Tales of Erogenia: Book 2 - Chapter 1

Chapter 1: The Mission

Zenaria struggled to escape her bonds, but Cron had taken no chances with her this time. The silken cords that bound her wrists to the bed frame could not be loosened and her body arched, driving upward as he thrust into her. "Aaahh! Aahhh!" she screamed as her body shuddered with the strength of her passion. She wrapped her long powerful legs around him and strained to pull him deeper within her. "Oh, by the Goddess," she cried as her loins contracted yet again, her womb reaching for the seed of her lover. She collapsed backward, her body heaving from exertion; so exhausted she could hardly move.

"Did that satisfy you, princess?" Cron panted, as he rolled to the side of the small cot and softly kissed her nipple.

"Almost," Zenaria answered. "I think you can untie me now."

"You're sure?" Cron teased as he moved to pull the slipknot that would release her bonds. "My back is still sore from the last time we forgot."

"Poor baby," Zenaria said, her fingers stroking several half-healed scratches that decorated his back. "Would you like me to lick them better?"

"Perhaps later," Cron said, pulling out of her arms and stretching to his full six-foot-six. He was magnificently muscled and she could not help admiring his impressive physique. He was the pick of the Snow Leopard tribe and almost a match for her in sexual endurance.

Zenaria rolled off the cot in a single smooth motion and moved to stand beside him, her unbound ebon tresses falling to the curve of her backside. Cron placed a hand in the small of her back and then moved it slightly lower to the contour of her right buttock. She made no move to stop him. Any woman in the tribe would have willingly changed places with her, but her gaze went through the open window and to the snow-capped mountains that loomed over the stockade of the Snow Leopard Tribe. Dawn was breaking over them and the high peaks shimmered in the early morning light.

She had once crossed those mountains. And it was not so long ago. But now it almost seemed like a dream. In the eighteen months since her return she had given birth to her daughter and raised her to a healthy toddling infant who had seen a full turn of the seasons. As was the custom among her people the child would now be raised by the tribe, her birth mother having only a nominal role in her upbringing.

She took the arm of the warrior at her side. She was nearly as tall as he, and almost as well-muscled, albeit with an obvious femininity that turned male heads wherever she went. She was tall and curvaceous, with the large breasts typical of her race. Certainly no one would mistake her for a man. But she was also the foremost warrior of her tribe, as several would be challengers had learned to their regret. Even Cron did not dare challenge her. He had decided to bed her instead and they had been lovers for almost a moon.

Zenaria should have been happy, but she was not. Each time her eyes went to the mountains something twisted near her heart and she found herself thinking of another lover; one who was much shorter than Cron, with deep yellow-gold skin and dark, mysterious eyes. One day, she thought. One day...

"Oh," Cron said, interrupting her thoughts. "There is something I was supposed to tell you. The queen summoned you to meet with her."

"You tell me this now?" Zenaria exclaimed. "After rutting with me all night?"

"She told me I could take my time delivering the message," Cron grinned, flashing perfect white teeth.

"You wolverine," Zenaria laughed, giving his arm a playful slap. "I had best get going. She'll wonder what happened to me."

"Oh I doubt that," Cron said. "I think everyone in the village knows what happened to you. You are not especially quiet when you are in the throes of passion."

Zenaria coloured. Blushing was a reaction she had never been able to eliminate in spite of her culture's very open attitudes toward sex. "Very poetically spoken," Zenaria observed. "I suppose I have time for a quick bath before I present myself."

"I'll go with you," Cron said. "After last night I need to cool off."

The 'bath' consisted of splash in the frigid waters of a deep pool where the waters of a stream known appropriately as the Icewater plunged over a steep cliff. It would have chilled most people to the bone, but Zenaria had swum in the nipple-numbing pool since she was a child and she and Cron spent a good hour splashing about in it before making their way to the shore. They were not alone. Many members of the Snow Leopard Tribe made a point of bathing in the Icewater each day and no one paid them any particular attention other than to give them appraising looks as they emerged dripping from the pool.

Zenaria dressed, and using a pool of quiet water caught in a rock pool as a mirror combed out her hair and then formed it into the long thick braid that distinguished the Snow Leopard warrior. Then she dressed in her simple warrior's garb - doeskin boots, buckskin trousers, and a doeskin jerkin. Around her neck she hung her necklace of lion-spider fangs, a souvenir of her first adventure. Then she slipped into the harness holding her four foot sword, and with its hilt jutting over her left shoulder, headed toward the stockade and her queen.

Cron did not follow. Instead he split off from her to collect his bow. Much of the food of the Snow Leopard Tribe came from hunting and when he was not enticing some willing female into his bed he usually spent his time in the woods.

She did not hurry. If her mother really wanted her she would have sent a more formal messenger than Cron. However, her long legs soon had her through the gates of the stockade and moving to the royal quarters. After what Zenaria had seen in her travels, calling the three story wood and stone building where Queen Cirilia held court a palace would be a bit of an overstatement. It was not even the size of the Guildhall in the small Kivalian border town of Singleton. However, it was where Queen Cirilia, Zenaria's mother held court, dispensed justice, and spent a good deal of her time entertaining a never-ending stream of lovers.

Queen Cirilia didn't have to work very hard to attract them. Still in her early thirties, and tall and athletic, with wondrous dark hair that flowed down to her hips, she radiated both strength and beauty, an unbeatable combination in Erogenian society.

As Zenaria entered the throne room the Queen rose to greet her daughter, setting down the deerskin leggings she had been working on. Sitting next to her was Zenaria's thirteen-year-old half sister, Shalandra, who grinned at her knowingly as she entered.

Zenaria blushed again. Would Cron have to gag her as well as bind her wrists?

She was saved from further embarrassment by her mother. "Have you broken fast yet, daughter?"

"No yet, mother," Zenaria answered, lowering herself to the stool offered by her mother. Like almost everything else in the room, the furniture was simple, consisting of a few sawn board tables and matching hardwood stools. Even the twin thrones set against the back wall of the hall were of plain construction although each were carved from the trunk of a single massive oak.

"Then we will break fast together," Cirilia said. She motioned to the single attendant in the room, a young girl of about ten years who regarded Zenaria with large blue eyes. "Bring us tea," she said, referring to the bitter tea brewed from the roots of a local plant, "and whatever else is available."

The girl almost stumbled as she left the room, her eyes never leaving Zenaria. It was something Zenaria expected by now, although she was not comfortable with it. Two years ago she had left her tribe in disgrace and then returned wearing shining black leather armour the likes of which no one had ever seen; a necklace of the lion-spider fangs; and three months pregnant. She also wore an number of honour scars and had stories of strange people, stranger animals, and cultures no one had even dreamed existed. It was small wonder that she was regarded with a mixture of fear and awe.

Soon, Zenaria hoped, her notoriety would die down, but in the meantime she would just have to live with it.

The tea arrived, along a plate of cheeses, a loaf of hot bread, and a few wildberries picked from the forest. While they ate Cirilia talked. "You are now free of your daughter; it is time for you to assume a greater role in the life of the tribe."

Zenaria had been expecting this. As Cirilia's oldest daughter she would eventually take over the leadership of the tribe provided no one more suitable could be found. It was not something she was adverse to. She had already assumed a partial role in training some of the younger warriors in combat and had led a few hunting expeditions. She wondered, however, just what her mother had in mind.

Cirilia continued. "I have been thinking over your account of your adventures. For many decades the Tribe of the Snow Leopard has been isolated from the rest of the world and it is time for us to improve our relations with those outside our margins."

Zenaria nodded her understanding. One of the lessons she had learned during the last year was when to speak and when to hold her piece. She knew her mother would get to the point eventually. "I have decided in light of the fact that you have traveled to lands far beyond anything that any of us imagined that you shall be our first ambassador. I am especially interested in having you travel to the lands of the Sandakar and establish relations with the society of assassins you spoke of."

Zenaria's heart skipped a beat. She gave her mother a sharp look. Cirilia returned her astonished stare with a smile. "I would be a poor mother," she said, "if I did not notice the way my oldest daughter has looked to the mountains each day since her return. It is now the second month of summer. The Ice Gates should be open. You will leave tomorrow and take Shalandra with you."

"Shalandra?" Zenaria asked.

"Your sister saw you in a dream. You were riding with her on a strange humped beast across a treeless waste and she was with you. It is a sign from the gods and should not be ignored."

Zenaria bowed her head. Although still a novice in the priesthood of the Snow Leopard, it was known that Shalandra had the gift of precognition. And although her skills in this regard were still undeveloped she was known to be startlingly accurate. If Shalandra had seen Zenaria and her crossing the desert on a camel then it was almost certainly something that was going to occur.

Zenaria rose from her seat and going to one knee bowed her head, glad that her mother had seen fit to believe in Shalandra's gift. "I will do as you ask, my queen."

Continued in Chapter 2