(Fergus)
The slavers were fleeing before us. We had left Deirdre behind. She had used some dark power, and resurrected two soldiers. I had heard tales of necromancers before. Children’s tales. Tales of horror. The stuff of nightmares. I couldn’t shake the image from my head.
Stop! Don’t think about that! We have to save Selene now! Focus! The slavers were fleeing down some hidden passageway beneath the city. We’d been down here before. It was a maze of streets, alleys, dead ends, pitfalls, and traps. The slavers flew down the passages as if they had memorized them.
Eoghan was out in front, channeling Kanae’s powers. He was pulling us forward with him with a wind spell.
“Sleeping Ice arrow storm!”
“Stasis Earth ball storm!”
“Stasis Firestorm!”
“Sleeping Wind wall!”
“Sleeping Darkness!”
“Stasis Light arrow storm!”
He was firing off spells of every affinity with the accuracy of a scholar who’d never fired a weapon in his life. But since he was casting a continuous barrage of storm arrows and balls he was taking down one or two slavers in the process. Kiera and Cathar were just behind him. One a sniper, and the other an assassin. Their aims were hitting with lethal coldness. Or it would be lethal if we were trying to kill them. The trio were wrapping their spells intentionally with sleep or stasis spells. Rosie was grabbing all the fallen slavers.
“Body bind! Spatial Storage!”
The fact Rosie had learned Deirdre’s rare Spatial Storage spell was truly frightening. While storage spells and bottomless bags enchanted with storage spells were common enough, you couldn’t store living things in them. There was no air in those dimensionless holes. Deirdre was not your ordinary mage, though. She read, constantly. She had a never-ending hunger for knowledge.
Rosie, Kiera, and Aoi, weren’t far behind. In some ancient tome, Deirdre had come across the research about a storage space that had breathable space within. Deirdre spent months researching the concept, and finally invented a spell that could create a personal spatial storage. The mana expenditure was massive, though. Aoi helped design an artifact that others could use to create their own personal spatial storage. It still required a massive amount of mana. Only Deirdre, and her ‘Isekai’ friends had such massive mana. Perhaps some of dragonkind did as well. None of us understood what an Isekai was. A term that Kanae used to refer to herself and Dee’s first friends. We all suspected they were offworlders. Summoning offworlders was a death sentence though, so none of us would ever say that out loud to anyone.
Many spells were still being deflected by shielding. My focus was taking down the shielding as I could, and prevent them from activating new shielding. I was succeeding with the first, but failing in the second task. Suddenly, they broke out into the light. Hestia was focused on breaking any displacement spells and her focus was as focused as a light beam. We followed them, and discovered we were in the small copse of trees outside the city walls. Hidden from the eyes of the watchtowers and the main gates.
An ancient escape route for the royal family, or the nobles. The perfect entrance for smugglers. A royal secret that couldn’t be guarded without revealing its location, and couldn’t be exploited for a large invasion. How many cities had these sorts of tunnels long ago left unmonitored, and put to use by smugglers and rogues? Hestia’s task just got a lot harder. Free from the city, and it’s protective boundary spells, the slavers would probably try to teleport away.
Finally, one of Eoghan’s attacks hit the mage that Hestia was focused on, and he went down. Rosie cast,
“Body bind! Spatial Storage!”
Suddenly, the slavers sped away. Small boards appeared under their feet lifting them off the ground
“Levitos! Cart! Levitos! Wind burst!” Kiera cast.
We were lifted up as a wheeled cart appeared under us, and we blasted forward under the combined wind spells of Eoghan and Kiera.
“Catch! A gift from Aoi,” Cathar shouted.
“Mana chrystals!” I said, as I caught some chrystals Cathar was tossing to us. I drained one of them. We were burning through mana like it was as plentiful as needles on a pine tree.
“Just what the mage ordered!” Rosie said, as she drained several chrystals, and pocketed them.
We chased the slavers through the hills and farms of the countryside. Traveling ever in a southeastern direction. Not far away, to the southeast, the Queendom of Prittoni lay. We had reduced the Slaver’s numbers by about a third. How many were mages? Why were they not giving up. Did they truly hope to escape us?
“We need to catch up, and stop them soon. If we continue down this path we’ll head straight into Rogues’ Holler. Things might get really rough, and dicey, if we wind up there,” Cathar shouted over the wind.
“How far is it?” I shouted back.
“At this speed? I have no idea! Maybe an hour, maybe three!” Cathar shouted.
Rogues Holler. A more vile and wretched hole of scum and villainy probably didn’t exist in the known universe. It was called a Holler. It was a chasm, a ravine, left behind by some long dead and gone ancient massive river, that had carved the most treacherous deep ravine this planet possessed. It was a maze of narrow rock walls a hundred meters deep. There were thousands of caves, ledges, and walkways on multiple levels. Caves was perhaps a poor description. The caves varied from mere nooks that were barely protection against the elements to deep caverns. Some so magnificent it would move even the most impassive and stoic person to tears to see such beauty. Now, it was a nearly impenetrable city of rogues and villains. It would take an army months, if not years, to clear out.
“That would be, not a good thing,” I said.
“What!?” Cathar said.
“That would not be a good thing!” I shouted.
“No shit! Really!?” Cathar shot back sarcastically.
“A little respect, for your lieutenant, huh!?” I shot.
“What demented soul would ever make such a self-aggrandizing, self-inflated, vain, bumpkin like you a lieutenant?” Cathar taunted.
“Our Queen!” I yelled over the wind.
“More like because you’re the personal fuck-toy of a certain favored and blessed Queen’s curiosity,” Cathar laughed.
“And loving it!” I said.
“Pfft!” Cathar grunted, not having a comeback.
“About that said curiosity,” Darby said, pointing behind us.
We all turned to see what Darby was looking at. We saw a bright point of light, no bigger than the Morning Star. Only the point was growing, or coming at us at a high velocity. Very soon it became clear it was a creature in flight.
“She looks really, seriously pissed!” I shouted.
“I was looking forward to some skull bashing! Think she’ll leave any for us?” Darby asked.
“Only if we hurry and beat her there! Boost!” I shouted, and cast.
We lurched forward and some of us almost lost our balance. Soon we were overtaking the slavers. They noticed our approach. Five turned around to face us.
“No need about sparing these five. Selene isn’t among them!” I shouted.
We hit them like a tidal wave. Eoghan, cut one down with a light saber. Cathar had cast a pair of darkness swords and sliced two more in half. Rosie’s magnificent Warhammer crushed the skull of another. I took out the last one with the adamantine katana Dee had made for me. She’d used one of her white scales as a coating over the adamantine. It was probably worth more than the palace of the Empress.
Dee’s form was now clearly visible behind us. We had caught up with the slavers, but four of them leapt ahead of the rest, and one of them was Selene. They blasted away so fast they’d be out of range of my spells soon. Then a spell circle lit up, but was shattered almost immediately. Dee blasted past us and towards the three who had Selene in chains and bindings. The blast of the wind wake knocked us all to our knees. Rescuers and slavers equally. I had no time to be distracted by Dee though. As we all arose, three rogues were barreling at me with blades drawn. One was a pike of some sort.
I dodged right to avoid being impaled in the heart, slicing my katana downward to the left.
“Ro!” I cast on my blade as I followed through on the strike.
White-hot flames leapt off the blade, hotter than the fire of a furnace. The katana sliced through the pike’s staff as if it were slicing bread. I turned the blade forward and stepped past the rogue pulling the blade through the piker, slicing through him cleanly. The blade so hot it sealed the cut as fast as it made the cut. He fell his body folding out like hinge. Not a drop of blood could be seen. Then I used the power of the earth to shift sideways. I turned as I slide over the ground, like I was sliding on ice. I was positioned to slice through the next attacker. He noticed and turned too late, as I sliced him in half. Again the magik flames on the sword so hot it sliced and cauterized at the same time. The third slaver was coming at me from behind now. I turned, sidestepped and brought my blade up and forward. I sliced through his arm as it was coming at me, and then through his head.
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Then I had a chance to notice the carnage. Rosie stood in the center of a pile of bodies, like the head of a flower surrounded by petals. It was an oddly disturbing image.
“Look, I made a flower!” Rosie said, looking down at her handiwork smiling.
“I’m going to need several beers to wash away that image,” I said.
Cathar, Eoghan, and Darby had left a trail of bodies behind them and were speeding on towards Dee. Everyone else had likewise passed through the slavers like an unstoppable wave crashing down on a field of saplings, and all headed towards Dee and Selene.
Then the last survivor was holding Selene in front of her and pulled a knife moving toward Selene’s neck, but she never made it. Her body flashed bright white and vaporized, blade and all, as if she’d been consumed by the heat of a star. Selene began to fall, but Dee caught her. Then Dee touched the chains and bindings, and they fell away.
When we reached Selene we could see she’d been beaten, bruised, and bloodied, but she smiled at us and said,
“We got them!”
Then she passed out. Darby healed all her injuries, and Dee removed a slave tattoo the slavers had placed on her. Then Dee teleported us all to the outskirts of the city, and carried Selene back in her arms. Only those closest to her could see the tears falling from her eyes. We had found Hestia’s attackers, had one of our own kidnapped and branded a slave, captured or killed the entire slaver organization that had been hired to abduct Hestia, and returned whole and healed. Our unit intact. Selene woke up before we reached the gate, and we all walked in triumphantly.
We turned the slavers we’d captured over to the sheriff, and they were locked away in the Dungeon awaiting trial, for the numerous crimes they’d been a part of. We reported to the Vice Commander what had happened, and returned to the Academy, or barracks we were assigned. One more threat eliminated. The issue of the Queen of Prittoni, unresolved, for now. There was probably never going to be a way to prove her involvement. Short of a war, there wasn’t much that could be done even if we had proof.
Now we had time to prepare for the most serious challenge and daunting crisis we were facing. The final exams began in a few short days. It was cram time, and Dee was having a meltdown. So we did the only thing we could do, and snuck out of the Academy. We made our way to the Green Dragon Pub, and got plastered.
“It feels different somehow. Kind of peaceful,” Fergus said.
“That’s because Kanae is not drinking because of the baby,” Deirdre said.
“So all we had to do was get Kanae pregnant?” Eoghan said.
“There is no we. That was all you,” Darby said.
“Yeah, took you long enough though,” I said.
“You’re next,” Cathar said.
“Not yet. Going to watch you and Cathar suffer for a few more years,” I said.
“That sounds like a challenge,” Cathar said.
“Don’t even think about it! I have six kids on the tit as it is,” Deirdre said.
“Don’t you mean seven, your majesty. Or have you come to your senses and cut Lover Boy off?” Rosie said.
“Better watch it, Rosie, or I’ll go full queen on you and arrange a marriage to the orneriest, horniest dwarf in the thirteen realms,” Deirdre said.
“You wouldn’t! Would you?” Rosie said.
“Might be kind of fun. But probably not. Not sure I ever want to see what dwarves are like when they aren’t drunk,” Kiera said.
“All that aside, are we going to make curfew, my Queen?” Hestia said.
“Shit! It’s Sunday! What time is it?” Deirdre said.
“Forty past the seventh evening hour. We have twenty minutes,” Selene said.
“Time to go!” I said.
We all jumped up. Dee slapped some coins down onto the table, and we took off. After slipping back into the campus, us guys headed off to the male dorms, and Dee and friends headed for their dorm. They walked in to their dorm and Fionna was standing there with her foot tapping,
“You’re drunk!”
The Curfew rang.
“What are you doing here!” Fionna said turning to Selene.
“Selene!” Deirdre said.
“I wanted to say goodnight to Darby, but he just kept running away,” Selene mumbled, as she threw her arms around Darby’s head and pulled him into a passionate kiss, and then passed out.
“She’ll have to sleep here tonight,” Fionna said.
Selene snapped to and said,
“Ok!”
She grabbed Darby’s hand and pulled him towards his room. Fionna grabbed her hand and pulled her away,
“In the ladies apartments.”
“I wanna sleep in Darby’s apartment,” Selene said. The women all snickered. Darby’s face was priceless. Somewhere between terror and overjoyed.
“Not on my watch!” Fionna said.
Darby turned around and walked to his room, stiffly but with humped shoulders.
(Darby)
I woke up suddenly. I was hot, and it felt like I was buried under something heavy. A strangely sweet scent was drifting over me. Somehow it was arousing. My crotch felt even hotter and it was throbbing. My pulse was racing. I could feel my pulse throbbing in my ears. Suddenly my muscles tensed all at once. My mind went blank and a wave of intense pleasure swept over me. I jerked, and my nose slipped into something hot, wet, and soft.
“Oh!” came a sweet voice, that I knew.
A warm liquid sprayed over my nose and face. Some of it poured into my mouth. It was salty and sour, and pleasurable somehow.
“Oh. Mmm. They are right, it tastes sweet, salty, and somewhat bitter, but I think I like it,” Selene said as her leg swung over my head, and I got a very close up look at her dripping wet, naked femininity. She was pulling her face away from my crotch, and some of my seed was on her face, her lips, and dripping out of her mouth.
“What are you doing here?” I said.
“Oh, I thought it would be rather obvious. I was just enjoying a little taste. I hope you enjoyed the ending. Do you like what you see? Want to rub your nose in me some more? Or maybe some other body part?” Selene said, hungrily looking at my fading erection.
“I uh ...,” and I couldn’t remember what I was going to say. I wanted to grab her and throw her down and mount her, but I was groggy and confused, and apparently had lost the ability to communicate any words.
“Maybe, I should go for now, and give you time to collect your thoughts,” Selene said as she casually dressed, piece by delicious piece. She turned and walked towards the door. As she reached out for the handle,
“That was incredible!” came out of my mouth, but I don’t remember forming the sentence. One moment was blank, and then it was out there. Selene turned her head and said,
“Good.”
She turned and began walking out the door. I jumped out of bed, and tried to grab her hand, but she was already out of the door. Fionna was there looking at Selene walking out the door, and Dee at the stove looking at me. Aoi and Kanae were floating beside Fionna like giant pear shaped faeries.
“You smell like sex, and you look like sex,” Fionna said.
“I didn’t do anything!” I said.
“Oh, I wouldn’t quite say that, Darling Darby. Next time, I want to try filling a different hole,” Selene said, licking her lips and looking at my deflated rod. It, jerked forward at her involuntarily.
“Put some clothes on, Mr. Ó Neill. Most of us don’t want to admire your naked form,” Fionna said.
“Take it off campus, next time, Miss Ó Grainne. Or I will have to report your conduct,” Fionna said.
“Yes, ma’am,” Selene said and began to leave.
“Come eat breakfast with us Selene. We have so much to talk about!” Kanae said.
“Thank you, but I really should get back to my dorm, I’m sure they are very worried about me,” Selene said.
“Not at all. We contacted the dorm last night and let them know you’d be spending the night given how exhausted you were from your ordeal,” Deirdre said.
“Oh, then, yes, I’d love to have breakfast with you,” Selene said and sat down next to Rosie.
“How bold of you,” Kanae said.
“I’m not sure, I could have done it if he’d been awake. Enya was right though, I feel so much more confident now. Do the wings and flying help?” Selene asked.
“Oh, yes! They are so wonderful. I can’t thank Aoi enough for coming up with the idea and making them work. It’s so difficult walking, or dealing with the backaches at this stage,” Kanae said.
“I bet there’s a huge market for them,” Selene said.
“I’ve said the same thing,” Deirdre said.
I got dressed and joined Selene at the table.
“Uhm, uh, Selene?” I said.
“Oh, my darling Darby! I completely forgot to say good morning. Good morning my love,” Selene said, reaching up and grabbing my face. She pulled me in to a passionate kiss.
“G-good morning, ... Sweet, Selene,” I said.
Selene leaned in and said, “I love you. Will you marry me?”
“Y-yes. Yes! I mean, yes, I’d be honored to mar-marry you. I love you, too,” I fumbled out, and shoved a breakfast bun in my mouth, looking away.
No one laughed, but I couldn’t tell if everyone was smiling happily, or just trying to hold in a loud laugh. Fionna was shaking her head, but had a laughing smile on her face. After breakfast, we all headed out for class. Selene had her arms wrapped around me all the way to class. Her hot body pressed up firmly against my arm stuck in between her sizable breasts, giving me an almost painful hard-on.
“Finally,” Fergus muttered when he saw us.
“Took you long enough,” Cathar grunted.
“Oh, no, it’s not what you think,” Aoi said.
“Selene was the huntress. He was the game,” Deirdre said.
“She completely disarmed him,” Rosie said.
“She ate all his bullets, you could say,” Kiera giggled.
“Kiera!” Selene said, and turned bright red, but had the biggest grin.
Today was the last class, and then finals begin. Well not really the last class, it was a class preparing us for the finals. The first final was in two days. We spent the rest of the day and the next cramming. We weren’t going to cover everything, or every class. It was a gruesome grind, all the same.
However, years of school, and real life experience had been more than enough to put us a level above most of the student body. The upper years though, had quite a few older students who had gotten real experience and came back later. So those students were closer to being on the same level as us. Again we came in among the top of the class. Our many missed class days did hurt our grades some. Then we had another end of year party, after the official close of the year. The Academy turned a blind eye to the party, as it was officially after the school year. We reserved the entire Green Dragon Pub, but some of the regulars snuck in any way.
Around midnight, in a very, drunk state I came up to Deidre, and said,
“My Queen, you know what would be a blast? If you married Selene and me here in the Pub.”
“Aren’t you forgetting multiple steps here? Selene is a noble, and you should at least meet her parents first. They’ll probably want a formal wedding,” Deirdre said.
“I think it would be fun,” Selene, just as drunken, said.
“You want this too, Selene?” Deirdre asked.
“I totally want this!” Selene said.
“Fine. Friends, gather round and help us celebrate the wedding of Selene Ó Grainne, third daughter of Nerise Viscountess of Direwood and Diarmuid Ó Neill Knight of the Order of the Mystic Orchid.”
“Selene Ó Grainne, third daughter of Nerise Viscountess of Direwood, Knight of the Queen’s Royal Guard, do you here, and now, choose Diarmuid Ó Neill, as your Mate to Love, to Honor, to Defend and Protect, to Cherish against All Threats and Trials, in Success and Failure, In Abundance and Scarcity, to Heal and never Wound, until the Thread is cut?”
“I do!” Selene said.
“How shall we know?”
“I Swear it upon the One Truth! May the Goddess be Judge,” Selene said.
“Diarmuid Ó Neill, Knight of the Order of the Mystic Orchid, Knight of the Order of the Arcane Mage Knights, Knight of the Queen’s Royal Guard, Baron of the White Realm, do you here and now choose Selene Ó Grainne, as your Mate to Love, to Honor, to Defend and Protect, to Cherish against All Threats and Trials, in Success and Failure, In Abundance and Scarcity, to Heal and never Wound, until the Thread is cut?”
“I do!” I said.
“How shall we know?”
“I Swear it upon the One Truth! May the Goddess be Judge,” I said.
“Having seen your oaths, I, Queen Deirdre I, hereby pronounce you wife and husband. You may now mix your mana,” Deirdre said.
Around the second hour of the morn, Darby and Selene retired to their wedding suite in the rooms the Pub managed in the building nextdoor. The rest of the party retired to the dorm around the fourth hour when the staff kicked them out of the pub, so the staff could go home.
The next day we moved our stuff back to the barracks near the palace. Deirdre was about to leave for her palace and her children, when Selene and I came in.
“Salutations Darby and Selene. I note you didn’t do anything crazy and wind up pregnant this morning,” Deirdre said.
“Of course not. Not until we are officially married, Dee,” Selene said.
“You were officially married just after midnight, this morning. Did you forget?” Deirdre asked.
“Yes, you did the rites, but we haven’t had an official wedding,” Selene said.
“Selene, you are aware, I am a countess of the Realm, and the Queen of two nations. If I perform the wedding rites for a couple, it is an official legitimate marriage, recognized by every realm,” Deirdre said.
“It is? We are? We are really married?” Selene said.
“I have told you a few times, Sweet Selene,” I said.
“We’re Married!?” Selene said and planted a huge kiss on Darby’s lips.
“Oh, Goddess! Mom is going to be so, so pissed! She’s going to make us do it again, you know! Oh, shit! Oh, this is terrible!” Selene said.
“What’s terrible?” I said.
“Mom threatened me that if I married before my sisters and didn’t get her consent first, she’d make me drink a fertility potion, and make me do the ceremony again, including a bedding ceremony. If I get pregnant she threatened to make me her heir. We are so screwed!”
“Wow. Well, it’s ok. I’ll do whatever it takes,” I said, gulping.
“It is? You aren’t angry?” Selene said.
“It’s completely alright. I am not upset at all. Why would having a child with my lovely, sweet wife make me angry? Terrified, maybe,” I said.