UC:Fates Facio Sexus Recolo
“This is getting old.” The Man thinks to himself as the latest group of seven tries to overpower his shields, reusing the same trick that has failed numerous times so far. The thousand this trial began with are down to a hundred, ninety three now as the current group falls.
“Quesco.” The next woman shouts as she lunges.
“Igni.” A partner shouts attacking from another direction.
“Duomo.” A third whispers from between them, forcing him to create three separate types of shields at the same time, with far better coordination than before. It means there is another player out there helping the others compete.
“Finally” He thinks to himself as he looks for then finds a now familiar face.
“Igni.” The third one shouts as the first and second crumple. She forces him shift defense yet again. Her shields shift type as her attack shifts. This buys her a moment’s reprieve before he squishes her shields.
“Excellent.” He congratulates the fallen girl as he walks up to her.
“Ughh,” She whispers groggily while wincing. “Thanks.”
“Stay still.” He orders noticing the extent of her injuries before she does. “You took some real damage and I don’t want it made any worse.”
“Did better than I thought I would.” She whispered.
“That you did, better than I thought you would as well.” He told her. “Nice tactic changing attack and shield type both. You got hurt because I had to use a lot of the wrong type of force to get through it. Congratulations, I mean it, congratulations on that. That is the best anyone has done so far.”
“Thanks.” She grunted uncomfortably.
“Who told to do that, or even how to use different type of shield and attack?”
“A friend.”
“The short brunette with really dark hair?”
“Yeah.” She admitted startled.
“Don’t worry. You are not in trouble and neither is she.” He laughed, “In fact it could be said that you just bought the farm.”
“I have no money though.”
“Linguistic drift, I keep forgetting it.” He admonished himself. “What I meant was you just earned the farm. Unless of course you would rather have the grave.”
“A place for my children in life, or a place for them to visit after my life, a tough choice.” She answered as she was placed on a stretcher to be taken to the healers.
UC:Fates—Facio Sexus : Partus Duo
“What exactly happened?” The headmaster of Centerversity asks Tagoni and Nicole in his office as they attempt to explain.
“One of the Legents made him into a Magist.” Charles answered for Tagoni. “At the same time she took Nicole’s magic. Unlike when it was suppressed before, it really is gone now. I have been looking and as far as even I can tell she is a pure Techist now. She carries not a trace of Magic.”
“So you have all been saying.” The headmaster agreed. “Yet I notice you do not say how you were able to do this without any of the medicines we use here for the same end when you punished her.”
“No I didn’t, and no I am not.” Charles agreed amiably.
“I thought not, but I had to try.” The headmaster replied looking frustrated, “I take it we have Lady Ericson here to thank for the rumors that the Legents gifted Prince Tagoni with Lady Nicole’s magic?”
“Yes.” Lisa agreed, “It needed to be done. A gifting can be explained, especially since he does have some Magist blood.”
“To let it be known that powers and magic can be given would bring chaos.”
“Yes headmaster it would.” Lisa agreed, “The timing, the removal of a key player and the public manner tell me that there is more going on than even I have thought.”
“I understand he will have the best of tutors to help him learn his new place in life.” The headmaster laughed. The idea that Lady Ericson was not looking wide enough to see the whole picture brought a visible shiver he tried to ignore.
“Yes headmaster, I will.” Tagoni agreed looking around the room. Charles and Lisa, the Hearth holders Ericson. Brenhar and Lucas, Heir Primus and Consort of Michelson. Muren and Jack, Second Heir and Consort of Thomson. His own Nicole and the cousins Kimer. All were here and all would be his tutors as he learned.
“Then I welcome you Prince Tagoni of Dest to the Centerversity Magisti, and I leave you in the best of hands. For now though I have to ask, what becomes of Lady Nicole?”
“I stay with my husband.” Nicole answered for herself.
“Husband?” The headmaster asked sounding surprised.
“Yes,” She answered, smiling. “I looked up the words and formulae Legent Alice spoke with. We are, in the eyes of the Legents, married. One entity in their eyes, equals. That means according to all the laws of all the lands, we are one.”
“Then you will remain here with him?”
“Yes sir. If you would permit, I would attend the Techist side to continue my education there since I am one now and have much to learn of my new life. I know enough to get started since I was his chambermaid there for a while, but that taste does not mean I know it all.”
“Easily, though you will draw attention.”
“I do not enjoy my new celebrity status.”
“I wish you the best as well. In fact you should continue to use his dorm on that side at need since everyone knows where it is and that he can be contacted there as needed.”
“Thank you headmaster, I believe I shall.” Nicole replied rising as the group headed out.
“Why?” The headmaster asked the empty room two gross of hearts later.
“Because war is marching on us.” Legent Alice replies fading into view.
“I’ve done my part.” He replied, “I’ve watched over this school for half a millennium. Isn’t my penance done yet?”
“No headmaster, not yet, but soon.” She replied looking at him.
“Why me? Why did you choose me?”
“You mean why did I bind the only true Blood King to his core lands?”
“You sentenced me to life, I expected to serve my time then die.”
“You might yet.”
“Yet you evade my question.”
“There is another player, she is moving.”
“Who? A legent?”
“No, something worse, maybe better, it is difficult to say.”
“But you know her?”
“Yes, better than you might imagine. I, we, have thought her dead before. We have buried her more than once. It doesn’t seem to take.”
“I have done your bidding for six hundred and fifty nine years. How much longer? Answer me this time damn you.” He demanded, though his laughing grin took the force and sting from his words.
“You could end it tomorrow.” She answered smiling back.
“I know, go for a picnic on the hill, wander too far, leave the Centerversity grounds for too long, it is only a few leagues after all.”
“Then why don’t you?”
“I might yet.” He replied setting his head in his hands with a sigh, “He is strong, stronger than I am if he ever stopped to look at what he has.”
“I know, and he will grow stronger. The longer it takes Lisa to realize this the better. Life, all life, is about balance. I started out life one thing, spent my life as another, was made into something new, then became yet another. As I adapted and changed, so must he or much will be lost.”
“If he doesn’t learn to look beyond his horizons he will be a bigger butcher than I was won’t he?”
“Yes.” Legent Alice replied, eyes lost in memories of wars and deaths beyond number.
“My lady.” Neall said ensuring he spoke with Sien not her cover as he entered the room she, Micah and Cinna shared in the warehouse.
“Yes.”
“We are down to forty two wipes and still no real contact. What do they want us to do?”
“I don’t know Captain, I just don’t know.” She replied glumly.
“What is wrong?” He asked disturbed by the tension and worry in her stance and words.
“It’s Nicole, rather, it isn’t. It is that I can’t reach her. I haven’t been able to for days now.”
“What’s happened?”
“No idea, but I can’t reach her and the bindings on Micah have begun to fade. So far I am able to keep ahead of them, but before too long I won’t be able to keep his real memories suppressed and have him able to play his part here or for crossing the border. It also means I am having to play my part as me, and I am getting tired Captain, mightily tired.”
“How long?”
“Days now, and Captain, the drive behind her magic went away all at once. It didn’t fade. It wasn’t blocked. It was just gone, no longer alive. All I have to work with is the residual as it decomposes.”
“And you fear she has died?”
“Yes.”
“How does that affect us other than the obvious?”
“The only way out I can find involves offering you a job.”
“A job?”
“How would you like an upgrade from guarding an Heir?”
“To what? A corpse?”
“You keep making your shields too small.” Lucas tells Tagoni. It is obvious that this is far from the first time by his tone, yet patience remains.
“I know, you keep telling me to see them complete.” Tagoni answers. “Yet all my lessons over the years have emphasized ignoring what can’t hurt you. If a blow won’t hit, ignore it.”
“That’s the thing Tagoni, in magic, attacks can come in sideways as well as from above even.”
“I know, I’ll keep trying. It just seems so unnatural.” He replied nervously glancing upwards for a moment, before his eyes danced sideways just in case.
“What is your name coordinator of attacks?” The Man demands as he absently deflects the attacks of the latest group to try to take him. The contest for the first to have the power of Blood Seed, reduced from a thousand to seventy, looks to be reduced yet again. yet much to his dismay, Owever, much to his dismay, she still hasn’t tried to fight him directly.
“Why should I tell you?” She asks laughing.
“Only a few remain that you are not helping,” he answered, “I would know who you are.”
“Not interested in any position.” She answered, “I’m just here to study.”
“By helping them attack me better?” He asked.
“Of course.”
“And if I choose you?”
“You called for volunteers and I’m not.”
“Yet you are here.”
“I snuck in.”
“And what have you learned so far?” He asked as he projected a shield at her in a half hearted attack while dealing with the next set of contestants.
“Not to fight out of my class.” She responded deflecting his attack nearly as offhandedly as he had sent it.
“Well done.”
“I just copied what I saw and felt you do earlier.”
“Still,” He commented, “well done.”
“Please,” She laughed as the next group started their attack by surrounding him. “Don’t let me interrupt.”
“Oh but you interrupt me by simply being here.” He answered as he shredded the attacker’s shields before sending them flying a short ways to force a break in the rhythm of attacks.
“I am not here to fight.” She replied, getting scared as his feel began to change, as his focus reduced to just her.
“I am.” He laughed as he threw another attack her way.
“Chaos.” She hissed when she tried to deflect it. It hurt this time. It wasn’t like before.
“Well?” He asked smiling.
“I am not here to fight you.” She answered, eyeing paths, looking for an exit, hoping for a chance to use it.
“Did I tell you to stop?” He asked looking at the next group of three who were holding back while he spoke to the so far unnamed woman.
“Did I?” He yelled as he projected a force attack at them. All three fell. Only one had stumbled back to her knees by the time he had taken a step toward the brunette.
“Hey.” The unnamed brunette yelled when she saw the next attack at them gathering.
“What?” He asked and the attack went at her instead of the only woman standing from the last group.
“Gmph.” She grunted when it struck, driving her backward, leaving drag marks in the loam. Had it struck it’s still stunned initial target, it would have killed her.
“I thought you only came to watch? To learn?” He demanded.
“That would have killed her!”
“So?” He asked attacking her again.
“What’s your problem?” She demanded as she deflected the attack leaving her fingers tingling.
“What’s yours?” He demanded again as he attacked.
“Gahh.” She hissed in pain as this attack hurt more, but she spotted a pattern to the attacks.
“Come on, what have you got?” He demanded.
Attack after attack is deflected by her. Each one is a little stronger, the kind of attacks you use to gauge your opponent, but on a scale none of those watching could match. Yet the Brunette held, her shields changing, morphing, adapting as his attacks changed, but she was also tiring. Each attack drove her back. A step at a time he forced her to the wall of a barn. Around her the very air became charged. Her hair began to halo from the static in the air even as sweat tried to plaster it down. Again and again, she deflected what could have been killing attacks.
Over and over, her shield wavered then adapted. Sweat poured from her as the very ground began to smoke from the heat, the steam from evaporating sweat giving the air an even more acidic tinge. Still she held, though no one doubted it was just a matter of time. Slowly he began to recognize that she was adapting his own attacks for defense.
“Well done.” He laughed as he closed to three paces.
“Gahh.” Was her only response as his shields firmed in anticipation of her finally attacking.
“Come on.” He yelled as he projected force at her.
“No.” She replied coldly as her shields were compressed to the point they pinned her against the barn wall.
“Why?”
“I didn’t come to fight.” She grunted in reply as he manipulated his shields and force projection to push her arms straight out.
“That’s right, you came to learn. Have you?” He asked as he finished putting her into the vitruvius position against the wall.
“I’m alive.” She hissed wiggling against where her own shields met his.
“What is your name?” He asked compressing her clothes against her to get a better look at her body.
“Chaos take you.” She hissed as he closed to a single pace.
“All I want is your name.”
“Ask one of them, I’m not saying.”
“I’m not asking them, I’m asking you and if one of them tries to gain favor by shouting it they are dead.”
“Then I guess you get to wonder.” She hissed, wiggling fingers that were only now beginning to work properly again.
“How did you adapt so quickly?” He asked almost normally as he looked her over.
“I was once told that everything needed to start a thing, comes with everything needed to stop it as well. All I have to do is find it.”
“How is dear Wilhelm? Haven’t seen him in simply ages.”
“I don’t know. I was a small child when I met him.”
“What happened?” The Man asked, pausing his inspection to look directly at her.
“My parents and I were on a small ship with friends, also business partners, when pirates attacked.” She answered and another type of pain joined the one already on her face. “I was the only survivor by the time Wilhelm showed up. Then the pirates all died leaving me the only survivor in either party.”
“And then he dropped you with the Kilson’s?”
“Yes.”
“What to do with you?” He asked exploring her with his eyes, obviously fascinated.
“Quesco et Fiery.” She shouts firmly, enjoying the look of startlement in his eyes as nothing happens at first.
“What?”
“Igni.” She shouts and his world becomes the explosion behind him driving him into her shields.
“Umgph.” He grunts startled and in pain. He doesn’t notice when her shields collapse. His also collapse, releasing her as he impacts the barn beside her. The force projection and shield enhanced right cross take him by total surprise. No sound escapes him as his nose vanishes while his left eye socket buckles. The left that follows breaks his jaw while driving him backwards and sideways.
There is no trace of the Man in the response sending her flying away from him. She had anticipated this in the pattern of attacks he has used though, and lands on her feet in time to catch a fist as he charges at her madly. Two punch drunk fighters stand there throwing enhanced strikes. Blow and counter blow are traded over and over until both can hardly stand.
“Magnificent.” Is his groaned exclamation when he comes back to himself as they circle. The pain as his skull is regenerated is enough to keep him focused now. He stares at her in either lust or love, not thinking like an ancient man with goals, but as a man responding to strong desirable woman.
“Despite this.” He asks once his lips are reformed, “You don’t actually think you have a chance do you?”
“You started it.” She laughs through shredded lips and he can tell her mind is hanging on by threads. Do the wrong thing and he will lose her which is completely unacceptable. She is the first person to bring a visceral response from him in far longer than he will allow himself to think about and he will not lose her.
“You do realize you are dying? Right?” He asks.
“Yet I stand.” She replied unsteadily.
“Why?”
“Because the pirates who killed my family, who took everything except my survival, they were out of Bea Medusa, the outer islands. They were island hoppers on the rise, until Wilhelm intervened.”
“Oh.” He whispered sadly, suddenly knowing where this was likely going.
“It took me years to discover why they were brave enough to ply their trade up here.”
“Oh.” He repeated knowing now where her drive came from. If he wasn’t careful, this would be a fight to the death. It would be hers definitely and his also if she could arrange it. Because if she knew the pirates had a sponsor, then she also knew that he was that sponsor.
“They had a sponsor. Someone who promised them help, to make them stronger, to make them more, and for a while it worked, until it didn’t, sound familiar?” She asks, startling him with the strength and determination she shows.
“I.” He starts to reply when she attacks again. This time with a narrow thrust of force the size of a knife blade that shredded normal shields. His other shields stopped it however, the ones that no one like her could know how to make. They potentially save his life since she would not have stopped.
“I am not you, not like you, not like any of you.” He shouts as rage and lust combine to overtake reason for a while. A gesture and she is up against the wall in a vitruvian position again, pinned not by her own shields this time, but his.
“I’m not done yet.” She forces out.
“Unlike you, I don’t just heal, I regenerate.” He says moving to her. “I will be whole in a bell. You’ll need a moon before you can start getting back in shape to try again.”
“Then I’ll see you in a moon I guess.” She grunts.
“No,” He says tenderly raising a hand to her cheek gently. “Not a moon. I said you would need a moon to start getting back in shape. You’ll need a year to be ready to try like that again.”
“Next Summer Fort then.” She teases grimly.
“No,” He says with a still reforming smile and a gentle caress, “I have a better idea.”
“Going to surrender then?” She asks in a growl, “Going to let me kill you and get it over with?”
“No.” He laughs as his hands move to the remains of her shirt. He removes them then her bra, a gesture of his hand then her pants along with the rest of her clothes shred into nothingness leaving her nude against the wall.
“Why?” She asks. Her rage is suppressed by surprise because he does not take any further immediate advantage beyond exposing her.
“I am no Legent.” He says softly enough only they can hear. “I am a man and you are a woman, a real and desirable woman who has, for the first time in more years than I care to know, brought me feeling.”
“Feeling?” She asks, unable to understand the change in him, or her reaction to that change.
“Feeling.” He affirms by grasping a bare breast. “Like the sensation you feel now, I feel it as well. I feel you feeling me and it has been a long time for me since I truly felt.”
“What?” She asks, startled by his change in demeanor, even more by the gentleness of his touch, and most of all by her own reaction to his gentleness. Where her mind rages and screams at his violation of her body, her body impossibly responds with arousal. Whether it is self preservation or something else it does not matter to her. She is still bound by that feeling as she feels tingles race down her body from nipples to other places while her mouth goes dry.
“I feel and I want to feel. I want to keep feeling.” He says massaging her bare breast gently, enjoying the soft pliant feel as he kneads it, then her gasp as he tweaks a nipple before moving to the other breast.
“No!” She grimaces trying to wiggle free in spite of the way it feels as she is fondled. The feeling when he leans down to suckle her nipples brings a frustrated gurgle interrupted by of all things, a hiccup that echoes like an electric shock from her middle to her fingers and toes. Only then does she realize he is stroking her by finger as he suckles her and her body is feeling better and better as he enjoys her. Then her breathing eases as he eases back for a moment. He stares for several hearts then begins fingering her again with one hand while the other gently gathers her nipples in a double pinch as he kisses her.
Unable to do any more than wiggle where she is suspended against the barn wall, she is horrified when she feels herself wanting to kiss him back. When she does, he strokes her faster and then pinches both nipples firmly. Her jaw tremors and then, even with her eyes closed, the world goes white as the orgasm rocks her. A cascade of tremors and shock waves bury conscious thought beneath the feeling. Some part of her knows this is induced, but she just can’t care at the moment. The little of her that can still think is grateful he isn’t taking her all the way, damn it.
“I will make you a deal.” He offers as her eyes refocus. Pulling a few errant strands of hair free from her forehead, he pauses until she actually looks at him.
“What kind?” She asks in a whisper, not recovered from what just happened yet.
“You want to kill me for being the backer of the pirates that killed your family?” He asks as he untangles the bundle of hair.
“Yes.” She whispers again, afraid as she feels his voice in her tingly palms and other places. Rage and arousal fight, refereed by survival, she wonders with dread what comes next.
“Then listen carefully.” He says as he coats the bundle of hair with his blood before wrapping it around her neck but not quite connecting the ends.
“I’m listening.” She admits, grimacing at the husky whisper she hears from herself.
“Finish the circlet before my blood dries if you want to regenerate like I do.”
“At what cost?” She forces out, resenting the effort.
“I will teach you how to really use magic, the way I do, the way the Legents do.”
“And in the mean time?” She laughs, knowing the price.
“You keep trying to kill me. If you fail then you are mine for the night. You do anything I want.”
“What?” Slipped out as what she thought she knew proved wrong.
“Close the circle, gain regeneration. I will teach you. You get to try to kill me, everyday if you really wish. However, every time you fail I get that night with you as I wish you and you will cooperate.”
“No thank you.” She gets out, the hardest thing she has ever done.
“Regeneration is how we live so long.” He says softly, “Eventually you could learn enough to challenge even the Legents.”
“Too simple, what is the rest of it?”
“You regenerate with the same intensity as you try to kill me. You try intensely, you regenerate intensely. You make a half hearted try, you regenerate halfheartedly. You can try each day, even while I am teaching you if you like. If you fail, you service me on your own that night.”
“And?”
“Very good.” He laughed, “You must try at least once each seven days, after that you lose regeneration until you do try. Let a fortnight pass and you die.”
“Tempting.” She deadpanned, barely managing not to pant by force of will, not thinking about what kind of pant.
“You can also break the bargain anytime you wish by removing the hair circlet.”
“Your word?”
“Yes.” He answered then spoke up to the silent crowd, “We have struck a bargain, if she breaks the hair circlet I am placing on her, the bargain is over and she is free to go.”
She hung there suspended by his shields spread out against the barn wall and debated. If she took the bargain one thing happened, if she declined, another. The years since watching her parents die, since seeing the figure halloed in light coming over the water too late to do anything for her family passed by in her mind’s eye.
In her mind it was then and now and the moment she learned who had given guidance and protection to the pirates to encourage them to venture this far north. Awareness of her oath sworn over her parents graves ran through her, awareness of her own mortality whispered. Ribs grated as she breathed, her jaw made a grinding noise when she moved it and something felt wet inside. She could die, was dying and would without medical care. Only the afterglow protected her from the worst of the pain of it all and as humiliating as that had been, she found herself thankful for it.
Awareness of events moving across the world spoke of things happening beyond the narrow little spot she cared about. This man was her enemy and the enemy of the Kallows’ enemies. His real goals stood shrouded in actions across centuries. The moment she found herself in was larger than her, larger than just her loss. For the first time she saw the larger world, saw how this one moment could affect it, how it affected her, and she could in return affect it back. She saw both how large and how small her personal loss was. The pain it caused her, yet how little difference it made to the world at large. Thinking of the world brought children to mind, the first thing on any woman’s mind, her legacy, if she were able to have one.
“And when I succeed?” She asked, for the first time thinking beyond the moment, considering she might do more than die gloriously. If she died then her line ended with her, another betrayal not of her making, but this time one she could fight.
“You get to keep as much of the gifts as you want.” He laughed knowing he had won this round.
“Ok.” She replied in a whisper as for the first time in her life, life came before death, then she found her arms able to move and reached for the hair circlet, “But can that servicing you in bed start tomorrow?”
“When it is my time you will kneel.”
“When it is your time I shall kneel.”
“You will obey without question.”
“I will obey without question.”
“On the nights after you try to kill me you are my sex slave, my sex toy and have no other purpose than my sexual or other pleasure until we leave bed in the morning.”
“OK.” She replied.
“Say it.”
“No.”
“Then the deal is off and you will most likely die here.”
“You don’t use or humiliate me in public.”
“I won’t even make you call me master and I do promise to teach you everything you need to know.”
“Your word?” She asks as the high starts letting down and she discovers how much healing he just helped her do.
“My word.”
“All right. On the nights after I try to kill you I shall be your sex slave, your sex toy and shall have no other purpose than your sexual or other pleasure until we leave bed in the morning.” She swears knowing her one and only chance to end this now was upon her. One last time death came first, if this failed, then life came before death from now on. Wasting her life against the unkillable served no purpose, rendered her families deaths meaningless if she joined them without having lived, or had children to leave to the future.
“Ok.” He replies releasing her as he raises his primary shields for the anticipated attack. He isn’t disappointed in her efforts. Once more she attacks, this time without regard to her own survival. This time she held nothing back. Shock waves and concussion rattled the barn, knocking down two walls and part of the audience. She howled in pain as they fought, he in ecstasy as he was challenged enough to feel alive once again. By the time he was missing an eye she was also. She had a crushed shoulder, multiple broken bones and her hands were no longer intact enough to cast with.
“Just nudge the ends together.” He panted standing over her after she had finally failed to rise.
“Gahh.” She mumbled back with something in her surviving eye that intrigued him.
“Please.” He pleaded as his face slowly flowed back into the proper shape.
“I have business in Donaldson.” He told her, “I shall return in seven days. You have that long to have the training started, to be showing them how to shift attack and defense as you do. Our bargain will not begin for a day after that. If you have any healing left to do, be in my room kneeling nude beside my bed. Offer yourself to me with no need of any controls and I shall heal you fully by morning.”
“Gahh.” She repeated, smiling as best she could.
“I know you have a cause worth dying for.” He replied, almost pleading, “Can you find it in yourself to live for one as well?”
“Aswhol.” She muttered around misshapen lips and lumpy jaw as her swollen hands moved the ends of the circlet.
“Thank you.” He said softly, “I will see you in seven days.”
“How do you stand the noise?” Tagoni asks Nicole in their now, formerly hers, now actually his dorm room in Centerversity near last bell.
“You mean the constant humming whisper indoors here?” She asked. That she missed hearing it for herself was obvious.
“Yes.”
“I grew up with it, you get used to it.” She answered sounding melancholy and a little lost. “Once you learn to accept it always being there, you no longer hear it unless you listen.”
“I’m sorry.” Tagoni said back softly, hating the loss he hears in her voice.
“Not your doing.” She replies softly.
“No, but I regret that I need your help so much. I know it makes it harder on you telling me all about what you no longer have to help me use it instead.”
“It’s not that.” She demurs, “At least not all of it anyway.”
“Then what?”
“I don’t know what to do with myself now.”
“Do with yourself?”
“Without magic, who, what, am I?”
“My softer more feminine half.”
“I know that.” She admitted fondly, “But what I mean is what now? I have no idea what to do with my life now that I don’t have magic anymore. Everything about my life, about me, me in fact, centered around my magic and now it isn’t there anymore.”
“You are mine. I am yours. We are together now and forever my love.” Tagoni said moving to take her hand in his. “It is all that is needed. Just as you learned spell after spell, now you just have to learn to do something new again.”
“I’ll try.”
“No, you’ll succeed.” He says firmly as he leans in to kiss her, drawing her to him desperately as he tried to smother her pain so he doesn’t have to answer those same questions of his own.
“What news of the wipe traders King Donaldson?” The man asks entering the council chamber where the King is studying a map showing the distribution of forces in his and the surrounding lands.
“They seem scared of the Hearth Hold.” King Donalson answered without looking up.
“Scared?”
“One of our men finally got one of the guards talking. It appears the Hearth Hold has been gathering people.”
“Gathering?”
“Bringing in traders for interviews, asking questions about us and recruiting. We have gotten hints before, but it must have been going on longer than we thought.”
“Recruiting?” The Man asked startled.
“It appears so and they also have a time table it appears.”
“What have they said exactly?”
“That they got out of Dest just after the coup attempt. They were actually there when it happened. They grabbed as many wipes as they could and then ran for it before Lady Nicole began purging the capitol.”
“Can they return if they wish?”
“Easily it would appear. To Dest at least, mentioning going any closer to Ericson brings visible panic in their eyes.”
“Bring them in, recruit them, gently, very gently, send some of your people with them to join the survivors in Dest, Thomson and Michelson. Abort the coup attempt in Thomson. We know they are expecting one, they seem to be enjoying looking for it, so leave them expecting it, it will at least keep them busy.” He ordered while thinking as he also studies the map.
“Makes sense.” King Donalson laughs.
“I brought mirror tokens. They come in pairs. One stays here while the other goes to agents for reporting in.”
“I thought the Legents would be watching the mirrors now.”
“Not these, as I said they are paired, matched sets, they can’t connect to anything except each other.”
“Having private communications again would be nice.” The King quips angrily.
“Make sure your map is up to date. We are making progress in the Kallows. I think we can be ready with the first wave by autumn equinox.”
“First wave?”
“You thought I would settle for one?” He asked with a smirk.
“How is she doing Healer?” Mother Kilsin asks of her primary physician staring at the patient.
“Three days ago I would have sworn it only a matter of time before she died.” He answered, “Her injuries should have killed her during the fight. I expected to lose her during the night, but the first morning she was back on her feet, if only barely. The second she had real mobility back.”
“Then this morning she began asking how to go about getting this training camp setup?”
“Yes.” The Healer answered hesitantly.
“And you have no idea what is happening with her?”
“Not exactly. She isn’t healing, she is regenerating like a lizard or snake, almost exactly like the oxatl, the little wet lizard from mexch, no almost about it in fact.”
“And the rest?”
“I can’t tell. Her mind is fragile, she is moody, unstable. There is something broken besides her body.”
“I think being beaten most of the way to death twice in a single bell would do that to any of us.”
“Likely, no...most certainly.” The healer admitted, “There is also something else. The expected sharpness is there, the razor edge to her temper, yet there is also some kind of patience, almost like acceptance, but made of nothing but defiance.”
“No one overheard them talking?”
“No, no one wanted to be close enough to hear them.”
“To be fair I wouldn’t have either.”
“Again Tagoni.” Lucas orders.
“I’m trying.” The exhausted Tagoni answers, looking around the enclosure that a rancher would have called a cattle pen. Roughly ten fathoms across, it was one of a couple of dozen practice areas dedicated to learning shields and defense. “You learn to do multiple shields as well as attack normally?”
“Yes. Now I know that you are used to focusing on one opponent at a time while merely tracking the rest. In magic combat though you can’t do that. Attacks can come from any angle at any time. You have to be aware of the environment itself.”
“A moment Lucas.” Nicole interrupted.
“What?” Lucas asked curiously. She might not have magic anymore, but she did have a lifetime of experience having grown up with it. More recently she had learned from the Techist side. Thus she often had an easier time saying things so Tagoni could understand them.
“I suspected he might have this problem so I visited the other side of the school to borrow some supplies.” She answered opening a backpack she carried.
“I thought that you couldn’t ‘borrow’ things like that.” Lucas asked looking at the backpack of school supplies.
“Magic or no.” Nicole answered holding up her hand with the ring on it. “I am a fate and I do as I must.”
“Interesting.” Lucas says watching as Nicole removes a set of tubes that look just like the ones she took to Michelson for demonstration. Each contained a sample of a different element.
“You may recognize these Tagoni.” Nicole says laying them in a circle around him, “I know that you know what they do. You can also already see them reacting to you.”
“Yes, I see that.” He replied, disturbed that her words made sense. He could see them reacting to him as they once had to Nicole herself.
“Now what you need to do is not look at them, but listen for them. Hearing them will tickle at first so don’t think it has to make sense to your Techist mind. You are a Magist now. You must learn to do as a Magist does.”
“Listen?” Tagoni asks.
“Yes.” Nicole laughs, “Sit down as you saw me do meditating, cross legged, then close your eyes and ears and listen.”
“How? If I close my ears I won’t hear anything at all.”
“You can hear with more than just your ears now my Prince.” Nicole laughs while smiling in encouragement.
“That makes no sense.”
“You hear my voice. You feel my touch. Both are from me and of me. You see sunshine. You feel the warmth. Both are from the sun and are the same thing. You just experience them differently.”
“So ‘hearing’ them is just a word.”
“A word to describe a thing that has no words.”
“To help me experience a thing differently.”
“Exactly.”
“Ok,” Nicole says closing his eyes with one hand, “Now listen Tagoni, listen closely. Focus, listen to nothing except my voice and relax. Let me show you the way. Let me guide you to where you need to go.”
“She is doing better than I had hoped.” Lisa admits to Charles watching from a distance. They are in the stands overlooking the practice area and watching Tagoni come to grips with his new world.
“It amuses me that she is trying to use sleep talking, as you named it, to help him focus. Do you think she can really be trusted?”
“Yes.”
“Good. His uncle told me Tagoni has had a vast interest in magic all his life. If any Techist can make the transition, he can.”
“I am concerned for Sien and Micah.” Lisa told him changing the subject sadly.
“So am I,” Charles admitted, “I just don’t see any way we can help them.”
“Neither do I, even trying to locate them could blow their covers, assuming they are still alive that is. Do you suppose Nicole’s magic faded from Micah.”
“As best I can tell, and I am guessing, it began fading immediately. If Sien were observant enough, and lucky, she might have caught it early. If Micah’s cover identity and shell personality accepts it, she might be able to keep the real him suppressed until they can get away. I have to admit that I thought your backup extraction plans were paranoid even for you, but with events like these last few weeks I no longer think so.”
“I know, and we can’t start the war early just to provide them a distraction.” Lisa said sadly. “I mean I know I sent them, not us Charles, we didn’t do this, send them, I...I did this. I sent a boy to do a man’s job.”
“Only because any man sent would have been caught, and even being a child in most ways, he volunteered.” Charles told her firmly, “We, not just you, but we, us, all of us, needed what they have been providing, had been that is. Scuttlebutt of the guards is a usable index into events. With wipes as bribes, especially the way we modified them, they can get as much credit as they need and you know it. Now quit fretting. We can’t help them. We have to get our part right or theirs will have served no purpose.”
“What do you suppose will happen now?” Lisa asked deflecting an uncomfortable turn of conversation to hide her own pain. “I just wanted them to gather information. We needed that in order to see what is really happening.”
“You had to use Micah and Sien. There was no one else close enough, no other tool or people even close to as good a fit for what WE!, all of us, needed.” Charles went on firmly. “Circumstances forced your hand. Everyone knows that. We needed someone we could depend on communicating with long distance and untraceably. I know that, King Dest knows that, the Mothers know that...and you know that.”
“It doesn’t help the feeling that I got them killed just to get a few more facts.” Lisa replied sadly.
“Have a little faith. He’s resourceful and she is after all a Yemel. In the end she is a Blood Queen if it comes to that. She can fight if she has to.”
“Against two or ten or a hundred, yes. But there are ten thousand people in or around the capitol they can draw on. Numbers count.”
“They are not alone. They have Jeanne’s guard if it comes to that.” Charles replied smiling, “They were the elite guard of a princess. They won’t go easy. Donalson will know they were in a fight.”
“But if they get involved, if they are even identified, Donaldson will march on Dest immediately. King Dest has not had time to be sure his military is really even his still.”
“She is the blood of the Emel.” Charles told her while watching Tagoni return Nicole’s kiss as she guides him to the frame of mind he needs, “Have faith.”
“We’re screwed.” Sien hisses from where she sits cross legged in the corner.
“How so?” Neall asked looking around the only room in the warehouse with no exterior windows that had, by default, become their tactical center.
“You know I’ve been using Cinna as a scout, sending her out for supplies that I keep claiming she messes up?”
“Yes, still disturbed by that though.” Capt. Neall admitted.
“Well,” Sien laughed as she went on, “We have the watchers we knew about here as well as the anticipated ones watching them. What I hadn’t figured on was those watchers having watchers.”
“So there is no way?”
“No, none, we send anyone other than the retard out and they know we are here for information gathering, not hiding.”
“How are you holding up?” Capt. Neall asks.
“I am seriously tired.” Sien admitted, “And getting more so every day.”
“How much longer?” He asked. The implied question being how long she could keep this up.
“I am already at the limit of my instructions and it is hurting.”
“Then I guess we’re lucky the Hearth Daughter is paranoid like the world hasn’t seen in an age.”
“Why?”
“Sien Ciel Yemel.” He says slowly, one syllable at a time, almost musically.
“Yes sir.” She answered as she felt something stir in her mind in response to his words and tone.
“Stage one, an uncertain future awaits.”
“Stage one.” Sien heard herself answer as something in her mind moved in response to his words.
“Do your duty, do your job.” Captain Neall ordered firmly and formally.
“I comply.” Sien answered just as formally as a click sounded in her ears and some weight eased from her mind.
“That should help.” He commented.
“What? What did you do?” She pleaded as she felt restrictions on her mind and will easing.
“I asked her and my king for a favor, just in case.”
“What kind of favor?” She asked, eyes going wide as little bits suppressed by the collar and other things done by Charles and Lisa until now stretched while waking.
“My uncle is a historian.” He said smiling, “He studies the ancient past. He found records of something pre Legent.”
“And?”
“I took it as my credo.”
“Took what?” She asked, puzzled and overwhelmed as she felt herself truly waking up.
“They said to bring their shields back on their own, or be brought back on them.”
“Earn the glory you want to bask in for life, or leave it as a legacy to be remembered as inspiration for a thousand years.” Sien quipped smiling sadly. “You know what I have in mind if we can’t get away then?”
“Yen said it best.” He replied thinking of what she had said to the guard in Camden.
“Yes Captain.” Sien answered as tears formed, “Yes she did.”
“Dest has no armies it can trust in the field right now. Only the threat of Nicole being turned loose has kept things in line so far. Yet even that threat rings somewhat hollow, but everyone honors it because they are not sure of where the line where the Legents become involved is.”
“And her magic has faded.”
“So I must assume she is dead in that case.” He replied.
“And you feel you can trust me?”
“If Donalson marches right now, Dest stands a good chance of falling.” Neall answered sadly, “It would take Donalson eleven days to march on Dest if our army fractures. Sixteen for Michelson to support them.”
“So we need a way to signal home then delay these guys for five days?”
“It’s been an honor.”
“We’re not dead yet Captain.” Sien answered smiling as yet another new plan formed.
“How many do you think are worth the effort my dark haired siren?” The Man asked staring at the circlet of hair she made no effort to hide even here in front of the assembled volunteers of the Kallows wanting the power of the Blood Seed.
“Of the seventy or so still on their feet,” She answered keeping her voice neutral, “Maybe sixty are worth it for now. They think I am your slave you know.”
“No, not slave.” He laughed as he looked at her lustfully.
“No you don’t.” She laughed grimly. “You don’t get that until I figure out a new way to kill you.”
“Make it interesting.” He laughs as he turns his attention back to the watching crowd.
“That I can promise.” She laughs and then turns to the crowd as well. “Ok, who wants to try a collar first?”
“Is it true you are a Yemel?” Someone asks as she joins Nicole at the table in the gardens.
“Yes.” Nicole answers flatly, long tired of the question.
“A real Emel?”
“Yes.”
“Let me start again. Hi, I’m Sendra.” She replies holding out her hand.
“Hi Sendra, I’m Nicole.”
“Lady Nicole you mean.”
“That’s just because I married Tagoni.”
“Perhaps, yet back before all this mess with the Hearth Daughter and Son, I never knew you were one of those Yemels, a real Emel, why not...why not tell anyone?”
“The truth?” Nicole asked feeling tired.
“Please.”
“It is part of a bargain made with the Legents.” Nicole answered. She saw no reason not to. It would all become public knowledge soon enough anyway. “If we try for power, if we return to our former lands, they will end us.”
“Wow. How many have you met now?”
“Most I think, but I am not sure. No one is sure how many of them there really are.”
“Look, I didn’t stop here by accident, I chose you.”
“Chose me?”
“Yes. I don’t go to school here. I go back home in the Kallows.”
“You’re from the Kallows? What are you doing here then?” Nicole asked genuinely surprised. Students from the Kallows are rare here, only a handful are present at Centerversity and in light of recent events have been keeping their heads down and maintaining a low profile.
“Delivering some younger cousins to the headmaster. My great aunt, Land Mother Kilsin, sent them here with orders to remain until called for.”
“Why?”
“That is why I picked you to talk to. You’re close to the Legents and the Hearth Holders. I need to speak to them and you are the least scary person I could find to talk to in that group.”
“You mean because the Legents took my powers, made me, an Emel, into a Techist?”
“I’m sorry, but yes.” Sendra replied with obviously heartfelt sympathy.
“Ok then.” Nicole replied actually looking at the girl for the first time. What she saw surprised her somewhat. A hand and a half under a fathom. Blond with highlights of red. Eyes that seemed green, but an unusual shade. She had muscled shoulders with large, nearly self supporting C cup breasts but still managing to look feminine. Somehow she seemed larger than life the same way Brenhar did, yet hollow. A void is visible in her eyes and Nicole doesn’t understand that, but she knows all about pain.
“I came under orders to deliver my cousins.” Sendra went on. Her determination to overcome some sort of internal fear lighting her eyes. This emphasized her high cheek bones and made her jaw line unusually sharp, magnifying the tightness of the cords in her neck.
“And?”
“I need to speak to the Hearth Holders at least.”
“Why?”
“Please, just tell the Hearth Holders to tell one of the Legents, ‘There is a rumor’ and they should understand.” Sendra pleaded.
“What kind of rumor?”
“It’s a phrase he uses.”
“Who uses?”
“The Man, he, his family I guess, has been helping us for centuries.”
“Helping you?”
“Showing us things.”
“What kind of things.”
“Like how to make more of you.”
“More of me? You mean taking people’s Magic?”
“No, more Emel.”
“More Emel?”
“Yes. He arrived recently, very excited.” Sendra said getting more nervous, “He arrived and they talked for days, then he began asking for volunteers to learn Blood Seed.”
“Learn Blood Seed?”
“Yes, he says it is technique not power. That we will never have your full power, but so many volunteered, even knowing we will live in collars, there are so many.”
“Collars?”
“He says the collars will define our roles and what he calls regg late. I think I got the word right but it is foreign to me, our power. That without the collars we would burn up, but with them we will be queens.”
“Who is this man?” Nicole asks as myth and legend cross in her mind, souring her stomach.
“I don’t know, but he or someone like him has been visiting us for centuries. He visits Donalson as well. He aids them in their quest to take Dest.”
“Is he a legent?” Nicole asked fearfully, thinking of Micah and Sien already in Donalson.
“No. He denies that. He calls them soft and says they need to let the strong be strong again. He also says he is not as strong as they are.”
“Still, he sounds scary.”
“He is. He is strong, powerful, and even when hurt, which he has been training the girls. He doesn’t heal, he regenerates. I have watched his face flow back into shape between sixth and ninth bell. He couldn’t talk at midday and then was lecturing that night.”
“I’ll pass that on.” Nicole promises, “Stick around.”
“I’ll be here for several days getting my cousins settled in.”
“Hopefully I’ll be in touch.” Nicole replied rising, but when she tried to find Sendra again, she was gone. Later Nicole found out she had left on the next train, only her cryptic warning left as a wake.
“I must admit I am surprised you actually came.” The Man said entering his chambers to find The Unnamed sitting in meditation at the foot of his bed.
“I gave my word, unfortunately.” She answered unfolding and rising, careful to keep her robe covering all of her as she did so.
“You don’t want to be here?”
“No.”
“Yet you are?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I gave my word.” She answered walking up to and looking him in the eye.
“Why are you really here?” He asked smiling, “The truth, not the reason on the outside, the one on the inside.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me and if you are here you are mine to do with as I please. So are you my property tonight or not?”
“I am.” She acknowledged looking down.
“Then answer me.”
“I am here to pay you for my healing.”
“And?”
“And?”
“And.” He laughed, “You are a woman. A true and real woman despite not having your majority. Real women always have more than one reason.”
“Damn.” She cussed in frustration, using one of his words trying to divert him.
“And you prove my point for me. No one with only a single reason would attempt a deflection like that.”
“Ok.” She relented, “I am here to begin learning how to kill you in revenge for you getting my family killed.”
“See.” He laughed smiling, “I told you there was more than one reason to be here.”
“You don’t seem concerned.”
“I’m not. I have bigger concerns than that, than you.”
“Like what?”
“Not yet my pet, not yet.”
“Oh, sex first?” She asked seriously.
“No, or not really that is.”
“Then what?”
“Are you ready?”
“Yes master.” She gulped as she dropped top her knees.
“First, don’t call me that unless you mean it.” He ordered, “Also, get back up.”
“Yes sir.” She answered rising.
“Better, now help me get undressed. When I sit on the edge of the bed, kneel in front of me.”
“Yes sir.” She acknowledged while helping him get undressed.
“Excellent.” He said a gross of hearts later looking down at her as she knelt in front of him, “Now you will, when I say, get me erect then go down on me. You will suck me off and swallow only on command, do you understand?”
“Yes sir.”
“Again, excellent.” He laughed looking at her, “What I am going to do make some alterations to your body and mind.”
“What?” She demanded.
“Quiet please, property does not have any say in how it is used.”
“But that was not part of our deal.”
“It is now and it was, but you didn’t have enough information to realize it.”
“I didn’t?”
“No. I used my Blood and my Seed Magic to make you regenerate, but that is gone now.”
“I had wondered how you made me heal so quickly.”
“It was the hair circlet that did it.” He answered, “Now it is time, bring me erect
“Now you will take my will won’t you?” She asked terrified, afraid she had misjudged her chance.
“I could, and in some small ways I will, but only for your protection.”
“My protection?”
“Yes, once the Kilsins realize what and how much you are learning they are going to have a lot of questions that answering now would cause problems later. So I am going to prevent you from answering them.”
“And make me more fun in bed.”
“No.” He denied. “You will obey me by your own will or you won’t be nearly as much fun.”
“Why not just humble me and have your fun?”
“Because I want you awake for this.”
“Oh.” She replied as she started stroking him erect. In a gross of hearts she not only had him fully erect, but he was filling her mouth. She held it in her mouth as instructed and was surprised by the amount.
“Perfect. Now take a tiny bit on a finger and re wet the circlet.” He ordered which she did and felt something about it change.
“Now put a trail of it where I indicate.” He ordered and watched as she complied. Dabs went on her nipples, on nerve points along her arms, on nerve points on her legs and torso, on her lumbar and he helped her with several on her back, then on several places on her head.
“This will feel a little funny.” He warned her as he began working on adjusting some things.
“I am not adjusting your mind or anything else to control you.” He promised as he worked. “What I am doing is making some changes so you regenerate instead of just heal. I am opening some doors in your mind to allow you to access more of your true potential. I am also placing some controls on them so that if you pull or use too much power you will be withdrawn from yourself. That is only to prevent you from killing yourself. Therefore when you feel yourself getting distant from yourself, withdrawn from your body that is, simply ease off the power you are trying to use and you will return.”
“Now this next part will feel funny. In fact it will be terrifying but you will not be harmed. You have my word and my solemn vow.” He warns her.
“What just happened?” She asks after wincing in pain for a few dozen hearts and then finding her mouth empty and dry.
“I am lacing you with my Seed Magic. I am remaking your body in a way.”
“Remaking? That wasn’t part of the deal.” She protests, but is afraid to rise.
“Not really I admit, but necessary in the long run. Though I could use it to control you much as the Hearth Son has his pets, I am not going to. Instead, I will be using it for another purpose. Here you have to take my word, but it is not to make you more accommodating.”
“This is part of making me heal better?”
“Yes. Now I need you to lie down on the bed and prepare yourself.”
“Yes sir.” She says rising and shedding the robe at the same time.
“You are, as I have said, quite beautiful.” He said watching her move as she lay down.
“Why do you do this to me?” She asked as she draped her arms across her stomach crossing her hands and ankles.
“Why do you think?” He asked back, concentrating on her.
“I don’t know. I know I can’t kill you as I wish. Yet I can’t let the deaths of my family go. I somehow find myself in your bed when I would rather find my knife in your gut. Yet I also know that would accomplish nothing. You can’t be killed by the purely physical.”
“Very good.” He compliments her as he begins testing the lacing of her body.
“What did you just do?” She asked as she felt her body become aroused. Her nipples firmed, becoming sensitive and she felt warmth and lubrication below.
“I am preparing you.” He laughed and her back began to arch as a feeling began to overtake her, a feeling of emptiness, of yearning for something to fill that void in her.
“For what?” She gasped in shock as her body moved, spreading her legs. The movement was made of the sensation of tickling and tingling.
“A demonstration.” He told her as her arms moved to point straight out.
“What is...” She starts to ask but her jaw hangs open with lips forming an O.
“What is happening,” He replied answering her uncompleted question, “Is that I getting ready to make a real demonstration of real power.”
“Some things are never going to be the same again.” He said with a smile and snapped his fingers. Her world became the most incredible orgasm of her life and then it became a blissful white.
She came back to herself and found herself seated on a throne in a white room with him facing her.
“What you just felt out there.” He said, “Is just a point I wanted to make. A point about what power is and how I am going to teach you.”
“What? Where is this place?” She demanded, unable to connect the moment before and this one.
“This is your mind, at least a portion of it.” He replied moving toward her.
“My mind?”
“Yes, and for now I am in charge.” He answered gesturing. She felt herself rise from her throne and stand at attention, only now noticing her nudity.
“What are you going to do to me?”
“For the moment, enjoy you, but only until the next stage is ready.” He answered as he unfolded her throne into a bench.
“I thought you said you weren’t going to force me?”
“I’m not, not really, this isn’t actually happening. It really is all in your head.” He told her as he sat on the bench then lay back lengthwise on it.
“It is? Then when can’t I move?”
“Because I am more powerful than you are and know far more than you do.” He said smiling. “Now come over here, get me erect and prepare to mount me.”
“No.” She answered but went to him anyway.
“This part is happening no matter what.” He said as she stroked him erect before settling onto his lap.
“Why?”
“Because this is both the fastest and, for me at least, the most enjoyable way.”
“For what?”
“To make those changes I was talking about.” He laughed then grinned as she moved at his gesture to lower herself onto him. She felt his tip part her then begin filling her. Even knowing it was in her mind, it still felt real. Given the aroused state of her body, it felt good.
“Now lean forward.” A second one of him ordered from behind her as he grasped her bare breasts to massage and tweak her nipples. She leaned forward away from that grasp and into the one she had in her instead.
“Now reach back and spread your cheeks for me.” The new one ordered. She tried to scream but no sound came out as her hands complied. Then she felt his tip breach her. Now she felt filled front and back. What she felt went beyond simple violation, but nothing happened to fight him no matter how hard she tried. Wiggling only made it feel better, which also made it worse.
“So far, so good.” A third one of him said grinning. This one moved to stand over the bench with an already full erection in her face.
“What the?” She whimpered softly, the loudest sound she could make. Then her mouth stayed open, waiting for him fill it.
“Excellent.” The third one said. Her lips sealed on his erection the moment he entered her mouth and she began working it. Oblivious to her wishes, her tongue did its job as he wanted. The rest of her tried to as well.
“I know you have questions still.” She heard one of them say in time with the massaging of her breasts. Then her body reacted with something approaching orgasm when her nipples were pinched at the same instant she felt all three of him push into her. Whiteness once again took her vision and then her awareness.
“Welcome once again to your mind.” He said as she found herself in another white room, this one with many corridors.
“What is happening?” She asked.
“We, you that is and the three of me, are here to finalize some changes.” He answered her before speaking to his other selves. “You two know your jobs, go do them.”
“This is still my mind?” She asked, watching the other two of him race off down corridors.
“Yes.” He answered smiling, “This is as far as I need to intrude to do what is needed.”
“There is more?”
“Yes, but not needed.” He replied with a smile, “Once we leave here you shall be ‘The Unnamed’ and answer to it.”
“I will? Why?”
“It is part of what I am doing. You shall answer to and think of yourself as ‘The Unnamed’ because I say to. You don’t get your name back until you break the circlet.”
“But that will take away regeneration and the other gifts won’t it?”
“Regeneration, yes, the rest, no. They will remain, but without any safeguards. The result will be that the first time you mess up, you die.”
“So all it costs me to learn this is my name?”
“Identity? Name? Much the same. Neither are needed for someone as singularly focused as you are my pet.”
“I can still feel you filling me, how?” She asked.
“Because I am in that part of your mind. Your body is currently under my complete control, but don’t worry. I will be returning it as soon as we are done in here.”
“You will?”
“Yes.”
“It is done.” Two and three said in unison as they returned.
“Excellent.” He laughed and she found herself back in her throne room still filled three ways. He laughed again and she was back on the bed with him looking down at her smiling.
“Was that real?” She asked quietly, surprised to hear the words actually being said.
“Yes.” He laughed, “And you have a choice to make.”
“I do?”
“Yes, you can invite me into you, or you can leave.”
“What’s the catch?” She asked.
“Smart. The catch is that if you leave you get to discover the rules for yourself. If you invite me in, then I will explain them.”
“Even as enraged and violated as I am and I feel, I know enough to invite you in.”
“Excellent, just tell me your name as you do.”
“I am the Unnamed and I invite you into me.” She replied, looking surprised to hear her title instead of her name.
“You’re learning.” He laughed as he climbed over her, positioned to take her in a single thrust if he so chose.
“Now what?”
“Put my hands on your breasts and pull me in.”
“Why not make me?”
“I want you to do it.”
“Yes sir.” She replied as she took his hands to place them on her bare breasts positioned to pinch nipples if he so chose. Next she took his erection in one hand, spread herself open with the other and guided him in.
“Good girl.” She heard though his mouth stayed closed. “I know this is confusing. I made it so that when I am in you, like I will be after each attempt to kill me, small leaks will occur between me and your inner mind, the one with many corridors.”
“The more often and deeper I am in you, the more you get out of it, the stronger the feelings you feel. With every orgasm the information you are given access to grows.” His dialog went on as he thrust over and over. “Never very fast, never much at one time, but it will add up. It will give you the same basic gifts the Hearth Son gave his pets, but more so, more so and stronger ones.”
“I give a gift now, one brief moment of pure joy.” He said and her world became his touch, his thrusts and the feeling of him filling her. Then her world became a buzzing white version of them and she drifted away from consciousness, lost in the white cloud of bliss that took all thought with it. This left only carnal lust and joy as her final thoughts for the night.
“Say again nephew.” King Dest says to Tagoni via mirror.
“Nicole is now a Techist, and I am now a Magist.”
“You have Magic?”
“Yes sire.”
“I am not your king so much as your concerned uncle right now Tagoni.”
“This effects too many things for you to be my uncle right now, sire.”
“He is right sire.” Nicole interjects, “We are married in the eyes of the Legents. Not promised as Wilhelm did, but actually married.”
“Well then, I suppose we will have to hold a formal wedding when you get back.”
“Another time.” Nicole replies seriously.
“Actually no, this time, right now.”
“Why?” Tagoni asks.
“You know that I have been grooming you to take your father’s place heading the armies when you reached your majority Tagoni?”
“Yes.” Tagoni admitted, “I have had advisors aplenty, often more than I wanted or felt I needed. Though as I learned more, I came to value them.”
“That was, in part, to give you a focus in life so you wouldn’t dwell on things lost to us all. It was also so I could be sure my armies were in trustworthy hands. We have had quite a few near calls holding onto power in the last few generations. It has been apparent someone was working against us. Now I know who.”
“Donalson.” Tagoni states flatly.
“No, as annoying as they are, they are merely fingers on someone else’s hand.”
“Whose?”
“The Kallows I believe, though I lack any proof. Though to be honest even that may in part be a misdirect. Nothing I have seen from them has this kind of depth. “King Dest answered and mused before continuing, “So now that I think about it, either everything else is a cover, or they themselves are someone else’s cats paws.”
“Now I am lost.” Tagoni admitted, “What does this have to do with us?”
“Now I need to unify my armies, yet a second Prince is actually too high of a rank to head them. I need you here in the palace now.”
“Why?”
“So I can have the palace in hands I trust implicitly. My son, your cousin Duane, is now First Prince instead of second Heir and I am still fighting to make sure my government is really mine.”
“What do you need Uncle?”
“We are going to war.”
“We are?”
“Yes, but not alone.”
“What?”
“Come home nephew. You two are getting married, formally and openly, in court.” King Dest went on. “Then you assume duties as head of Palace and Capitol security. No token posting as it has been. You will be in charge and expected to perform.”
“Yes sir, umm, I mean, sire...” Tagoni answered as his throat tightened.
“There is more.” King Dest said with a smile as he watched Tagoni sort the personal from the royal.
“They agreed?” Nicole asked.
“Yes my lady, they agreed.”
“Agreed with or to what?” Tagoni asked, wondering what Nicole could have had time to be involved with that he wasn’t.
“Your first job is going to be arranging housing for the contingents from Michelson, Thomson, Yasan and Kelsini.”
“How many?” Tagoni asked in a whisper thinking about how crowded the Capitol and in particular the palace is.
“Sixty thousand total.”
“Sixty thousand?” Tagoni demanded, “What are we doing, hosting their standing armies?”
“Mostly.”
“Tagoni.” Nicole interrupted, “Stop for a moment, think about it.”
“Think about what?” He asked.
“Think Tagoni, look at it.” Nicole pleaded, “That is going to be the largest combined forces since the Sync wars.”
“And you are going to run it since everyone involved at the top knows you or Nicole personally.” King Dest states flatly, “I know this is much to put on one so young, but we must deal with what is, not what we want.”
“Wow.” Tagoni whispered, proving once and for all that surprise never really changes.
“So someone in the Kallows is making new Blood Lords?” Sara asks Charles and Lisa.
“Yes.” He answers, “From what our informant said, before she ran away that is, an old ally of the Kallows is using collars like I made to unleash Blood Seed for the non-blood.”
“How many?” Sara asks.
“A dozen to begin with and then half a gross if she is correct.” Lisa tells her. “In the first wave.”
“There are only three of us and until a moon or so ago we had no idea who, what, we are.”
“I know.” Charles admits frowning, “Yen Holds Camden. Sien is on assignment, most likely gone by now I have to admit, spectacularly, but gone all the same. And Nicole is now a Techist.”
“So it falls on us. Just us, the three of us.”
“It appears so, I am sorry, but it appears so.” Charles admits, “We are stuck, we have to prepare.”
“If we do nothing we will be over run, we have to make you into Blood Queens, we don’t have a choice.” Lisa interjected, “If we do to much directly, ourselves without using the resources available to us, without involving the people actually affected by it, the Legents will intervene.”
“Yet if you do nothing they will win?” Sara asked.
“Yes,” Lisa answered, “and if we do to much we will lose as well.”
“Which is why even though Tagoni is three days ahead of you. You will arrive in Dest about a week before their formal wedding takes place, unless there is yet another delay of course. You are hereby assigned to Tagoni of Dest for the duration.”
“Can I take Marc with me? Be his instead?”
“Easily, in the end it makes no real difference though. You are going to spend your time being tutored by Nicole. You have just over a moon we can guarantee, perhaps two, or even three if we are unreasonably lucky.”
“I understand a number of Brenhar’s cousins are going to be there for the wedding.”
“Yes.” Lisa answered, “And yes, they will be studying with Nicole as well.”
“I know she has the experience, the personal connection to the power by blood, but is it going to be enough?” Sara asks quietly.
“Is it going to work?” She asks again in the ensuing silence.
“We don’t know.” Charles finally answers, “If Sien had lived, had been able tell us about Donalson, rejoined us, then maybe I could answer definitively.”
“We think so.” Lisa continues sadly, “But we don’t know, we just don’t know.”
“All of them volunteered?” Land Mother Michelson asks again looking out the window of her personal chamber, hating the cheerful sunshine because of the darkness lurking in her own heart.
“Yes Land Mother.” Clan Mother Michelsini answers proudly. “Even knowing what would happen, all fifteen of the girls volunteered.”
“If this fails it will cripple our clan.” House Mother Michelson observes, “That is every girl and young woman under thirty that is old enough to try for the power.”
“How has Lucas taken the news?” Land Mother Michelson asks.
“We haven’t told him yet.”
“Why not?”
“Brenhar volunteered to break it to him that he gets to collar all of our girls to unlock their power safely.”
“Is there enough time for him to accomplish it alone?”
“Barely, and even then Brenhar will be helping him with sexual endurance.”
“Some men would kill for a chance like this.”
“Most would die in the trying.”
“But smiling.” Land Mother Michelson laughs.
“True.” House Mother Michelson agrees, “The train leaves day after tomorrow, he should be started on the third one by then.”
“Cinna?” An unknown voice says startling Sien. She is using Cinna to scout the market for fresh fruit and just the right kind of servant to help them sneak into the capitol building.
“Cinna? Yes.” Sien echoes through Cinna, continuing the same semi-retard cover established for her.
“Good.” He laughs and Sien recognizes one of the original guards from when they first arrived. “I need you to tell your employer to expect an official visitor tomorrow or the next day.”
“Visitor, expect.” She echoes.
“Yes, visitor, important visitor.” He repeats, “Now run along and tell them. There is a feast and we need servants.”
“Visitor, tell them.” She echoes again and heads off knowing more than the guard even suspected.
“Neall.” Sien whispers in his ear, interrupting the card game the guards play constantly.
“Go ahead.” He replies holding a finger up to pause the game.
“We are going to get an invitation to the palace. Expect a visitor tonight. He said there is a feast and they need servants.”
“No way, that is just too good of a chance.” Neall whispered back.
“Even if there is a feast it is just a cover to try to put some people with us on our way back to Dest so they can sneak them in under cover of us.”
“But to invite us into the palace must mean they don’t even suspect.”
“That we are spying at least passively? No one is stupid enough to miss that we are keeping our eyes open, but hiding that was never the point.”
“Not that, who you are.”
“How much authority did they give you?” Sien asks quietly.
“Why?”
“I have an idea but for it to work I have to be able to trust you, and more importantly you have to be able to trust Micah.”
“Micah?”
“Look, we both know I basically belong to him right now. I can’t do anything without his acceptance and I, we both that is, we know it.”
“And?”
“What would you think if rather than getting wipes into the palace for well placed spies, we aim a little higher?”
“You are insane.”
“Do you honestly think we’re getting out of here? Do you think we have a chance of going in then getting back out without someone figuring out something inconvenient?”
“No.” He admitted, “And this has to be them wanting to send people back with us into Dest. If they had come to us as these things are done maybe, us going to them, no. I mean if they had just come out and said they want to hire us to cover sneaking a couple of their people into Dest, fine, but calling us into the palace grounds is another thing completely.”
“I will need three dozen hearts. Place your pieces and pick your time well. It is all in your hands now.” Sien said smiling as something in her stomach did flip flops. She didn’t want to know if it was anticipation or fear.
“It’s been an honor.” Neall replied then spoke a phrase and watched her eyes go soft.