“You didn’t think I would ever willingly return to that place, did you?”

  “But—”

  “When it isn’t a pit of blood and fear, the Dungeon is an endless wasteland of drudgery. You cannot imagine the countless centuries I’ve wasted just in striking mazes, all the while wondering when next I might have an hour or two to myself. It isn’t every day a lilim gets to steal a kiss from a wandering Quester.”

  “Yes, but you wouldn’t be—” I paused. “You have to tear down used parts of the Dungeon by hand?”

  “No?” Xyn chuckled. “Don’t be silly.”

  She did not elaborate.

  “We ain’t askin’ ye to drudge nothing,” Jax said, stepping into my arm. “We’s askin’ ye to do like ye said ye was gonna: to protect the master.”

  Xyn eyed Jax a moment. “What you are asking is for a guide. But even if it were possible for me to oppose Mother in that way, it would only dull the blade she would make of you. So I say again and do not make me say it a third: I shall never willingly return… nor may I willingly leave.”

  I groaned aloud. “You should have led with that.”

  “Lilim really can’t leave the Dungeon?” Arx asked as she pressed herself to my other side—and began to subtly rub against me.

  I glanced from Dolilim to Dolilim surreptitiously, recognizing what was happening. The Mouth, facsimile or otherwise, smelled so much like the goddess that it was driving my hormones absolutely nuts. I wanted them to press their perfect, nubile bodies against me. I wanted to seize them by the legs and drive myself into their centers, again and again, while they sang my name in worship. Subconsciously, anyway. But if I did not get some fresh air soon, that would change. It was only natural my girls would sense that.

  “That doesn’t seem fair,” Arx continued, her tone harboring sensual overtones despite its actual content. “Monsters come out all the time.”

  Xyn only snorted with disgust. “You don’t have to tell me. Such is the Purpose.”

  Jax’s eyes sharpened. “The what?”

  “She can’t say,” I explained dully. “Or won’t.”

  Xyn only smiled.

  “Master…?” Arx began to question, turning to me, but I waved her off—mostly because it was less a question and more a come-satisfy-yourself-upon-my-delectable-body distilled into a word.

  “I’ll fill you in later…”

  Phrasing, damn it.

  “…not that I know much.” I tried breathing through my mouth, but I could taste Her too. And that was far worse. For my sanity. My libido was absolutely loving it. “We need to get out of here. Now.”

  “I’ll say,” Lynnria agreed. “You guys are getting so horny, even I can feel it.”

  Jax made a whining sound deep in her throat from my other side. She had taken my hand and… Well, I was trying not to think about what she was using it for. “Aye… I think ye’ve the right of it. I were hoping we could make camp afore we went in, but…”

  Clear head, Donum. Clear head.

  I returned my attention to Xyn. “What were you planning to do while we’re gone?”

  “Only my duties as your Seneschal, Gift. I am the keeper of your house… but as yours is currently unmoored, I shall busy myself with preparations for your return,” she explained, seeming reluctant to turn her head from the developing carnal display to consider the Mina birds still scratching at the cave mouth. “Starting with a dash of pest control.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “You fear for me?” She aimed a radiant smile at me—which did not do great things for my blood pressure. “I do so love that about you. But rest assured, I have no designs on losing this body just yet. I shall be cautious. I need only convince them we are not worth their trouble. In the meantime, I feel you should turn your worries toward your newest servant.”

  “Why?” I was quick to snatch the excuse to tear myself away from the Dolilim’s twin embrace in order to find the guardswoman. “Is she waking up?”

  “No. Nor will she. And I suggest you change that. Mother knows as well as I that you have only carried her this far out of obligation.” She held up a hand, forestalling any objections—not that I was about to make any; she was absolutely right. But she went on anyway. “After all, what chance does an unconscious body have to plant seeds of desire? Should you take this woman into the Dungeon as she is, Mother will only secret her from you with no more thought than to keep more of her Sister from taking root. And should you then escape without retaking her, you forfeit your claim of ownership. Mother may destroy her at her leisure.”

  “Yer Ma be a cold bitch,” Jax commented, even as her claws returned to sending shivers up my spine. “Ye know that, don’t ye?”

  Xyn only shrugged, not the least offended.

  “What do you mean, she won’t wake up?” I cut in. “Like… ever? You know that for sure?”

  “Naturally. Was I not standing there when Auntie worked her magic?” She made a disgusted sound in her throat. “How typical of her to leave, just assuming you would understand it.”

  I waited. Aggressively.

  She sighed. “Think, my Gift. Use your head. You’ve seen all this before. What did Auntie gloat of whilst waggling this woman ‘neath your nose? Hmm? Why was she spared?”

  “I dunno. She just kept on about how I was her lord or something.”

  “Meaning…”

  “Well, I—” I blinked, nonplussed. Oh. “I did not!”

  “You must have, else the woman would not have had your scent. She’d not have been so compelled to follow you.” She cast a considering glance at the naked woman. “Though I’m surprised you would stoop so low. She isn’t exactly up to your standards.”

  I glared at her.

  “I’ve never touched anyone other than… than…” My lips suddenly felt dry and cracked. I wanted to say I had never even met her, yet I had. I knew I had. But where? It was like there was this hole in my mind where she should have been. Have I been seducing women in my sleep? “What do you mean, compelled?”

  “Compelled. Driven with inescapable need. Haunted by your image from every shadow.” She shook her head. “Surely I need not explain these things as well.”

  “She wasn’t… any of that! She was just doing her job. Part of the posse.”

  Xyn smiled at me gently. “Perhaps. Perhaps she even believed that. But I saw the look in her eyes when she first beheld you. The certain hope for salvation.”

  “She was terrified!” I turned to Jax for support. “Go on, tell her.”

  Jax’s eyes jerked up to mine guiltily, and for a moment, it appeared as though she was struggling to remember what we were even talking about. There was no need to wonder what fantasies had been dancing through her head.

  “Err…” Jax hemmed. “I ain’t saying she weren’t mortal afeared, mind…”

  “Oh, damn it all! I have never slept with that woman!”

  “Maybe you haven’t…” Mia interposed.

  “And what is that supposed to—” I froze. “Wait a second. She may have called me lord,” I turned my glare on Jax, “but you were the one she called mistress.”

  My First straightened, affronted. “And why would I want to lock legs with a nasty kimon like that? Don’t make me boak.”

  “She had my Mark, Jax. She must have gotten it from somewhere.”

  “Aye, but she did nay get it from me!” Jax snarled. “I never touched hide nor hair of no one save ye and… and…”

  She paused, reconsidering, then took another long look at the comatose guard.

  I narrowed my eyes. “Jax…”

  She held a finger to my face, shushing me, before going over to squat next to the woman. For a long while, she peered down at her, examining the unfamiliar laoi from every possible angle, even going so far as to look from between her own legs.

  “Well, hang me sideways.” She turned her attention to me, still upside down. “Master, do ye think it be possible to Mark a person secondhand?”

  I folded my arms, abruptly struggling to remember why I had even been upset. With the divine musk in the air, I was finding it difficult to concentrate on anything beyond Jax’s displayed backside—and the scant bit of cloth concealing what laid between her legs.

  Not that I needed to look far to see a prime example.

  I jerked my eyes away, trying to find anywhere safe to look, and coughed into my hand. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  Heaving a sigh, Jax straightened again. “After I escaped that crystal the Queen put me in, I were powerful hungry. Ye remember how it were, Arx.”

  Her sister firmly reattached herself to my side.

  “Oh, I remember,” she purred.

  Jax grunted, visibly affected but determined not to let herself get distracted. “Anyhow, I were stuck in this great blinding maze a while, trying to find me way to ye and out of me mind with the need, when I happened on this fella curled to sleep… or were it two fellas?” She bit her lip, pondering, before shaking her head. “I only touched ‘em long enough to color his dreams a bit. ‘twere the Faen’s idea.”

  “Mia?!”

  Why didn’t she tell me any of this? And why does this story seem so familiar?

  “Aye, the same. I had to feed, Master. She were right about that. There weren’t nothing else for it. But I did nay touch ‘em more’n I had to, I swear it. Not enough to pass no Marks along… unless…” She bobbed her head to one side guiltily. “Well, I may have stirred me bits a little. Overhead-like.”

  Arx gasped. “You dripped on them?!”

  She bit into my robe to dampen her moans.

  “Ew…” Lynnria groaned.

  Xyn smirked. “Any one of us would happily recreate the event for you, my dear. No need for jealousy.”

  “I am not jealous!” Lynnria made sure to stamp her foot for emphasis.

  My eyes closed, and I made a show of scrubbing exhaustedly at the bridge of my nose while I clamped firmly down upon the all-too-natural feelings of possessiveness flaring in my belly. With so many concurrent sexual partners, I had no right to them—but much more importantly, that would have been a fantastic way to give a certain other Dolilim ideas.

  I simply had to remind myself that Jax was what she was. She could never get pregnant. She was immune to disease. As far as I was aware, she was not even capable of developing feelings for anyone outside of my immediate circle, so any fear of abandonment that might have burbled to the surface died before it could begin. She had been trying to get to me, but her hunger had gotten the better of her before she could. This was little more than a stop at a convenient drive-through…

  …from which she had brought home leftovers.

  I took a long—and distressingly musk-filled—breath. Ugh! I cannot have this conversation right now.

  “Alright. For future reference, let’s all be aware of where we’re spilling our fluids…”

  I paused, grimacing. Ah, shit… If this is really a thing, whoever Tips gets to clean out our room is going to have a hell of a time of it. I just had to hope the effect would eventually wear off.

  “We know our… kind concentrates a lot of Life Energy there, and that sort of thing can have unpredictable effects on people it isn’t attuned to. Feel free to step in if I’m off-base here, Mia.”

  “Off what now?”

  “Baseball metaphor. Never mind.”

  Lynnria perked up. “What’s baseball? Is it like gameball?”

  “No.” Nothing’s like gameball. “Baseball is a skill-based sport where you’re trying to hit a little white ball with a—damn it! Stop distracting me. I can’t think in here.”

  I worked my tongue for a moment. The flavor in the air was completely indescribable—other than yes!

  “Sorry. My point is, it seems to have had a compulsive charming effect on this woman.” I rounded finally back to Xyn. “None of which explains how we’re supposed to wake her up.”

  “By itself? No, it does not. But now we know who must awaken her. I had assumed it would be you, but,” she turned a spreading grin on Jax, “it seems Auntie and I both were mistaken.”

  “Me?!” Jax looked at me with an uncharacteristically panicked expression. “I don’t want the wench. I ne’er meant to… the Shepherdess gave her to the master! There’ll be hell to pay if she don’t take to him proper-like.”

  “Oh, she’ll take to him.” Xyn eyed me hungrily. “Never fear of that. But I doubt it will be in the manner dear Auntie was expecting.”

  A dark chuckle vibrated up through her chest, and she slapped her hands to her cheeks, squirming with delight.

  “Xyn…” I grumbled in warning.

  “Oh, please don’t ask me to spoil it.” She hurriedly turned her attention to Jax before I could say anything else. “Just tell us her name and we’ll all find out together.”

  “But… I—” Jax looked to me for help. “I dunno this feck! I’m only guessing she were one o’ them in the maze. It ain’t like I recognize her face!”

  “And yet you do.” The gorgeous lilim tilted her head, smiling. “Isn’t that odd?”

  I blinked. Slowly. Something had been tickling my brain about this situation for a while now, but it was not until Xyn had poked at it that it jumped into the light.

  I blamed the vagina.

  “Wait a second. You’re not asking us to remember her name. You’re asking us to give her one. Ahnbe made her a Servant!”

  Just as She had said She had done.

  “Mia! What the hell? You’re supposed to prompt me when I need to do this stuff.”

  My resident brain worm moaned gently into my ear. “My lord, please. Why would I bother when we both know you do not want her? She was forced upon you—or Jax, as it happens—against your will. Have you not made clear your distaste for such things? I was simply allowing the woman to remain as the Third left her: without Core and without name, dead to the world.”

  My mouth worked for a moment, flabbergasted. She was right, of course. In all respects. The most I wanted out of this situation was for the woman to return to her normal, everyday life, and forget I ever existed. But that was impossible.

  “Without Core, huh?” That must have been the glowing object Ahnbe forced her to spit up. I had no clue what to make of that information, but it did not sound like a thing a person could just walk away from.

  Dispirited and overwhelmed, I allowed my weakened knees to finally give out. I needed to rest. Five minutes. A week. Three. But the blasted Mouth just kept… sitting there, existing for no other reason than to make me feel like a dog off its leash.

  “Whatever!” I shouted. “Whatever. I don’t care anymore. Jax, give her whatever name you want. Let her follow or leave as she likes and get me out of this damned funk before I lose it!”

  “Aye, Master. Err… Mia, help me. What’re the rules to this shite…”

  “Yes, yes. Be right there.”

  While that was going on, Lynnria slipped between the others to rest a comforting palm on my knee. “Donum, I—I don’t know what it is, but there’s something coming from you. It’s pressing against me, like… really hard. ”

  I gave her a look. Phrasing! Again! Damn it, Lynnria.

  “Are you alright?” she asked.

  “No. I’m not,” I admitted quietly. “How are you not affected by this? Can’t you smell Her?”

  She shifted uncomfortably. “I can smell it. How could I not? But Her?” She shook her head. And in fairness, none of the others appeared bothered either, so I should not have been surprised. It seemed the Demon Queen’s essence was continuing to work its magic. “Is it unpleasant?”

  “No… and yes. Too much of a good thing.” I grimaced. “I don’t know if that makes sense.”

  “You can smell the Life Energy.”

  It had not been phrased as a question, but I nodded faintly anyway. “Most people… well, no. Not most. Just you guys, that I’m aware of. You all have this unique quality to your aroma… down there,” I winced, embarrassed even now to admit to such a thing. “It… calls to me. Boozes, creams, sugars and spice… all different. Once it concentrates enough, anyway. But Her aroma…”

  I trailed off, letting my silence fill in the blanks.

  “What, uhm…” Lynnria took a shallow breath, eyes wide and cheeks just beginning to pink. “What is mine like?”

  I let a puff of air escape from my nose. Normally, I would have been reluctant to broach this subject—especially with her—but talking about it was helping me deal with the raging thirst that had seized my throat.

  “And how do you suppose I’m to know how many bloody letters the thing’s got?” Jax’s voice drifted through the momentary silence. “A silly-what?”

  Have fun with that, Mia.

  Rolling my eyes, I returned my attention to Lynnria. “Your flavor isn’t as strong as the others. Lesser Dolilim stuff, right? But I don’t know the actual reason. Maybe because your ability to feed isn’t as developed. Maybe it’s because you don’t like to have sex as often—”

  The flush crawling up her neck while I was speaking finally burst. “Only because you leave me an emotional wreck every time you touch me!” Suddenly remembering herself, she cast her eyes downward and mumbled, “…talk about too much of a good thing…”

  It was difficult not to smirk. “Well. I suppose I could tone it down a little. Anyway, your taste is… peppery? Kind of earthy with this vegetal… smokiness, I guess. I dunno. It’s subtle, but nice.”

  “It doesn’t sound very nice,” she said, pulling away slightly. “What does the Demon Queen taste like?”

  “Like getting kicked in the face by a mule,” I replied. “But in this horrible hypnotic way that makes you keep coming back for seconds.”

  Her frown turned into a brief but sympathetic grimace before she waggled her head and smiled. “So you’re saying you’d rather eat me out than a goddess?”

  I just looked at her. All day, every day, sweetheart.

  If only I could convince the rest of me to be so practical.

  Jax’s voice again rose just high enough to cut through our conversation.

  “And why not?” she asked, seeming insulted.

  “If it works how it normally should, I’d expect it’s because she’s your Servant,” Arx explained. “Her station isn’t high enough to warrant the Clan name.”

  “Says you. But what happens when I sends the poor lass on errands, huh? The shop keep is just gonna take some Clanless git’s word for it to put it all on our tab?”

  Nope. It’s her mess. Not getting involved.

  I turned back to Lynnria before I could get dragged in.

  “Ah, what am I grumbling about? You must have picked up on most of this already,” I muttered. “I mean… Hell, what do I taste like?”

  The question pulled her forward again. From her expression, you would have thought I had just asked a Trekkie which show had the best cast.

  “Like everything missing in my life,” she whispered fervently. “But it isn’t just one flavor. It’s different every day! Different needs. Different… different emotions. Like… Donum, have you ever wondered what a stolen childhood might taste like? Because I know. Isn’t that insane? It’s insane, right? A single drop on my tongue, and you might have thought I’d had all the hugs and affection I could ever have wanted growing up. When you finish in me, I can only…” Her face cracked into a smile even as tears sprang to her eyes. “I can only look on the endless dreams I’ve had these last years of restoring my birthright and… and laugh!”

  I sat back.

  Most other days, on hearing something like that, I might have put on my amateur psychoanalyst glasses and tried delving deeper into whether treating the obvious trauma she had just lain in my lap with my spunk was the best option for her during this fragile period of healing. Or I might have wondered whether the goddess was supposed to taste like that too, except it was so strong, I simply could not process it before it knocked me on my ass. Or at least brought Lynnria in for a hug. But my dick was almost painfully hard, and it had been since I had walked into this cave.

  I really needed to invest in some control over my unconscious bodily functions. It would be part of my dealing-with-goddess-bullshit skill suite.

  “Cool… cool. That sounds…” I jerked my head uncertainly, “I—I don’t know what that sounds like. Are you ready to draw those Runes on your chest, by any chance?”

  She scoffed. “Are you serious? I’ve only been practicing them every chance I get.”

  “Excellent. Take your shirt off. I’m about four pumps away from erupting over here.”

  That drew every eye in the room.

  “Dibs,” Xyn called—to uproarious disapproval from all corners, but Lynnria’s was the one whose voice cut through the din.

  “Are you out of your mind?!” She had paused in tugging her jersey over her head, and from her expression, she looked ready to rip the older lilim’s face off. “Dibs, nothing. Back off! This is for my—”

  “I know, dear heart. Be still,” Xyn assured her, moving to caress the girl’s cheek even as the scales fell away from her glorious curves. “I would never interfere with a ceremony of such sacred magnitude. I simply wanted to be a part of it. Perhaps by helping him…” she turned a gaze full of heavy promise on me, “…aim?”

  A shiver raced up and over my head. “Make that three pumps,” I grunted.

  “Oh. Uh…” Lynnria worked at her lip as her eyes danced between the two of us uncertainly. “I guess that would be okay… as long as you don’t touch any.”

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Agreed.” The lilim was behind me in an instant to work at my robe, but she was careful to keep both it and her hands deftly away to prevent any unnecessary stimulation. For which I was immensely grateful. The air in here was doing plenty enough already and any potential brush—against Xyn’s exposed skin, for example—was not a thing I was prepared to handle.

  “Here, now. Wait a scanty,” Jax began, even as the cloth was passing in front of my nose. “I were right in the middle of—”

  Oh, ‘snails! Is it really happening?” Arx asked over her. “I’ve been so excited for this. Lynnria! Aren’t you excited?!” She began rapidly clicking the tips of her claws together beneath her chin.

  “Would you shut up?! I’m trying to concentrate!” the girl snarled. She was already scratching at her bared chest with a feverish intensity.

  Lynnria had only ever allowed me the one glance at the milky expanse of nothingness that remained there, too ashamed of what her former Clan had done to remove that final barrier of intimacy between us. So I was eager to take in this vision of her before she was again changed by my continued influence—and at least this time, her own hand.

  Her chest was not at all broad, so the complete absence of fat made her seem disturbingly waifish and childlike. Almost boyish. I could actually see the corded muscle her years of training had wrought, working beneath the skin as her fingers moved to draw over them. That was not a thing I had ever expected to see on a woman for all that basic anatomy demanded it. But it did not diminish my feelings for her. If anything, it made me feel… protective. And oddly proud that I had been tasked to play this role for her.

  The Runes she was scratching into herself flashed once, signaling their readiness, and her claws rushed to her opposite hemisphere before they could dissipate.

  “Shoot,” she muttered. “If the first set was here, then… Am I in the right spot, Donum? I don’t want them uneven.”

  “A little higher,” Xyn called out, speaking for me, and I turned to notice the others crowding closer.

  “And to the left,” Arx added.

  “Like this?”

  “Yer other left!” Jax grumbled, gesturing.

  “Sorry, are we distracting you guys?” I asked. “I didn’t intend to make a big production out of this. Just give the woman a name, Jax. I don’t want to stay in here a second long than I have to.”

  She pulled a face. “Oh, Master! T’ain’t right, me crowding yer toes about like this. Bad enough, I be the one what brought her here, and now I’ve to name the cunt? What if she don’t like it?”

  “Jax,” I began.

  “She’ll like your breasts the best,” Xyn informed her from just above my ear. Her hand had already snaked down my front, not exactly touching me, but close enough that I could have sensed her without looking. My dick certainly had. “Over all of us. Even me.”

  The redhead jerked upright, suddenly extremely interested. “Really?”

  “Maybe. But they won’t be magical,” Lynnria said, grinning. Her hand fell away, and she looked up. “I’m ready, Donum!”

  No sooner had those words left her lips than Xyn seized me, both above and below, and I was inundated with the sensation of her exposed softness crushing into my back. But she did not otherwise move. Not yet.

  “Look at her, Gift,” she whispered with an ardent zeal. “Look at her presenting herself, ready to receive that which you will provide: the mark of your dominance over her. You. Not hers by birth or gender. You. All you.”

  “Xyn, that really isn’t—”

  Stroke.

  The wind left my lungs so suddenly you would have thought some malignant poltergeist had sucker-punched me in the gut.

  “She is eager. Desperate. Her lungs starve for want of you. See her trembling flesh. Her shining eyes. Know her dripping sex.”

  I had no air left with which to respond, but the way she hissed that word sent shivers racing through every inch of my body, like her voice had been dipped in molasses.

  Stroke.

  “Ugh!” Oh, Watcher’s eye!

  “Empty yourself. Empty yourself upon her. Watch as your power swells upon… and within,” she growled with the ecstasy of a villainess unleashing her master plan.

  Stroke.

  And unleash I did.

  The orgasm came like a dam bursting its mortar and so hard I almost felt as if I had been kicked in the balls. The stream shot in a frozen arrow across the intervening feet to spatter dead center upon Lynnria’s chest. Before I could blink, Xyn had lifted me, her immense strength carrying me forward so that the next and every pulse after fell exactly where it needed to. Lynnria accepted it all. Openly.

  Her eyes almost… worshipful.

  Then her Runes flared to life.

  The gently glistening liquid flowed across her chest, spiraling down, up, and around as into twin whirlpools. The few droplets that had splashed across her face or were trying to drip from her chin were abruptly tugged down and in, abandoning the world’s natural gravity for these new wells. And when it was done, when all traces of my sin had vanished, twin cones of pink sprang into place, seals upon the Life now contained within.

  Lynnria looked down at them in breathless shock for several moments, perhaps in disbelieve that it had actually worked. They were not big by any stretch. Just a couple of bee-stings, really. Even so, her arms curled around them as protectively as a mother over a once-stolen child, and a single, heart-wrenching sob escaped her lips.

  I had no idea what to say. What with Xyn holding me upright and my spent balls cradled in her hand, it seemed like an awkward moment to try for something reassuring. So I simply rested my palm over her head, only just brushing against her budding horns. She seemed to like that.

  “Wow!” Arx let out her breath in a rush, and popping the tension in the air like a balloon. “That was something, wasn’t it? Much more entertaining than that silly woman’s name.”

  “Fecking ‘ell,” Jax agreed.

  “Yes, Mistress!”

  We turned as one at the sound. Or rather, the Dolilim turned. I was dragged.

  “Your Servant hears and o… beys?”

  The former guardswoman was staring at us with a look that could not have been more stunned had we simultaneously pulled Tommy guns on her. And suddenly, the scene that had started out so poignantly erotic went from being simply awkward to one of the most profoundly embarrassing moments of my life.

  Which was when Lynnria oh-so-helpfully reminded us she was there.

  “I have breasts, Donum!” she shouted, her voice raw with unbridled emotion. “We did it!”

  And then she kissed my dick.

  My eyes closed.

  I think I’m gonna throw up.

  *

  “Your name is… Ell?” I intoned, standing over the woman.

  I had not meant to make my voice so imperious. Now re-clothed and surrounded by a small army of gorgeous women, I probably looked like a foreign emperor surveying the neighboring realms for potential conquest. So I might have been overcompensating just a touch in a forlorn effort to reclaim my stolen dignity.

  “Yes, your lordship!” the woman gasped fearfully. For some inexplicable reason, she did not seem capable of looking me in the eye, preferring to grovel at my feet every time I so much as glanced at her. “Or no, your lordship. I’m Fekinell… err, properly—so named by your most holy Servant. But you can call me Ell for short… if you’d like!” she added in a rush.

  Jax was squatted by my feet, almost curled into a fetal position with shame. “I be so… so sorry about this, Master.”

  I ignored Arx and Xyn cackling in the background to let out a very slow, very careful sigh. The musk in the room had not dissipated in the slightest after my… performance. If anything, it was getting thicker. I was positive that damned Mouth was getting off on all this, but I could at least rely on my refraction period to provide a few minutes of reprieve.

  Strangely, it was only now that she was awake that what few distorted memories I had of this woman were coming back to me. I now recognized her as one of the guards I had met on first entering Raialie. She had been introduced as a relative of the guy who owned the local sporting arena. Had that been the sum of my encounters with her, I could have been forgiven for not recalling her, but I had bumped into her a second time—when she had knelt and proclaimed me lord in front of a common room full of people. You would think I would have remembered at least that, but no. It was like she had been temporarily erased from existence.

  Dead to the world.

  “It’s alright, Jax. These things happen.” I directed a brief but concentrated glare at the ceiling.

  Thankfully, our resident noblewoman was showing considerably more grace in the face of the meltdown going on around me. Lynnria had been gently smoothing the fabric of her gameball jersey over her chest as if it were the finest of ballgowns—though I noted the pouches she usually kept on hand to stuff her bra had been moved to a spot on her belt. It might have made her chest seem smaller, but she was too proud to use them anymore. And too much of a Quester to simply discard such convenient storage containers.

  “Fekinell, you say? Curious. That does not seem to fit the pattern.”

  “Of course it does,” Mia piped up. “Five for those above. Three for those that serve. Such is the rule. Faen rarely need underlings of their own, but when they do, it is for a singular purpose. The creature is most often used and discarded once its task is complete, so a name is not required. But if they persist for longer than a few days—as this one evidently will—it is because they are meant to go amongst the kinds. Thus, they are given a name of three syllables, both to—”

  “Three… You mean like my name?” Lynnria squeaked. “Donum, you didn’t change my name too, did you?”

  Before I could deny it, Mia harrumphed with annoyance.

  “As I was saying… it is both to reflect their—giant sweating hoo-haas!” she took a quick breath before trying again, “—to reflect their nature and blend with the lawless ‘traditions’ of those below. That your name has three as well is just a happy coincidence. All of which I was attempting to explain, but certain amongst our company cannot even pronounce syllable… so here we are.”

  That seemed to satisfy Lynnria. But if this Ell had heard any of it, she did not let on. Instead, she had been using our collective inattention to ever-so-subtly creep toward Jax’s other side, almost like she was using her as a shield. From me.

  Not that she needed to try very hard to escape my notice, what with Jax’s wailing.

  “I be such a fool, Master! I deserve to be punished.”

  “I’m not spanking you, Jax.”

  Her crocodile tears dried up in an instant. “Aw! Please?”

  ‘Fekinell’ did not appear to have picked up on the overt revelation of her mistress’s kinks, either. “Do not weep, my mistress! Your humble servant will do whatever you ask. You can count on me!”

  Jax grunted, already annoyed with the groveling and miffed that her little ploy had not panned out. “Oh, stand up. No one likes a kiss arse.”

  “Yes, Mistress!”

  Fekinell hastened to her feet, though she kept her hands firmly clamped over her unmentionables and her eyes glued to the floor—all relatively normal behavior from what I could tell. For anyone other than a lilim.

  “And don’t ye be calling me Mistress, neither! There be only the one master here, and it ain’t… Look at me when I be talking to ye, ye bloody cunt!”

  “Yes…” Ell grimaced uncomfortably as her head came up, but she kept her chin at an odd angle. “Yes, Ma’am?”

  “Acceptable,” Jax agreed before giving her a quick once over. “Yer fit enough. Did nay let yer ownself get soft while guarding them city folk, I see. But what do ye be doing with yer neck? D’ja put a crick in it while ye was sleeping?”

  Before she could answer, Lynnria stepped up.

  “Do you think you’ll be punished for looking at nobility?” she intuited suddenly. Hands on hips, she peered up at the woman’s face before casting a glance my way. “I’ve seen servants whipped for that… in some houses.”

  Ell’s eyes flicked to her for the briefest of moments. “I’m sorry… young miss. It’s not that. Please don’t take offense, but my lord, he… he blinds me with his radiance.”

  Pardon?

  The swell of raucous caterwauling going on from behind was my only warning before Xyn collided with my back. The lilim slung an arm over my shoulder in what was evidently a vain attempt at catching her breath. “You see? Did I not tell you? Oh, Auntie! You’re killing me!”

  Lynnria ignored her. “He blinds you? Do you mean that literally? You cannot mean to say he is so attractive as that?”

  Fekinell’s head jerked up. From her face, you might have thought Lynnria had just called her out in front of the entire imperial court. “Att—? Young miss, please! Every one of you is as fair as the dew on winter grass. But his lordship? I wouldn’t dare! I am not so worthy to think such of him.”

  “She knows her place. I’ll give her that,” Jax grumbled, folding her arms. “Got a funny way of speeching, though.”

  I just grunted. She might have stretched her vowels a bit, but her accent did not seem so strange to me. Not compared to Jax’s, anyway.

  “Look… Ell, I’m no more a fan of this bowing and scraping business than I am attached to a bunch of fancy titles. You can just call me Donum if you want.” Not that I expected for a second that she would. “And I’m sorry if I’m so disturbing to look at. I hadn’t expected that would be a problem for quite a while yet; my Charisma isn’t that high,” I mumbled. Then winced. “It must have been quite a shock to wake up to the scene you did.”

  Her eyes widened with panic, and I could actually see her throat working to swallow. “Scene, my lord?” she rasped. “What scene?”

  Arx came around to my other side, her chuckles of amusement turning deep and sultry. “Oh, I like this one. So subservient. I could learn a thing or two from her.” She draped herself across my flank and purred into my ear, “Wouldn’t you agree… your lordship?”

  “Stop that,” I grumbled shortly, swatting her tail away from my backside, before returning my attention to the naked guard. Come on, refraction period. Hang in there. “Alright, whatever. I think the main thing we all want to know, Ell, is what Ahnbe did to you.”

  There was a beat of silence, but Fekinell did not look like she was trying to evade the question. She looked confused.

  “Ahnbe… my lord?”

  “The Shepherdess,” Lynnria filled in.

  “The Shepherdess?!” Ell squawked in horror, then hastily held three fingers aloft in a warding gesture. “Heavens forefend, young miss! Don’t you know better than to invite that one’s attention out in the wilds? You’ll bring doom on us all!”

  “Y’already done that, fool. Don’t ye remember? She were the one what brought ye here in the first place!”

  Fekinell turned to stare at Jax. “She… she brought me?” A nervous sort of giggle erupted from her throat before she could quash it. “Forgive me, Mis… Ma’am. I don’t mean to laugh. But surely you’re taking the piss? None of us would be here to tell about it if the Destroyer had been about.”

  Arx shrugged dismissively from my shoulder. “It helps that she has the hots for—”

  “Never mind that!” I interrupted quickly.

  We had not even decided what we were going to do with this woman yet. She was acting deferential enough, so I was sure she would go along with whatever we asked of her… if reluctantly. But if the events surrounding her capture had been so traumatizing that she had blocked them from her mind, I saw no reason to remind her of them. It seemed Ahnbe had been telling the truth; this woman saw no connection at all between herself and her maker. So there was even a chance we could release her back to her old life… depending on her answer to my question. I was not about to let her dodge it a second time, confusion or not.

  “Fekinell…” Ugh. I will never be able to take that name seriously. “What are you?”

  She actually tried to look at me for a moment. There was a lot of squinting involved.

  “Sire? I don’t understand. What are you asking?”

  “What kind are ye, ye mangled weapon?” Jax barked. “Do we need to spell it out?”

  “Mistress… Ma’am, I—I don’t… Please, don’t be angry with me.” Ell glanced from face to face, apparently hoping one of us would at least crack a smile to let her in on the joke. “Aren’t I laoi? Isn’t that obvious?”

  “Strange,” Arx muttered.

  “Very,” Lynnria agreed. “From what you told me, I would have thought…”

  “She don’t look no different.”

  However, Xyn was the first to notice my face… and the lips pulled way back over my teeth.

  “Master? What is it?”

  “Oh…” A nervous sort of warbling that only tangentially resembled a chuckle worked its way out of my throat. “Just dealing with a slight panic attack is all.”

  *

  She was a werewolf. She was definitely a werewolf. I knew in my bones.

  Or a were-something, anyway.

  Probably. It was difficult to be sure.

  But the pattern was there! Silver. No memory of the attack. No knowledge of what was going on. She was just a regular human! Laoi. Whatever.

  The point was, it would not be long before she would start waking up naked out in the woods somewhere next to a dead animal carcass and covered in blood. Potentially, our blood. I just had to hope Ahnbe had not been so careless as to let her own creation turn on us.

  However—I told myself firmly—there was still the very slight chance that I was mistaken. Something else could be going on. After all, Jax had taken quite a while to flower into the beautiful creature she was now. And Lynnria was still mid-transition. Neither of them had ever thought they were laoi, but who knew? Ahnbe’s methods might have been more mysterious than I had given her credit for.

  Either way, there was not a chance in hell I would be letting this woman out of my sight until I knew she would not be a danger to the populace. What I planned to do about it, should the worst come, was another question entirely.

  But Xhinn just might.

  And so it was that I had us all prepping for our dive into the large… woman… thing.

  The Demon Queen really needed to pursue therapy. This much nymphomania was just intolerable.

  Naturally, Fekinell—such a stupid name—protested mightily over the prospect of us returning to the Dungeon after only just escaping it, but Jax only had to drop the single hint of leaving her behind before the woman scurried to help. I had no idea yet how capable she might have been in her native form, seeing as she had been forced to hork her Core into the dirt, but she insisted on being there to protect her Lord and Mistress.

  Which brought us to the present moment, gathered in front of the Mouth’s fleshy entrance.

  “But Mistress—”

  Jax growled in warning.

  “—Ma’am, I’m sure I’d never have come so far from the village without me armor. We’re trained from the get not take it off in the wild. We even sleep in it. I just don’t understand what could have—”

  “I told ye what happened already,” Jax grumbled, interrupting her nattering. “Ye deaf and a tube both?”

  “Yes, but… but you can’t mean…” Ell whined a bit in lieu of finishing her sentence. “But what about me weapons? I don’t even have a spear!”

  “Ye did nay have weapons neither. She plopped ye here as ye were, naked as the day.” Jax turned to her. “Be ye complaining about the dress? That be it?”

  Fekinell’s hands dropped away from where she had been attempting to spread the flap over her front to cover more of her thighs. It had been a rush job, but Jax had managed to copy the design of her own dress fairly well using the bolt of green fabric we had been carrying around—minus the finer details, of course. She had needed to settle with cloth for the belt, and there were no extra boots, so Ell was every bit as barefoot as her Mistress. But where Jax made the garment look like a flirtatious party dress, Ell just looked awkward… and the unfortunate mismatch between the seafoam of her hair and the bright chartreuse of the fabric was not helping.

  The next time we arrived in civilization, I was going to invest in a set of nice black textiles. That went with everything.

  “Alright, everyone,” I called. “Make sure you have your stuff secured to your person. We don’t want to lose anything mid-transit. And if we wake up on the other side separated again, remember we can sense one another. If you can find something that looks like a central hub, wait there. The rest of us will find you eventually.”

  I glanced down at the little rabbit monster with regret, still waiting in its cage. I had wanted to get Mia enrobed before our dive, but there was simply no way I was about to attempt such a potentially volatile spell with that musk in the air. My poor manhood was already struggling to rise again, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to concentrate on anything beyond the constant onslaught of jiggling bodies.

  “Be sure to look after that thing, Xyn,” I said, nodding toward it. “We’ll want it after this. And—”

  Graaaawk!

  We all of us turned as a boulder the size of my head crashed through the entrance, leaving a sizable dent in one of the stalagmites before settling into a nearby puddle.

  “And be careful with those birds. I don’t want to have to find you a new body, too.”

  She folder her arms beneath her breasts dismissively. “Don’t worry, my Gift. I’ll be gentle.”

  I tried to dismiss the unease settling in my gut over her apparent lack of concern. Or maybe I was just bothered by having to leave her behind. I was going to miss her, that much I knew. Badly.

  “Stay safe,” I murmured before offering a chaste farewell kiss… which she instantly turned into something a lot more. If I had not been so overwrought, I might have let her, but the second her hand found my crotch, I was forced to wrestle myself away, panting.

  “You, too,” she called, her eyes alight with mischief. “I already long for your… return.”

  Yeah. My return. Sure.

  Clearing my throat, I stumbled my way over to the Mouth. It was kind of strange to see such a thing from so close. And magnified beyond my wildest imagination. Besides the overwhelming scent, the heat pouring off of it was intense. It was like getting blasted in the face with a freshly opened oven. And being compelled to dive in.

  Breath kept shallow, I raised a hand to touch it but hesitated a moment. It could have been my imagination, but I almost thought I had detected the great orifice tensing with anticipation. This was the only Mouth I had ever encountered that needed to be coaxed open, so the possibility we were wrong in that assumption—and thus in store for a sudden burst of violence—weighed heavily on my mind. But when nothing else happened, I decided I was being silly. Violence or not, we would end up in the same place.

  Yet when I extended my hand, when I rested my palm upon that smooth expanse of skin just to one side of its folds…

  It was… deliciously soft. A sensation so exquisite it was difficult even to describe. It was like finding that perfect, freshly laundered bath towel, wallowing in the finest of silken sheets. Pleasure rocketed up my body in waves. I wanted to rub my face against it, to wrap myself in its embrace. But I held off. Just. My cock already throbbing with need, I pressed my own pleasure back out again, reflecting it into the great maidenhead before me. Yet this was no war. No battle of wills. Our pleasures compounded against one another, magnifying until neither of us could stand it.

  As the giant lips swelled their welcome, I called over my shoulder, “Hurry! I don’t think I can hold this for long!”

  “Aye, Master!” Jax took a deep breath and, without an ounce of hesitation, dove through.

  Fekinell was not a heartbeat behind. “Mistress! Wait for me!”

  And with a plop, she was gone as well.

  Arx followed at a more sedate pace and casually swatted my backside on her way past. “Don’t tarry long, Dearest. Your new girlfriend here isn’t the only one you’re making… wet.”

  She was gone before I could think of a clever comeback, leaving only Lynnria. And Xyn of course.

  “She’s right, you know,” the lilim mused. “It’s positively soaked. It’d be a shame to let it go to waste.”

  Lynnria frowned at her. “Waste? What are you—”

  But before she could finish, Xyn had jerked the lesser Dolilim’s jersey up and over her head, rendering her bare to the chest.

  “Hey!” Lynnria’s hands flailed wildly, blinded. “What do you think you’re doing?!”

  “Just giving you a helping hand, dear,” Xyn replied, then almost casually hoisted the girl up by her waistband and hurled her, screaming, through the entrance.

  “Xyn?! What the fuck was that?”

  “You’ll see.”

  And with that, she delivered a gentle shove to my back as well. The next thing I knew, the entirety of my being was inundated with a sensation I could only describe as complete and utter orgasmic fire. At least, for a single microsecond.

  Then I blacked out.

  *

  Xyn dusted her hands with satisfaction.

  “That’s that. I’ll see you soon, my darlings. Now, then…”

  Turning, she spied the little rabbit creature, and gave it a long, considering look.

  “Mmm… no. I think not.”

  Humming tunelessly, she sauntered over to it, bent at the waist, and hooked a claw beneath the latch of its cage door, springing it open. The fluffy monster surged into action in an instant, going for her throat, by Xyn was quick to catch its slavering jaws on one of her scale-encased wrists.

  “Foolish creature. You really should have run.” Taking it by the scruff of the neck, she tossed the black-furred not-quite bunny over one shoulder, where it sailed straight into the void of the waiting Mouth. “Oh, well. I’m sure you’ll have fun playing with the others.”

  Tapping her claws thoughtfully against her opposite elbow, she considered the cave exit and the flock of Mina birds still pecking at it for a moment and sighed. But before she so much as took a step toward it, she glanced back at the gaping Mouth.

  “Well? What are you waiting for? You know the rules.”

  The great orifice shuddered in response, then seemed to melt in on itself until it was nothing but a giant, formless, yet still flesh-colored blob. And gradually, it began to ooze through some hidden crack in the wall, where it drained away until there was nothing left of the once-feminine canal. Within minutes, the cave was empty, save the moss, the few ferns, and a certain increasingly dispirited lilim.

  “I hate this already,” she muttered.

  Yet still, she did not engage with the birds. She simply stood there. Several minutes passed like that. Her, unmoving. Quiet as a mouse. Barely so much as breathing.

  But then one of her pointed, demonic ears twitched.

  And deliberately, her head tilted to one side. When nothing else happened, her neck twisted first one way and then the other while her eye scanned about, as though searching for some unseen assailant. Or a cat intent upon the crack of a door.

  “Are you… watching me, my Gift?” she called into the empty air.

  There was no reply. Yet she grinned.

  “Can you hear me?” Her mouth opened, and her tongue flicked between her fangs as though attempting to trace her target through the flavor it had impressed upon the wind. “Can you see? Can you… feel?”

  Her fingers ran up the sides of her hips, taking in the sensation of the bumps and ridges of her blackened scales until they had found her breasts. She gasped with delight, waiting.

  Still, nothing happened, and a look of disappointment crossed her features.

  “Perhaps it is too early for that. Perhaps you do not yet realize what you are doing.”

  Her grin returned. Then one hand came up, her finger dragging along the side of her face until it had snagged under the strap holding her patch in place. And with a tug, it fell away—revealing her mismatched eye.

  Nothing happened then, either. Her blonde hair did not grow into midnight. Her breasts did not swell. She was the same as she ever had been.

  “I can hear you, though…” she sang in a whisper, “scratching away at your little book.”

  She tucked her bottom lip between her teeth, overjoyed, yet even now considering her next move.

  “Well, then! In that case,” metallic wings snapped into place at her back and she called out, “Watch me, my master! My love! Watch as I destroy those who would hunt you. Watch as I build our house until it is one deserving of its lord!”

  And with a snap of her wings, she shot toward the light above.