Spear of Destiny: Chapter 28

Hi everyone - sorry this took a while to get out, but I had to finish the book and get cracking on editing before I felt like I could keep posting.

There's some significant changes to prior chapters to make some plot connections more clear and link the start and end of the book more clearly. You'll see that in the final version of SoD - which every Patron receives as part of their sponsorship. I'll be able to set that download up for you on the 31st :)

And oh look: it's the first sexy-times chapter!

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The colorful hallucinations from the battle tea were in full swing by the time we finished mopping up and got shown to our rooms. Suri and I fell on each other before the door was even closed. I peeled her out of her armor, shedding it piece by piece on the floor, and half carried, half dragged her to the bathroom. We didn’t actually make it to the water: Suri pressed herself against the vanity counter and hooked her legs up over my hips, moaning as I kissed from the base of her sternum to her neck, tasting salt and the faint scent of jasmine and sandalwood. She lifted her chest, pressing her skin to my mouth, her breasts sliding smooth and heavy against my cheeks.

“Ah! Mmmmnngh-oh!” Suri’s scarlet hair clung to her face as she tipped her head back and to the side, baring the long, dark line of her throat. My heart sped, and my mouth watered as I nuzzled up and bit down on the side of her neck. Her skin was so soft it felt like fur against my lips. She shuddered in my arms, gasping, then moaning as the points of my teeth pressed into her skin.

“Harder!” She clutched the back of my head, pushing it forward.

A flicker of anxiety made me hesitate, but when I pushed in between Suri’s thighs, they were slick with need. Skin-hungry, I pulled her hips forward and thrust into her as I bit. At the first taste of blood, my unnaturally slow heart surged to life, pounding in my ears.

“Mmph!” I clamped my jaws down, holding her like a lion with a gazelle by the throat, and drove into her with sudden urgency. Suri gasped, pressing up against my mouth, and I felt her shudder with need. Her muscles relaxed, leaving her hungry, willing…then ecstatic, as I clutched her close and fucked her down against the counter.

“Yes, yes, yes-” She panted the word, over and over, then let out a staccato cry when I reached up to stroke one of her nipples in time with the sucking pressure of my mouth. My teeth were to either side of her carotid, not penetrating it, but I could feel her racing pulse as she built toward an explosive, eager release. The sensation blended with the wet heat of her body, the rhythmic clench of her body around mine. My eyes rolled, then fluttered closed as brief, hallucinatory images and sensations overlaid the pleasure. I was flying, diving, two hearts pulsing like engines deep in my chest. The muscles of my back and shoulders worked like I had wings, flexing with every thrust, as a distant, alien excitement built with the heat in my own body. It was the dual heartbeat that tipped me off—and briefly shocked me out of my trance.

“…Karalti?”

She did not reply, but I knew was there with me, with us—silent, breathless, watching and feeling through the Bond the way she had watched the gauntlet in Lahati’s Tomb. I jerked in surprise, just as Suri climaxed with a deep, throbbing spasm that pulled me into my own release. And as I came, I heard and felt Karalti’s telepathic gasp of empathic pleasure.

“FUCK!” I snarled, pulling my mouth up from Suri’s neck. She was glassy-eyed and flushed as I dragged her down to the floor and roughly guided her onto her hands and knees. She let out a cry of surprised pleasure as I mounted her from behind, caught up in some instinct that was only partly human. I clutched at her waist with one hand, reaching around to cup her breasts with the other, and took her a second time as the flow between Karalti and I deepened and broadened into a two-way river of sensation. She was curious, nervous, excited as the unfamiliar sensations of my body echoed to her nerves… and when I came again, the orgasm rocketed between us like a sonar pulse, back and forth, as she reached her own private climax somewhere beyond the keep.

“Oh…god… holy…” Gasping, still bucking into Suri’s body, I collapsed over her back and pressed her chest down to the floor as I strained for more purchase, more depth, more…everything.

“Mmmm.” Suri stretched underneath me, resting her cheek against her arms. Her voice was thick and slow with afterglow. “Post-combat sex. The actual fucking best.”

I was tongue tied, my senses anchored somewhere between my own body and Karalti’s. It was all I could do to lie over Suri’s back and catch my breath.

“You ‘kay?” She murmured.

“Yeah.” My voice was hoarse—because god help me, I was still hard. Karalti’s own spasms of pleasure were echoed in places in my body that didn’t rightfully exist. I felt her self-delivered orgasm at the root of my cock, driving me to keep thrusting, keep moving… until finally, she finished. The strength of the Bond began to ebb and narrow, and I was able to breathe without feeling like I was doing it with two pairs of lungs. “Yeah. I’m okay. Something really weird just happened.”

“Was it this?” Suri reached up to gently touch the deep bloody marks on her neck. “Because I’m fine, I swear. I’d have said something if I wasn’t.”

“No, it wasn’t that. It was…” I flushed, suddenly ashamed. “Everything’s okay. Just… uhh… it’s something to do with the Bond. You know, my link to Karalti.”

“I know what the Bond is, you dimwit.” Suri chuckled, and reached back to cup my head. She drew my face to hers and kissed me over her shoulder, long and deep, and the flush of shame faded as I lost myself in the feeling of her lips on mine. When we parted, I slowly eased out of her. She looked back and down, and her eyebrows rose.

“Well well well,” she said. “Guess we need to make Meewfolk Battle Tea a regular part of the castle diet?”

“If it lasts more than four hours, I’m calling a doctor.” I cleared my throat and kneeled back. “Holy shit.”

“What’s this about Karalti?” Suri scooted over to the vanity, searching for a towel.

“I-I’ll talk about it later. Give me a minute to talk to her.” I scrubbed at my eyes, reaching back out to my dragon—and finding a channel of blissful post-orgasmic fatigue as she lounged in her own afterglow.

“I’m sorry.”Karalti’s telepathic voice was sheepish, but also a little blurry. “I should have asked, huh?”

“It’s okay.” I said—and let her feel—that it really was alright. “Just took me by surprise. You’ve uhh… you’ve always tuned out when Suri and I are together. You’ve never tuned IN before.”

“I know. But this time, I felt you start to feel good and I just…”Karalti trailed off, and I felt a small, sweet wave of afterglow pass over me like warm sunlight. “I guess I just wanted to know what it was like.”

There was a heavy pause between us. Suri threw me the towel and picked herself up with a pleased groan.

“So…was it good?” I gave Suri a smile as she went over to the bathtub, spoke the command words to heat the water, and stepped over the rim to ease down.

“Yeah. It was.” Karalti hummed. “Suri is really awesome, isn’t she?”

For a second, I wasn’t sure I’d heard her correctly. Then I realized that, yes, she had just said what she’d said. And meant it.

“You…uh… Yes. Yes, she is.” I rubbed myself down, then got to my feet and wobbled over to the tub. It was easily big enough for two people—or three—and in that moment, I felt a deep surge of resentment toward Ryuko’s developers for insisting on a 6-hour grace period between Karalti’s use of the Polymorph spell. “Look, I’m going to have to talk about this later, alright? But rest assured that I am not mad. I’m whatever the opposite of mad is, but also combined with an unstoppable prize-winning erection.”

“Believe me, I know.” Karalti’s voice turned dark and sly. “I can hear your thoughts too, remember?”

I winced as I eased down into the hot water between Suri’s knees, sitting with my back to her front. “After this, I seriously doubt I’m going to ever forget that again.”

***

I may or may not have been preoccupied with thoughts of Suri, Karalti, and myself in various configurations as we led the ships home on the morning of the 28th of Boseg Hava. I flew ahead of the frigates with Karalti, daydreaming for most of the four-hour flight until we came within view of Karhad. For the first time since I’d arrived in Myszno, the city was celebrating.

The marketplace was packed—a festival, by the look of it, with the townspeople feasting as best they could to celebrate the liberation of Bas and the restoration of all ten counties. Beyond the marketplace, I noticed that something had already changed about the city’s skyline. There was scaffolding everywhere.

“Wait a second. Are they... are they rebuilding the cathedral?” I zoomed my vision in, and sure enough, the big building now covered in walkways was the half-destroyed church of Khors. It had been third on my list of big projects to fund, after the university and hospital. “Did Vash come back with money, or did I miss something?”

Karalti flicked a wingtip, gliding easily on the warm currents of air rising from the city. “I dunno. Check the KMS?”

I opened the menus and flipped through to Karhad’s screen. When I saw the stats, my eyebrows shot up. “We have nearly a thousand volunteers mobilizing in Racsa. Like…spontaneously. By themselves. I did not order a thousand volunteers.”

“Well, duh. I’m pretty sure that volunteers who are ordered to work are called ‘slaves’. Wanna go say hi?”

“Let’s do it.” I banged my fist down on top of my helmet, and assumed the position.

Karalti let out a melodious, ringing roar, then pulled her wings into a swift dive. She tilted to the left as we descended toward the marketplace, roaring a second time as we passed the walls of the Merchant Ward. I adjusted position as I sensed her intent, hanging on tight as she rolled in the air over the crowd below. People squealed, cheered and waved to us; children jumped up and down, priests bowed their heads. She pulled out to glide gracefully around the perimeter of the market ward, high enough we didn’t blow anything over, low enough we could hear what everyone was shouting.

“Lord Dragozin!”

“Long live House Dragozin! Long live Myszno!”

“Is that the Volod?”

“BURNA MALADIK!”

I unequipped my helmet to wave back down, returning to the saddles grips as Karalti and I wordlessly synced through the bond. I dropped back down and held on as she barrel-rolled overhead. Cries of wonder were drowned out by growing roar of the airships as they came in low behind us. I looked back to see the decks lined with Yanik and Meewfolk, all of them waving and whistling to the townsfolk.

“I didn’t know the Renown boost was going to make THAT much of a difference!” I almost shouted to Karalti telepathically, before remembering that she could hear me over the noise. Musicians had struck up in the market, blasting cheerful music on fiddles, flutes and zithers.

“They’re happy that the harvest is gonna come in,”Karalti said. “The Demon ruined their lives, and now they see things turning around. I’d be happy, too.”

As we drew up on the castle, I couldn’t help but notice that it was bustling. I frowned, trying to make sense of the number of people inside. They were all over the scaffolding, reinforcing it and adding more.

“Hang on—I DEFINITELY did not order repairs on the castle. I wanted to rebuild the university first.” I leaned out over Karalti’s shoulder, squinting into the wind. “Holy shitsnacks. Are those the volunteers?”

“I dunno.” Karalti replied. “Let’s go down and ask Istvan. I can see him from here.”

Istvan stood beside a table manned by four guardsmen, talking animatedly with Rudolph as the guards processed lines and lines of people. There wasn’t enough room to land in the courtyard: Karalti had to fly past the Gatehouse and land outside the Orphans Camp, scattering a crowd of curious, bored Meewfolk and awestruck volunteers.

I surveyed the commotion and struggled to understand how and what was happening. Carpenters sawed at logs, while masons shaped blocks of stone to repair the curtain wall. Workers shifted wheelbarrows full of rubble, or walked beside grunting triceratops as they hauled creaking wagons of stone and sand up the road. The cleanup was going at a surreal speed. Like players, NPCs had Inventories and Menus. They crafted by running through kinetic mini-games that distilled crafting into a fun, but challenging act of pantomime. As I watched, a Mercurion [Master Stonemason] and their assistants rapidly stacked and fit drystone into a broken doorway, while others pried broken paving stones out of the courtyard and replaced them with new sheets of slate.

“My lord—we heard the news of your victory!” Istvan seemed genuinely cheerful as I pulled up at the table in a daze. “As you can see, it was not only us here at the castle. Word has spread of the fall of Zoltan Gallo.”

“But who... how...?” I bought up the KMS logs, scanning for activity, but there was no history of anyone with access to the system rustling up all these volunteers. “Was it Bubek?”

“No, I haven’t heard from him. Believe me, Your Grace, we weren’t exactly expecting this ourselves.” Istvan planted his hands on his hips, looking out over the crowd with satisfaction. “They began showing up yesterday.”

Numbly, I checked the KMS. Sure enough, we were in the right Renown tier to command about a thousand volunteers. Emphasis on ‘command’.

“My lord, there are two matters I must bring to your attention,” Rudolph said, as drawn and dignified as always. “There are guests waiting to speak with you in the great hall. Starborn, in fact.”

“Starborn?” The giddiness faded around the edges, replaced by wariness. I’d had very mixed interactions with other players in Archemi.

“Yes, Your Grace. You hired them for Kingdom Quests, and now they wish to introduce themselves and possibly pledge service to Myszno specifically and Vlachia in general,” Rudolph said. “Also, I have taken the liberty of contacting an artist to help you design livery and heraldry suitable for your House. We cannot fly the standard of House Bolza. The designer is charging a very reasonable rate within our budget.”

“I... thanks. Man, I don’t know what to say.” I rubbed my eyes, then let out a tense breath. “I guess the first thing I need to do is go and play greeter.”

“Welcome to the life of nobility,” Istvan replied dryly. “Oh, also: Vash has been in contact. He says they have begun extracting the goods from the dragon graveyard, and all is going well. There is, as Vash so eloquently put it, ‘enough gold in that place to make me cough so hard my asshole popped out like a mushroom’.”

I shook my head in amazement. “Vash should have been a bard, not a monk. The man is a poet.”

“The man is something, that’s for sure.” Istvan let out an irritated sigh, but he couldn’t hide the smile at the corners of his mouth.

“Thanks for handling this.” I rolled my shoulders, glancing up as the shadows of the frigates fell over the skyport. “I’m grateful for your work, both of you. Rudolph, I’ll meet with your artist after talking with the Starborn, so that we can sit down with Suri and hash something out. I think you’re right. It’s about time we had a flag to rally behind.”

Suri was with the ships, so I went to meet with the players alone. I entered the great hall to find a knot of five people talking and laughing—four Meewfolk and one human—and a second human sitting apart, wrapped in a feathered grey cloak, her shield resting against the edge of the bench beside her. She had a boxy kind of face, with a hard jawline and very large eyes. Her hair was brown, falling like a mane halfway down her back. When she heard the door open, she looked over—and my eyes widened as recognition dawned.

“Nethres?” I called, picking up my pace. “Holy shit.”

Nethres tensed when I called her name, rising to her feet. The last time I’d seen her, she’d been clad in the blue and silver heavy plate of the Order of St. Grigori. Now, she was dressed in a set of armor fit for a Valkyrie. By the sword, shield, and Teutonic designs on her surcoat, I was willing to bet that’s exactly what she was.

“Hector.” Nethres had a husky, hollow voice, which warmed with real pleasure as I closed on her and offered a hand. She clapped her palm into mine, meeting my gaze as we shook. “Always knew you’d go a long way. Never imagined how far, though. Look at all this.”

“Thanks.” I was glad to see her, but still wary. “What a fucking adventure it’s been since dragon school, hey?”

“Guess you could call it that.” Nethres hadn’t ever smiled during the Trials, and she was just as serious now.

“What are you doing here, on the other side of Artana?” I asked, glancing back at the others. They’d stopped talking, watching us curiously. “I figured you’d stayed in Ilia.”

Nethres’ lips tightened. “The only people who stayed in Ilia are the ones into Baldr and Lucien’s Hitler fantasy. I left the country and traveled west to Gilheim. Picked up my Advanced Path, and bonded with a quazi.”

“Jeez. Well, what about Casper? We saw him in Dakhdir not long ago.”

At the mention of the archer’s name, Nethres’ face rippled with an irritated tic. “Fuck Casper. I thought he was my friend. Turns out he’s a piece of shit. I’ll be happy to tell you how it went down, in private.”

“Sure. Let me handle these guys, and we can go catch up.” I nodded, and turned to the rest of the group, beckoning them over.

The five of them were clearly split into two different parties, because the first group, three almost-identical Meewfolk with calico-patterned fur, moved together like synchronized swimmers. The other pair was only slightly less surreal. The Meewfolk woman was some kind of bard class, judging by her eccentric clothes and the strange looking instrument slung over her back—a set of double-layered pan-pipes about as long as a baseball bat. Her human companion was a one-hundred-percent walking fanfiction toon of Conan the Barbarian, complete with sword, shield, and bulging muscles. He wore nothing except a manly scowl, a loincloth, a rough fur cloak and steel pauldrons.

“Hey everyone, sorry to keep you waiting.” I put on my best veneer of confidence as they joined the conversation. “I’m Hector. I’m guessing that we have The Meews Brothers, plus Kylirra and Konan?”

Kylirra’s brilliant blue eyes hooded, and she trilled as she extended her hand to me, fingers out. “Oh, darling, I didn’t expect you’d even remember us! It’s so wonderful to be able to finally put a face to the name! We did that quest to recover all those little lordlings for you, remember? Kon, say hello.”

“Uhhn.” ‘Kon’ grunted.

The three brothers stepped forward to shake hands: all of them, at the same time. I started from the left and worked to the right, trying not to cross my eyes as I looked at them. The only visual difference between the three Meewfolk men was the color of their calico patches. The ginger, brown and white spots were swapped around.

“Nice to finally put a face to the Count of Myszno.” It was the middle one who spoke. “I’m... uhh... we’re pleased to meet you. My name was Hayden, but here we go by Makmaai. Or Max, if that’s easier.”

“Just... Makmaai? Singular?” I looked between them, confused.

Kylirra let out a tinkling laugh, flapping her hand. “‘Makmaai’ means ‘Legion’ in our language, in case you didn’t know.”

“Hah, yeah. We kind of shift focus from body to body, and the other two just roll with whatever the one in charge is doing. If we’re in character, we just go with White Max, Ginger Max, and Brown Max. Like a damn Dr. Seuss book.” The one to the left—the gingeriest—spoke up. “There was a glitch when I... we... uploaded. One set of brain data, three different avatars. If anyone was alive back at the company, we’re sure they’d have a goddamn field day trying to figure out how this happened.”

“We’re used to it, now, though,” Brown Max continued. “It’d be great if we actually got full EXP for all three toons, but we don’t. It’s split between us, so we make the best out of it.”

“Oh my god, you guys should totally make an acapella group!” Kylirra trilled, before looking back to me. “Anyway, Hector, me and Kon here want to sign up with your clan. I mean, I know there’s no official clans on Archemi or anything, but we’ve been all over Artana and the only other Starborn worth anything is that Baldr Hyland guy in Ilia. And to be frank with you, he seems like kind of a douche.”

“Hunh.” Kon nodded his assent.

“You don’t even know the half of it,” Nethres said dourly.

“Believe me, we’ve heard stories.” Kylirra let out tittering, nervous laugh. “But yes, I don’t know about y’all, but after two back-to-back world wars and a mass extinction event, I’m a little sick of assholes trying to conquer the world for no good reason.”

“Same,” Brown Max said. “We want to sign up with your group and help out as we can. The talk in taverns is that Vlachia is gearing up to fight Ilia.”

“We’re trying to deter Ilia before it comes to full blown war, but yeah. Baldr and friends might leave us with no choice,” I said. “Anyway, I’ll tell you what: Myszno always has quests that need doing. All of you are welcome to take up rooms in the castle, or you can find your own places to live in Karhad, Boros, Litvy or Solonovka. I’ll preference you for Kingdom Quests for say, the next month or so. You get the EXP, money, whatever loot the quest entails, unless that loot belongs to the Volod and-or my province. Once Myszno is back to full operational capacity, we’ll see what I can do here as Voivode to grant special status in Vlachia. Depending on what your goals are, there’s posts available here for good people. You can also just use Karhad as a base to adventure from, if you want.”

“Sounds good to me…us. We don’t really get what’s happening in Ilia. We’re just really just looking for a place to figure out the game,” White Max said. “Feels like we’ve been running all over the place since the Helpdesk went dead.”

“Did you work at Ryuko?” I asked.

“Yeah. HR department. Nothing technical, unless you count staffing as ‘technical’.” The Maxes nodded.

“My wife was a programmer in the military division down in Texas.” Kylirra pinned her ears, tail lashing. “She didn’t make it, and I’ve just been drifting ever since. Kon here has been really supportive, but honestly, I just want somewhere to settle down and put my life back together.”

Kon grunted, crossing his arms.

“What about you, man?” I regarded the barbarian apprehensively. “You, uh... got any goals?”

“Uh? Oh.” He sniffed and scratched his nose, scowling up at the roof of the Great Hall. “Yes. After we crush the decadent Ilian dogs, I would like a position at the University of Karhad.”

“You want to…work at the university?” I resisted the urge to rub my eyes. “Teaching…?”

“Law.” The big man’s mouth sloped across to one side. “I was about to finish my second doctorate before HEX.”

I blinked a couple of times.

“Security, Conflict and Human Rights. Focus on child welfare,” he added, helpfully.

“Well. Sure. I think we can arrange something.” I was about to propose some kind of Barbarian Harvard idea when the doors to the Great Hall opened, and Suri strode in ahead of Taethawn, Zlaslo, and Kitti. When Kon saw Suri, his eyes got very big and very dark. He sniffed, straightened up, and dusted off his loincloth.

“Hey there, partner.” Suri kissed me on the cheek, the turned to the group of Starborn and shook hands with each person. “Suri Ba’hadir, Voivodzina of Myszno. You’re the players we booked to handle some of our Kingdom Quests, right?”

“Yes. Yes ma’am.” Kon cleared his throat, shooting me a beady-eyed glance. I grinned back at him, making sure to show fangs. “Lady Ba’hadir, the tales of your great beauty have-”

“Oh, knock it off, mate. I appreciate it and all, but I don’t know you from Adam.” Suri brushed him off, shaking hands with Nethres next. “Don’t know if I recognize you, either.”

“Nethres. Just Nethres.” She gripped Suri’s hand firmly. “A Valkyrie of Gilheim.”

“Can always welcome more strong arms into Myszno.” Suri smiled at Kon, who was still trying to scowl despite his red cheeks, and then at Nethres. “Now, sorry to break this up, but Hector and I just got back from a big mass combat and we need to get ready for an appointment with His Majesty.”

“If you can handle the prep for that, Nethres and I need to catch up in private about our time in Ilia,” I said. “I know her from way back. We met at dragon school.”

“Yeah. I was wiped out in the first round of Trials,” Nethres added, her slow eyes shifting to me.

“Ooh, do you know what’s really happening in Ilia, then?” Kylirra’s tail curled into a curious arch. “I’ve heard so many horrible stories.”

“Nah. We just need to catch up about some old friends,” I lied. “By the way, if you guys are interested, there is actually a decent-sized quest that needs handling. There’s been reports of monsters and bandits in the ruins of Karhad University, and we can’t rebuild it until they’ve been thrown out. How do you feel like teaming up to handle it?”

“Sure. Seems like a good way to settle in and build some Renown.” White Max nodded in time with his clones.

“I approve,” Kylirra said, squinting happily. “Can’t wait for those university taverns to open back up!”

“Yes. I accept this challenge.” Kon gave me a curt bow of his head. “Issue the quest.”

I went into the KMS, found The Vaunted Halls of Karhad University, and assigned it to them. “Done.”

“Excellent. We will destroy these monsters and bandits.” Kon cracked his knuckles, sneering on one side of his mouth. “And after the university is rebuilt, I will teach from a lectern adorned with their skulls.”