The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Almost immediately after the pair set out on the path, Sylanna chose to let her horse manage the path and allowed herself to slip beneath the power of a resting spell and Vale found it best for both of them in that it allowed Sylanna to recover from a long, admittedly difficult night and it allowed Vale to temper some of her anger and frustration. Sylanna was a gifted healer and, no doubt one of the best Vale had ever seen. She could count on one hand with a finger or two left to spare the number of healers good enough to mend Ara basically on their own. She’s worked multiple layers of tissue at a time. She’d worked two organs at a time. Even though Vale knew healers that were capable of it, she’d never seen it done.

Her skill was something to respect and Vale did. It was everything else about her that rankled. In the days since she had been changed, she had gone from one who fawned over Deres for having done it to respecting his power and seeing it as an opportunity to learn from him whatever he would teach. When she saw the two of them together as they compared various botanical notes she gave him every deference, and the same with Mistress Lia. To everyone else, Vale imagined that she was much the same as she’d always been. Deres had remarked that every person was different in how they would ‘settle’ into themselves after the new directives had been placed within. It was always his thought that they should remain who they had always been as much as could be allowed because that was part of the tapestry of the universe as it should be, too.

Though, Vale thought, one or two additional changes wouldn’t have hurt.

They rode for nearly an hour before Vale noticed that Sylanna had awoken, her now blue eyes focused on the road ahead. “Rested?”

Sylanna gave her a look, “Yes,” speaking as though she wanted to hurry up and be done with her part of the conversation as quickly as possible.

Vale ignored that aspect of things because that was essentially normal for the other. “You did wonderful work with Ara. Not too many others could have managed that.”

“I expect that’s true.”

“There’s that Sylanna Seren humility” she said dryly.

“Why should I have humility over facts? Am I wrong?”

“Would you ever admit it if you were?”

“Of course,” Sylanna answered as though she were schooling one on the obvious. “On those rare occasions, when I’m wrong, to not admit it only compounds the error.”

“You were wrong back there. You made my job harder back there, so what do you have to say to that?”

Sylanna snorted. “I made your job harder. How exactly did I do that, Denna? I saved a young girl’s life from the idiocy of her parents. The child needed saving and I did it. After that, they would have cut their own hands off with a spoon in gratitude and all you asked for from them was to take packages and messages now and then.”

Her ire grew. “Right there. Do you hear that coming from your own mouth? Do you think that helped me in there?

“What? Calling the girl’s mother an idiot? She was an idiot. You know it and I know it.”

“She’s not an idiot, Sylanna.”

Her response was an incredulous snort. “Really? She’s not. So you advocate just shoving whatever random thing you might find in a cabinet or a tool shed down your child’s throat if they’re ill because why not?”

Vale had no tolerance for the absurdity, “Of course not. But you probably weren’t wrong that she got it from her mother who got it from back, and back, and back. She saw it happen, no one died, so maybe it helped. She was just trying to help her baby. She wasn’t trying to be malicious. We don’t even know if she can read. We can’t all know of every root, flower, tree, and bit of pollen in the world like you do.”

She slid into a slightly condescending teaching tone. “I didn’t say she was being malicious. I’m saying she was a fool. No one has to be learned in everything...or even anything to know that you shouldn’t take in unadulterated toxins when you have no idea, apparently, how anything works. What should I have done? Taken her aside, patted her hand, and asked her to please stop killing her child?”

“Yes,” she said, as though Vale was excited that the other had stumbled on the truth. “You take her aside and you explain to her why what she was doing was wrong. You can be firm and you should be so it doesn’t happen again. But you take into account that she’s a mother that loves her child, and she has feelings, Sylanna, and that matters. I know that you don’t seem to put much stock in them, especially when expressed by other people, but they matter.”

“If you say so, but I leave the nuance of emotion to you, Vale,” Sylanna announced before turning bitter. “Indeed, I hope to emulate the same example of kindness and forgiveness as you and all the others of your guild have shown me. You all act as though I have no feelings, so why should I bare myself? So you can wound me more deeply with coldness and reminders. Show me civility and perhaps I’d feel in a better place to not be the person you see every day.”

Vale was in defensive mode now. “I’ve been perfectly civil to you, though Goddess knows you haven’t made it easy. You bark orders at people like we’re all just beneath you or at your beck and call. We have all been civil to you.”

“Only because Mistress Lia has asked it of you,” Sylanna said, as though that proved her argument.

Vale, for her part, had no interest in conceding. “Of course because she asked it of us. And we tolerate your barking, and your bitter cold detachment from everything but, seemingly, yourself, and Deres because she has asked it of us. You harm her by seeking to harm the child that’s hers in her heart if not by blood and yes, you were taken and changed so that it would never happen again, but even, Deres, the girl’s own father, showed you more mercy than you deserved and...”

“To lead him to the others, not because I mattered beyond that.”

“I don’t care why and you shouldn’t care either. Most others would have gotten what they needed from you and then exacted their vengeance. But he left you with your life and basically as the, pardon my language, but I doubt you’ve never heard the description before, bitch you always seem to have been that could do what you did in the first place. You do what you did to her and still she gives you a place near her and asks that we give you a place as well.”

“Yet you still act like the person that could have done that and everything else you’ve probably done in your life and then you wonder how you’re still treated as that person.” Much of her frustration spent, Vale turned more contemplative. “Perhaps for me, part of it is that I simply do not understand how you could have done what you have done? I don’t understand how you could come up with the plot you did, and then the mechanism, and watch the southern quarter burn and watched all those people suffer. I don’t understand it and I don’t want to.”

“That was just one of my…greater accomplishments,” she told Vale in a harsh, quiet voice, unwilling now to look at her. There were many others.”

Vale ignored it, as the last thing she desired was a tour of the woman’s past. It would make it just that much harder to see anything else “You have a chance at a new life. You have a chance to turn a page. Of course no one wants to show you kindness or offer forgiveness. You don’t show kindness or allow them to see things that would warrant forgiveness for whatever else you’ve done. All they see, Sylanna, is a woman who acts exactly like the type of person that could do what they know you did. How can they see that from you and respond in any other way?”

There was a long silence before she spoke again with nothing between them but the breathing of the horses and their footfalls. “Hopefully none of you will have to endure me much longer. Once this task is complete, I intend to ask Deres to allow me to go elsewhere.”

Sylanna expected no response at all, much less some melodramatic attempt at concern or social niceties like, ‘Oh, please don’t go, so she wasn’t upset at getting no response at all. Honestly, she was pleased to just focus on the road.

The day proceeded mostly as a silent one from that point on and, as the sun began to peek through the clouds for minutes at a time before bleeding into an orange, a red, and finally a darkening violet. They found a pleasant space to camp and did so, not speaking much beyond the basics of where they would go next. There was a village they’d arrive at early the next day, so there was no reason to push on into the night only to arrive when everyone there would be asleep anyway.

They ate and watched the fire in silence, with Vale firmly believing that that was how the night would go, and, all things considered, it wouldn’t have been the worst way for the evening have gone, but she couldn’t make herself remain silent. Perhaps it was because she believed it was what Mistress Lia wanted because Sylanna was there to begin with. Perhaps her own pragmatism didn’t allow someone to go off and do a stupid thing for a stupid reason without attempting to say something so she could salve her conscience with being able to tell herself that she tried to do something about it. “Are you serious about running away?”

“Not running away. Leaving. And It does seem to be for the best.”

Vale watched how, with her ability to see the magic when she chose, the veil around her could play with the light. “It seems to me to be pointless.”

“Explain.”

“Simply enough, it won’t solve your problem.”

“Which is?”

“You, Sylanna You are your biggest problem. Everyone else is an obstacle or something for you to use. No one else understands you, and they don’t want to. They couldn’t understand you anyway, so, of course, that’s why they don’t try. You don’t need to understand them beyond obstacles or something to use, so to the void with them otherwise.”

Sylanna studied her in return before returning her gaze to the fire, “So you believe you understand me now?”

Vale shook her head and raised the palm of her hand against the fire and used hint of her power to make the embers plume upward and form a pattern that amused her almost as much Sylanna’s self-delusion of depth. People so wrapped themselves up in what they thought they were they sometimes forgot the truth. “I know people, Sylanna. I know them and I sense them. It is a gift I seem to have been given that years of dealing with them has helped me hone. Even if I had none of that as part of me, you’re not all that difficult to understand.”

She seemed almost intrigued at the notion. “Is that so?”

“You have changed and you are at a complete loss because you can no longer do the things you used to do. You no longer even want to, but what are you without that? So you treat people as much as you always did as you can manage because it’s comfortable. But their reactions are uncomfortable, so your solution is to leave and be alone.”

“The problem with that solution, Sylanna, is that it still leaves you alone with you.”

Sylanna rose, and her tone was bitter, “So I am just so overwrought with self-loathing that I choose to flee. Is that what you believe?”

“I would be if I were you.” Disgust crept into her own retort. “I would be if I lived my life like you have and then I was forced to look at it and not be able to look away. I would want to flee humanity.”

“Should I bow to worship your fucking pure heart, Denna?”

She groaned, “I am not pure and never pretended to be.”

“Well, no one would know that there was ever a blemish on your divine aura based on how Mistress Lia simply beams with pride at your mention. Her adoration of you is obvious and more than a little gag-inducing. And the youngest of the apprentices? They follow you about like puppies as though you were Guild Mistress, too.”

“Because they see in me that I am closer to what they are than the likes of Lian or Mistress Lia. And I certainly don’t tell them that I abandoned my mother. I don’t tell them that after father died there was so much hardship and misery in life and misery from her that when I learned there was a world of magic that was not living with a mother that died inside after my father did, I ran to it and have not looked back.”

“So if you need something to tarnish my aura or to temper your apparent jealousy at the fact that I treat other people like people and they respond to that, then use that. I’m not perfect. My leaving hurt her more, but I wasn’t strong enough to be there, so we all have regrets and shame. The guilds gave me the chance to become something stronger, and sort of turn that page on the book of life that’s mine.”

She rose now, stepping to her bedroll “You have that chance to do that like few others do. Maybe you do belong alone and would be a better person that way, but you should at least try living with others and tried living in the world before you head for a mountain cave somewhere nowhere. Let’s take a step,” she began, her voice oozing sarcasm. “Can you pay a compliment? I haven’t heard one since I’ve met you directed towards anyone at all. Is it in you?”

“When it’s warranted,” she said haughtily.

“Is it ever?”

“Occasionally.” She chose not to bring up the fact that the last time she paid one was when she complimented a fellow mage as he directed the pollen she created to the southern quarter of the city of Erette that set the people against one another and set the city to burning.

“You can’t do it,” Vale said, her eyes a mix of resignation and humor. “You can’t even do that. You can’t bring yourself to pay a compliment to anyone because it would say that other people can do things that might impress you and put them on par with you in even the smallest ways. Do it. Pay a compliment. It doesn’t even have to be about me. It just has to be a heartfelt and sincere.”

“You did well last night,” Sylanna said quickly, partly to prove that she could do it, and partly to put an end to Vale’s incessant pecking. “With Ara. You were an excellent assistant for one without formal training as a healer.”

Vale blinked, somewhat shocked at the admission, and not even sure she believed it, seeing it as possibly just a ploy to get Vale to shut up. “That’s news to me, what with the two hours of sniping over virtually everything I did and how I did it.”

She looked at her with the incredulity of one somewhat shocked that she should have to explain the obvious. “Why do you think I stopped when I did? There was no longer reason to direct you, or snipe, as you put it. You made it clear that you could be trusted to perform the tasks asked of you.”

Sylanna blew out what was left of her emotion and looked toward her own bedroll. “Well, now that I’ve proven I can engage in basic social contrivances designed to prop up soft people who should already know their abilities and not need such validation, I believe I’ll go to bed.”

She slid into her own bed without another word.

Vale blinked again, somewhat proud of herself for not screaming, yet confused as to how exactly she managed it.

The two followed the road that was really little more than a trail of half-frozen mud that wound reasonably close collection of homes, which was as close to a village as this area could manage. They veered left from that path towards the first house they saw. It was simple, as most of the places around this area were. Utilitarianism was the order of things in places where there was wasn’t much civilization to be had four walls and roof was enough. One benefit of these trips, aside from expanding various guild networks, making rounds like this lessened fear of mages among the people and it built goodwill, to help, especially if nothing was asked of the person in return. Even if no one needed or would have understood the turns magic could take, sometimes all they needed was a pair of strong hands or a listening ear.

Vale knocked on the door and smiled while Sylanna gave her a sidelong glance and a moment’s wonder at the fact that the smile was real. As someone who spent years practicing her expressions and learning which expressions her clients and others wanted and needed to see, she’d long ago learned to lie effectively and spot one often before they’d opened their mouths to do it, so she knew Vale wasn’t putting on a guise for anyone’s benefit. She liked people. She liked meeting them, knowing them and forming relationships.

And people usually took to her, probably because they could sense that sincerity in spite of her generally quiet nature. The young apprentices did indeed follow her about already because she was a warm, welcoming presence during those awkward and often frightening first steps into a life of secrecy and danger on several fronts. And Sylanna had already witnessed her show patience with them enough for ten mentors. For Sylanna to witness, it almost seemed like a mage specialty of hers.

The door opened to a man of middle age. He was a somewhat squat, but not unappealing. Vale saw that, not so many years ago, he probably had no shortage of women he could court. That vibrancy and charm were still there and all he’d done was open the door and give them a friendly smile. “Oh, my. Two lovely ladies at my door without invitation leaves me to wonder what good deed I might have done that the Goddess would reward me so. What can I do for you this day?”

Vale reflected his warmth as she introduced herself, “I’m Vale and this is my companion Sylanna. We’re healers by trade and have other technical skills people sometimes find useful and represent our guild of men and women who are hoping to extend those services to remote areas like this one. Might you or someone in your family have need of a healer or a tradesman of some sort? Or might you know someone that does?”

He laughed and patted his heart, “So much for my reward from the Goddess. I’m Nic and I’m still pleased to meet you.” He looked around the floor as if to search around them for someone as he searched his mind. “I’m afraid that I can’t think of anyone that might need someone with your skills just now.”

Vale looked just a touch disappointed before brightening again. “That’s quite all right. Actually, it’s good news when one doesn’t need a healer for anything. Perhaps your wife might know of someone. Is she here to ask?”

Confusion flashed across his features for an instant and he gently corrected her, “My dear lady, I’m afraid I don’t have a wife.” His voice carried a touch of lament and humorous resignation. “I never found the right one to settle down with who was agreeable to a quiet, simple life once I’d had enough of burning both ends of the candle.”

Vale’s smile faded just a touch as she looked around the home. There was nothing obvious in the man’s manner or his words that suggested to her that he was lying, but she knew that something was off. She could feel it in her belly and on the back of her neck just looking around the house. It was in the touches of lace in the simple curtains. It was in the trinkets over the fireplace. It was in a dozen little hints all around the room that she could see. A woman’s touch was in this house, and it just felt recent. This man didn’t lose someone and keep her belongings enshrined while he struggled to pretend she was never there to begin with so he could pretend there was no loss. A woman lived in this house.

“No wife?” Vale was playfully incredulous as Sylanna looked on, wondering why she wanted to continue to engage this man. “How can that be? I can’t imagine there wouldn’t be a lovely blonde anxious to follow you home to a quiet life in a lovely little home like this that seems to have just so many things in it that would make a woman feel at home.”

He sighed, but the humor was still there, “Even as a strapping buck I never tended toward blondes,” his mind wandered, “though there was a blacksmith’s sister in Volis that caught my eye. That was a lovely, lovely little thing.” He eyed Vale and she noticed how his eyes darted for half an instant, up and to the left again, “I always tended toward darker-haired young women, not unlike yourselves as a matter of fact.”

Vale felt the difference. She knew when she was being lied to many people looked up and to the left. When they told the truth, as he had with mention of his romance in Volis, their eyes went to the right. They did so again, but the added brevity told her that feeling in her gut there was something he didn’t want to remember.

Or perhaps he wasn’t supposed to, so he didn’t and moved on.

Something in her told her that someone needed help. Either it was him or the woman who somehow never and always lived here. Vale’s magic took some time for her to learn here and there, but her instincts were always there, always sharp as a blade, and she knew to trust them. She had to know if she was right or not, and, if she wasn’t, she would leave this seemingly kindly man as she found him. She tilted her head, allowing herself to sound flirty, “Are you trying to charm me?”

He grinned from ear to ear, “Is it working?”

“Maybe.”

Sylanna’s groan was audible, “Could we please just…?” The question died on her lips, replaced by surprise, which was something of a feat since it took a lot to genuinely surprise the woman. For a moment, it looked to her eye that she was suddenly closing in to kiss the man. “Exactly what are you doing?”

Vale closed in on the man and placed her hands on either side of his head as she began to mutter the beginnings of the spell that would open his mind to her, so that, by the time Sylanna’s question found the air, Vale was in no position to hear it.

The man answered the knock at the door, wondering which of his neighbors it was. That sort of thing really wasn’t all that unusual. Some came in need, but often they just came to visit. They had sort of become each other’s extended family out of need, and then simply because they liked each other and shared the view that there was such a thing as a little too much civilization. Friends within reach but distant enough to be able to look outside your home and see nothing but the magnificence of nature was just civilization enough.

He found that he was surprised after all, seeing a stranger on his porch, but even that wasn’t entirely unheard of with healers, traveling salesman ,and the simply lost making their way to his door from time to time. Everything about him was average and not particularly worthy of note one way or the other. From his height, to his appearance, to his overall manner just standing there suggested someone you forgot about almost immediately after meeting them. Yet he had a pleasant aura about him. One could almost feel the raw charm, as if it were part of his being. He returned the smile sent his way. “Hello,” he began. “What brings you out this far?”

Vale studied the face the eyes not hers saw no one that she recognized. It wasn’t a mage that she knew, not that that proved anything one way or the other. It wasn’t as if she knew every guild mage, freelancer, and outlaw on the planet, but this was definitely someone with magic. She could feel it around the man because she could feel it pressing against Nic’s mind, so she let herself follow Nic’s memories and the magic.

“Oh, I’m a trader of sorts,” he said cheerfully. “I have odds and ends that I pick up in my travels. I thought that perhaps I might come visit and see if there was anything you might want to buy at a very reasonable price. Perhaps a trade instead, if we each has something the other might want.”

Nic looked the man over and responded with the same friendliness that he offered anyone that came to his door, “Well, I’m not sure we’re in need of anything. We do all right for ourselves even if we’re not in some manor hose somewhere. But I suppose I can...”

“You’d really like it if you liked me.”

Vale felt the push on his mind. His subconscious remembered it when his conscious mind did not. It was blunt and unfocused without the slightest hint of finesse. Where most mages could and did shape and direct their magic with precision as a mark of skill, pride, and even creativity, this one just bashed his power and will into their minds.

Nic blinked at the psychic impact to the point where he wasn’t sure he even heard the words. “What?”

“You’d really like it if you liked me. You’d like it if we were best friends. It’d be nice to see an old friend again and be with someone you like a lot.”

He struggled to hold on to thoughts. “But.. we haven’t.”

Vale felt the hit to his mind again as the other spoke. “It feels good to be with a friend like me. It feels good to want to be with a friend that you’ve known for years that you want to spend time with like me.”

She felt Nic’s mind soften as she expected it would. It was probably the simplest form of corruption to be had. Make people feel good and they would do things that kept them feeling good. So long as they didn’t immediately try to get the person to do something against their survival instinct like drive a knife through their eye it worked out well enough, though even that was possible if one kept them in the fugue long enough.

Nic smiled and visibly relaxed. It really is good to be with an old friend like him. His mind liked the warm, comforting, safe feeling that came with acknowledging it.

“It feels good to be with an old friend like me.”

It truly did. In that sudden rush of joy he grabbed Kel in as much of a bear hug as he could manage given the man’s pack. “How are you? By the Goddess, it’s been forever.”

The other rode out the hug just as he heard a woman call after him, “Nic, who’s at the door?”

“Come I, come in.” Nic’s excitement was so overflowing at the feeling of being with an old friend again after all this time, he fairly dragged the other man across the threshold and into the house. “You just have to meet my family.” His voice lifted to match hers, “Rose. Rose, you just have to meet an old friend of mine.”

“Do I now?” she said, her voice carrying some amusement as she came from the kitchen to the front door. “He’d have to be a good old friend to head out this far for you of all people.”

As she approached, Nic was more than pleasantly surprised by the view of loveliness she afforded him. She was neither tall nor short. Her blonde hair was pinned behind her head in a loose bun, but the size of the bun implied that it might fall well below her shoulders. Her eyes were brown and playful. The light behind them seemed like that of the stars themselves. With her high cheekbones and delicate jaw, she could have been mistaken for one of noble birth. And, despite a few laugh lines, she still had her youth. The Goddess and time were kind to her. “Hello…”

In his excitement, Nic spoke over her as he patted the man on the shoulder, wanting to hug the man again, enjoying the feeling of being with a friend like him, “Rose, my heart, this is…”

Kel stepped in just as the pause began to linger so that Nic wouldn’t be in a position to perhaps ponder the fact that he didn’t know the name of this great friend. Nic had found that the feelings the magic could create were so intense that they seemed to make up things within themselves to paste over incongruities or gaps that appeared, but he didn’t want to risk Nic trying to think. “Kel is my name.” He admired the view before him as he offered his hand. “I had no idea Nic managed to marry so well.”

She took it, giving it a firm grip. “It still shocks me, too,” Rose said with a gentle smile at her husband. “But he’s a charmer, and, by the sounds of things you are, too.” She raised her voice loudly enough to be heard through the home, “Ladies, dinner is almost ready. What are you doing anyway?” She hadn’t lost the good humor she’d let Nic, see.

“We’re finishing the cleaning up you asked us to do,” a voice called back as if stating the obvious.

“An hour ago.”

“We’re coming.”

She rolled her eyes and shook her head, looking to the men for understanding. “One’s three months away from having a husband and the other not much behind and I swear both of them are going to have to live in a manor with servants or husbands who don’t mind a house that looks like a storm blew through.

“Or have husbands all right with housekeeping?” Nic offered.

“They have no example to draw from in that regard,” she explained with a humorous bite.

Nic winced. “You wound me.”

“Only because sometimes the truth stings, dear.” She turned her attention back to Kel, “I assume you’ll be staying for breakfast.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’m not sure I can stay long,” he demurred as he allowed his eyes to glance down at Rose’s tan dress and the outline that a pair of full breasts beneath it created, “It’s a long day ahead, and I have a few more visits to make on the route I’ve chosen, so I’m not sure I have the time.”

“Nonsense,” she said quickly. “How long does it take to eat a good meal that’s all but served?”

He didn’t reply beyond a smile for a moment, a smile that broadened noticeably when he saw Nic’s daughters enter the room. Rose gestured them over, “Come here, young ladies. Come meet a long lost friend of your father’s who happened upon our doorstep this morning.” As Kel took each hand in turn, Nic introduced them. “This is Alix,” he said of the slightly taller of the two. They were both lovely. Alix was a true combination of her parents, having the darker eyes and hair of her father while eschewing his slightly more rounded face in favor of Rose’s more finely sculpted ones, but she looked enough like each that no one would doubt who her parents were if they were all together in a room as they were now. “Hello, Kel. It’s a pleasure to meet any friend of father’s.”

“And this is Rianna.”

Through Nic’s eyes, Vale saw him take Kel’s breath away and it wasn’t hard to see why, as she appeared to be as one would have imagined Rose at that age. Her hair looked as spun gold, her eyes had a lively sparkle to them and her lips had a perpetually adorable pout. “So pleased to meet you, Rianna.”

She took his hand as firmly as her sister had, “Is Kel your first or last name, if I might ask?”

He recognized it as the voice he’d heard calling back from the bedroom. “First, though, please, it’s all I ever really go by.”

That smile lit the room, “Of course, Kel. No offense intended. I was just curious.”

He shook his head. “None taken, young lady. He took another look at his surroundings made his decision. “You know, I think I might take you up on that breakfast after all if that’s all right.”

“Then, as I all but said a moment ago,” Rose began, gesturing to the family table, “sit yourself down and enjoy breakfast.”

Nic grabbed a seat from the living room, leaving a friend like Kel his place at the head of the table, before they all sat to partake from a platter of thinly-sliced ham and a large bowl of scrambled eggs, with milk. It was simple but tasty. The eggs were fluffy and the ham was cooked just right. Nic was always fond of her skill in the kitchen, and, judging by the way Kel attacked his meal, he was, too. “Been awhile since you’ve had a good meal?”

Kel looked at him, suddenly realizing how he might have looked as he continued to dig in, “You know me, Nic. I can’t cook work a damn.”

Nic laughed as the magic placed within his mind added a certain heft of reality to the things that he imagined were true because of Kel’s words. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

Kel had done the best he could do delay and deflect any serious questions. Indeed, Nic was unintentionally helpful with that. He could simply make a comment, then allow Nic to embellish while he nodded along and added bits that he thought might amuse. It kept the family entertained while he ate his fill. It was a simple question when he’d almost reached that point that caused him to pause mid way through a bite of food.

“Did you two grow up together?” Rose was as enamored of the grand stories as everyone else had been. “All of these grand adventures the two of you have had and I never heard any of them before this morning. And I thought I knew everything there was to know about this one,” she said, jutting her chin in her husband’s direction. “How many other lives have you lived that I know nothing about?”

“Just the one,” he answered with a blush. He did feel a little badly about having kept their adventures from her, but there were simply things that belonged to him and a friend like Kel.

Rose turned her attention back to this new found friend, “So, did you?”

Kel looked at her in askance, “Hm?”

“Did you two grow up together?”

“No, but you needn’t worry about that.”

The amusement began to leave her features and the girls stopped eating before glancing at one another, a little unsure that they heard what they heard, and even more uncertain as to how they should react to it. “Pardon?”

Nic jumped to his friend’s defense, not concerning himself with the validity of the question because that might interfere with the feeling that came with being with a friend like Nic. “That’s right, Rose. Really, there’s no need to get bogged down in all sorts of silly details like that.”

She looked at him in more than a little shock that Vale didn’t need to be a mage to read. It was all well and good to this friend simply show up at their door, and he certainly seemed a friendly sort even if it were more than a little off-putting to have this complete stranger fill in aspects of your husband’s life that you were completely unaware of until literally that moment, but then to hear them both brush off the simplest direct question was more than uncalled for.

“Silly details?” She looked at him in anger and bewilderment, as though she didn’t know him at all which was seemingly the case. “Some man just happens by that has apparently known you for years, though you’ve never mentioned it to me or your children and somehow my asking the simplest question is silly and out of line?”

Nic was at a loss to provide an answer. He didn’t know what to tell her without thinking of something that would require him going into their history together and using what he knew of her in their time together to come up with something to say to quiet her anger if not put her at ease. But to do so meant having to disrupt the happy feeling that enveloped him to collect thoughts and string together words, and it just wasn’t worth the bother. Kel would know what to say to her anyway. He was so right about everything.

Since life was an integral part of magic in that it helped form the pools from which mages drew upon it and minds shaped and directed it, it wasn’t completely unfair to say that magic had a life of its own, even if it was more of an instinct than anything else. Some mages compared it to a leashed animal that could be trained to heal, destroy, or a nearly infinite number of other things depending on the skill of the trainer.

Vale studied Nic’s mind carefully as his story unfolded. This magic was barely contained. Vale could see that in how it flowed from Kel and the talisman and swirled around him. There were a few old mages in a line of work that generally didn’t make it easy to make it to be old mages, and so old apprentices were fewer still. That being the case, that left that this was a man who found magic and had learned how to use it in the most elementary way, making the magic something of a wild beast that attacked, pummeled, and subdued anyone Kel set it against.

And all Vale could do at this point was watch the memories Nic had buried and the remnants of the magic left behind as Kel continued to unleash the beast on this family.

“Does it really matter?”

“Of course it matters,” Rose said, looking at him with growing annoyance, all hint of hospitality gone. “I know perfectly well that he existed before I met him and lived a life but…”

“It doesn’t matter,” Kel said with more force, and, with her mage’s eye, Vale saw the otherwise invisible threads of magic reach for the woman and close in around her. “Why are you making such a fuss over things that don’t matter?”

“They matter to me,” she shot back with zeal.

“Sure they do, but wouldn’t it feel better if you just stopped caring about any of what you’ve made so important in your mind? Give it a try, Rose. Just stop caring about it and imagine that the relief that will be. Give it a try.”

Vale watched the threads tighten around the woman’s mind. They pushed inward and her body gave the slightest jerk in shock as the magic touched her. She took a full breath as it penetrated her mind more deeply and the timing made it appear to Vale’s sense as though she was inhaling it into her being.

Kel smiled as the visible signs of Rose’s annoyance smoothed. See? Isn’t it better when you stop worrying ? Don’t you feel better when you don’t worry about things like that?”

All she could manage now was a look of calm placidity as the magic tightened its grip.

“See? You feel better when you don’t worry, don’t you? You feel relaxed and calm, and don’t you like how that feels?”

It was hard from this perspective to see how much the magic overwhelmed her and how much Rose embraced the bliss, but Vale did see the smile form slowly on her face, which Kel mirrored. Vale knew that look. He liked the power he had and what it could do. She’d seen it in the eyes of students when they first truly mastered a spell, any spell. They liked the rush of power that came not only with the power itself, but with the fact that they controlled it.

That, however, was the time to begin teaching them in earnest the need to tread carefully. Humans liked power and magic was power distilled into a formless essence that waited to be used, and some scholars said, wanted to be. Feeling that magic flow through them as something they could command was power of a different kind, and it, all too often, lead mages down dark paths as they sought reasons to use it just to feel the power course through their bodies. One had to have the will to control magic. One had to have the will to decide the where, the when, and the why and not be urged solely by the thrill of its use.

Many could be taught to use magic. It was more rare to find those that could resist being used by it.

“Yes.”

“It feels good, doesn’t it? When you don’t worry, everything feels warm, and safe, and peaceful.”

Her daughters exchanged looks as they saw their mother’s smile broaden. “It feels good.” Her response came with an exhalation of breath that sounded like a physical release, and it was. She wasn’t slumped forward as if boneless, but she was at ease now, as if her body were floating on the same cloud of joy that her mind was consumed by. It was impossible not to notice and Alix, the eldest, spoke, “Mother?”

“Quiet, dear,” Kel said gently. “Let your mother feel what she’s feeling.”

“Quiet, Alix.” Nic’s tone was far more harsh as was his glare at the girls. It was so intense that Rianna recoiled ever so slightly as she reacted like a daughter whose father almost never took such a tone, so when he did, it had that much more impact. Her lips parted ever so slightly before clamping together once again, though the young women did exchange glances that each said the same thing.

Something was very wrong.

And, for the space of several heartbeats, that’s all Kel did. He let Rose just feel what the magic was doing to her. He let her drown in it. He watched her eyes, searching for the right emptiness before he acted, searching for the one moment after which he knew that enough of her will was blown away by the currents of magic that he’d sent through her that she would do as he pleased.

He watched her fall and Vale watched him get hard watching her fall. It wasn’t that through Nic’s eyes she could see his cock press against the fabric that covered it, but she could see everything else. She could see from across the table all the other signs that went with it. She saw the dilated pupils. She saw the smile pull at his lips even as he tried to hold it back that came from the rush of power and Rose’s surrender to it that urged him to take physical ownership of the body now that the mind would be his. She saw him shift back and forth ever so slightly in his chair.

And Vale saw the anxiousness for more. That hunger to use his power was there, too. He corrupted himself even as he corrupted others.

When Kel knew he had her he waited a few seconds more before speaking to her, using that time to push harder on Nic’s mind so that he would continue to be agreeable when it came to the inevitable path of events.

“Wouldn’t you feel better about all this if you loved me?”

Her brow knotted tightly for an instant at Kel’s question, but that came more from being asked to use her submerged brain more than anything else. The gears turned slowly in the goo that surrounded them, but yes, that made sense. “Yes, I’d feel better about all this if I loved you.”

“Wouldn’t you feel better, too, old friend,” he said, casting a glance in his new best friend’s direction. “You want her to feel better about this, right?”

Nic smiled because a friend like Nic always knew what was best. It was true, of course. “I do. She shouldn’t worry and all her worries are ruining the morning.”

He saw the girls exchanging looks again and he seemed to know what those furtive glances meant. “You should talk to her about things. It’s exciting to talk about things and to make her excited, too. You want to help me make her understand that she loves me and wants me more than she ever wanted you.”

“I will.”

“Father!” Alix shouted, all pretense of deference of child to parent gone now. She looked bewildered, as though didn’t know what magic, illness, or insanity had descended upon her home, but her eyes held a fiery determination even if her voice wavered with a hint of fear. “Father, what in the world is wrong with you?!” She rose, circling the table rapidly to reach her mother and take her by both shoulders. She looked down into her mother’s glazed eyes and seeing that empty smile. “Mother.”

“Yes, dear?” The voice was soft and distant, as though the part of her mind that was her was responding across a great chasm.

“Mother, snap out it.” She punctuated the demand by shaking her, which just made the older woman’s brows tighten in confusion. “Mother!” The last was a plea with a clear undercurrent of fear.

Kel looked annoyed as Rose looked confused again. “Your mother is in a happy place and you’re ruining it.”

Alix’s new goal was clear when she took Rianna by the arm and they both headed to the door. Rianna said nothing, seemingly still stunned speechless at what was happening, but the look on her face suggested to Vale that she was relieved at the prospect of getting out of that house and where they ended up didn’t really matter.

Kel’s demeanor since he began suggested that he knew something like this would happen, but what seemed to catch him off guard was the suddenness and speed with which they’d bolted for the door. Vale saw the magic build quickly, driven by the panic within Kel that could be seen in an expression that reminded her of the sudden realization something horrible that was about to befall them and heard it in the pitched shout of, “You don’t want to leave!”

Vale watched the lines of force lash outward with the speed and force of the crack of a whip. It forked and seemed to spear the skulls of both, holding them motionless where they stood. Kel watched for several moments to be certain that it had worked as he hoped and intended. But they stood with the stillness of statues. They blinked. They drew breath. Tears even began to meander down her cheeks as probably the only expression of rage and frustration that her body allowed her now. Beyond that, they may as well have been frozen in a moment of time.

“That’s better,” Kel said finally, looking comfortable now that he had enough time to do what he needed to do and have more than a little fun doing it. He rose and examined the young women closely, obviously even more enamored of them now that he had complete control over them.

He cradled Alix’s chin in his hand, caressing her cheek with his thumb. “Don’t worry, and I mean that. I’m not a bad man. It’s just...when you get a chance to have anything you want, you may as well dream big and live big.” And he looked as though he had big dreams in mind already. He caressed that smooth skin again. “By the time I’m done you’ll love everything.”

“Now, Nic, help your wife understand how things are now.” Vale could see that Kel was concentrating on holding the two women in place while Nic worked to place his wife where Kel wanted her to be.

Nic was so happy to help a friend like him. He looked to Rose as a man who had to set the world right. “Rose?”

It took her a moment to realize that her daughter was no longer before her eyes and focus on the voice that said her name, moving slowly, as though every movement had to overcome the weighted mush in which her mind found itself. When she saw a familiar face, her eyes brightened a bit and the happiness returned. “Nic.”

Kel needed help, and Nic needed needed so much to help his friend. “Are you paying attention, Rose? I really need you to pay attention.”

Heartbeats passed and Rose seemed to find someplace within herself that was at least somewhat normal, but one could tell that she was working to focus because she leaned forward and her eyes narrowed, focusing her vision on him because he needed her to pay attention. “Yes?” The sound came out in a breathy, quick huff as though even that took effort.

“Are you paying attention?”

“Yes.” Her voice was a bit more firm now.

“Do you love me, Rose?”

“Of course.” She answered as though it was an absurd question. Then she seemed to have been pawed at by the haze again. “Is that right?”

Nic leaned forward himself. “Not like you love Kel.”

“No?”

“No, Rose. You love Kel so much more than you love me. Are you happy right now? Do you feel good?”

She felt at ease with a question that simple and she got to think about how good she felt, “Yes.”

“So do I, Rose.” He let himself enjoy the feeling, too “It feels so good to have a friend like Kel here after all this time. “Have you ever felt so good with me?”

“Oh, no,” as if the very thought was nonsense.

“And our friend is here, and just by talking to us he made us feel so wonderful. You have to love a man that could make you feel like Kel does just talking to you.

That made perfect sense and a warm, slightly silly smile appeared. “Yes.”

“That feeling you feel is so good that it has to be love, doesn’t it? And since I’ve never made you feel like he has, and what you feel has to be love, you must love him.”

Something visibly broke behind her eyes. “Yes. I love Kel.”

He looked thrilled that she understood. “Yes, you do.” He looked to Kel for approval and he found a satisfied look when he glanced upward to see him turning his daughters to face their mother, moving them as though they were dolls to pose.

“And to love me is to want me,” Kel told her, seemingly satisfied that the girls weren’t going to be going anywhere until he got around to them. “Tell her how much she wants and needs me,” he commanded as he made his way around the table to her, his movements anxious ones. Clearly, this is one of the moments he was most looking forward to and Vale knew people well enough to know why. Nic felt Kel’s own excitement through the haze of magic and mirrored it. He shifted his weight in his chair in response to it. His voice quivered in response to it. “Rose, as much as you love Kel, you want him. He’s s so important to you and this feeling of love he’s given you, given to us, is so wonderful, that you have to show him how grateful you are for him.

Kel added his voice now, and, at least this much sounded firm and practiced. “Look at me.”

When she languidly turned her head to do as she was told, her loving heart pumped a bit more life behind her eyes. She thrilled at the sight of him.

“You want me, Rose. As much as you love me, you want me even more. Everything about me is what you want and need.” Kel watched in anticipation as the light behind her eyes turned to a slow-burning heat. “You’ll do anything I want or need you to do.”

“You’ve never wanted as you want me,” he said hoarsely. Seeing that look in her eye and feeling the power course through him helped drive him to his own place where his own mind was clouded to all but the power within and without and his own immediate desires. His own display of clouded frenzy came with the way he fumbled with his pants to expose his cock to her. “Show me, Rose. Show me your want.”

She was hesitant to tear her gaze from her love, but when his hardening cock appeared in her field of vision, that burning heat within found focus when coupled with his commands. She inhaled sharply, letting his scent fill her nostrils as she drew closer to him and slid his cock between her wet lips. Her eyes gazed up to his adoringly as she pleased him, her head beginning to work rhythmically up and down the shaft. He would whine or grunt as she changed her pace here and there between his urging her onward. “Fuck that cock. Fuck that cock with your mouth, you fucking slut. Love me. Love my cock.” He whined when she, no doubt, found a particularly sensitive place. “Yes, like that. Oh, yes. You love a nice cock, don’t you?”

His panting and sounds of need changing, depending on her touch, as though she could literally play him like a musical instrument through his cock. You’re, oooh, a lucky man, Nic. Did she used to do this for you like this?”

“Often,” he said, his eyes locked on the scene.

“I would have had her doing this for me, mmm, every day.” He snorted in response to the humorous truth, “In fact, I am going to have her do this for me every day.” He sighed and shivered. “Maybe more than once.” He watched her eyes love him as her mouth did the same for some time before seeming to realize that he had forgotten some important bits. He was going to do what he was going to do, but there was no reason everyone couldn’t have a good time first. “You love sucking and fucking as much as I love getting sucked and fucked, Rose. The more you suck, the more you love me and the greater the need is to just do what you’re told.”

His words became reality as she worked him faster, which could be seen in the wild spark in her eyes. It was in the gobs of saliva that trailed Kel’s shaft when she pulled her mouth back from it before sucking it in again. It was in her moans and shivering that spiked at regular intervals that suggested regular, intense orgasms that served to keep her mind subsumed and to reward her no differently than a dog would be rewarded for performing a trick properly. It wasn’t an entirely inappropriate comparison since the animal within was clearly what the magic was driving and feeding.

“Nic. I know it excites you to watch. Let it excite you to watch. Let it excite you to watch your wife work my cock, like… Goddess,” he whined as she worked with an intoxicating combination of love, lust, and machine-like efficiency, “like one of the finest whores in Erette.”

“It’s even okay to touch yourself. I don’t mind. Let it drive you.” He glanced to the lovely statuettes as well. “Let the sight of it inside you. Let the sight of your mother sucking me inside you. Let it fill your mind. It’s so improper.”

He watched her work. “So nasty. So dirty. So wrong.” He had to stop talking and look away to regain control of himself, choosing instead to look at the young women. Their eyes were wider now. It was inside them. He could see it and so could Vale. It seeped inward, like water seeking the dry pathways of a sponge. The mind didn’t want to live in fear and terror. It couldn’t. If one didn’t die from the shock and horror it began to dull to it. The mind got used to what it was seeing and what was happening to it as it tried to acclimate to a new normal. That only helped the magic and helped Kel drive it through their thirsty minds.

“It’s so animal and dirty and filthy seeing your mother act this way and do these things. It’s so animal that you respond like an animal, too. Your nipples get hard. Your pussies get so wet. Your pussies get so wet watching your mother love me and be obedient to me.”

He let Rose suck, the sounds filling the room so that there was nothing but that and Kel’s and, increasingly, Nic’s heavier breathing. Kel bit his lip and groaned, letting it all work. The only thing that kept him from trying to drown her in seed then was what was awaiting him shortly and decided to push that imagery. “Just watching her is so exciting, makes you so warm all over, and wet inside. So wet that if it weren’t running down your legs those juices might drown you.”

“And you might like that.”

“You would like that. You want that. The more you watch your mother love me, fuck me, and be obedient to me the more you want to be her. The more you watch, the more you love me and the more you want to be like her. It’s in your mind. It’s in your mind always. You see it even when you don’t see it.”

Rose continued until he put his hand on her head and pulled his thick cock free of her, drool dripping onto the floor with a plop. She leaned forward as if to chase it until the “No, Rose.” he gave her in a tone that he actually would have used on a disobedient animal. She settled back in the chair with a deep sigh and a smile, looking at him adoringly as she did so.

Having had his fill of appetizers, he again looked at the young women, his own hunger and need pushing him forth, his cock still out and hard. He decided to test them, ready to use the force of the magic again in the event the first thing they did was try to go for the door. “You can move again now.”

Their muscles seemed to come away from their bindings, their bodies no longer held by the force of will and magic, but that was the extent of their movement.

Kel smiled. “If you want.” He did a figure eight around the girls, examining them, his hunger evident, whispering to them as he did so. “Do you still see it in your mind, Alix, your mother slurping my cock. Did you see her loving me? Do you see in her eyes how much she loves me now?”

Alix blinked a few times but said nothing.

“And all I had to do was tell her how much she did. I told you things, too, Alix. Those things are still in your mind, I bet. I bet you remember them. I bet they’re filling your mind so nicely and making you so much more agreeable, huh? No more leaving for you.”

He looked Rianna in the eyes now. Those beautiful, dull, wide eyes seemed to hold bits of thought now and then. For a fleeting instant they could look almost normal, then he could watch them change and that put excitement in his own even if they were all different in their own ways. Alix barely seemed to blink at all, but, when it came to Rianna, her eyes would remain wide for a time, then her eyelids would flutter as though the thoughts and imagery running around nside her were having their way with her in ways that she clearly liked.

What truly excited him that showed in how he would shift his weight was that, when her eyes would widen again, it seemed in shock and fear, as though she suddenly realized she was being subsumed and tried to get herself out of it, only to begin to lose herself again. Nic’s memories were clear and the remnants of the magic that linked them all still so strong within the home that Vale could still feel the magic’s want as much as Kel’s.

It was clear from the look on his face as Vale followed the lines of force from him to her so that she could see his eyes through hers, that Kel had grown to like this part for reasons beyond the obvious. He liked watching the effect that his powers had. Whether he liked knowing he was winning the battle within or that she was losing, Vale didn’t know. But in a space of heartbeats she saw a glimpse of the man Kel had been before it was replaced by a man increasingly addicted to the power he held that held him, looking for reasons to use it, like now, and rewarding himself for doing so.

Like now.

Maybe simply because of convenience, or perhaps because he liked the irony, he took her smoothly and quickly as he placed her against the door. Her fingers clawed into the wood, but she was too far gone to do more, and there was no way to be certain if it was an attempt to escape or if it was the animal that Kel hoped to unleash trying to get free. Either way, what came with it was a drawn out, “Nnnnnn...” that started as a growl, but ended in a plaintive wail.

He smelled her hair as he drew closer to her from behind. “Shhh...it’s all right. It’s all right.” His hand fumbled at her dress.

“Oh, let me help you with that, my love,” Rose said, her voice a sleepy, dreamy, sing-song as she came over to lift the dress and the slip together so the man she loved more than anything could have what he was so clearly anxious for. Kel made his own sound when that nearly perfect heart-shaped ass was within his sight. The moment it was, he saw a droplet fall from between her legs and join the others that were beginning to form a puddle on the floor now that they had the freedom to do more than make trails on her inner thighs that caught the light.

He ran his index finger between her folds to see what there was to see. As his finger ran over her clit and down over her slit, she shuddered and purred as she shook her head to and fro, which made him sigh as he looked down at his drenched finger before repeating the action again and again until wept in lust and perhaps a hint of despair as her body betrayed her, panting each time that finger dragged that engorged button of flesh. He entertained himself that way for a time as he worked her body into a greater frenzy as he further subdued her mind. “You like this, Rianna.”

She moaned. The magic put force behind the words, but there was almost no need at this point. The mind was drenched in the haze and her body was hungry for more.

“You like this.”

Her ass wiggled in response and her head seemed too heavy for her neck as it sagged so that she could see nothing but the worn wooden floor.

“Are you virgin, Rianna?” he asked as he placed himself behind her and his cock next to those folds.

“Yes.”

“But that’s so proper, and you want to be improper. You want to be improper like your mother.”

He let the head of his cock replace his finger, “You love me. You want to be obedient to me. You want to be improper in all the most fun ways.” It was so. He knew that she knew it because her legs spread as her body prepared for what was coming.

“So I should take care of that virginity for you.” He tried to push in slowly and savor the moment, but his own need, driven by the magic, didn’t allow for that type of game playing. He sank in to the hilt on a single thrust before closing his eyes to presumably savor the feeling before beginning to hammer his cock into her without mercy, though she seemed to have no complaints, pushing back on him with the same ferocity.

Rianna looked to her mother, seeing the emptiness and adoration in her eyes and giggled madly. She understood now. He felt so good. Loving him felt so good. Obeying him felt better. And being improper felt so indescribably good all she could do was giggle and moan while he fucked away everything she used to be until she barely remembered it. Anyway compared to the bits of her that she was aware of, it was nothing compared to this.

She quieted when he whispered, “Shh.” into her ear again. Her everything wanted and she wanted to hear what that was so that she could want it too.

He whispered.

Rianna spoke.

Alix listened.

“You love him, Alix. Right?”

Her eyes were saucers and Vale saw from her dulled mind that the house could have burned down around her and she wouldn’t have looked away from the sight of the perfect man fucking her sister. Her mother and sister loved him so why shouldn’t she? Even her father didn’t object. Watching Rianna serve him didn’t make her jealous in the slightest. It only made her...want. “I do.”

“Like watching him fuck me?”

She nodded slowly. “Uh-huh.”

“It’ll be you soon.”

The anticipation suddenly became almost unbearable. She heard the sounds of him slamming his body into hers and she craved it like nothing before.

“Think about it, Alix. Think about how this will be you. Whenever he wants. How ever he wants. Think about how much we love him and love being fucking improper and just fucking filthy.”

It was all she could think about. It was all she could think about as she watched their bodies slam into one another.

It was all she could think about as her jaw dropped listening to her sister cum like a slut and knowing that, when he chose the time was right that would be her. And, oh, how she wanted it to be.

It was all she could think of when she could see her mother still sucking his glorious cock in her mind.

Thinking about how she loved him, wanted to obey him, and all the ways that he would have her be filthy and improper was just too much to bear. Her legs could no longer bear her weight and even as she fell to her knees, her hands scrambling under her dress so that she could molest herself with the same whorish abandon that her sister was now. She had no more than brushed against her cleft before she added her voice to Rianna’s.

Nic watched it all, glad now that they all understood what a great friend Kel was.

Kel wasn’t sure how long it had been, but he was now thoroughly sated for the time being. Rianna was insanely tight and like a wild animal once she got going. He had wanted to sample Alix, too, but, as lucidity returned, he decided that saving that moment would be something to look forward to. Three lovely women looked at him as though they were drunk on their adoration for him.

He looked at Nic as he looked dumbly on. “Aren’t you going to see me out?”

Nic snapped to the now, his cheeks flushed with the embarrassment of being so wrapped up in himself that he ignored the best friend that he could have ever had. He practically jumped from the chair. “Oh, of course.” Sadness pierced his happiness, “Are you sure you can’t stay?”

“I’d love to, but you know me, I’m not one to stay in one place. I was on my way to bigger and better things when I stopped by and I really have to get back to that.”

“I know. It was worth a try.” He took Kel’s hand and shook it vigorously. “It’s been so good to see you. I hope you can stop by again on the way back from wherever.”

“We’ll see.” The tone, however, was clear that it was the two words necessary to quickly end the conversation.

Nic opened the door, giving no thought to the four women on the porch who seemed content to wait patiently for their love to return, no matter how long it took. But now that he had, they beamed as brightly as the sun. They rose anxiously, awaiting their love’s whim. By looking, Vale saw that they were as surrendered as Rose, Rianna, and Alix. They gave the new members of the sisterhood knowing and welcoming smiles. Nic snapped his fingers as though he’d forgotten something at the last moment even though he truly hadn’t. “You know, my friend, there is something you can do for me though.”

Nic couldn’t wait to help. “You just name it.”

“Could you just come and see us off?”

“Well, sure.”

“And as we get smaller and smaller in the distance your memories of me and the lovely ladies here fades just the same way. When they disappear so will any memory that you knew them at all. Is that something you think you can manage?”

Forgetting seemed like the easiest thing in the world, especially if a friend like Kel asked it of him.

So he watched as his wife, his daughters and several of his neighbors headed down the road, to where, he didn’t know. It didn’t matter because he trusted a friend like Kel implicitly.

Soon it didn’t matter because, as far as he knew, there was nothing to remember.