Bloom & Dark Page 7

  “I wouldn’t dream of it,” I said absently. If she heard me, she did not acknowledge me and went on with a certain degree of automation.

  “You will serve as the Materna’s personal attendant. Much will be expected of you. If we decide that we can trust you, you will be responsible for bringing her meals and running errands for her. That is only if we decide we can trust you, and if Her Holiness deigns to utilize you for more tasks than the caretaking of her person. Until such time as she informs you otherwise, you are to regard everyone you meet—even other slaves—as your superiors. Disobedience will be met with harsh measures, and any effort to damage the property or person of a durrow is considered a capital offense. Again, this includes slaves. Is that clear to you, human?”

  “Very clear,” I answered, tearing my gaze from the striking view of the city and glancing, as I turned my head, down the nearby hall and into the interior of my mistress’s bed chambers. These were largely blocked from view by a folding screen expanded between the doorway and a broad bed wide enough to fit five people, let alone two. “What about matters such as my own food? Bathing? Where do I sleep?”

  “Your mistress will decide all of that.”

  Here was to hoping she would be generous. From the look in Valeria’s eyes when we met, she was not necessarily poised to be cruel. I held onto hope that I had read her properly. My shoulder still burning slightly from the new-laid brand, I only further thought to inquire, “All this casual talk of assassins—is this a common occurrence for the Materna? I was under the impression that she is untouchably holy.”

  “She is…but you should know, holy man, that there are many in this world who have no respect for the divine, and even less respect for the fleshly beings that consort therewith. We have had recurrent problems as of late with spirit-thieves, and even a few individuals employed by them, routinely disrupting the peace of our tower and our city as a whole.”

  I laughed lightly. Upon the sharpening of her features, I assured her, “That won’t be a problem anymore—I slew them in their nearby den before I was brought here.”

  Though the guard seemed poised to respond—maybe even ready to express admiration for the act—we were interrupted by the opening of the chamber door.

  “Arrogance is not a survival tactic that serves in the Nightlands,” said the Materna, cutting a surprisingly delicate figure in the doorway where she stood. “Do not think, just because you have annihilated a brood of spirit-thieves, that more are not aware and ready to seek revenge.”

  The guard had dropped to her knee swiftly on the Materna’s entrance—but, much as I delayed when given formal audience with her, now I was frozen by her beauty much as by the wrapped sword cradled in her arms. She may as well have held my very heart.

  “Strife,” I said, as unconsciously and eagerly as I might name a friend from whom I’d been separated.

  To my surprise, the Materna slightly smiled. “You may go, Fiora. I will instruct my slave myself…my needs are very particular.”

  “As you wish, Your Holiness.”

  Bowing once more as she straightened up, the guard made herself scarce with but the briefest of glances my way. When she exited, the Materna locked the door’s bolt after her. Then, still cradling my sword as though it were an infant, Valeria studied me.

  “You are a very strange slave,” she said. “Very informal. Most newly registered slaves can hardly look us in the eyes when stripped naked.”

  “Not as though I chose to be divested of my clothes, is it, Materna? Nor of my blade.”

  With a slight smirk, the priestess turned away to lay my wrapped blade upon a nearby table. “I suppose not. Some clothes should have been delivered for you—a fresh tunic and breeches. More will be acquired soon. Once you have overseen my bath, you may wash yourself as well—I’m sure you’re quite exhausted from your journey here.”

  The idea of this exquisite elf bathing her smooth, dusky skin before me inspired a certain very natural twinge of lust. I resisted the urge to politely fold my hands before myself and instead crossed my arms. “Less exhausted than I am curious.”

  Her great green snake poking its head from beneath her long white locks, the Materna lifted a hand and stroked the elongated barrel of its body without looking down at either it or me. “I suppose you do not know much about our people…we are a very secretive race for a great many reasons, even among the elves. At least you will have much time for finding answers.”

  “It’s a good thing, because you’re right—I do have many questions. I was told you will decide where I eat and sleep.”

  “You will eat with me,” she said, gliding past me while wearing the affect of a woman entranced by things mere mortals could not see. “There will be instances when my duties require solitude or separation from you; but by and large, you are expected to serve as my footman as much as my bodyguard.”

  Footman to a beautiful durrow! Now, that didn’t sound so bad when compared to the lot of those men tasked with slaving over endless swords, shields, spearheads. I drew myself upright, assuring her, “It would be my honor to assist you in your day to—that is, bloom to—why, what are you laughing for?”

  She had been laughing, at any rate, her teeth bright white pearls against the red cast of her lips. At my question—my demand—her laugh took a darker tone. “What an impudent question…you will learn how to speak to your betters in time, Burningsoul. Until then, I’d might as well humor you. I’m laughing at you, of course…your routine.”

  I scoffed lightly, hands folding before me. “What routine is that, Materna?”

  “You know what I mean. This willingness to serve. This paladin of Weltyr, rolling over and showing the immediate obedience of a dog. You think you’re so much smarter than us…don’t you suppose other men have tried such things before, attempting to gain our trust to earn freedom—or, at the very least, privilege enough to steal their freedom back? It doesn’t work. It never works. You saw this city. How long did it take you to traverse it? Most of the bloom, I would wager…and it’s dark now. Not the finest time to be moving through the Nightlands. Not as a human, anyway.”

  “Surely you understand what I did to the spirit-thieves within their own den of sin.”

  “And surely you understand that we, as the keepers of slaves, have long-since developed all number of systems and social constructs to keep those slaves. In other words…your compliance until now has been very much appreciated, but ultimately unnecessary and far more duplicitous than showing your frustration would have been.”

  “I’m not frustrated. I owe my life to Odile and Indra; if anything, I’m frustrated that I won’t be able to fulfill the favor I promised them when I was in their service.”

  “Oho, I see…this use they had for you in the city was attractive, was she?”

  After considering the wadjita in my mind’s eye, (and the expectant face of the durrow before me prepared for another lie), I decided it was best to confess the truth. “I did find her curiously beautiful, I admit, but it’s more a point of honor. They offered my services as part of a deal on some heathen relic they were melting down; without me, they’ll be cheated.”

  “I see. Well”—the Materna sighed and slunk into her bedroom, shrugging the great python from her slim shoulders and draping it over the branch of a tree growing, to my surprise, along with a great many other aboveground plants in a little garden to one corner of the room—“those two are trouble, but they have done me many favors in the past…your presence is but one of them.”

  While this high priestess looked tenderly upon her snake as he settled on the branch where she’d set him, I had the opportunity to examine her profile as close as I dared. In the dwarvish lighting and soft tapestries of the room, Valeria’s gray-blue face was kissed by tinges of pink—a soft blush to her face, a hint of color upon the tip of her nose. It echoed the color of her mouth, those lips contorted in thought; my heart sped in my chest to behold her until, as she turned to face me, I averted my eyes to th
e snake.

  “I will look into loaning you back to them for a few hours somebloom soon. But I must confess, Burningsoul…what talents could a paladin of Weltyr have in such matters?”

  Another twinge of lust overcame me. Though I strove to keep my mind and manner professional, my undressed state made it difficult to hide my interest in her. “Plenty of talents, Materna. I have never been a man who was above learning what it is that women want.”

  “My, so it would seem…you are very charming.”

  Though she, like her sisters, had no pupils I could perceive, I nonetheless could tell her eyes were linked fully with mine. That phantom’s gaze seemed as though to see my very soul, and now knowing her as I do I wonder if perhaps she could. As she looked into me, her hands lifted to the clasp of her cloak.

  The fabric slipped from her shoulders and left her in the clinging priestess garb that was like nothing any holywoman of Weltyr ever would have dreamed of wearing. It was barely a loincloth and a bodice, in truth; without her cloak, her body’s every curve was lain bare before me, dark against the white fabric of her vestments. These were thin, and the play of light upon them was such that even my insensitive human eyes could make out the distinct patterns of what lay beneath.

  And all that lay beneath was soon lain bare for my eye, as the Materna of the durrow reached behind her neck to unclasp the hook of her gown. With barely more than a serpentine wiggle, the scraps of gilded white cloth fell to the floor at her feet. My new mistress stared me down through those haunting, steady eyes: my own whipped wildly from the pouring mane of thick white hair that half-obscured her sumptuous breasts; to the small cotton thicket of pubic hair, slight but barely visible upon the tip of her pubic mound; to the broad curves of her thighs and rear compared against the tight bow of her waist.

  “Let your new mistress decide how talented you are in the matters of pleasing a woman…then I will make my final decision as to whether or not you are worth lending out.”

  Unable to help myself but cure the empty palms that itched to fill with her, I closed the distance to the sound of her brief gasp of erotic surprise. Her hands had lifted instinctively and I caught her wrists. Valeria gazed into me, her eyelids fluttering, her lips parted to show the tips of white teeth against the red petals of her mouth. Beyond that, a shimmering field of tongue.

  She relaxed in my grip. I released her arms to pick her up by the waist, provoking a better-natured gasp followed by a quite astonished laugh. “Oh, my! You really are an impudent one…I knew I’d like you, oh—”

  Her body was so warm and soft and fragrant to hold over my shoulder that I hated the thought of relinquishing my grip on her. All the same, I threw her down upon the thick spread of her bed, a well-pillowed love nest that splayed from the wall in a semi-circular shape and took up easily a quarter of the room. She gasped, landing upon her back, her thighs spreading to reveal a glint of excitement at the apex between.

  “You’re certainly making the most of your slavery, it would seem.” One hand lifted to hide her mouth, her fingers poised against those ruby lips. The other hand ran over her breast, toying with a dusky nipple to increase the ache that I let her see without compunction. Anyway, it was impossible to avoid: I knelt between her splayed legs and ran my hands over her thighs, an act that left me uncovered for her gaze’s greater pleasure. At the sight of me, I swear her legs spread wider into my touch.

  “Weltyr guides us down strange byways in life—it is not up to us to argue, Materna, but to throw ourselves into our circumstances and see what comes of them.”

  My caressing thumb brushed over her gently parted lower lips, her delta’s slight blossom of arousal revealing a pink valley amid the lovely ashen mounds. She gasped softly, shifting slightly as my thumb’s tickling grew more deliberate but no less teasing, trailing up and down the button of her greatest pleasure.

  “I feel much the same of Roserpine…my Lady warned me of you, Burningsoul, oh, in a dream just three darks ago…”

  The feminine nectar of her lust poured in earnest now: I parted her labia to admire the tight, oozing source. The tip of my finger teased against this soft, warm burrow and she shuddered, her voice rising in a moan as I lowered my head to work my tongue over her center in time with my digit’s probing. Each time I pushed in just a little deeper, and each time I ached all the more; I resisted relieving it, devoted solely to the pleasure of the exquisite woman before me. It was more than having something to prove—it was a desire from the start to give her pleasure. A real desire to learn about her, caress her, make love to her, that I felt from that very first time.

  “I didn’t know it was you, of course…I won’t say more about it because—oh, because you’re not one of Roserpine’s chosen—but oh, oh! Oh, slave!”

  She gasped, the hands that had been roving over her breasts reaching up to grip one of the many pillows behind her head. I lapped at her all the faster, my middle finger plunging into her soaking altar of Roserpine as deeply as my manhood ached to stab her. Ah, to be so lucky as that finger!

  No matter. Just that touch rendered her momentarily speechless, her keening high and loud as she dripped hot feminine lust around my tongue and finger. “Slave, slave, yes, yes, you’re very good…good boy, Burningsoul, oh, goddess, what a good slave…I was worried, you know—worried, worried the dream meant something else—worried that you wouldn’t work out…by Roserpine’s eyes, oh, I had no idea paladins were so versed in the bodies of women—yes, yes—”

  While I suckled and teased and toyed with her, Valeria’s body tightened sharply around my fast-working finger. It curled up in pursuit of the spot that I had found, in most women, to be as reliably sensitive as the more traditionally utilized external nerve. As many did, she cried out in shock to have it touched; unlike many, however, she did not protest that it was too intense for her. No—she only moaned with relief, with joy, crying out, “Oh, yes! Burningsoul, yes, faster, faster, oh—oh—”

  Her widespread legs tensed on either side of me, her back arching into an exquisite obsidian bridge. I watched her as best I could, my eyes flickering toward the rest of her while my tongue increased its pace as fast as possible. Soon she clenched and released a veritable flood of desire, her body rocked by a moan that rattled through my brain and surely made it to the ears of the guards outside her quarters.

  “Oh, yes! Yes, oh, Burningsoul…”

  Her hands ran wildly over her body as she climaxed, her violent shuddering easing to something less rattling when I lifted my head and removed my hand from her glistening valley. She moaned, biting her lip and running those hands up into her streams of white hair. I realized after a belated seconds that she was staring at my cock, straining miserable and stiff against my stomach like a dog leaping up for table scraps.

  “Maybe you do serve me happily after all,” she said, her voice still breathy with shortened breath and low hums of pleasure. “That was very good, slave…oh, very good. Wretched thing—aren’t you embarrassed that you’ve gotten so hard?”

  “It’s only the natural thing, Materna…you are the most beautiful woman I have ever bedded, to say the very least.”

  “Aha! You are a wretch, oh, my…you think your sweet words will be rewarded, do you? Think that if you’re very good I’ll let you satisfy yourself in this very same temple you just pleasured? Such a reward is only for the finest of slaves…the bulls we breed with, the concubines we favor. Your cock’s satisfaction means nothing to me, nor will it to any of the women I permit to use you.”

  “It is more than enough to lay hands on you and suffer the aching weight of this desire.”

  “Is it?”

  Watching me carefully, the Materna sat up and rolled to the edge of her bed. A shelf there was displayed with, I quickly realized, a number of differently-sized phalluses of a number of different materials. The ivory one she chose was nearly my size (only nearly) and almost as white as the pubic hairs near which its head lay when she settled back in the pillows again. In ti
me I would have a chance to look around and consider that the whips and straps and other instruments of cruelty lining her chamber’s walls were not intended for punishment, but pleasure. For now I was simply as surprised as I was aroused by the sight of my gorgeous mistress with this ivory dildo in her hand.

  “So it’s enough to watch me fuck myself with this, is it?”

  Valeria moaned low to ease the cool tip of its head up and down her shimmering slit, working it slowly against herself before sliding it down toward the tight entrance of her body. “You don’t mind that no matter how badly you want it, I’m not going to let you take me just yet?”

  “Of course, it drives me mad…but the decision is yours, Materna. I am your slave.”

  “How your cock jumps to admit it! Oh…Burningsoul, oh—”

  The ivory head had begun to push just inside her body, and I ached to be so lucky but strove not to show it in my face. Her wicked grin expanded. “Yes, that’s right, watch me…oh, I like the thought of you watching me. Will you be able to stand to watch me use other slaves before your eyes?”

  She was a tease to say the least, and the wildest woman I had ever known. Not even Branwen—like most aboveground elves, was very liberal with her so-called love—had been so avidly filthy-minded of tongue and daring of deed. As Valeria slowly worked the dildo into the confines of her wet valley, I dared to slide a hand along the smooth flesh of her shin and caress even high as the middle of her inner thigh—the only torture I dared offer her in revenge. “If I am your slave, Madame, then I am to be your property. No more worthy of release or attention than this toy here. If you choose to use other slaves before me, I can stop you no more than I could stop you from lending me out to please your friends and comrades.”

  “Good, good…oh, good…I like a slave who genuinely has a good attitude. I like a slave who likes to watch…oh, you do like to watch, don’t you?”