Two hours after Lord Barlon’s arrest…
The air in the cathedral was thick with incense and damp stone, a holy scent that Priest Eldrin wore. He stood at the edge of the baptismal font, a deep stone basin filled with clear, cool water, his hands clasped before him in pious solemnity. His eyes, however, were not on the altar. They were on the line of the girls awaiting their sacrament.
The new nuns.
The newest crop of novitiates offered to the church’s care. All sworn to the service of the church, their worldly lives washed away. They were dressed in simple, white linen shifts…the humble garments of their new vocation. But the material was anything but humble. It clung.
The first girl stepped forward. She was eighteen, with a face of innocent roundness and a body that had clearly not known hard labor. Her shift was loose, but as she descended into the water, it suctioned itself to her form. Eldrin extended his hand, his voice a low, resonant murmur of blessing.
“In the name of the Father…” His left hand rested on her shoulder, a firm, guiding touch. His right hand, the one that would pour the water, dipped below the surface. As he cupped water to anoint her head, his fingers brushed… just a passing, incidental contact… against the side of her breast. The linen was taut there, outlining the soft, youthful swell. The girl flinched slightly, but said nothing. A holy man’s touch could not be impure.
He lifted his hand, water dripping. “And of the Son…” He poured it over her brow. His left hand, still on her shoulder, slid down, a natural movement to steady her as she rose from the water. His palm grazed the curve of her back, down to the dip just above her waist. He felt the warmth of her skin through the soaked fabric, the subtle flex of her spine.
She emerged, dripping. The white shift was now transparent in patches, plastered to her skin. It revealed the shadowed outline of her small breasts, the darker hint of nipples beneath, the gentle taper of her waist, and the faint, promising swell of her hips. Water cascaded down her legs, making the linen cling to her thighs. Eldrin’s gaze followed the rivulets with devotional intensity.
The second girl was taller, slender. Her shift clung in a different way, outlining long legs and a narrow torso. When he guided her into the water, his supporting hand found her hip. His thumb pressed into the soft hollow just above her pelvis, a steadying point. He lingered there a moment longer than necessary, feeling the bone beneath, the flesh around it.
Each baptism was a masterclass of subtle violation.
The third girl had a fuller figure. Her shift, once wet, became a map of voluptuous temptation. The fabric strained across her bust, the peaks visibly proud. As Eldrin anointed her, his hand ‘slipped’ … the water was slippery, after all … and the back of his knuckles dragged across the prominent curve. She gasped, a tiny, breathy sound lost in the echo of the chapel. He murmured a prayer over her, his eyes feasting on the way the wet linen molded to the generous roundness of her buttocks as she turned to leave the font. The fabric was sheer across the back, showing the faint shadow of the cleft between those full, ripe cheeks.
The fourth, the fifth, the sixth… Eldrin’s methods adapted to each form. A fingers tracing the line of a collarbone. A palm 'accidentally' cradling a waist and dipping low to the hip. For a girl with particularly lush hips, he used both hands to 'help' her rise, his grip settling on the outsides of her thighs, his thumbs pressing into the soft inner flesh just above her knees. He felt the heat, the pulse of life there.
The seventh girl was shy, trying to keep her arms crossed over her chest. Eldrin gently pried them apart with a fatherly touch, his fingers sliding between her arms and her body, a soft invasion.
“You must be open your soul to grace, child,” he whispered. His touch opened her, and the wet shift fell away from her bosom, the view clearer. He blessed her, his heart hammering.
The eighth was a blur of similar, smart transgressions. A lower back caressed. A shoulder squeezed, his fingers drifting to the side of a breast.
The ninth… a striking girl with golden hair and piercing hazel eyes that seemed to see through his facade. As he ‘helped’ her into the font, his hand boldly cupped her ass for a heartbeat ... this time he squeezed harder than intended … she stiffened, her eyes narrowing in silent recognition. She hurried the process herself, rising quickly from the water her tunic clinging to her firm body, revealing more than she intended.
"You rush the sanctification of your soul girl?" Eldrin asked, his voice low and smooth.
"Impatience is a vice, little one. It opens the door to sin … Your haste … That is how evil will mark you."
He reached out, gripping her wrist firmly. "You have tainted the ritual. The blessing did not take. It cannot take when the heart is racing with worldly concerns."
"I am sorry, Father," she stammered..
"We must redo the cleansing. You must be washed again, properly this time, with a still heart and a patient mind."
The girl hesitated, her feet dragging on the bottom of the basin … She had no choice. Disobedience was not merely a sin. It was a death sentence in this world. She knew what happened to novitiates who defied the holy priests. They were flayed, their skin peeled from their backs in the public square before the morning mass. They were paraded naked through the streets, forced to chant their failures to the crowds, screaming about how they let evil take hold of their souls.
The shame alone was enough to break her.
She swallowed hard and nodded. She squeezed her eyes shut, her breath hitching in her throat. She felt his hands on her waist, sliding down over the wet, rough fabric of her habit. She shuddered, her body trembling, but she said nothing. This was the way of the world. The strong took. The weak served. She didn't pull away. She didn't cry out. She let him touch her, terrified of the flaying, terrified of the parade, terrified of him.
The tenth girl, however, was the one Eldrin had been waiting for. She stood at the end of the line, a vision. Her hair was a dark cascade, and even in the dry shift, her body promised curves that would defy the humble fabric. He could already imagine the water revealing the heavy, perfect weight of her breasts, the lush, inviting arch of her backside.
He beckoned her forward with a serene smile.
She stepped toward the font’s edge, her eyes wide with nervous piety.
Just as she was about to descend, the heavy oak door at the side of the chapel creaked open.
An older nun entered, her face lined with stern duty. Sister Margot. Her gaze swept over the scene … the dripping girls, the priest … and a flicker of disapproval tightened her mouth. Eldrin felt his smile stiffen. Irritation coiled in his gut, but he let none of it touch his holy expression.
“Forgive the interruption, Father Eldrin,” Sister Margot said, her voice brittle. “You are needed. Urgent prayers.”
Eldrin kept his hands poised over the tenth girl. “The sacrament is nearly complete, Sister. The god's work cannot be hurried.”
His jaw clenched. He wanted to feel the water soak that final shift. He wanted to guide his hands over that last, untouched form, to explore the geography of her youth under the guise of blessing. The frustration was a physical ache.
His eyes, lingered on the girl, watching the way her still-dry shift hovered over the unseen, tantalizing curves beneath. The promise of her, unfulfilled, burned in him like a denied sacrament
“I fear we must, Father” Margot insisted, stepping closer. Her eyes narrowed slightly as she took in the tenth girl’s apprehensive stance, the priest’s proximity. “We must pray for Lord Barlon’s family. For their… safe deliverance. The situation is dire. A war might arise. Your intercession is required now.”
He lowered his hands slowly, turning his full attention to Sister Margot. The tenth girl stood frozen, a missed opportunity dripping with potential.
The king’s chamber...
Queen Elara stood over the ruin of her husband. She brought the murder stick down again with a wet, crunching thwack on the pulverized remains of King Theron’s pelvis.
Against the far wall, Anya and the servant girl pressed themselves into the shadows, their eyes wide with a terror that had gone beyond screaming.
Elara lifted the hem of the night-dress, gathering it in her fists at her waist. She stepped over Theron, one foot on either side of his head. She lowered herself slowly until she was crouching directly above his face. Then, she sat.
The back of her thighs pressed against his temples. Her bare sex settled heavily over his mouth and nose. She shifted her weight, grinding down deliberately.
“You humiliated me.” she whispered, her voice low and shockingly steady. “I have fine buttocks too. It’s borne you an heir. You used to beg for it! ‘ Oh Elara your ass is like a perfect, ripe peache. It clenches so prettily when you come.’
She received no response.
She let go.
A hot stream burst from her. It pattered against the king’s skin, a clear arc, splashing across his eyelids, his nose, his mouth. She sighed, a sound of profound, visceral release, as she emptied her bladder onto his dead face. The heat was immense, soaking his beard, his hair, pooling in the hollows of his throat. She grinded her hips in small, contemptuous circles, smearing the mess across his features.
The flow finally trickled to a stop. She stayed seated, feeling the warm dampness seep through her own thighs and buttocks.
Her eyes swept across the room and locked onto Anya and the girl.
“You,” Elara breathed, the word a poison.
With a shriek that was pure, undiluted fury, she launched herself forward. She moved with a viper’s speed, the murder stick swinging up in a two-handed grip. It whistled through the air, aimed straight for Anya’s temple.
Anya froze, paralyzed.
The servant girl did not.
With a desperate cry, the girl shoved Anya sideways with all her strength. Anya fell hard, the breath knocked from her. The stick came down on the girl’s outstretched arm.
The sound was hideous. A sharp, dry SNAP that echoed in the chamber, followed by the girl’s piercing scream. She crumpled, clutching the limb to her chest, her screams dissolving into high, animal whimpers.
Anya scrambled forward, throwing herself over the sobbing girl, shielding her with her own body. She looked up at the mad queen.
“Have you lost your mind?!”
Elara lowered the stick slowly, her chest heaving. A sarcastic smile twisted her beautiful face. “Have I..” she echoed, her voice dripping with faux curiosity.
She took a step closer, towering over them.
“I have not lost my mind, dear Anya. Why would you think that? All I want is to kill the whore who stole my king!”
Anya stared, utterly bewildered.
‘You’ve grown wide, Elara.’
She mimicked Theron’s voice with a cruel, lisping sneer, her eyes filling up with tears.
“You think you’re so elegant.”
“He said that he had lost the feel of his cock inside me. All because his pathetic mind was suddenly obsessed with your buttocks. One night…One night is all it took for him to throw me away. That damned letter. That bastard humiliated me far worse than a common whore. He forced me to watch as he fucked two filthy peasants right in front of me, all while whispering about your perfect, scrumptious ass cheeks that he'd rather bury his face in than my own!"
The servant girl whimpered, the pain in her arm a white-hot nova.
“And now the fool is dead,” Elara whispered, her fury cooling into something far more dangerous, “All because of some fantasy.” Her eyes cleared, focusing on Anya with deadly intent.
The stick rose again.
“I am going to break the fantasy. Starting with the face. Then the breasts. Then I’m going to break that prized ass of yours into pulp.”
“You are a sickness. A festering rot that infected my bed. A disease that needs to be cut out, burned away, so the realm can breathe clean again! You're the reason my cunt's gone cold, you thieving slut, turning my king into an idiot!"
She swung.
But before the impact could land, the girl, her face a mask of pain, lunged forward and grabbed Elara's legs with her good arm…grab… pull…yanking hard and sending the Queen stumbling backward in a chaotic heap, the stick flying from her grasp.
Before she could even gasp, a weight settled on her. Anya, driven by instinct and survival, was on her, straddling her stomach and forcing her arms above her head.
"I did not steal your king, you twisted harpy!" Anya shouted down at her. “I never wanted him! I love Barlon! You blame the field for the locust’s hunger!”
Elara stared up, trapped. The fight seemed to drain from her for a heartbeat, replaced by a bottomless, weary grief. The tears flowed freely now, silently.
“Really?”
“Yes…”
Elara’s body went limp.
“ Okay fine. Get off me,” she whispered, her voice hollow.
Anya hesitated, panting.
“You’re not going to attack us.”
“Yes.”
Silence.
“... I swear.”
Cautiously, Anya loosened her grip. She didn’t let go, but her hold eased.
Elara seized the moment, freeing her arms with a sudden twist. Her hands shot up, aimed for Anya's neckline. to pull her down.
She was going to bite.
Anya bucked instinctively, toppling backward onto the floor with a heavy thud… as Elara scrambled on top of her, pinning her down with feral intent, aiming for the soft mound of breast heaving just beneath the velvet.
Anya protected herself by holding Elara at bay with all her strength.
Thud.
Elara froze. A line of confusion crossed her face. Then, a trickle of warm blood seeped from her scalp, matting her hair. Slowly, she turned her head.
The servant girl stood behind her, the sharp, bloodied stone in her good hand…the one she’d used on Theron…
Anya seized the opportunity, shoving Elara off her with a forceful push… shove, tumble…sending the Queen scrambling to her feet.
Elara’s knees buckled. The world grayed at the edges, and she fainted.
Lyssa leaned down, her lips hovering over Mila’s bloody mouth.
She placed her hands on the girl’s sternum. She could feel the faint, terrifyingly slow beat of a heart, a butterfly trapped in a jar.
The girl was a broken doll. Her cheeks swollen and bruised in shades of purple and black, each mark telling a story of the merciless pounding. Her lips were split and crusted with dried blood, and shallow breaths rattled from her chest, barely audible.
“Don’t die,” Lyssa whispered to herself, her voice breaking.
“Please.”
A sound. A wet, choked gurgle deep in the girl’s throat. Lyssa froze, her entire world narrowing to that sound. The girl’s body convulsed, a weak, shuddering tremor. Her mouth opened, and a bubble of dark, crimson blood welled up over her lips. She coughed, a weak, pathetic hack that sprayed flecks of red onto Lyssa’s face. But it was a cough. It was air.
Lyssa’s breath left her in a shocked rush. She gently, so gently, hauled the girl up, cradling her head.
"Hey..."
The girl’s eyelids fluttered, revealing the sliver of a dazed, pain-glazed eye. She tried to focus, tried to see the girl hovering above her. Another weak cough, more blood.
The next moment her limp arms were draping over broad shoulders, her bloody face resting against what seemed to be a man’s neck.
Lyssa reached out, grasping the girl's hand tightly, her fingers intertwining with the girl's weakened grip. She interlaced their fingers, squeezing, trying to transmit some pulse of life, of anchoring, through the touch as Kian carried her on his back.
Footsteps
One moment, the corridor was empty. The next, iron filled it. Royal Guards. A dozen of them, maybe more, their polished steel glinting in the torchlight. They formed a wall in front.
Lyssa’s heart plummeted into her gut. Kian stopped dead. His head turned, slow and deliberate, taking in each man. Lyssa’s grip on Mila tightened protectively. With a firm, deliberate movement, Kian moved to Lyssa's front, shielding her.
The guards laughed. It was a cruel, echoing sound.
The Commander… the one who had fucked the archer… stepped forward.
He looked Kian up and down, his lips curling. “Well. Well. Well. What do we have here?” His voice was a sneer. “Who might you be?”
The guards around him chuckled, relaxing.
"What’s this?" The commander gestured toward Mila, who was trying to open her eyes. "A whore’s plaything gone wrong? Did the little slut bite off more than she could chew?"
He took a step, his eyes narrowing as they flicked past them to the floor a few yards back. There, lay the corpse of what seemed to be a man. His face bashed to a pulp.
His gaze turned to Kian, dropping to his dry-blooded hands. He laughed softly.
“Question for the men, lads. Who gets first go? The bloody young dove? Or the ripe noble peach?” he said, his gaze never leaving Kian’s.
A guard with a broken nose leered. “The slave is already broken in. Less fight.”
“Nah, the noble,” another argued, hefting his spear. “Cleaner. I want to hear what quality cunt sounds like when it screams.”
“The bloody one’s younger,” another guard grunted, licking his lips as he stared at Mila. “More tender."
A fourth, a brute with one eye… from being jabbed by a whore after he refused to pay her double for anal… laughed. “I’d have a go at the man myself. Shut that defiant look up his ass.”
The others turned judging eyes on him, snickering. “Save your perversions for the dungeons, Harek,”
The commander sighed, as if bored.
“Boy. Put the slave down and kneel. You might live to be a gelding.”
Kian didn’t move. He just stared, his silence more deafening than any shout.
The commander’s smirk faded.
“Fine. Have it your way. Take them. The girls alive. The boy… disable him.”
The guards charged.
The first one lunged, sword point aiming for Kian’s thigh.
His eyes instantly went dark.
Dead.
The sound was a sickening, wet crunch. The guard’s head snapped around a full hundred and eighty degrees. His neck broke with the clean finality of a snapped twig. His body crumpled to the floor, his sword clattering harmlessly.
The laughter died.
The other guards froze, their weapons half-lifted, confusion and terror dawning on their faces as they beheld the two new figures who now filled the corridor.
Their instincts screamed run..
The larger on moved first. He didn’t charge. He flowed. A guard lunged with a spear. He caught the shaft, snapped it like a twig, and drove the splintered end into the man’s throat. He dropped the body, his fist already arcing in a backhand that caved in another guard’s temple.
The other one was a whirlwind of quieter, more precise violence. He caught a jaw, lifted the screeching man and slammed head into the stone wall, once, twice, until it was pulp.
It was over in less than ten seconds.
They were hammers, and the guards were glass. The corridor was suddenly littered with broken bodies, the air thick with the coppery stench of fresh blood and voided bowels.
Only the Commander remained standing. He had backed against the wall, his sword trembling in his hand. A dark, wet stain spread rapidly down the front of his fine trousers, dripping onto the stone. He had pissed himself.
“D...Demons…” he whimpered.
The larger one turned toward him. He took one step, then another. Each footfall a deliberate, earth-shaking promise.
With a strangled cry, the Commander threw a wild, desperate punch at his bare stomach. His fist connected with solid, corded muscle. It was like punching a wall. There was no give. Not even a flinch. The Commander cried out, cradling his shattered hand.
The man's hand closed around the commanders throat. He lifted him, one-armed, until the Commander’s kicking feet dangled a foot off the ground. He brought the man’s face level with his own. His eyes flat, dead pools.
The Commander sobbed, tears mixing with snot.
“I didn’t touch her! I swear! On my mother’s cunt, I swear it! May the gods strike my children thrice if I lie! I didn’t touch your daughter!”
Barlon stared. The silence stretched, broken only by the man’s wet, choking gasps.
He opened his hand.
The Commander dropped like a stone, landing in his own urine. He didn’t get up. He didn’t try to run. He just curled into a ball, weeping.
Barlon turned away from him his eyes finding Lyssa.
She was already moving. She broke from behind Kian, a choked sob escaping her. She launched herself at Barlon, her body crashing into his solid chest. Her legs wrapped around his waist, her arms around his neck, her face buried in the sweat-and-blood-scented crook of his shoulder.
Great, heaving sobs wracked her body.
His arms encircled her, one massive hand splaying across the small of her back, the other cradling the back of her head. He held her with a crushing, possessiveness that stole her breath.
“I’m sorry.”
The air on the hillside was thick with the smell of crushed grass, sweat, and blood. A rough semicircle of warriors stood, their faces a gallery of sneers and hungry grins.
In the center, two men moved in a slow, painful dance.
The Royal captain was broken. Blood streamed from his flattened nose, painting his lips and chin a glistening red. He favored his left leg, each step a limping agony that dragged through the mud. His shield was a splintered wreck on the ground. He held a notched axe in a white-knuckled grip, his breath coming in ragged, wet gasps.
His opponent, was a bull of a man, a head taller and half again as broad. A single, superficial cut marred his cheek. He circled with lazy, confident strides, his own axe held low.
“Look at him hop!” a warrior with a braided beard barked, spitting into the dirt.
“He’s pissing himself, I can smell it from here!” another jeered, earning a round of rough laughter.