Chapter Twenty-Two

LEVERIA

The previous night had been a sleepless one. I’d sat in my office, drinking wine and contemplating the mirror before me. Its twin was hanging over Elena Straltaira. She was awake, staring up at herself, a thin rectangle of moonlight shining on her face. Though her jaw was swollen, her eyes were bloodshot, and her face was filmed with dried sweat and smeared blood, she shown like an angel to me in her lunar aura.

“What the fuck is wrong with me?” She asked herself. I’d been asking myself the same thing. Father had come by again. He’d rapped on my door and pleaded gently for me to let him in, and once again, I didn’t answer. I’d just sat there, testing my reattached tongue against the back of my teeth, watching the mirror. I wasn’t looking at Elena anymore, but staring through her visage to see my reflection. I’d always been honest with myself.

“You don’t love him anymore.” I whispered to my reflection. With all the dispassion of a mortician, I dissected my relationship with my father. Not once had I given an inch to him. I learned from him, adored him as a mentor and a man, and took his ill-begotten son into my womb, but he’d been right about me all those years ago: power was my true love, and he had no more to give me. I heard him shuffle away, and I detested him for it. He was just so… weak.

“Not like you.” I whispered, touching Elena’s face on the glass, “Even as I steal everything from you, I can take nothing.” I planted a kiss on the glass, leaving a print on her face, “But when you’re inside me, I give you everything, and I give it all so willingly.” My voice was so hushed it was barely audible, “It terrifies me. It thrills me. And I know you feel it too, Elena.” I slid my hand between my legs, leaned back in the chair, and watched her until the sun rose.

“…the list reads thusly: assassination of diplomats, slaughter of civilians, and scorched-earth destructions of settlements.” The Lowland diplomat, Fran Wentz, read aloud before the Noble Court. “Good King Dreus has recognized Alkandra, and indeed, Alkandra’s claim to the Midlands-”

“The entire Midlands, my lord?” I asked tiredly. It was too early in the morning for this shit.

“The Great Forest and the Tundra, yes.” The speckled man looked up from his scroll, “The Highland kingdom cannot claim vassalage over territory it cannot tax.”

“And has the self-proclaimed ‘Dark Queen’ levied taxes on her citizens?” Lord Ternias broached.

“What the good Queen Alkandi does within her borders is not my concern.” Ambassador Wentz retorted.

“But do her own citizens even recognize themselves as her citizens?” Ternias pressed. It was good to have him on my side. When it came to international statecraft, all civil strife was put on hold for the good of the kingdom.

“It is our understanding that Queen Alkandi is beloved by her citizens.” Ambassador Wentz replied.

“And I have it on good authority that the council of the Ten has rejected Queen Alkandi’s claim outright.” Ternias said.

“And what authority is that, Lord Ternias?” I asked with a raised brow.

“Good authority.” Ternias smirked back.

“Since I cannot corroborate your story, I cannot consider it at this time.” Ambassador Wentz said sharply, “My concern as of now -the King’s concern as of now-, is the terroristic warfare being waged upon a sovereign state. News that the esteemed Prestira Rasloraca was murdered in cold blood-”

“We deny any part of that.” I interrupted curtly, “My sources claim that dawn-elves carried out the assassination at the behest of the nymphs.”

“Is that so?” Ambassador Wentz said wryly.

“If you have evidence to the contrary, please Ambassador, share it with us so that we may revise our investigation.”

“Investigation!” Ambassador Wentz barked, “Queen Tiadoa, my king will not lend credence to an investigation conducted by the accused.”

“And why has the good King Dreus decided to take the word of a rebellious territory over that of an honored and longstanding partner?” I asked.

“The Lowlands formally recognizes the Alkandran nation as-”

“But we do not, Ambassador.” I said coolly, “And even so, such recognition does not give reason for this flagrant disregard for our official statements. Have we been anything but honest with the Lowlands?”

“Do you deny that the Protaki compound at the Bend and the Terdini village at the Gorge have been levelled?” Ambassador Wentz asked.

“It’s my understanding that the Protaki and the Terdini have left their abodes and burned the steadings themselves.”

“Indeed.” Ambassador Wentz gave me a frank look, “And do you deny attacking the tribes of the Pines and targeting noncombatants?”

“I do not deny quelling rebellious sects in my kingdom’s territory. When a province rebels, there are no such things as noncombatants.”

“That’s your policy?”

“It has always been.” I inclined my head, “As it is with your nation, Ambassador. Now, you’ve raised three concerns before this noblest of courts, and we’ve addressed all three to the best of our ability. Is there more you wish to discuss, or shall we adjourn?”

“There is one more thing, Your Highness.” The ambassador cleared his throat, “Two days ago, a Sea Serpent man-o-war was intercepted on route to the Ardeni docks. All souls on board were women who claimed to have been captured for slavery by the pirates. They claimed that Queen Alkandi rescued them from the infamous pirate captain, Timothy Two-Shot.”

“And we formally thank the despot Yavara Alkandi for rescuing the captives.” I said with a wave of my hand.

Ambassador Wentz twisted his lips. “One of the women claimed that Prestira Rasloraca had been a captive aboard the ship.”

“Then I believe you should look for her killer amongst the Sea Serpents.” Ternias interjected.

“Indeed, my lord.” Ambassador Wentz replied, “And when we searched Timothy Two-Shot’s manifest, we found a journal detailing transactions between the Bank of Bentius and himself.”

“Our bank notes are legal tender all over Tenvalia, Ambassador.” I answered.

Ambassador Wentz cleared his throat once more. “We also found detailed notes pertaining to a meeting with you, Your Highness.”

“Me?” I said with an amused smile, “I wonder who would benefit the most from the discovery of these… notes. These are forgeries created by our enemy.”

“We also found a witness in the cargo hold.” Ambassador Wentz said, “One Big Bill, the first mate of Timothy Two-Shot. Under interrogation, he confessed that Timothy Two-Shot had direct business dealings with the first diplomat of Bentius, now monarch of the Highlands, Queen Leveria Tiadoa.”

There was a murmur around the court. I silenced it with a slight elevation of my hand.

“And now you’re taking the word of a pirate over mine?” I sighed, “Ambassador, misinformation is a weapon of war.”

“A potent one indeed, Your Highness.” Ambassador Wentz wrapped his knuckles on his dais, “Given the exorbitant amount of misinformation levied against you, I’ve been instructed by my factor in Ardeni to freeze silver exports coming into the Highlands.”

The murmurs around the court turned to low grumbles, the eyes of the nobles looking to each other, then to me. This… this was unexpected. I cleared my throat. “You are sanctioning the Highlands?”

Ambassador Wentz shuffled his papers. “Until we have a clear picture of what’s going on here, Your Highness, we can do nothing but assume and prepare for the worst. Prestira Rasloraca was not only Alkandra’s ambassador to the Lowlands, but a beloved citizen and personal friend of the king. Your blatant disregard for diplomacy is… well, it’s wholly disappointing.” He narrowed his eyes at me, “The Highlands used to have a stateswoman who was quite fond of the elegance of statecraft.”

“What can we do to regain the trust of our friends in Ardeni?” Ternias said, looking disgustedly at me as he addressed the diplomat.

“Diplomacy, my lord.” Wentz said, standing up, “My king will not consider lifting sanctions until the Highlands show a concerted effort to find peace. The streets of Ardeni Dreus are filled with the criers of Alkandra sympathizers, and every day they bring fresh news of Highland atrocities to our citizens. If armies clash, I fear we might face a domestic crisis. Then, who knows what steps we’ll have to take.” Wentz turned on his heel, and addressed the court, “War is a failure, ladies and gentlemen of the court, not an opportunity.” Then he left.

The shuffle of chairs and the grumble of discontent sounded from the nobles as they made their way out of the court. Lord Ternias rested on his dais, drumming his fingers as he watched me. Behind him, Lord Xantian was furiously rifling through a stack of papers, a host of stewards snatching letters from him and sprinting out the door. The Highland silver mines had run out generations ago, and Xantian’s family had made their fortune acting as intermediaries between the Lowlands and the dwarves of the Bearded Peaks. He had been a staunch ally of the throne ever since I’d promised him access to Tundra mines, but his allegiance was only as strong as his checkbook.

I turned to Eric. “Darling, make sure to invite Lord Xantian to dinner tomorrow. See if you can smooth things over with him. Tell him… tell him the crown is open to subsidizing his losses.”

“It’s his contracts he’s worried about.” Eric replied, “If he defaults, the dwarves will look elsewhere.”

“Thank you for your insight.” I smiled, patting Eric’s hand, “Now please, if you don’t mind…” I gestured toward Lord Xantian, and my loyal dog of a husband went trotting away. I turned to Ternias, who was waiting expectantly at his dais. I got up, opened the door behind my throne, and gestured for him to follow.

“The Sea Serpents?!” He hissed when we were alone, “I knew you liked to get your fingers dirty, but I didn’t think you’d go that low!”

“They’re contractors, not employees.”

“They’re pirates!” Ternias growled, “And Timothy Two-Shot was persona non grata in the Lowlands for over a decade! What were you thinking?!”

“I was thinking that if I killed my bitch of a sister before she got to the Pines, then I wouldn’t have to deal with this shit!” I snarled at him, gesturing to the door that led to the Noble Court, “Since I couldn’t rightly send a Highland frigate into Lowland seas to kill a recognized sovereign, I got a little creative!”

“Oh, Good Mother!” Ternias sighed, rubbing his temples, “You know this is just the beginning; King Dreus has tipped his hand.”

“Yes, he has.” I muttered, looking at the map of Tenvalia. The Bearded Peaks backboned the continent along the western seaboard, starting at the latitudinal line that bisected the Highland kingdom, and ending in the Tropics at the southernmost point of the landmass. Trade between the Lowlands and the dwarves always had to go through the Highlands, for though the Bearded peaks and the Lowlands nearly bordered each other at the Tropics, everything south of the Maples was impassible. The marshlands of the Willows couldn’t hold a highway, the Palms were unconquerable, and the mountains bordering the Tropics themselves were too steep to pave. That meant any caravanner would have to travel along the old imperial paths in the Maples, Spruces or Pines; those parts of the Great Forest that bordered the Highlands directly. If there was one part of the Great Forest the Highland kingdom could actually claim, it was those paths. They were the lifeblood of trade, for any Lowland merchant who dared brave the Southern Sea would fall prey to the pirates that called the Tropics home. Pirates like the Sea Serpents, which was why my consorting with them was such a diplomatic catastrophe. I thought my word would carry me through any accusation made by my sister, but I’d underestimated King Albert Dreus’s gall. He hadn’t propped up Yavara to gain unfettered access to Alkandran silver, nor because of the beast population in his capital city; he was propping up Yavara to steal the Midlands from me without even having to draw a sword.

“That clever cocksucker.” I whispered.

Ternias looked at a tapestry depicting the crest of each noble house. “It’s silver now.” He said, pointing at Xantian’s crest, “Cotton next?” He pointed to the Feltian crest, “Maybe diamonds?” He pointed to Feractian’s symbol, “Or will it be cattle?” He pointed to Huntiata’s crest, “Or maybe… maybe even whale oil.” He rested his finger on the Tiadoa crest, and looked to me. “Your Highness, if we do not crush this rebellion soon, Dreus will think us weak enough to pick apart. He will cut our economic lines one by one until we make peace with the Dark Queen. Do I need to say that that would be the end of your reign?”

“No. I’m very aware.” I growled, drawing my eyes across the map, “He was going to do this no matter what, Ternias, he just needed an excuse.”

“You didn’t need to gift him one.”

“Risks have to be taken!” I snapped, “Are there balls in that sack between your legs, or do you use it as a purse?!”

Ternias stared implacably back at me, the corner of his mouth curling in a sneer. “Don’t concern yourself with the wealth between my legs, Your Highness. The Tiadoa family jewels take up so much of your attention already.”

Of course, he knew. But it wasn’t what he knew, but what he could prove. “Careful, Lucas.” I smiled sweetly at him, “Misinformation is a dangerous weapon.”

“The most dangerous, Leveria.” Ternias smiled back.

I glanced at the map, taking one breath, then another. I let them both out through my nose, and felt the anxiety ebb from me. “Ok. Well, I’m left with only one option then.”

“What?”

“I recognize Yavara’s sovereignty.”

“You can’t!” Ternias yelled, shocked.

“Why not?” I smiled over my shoulder.

“The Noble Court-”

“The Noble court will fall in line, because you will make sure that they do, Lord Ternias.” I said softly, “Am I not your queen? Have I not given you an order?”

“I can’t do the impossible.”

I looked at the tapestry of crests. “King Dreus is betting that our greed will divide us. It is a safe bet. But he’s also betting that I won’t risk evoking the ire of the Noble Court, and that is where he erred. He thought he put me in an impossible quagmire; unable to capitulate to his ultimatum, and so unable to contest the increasing tariffs he imposes. Well, I’ll call his bet, and see his bluff. Our emissary will nail our proclamation of sovereign recognition to his court’s door, and we’ll see if his merchant governors are willing to keep playing along with him then.”

“It’s not just the Noble Court.” Ternias said, “What will we tell the people?! That you recognize your sister as the rightful ruler of the Midlands? Do you want a real rebellion, Your Highness?”

“The people?” I giggled at Ternias, and pinched his cheek. “My lord, the people will love me for this.”

“What?”

“In one breath, I’ll recognize the kingdom of Alkandra.” I rolled my eyes to him, “And in the next, I will declare war on it.”

Ternias opened his mouth, then closed it. He nodded. “But then we run the risk of Dreus doubling-down on his tariffs. Instead of escalating things gradually, he might call us bad-actors, and impose all the tariffs at once.”

“I have a feeling that we won’t be considered the bad-actors for long.” I chuckled.

Ternias looked quizzically at me. “What have you done?”

“Every fire needs a spark to start.” I smiled innocently, “I just gave Yavara a box of matches.”

He chewed on his lip, his calculating eyes scanning me, the map, then the tapestry of houses. “So, you’ve goaded her into attacking us. That’s wonderful and all, but you still have one problem.”

“What?”

“You can’t claim to recognize Alkandra’s sovereignty if you don’t have an Alkandran diplomat. Wentz will call foul, wave away any attack as a desperate nation lashing out, and level his sanctions anyway.” Ternias dropped his eyes on me, “Do you have an Alkandran national lying around, one that Wentz won’t immediately decry as your hof?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. Lydia Straltaira had been busy, as I expected her to be. “Why, did you hear something, my lord?”

He smiled. “Just rumors, I’m sure.”

BROCK

Zander and I stopped in the shadow of Castle Alkandra. The great hall had already been rebuilt, and the ramparts and towers were close to being done. Massive trolls imported from Ardeni Dreus lifted tons of stone on their backs and stacked the walls high in a matter of hours, and goblin masons quickly chiseled to rockwork into flush corners. The trolls that weren’t working in the quarry were working in the mines, unloading mountains of raw silver onto Lowland cargo vessels. Titus stood in his black robe, shouting directions behind his mask. Zander walked over to him, but I had no compunction to follow.

“I heard there was bad news.” Trenok said, stepping up to me and wiping his brow. He had a chisel in one hand, and stone dust all over his chest.

“You heard correctly.” I grunted. He looked at me for a bit, his muscles tensing slightly. I raised an eyebrow and nonchalantly pivoted my heel into the dirt. Trenok acknowledged my offensive stance and gave me a grin, then offered his hand. I shook it, trying to hide my relief. “Where’s Jefrok?” I asked.

“Digging the moat; why do you need him?”

“We’re going to the Maples, and we don’t have time to marshal the entire brigade and march for three days, so I’m just taking ten of my best to go with me through a portal.”

“That’s it? Didn’t Zander say he could fit around seventy before it collapsed?”

“I guess we’re getting help.” I shrugged.

Trenok eyed me. “What’s the play?”

“The tribe leaders meet with the centaurs in this spot below the Spearhead Mountains. Zander says he knows how to get them all together. After that, it’s up to us to convince them.”

“That’s… one hell of a longshot.”

“Yeah, well.” I grunted, cracking my neck, “That’s where we’re at.”

After giving my people a terse greeting, me and my ten best went to where Zander’s portal was concealed. The man himself was waiting there with over two-score vampires at his back.

“I convinced Titus to lend you coin and some of his children.” Zander said, “You’ll need them for what you’re about to do.”

“And what’s that?” I asked.

“There are fifty-three minor clan leaders in the Maples,” Zander said, “and we don’t have the time to convince them.”

“Where is the honor in that?!” I growled, “Assassination is a tool of weak leaders! The clans would never follow me!”

“They will.” Zander said coldly, “When they see your symbol carved into their chieftain’s chests, they’ll know their brand of strength has expired. We don’t have time to earn respect anymore; we’ll take fear instead.”

“Tyrants are rewarded as they have ruled. You’re condemning me to a short life of looking over my shoulder.”

Zander stepped toward me, “Are you saying ‘no’ to me, Brock?” He levelled his staff. “Because if you don’t have the stomach for it, I will throw Yavara’s support behind one of the Ten, and add your clan as a prize.”

“Watch it, old man.”

“Test me, orc.”

I stared down at the wizard, and saw no bluff in his eyes. With Prestira gone, everyone but Yavara was rapidly becoming expendable to him. I gave him a cold look back, and walked through the portal.

ELENA

I wasn’t on my board anymore. I wasn’t even in my cell. Sir Piss and Shit had cut the binds on my wrists, and carried me from the catacombs, to the tower. I tried to summon the will to fight him, but my limbs were locked from two days of bondage, and my muscles were wasted with spent adrenaline and fatigue. So I just insulted his children all the way up. My new cell wasn’t even a cell; it was the guest room, reserved for Castle Thorum’s most distinguished visitors. I was gently place into a steaming tub, and I couldn’t help it; I purred like an indulgent kitten, and melted into the hot water. I didn’t even notice Sir Piss and Shit cuff my wrists to the tub’s sides, nor did I care. I only noticed the feeling of my body turning to butter beneath my flesh. I didn’t even notice when she came in.

Leveria squeezed the sponge, sounding the soft dribble of water as the suds foamed from the pores. She hummed quietly to herself as she gently blotted my skin from my neck to my breasts, and down my torso. She stopped just short of my cock then looked at me, and ran her reattached tongue over her lips. I just stared back at her, wondering what new torment she was concocting. She spread my cheeks and washed my nethers, taking a moment to tease me with her fingers beneath the water. I sighed, and let my head rest on the lip of the tub. It didn’t matter what Leveria was planning. I tongued the capsule in my socket, and felt a blissful smile cross my face; I was free. And if I was being honest, it did feel good to be doted upon. My eyes wandered across the room, where a very uncomfortable-looking Headmaster Glendian was standing audience.

“How do you think we should do your hair today?” Leveria asked, moving behind me.

“Just let it flow.” I murmured.

Leveria undid my braided pony tail and began to wet my hair. When she was done, she poured a dollop of shampoo onto my crown, and gingerly went to work. Her fingers massaged my scalp as she lathered, the soap foaming between her knuckles. Then she gently rinsed the suds, taking care not to get soap in my eye.

“Glendian,” Leveria said, “please give Mrs. Straltaira her toes back.”

I glanced up at Leveria. She was biting on a smile, apparently quite pleased with herself. I kept my tongue pressed against the capsule as Glendian approached me with a velvet pouch. He upturned the pouch, and out plopped my two toes. Carefully, he lined up my severed pinky with the weeping stump it had come from, and muttered a spell. I felt a sudden release of pressure, and I had to bite my cheeks to keep from moaning. All the blood that had clotted in the foot drained away, the inflammation subsiding as the appendage righted itself. I flexed my pinky toe, marveling at how much I’d missed it. Glendian performed the same magic on my other toe, and I submerged myself to the eyes beneath the water, bubbling the moan.

“Well?” Leveria asked, her voice baring a forced upward inflection. I narrowed my eyes at her, wondering at her game. She shifted uneasily. “Does it feel right?” She asked.

“It feels like a toe.” I replied plainly.

“That’s good,” Leveria said, smiling awkwardly, “that’s… exactly how it should feel.”

“Yeah…” I responded, letting the word die slowly.

Leveria opened her mouth, then closed it. She paced around my tub as I soaked, occasionally checking the water temperature with her fingers, sometimes stealing rapid glances at me. I tried to ignore her, but it was futile. I could practically smell her impatience.

“What?!” I growled.

“I’m just waiting for you to be done.” Leveria smiled sweetly, “Don’t mind me.”

Well, that was going to be impossible. “I’m done.” I grumbled.

“Great. Glendian, please prepare our guest.”

With a wave of his hand, the wizard lifted me from the tub, dried me off, and adorned me with a plush bathrobe. I was gently placed into a chair, and cuffed to it at the wrists and ankles.

“Those can be looser.” Leveria said, beckoning to the shackles around my wrists.

Glendian looked up at Leveria with a weary expression. “I feel obliged to tell you that this much slack is more than enough to strangle you with if the prisoner were so inclined.”

“Looser, Glendian.” Leveria said. He sighed and allowed two feet of slack on each chain, giving me an absurd amount of arm mobility.

“Thank you Glendian,” Leveria said, “that will be all.”

The wizard left the room, and Leveria sat in the chair across from me. She wore an ornate dress that covered her to the chin, something that seemed wholly too conservative for her. She’d been at court today, it seemed. She put some pastries on the table and beckoned me to eat. I was too famished to deny the offer, and Leveria watched me with a studious expression as I devoured the food. When I finished, I looked up at her for an indication of what was next, but she just sat and smiled.

“So…” I said, “should I pick a new body part, or…”

“Why didn’t you kill yourself?” Leveria asked.

“Huh?” I asked stupidly.

“The pill April gave to you,” Leveria said, “you put it in your mouth, but you didn’t swallow it.”

I looked at her for a moment, then came to the realization. “The mirror,” I said, leaning back, “It wasn’t just for my viewing pleasure.”

“No,” Leveria grinned, “it was for mine.”

“I suppose I don’t have to wonder at the fate of poor April.”

“A kitsune is hardly a threat,” Leveria waved irreverently, “and Adarian’s escapades aren’t a concern unless they interfere with his work. It’s funny; he never covers his mirror after he’s done using it. A simple enchantment can keep the line open on one end while the observing party appears to be gone. Just yesterday, he was getting a blowjob from April while he talked to me. The entire time it was happening, he was so worried that I’d catch on.”

“You’re quite a voyeuristic little queen, aren’t you?”

“I like to observe people when they think they’re alone. You get a true sense of who they are.”

“Everyone picks their nose and farts, and you’re not getting a glimpse into anyone’s soul by watching them masturbate.”

Leveria tittered in that disquietingly-childish way. “Perhaps not, but I believe I get quite a candid look when they’re contemplating suicide. Now you still haven’t told me: why are you still alive?”

I eased back in the chair. “You haven’t given me a good enough reason to end it just yet. Now tell me what the fuck you’re doing with all this pageantry.”

Leveria cleared her throat, then pulled out a cigarette. Lighting it, she took one shallow breath, then a deep one, and let them both out in a cloud of smoke. “The Lowlands sanctioned me today.”

“About time.”

“Did you know they would do that?” Leveria raised her brow, “Perhaps I should’ve actually questioned you instead of just skipping right to torture.”

“I intuited King Dreus’s intentions. He could’ve easily placated Yavara, then sold her to you the moment he could wash his hands of the crime. If he wanted Alkandran silver that badly, he would’ve just contracted an orc tribe to mine it for him, but the Lowlands is rich with silver. The Highlands, however, is devoid of it, as are the Bearded Peaks. He wants unrestricted trade with the dwarves.”

Leveria leaned in. “And what do you think his next move would be?”

I inclined my head thoughtfully. “Ramp up sanctions to slow your military progress and sow dissent in the Noble Court, buying Yavara time to organize a force large enough that you couldn’t win the war in one decisive battle. Then once the armies become entrenched, apply more pressure until you’re forced to the negotiating table.”

Leveria smiled broadly. “You have a talent for this, Elena.”

“It was always easy for me to see people for what they are. Using that information was my pitfall.”

“Using people, you mean.” Leveria said, sucking on her cigarette.

“I guess I don’t see them as tools.”

“That’s an interesting proclamation from a slaver.”

“Accidental slaver, and I couldn’t get rid of them if I tried. Kind of like you, actually. You don’t take a hint, do you?”

“Biting off my tongue wasn’t you playing hard to get?” Leveria laughed, “I’m sorry, Elena, but I’m terrible at courtship.”

“That’s what happens your only practice is fucking your dad.”

Leveria smiled without even flinching. “Your only practice was fucking your hand until two weeks ago.”

“Two weeks is a long time in Yavara’s court. I’ve done things you can’t even imagine.”

“I have a very active imagination, Elena.” Leveria smiled around her cigarette. She blew out a ring of smoke, and watched me through it, “Tell me,” she said softly, “how does my little sister like to get fucked?”

I leaned into the smoke ring, and let it wash over my face. “Right up her little asshole.” I whispered back.

“Does she?” Leveria raised a brow, “She always was an adventurous one.”

“Adventurous.” I chuckled, “That’s an interesting word for her. Do you know how I found her? She was in Prestira’s bar disguised as a human girl. She stood up on the bar, and told everyone there they could have a turn with her. Humans, orcs, goblins, dwarves, men and women in all varieties and combinations; she fucked every patron in that bar from dawn to dusk.”

Leveria put her elbows on the table. “And you just sat there and watched it happen? You called me a voyeur.”

“She put on quite a show.” I smiled in recollection, “I was horrified at the time. I didn’t understand her.” I rolled my eyes to Leveria, “Now I understand her perfectly.”

Leveria leaned in. “How did she change you?”

I leaned closer. “She sucked my clit until it grew down her neck, then she raped me until I loved her.”

Leveria’s sapphire eyes sparkled. “That’s what she really likes, isn’t it? The transformation, the corruption. I understand it; it’s what I like too. We just go about it… differently.”

I snorted. “You can’t compare yourself to her.”

Leveria’s lips opened to show her teeth. “I suspect we’re a lot more alike than you want to admit. We are sisters, after all.”

“You’re not even the same species anymore.”

“No,” Leveria’s face was so close I could feel her breath, “your kind is very special, isn’t it? You don’t know how far you’ll go until you’re already there.” Then I could taste her breath when she whispered, “It’s why you came so hard for me after I mutilated you. You were made for the obscene.”

“I wasn’t the one so cum-drunk that I stuck my tongue in the enemy’s mouth.”

Leveria smiled impishly at me. “You kissed me back. For those first few seconds, you didn’t care who I was or what I’d done to you; you only cared about how I made you feel. Don’t pretend otherwise.”

My tongue was wet in my mouth, my heart was drumming in my throat, and with a tremulous breath, I whispered, “Leveria.”

“What?” She whispered back, her eyes lidded expectantly.

I leaned in until our noses were nearly touching. “You should have listened to Glendian.”

In one motion, my hands shot from the chair, grabbed Leveria’s head, and hauled her across the table. I muted her with a pressing forearm, dragged her into my lap, and began methodically wrapping my chains around her throat. As she squealed and sputtered, I felt myself getting hard as a rock. She was right about me, of course. Now she knew for certain at the end of her life.

BROCK

I stepped through the portal and into the heart of the Maples. The jagged snow-capped peaks of the Spearhead Mountains towered over us, and the perpetual autumn colors of the maples painted a forest of deciduous flame. I took a moment to breathe the sweet air that the syrup trees yielded before the vampires came in behind me.

“What’s the plan?” Jefrok asked.

“We’ll position ourselves at the Broken Pass,” I said, pointing to a canyon that cut through the Spearheads, “That is where the clans here meet with the centaurs to trade. There’s an ancient citadel deep in the canyon that the tribes use as a meeting place in time of strife.”

“Why are we going there?”

“To negotiate with the centaurs.”

“We’re not here for the centaurs, Brock.” Jefrok said, “We’re here for the tribes.”

“No, that’s why they’re here,” I said pointing to the vampires, “and when they do their deed, five-thousand orcs will descend upon the Broken Pass to find out what the fuck just happened.”

“And there they’ll see Brock Terdini, the man whose symbol was just carved into the chests of their dead leaders.”

“Which is why we’ll need back up.” I mused, assessing the landscape, “Because they are going to be fucking pissed.”

“Brock,” Jefrok said, clapping a hand on my shoulder, “I’ve followed you through some stupid missions, but this one, this one is fucking suicidal.”

“It really is,” I laughed, “but we have a small chance. The centaurs are Alkandra loyalists, so it will be easy to convince them to join Yavara; it will be much harder to convince them to save our asses.”

“What do we have to negotiate with?”

“Ivanka, Tiffany,” I prompted Titus’ blood-daughters, “how much gold are you carrying?”

“Ten thousand a piece.” Tiffany said.

“That might help grease negotiations.” I grunted, “We’ll all meet at the citadel after midnight.”

“We’re never making it out of that fucking canyon.” Jefrok said.

“Maybe,” I smiled, “but if we do, Jefrok, every inch of this land, from the Spruces to the Willows, will be mine.”

LEVERIA

Elena’s chains were constricting around my throat, the tendons in her arms standing taut as she pulled tighter. It aroused me like nothing else. While she jerked violently to kill me, I was rubbing my thighs together in arousal. I felt the air leave my lungs and the pressure in my eyes build. I looked into her hate-filled gaze, her teeth gnashing and her eyes bulging. I let her choke the life out of me a little longer before I played my hand, and draped her mother’s necklace over my face. Elena’s expression warped into one of horror.

“What did you do to her?!” She screamed.

I choked out an answer. Elena pulled the chains from my throat and brought my face right to hers

“Where is she?!” She yelled. Her breath was hot in my nostrils.

“In Bentius,” I coughed, “at her estate!”

“Bullshit!” Elena drove me into the floor.

“I’ll take you to see her if you like!” I squeaked, “We can go anywhere you want.”

“How did you get this?”

“She gave it to me to give to you.” I said, pulling myself up to rest on my elbows.

“This is a threat.”

“It’s a promise, Elena,” I smiled weakly, “She dies if I die, and she dies if you run away.”

Elena collapsed into her chair, the necklace hanging from her open palm. She looked at it, and then at me. “What the fuck do you want from me?”

“I told you the Lowlands was levelling sanctions on me.” I said hoarsely, massaging my throat, “Dreus is justifying them by saying I’m waging terroristic warfare upon a sovereign state.”

Elena narrowed her eyes. “Get to the point.”

“You know Yavara; she’s a hothead. She’s going to come for you.”

“I noticed there were a lot of new faces around.” Elena growled, “You don’t think she knows it’s a trap?”

“She’ll do it anyway. You know it, I know it.” I eased myself upright, “And when she does, I will formally recognize Alkandra, and declare war. But a formal declaration requires a diplomat from Alkandra, one that King Dreus cannot claim is just my sycophant.”

She gaped at me. “You want me to represent Alkandra in the Noble Court.”

“I’ve already begun laying the foundation for your reputation. You’re a spy, you’ve been one the whole time. You won’t have to worry about assassins from the nobles.”

“You want me to betray Yavara?!” Elena snarled.

I smiled pitiably at her. “Yavara is doomed, Elena. I’ve raised the largest army on Tenvalia, and it’s already mobilizing to invade. Her army consists of a few hundred vampires, and two middling orc tribes. I know she failed to convince the Ten to join her. Once she is repelled from her disastrous assault of Castle Thorum, I will have carte blanche to treat the Great Forest has a hostile foreign power, and there will be nothing King Dreus can say about it. If Yavara’s smart, she’ll flee across the sea to Terondia before Dreus turns on her. If she’s not, well…” I shrugged, “…it would be best for her sake if she wasn’t captured alive.”

Elena shook her head, disbelieving. “I won’t do it.”

“You will.” I said simply, “If you care for the welfare of the beasts in the Great Forest, you will represent them when they formally surrender to me. Genocide is such a messy business; I’d prefer peaceful relocation.”

Elena bit her lip, and looked out the window. “And then what?” She whispered, “Then you’ll let me go?”

“No.” I answered quietly.

“Why not?” There were tears in her eyes.

“Because you’re too great a threat.” I said, rising to my feet, “I can’t let you free in the world when so many beasts would see your flesh and call you a messiah. You will take your mother’s place and represent the Straltaira family when the time comes, but you will always belong to me.”

“Your prisoner.”

“Yes.”

“Your slave.”

“If you wish.” I answered, then took the key from my purse, and undid the shackles on her wrists and ankles.

She tested the joints, then stood on wobbling feet, her legs remembering their strength. She was a few inches taller than me, and imposing in her dark splendor. The contrast of her flesh against her hair and eyes was striking, and the austere beauty of her freckled face was like that of a solemn goddess. She looked down at me, and I felt a compulsion to get on my knees and worship her like she deserved to be worshiped. “Ok, Leveria. I’ll be your little diplomatic puppy. I’ll bark and yip and heel so that all the Noble Court can see how well you’ve tamed me.” Then she grabbed a fistful of my hair, and pressed out bodies together, “But when we’re alone, Your Highness,” she snarled in my face, “I’m not your prisoner. I’m not your slave. I’m your master, and you’re my little whore.”

“Yes!” I mewled, and she shoved me into the chair, the backs of my knees hitting the seat and folding me into it.

“Open your legs and move forward.” She commanded. I obeyed, spreading my legs to her and pushing my ass of the edge of the seat. She pulled my panties off and strapped by ankles to the legs of the chair, then forced my skirt up to my belly.

“You’ve been such a naughty little girl, Leveria,” Elena teased as her fingers traced back and forth along my taint, “you killed your mother,” she pushed a finger into my ass, “you tortured me,” Elena added another finger, “you murdered my friend.” Elena forced her whole hand inside.

I jerked forward against my restraints, my back arching from the chair, my body teeming with shock from the invasion. “Yes!” I cried, “I tortured and killed your friend!” I panted like a bitch as Elena formed a fist inside of me, “I raped and killed my mother!” Elena rotated her fist, “I fucked my father!” Elena drove her fist deeper, “I deserve this! Make me pay!”

Elena opened her fist inside me until her fingers were flat. She looked up at me with wild eyes as she brought her other hand to my gape.

“No!” I screamed, thrashing against my binds, “I can’t take another one!”

Elena sneered. “You wanted to know how Yavara fucked. Well, if you’re going to be your sister’s substitute for me, you better act that part!” She pushed her fingers next to her wrist, and slowly entered me. I felt my rim stretch to agonizing levels, the taut circle thinning to grip her entering hand. Oh, I thought I would tear, I thought I would die, I wanted her to make it worse! I gritted my teeth and flung my head back as the pain arced through me. So sweet was her sadism, so rich with her power over me, power I gave, power she took.

“That’s it,” Elena whispered, “that’s a good little bitch.”

I growled to the ceiling as Elena’s fingers slid deeper and deeper, expanding me wider than I’d ever known. My growls turned to a scream when her palms met inside of me. Then she curled both hands into a fist, and I contorted in the chair, my scream sputtering from me to become a breathless squeak.

“This is what you get, Leveria.” Elena teased, “You want to be with me so bad, well this is how it’s going to be. I’m going to make you pay every time we’re alone. I’m going to let you know how much I fucking hate you.”

“Yes!” Was all I could scream, “Yes! Yes! Yes!”

Elena slowly thrusted both fists inside my ass, the knuckles kneading into my taut sheath, scoring pleasure and pain into my rectum. My head flew forward, and I gazed rapturously into her hate-filled eyes behind strands of disheveled blonde strands. My exacerbated growls turned to into lecherous moans, my muscles relaxed, and I savored the feeling of her fists methodically breaking me open. My back rested against the chair as I succumbed to the lassitude of lust, my lower lip pouting vulnerably. She gave me an evil smile, and pushed in even deeper. My moan rose in intensity until it was a scream once more, exalted to the ceiling as my back arched. She pushed until she was halfway up both forearms, my anus naught but a ruined oval clinging desperately to her, stretched to the point that I thought it would never close, useless as anything more than a hole for her to violate. I sobbed my pleasure, my body twitching in elation as I was defiled like never before.

“Are you ready, Leveria?” She whispered.

“For what?!” I gasped.

Elena grinned, and slowly pulled out of me. I groaned in relief as I felt the pressure subsiding, her pressing knuckles stimulating my ruined shithole all the way to the exit. She eased her left hand out with pinched fingers, and my exhausted rim cuffed her right wrist like a fleshly bracelet. The she tore her right hand out of me, and my whole body wrenched violently, a scream erupting from my lips.

“Oh,” Elena laughed, “did I hurt you?”

My lips twitched and my eyes quivered, my vision blurring back to focus.

“Look, Leveria,” Elena said sweetly, beckoning my eyes down, “you’re so pretty down here.”

I gawked at the fleshy bulge that had been birthed from my anus, it moist red texture and grotesque petals a contrast to the silky alabaster flesh surrounding it.

“Do you want me to play with it?” Elena asked, her breath blowing against it.

“Please!” I moaned, “Please play with my out-turned asshole!”

“I can’t hear you…”

“Please, Elena!” I begged, “Please defile me more! I’m just your little anal whore!”

“That’s right,” Elena laughed, “You’re my little whore-queen.”

I nodded submissively, my lip quivering. Elena gently placed my prolapsed rectum between her fingers, and lowered her lips to it. Her warm mouth sucked on my sensitive innards, drawing me outward with sensual pressure, her tongue creasing the vile folds and electrifying the bunched nerves. I moaned and slowly gyrated my hips, my body expressing my need without my permission, my legs strained against their binds as I felt the familiar pressure begin to build. Such brutality followed by such gentleness; what was a girl to do against that onslaught of the senses?!

“You’re not allowed to come yet.” Elena growled.

I clenched my body and tried to hold back, sucking my bud back into my ass.

“No…” I sighed defeatedly.

“It’s OK,” Elena grinned, her eyes sparkling, “you can push it out all by yourself.” She undid the shackles on my ankles and guided my legs to separate. I pulled my legs up by the backs of my knees, presenting everything between my spread cheeks. “We just need to encourage it a little to come out and play.” She said softly. She gently pressed against the sides of my rim, and began massaging the tension away as I pushed with my anal muscles. I felt my insides ball up and move down my rectum. She saw the movement inside me, and curled her fingers into my rim, spreading me open. I moaned as I pushed, straining with my fists clenched until I finally felt the bulge birth from my gaping anus with an exquisite release, and the caress of air upon my outturned insides.

“See Leveria,” she smiled, “you can do it all by yourself. What a big girl you are.”

I smiled lustfully down at the hybrid as her tongue descended, invading the ovule of my flower, her lips sucking the petals into her mouth. I bit my lip and laid my head back against the chair. Her tongue bored into me, wet slurping noises leaking from her mouth. Pleasant moans flowed from my content lip-bitten smile as I savored this alien sensation. Her fingers gently squished my prolapsed rectum as she pulled with her mouth and pushed with her tongue. My moans turned to breathless gasps and whimpers.

“I think we got it worked out enough,” Elena smiled down at her work, my rectum swollen and glistening from her suction and spit, “do you want me to fuck this pretty little asshole?”

“YES!” I screamed.

Elena undid the shackles on my wrist and guided my hands to her breasts. I pulled off her robe, then squeezed her supple assets as she undid the lacing on my bodice. My breasts burst in a reveal before the unraveling laces, and Elena took a nipple in each hand and pinched hard. She pulled away from me, forcing my chest forward and my back to curve. I rested my thighs on the arms of the chair to give her better access, and I bit my lip excitedly. Elena smiled down and pressed her tip to my outturned asshole. She pushed in.

ELENA

Leveria’s soft innards gave way to the advancing head of my cock. I pushed until her prolapse enveloped my shaft, and then pushed in further until it was sucked back inside of her. She cried out her pleasure and tilted her head back, and I pulled on her nipples as I pushed into her gape. When I was buried all the way, I held myself into her tender vile depths, savoring the feeling of her stretched insides slowly constricting around me. Then, I began to pump. She cried out with each advance and retreat, my pelvis sounding sharply against her jiggling ass, her fine dress ruined before her wrenching body. I marveled at the sight of her rectal skin sheathing my retreat; it was like I was wearing a condom made of stone-cold-bitch. She fucking loved it. Every time I pushed in I felt her relax for me, and every time I pulled out she clenched so that she would come out with me. I was slow, but firm with my movements. I wanted her to savor the pain, but not to be taken by it; not yet.

Leveria’s eyes were half-mast with lust, her mouth curled into an open smile. I released her nipples, watching as they bounced back to her, then I filled my hands with her thick legs. She squeezed harder on my breasts, tilting her head up and moaning, a few teeth pulling on her bottom lip from the corner of her mouth. I moaned with her, moving slowly and sensually for a while, gyrating with long, passionate thrusts. I took my time to drive deeply, to savor her insides as they clung to me. Her hips rocked back and forth with me, her body shifting in a slow, lustful dance. She began to purr with pleasure, deriving love-making hedonism from our gelatinous joining, her anus pulling me into her with beckoning clenches. But I would never make love to Leveria Tiadoa.

I pulled all the way out and then thrust in hard. Leveria’s body shifted violently against the back of the chair, her half-close eyes opened wide, her lips parted in shock. I jack-hammered my way into the woman, driving my hatred into the passion. Ripples of flesh flowed in waves up her ass and thighs, and her pale breasts shook belligerently. Her anal skin still came out with my cock, but instead of flowing, it was jerked and compressed, bunching around her exit with each forceful entrance. Her back wrenched into and arch and her head smashed roughly against the chair. She writhed in a duality of pain and pleasure, screaming my name, her pussy gushing its approval, spurting with each thrust to dribble the clear fluid down her bulging pelvic floor, and grease the relentless piston-fuck of her pink shithole. One of Leveria’s hands braced her body against the arm of the chair while the other sunk four fingers into her frothing slit. She looked up at me with wide eyes and a quivering mouth. She spread her pussy for me, showing me the way my cock pulsed beneath the glistening pink swath of her vaginal floor. I pinched my fingers together and drove my hand into her cunt, her hot wet insides closing around me. Her abdomen shot forward, and her pelvis lurched. I turned my hand around inside her and gripped my cock from between her holes.

“Oh my god!” Leveria sobbed.

“Shut your fucking mouth, whore!” I screamed, and slapped her hard across the face. Her head whipped to the side, a bright red print forming on her cheek.

“Again!” She pleaded. I complied, this time with a backhand across the other cheek. Leveria let out a yelp and her pussy clenched around me, frothing about my wrist. I pulled out, and made her suck my fingers. She moaned while she did it, her shithole pulsating around me, rewarding me. I picked the bitch up by her thighs and spun her around, forcing one of her shackled hands high on her back. I grabbed her platinum hair in one hand and ripped her head backward, forcing her to look up at me. Her eyes quivered and her mouth drooled, her portrait a masterpiece of slutty desire. With my other hand, I punished her with a series of brutal slaps across her ass. She screamed out with each blow, her voice rising and rising with increasing euphoria, her insides seizing around me as pain became pleasure. I gritted my teeth and drove at a fervent pace, smashing against her, burying into her soft insides. Her eyes rolled into her head and her mouth sounded a fluctuation of primal guttural tones. I yanked her hair back, and licked the side of her face. She opened her mouth for a kiss, and I shoved my fingers back into her mouth. She licked them as though she didn’t really care what part of me she kissed. I laughed at her audacity, and ripped her legs out from under her.

Leveria was lighter than her sister, which made it a lot easier to fuck her while she dangled helplessly in the air. Her thick ass pillowed against my pelvis as she gyrated atop me, willing me to brutalize her more. I accepted the challenge, and pressed the bitch against the stone wall, forcing her body into the rough surface with a flurry of thrusts. She screamed against the stones, her back flexing as convulsions of pleasure shot through her. The pressure in my loins began to build, but I held back on it. I forced more and more of myself into her desecrated asshole, driving her to climax, making her look back at me with tear-filled eyes as the ecstasy burned its way into her mind. Her lips trembled, her eyes quivered, her back wrenched and her legs shook. Her whole body tensed violently as a high-pitched shriek blasted from her gaping mouth.

I didn’t give the bitch time to recover. I pulled out of her ruined asshole and pushed her to her knees, then throat-fucked her viciously, forcing her to choke and gag around me. She looked up at me with burning desire in her eyes, drool stringing from her chin in strings, and ecstatic tears carrying black liner down her red cheeks. She took my rage easily into her compassionate throat, then held me deeply when I unloaded into her. I cried out, my legs giving way with sudden exhaustion. She caught me by the ass and guided me down as she greedily drank from my cock, lathering her tongue along my pulsing shaft to taste the vile flavor of her own anus. I eased myself onto the stone, and let the bitch consume me, too sapped of strength and will to do anything else. I stared catatonically out the window, and tongued the capsule in my mouth. A shadow crossed the high noon sun, and I smiled.

YAVARA

The sun beat on my back, the wind flowed through my hair, the world grew small beneath me. The warning horn sounded a second after I burst through the treetops and rocketed into the sky. The rangers were like ants scrambling along the ramparts, manning their ballista and marshalling their archers. I slowed my assent a thousand feet above the tower, and for a moment I was suspended in air, caught in the equilibrium of gravity’s pull and my own propulsion. The world was muted this far up, only the wind buffeting my ears. I raised my arms above my head, pressed my palms together, and leaned as gravity took me. I plummeted. There was a pregnant pause in the movement below me, as if all the rangers on the three tiers of Castle Thorum couldn’t believe what I was doing. They gained their faculties quickly, and raised their ballista high. The wind sounded in my ears, the air rushed through my pointed fingers, my heart drummed in my temple, an eternity between beats. They fired. For a moment, three stacked circles of projectile appeared hundreds of feet below me, seeming to be suspended in air from where they’d been fired. I’d seen the illusion before, and I braced myself. A second later, the circles converged, the deadly black points glinting off the sun, trained on me as I dove to meet them. With a scream, I unfurled my arms, and split the air. The heavy bolts curved away from me, caught in the maelstrom of air I made before me, leaving a vacuum to path my descent. The air was sucked from my lungs, the wind died in my hair, and I closed my eyes, and crashed into the tower.

ROSE

I gawked as the Dark Queen fell from the sky like an eagle. The ballista missiles arced away from her like the breaking head of a fountain, and she shot through the center of it. There was a thunderous explosion, and in rapid succession, the windows of Castle Thorum were blown out. Glass shattered, debris shot out, and men were sent screaming from the ramparts. Yavara crashed through each floor until she was buried deep in the catacombs. A curtain of dust settled over the fortress, and I turned to my sisters, and nodded.

Getting across the bridge was nerve-wracking, but with our advance concealed by the dust, we made it without detection. Then we plastered ourselves to the grassy mall before the fortress, dawned our natural flora camouflage, and painstakingly crawled on our bellies to the wall. The details became clearer as we neared. I could see the top of the first tier, then I could see the black outline of the ballista, then the scurrying silhouettes of rangers. They peered out from the ramparts, looking right at us, but seeing nothing through the airborne debris. Foot by tortuous foot, we slithered forward, adjusting our camouflage carefully. When I could no longer see the tops of ranger cowls, I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding, scampered to the wall, and pressed myself against it. I waited for my sisters to do the same. I nodded to Buttercup, and gave her a reassuring smile, then clasped hands with Violet, and offered her a resolute nod. I turned around, pressed my naked body against the stones, and leveraged my fingers into a crack in the wall. Taking a deep breath, I began to climb.

I’d never ascended a stone face so smooth, but my practiced limbs were deft, and my fingers found the holds. I made it to the top of the wall, and peered between the battlements. This section was almost empty, only a single guard pacing nervously as the others rushed to the tower. She was a high-elf no older than I, her hands gripping white-knuckled around the haft of her spear, her eyes shifting frantically. I spotted a rack full of swords just a few paces from where I was. I ran my gaze from the weapons, to the woman, and back. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t make her a monster. She could’ve been me. Below me, I heard the whimpers of my sisters, the desperate scramble of feet against stone as footholds began to crumble. I couldn’t wait a second longer. When the woman turned around, I leapt over the wall, dashed for the rack, and grabbed a sword. The metal sang from its scabbard, and the woman stopped dead in her tracks, her shoulders pinning with terror. She looked over her shoulder at me just as I plunged the sword into her back. Her eyes bulged, her jaw wrenched open, and I stuffed my fist into her mouth to gag her scream. Then I pulled out the sword, and stabbed her again, and again, and again. I didn’t stop until the light faded from her eyes, and her teeth relaxed from the deep gouges they’d made in the back of my hand. I crouched over the body, breathing heavily, my heart drumming behind my eyeballs. I watched a dying tear film the elf’s eye, then break from the corner to draw a path along her cheek, and splash into a pool of her blood.

“Rose?” Violet asked. I looked over my shoulder at her. Behind her, Buttercup was staring wide-eyed at me, like she didn’t recognize who I was. She wasn’t the only one. Orchid, Dandelion, Lilly, Poinsettia, and scores more stopped and stared at what I’d done. Murder. Killer. Destroyer. Violet stepped cautiously up to me. “Rose, what do we now?”

“This.” I muttered, pulling the sword free from the woman’s back, “This is what we do now.” I turned to my sisters, “The oldest ones grab the weapons from the racks, the younger ones follow behind.”

“We can’t arm us all.” Violet said.

“There will be more weapons soon, Violet.” I whispered, and snatched the spear from the elf’s dead fingers, and put it into Violet’s. She stared at the blood that now stained her hands, then looked at me with something between horror and resolve. I smiled back, and I knew from her expression that it was a bloodstained grin, devoid of anything but a manic thrill that wasn’t quite terror. I didn’t have a war cry, but I shrieked out anyway, and charged down the steps, and into the bowels of Castle Thorum.

THOMAS ADARIAN

My ears rang with the echoes of the explosion. The world was a blur of chaos, debris raining down, bodies strewn and mangled, men and women screaming. I climbed to my feet, and stumbled down the hall. There was no hall. There was just a gaping hole in the floor that descended into darkness, rimmed by the jagged remains of beams and floorboards twenty levels down. I remembered the stories of Alkandi. None of them had prepared me for this. My mind would forever be scarred with the image of Yavara plunging right for me, her orange eyes blazing with deific fury, the very air around her yielding. When she hit the tower, the stone itself seemed to flex, bowing before the Dark Queen, then bursting. I was flung like a ragdoll against a battlement, and slid unconsciously down the ramp that was once the tower roof.

“April?” I called hoarsely, “April?!”

I heard the familiar scratching of paws, and I breathed a sigh of relief as April came scampering around the corner. She stopped at my feet, and pawed fervently at my leg.

“Stay here and hide.” I said, scratching her ear.

She inclined her head inquisitively.

“I have to find the queen.” I answered.

She whined and whimpered.

“I’ll be back.” I whispered, “I’ll be back right here, so you stay here, you understand?”

She nodded. I planted a kiss on her brow, and ran into what was left of the tower.

ELENA

I didn’t know what happened. One second the warning horn had sounded, a few seconds after that, I was dangling from the edge of the floor, looking a hundred feet down into blackness.

“Elena!” Leveria shouted, “Give me your hand!”

“Oh fuck off.” I growled as I hoisted myself up. I brushed aside Leveria’s attempt to pull me to my feet, and stood at the precipice of the hole Yavara had made of Castle Thorum. Debris drizzled from above, bouncing and clattering into the void. The discordant groan of failing beams sounded from all around, the occasional shear and boom of entire floors collapsing. The chair I’d been sitting on was split cleanly in half, and the part still remaining teetered on the edge before it tumbled into darkness.

“You could throw me down it,” Leveria said softly, “I couldn’t stop you.”

“My mother’s life isn’t worth your death.” I muttered, “And it wouldn’t stop the war. Not after this. You got your wish.”

“I think I got a bit more than that.” Leveria stepped beside me, and cautiously looked down the hole. “Did you know she could do that?”

“No.”

“Such power.” Leveria whispered, almost covetously, “Have you ever heard legend of the Creators? Those ancient gods who could bend the elements to their will?”

“She’s not like them.”

“She’s close.” Leveria said, awe in her voice, “My own sister.” She looked upward, where a beam of light shown through the new atrium of the tower, “I never truly realized what it meant until now. I thought the stories they told of Alkandi were mostly just legend, but it’s not so.” She turned to me, “Elena, we’re in a fight for our very existence.”

“Yavara isn’t like you.”

“No?” Leveria mused, “When you reunited with your beloved, and you found out what she was, did you join her willingly?”

“She gave me a choice.”

“Did she?” Leveria said with a sardonic smile, “Kind of like the choice I gave you? Come now, Elena. The moment Yavara had you in her clutches, she was never going to let you go.”

“I liked you better when you didn’t have a tongue.”

“But I can do so many very interesting things with it.” Leveria twerked her brows. Then her face fell, and she jumped on me. There was an explosion, a sudden burst of light, and I was on my back. A nine-foot missile was imbedded in the wall where I’d been standing, the wrought-iron haft singing a low metallic note as it vibrated with released energy. A drop of blood dripped from the butt. Leveria stared at the gaping hole in her chest. She swayed on her feet, then fell to a sitting position. “Huh,” she muttered, her eyes clouding, “that’s… not good.”

“Why did you do that?!” I screamed, heaving panicked breaths.

She looked at me and smiled with a set of red teeth. Then she collapsed. I stared at her limp form, my lower lip quivering. Outside, I could hear the clash of steel and the screams of battle. A cacophony of rumbles sounded as missiles struck the fortress walls, turned around to fire from the tiers below. The tower shook as Yavara excavated its bowels, searching for me in the catacombs below. All I had to do was call for her, and she’d come. Leveria whimpered, her delicate back rising to sound a rattling breath, the yawning hole between her shoulders dripping. That missile had been destined for me since the moment it was made. It had had been forged with my name writ in the fibers, cast with my name etched in the mold, packaged and stored with my name cording its iron-spiraled shaft, waiting, waiting, waiting for years just to fulfill its singular purpose, to cut through the fabric of chance and circumstance and meet me at the end of both our lives. Until Leveria stepped in its way, and changed its course with her own. Why? Why?!

“God fucking damn it, Leveria.” I growled, and hoisted her onto my back. She murmured something in her dying delirium as I carried her along the perimeter of the hole, and into the mage’s office. Glendian was cursing wildly and shooting spells out the window, his bald head shining with sweat. He dropped to the ground as a salvo of ballista shot blasted through the room. Shrapnel cut through the air, and I dove with Leveria atop me. She shuddered against me, and I realized that I had just unknowingly used the queen of the Highlands as a meat shield.

“Glendian!” I yelled at the mage.

Glendian turned around and looked at Leveria, and then at me. “She died bravely.”

“She’s still alive.” I groaned, getting back onto my feet.

Glendian looked purposefully at me. “She died bravely, Ranger Straltaira, in the service of her country.”

“My mother will die if she does.”

“If she dies, Lord Ternias becomes king.” Glendian said, “I have contacts, Ranger, I can get your mother to safety before anyone knows of this. Ternias would protect her afterward.”

Leveria hacked blood onto my shoulder. I looked from her, to Glendian. “Just open the fucking portal, old man.”

ROSE

I charged headlong into the backs of the rangers, taking out three of them before they knew what happened. I spun just in time to catch the blade of a fourth on my cross-guard, the vibrations stinging through my hands. He snarled in my face, and forced me back, bringing his sword around for a second blow. I put up my blade, and it was blasted from my hands, clattering on the stonework behind me. I scrambled back, but he was too quick, his feet trained for combat, his motions expressing a ferocity I’d never faced before. I barely sucked my gut in before he split it open, and my knees buckled, sending me tumbling before him, landing on hands and knees. I raised my head, and felt mortal terror crawl beneath my flesh. His grin was that of a wolf when he raised his blade, his eyes bulging and inhuman. I began forming the words, ‘no, please!’ but fear had paralyzed my tongue completely. All I could do was watch as- there was a blade sticking through his neck, and he spat blood and dropped to his knees, then to his face, the knife wagging at the base of his skull. Buttercup gaped at the weapon that had been wrenched from her hands, then at me. Then her head was split in two, and she caved in on herself, the sword shearing to her chest. I screamed, and the man kicked my beloved sister’s unrecognizable corpse before me, pink brains spilling from her bisected skull. He sneered at me, then turned just in time to be impaled by five different swords. The rest of my sisters came screaming down the steps, virgin mania in their eyes. I turned Buttercup over, some irrational part of me hoping that the outcome would be different, but no. She was gone, and there was no peace in the passing. Only the void. It didn’t matter that Buttercup was the youngest of us, or the sweetest, or the most fearful. She’d been turned into meat with one swift swing by someone she never knew, nor never saw.

Violet stepped between me and the body, and extended her hand. I took it, and she pulled me up. “We’re lost forever now, sister.” She said in my ear.

“Yes.” I said back, and turned to the others. “Juniper,” I said to one of my captains, “take your squad around the outside of the courtyard wall and keep them pinned with arrows. How many bows did we pick up?”

“Around thirty.”

“Shoot blindly over the wall; don’t expose yourself.”

Juniper took thirty sisters around the courtyard wall and lined them up. They fired a volley into the courtyard, yielding two screams. They rained arrows until the screaming stopped, and I held up a hand to conserve ammunition. I peeked around the threshold of the courtyard, and barely got my face out of the way before a dozen arrows whistled past me, and clattered against the wall behind me. I made a motion with my hand, and Daffodil came sprinting by me, rotating and skidding to a stop on the other side of the threshold.

“How many?” I asked.

“Twenty in there.” Daffodil said, her chest heaving.

I nodded, turned to Juniper, and nodded. Her platoon loosed another volley, and I dashed in after it. The rangers were still in cover when I came screaming into the courtyard, hacking indiscriminately at anything that moved. I opened one woman’s guts, slashed a man’s throat, and imbedded my blade into the liver of a third ranger before I was forced behind a pillar by a flow of arrows. Two sisters screamed behind me; Dandelion and Lilac. The rest came at their heels, and swarmed the remaining rangers. Even without superior numbers, we were outmatched. I watched Carnation fall screaming, holding her spilling guts, a horror in her eyes so terrible it made her unrecognizable. Freesia was dragging herself away, and before I could reach her, her skull was bashed in. Iris was taking on two rangers, and holding her own admirably. But then one stuck her in the kidney, and the other slashed her breast, and she fell between them, screaming as they butchered her, every strike removing more of her. It didn’t end until twenty-three of our sisters were dead. By then, we were beyond grief. We dully collected the weapons of the elves and our fallen, and distributed them among the living. There were two more courtyards on the first tier, each undoubtedly packed with enemies. But Yavara had made her orders clear. “Climb, Rose. If they pin you on the first tier with those ballistae, you’ll lose ten sisters for every foot you gain.”

I looked up at the second tier of the castle, where scores of elves were marshalling at the battlements, the ballista rotating with the tick of metal and groan of gears.

“Guard the courtyard entrance!” I yelled to Juniper, “Don’t let them hit our flanks! Violet, take the rest and start to climb!”

“What are you going to do?”

I looked at the ballista on the first wall. “I’ll cover you.”

YAVARA

I looked up at the destruction I had wrought. Nearly a hundred broken bodies had come down with me to litter the catacomb atrium. Beams and wood planks rained down from the shattered floors above, the occasional stone plummeting to splatter one of the lifeless husks that surrounded me. Elena wasn’t in the catacombs, but she also wasn’t among the dead.

That was fucking reckless. I thought, wondering at what I would’ve done if I’d found her broken body.

I guided myself off the ground, rotating as I ascended, scanning the outturned guts of the tower. I killed dispassionately all the way up, crushing rangers against walls or sending them through windows. I cleared the tower floor by floor until I found the mage’s office. The glimmering air before a smooth platform told me a portal had just been used.

I was too late.

The head-ranger’s office was placed across form the mage’s lab. I walked through what was left of the room. The bed was balancing dangerously on three legs as the fourth hung over the abyss. There was an enchanted mirror on the wall. I pressed it, waiting to see Leveria’s smug face appear. Nobody answered. I pressed it again, and still no answer. I heard a whimper and I turned to the sound of it. There was a fox trapped beneath a pile of rubble.

“April?” I mused. Adarian’s pet fox. I was surprised the animal still lived; the last time I saw her was over ten years ago. Father and Adarian had been conversing in the next room, leaving eight-year-old me to play with the exuberant fox. I pondered dark thoughts for a moment, then shook them away. April was innocent, and I could never bring myself to harm a dog. I moved the rubble off her body and it immediately scampered around, sniffing and whining. A missile crashed through the wall, zipped past my head, and blasted through the far wall, giving the castle two new windows. The fox raced into my arms and shivered beneath me in terror. I put her in my bag and looked out the new window. Rose and her sisters had taken control of the ballista on the first wall, and were shooting up at the second. But they were missing high on almost every shot, and taking punishment with every failure.

ROSE

Juniper’s squad had fallen back, and was now strictly providing support from the wall, giving the rangers back their courtyard, cutting off the climbers’ escape. The rangers on the second wall thankfully didn’t have tar, but they did have rubble. The rained beams and rocks onto my sisters as they climbed up the shear face, sending them screaming past their ascending brethren. The fifty of us that weren’t climbing manned the ballistae on the first wall, and fired up on the second. It took us a few eternal minutes to figure out how to use the fucking things, and once we had the mechanics down, aiming was nearly impossible. We manned twenty ballista and shot them in salvo, but we missed high and blasted the tower three consecutive times. The rangers on the second wall did not miss. Every salvo we fired, they fired two, and with deadly accuracy. After our first shot, we were rained down with two blasts that took out four of our ballistae and ten sisters. Their bodies were shot to pieces with the force of the projectile, and their shrieks waned as what was left of them plummeted over the wall. A second salvo came down as we were loading the projectile, and one of our missiles misfired, pinning one of our sisters to the wall by the space between her shoulders. I couldn’t know who it was; she was a splatter.

A mage was blasting fire spells at us from the high window at the top of the tower. I loaded dual-shot spear heads into the ballista and blasted it. Our high aim worked for us this time, as the two spears crashed into the high tower with a burst of dust and rock. Another salvo came down from the second wall and took out three of our ballistae and five of my sisters. The sisters scaling the wall weren’t moving fast enough. We fired our last salvo as the second wall blasted us with theirs. My ballista rocketed backward, and I was thrown to the edge of the wall. Juniper grabbed my foot before I fell and hoisted me up right before another volley of ballista crashed into us. She was lurched from my hand and carried screaming over the edge, the iron haft propelling her further out then she fell.

The rest of the sisters manning the ballista routed, mindlessly abandoning their weapons to dive behind the battlements. Another salvo hit, and their cover was blown to pieces, two sisters flying off the wall and flailing to their deaths. I dove off my siege weapon just before it was shredded with metal poles that snapped the steel draw-cord and turned it into a deadly unweaving rope whose tendrils sliced Orchid and Dandelion into slabs.

“Get down!” I screamed at my panicking sisters, “Get down and draw you bows! We can’t let them aim down the wall!”

I fumbled with my own bow, taking cover behind the mangled remains of my ballista.

“Ready…” I said to my terrified sisters. Their hands slipped trying to notch the arrows.

“Aim…” My sisters were holding the bows all wrong, we’d be lucky to even hit the wall. The ballista on the second wall adjusted their sites and aimed down at us.

“Fire!” I yelled. Our volley shot out as their salvo unloaded. I screamed and dove, futilely covering my head with my hands. Stones crumbled, shrapnel flew in the air, and screams sounded from all around. Only seven of us remained unhurt, and the climbers were still so far! The ballistae were extended outward from the ramparts by massive levers, then aimed downward. The metal black tips gleamed in the afternoon sun as they stared down the horrified faces of my climbing sisters, the draw-cords cranking back with tick-tick-tick of metal gears.

THOMAS ADARIAN

The watch commander had done a commendable job breaking up the ballista strikes from the first wall, but he had failed to repel the advance up the wall. I’d rectified that problem, and now stared down the sites of a machine that could release tens of thousands of force-pounds in a second. A nymph girl that looked to be barely a woman stared up at me, a look of abject defeat in her eyes. Was there a plea for mercy on her lips? Maybe. I launched the missile, and speared five different women with one shot. I raised my fist, and the men at my sides cranked the bow back as the one behind slid the bolt into place. Then there was a deafening explosion, and I was sent sprawling out of the gunner’s seat. All around me were mangled bodies, screaming wounded and moaning dying. An entire section of the tower wall had been ripped out, and the Dark Queen was using it like a massive club. She zipped along the second tier in a blur, turning the men and women in her way into pink and red mist. Then she spiraled to the first tier, and emptied the courtyards below. Bang, bang, bang; the sound of her swinging the club was sharp and brutal, each impact shaking the tower. I hoisted myself on shaking legs, and drew my sword. The nymphs were spilling over the wall, hacking and stabbing at anything that moved, their green eyes bulging with fury. I charged into them, raising my sword high, bringing it down on a woman with violet hair. My blade stopped an inch from her face. I couldn’t move at all.

“Adarian,” Yavara whispered in my ear, her hands gently coming down on my shoulders, “where is Elena?”

End of Part Seven.

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