"Thanks." Egrid glanced at Keo. "Ever kill a priest before?"

"On her own altar in mid-rite, actually," Keo replied. "It felt good."

"Well, at least I have an expert with me." Egrid chuckled. "Let's see if we can do this the peaceful way first, though."

"Agreed." Keo gestured, and they began to leave the market. "The less violence the better, as far as I'm concerned."

---

It didn't take them long to reach the temple, a squat, grimy affair hunkering at one end of Eastpenny Lane. Most of the churches in Dylak-Leem were centered in the Temple Quarter, but the Rat God's congregants didn't leave their part of the city, nor did anyone want them to. So his houses stood in the neighborhood he dominated, three or four of them with the biggest one at the center of the quarter. This one was smaller, but the oldest of the lot, and the carved rat gargoyles that leered down from the walls were weathered with age and blackened with centuries of city soot. A low, slow, throbbing drumbeat eminated from the building, like a monstrous heartbeat.

Egrid and Keo exchanged glances, checked their weapons, and then walked up the steps and through the double doors of the temple.

The sanctuary within was a wide, pillared hall. No sunlight penetrated from windows or shafts; the room was lit by candelabra that flickered and cast a dim, uncertain light over the chamber and everything within. Throngs of people stood within; some in ragged street clothes, others in equally threadbare brown hooded ropes embroidered with a frayed rat. Four men and women slowly beat a massive drum against one wall; up at a rat-carved altar, a hooded priest led a group of acolytes in a chant. Most of the crowd was fixated on the raised platform before the altar, however.

On it, two young women knelt on their hands and knees. They were nude, save for the shackles chaining them to the platform. Mounting each of them was a gigantic rat, each the size of a large dog. The high-pitched squeals of the beasts and the moans and cries of the women mixed with the guttural chanting of the acolytes, with the drum sounding over all of it.

"Fucking filth," Keo muttered. "This shit is why I hate gods."

"Sssh. Our girl's not up there, is she?"

Keo eyed the two on the platform. One of them, black-haired, was panting with exertion but composed and thrusting back against the squirming, frenetically-fucking rat beast, clearly a willing partner in the public rutting. The other woman was blonde, but a golden-blonde as opposed to Miria's almost silver hair. She was crying, tears running down her face, wailing and choking out sobbing gasps as the verminous creature atop her took her yellow-furred pussy over and over again. Its claws had scraped red welts along her bare back and shoulders.

"Not ours," the black-eyed thief replied. "That doesn't mean ours isn't next up, though."

"Yeah. Think we can get away with doing a little bit of asking around, see if anyone saw her brought in?"

Keo frowned. "Maybe. Try and pick someone who doesn't look like they're in to this shit."

Egrid nodded. "You want me to ask, or should you?"

"You. You're friendly, Egrid. I fucking hate people. I don't want to talk to them and they can sense that. You'll get more out of them."

"Fair enough." The swordswoman surveyed the congregation for a while, and finally sidled over to a young woman in a tattered robe, face pensive under her hood. "Hey there. Mind if I ask a few questions?"

The woman shot her a wary look. "Questions about what?"

"The temple. What goes on here. A friend of mine, who I heard had come here. I'm Egrid, by the way."

The woman seemed to relax a bit. "I'm Faith. Sure, I can tell you about this place." She smiled wanly. "Anyone who lives in the Quarter winds up here eventually."

"Are you part of the Rat God's cult? I'm guessing so, given the robe."

"Yeah. I joined a year ago, during the bad winter. I didn't have enough firewood, and I was going without food too often. They give me a weekly handout, and they set me up with a job stuffing featherbolsters. It doesn't pay much."

"Does anything here pay much?"

"Yes. Rising high in a gang. Or the upper level of the cult. If you're willing to do what it takes."

Egrid nodded, then glanced up at the platform. "Those women... slaves, I'm assuming?"

Faith shook her head. "Oh, no. Those are members of the cult. They volunteered. This is Samantha's sixty-ninth time; that's when the exaltation usually happens. They paired her with Jessa today. It's Jessa's first time." She shivered. "She's not taking it well. They almost never take it well. It's probably horrible."

Egrid looked up at the platform. Jessa's eyes were red with sobbing. Tears ran down her crimson cheeks just as her own slickness ran down her legs from around the rat-rod pounding her pussy. "Why would she volunteer for THAT?"

"You have to go through it to reach the higher levels of the cult. To get the exaltation," Faith told her. "Once you've got that, you have it made. You're no longer poor. You have power, respect, fear. All you have to do..."

"...is sex up a giant mouse sixty-nine times," Egrid muttered. "What a deal."

Faith smiled hesitantly. "Yeah. I know." She watched the copulating figures with sad eyes. "But it's the only way out. Someday, I know I'll be the one up there. I can't bring myself to do it yet. But I want more than this. One day, I'll volunteer." She closed her eyes. "Maybe it won't be so bad."

"Yeah, maybe," Egrid said neutrally.

The black-haired woman, Samantha, suddenly began to cry out in pleasure. As they watched, the rat beast mounting her started to hump her quivering ass faster and faster, its squeals rising ever higher. Then, suddenly, it shuddered, thrust deep, and climaxed. Samantha let out a scream, and began to tremble. As semen bubbled out from around the rodent penis buried in her cunt, her hands clenched and her teeth bared. As Egrid watched, black fur began to sprout on her small, dangling breasts, on her rat-cum-smeared thighs, all over her body. Her nails turned to claws, and her face distorted, lengthening into a snout. Her mouth opened again, but what emerged this time was a shrill, chittering squeal of passion. The newly-created ratwoman pulled against her shackles as the beast mounting her spent itself in her completely.

Jessa watched this with an expression of horror, her breath coming in deep sobbing gasps as her own rat took her. Soon enough it began to speed up, going into a mating frenzy, making the girl's large breasts sway and flop as it ravished her tight hole. It began to chew her long, golden hair, making it matted and damp with saliva, and clawed insistently at her bare back. Her screams mixed with the rodent orgasm wails of Samantha and the shrill squeals of the vermin defiling Jessa's nubile young body.

"Is the transformation permanent?" Egrid asked Faith.

"Sort of. You learn to control it, is how I understand. They keep you in a cage the first month or so while they teach you. Then you can switch back and forth between forms at will."

"Right." Egrid glanced around. "So, about my friend. They wouldn't look like they belonged here; lady with white-blonde hair, sharp features. Probably was being escorted by someone."

"That was your friend?" Faith shook her head. "The Taker's Crew brought her in. They have a clearinghouse in the cellars under the temple; they took her down there. Probably going to sell her as a slave."

"She hasn't been convicted of anything..."

"That doesn't stop them. They sell to people who the law isn't eager to bother. If you're going to do something, you should probably do it soon. Someone like her will sell quickly."

Egrid sighed. "How do I get down there?"

Faith pointed to a shadowed doorway in one wall. "The stairs are there. Go straight down and then take a left."

"Thanks." A long, piercing scream drew Egrid's attention, and she glanced back at the platform. The rat beast mounting Jessa had climaxed; her golden cunt-curls were drenched with the sickly white semen of her rodent lover, squirting out from around the quivering pink penis buried in her swollen pussy. The girl was pulling at her chains and howling as gobs of sticky rat-girl cum mixture slid down her inner thighs to puddle on the floor.

"They'll breed her four more times tonight," Faith said. Sadness mixed with something like cynical anticipation in her voice. "I've seen a lot of these. Maybe if they break her completely it'll work out."

"What happens if it doesn't?" Egrid asked, curious.

"It doesn't with most," Faith told her. "They just never recover. All for nothing. We call them the Ratfucked. They don't get a lot of respect; they're sort of pariahs. Nobody wants to touch them." She shook her head. "The ones who stick it out, on the other hand... nobody dares call them that. And if they want a man or a woman, they just take them."

"Huh," Egrid said. Then she shook her head. "Thanks, Faith. It's been nice talking to you."

"You too." The woman looked at her belt. "Hey... selling your sword, is it a good living?"

"Only if you're fast and strong and smart and lucky," Egrid told her. "Dying with a yard of rusty steel in your gut is worse than being fucked by a rat."

"Right." Faith looked away, subdued. Egrid walked back over to Keo.

"Well?"

"They took her downstairs. Slavers. Come on." The two slipped through the congregation to the doorway, and passed through it. A crumbling candlelit stair descended into the catacombs below.

At the bottom of the stair it was dark and damp and musty. The drum from above still echoed like a dying heartbeat, along with Jessa's distant cries. The two glanced around, and then Egrid pointed down the left-hand way. Nodding, Keo slunk down it, Egrid bringing up the rear.

They passed through darkness for some time, then with startling suddenness turned a corner and were nearly blinded by torchlight. They were looking at a large room filled with people. Men and women, all naked, were chained against one wall, looking disconsolate. Several others, dressed in dark clothing and bearing shortswords, lounged about the room or sat at a table piled with parchments. All of them looked up as the two entered.

One woman stepped forward, with a narrow, ferrety face. "I don't recognize you," she said harshly. "What's your business here?"

"We're looking for a friend of ours," Egrid said, trying to sound friendly. "White-blonde, woman, was brought down here an hour ago?"

The woman stared back at her without warmth. "She's gone," she said. "Best forget her. Best go away."

Egrid chuckled. "Can't really do that, I'm afraid. Sorry. Can you tell us who you sold her to? We can pay."

"No. Go away. Now."

"Be reasonable," Egrid said. "We won't let on how we found her. A little money will be pure profit for you with no downside."

Turning, the woman glanced at her fellows, who were rising from their seats. Then she turned back to the duo and drew her shortsword. "Kill them."

Egrid sighed and drew her own blade. "Some people you just can't reason with."

"Gods DAMNIT," Keo quietly swore, drawing her paired daggers. "Do we both have to fight?"

"Yeah. Bit too many for me alone. Sorry."

"Fuck."

They went back to back, and the Taker's Crew closed in on them. The gang had the advantage of numbers, and it made them overconfident; Egrid took one through the throat with a lunge before they knew what was happening, and he fell to the floor gurgling on his own blood. Keo parried two stabs, and returned a cut of her own that sent a man staggering back with a crimson stain spreading along his swordarm. Their attackers recoiled for a second, as if surprised by the ferocity of the resistance. Then two of them began to shift, fur sprouting from their skin, faces lengthening.

"Two of 'em are ratmen," Egrid warned. "Kill them first, if you can."

"Oh, joy," Keo muttered.

The gangers swarmed the two again. This time Egrid severed the head of a slightly overweight woman who had tried to sneak in under her guard, but the half-orc took a light cut to her off-shoulder in return. Bellowing, she punched a man in the face, sending him swaying to the floor, and then gutted one of the ratmen as it tried to claw her bosom.

Behind her, Keo was barely holding her own. Not a fighter like Egrid, she was desperately trying to fend off her opponents with two short blades. It wasn't going well. The remaining ratman made an obscene gesture and pointed to her, then to its erect penis, as if in promise. Almost simultaneously a swordblade bit into her calf, making her stumble and hiss in pain.

Fuck it, Keo thought angrily. Egrid was busy; she had no choice. Reaching down to the small core of rage, lust, and hunger that she had learned to tap, she very carefully burnt a small amount of her blood supply.

The results were dramatic. The wound on her calf closed almost immediately, and she surged forwards. The Taker's Crew seemed to be moving in slow motion now, and she brutally slammed her daggers home into eyes and throats. Most of them were dead by the time she reached the ratman and snapped his neck with her bare hands, enjoying the astonished look on his rodent face.

As a red haze spread over her vision, she spotted the woman who had begun the brawl backing away. The leader. With a snarl, Keo was on her faster than she could react. The black-eyed thief's daggers flashed, cutting the pants off her prey as she slammed her down on the table. Keo basked in the woman's shrieking as her tongue and teeth started to lengthen, and she bent her head, ready to dine on her victim...

"Keo! Hey, Keo! What the fuck are you doing!?"

Keo hesitated for a second. The struggling woman's brown-furred cunt was right in front of her, waiting for her to dine. She shivered with anticipatory hunger at the thought of draining the woman dry and walking away sated, leaving her spreadeagled, bloodless corpse sprawled on the table with one last terminal orgasm stamped on its face. But Egrid was right here. She would see. She would know.

With a great effort of will, Keo simply slugged the woman in the jaw and then turned away. "Just stopping her from running."

"Fuck, I thought you were gonna rape her right there on the table! You never struck me as that type before. I always thought you were a bit of a cold fish, to be honest." Egrid glanced at her worriedly. "You okay? They didn't get you? You look sorta pale."

"I'm fine." She was HUNGRY. She had burnt more of her blood supply than she had meant to. "Check the papers, see if one of them can tell where our golem is. If not, we'll wait til this twat wakes up and then torture her until she talks."

"Bad day to be a slave dealer." Egrid shuffled through the papers for a while. Then she looked up, grinning. "Bingo. Description and everything. They delivered her to an estate in the Foreign Quarter; there's an address given. That's our next stop."

"House slave, you think?" Keo asked.

"Or concubine. That's what Miria used her for, after all." Egrid leered. "I wouldn't mind having a Miria to bounce on my lap myself."

"Think of your elf girlfriend," Keo advised primly.

"She'd love to bounce Miria on her lap too. Oh man! That would be so fucking hot!" Egrid was nearly drooling now. "Maybe before we bring the golem back, we can swing round her place and-" 

"No."

Egrid sulked.

"Come on," Keo said impatiently. "Time to go."

"Just a second," Egrid said. Going over to the far wall, she unshackled the slaves, pausing to slap the asses of some of the better-looking specimens. "Make your way out when the service ends. You can take the clothes off these corpses."

The woman on the table groaned. The slaves murmured darkly, and began crowding around her. One of them pulled her legs open.

"Time to go," Egrid told Keo. Nodding, they slipped out of the room. The cries and screams and moans from it were lost in the noise of Jessa taking her second rat cock of the night in her swollen, sopping pussy.

---

"Burning hells!" Miria cursed at length as yet another tracking spell blew up in her face with a hissing fizzle. It was her own fault, she knew; she had designed the golem with built-in anti-scrying wards set into its very bones. After all, she didn't want a colleague looking in while she was pleasuring herself, did she? But she had been confident that as the one who had designed the wards, she could use her intimate knowledge of how they were constructed to hack the protections and track her creation anyway.

Or not. It was quickly becoming apparent to Miria that her talent at building impenetrable protections was a lot better than her talent at hacking into said protections. In a way that was both good and unsurprising, since a large part of her business was erecting said wards. For the situation at hand, however, it was incredibly frustrating.

She paced about her spellcasting chamber like a caged lion. Hiring the two adventurers had been a backup plan, a failsafe, an insurance policy in case her own efforts failed. Now it looked like the backup plan was becoming her only hope. Could they do it? Miria had her doubts. Egrid was big and strong and ugly and therefore stupid. Keo was gutter scum, probably inbred and better off dead in a ditch somewhere. She doubted the two of them together could find their asses with both hands, although she granted that they were competent at fighting and stealing respectively. Could they fight and steal their way to finding her Fuckslave?

"Fuck!" Miria snarled, hurling a tome across the room. She was running out of ways to hack through the wards. Frankly she didn't think any of the ways she had left would work; she had already explored the most promising lines of attack. So what could she do?

Well... there was one thing. The wards protected the golem against arcane magic. They wouldn't stop a demigod. Or, for that matter, a demon.

Miria pursed her lips. She was an accomplished summoner; she knew how to call and bind demons of many sorts. But she didn't do it often, mostly because it was a lot of work and dangerous, and you could usually get the same results with safer, faster arcane magic. This was a special case, though.

And the alternative was trusting in Egrid and Keo.

That made up her mind. Grabbing a ramshead-stamped grimoire, Miria went over to the pentagram in one corner of the room and began to inscribe symbols in the alphabet of the hells. She was going to have to summon a lesser demon lord to get the results she needed. She had done this before, but never on such short notice.

Finishing the markings, she hurriedly assembled the components she needed. Some were rare and valuable, and sadly would be consumed in the summoning. Calling creatures from the hells was never cheap unless you involved human sacrifice, and while Miria wasn't above slitting a throat with a sacrificial knife to get what she wanted, there was no time to arrange someone who wouldn't be missed. That was a little extreme for her anyway.

Finally she had everything that she needed. This was the point where normally she would now spend three hours checking the pentagram, looking for imperfections, and then summoning raw nether energy to see if any of it could find a leak. But instead she trusted to her long experience and simply began the summoning.

If she had been thinking more clearly, she would have recalled that every time she had done her doublechecks, she had caught at least one error.

"Goraki, Nama, T'Rekiya!" Miria incanted, throwing a handful of oddly-scented power into a brazier. "By the thrice-folded seal I summon thee, Malbangru, Baron of the Lower Fifth Circle! Come swiftly to my commands, and obey!"

Flame and shadow bloomed inside the pentagram. Slowly, a huge form slid into being. The demon stood a good eight feet tall, covered in small blue-green scales, with two batlike wings folded behind its back. It was otherwise manlike, save for the curled horns, and wicked claws. "Impudent mortal," it rumbled. "Why do you dare summon me?"

"I will have you find something for me, Lord Malbangru," Miria said confidently. "Do this thing, and I will release you back to your home plane."

The demon scowled, looking intensely at the circle at its feet. For a few seconds it grumbled sullenly. Then he looked up and gave Miria a diabolic grin. Slowly, deliberately, he stepped out of the summoning circle. "You were careless, little mage," he purred evilly. "That was your undoing. Incompetence always catches up with wizards eventually."

Swallowing in fear, it dawned on Miria exactly how badly she had fucked up. She had violated one of the most basic safety protocols she had out of concern for an elaborate sex toy. Drawing back, she hurriedly began to cast a spell of banishing.

Malbangru had been expecting it. Almost contemptuously he lunged forward and grabbed the hand making the gestures, twisting her fingers. His other hand grabbed her by the throat, choking off the incantation in a gurgle for air. "Shall I strangle you to death, mage?" the demon lord mused. "Or can you be useful to me?"

Miria frantically tried to convey that yes, she could be VERY useful.

"This is an opportunity that does not come often. To be free, on the mortal plane, unbound... and with a wizard who will cooperate... yes, this is ideal for the settling of certain scores." The demon chuckled, and released his grasp on her throat, moving his hand down to her shoulder. "You will cooperate, yes?"

"Of course, Lord Malbangru," Miria groveled. "I live to serve you." She had fucked up BAD. She knew the only way she was getting out of this was to cooperate and wait for her chance. Maybe when Egrid and Keo got back they could fight it; Malbangru wasn't the sort of demon who was immune to mortal weapons. That would be Miria's chance to banish him.

"Yes, exactly," the demon lord smirked. "That is the only reason you still live. The second that changes..."

"I understand," Miria said, keeping her voice neutral.

"But who is it that I have serving me?" Malbangru glanced down at her. "Open your mouth, little mage."

Reluctantly, Miria did so. Smiling a fanged smile, the demon lord guided her head down to his crotch. His scaled member was starting to stand up, and it was obvious what he had in mind.

Miria mentally snarled in fury. This wasn't the first time she had had sex with a demon, but at least the last time she had gotten something out of it. Reluctantly, she took the green-blue penis between her pursed lips and began to suck it, moistening the scales with her saliva. It tasted like a lizard dipped in brimstone.

"Very good." Malbangru placed both hands on her head, and the mage felt the demon's will lightly touch her mind. As she sucked and tongued his cock, the demon lord began to peel away her outer defenses. The blond mage gave a strangled gasp as his mind broke through, and burning hell-will leaked through into her thoughts.

"So organized in here. Good. Let's get rid of this..." With an few adjustments, the demon turned off Miria's gag reflex. It was just in time, as his cock had been growing larger and larger under her oral ministrations. It was now so big it forced her mouth to open as wide as it could, and the tip was pushing its way down her throat. Miria emitted muffled moans as her head bobbed up and down, the warmth in her skull almost obscuring the huge organ violating her mouth.

"Let's see..." Malbangru began to riffle through her memories as if sorting through a picture album. He was trying to determine her abilities, Miria realized as she deepthroated him. One after another, images of her past rose up in her mind and were replayed before them.

"What's this?" Up came the image of her twin sister, naked and bound. Miria had advanced on her as she lay tied and squirming on the bed, and had lowered her eager mouth to the white-furred pussy of her sibling, lustfully eating out the only person as beautiful as her... "You're a bit of a pervert, aren't you, mage? No wonder she will have nothing to do with you any more." Another memory, of Mirena screaming and slugging her in the jaw as Miria tried to force her attentions on her. "How despicable of you. I approve."

Miria inwardly groaned with humiliation and pain. Nobody else knew about what she had done to Mirena. With Mirena. Her twin had enjoyed it, deep down, Miria knew. She was the only one who could compare to Miria herself, so they had to please each other. If only her sister could have seen that. But then, Miria had always been the smart one.

She shuddered as Malbangru's burning mind slid through her own, violating her memories and thoughts as his pumping penis nearly dislocated her jaw. Her eyes rolled up in her head as a lack of oxygen and the mental disrobing combined to make her knees buckle and tears slide down each cheek, mingling with the saliva and precum leaking from her mouth. The demon relentlessly catalogued every spell she knew, every summoning, every incantation. Her moans continued, although they were only muffled grunts around the massive cock straining her jaw.

Finally the demon lord seemed satisfied with his catalogue of her abilities, and switched over to porn, pulling up images of her past sexual acts. His arousal seeped over into Miria's own mind and combined with the lust from her own memories, making her a little wet. He replayed her first time fucking Mirena over and over, delighting in her sister's pleas and soft moans. Miria's legs clenched and crossed.

Malbangru's hands tightened around her skull, ruffling her white-blonde hair. With a roar, he climaxed, and Miria convulsed as what felt like gallons of burning hellseed pumped out of his cockhead and down her throat. Unable to gag, she gulped the stuff down as fast as she could, swallowing over and over as she guzzled it. It quickly filled her stomach, burning, tingling, setting her blood quickening.

Slowly, Malbangru pulled his long, massive penis out of her mouth. Glowing green semen spilled out from between her lips and down her chin, down her neck, down her chest. One last spurt spattered her face with the stuff. Miria gasped for air and choked as the demon lord released her head.

"You know that I can convert a product of my body at will, yes?" Malbangru told her. "Imagine how it would feel if I were to turn all the seed I just filled you with into, say, live scorpions. A nasty way to die."

"Yes," Miria agreed, wiping glowing cum from her lips. The taste of demonic semen filled her mouth. "I understand."

"Good. It only takes a second's concentration. Obey without hesitation, and you will continue to live and be useful."

"Yes." Maybe Egrid and Keo would have to kill it alone. "What do you wish me to do now?"

"Kneel and await my pleasure." The demon lord turned slightly, and began a complex incantation. For a brief second, Miria considered making her move. Then she dismissed the idea. Malbangru could almost certainly halt his spell and kill her before she could get a banishing off. She had attack spells that she was sure she could get off in time, but none of them would be fatal to the demon lord, and then he would kill her. She needed a large-scale distraction that the demon couldn't just set aside or shrug off, and her best bet to get that was buying time for Egrid and Keo to get back and stab Malbangru over and over.

The incantation finished, and a green-glowing portal opened. Eight small, spindly red forms filed out of it. Imps, Miria realized. The sort of minor demon you set apprentices to summon for practice. The peasantry of demons. Still dangerous, though, like everything from the hells.

The boss of the imp gang was a little larger than the others, and had more intelligence in his eyes. "Whatsa job, lord?" he squeaked in a high, grating voice.

"Construct me an infernal scrying basin here," Malbangru told it. "A subtle one."

"You gots it, great lord!" the imp boss squeaked. He turned to his fellows, and began conferring in the harsh language his kind used. "Jaga'ki, nog yah trej'keh..."

Gritting her teeth, Miria knelt and waited while the imps got to work ruining a portion of her workroom to build a demon's scrying bowl. Bored, Malbangru wandered over and placed his hands back on her head, and proceeded to pass the time by browsing through her memories of past sexual encounters. Miria's breathing grew heavy and her cheeks grew red as the two of them slowly covered most of her carnal life together.

Finally the imps finished their work, and the cackling mob of them bounced over to cluster at the demon lord's feet. "All done, lord," said the imp boss fawningly. "Quality work. Only the best from our gang."

"We will see." Malbangru went over and inspected the basin, a depression in the floor carved round with vile runes and leering faces. He filled it with wine from a nearby bottle, and made a few experimental passes over it. The results made him smile. "You have done well, my minions. You deserve a reward." He glanced over at Miria. "Get on your hands and knees, little mage."

Oh shit. Reluctantly, Miria did. She suspected she knew what was coming.

"Pleasure my imps while I conduct the scrying. Be enthusiastic. Think on this as a test to see if you can be relied upon to obey." The demon smiled wickedly. "From your history, you may even enjoy yourself."

Yeah, right. "Yes, Lord Malbangru," Miria replied unhappily.

"Nice! Thank you, lord!" the imp boss squeaked. He yapped at his fellows in their crude language, and eight pairs of beady eyes turned to look at Miria as she crouched, ass up and presenting, her blue robe draped around her slim form.

Then they swarmed her.

Imps scrabbled up her legs and arms as she sucked in her breath in surprise and disgust. They had sharp claws, and several of them now put these to use on her robe. Slowly, to the harsh sound of tearing cloth, the smooth silk garment was torn to shreds, the pieces falling to the floor. The imps chittered and salivated as her mostly naked body was revealed.

The white-blonde mage was slim and well-proportioned. Her ample breasts were round and firm without being large, and each was tattooed with a staring blue eye whose pupil was a diamond-hard nipple. Miria flattered herself as nobility, and so as a matter of style she wore white lace panties, a luxury that usually only Abois or an actual noble would go in for. They covered a hairless labia tattooed with squiggling runes on the outer lips.

The imps took all this in, then began to debate in their vile speech. The boss quickly took charge and made assignments. That finished, they sprang into action.

One scaled the front of her chest, using her tits as hand-and-footholds, clambering up to splay its torso across her face as it wrapped its tiny arms around her head. It shoved its penis into her mouth; the organ was larger that it should be proportional to the rest of the imp's body, but still seemed tiny after taking Malbangru's monster. It tasted better, though, Miria thought with resignation as she began to suckle it.

Another imp scaled her arms, grabbed her breasts with both hands, and swung its legs around and upside down. It wrapped them around her torso, and hung upside down like a trapeze artist, facing her twin mounds. Cackling, it whipped out its stubby cock and stuck it between her breasts, then began to titfuck her enthusiastically. Miria squealed around a mouthful of imp as its claws tweaked her nipples painfully.

The imp gang boss climbed up one thigh and slid into the front of her panties, using the lace garment as a sling to hang upside down. He had the biggest cock of any of the imps, and without hesitation he slid it into Miria's waiting snatch, already wet from the replayed memories. It filled her tight hole nicely, but then he stuffed his dangling scrotum in after it. Miria's eyes bulged as his two balls in their warty sack crammed into her vagina, pressed against her inner walls by the pumping imp-cock.

Another imp scrambled up the back of her legs, clawing his way onto her pert bottom. Lifting the taut back of her panties, he slid himself into them and began to fuck her up the ass, riding her like a jockey on a bareback horse.

Two more imps scaled her arms, coming to perch on her shoulders. They had the smallest, skinniest dicks of the lot, and each of them squeezed unceremoniously into one earhole. Miria's skull soon rocked and rattled under the pounding of three different imps fucking her head. Their fingers clawed and pulled at her white-blonde hair, and her eyes crossed, dazed.

Another imp now hoisted himself onto her lower back, wrapped his legs round her waist, and then swung himself down to hang upside down. Salivating, he craned his head to where his leader was energetically fucking her tight cunt. His long, dextrous tongue licked out to fondle her clit, making her moan around her headfucking. The moan changed to a muffled squeal as he nipped at the clit with his sharp teeth. All the time, just millimeters away, the imp boss thrust into her pussy over and over again, his body bulging against the front of her lace panties. Miria tossed her head and shuddered under the double attention her engorged box was receiving.

The final imp simply jacked off near her feet, waiting.

Miria's cheeks burned as she was taken in five different holes at once. This was probably the most humiliating sexual experience of her life, and the haughty mage was just glad nobody but the demons was around to witness it. She pictured Mirena watching her sister get gangbanged by a mob of lowly, disgusting imps. The thought was bitter, yet oddly arousing. She changed it to a picture of Mirena being fucked by imps while she watched. Yes, that was much more to her liking. Maybe some day...

The imp riding her backside climaxed with a squeal, rearing back and clawing her smooth cheeks as it shot its disgusting load into her tight ass. Miria shuddered in disgust as she felt the thing's semen fill her rectum. Cackling happily, it slid its cock out of her anus and hopped off her, leaving a trail of whitish cum down one of her legs and in the back of her panties. The imp that had been jacking off now climbed up. With a sigh of pleasure, it took her asshole, hammering her already sore back passage and making her emit muffled cries of pain.

Those cries changed from pain to something else as the imp tonguing her clit increased his attentions. Now and then he would nip at her button, or at the fleshy folds of her womanhood. Miria's body responded eagerly, stimulated by the oral attention, the thrusting cocks plowing ass and pussy, and the tweaking and caressing of both nipples.

"MMMMmmm-MMMMM!" Miria gasped. The ugly little shits were doing a number on her. Her pussy was dripping with her own slickness, and sweat was streaming down her body. She never sweated during sex. Oh gods, was she going to have an orgasm? That would be unbearable.

The imp gang boss was slamming his spindly crotch into her pussy now, panting and hooting. He had to be nearly finished. Miria frantically tried to remember if imps were among the sorts of demon who could impregnate human females. She couldn't recall. It hadn't seemed important until now. 

The imp titfucking her twisted her breasts and she cried out. His claws dug painfully into her sore nipples, and then with a shriek the imp climaxed. His whitish semen shot out to splatter against her upper breasts, neck, and chin. It smelled awful. The imp continued to hang there, his penis slowly spurting globs of cum to drip along her swaying globes.

Almost at the same time, Miria went completely deaf in both ears. The two imps taking her earholes had spurted, and her canals were now filled with imp seed all the way down to the eardrums. They slowly pulled their skinny pencil-dicks out, and hopped off. A white river oozed out of both ears, dripping down her cheeks.

The one fucking her mouth erupted as well, and her throat and tongue were suddenly flooded with musky, spicy imp semen. It had an oddly stimulating taste, not bad at all, and Miria reflexively swallowed. Then her clit was attacked from that probing tongue, and she threw back her head and gave a shrill, unwilling cry of passion. The seed burned in her throat, just as it burned in her rectum and ears. And was about to burn in her cunt. Her wet, ready cunt, that was being pounded over and over by that insistent penis and the two balls rubbing against her...

"AAAAHHHNN!" Miria's voice rose to a crazed wail as she began to climax. Her arms buckled and gave way, sending her front body crashing to the ground. The final imp on her head hopped off. "O-oh godsssss..." Her cheeks burned crimson as she spasmed in orgasm. To be brought to this by a gang of imps, to have them all use her magnificent body at once...

The imp gang boss had an orgasm with a gleeful cry. His hot seed drenched her waiting pussy, flooding her vagina and filling her barren womb. It bubbled out of her cunt around the edges, but was mostly held in by his cock and balls.

Miria panted and drooled cum as her climax finished. Her head was resting on the floor, and her ass was still hiked in the air as she rested on her knees. She felt drained and defiled, and she was still being fucked in two holes.

The front of her lace panties had become damp with cum and her own wetness, and now, straining to hold the imp gang boss in place, it snapped. The imp squealed and fell, only to dangle under her, held by its cock and balls stuffed in her tight snatch. Slowly, inch by inch, they slipped out, making Miria cry with the sensation. Then, suddenly, they tugged free. The imp fell to the floor, and a river of semen poured from Miria's cuntal mouth, along with her own nectar. Mixed together, the two liquids formed a pool on the ground beneath her.

Miria's legs collapsed, and she lay now on her stomach, flat on the floor. The only imp now on her was the one humping her ass, and as she lay there in a post-coital daze it enjoyed her repeatedly in her swollen anus. She wished she could throw the spindly little fiend off, but she didn't have the energy and she didn't dare to anyway, so she fumed and grunted helplessly as her unwanted lover took her over and over again. Finally it pulled its cock out of her butt, slid it between her twin cheeks, and spewed, sending cum squirting over her lower back. It dripped down between her crack, and pooled around her asshole. Cackling, the imp leaped off.

She lay there, breathing heavily, drenched in sweat and imp semen. Miria hadn't been fucked like that in ages, and she wished she could have enjoyed it. As it was, she just desperately hoped nobody ever learned about it. Oh gods, what if they decided to fuck her again, and Egrid and Keo returned and found her? She imagined their faces as they watched eight imps taking her nubile body, their scorn as they watched her pant and moan and orgasm under the gang-fucking of the lowly demons. She would of course have to kill them.

---

It was nearly midnight when Keo and Egrid entered the Foreign Quarter. The seemingly innocuous name belied the character of the place. Outlanders of various sorts could be found dwelling throughout Dylak-Leem; the port city was cosmopolitan and decadent, and embraced many cultures and races, sometimes literally. But there were some who were just unwanted, for one reason or another. They had too much money to be confined in a ghetto like the Rat Quarter, and so this place developed; a district of shadowed markets, odd architecture, and walled compounds, inhabited by many who preferred to go about robed and cloaked.

"I don't like it here," Keo muttered as they strode briskly along. "You can never tell what they're thinking, and they carry things you can't fence easily."

"Not my favorite part of the city either," Egrid admitted. "Though I did have an incredible one-night stand here once. See, this guy was half-human, half something or other, and even though his face was nothing to write home about he had a prehensile cock that could-"

"I don't want to hear it," Keo snapped.

"I had four orgasms that night," Egrid said happily. "He was a bit of an asshole, but an incredible lover."

Keo just snarled and walked faster.

Finally they reached the gate of an estate by the river, guarded by two hooded and robed figures carrying jagged pikes. The two adventurers exchanged glances.

"Diplomacy first?" Egrid asked.

"I think we'd better," Keo allowed. "I don't like finding out how many guards they have in there the hard way, and we don't have the time to plan a proper break-in. You do the talking."

Egrid nodded, and the two walked up to the gate. "Pardon me," Egrid told the guards. "We'd like a word with the management about a slave you may have acquired illegally. By accident, I'm sure."

The guards glanced at each other. They seemed to silently converse, and then one held up a hand signalling them to wait. It then headed back towards the main compound.

For several minutes the two women waited, uneasily watching the remaining guard. Keo noted with interest that, just like her, this fellow didn't seem to need to breathe. Finally a woman emerged from inside the compound; she had pale skin and black hair, strangely angular features, and was nude from the waist up, displaying an ample bosom tipped by green-yellow nipples. She wore a dark blue hoop skirt, and from time to time beneath it the tip of something... a toe?... the same color as her areola could be seen. A glistening trail of slime was left in her wake.

Egrid stirred, uneasy. "Ahhh... hello, miss? Do you speak for the owners?"

"I am Lady Anna, Lord Xiib's daughter." The woman smiled a too-wide smile, studying them. "What an interesting pair. What are your names?"

"I'm Egrid, and this is Keo. We're here about an illegal slave, purchased a little over an hour ago in the Rat Quarter," the half-orc told her. "I'm not suggesting any wrongdoing on your part, nor am I trying to get you in any trouble. We simply want her back. We're willing to compensate you for any losses you may have incurred obtaining her."

"Oh dear, I am so sorry. If you are to be believed, someone in my household has been very naughty." Anna giggled. "The woman in question was to be a playmate of mine tonight." She blushed slightly. "I have trouble arranging affairs. But you say I must give her back?"

"I'm afraid so," Egrid confirmed. "How much did you pay?"

"Two thousand gold," Anna told her. "Expensive, no?"

Keo and Egrid looked at each other.

"Do you think Miria will pay for-"

"No," Keo replied curtly. "Fucking be serious. Of course she won't."

"Ahhh..." Egrid looked back at Anna. She put on an insincere grin. "Two thousand, you say?"

"Maybe you would have trouble compensating me?" Anna said sweetly. "Maybe I would simply lose all my hard-earned money?"

Egrid and Keo exchanged awkward glances.

Anna tittered with laughter. "You look so crestfallen, Keo, Egrid, dear guests. I have an idea that shall satisfy everyone. I bought this slave for my needs tonight." She blushed again. "I will give you your slave back. But in return, I want an hour with Keo. An hour of sweet love."

"Deal," Egrid said immediately.

"WHAT?! Wait!" Keo gabbled. "Don't I get some fucking say in this? What the fuck?"

"You told me to do the talking. I'm doing the talking," Egrid told her unsympathetically. "This is the only way we're getting paid. If you want to keep your twat dry more than you want to get paid one thousand gold pieces, then we can just call it a bust and go home now. Otherwise, it's time for you to take one for the team."

"Why don't YOU do it?" Keo snarled back. "Everyone knows YOU'RE the slutty one!"

"She didn't ASK for me," Egrid pointed out.

"Orcs, they just do not fit my tastes," Anna said helpfully. "No offense, dear Egrid."

"None taken," Egrid assured her. "A lot of people can't handle that much sex machine."

Keo gritted her teeth and glared at the half-orc. Then she turned to Anna. Fuck, what WAS the woman even? Human and what? "Lady, sex with me could be fatal."

"The fuck?" Egrid asked, incredulous.

"I know what you are, dear Keo," Anna told her kindly. "It's part of why I'm interested. There's no danger to me, unlike most mortal lovers you might taste."

She knew? That put an entirely different spin on things. And if she was confident that she wouldn't be hurt, Keo WAS very hungry...

Fuck. She spent every day having worse experiences with Amelie. An hour with this freak for a thousand gold wasn't that different from what she put up with all the time, and it would get her that much closer to getting rid of her master for good. And it was uncomfortable running on such a low level of blood; she needed to feed, and here was a willing victim.

"All right," she said grudgingly. "You owe me, Egrid."

"I'll be glad to have sex for you WHENEVER you want, Keo," Egrid told her sweetly. "Speaking as the slutty one."

"Fuck you." Keo stepped forward. "Anna, is it? Where do you want to do this? Not here in the street I hope."

"Come with me, Keo." Anna took her familiarly by one arm and led her through the gate. "There is a room prepared for us."

"Right." The black-eyed thief let herself be ushered down the path to the door of the compound. She noticed right away that Anna didn't precisely walk; whatever was under that skirt, she moved with a sort of gliding slither, leaving a glistening trail behind. It didn't make her any more enthusiastic about her date.

The hallways inside were oddly shaped; hexagons with unevenly proportioned sides. Unseen lamps behind rice-paper screens shone a dim, green light that cast strange shadows and played tricks with the eyes. A sweet, spicy odor hung in the air; some sort of smoke, possibly incense. Distantly, Keo could hear sobbing; more distantly still, discordant flutes playing an alien melody.

"You aren't a virgin, I trust?" Anna asked delicately.

Bitterly, Keo shook her head. She ought to be, she thought, cursing her ill fortune. She had never wanted to be anything else. Now she spent her days being violated by Amelie, and there was still a silver coin lodged up her ass to commemorate the first time her womanhood had taken a penis.

"That's good. I'm not very experienced myself, so I'm sorry if I don't please you as much as I should."

"You aren't?" Keo asked, faintly surprised. She had assumed the freak had nightly slave orgies.

"I've only recently decided to become sexually active." Again, Anna blushed fetchingly; she seemed prone to it. "A dear friend educated me on how I could use my body to please women, and I've had a handful of wonderful encounters since then." She hugged herself, her breasts bouncing, the greenish-brown nipples erect. "When I've learned enough I'm going to seduce her. She's such a genius! I can't wait to make love to her. But tonight is about us; I should not talk of another."

"Yeah, okay." Keo twitched a bit.

They arrived at a doorway, and Anna motioned her in. It was a very small chamber, lit by a single candle, containing a small table, a chair, and a pillowed bed covered with silks and rose petals. The alien flutes were distant here, and when Anna shut the door behind them they almost could not be heard.

Keo stood there, awkwardly. "So. Uh. What did you want-"

Anna smiled at her. "Why don't you take your clothes off, and climb onto the bed?"

Hesitantly, feeling hugely self-conscious, Keo stripped off her cloak and her dark leather shirt. Acutely aware of Anna's eyes on her small breasts, she unbuckled her belt and pulled off her pants, revealing the tangled black forest that hid her private parts. She sat on the bed, watching her host warily.

"You're quite beautiful, in your own way," Anna said musingly. "You don't look the way a vampire is supposed to look, except for being so pale. You're short, and skinny on the top and a little wide in the back. We think of vampires as being tall and classical in their beauty."

"That would be my master," Keo said irritably. "This is what you've got. Take it or leave it."

"Oh, don't be cross. I did say you were beautiful." Anna smiled at her. "Slide up and lie down."

Keo complied, lying on her side so she could watch Anna. "I can't bite you if I'm lying like this, you know."

"You won't be biting me, dear Keo," Anna said, moving over to the candle. "You can't. You'll see what I mean when I join you on the bed." She blew out the flickering flame, and the room was plunged into pitch-black darkness.

It had been a disappointment to Keo to discover that vampires cannot see in the dark any better than humans; they simply have very highly attuned senses, particularly to walking bags of blood. In her line of work nightvision would have been a great asset, and it would have come in handy now. She could sense exactly where Anna was, she just couldn't see her. "The fuck?"

She heard the sound of the skirt rustling to the floor. "I'm shy, my darling. I turned the light out to get undressed." Anna crossed the room, a vague, faintly-seen outline in the utter darkness of the chamber. The door wasn't even letting a crack of light in. Slowly, the strange woman slipped into the bed, and Keo sensed and heard rather than saw Anna lying down behind her.

Those two breasts pressed against Keo's bare back, and she shivered. "Are you... are you going to take the lead?"

"Yes, Keo, sweet Keo. What does your hunger tell you?"

Her hunger. Why wasn't she grabbing Anna and sating herself on her? She wasn't getting anything. No; she felt actually a little NAUSEOUS at the idea of biting the woman. "W-what? What the hells?"

Anna kissed her neck. "You cannot drink my blood, my love. It is not like the mortal races you dine on, not entirely. It would poison you, perhaps even destroy you, and your undead body can sense that. You will not be feeding upon me, Keo."

"Then why did you ask..." Something slid between her legs; something moist and long. It probed up one thigh to swish through the black fur of her labia. "Oh gods. What is that?!"

"It's just me, Keo," Anna said soothingly. She wrapped her arms around the thief's upper body. "It's all just me."

"I can't see you." There was a hint of fear in her voice that she hated.

"That's for the best, my love." Anna's voice was throaty. "Picture me as beautiful."

"I... oh gods... your upper half was nice, Lady Anna..." The moist appendage probed around her cuntal lips. "Oh gods. I'm not sure-" It pushed its way into her, and Keo let out a strangled gasp. It felt like someone was shoving a live octopus up her pussy. "Oh gods. Ahhhhh! Oh gods! What IS that?"

"It's just me," Anna whimpered. "Oh! You're so tight, Keo! You're gripping me so tightly!"

Keo groaned as the organ slid deeper into her. "Oh my gods, this is..." She gave an electric start as another slimy appendage slid over her hip and slithered along her belly. "There's two? You have two of it?!"

Anna just nibbled at Keo's ear. Her hands went to the thief's small breasts, and she began to knead them. Slowly, the unseen tentacle slid up the front of Keo's naked body, sliding between her fondled mounds. It curled around one breast, and the tip of it went to press against her left nipple. Something like a sucker or little teeth clamped down on it, and Keo cried out. "What is it?! Oh fuck! Oh fuck!"

"It's just me, Keo," Anna breathed in her ear. "I'm going to make love to you."

Keo trembled. Her mind was trying to picture exactly what was squirming in her cunt and squeezing her breast, and the images she was getting were frightening her. "My gods, Lady Anna, I don't-" She groaned as the thing in her pussy pressed hard against her sensitive spot, making her back arch.

"I chose a vampire because I thought one would be harder to frighten," Anna said, sounding a little sad. "All of my lovers react like this. It was worse before I started turning the light off." She stroked Keo's side with her fingertips. "I like the darkness anyway."

Keo felt a stab of unusual guilt mix in with her fear and lust and repulsion, an emotion she didn't often have. She knew what it was like to be alone and different, unlike the others. In Keo's case it had simply been due to how her mind and personality were constructed; for Anna, it was her body at the very least. It wasn't the freak's fault, Keo told herself. She was trying her best.

Hesitantly, Keo reached behind her to touch Anna, careful to make sure it was her upper torso that her fingers found. "You looked pretty good to me, Lady Anna," she said, trying to sound complimentary. It came out as more of a plea.

"Do you like me?" Anna asked in a small voice.

Keo cringed inside. This was a little sad. "I like you a lot," she stammered, hoping it sounded sincere.

Anna's presence leaned forward, and Keo felt her lips shyly brush against her own. She returned it, and in the dark they kissed, slowly at first, then with increasing enthusiasm from Anna. The thing spearing Keo's pussy grew agitated, and the black-eyed thief moaned around the liplock. Anna took the opportunity to insert her tongue, her hand sliding down to caress Keo's shuddering hips.

"Oh Keo," Anna said, briefly breaking the kiss. "You're so good. I'm going to make you so happy. Are you ready for me?"

"Ready for what? What?" Keo whispered, alarmed.

A slimy, dripping mass of SOMETHING pressed against her buttocks. Keo gasped and tried to move forward, but Anna's arms grabbed her and pressed her back into it. "Oh gods! What is that? What IS THAT?!"

"It's just me, my love!" Anna's voice was a strange mix between lustful and pleading. "You like me!" She kissed Keo again, and the thief felt a stalklike THING slide out of the slimy mass and drive into her anus. She gave a strangled cry and convulsed as it plunged deep into her bowels.

"Oh gods... oh gods... oh gods..." Keo repeated fervently as Anna lifted her mouth from hers.

"Oh Keo, you're clenched on me so hard," Anna gasped. "Oh DJ'KAyeHcj, that feels good! Don't stop!" The various things penetrating and squeezing the thief suddenly froze. "Is that a... disk of metal in your bottom?"

Keo was surprised to find that she could still fit terminal embarrassment into this blend of agony and ecstacy. "It's a vampire thing. A secret vampire thing. Don't tell anyone." If she ever met Flann again she was going to kill the dwarf, painfully.

Anna began to move again. "I won't tell. Oh yes.... ahhhhhhh... do you feel me in you, my love?"

"Yes," Keo whispered back. "I do." She reached back again to touch the side of Anna's breast, motivated by a need to feel something that felt human.

Anna kissed her fiercely. "I can't hold back any more, Keo." The thing wrapped round her breast stopped suckling her nipple. It extended up her body, slide over Keo's chin, and pushed into her mouth before she could do more that gasp. "Suck me, Keo. Make me feel like a woman!"

Like a woman?! Keo burbled around the thing in her mouth. It was covered with slime of some sort, and tasted oddly; a little cloying, a little sweet. She sucked on it experimentally, and was rewarded with a deep moan from Anna.

Two things that felt like pincers grabbed her thighs. They felt like bone or chitin, like the talons of some enormous beetle, and Keo screamed in shock. It was muffled by the tentacle plugging her mouth. The pincers pried her legs further open as Anna pressed closer and closer against her and the organs threshing her anus and pussy grew more frenzied.

Keo writhed, unsure if she was trying to break free or cooperating in the sex act. Dear gods, what had hold of her? What was it like? Her body shuddered under Anna's attentions, and she let out another muffled scream, this time of passion. She had only ever had hungerless sex like this with Amelie, her lover. And she hated Amelie.

Wait, her lover? Oh gods, was that how she thought of her now?

"Oh DJ'KAyeHcj! YaH'VaceK, goj Cthunta..." Anna gasped, panting. "Oh Keo! Keo!" The woman spasmed, and pressed against the black-eyed thief. THINGS slid against Keo's legs and lower back, and then Anna stiffened and gave a long, enraptured bellow.

Acid pain suddenly speckled the cheeks of Keo's bottom, and she screamed in pain as the tentacle in her mouth slid out, spurting slime. "AAAAAAH! Fuck! It hurts! What is it!?"

"I had an orgasm," Anna said weakly, sounding embarrassed. "I sprayed a bit. I'm sorry."

"Oh gods..." Keo gritted her teeth. "Is that acid?"

"Yes. My... it's my woman parts."

"I envy you," Keo mumbled. A pussy full of caustic acid would have saved Keo a lot of trouble. Slowly, the things in her cunt and anus slid out, leaving a dripping trail behind. 

Anna kissed her. "Was it good for you too?"

"Uh. It was unique," Keo said honestly. "I don't really like sex very much, except for feeding. But, uh, you were a very thoughtful lover. Except for the acid." It had been incredibly horrible, but not that bad. More frightening than unpleasant. Anna had at least made her body feel good.

"I'm glad," Anna said. She eased herself up, and got out of bed. "I'm going to get dressed, my lover." Keo heard the rustle of cloth, and then there was the flair of a candle. Anna stood there, flushed and smiling, her long blue hoop skirt completely covering her lower half.

Keo looked down at herself. She was a sticky mess. The slime was a greenish-red. "Do you have a towel?"

Anna handed her one, and she wiped herself off in silence. Her body felt keyed up, like she was going to vibrate through a wall. Finally she dressed herself, and stood. "All right. Can I see the slave now?"

"Of course." Anna led her out of the room, down another hall, and into a similar chamber. Seated on the bed was an exact double of Miria, wearing a short cotton slave's tunic that barely covered her hips. She gave a big, foolish smile at the two. "Hi!"

"This is Keo," Anna told her. "She's going to be taking you."

"Hi Keo! I'm Fuckslave!" the golem told her. "Want to have sex?"

Keo just stared at the woman.

The hunger that had been absent during the sex returned full-force. The exquisite sexual playing of Keo's body that Anna had done hit it like a flamethrower hitting a fireworks factory. Keo felt her teeth lengthen and a red haze start to slip over her vision.

"Anna," she said unsteadily, "please leave now. I don't want to hurt you. I need... I need..." She felt violence start to well up, directed at the not-food. "Get out now!"

Nodding, Anna hastily stepped out and shut the door.

Fuckslave beamed at her. "So do you want to have-"

Keo descended on her like a black tide.

The first five minutes were a red blur. She remembered the woman crying in passion, remembered drinking and drinking. When her focus returned, she was buried deep in Fuckslave's hairless snatch, her tongue almost in the other woman's womb.

Consumed by hunger, Keo drank and drank, savoring the rich red blood and the nectar of her slickness. There was a current of arcane energy in it as well that gave her a heady feeling. She drank her fill as her victim convulsed in orgasm after orgasm, and as she reached the limit of her blood capacity Keo climaxed with a shriek, letting out all the horniness Anna had stoked.

Raw energy crackled off her as she burnt blood to make room for more. It was blissful. She felt incredible.

Finally, she pulled her head away from the gasping woman's pussy. Her tongue and teeth shrank down to normal, and she stared blankly at Fuckslave.

The golem grinned at her, still breathing heavily. "WOW! That was incredible! God-Mistress Miria never did that to me!"

"How are you not dead?" Keo stammered. "The amount of blood I just took out of you... you're not even pale!"

"I made more blood!" the golem said proudly. "I can do that! It's in case I get hurt! I just had to convert some stored food. When we get home, I'll eat something."

Well. Well well well. That was INTERESTING.

Keo led her to the door and opened it. "I'm sorry, Lady Anna. You just... stimulated me so heavily that the hunger..."

"I understand. I should have thought that something like this might occur." Anna looked at them. "Are you ready to go?"

"Yeah."

Fuckslave just gave her a very un-Mirialike grin.

Egrid was still waiting at the gate when they arrived. "Any problems?" she asked.

"None," Keo replied. "We've got our girl. Time to collect our reward." She glanced behind her, then on impulse walked over and kissed Anna. "Goodbye, lady."

"Goodbye, dear Keo. Please, come again. I would love to see you. We could have tea. We could have other things."

Not replying, Keo turned, and they left the gate.

"So how was it?" Egrid asked after a while, curiously.

Keo just shuddered. "I had sex with something. I still don't know what. Just don't ask."

"Sounds like a guy I banged one night after a lot of heavy drinking."

"Shut up, Egrid," Keo muttered tiredly.

---

Miria wasn't sure how long she lay crumpled in the puddle of her own fluids and imp semen, regaining her breath and composure. Not longer than several minutes, surely. But it was long enough for Malbangru to finish his scrying.

"Get up," he told her. "I'm going to need your services elsewhere."

"What sort of services?" Miria asked warily.

The demon lord grinned. "Not the ones you just provided my imps. Your abilities as a mage. In this city there dwells a templar who has been... troublesome. To remove her would gain me great favor. But she is formidable, and her accursed faith proofs her against practically all demonic magic."

"But not arcane magic," Miria said, seeing where this was going.

"Exactly. Your perverse little skull contains a powerful paralytic enchantment. We will enter, and you will use it on her. I will then deal with her as I see fit." Malbangru's voice dripped with evil anticipation. "You can handle that, I believe."

"Yes." The spell he spoke of was powerful, but not very useful most of the time. It completely froze the subject's muscles, but it required such utter attention and concentration to maintain that it had the practical effect of completely freezing the wizard as well. Not surprisingly, mages fond to living to an old age were not enamored of spells that required them to hold still and intensely focus on their navel in the middle of a raging, chaotic melee.

"Good. The templar's name is Avila the Strident; she's of the church of Kravos. At the moment she is alone, praying in the small shrine of Kravos at the edge of the Temple Quarter. We will teleport in. You will immediately cast. I know you can get the spell off within two seconds; take longer, and you will die."

"Not eager to face her in a fair fight?" Miria asked archly.

"Only a fool fights fairly against a dangerous foe," Malbangru replied irritably.

He clearly was afraid of her. Not entirely surprising. Templars were warriors fanatically committed to the god they followed; in return for their service, the deity in question empowered them with divine protection and offensive power. They tended to be a hard-bitten, zealous, murderous lot who loved nothing better than to purge that which was unworthy in their eyes. Kravos was a sun god AND a storm god, which in Miria's opinion meant that he was both violent and self-righteous. One of his champions would be death on demons.

Could Miria turn on the demon lord during the fight? It sounded at first like a prime opportunity. But the more she examined the situation, the less she liked it. She knew Malbangru wasn't bluffing when he said he would instantly kill her if she didn't immediately cast the paralysis spell. Once she did that, all her attention would be going into maintaining the enchantment. If she dropped it and let Avila move again, the demon lord would instantly know she'd betrayed him and kill her. But if she didn't drop it, all she could do was stand there and focus on the spell while Malbangru killed the templar and her hopes of escape. It was a no-win situation.

"When are we doing this?" she asked resignedly.

"Right now." The demon smirked at her.

Miria scrambled to her feet. "Let me just wash a bit and grab a fresh robe-"

"You do not need clothing or water to cast a spell. We are leaving right now. Be ready!" Malbangru strode over to her, put a clawed hand on her bare shoulder, and incanted several harsh syllables.

There was a wrenching sensation, and then Miria seemed to be falling through an inferno of fire. She opened her mouth to scream, and then they were standing in a dimly-lit shrine, the doors closed, a figure in plain white clothing kneeling before the altar. A naked broadsword rested on said altar, the mage noticed.

Immediately she incanted the words of the spell, knowing her life depended on it. Avila instantly started to stand and turn, hands reaching for the sword as she did. She had just managed to turn around when Miria finished her spell, and the templar's limbs froze.

"Greetings, Avila," Malbangru cooed, stepping forward. "Are you surprised to see me?"

"Fuck you, demon," Avila snapped back. "I'm never surprised to see your scum. You're like roaches." The templar was a tall woman, muscular and toned. She had red hair and angry blue eyes, and one bare arm bore a tattoo of the sun-in-clouds. Her expression was furious and full of wrath, but entirely unafraid.

"Fuck me indeed." The demon lord leaned over her and extended one clawed finger. Leering, he slit the clothes from her body, leaving her naked and exposed before the altar. "You've caused us so much trouble... perhaps a little humiliating pleasure from the great templar before she takes her place in history?"

"You overestimate your ability to humiliate me," Avila replied icily.

"Perhaps. You might enjoy it." Malbangru placed his scaly cock between Avila's large breasts and squeezed the globes together. Slowly, he started to thrust.

Avila's face twisted with disgust as the scaly head jabbed up from her cleavage, under her chin. A little bit of pre-cum leaked from it, and she spat. "Damnable hellspawn!"

"Keep talking," Malbangru told her gleefully. "Keep swearing at me as I cum all over your righteous face. After that, I'm going to desecrate you in each hole before pulling you out of your misery..."

It's possible that he was going to say something else. Miria never found out, because at that moment something massive and snarling slammed into her from behind like a ton of bricks and sent her crashing to the floor. Her attention shattered. The spell shattered with it.

Malbangru's head snapped around to stare at the screaming, thrashing mage and the thing atop her. The demon lord instantly realized his mistake and immediately swung his head back to focus on the templar.

He was too late.

The second the spell had snapped, Avila's hands had darted behind her to grab her broadsword. Now, as Malbangru turned back to her, she cut viciously downwards and castrated the demon lord with one stroke. The scaly, twitching penis tumbled free of her breasts, leaking ichor.

Malbangru howled staggered back, bent double. "BITCH!" he roared. "TEMPLAR BITCH!"

"That's right," Avila hissed, pivoting. "TEMPLAR bitch. You overconfident fool. Kravos's judgment upon you!"

She charged. Malbangru, in agony, tried to disembowel her before she could reach him. It was a miserable attempt, and the templar easily darted past it. The broadsword flashed, and the demon lord's head tumbled to the ground next to his cock. His body followed. All three began to ooze smoke and disintegrate.

Miria was still struggling under whatever had her pinned. She could feel fur on her naked back, and a long, angular set of jaws snapped an inch away from her head. "Get it off me! Get it off!"

"Silence, demon's whore." Avila's voice was unamused. "You desecrate a holy shrine with attempts at murder and expect mercy?"

"I had no choice! He stripped me naked, made me do vile things, threatened to kill me if I didn't do as he said!" Miria had no trouble laying on a sob story for her life. Besides, it had the virtue of being mostly true. "Why do you think I'm not wearing anything?!"

"Hm. Yes, I see," Avila told her unsympathetically. "You summoned a demon to service your vile lusts and it got away from you. You mages reek with hubris and love consorting with the lower planes. It always gets you in the end."

"I was just trying to find a missing person!" Miria sniveled. She shrieked as the jaws snapped again, nearly closing on one ear. "Forgive me!"

"I have no intention of forgiving you, but I will purify you. You've clearly been corrupted by his carnal lusts. I can still smell the leavings of it on you. Have no fear. We shall remedy that." Avila made a clicking sound with her tongue. "Karm. Get off."

The weight on Miria's back vanished, and she shakily climbed to her feet. She could see the thing clearly now; it looked like a cross between a cougar and a crocodile, furry with a long, long toothy jaw. A Drakkh. The beasts were apex predators in the eastlands, highly intelligent and very dangerous. They could be tamed, but you needed a brave handler and a strong will.

"The demon was a fool to think a shrine of the Sun-In-Clouds would be without a guardian to watch over a templar as they knelt in prayer," Avila said. "Karm went for the weakest link, and he refrained from killing you. Partly, I think, because he wants to mate with you. Drakkh are lusty beasts, and not always very choosy. But he is a loyal soldier and knows his duty."

Miria swallowed, looking at it. It stared back. "C-can I have some clothing and go?"

"I said I would purify you." Avila's voice was low and dangerous. "Are you calling me a liar?"

"No! No!" Oh gods, the woman was psychotic, Miria thought fearfully. And there was no way she could take out both the templar and the Drakkh before one of them killed her horribly.

"Good." Reaching out, the red-haired templar grabbed Miria and dragged her over to the altar. The mage was pulled along, acutely aware of the differences in their respective strength. Roughly, Avila pushed Miria forward over the altar, bending her over the front of it.

"What are you doing?" the mage managed.

"The demon has known you as a woman and corrupted you thereby," Avila told her sternly. "It must be burned out." Reaching into a chest by the altar, the templar took out a belt. A belt with a long, golden cylinder fastened onto it. She fastened it around her waist. "I will undertake to do this."

"Oh, you cannot be serious!" Miria said, trying to straighten back up. "Do you seriously mean-"

"Silence, demon's slut!" Avila forcefully shoved her torso back down on the altar. "You cannot escape the consequences of your sin."

"You're fucking insa-AAAAAAAAAAH!" Miria shrieked as with a powerful thrust of her hips, Avilla rammed the golden cylinder straight down the mage's hairless snatch. The wizard gasped in pain as her already-sensitive pussy was vigorously fucked by the hard, long object. "FUCK! Oh gods!"

"Only Kravos, whore," Avila told her, humping away. The templar picked up a five-tailed whip from the altar. "Confess your sins."

"AHHHHN! What the FUCK are you raving abou-" Miria's voice broke off into a ragged scream as Avila brought the whip down on her bare back, tracing red lines along it. "That HURTS! Oh gods, why are you-"

"ONLY KRAVOS!" The templar brought the whip down hard again, and Miria shrieked in agony. "Confess your sins!"

"Okay! Yes! I fucking confess!" Miria babbled. "I sucked off Malbangru and then I fucked all eight of his imps at the same time! Are you HAPPY?"

"Demon's slut," Avila repeated, her lips curling. She increased the power and force of her steady humping of the mage's swollen pussy. "Beg Kravos for his mercy."

"He's not my god, I really don't-" The whip cracked again, and Maria gave a wailing sob. "I don't-" CRACK.

"BEG FOR IT!" Avila hissed, slamming the pommel of the whip down on Maria's ass.

"Kravos, have mercy!" Miria screamed. "Please, Kravos!"

There was no sound for a few seconds except the panting of both women, the rhythmic schlup of the golden dildo sliding in and out of Maria's aching cunt, and the low growls of the watching Karm. Then Miria felt a searing warmth begin to flare in her stomach. Then in her ass, in her raw and dripping pussy, in her throat... "W-what?" she gasped. "What?!"

"Be purified!" Avila groaned, hammering away. Her hands squeezed the mage's ass tightly.

Miria felt the heat building up in her, and cried out. It went from warm, to hot, to searing. She opened her mouth and screamed in pain, and golden light poured out of it. Rays of gold emerged from her ears, from her asshole, from her cunt around the impaling object. Her body felt like it was melting in a fire; the pain was intense and overwhelming. Distantly she felt herself begin to climax for some reason, the hints of pleasure lost in a sea of agony.

Finally it died away, and she lay, panting and gagging, over the altar. Avila pulled out of her, and snorted. "No willpower. All mages are weak."

"That hurt," Miria whispered raggedly. "That hurt a lot."

"So will this." Avila took a brand from the brazier by the altar, and without warning pressed it down upon Miria's left buttock.

The mage screamed again and shot upright, yowling. Avila kept the brand pressed to her ass for a few seconds, then took it away. The smell of smoking flesh was intense. 

"Oh, shut up," the templar said as Miria howled. Placing a hand on the mage's ass, the templar concentrated. The angry red burn softened, turned pink, then silver as healing power flooded. over it. When Avila took her hand away, all that remained was a healed brand in the shape of Kravos' sun-in-clouds symbol.

"You... you...." Miria snarled.

"You are purified and marked. Now get out," Avila said. "You have interrupted my devotions long enough."

"Give me clothing," Miria growled. "And I will be on my way."

Avila laughed at her. "Do I look like a charity wholesaler? Naked you arrived, demon's whore, and naked you shall go. Now get out! Unless you wish to service Karm here. I can't promise you'll be alive by the end of it."

Miria turned and hastily left the shrine.

Thankfully it was after midnight and nobody was on the streets of the Temple District, at least in this quiet part. Miria stumbled along. With luck she could steal a robe off a washline and make her way home. The University Quarter wasn't that far.

---

It took a while for Miria to answer the door when the two adventurers arrived at the tower with the golem in tow. "I thought you'd be waiting by the door," Egrid said with a hint of disappointment. "Fall asleep while you were waiting for us?"

Miria just muttered something obscene. "Fuckslave, INSIDE. Go UPSTAIRS. To your room. STAY THERE."

"Yes, God-Mistress Miria!" Moping a bit, the golem trotted off, her ass wiggling.

"'God-Mistress Miria'?" asked Egrid. "Seriously, Miria?"

"Shut the fuck up," Miria snarled. "My patience tonight is nonexistent. Stand there and wait while I get your money."

Subdued, the half-orc shifted on her feet uncomfortably. "She seems really pissy tonight," she whispered to Keo as Miria went to get them their fee.

"Yeah, no shit," Keo agreed. "You'd think she had been the one running all over town and selling their body."

"No kidding. Maybe she was climbing the walls with worry or something."

Miria returned with two purses. "Here," she snarled. "Your coin. Take it."

Egrid accepted hers happily. Keo held up one hand. "I'm cutting a new deal," she said.

"You want MORE?!" Miria screeched. "I'm already overpaying you!"

Keo shook her head. "I don't want the money. You can keep it. What I want is access to Fuckslave and her services at least once a week."

"Out of the question," Miria snapped.

"You want people to know about tonight?" Keo asked.

Miria fumed. She stamped her foot. Then, tiredly, she nodded. "Fine. Once a week. Use the servant's entrance."

"Good." Keo smiled. "I'll be going now." She turned to leave.

"Likewise," Egrid said. "Always a pleasure, Miria. Don't be too hard on your girl."

"Whatever," Miria muttered, and slammed the door shut behind them.

Staggering upstairs, the mage looked into the golem's room. "You are forbidden to leave the tower. I'll deal with you later. Just you think about what you've done." She closed the door and locked it, then went to her room and flung herself down on her bed. Pulling off her bathrobe, she lay down on her silk sheets and closed her eyes. What a horrible fucking night.

Was there something she was forgetting?

Miria yawned, shrugged, and closed her eyes. She was too tired to worry about it now. Within seconds she was fast asleep.

---

The two adventurers walked down the tower's front path as the door slammed shut behind them. "You made an interesting trade," Egrid said, looking at Keo in surprise. "I thought you weren't into casual sex."

"I'm not," Keo replied. "It had to do with that curse, and avoiding negative effects of it. Not with my own filthy lusts."

"Huh." Egrid digested that. "This curse have to do with why you were afraid doing it with Lady Anna would kill her?"

"Yes."

"Harsh," Egrid said. "Hope you get that lifted soon. I'm surprised you didn't ask Miria to do that as your payment."

"It's not something a wizard can cure. It's complicated." Keo sighed, then brightened. "A profitable evening. Good working with you."

"Yeah. Nice job."

Keo nodded, then slipped away. Inwardly she was gloating. She now had a steady source of blood that she could drink her fill from without committing murder. This gave her the freedom to burn her blood reserve far more readily, rather than hoarding it for dire emergencies. Which mean she could actually practice using her powers and the limits of what the blood could do. Which meant she would get stronger, more powerful, and Amelie wouldn't even know it was happening.

She almost cackled. For the first time she almost looked forward to what would come with the day. She would have sex with Amelie gleefully, savoring the secret knowledge that she would one day use to destroy her master, exulting in the fact that the countess was embracing and caressing her own doom. The thought turned her on.

For her part, Egrid made her whistling, meandering way to Lanthel's townhouse. Arriving there at 3 am, she knocked on the door.

Cautiously, a stiletto in one hand, Lanthel answered it after a span of minutes. She was wearing a skimpy black nightgown that laid bare her boyish thighs. "Egrid?! You beast, it's the middle of the night! What are you doing here?"

"What do you think?" Egrid asked. Lanthel giggled, and opened the door. Egrid stepped in, closed it, and Lanthel tossed the stiletto aside and leaped into her arms.

They kissed, long and deep. "You should have come by earlier," Lanthel said, coming up for air. "You know I can't sleep well any more without you."

"I had a job," Egrid told her. "I made a small fortune. But I was thinking of you."

"Of course you were," Lanthel told her. "Why wouldn't you think about me?"

"I think about you a lot," Egrid said, looking suddenly awkward. "Not just the sex. I mean... about you. That's.. what I mean, is..."

Lanthel kissed her. "I know what you mean," she said. "I think about you a lot too. Not just the sex. I think..." She looked down. "I've had a lot of physical relationships, but I've never... I don't know how to handle this, Egrid. I thought we were just having sex, but..."

"But it's turned into more than that, hasn't it," Egrid told her softly.

Lanthel nodded. "It has. Something special. Something precious." She gave a shaky laugh. "Me and a brutal orc thug."

"So do we continue?" Egrid asked.

"Yes! Of course we do!" Lanthel clung to Egrid, her slim arms wrapping tightly around the swordswoman's waist. "Don't say things like that, Egrid! You scare me."

"You really want to be my woman?"

"I really do." Lanthel reached up to caress her jutting jaw. "I think I already am."

"Yeah. I guess you are." Egrid smiled. "We can't tell Tesaiel, can we."

"No. I wish we could. I want to tell her... I want to tell her that I'm in love," Lanthel said, her cheeks flushing scarlet. "But we can't."

"Too bad." Egrid kissed her. "Do you want to go upstairs now?"

Lanthel giggled. "Is the savage orc going to show her woman what her massive, brutal body can do?"

"Mmm. How loud can you scream, little elf?" Egrid purred nastily.

"Let's find out," Lanthel replied, letting her nightgown fall to the floor.

---

Miria awoke muzzily. Had she been drugged? Had someone used a spell on her? What was wrong?

Coming fully to consciousness, she realized that she was lying naked on her back on her bed, just like she had fallen asleep. What was different was the cords tying her arms and legs to the bedposts. And the gag in her mouth. What the fuck.

"Mmmm-mMMMRRRPHM!" she said, struggling. The cords were tight, though.

The imp gang boss hopped into her field of vision, at the far end of the bed by her feet. "You're awake," he said cheerfully. "Good, the boys have been waiting."

Of course. The imps. Nobody had banished the gods-damned imps!

The door to the chamber opened, and Fuckslave walked in, clad it one of Miria's robes. "What am I supposed to do again?"

"Answer the door if anyone comes. Don't tell them who you are. Tell them you're busy with a spell and to come back later," the imp boss told her.

"Answer the door if anyone comes. Don't tell them who I am. Tell them I'm busy with a spell and to come back later, unless it's Keo, in which case have sex with her and send her away," Fuckslave answered back.

"That's not... aw, forget it, close enough," the imp said.

"Okay! Bye!" Fuckslave left.

"MMMMMRPH!" Miria screamed after her.

"Nice and energetic I see! Good." The imp gang boss turned. "Okay boys, form a line behind me!"

Miria watched with bulging eyes as the imp, erection jutting forward, advanced on her exposed cunt. She struggled against the cords, but they held her in place and her legs firmly open. "MMMMMPH! MMMMMRPH!"

"Human pussy is the best pussy," the imp boss told her. His penis quivered as it lined up with her waiting snatch. "Don't worry. We'll give ya rest breaks."

"MMMMMMAAAAMAMMMAAAA!"

Fuckslave listened to the bed's rhythmic creaking up above and gave a small pout. She wasn't sure she liked having God-Mistress Miria having sex with other beings, but hey, who was she to decide! She wondered if it would last a long time.

It did.

Continued in Chapter 10

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