“Filio, you old goat!,” an Adventurer still covered in adventure grime shouted when he saw the older warrior sitting alone. The Adventurer said a quick farewell to the party he’d arrived with then rushed to his old friend. “Wasn’t expecting to find you still haunting this Guildhall,” he proclaimed with a friendly wink as he sat down across from Filio.
“Ain’t been that long since your party was last through these parts,” Filio replied. “Or has it been?” he added uncertainly. “Time flies by when you get to be my age, and this life keeps you busy,” he added, grinning to make clear he adored the life of an Adventurer even if he was, perhaps, edging towards being too old for it.
“I suppose it hasn’t been THAT long,” the new arrival admitted. “Maybe it’s just that my party has been on some wild adventures since we last made our way through Midgate. I suppose how much this place has changed has thrown me off, too. I mean, I almost didn’t recognize it when we got here!”
Filio cocked an eyebrow. “You talking about the city of Midgate, or this here Adventurers’ Guildhall?”
“Both, I suppose,” the younger Adventurer said after thinking about the question for a moment. “Last time we came through this way Midgate was barely a town. Now look at the place! Not just a town, it’s threatening to become a damn city.”
“Hells,” Filio said, “I fear it’s threatening to become more than a damn city. Feels like it wasn’t that long ago I rolled in and the town wasn’t more than a few buildings being put up in a bit of reclaimed wilds. But thinking back I was a lot younger and sprier then. Must have been nearly a lifetime ago,” he muttered, memories causing him to drift off.
He looked around lovingly at the busy tavern-like common room of the Guildhall. “I even remember when this Guildhall was built. Just a tiny border town in the middle of nothing, a little stopover for travelers to spend a night in meager comfort while being protected by a wooden palisade. Now look at the place, high stone walls to keep the people in the city so safe they can forget that just an hour’s ride out of the city are monster-filled wilds!”
The younger Adventurer leaned in, intrigued by what the older man was sharing. “So you’ve been here from the beginning? I didn’t know that about you. I always wondered if the Guildmaster built this place with his bare hands. That kind, old man LOVES this place, you can see it.”
Filio chuckled. “No, lad, the Guildmaster didn’t build this place, although he’s put so much work into the Guildhall one could SAY he did. No, he wasn’t here, not at the beginning. He was still an Adventurer then. Wasn’t later till he arrived. He’d just retired from the life but wanted to stay in the thick of it, settle in running a busy Guildhall giving out quests to clear monsters from the wilds. Even now with Midgate having grown so large the Guildhall is just as much in the thick of things. More, maybe, even. Quest logs filled with a lot more than monster slaying these days.”
“The place HAS gotten bigger,” the younger Adventurer said as he looked around them. “This Guildhall was never the smallest, in fact last time I was through here I even felt it might be a bit too large for how small Midgate was. But I understood why there were so many Adventurers here. Ruin-filled wilds all around waiting to be looted or just cleared of monsters to make way for the growing towns and kingdoms in every direction. Lots of work to be done for men and women like us.”
He took another look around the Guildhall and frowned. “When we rode in through the town gates and saw how developed the city has gotten I wasn’t expecting the Guildhall to have changed so much. Same location, same common room, but the building’s had significant additions added to it! Whole new wings, and from the looks of things the old Guildmaster has finally hired a full staff to help him out. I mean, hell, I count THREE serving wenches delivering drinks. And is that one carrying a full plate of food? Is there a full kitchen here now? Any idea what made that old Guildmaster decide to expand the place so much?”
“Course I do,” Filio said as though the suggestion he didn’t know offended him. “You said it before, that man LOVES this place. He loves being around Adventurers, loves sending them off on quests, loves sitting over there behind his counter all day and most of the night just soaking in the sights and sounds of us Adventurers feasting and drinking and sharing stories.”
He leaned in and lowered his voice. “He was losing ground,” he said as though afraid of being overheard. “As the town became a city and everything grew. The inns in town, they got better. Ever so slowly Adventurers were deciding the free beds here in the Guildhall weren’t worth staying in. What’s a little coin for a much nicer bed and an inn with full meals? And serving wenches! Sometimes an Adventurer is looking to get randy with a woman who ISN’T as covered in adventure grime as they are.
“I could see it before the Guildmaster could. Every few months you’d notice a few more people or even full parties that would come in, collect the reward for their quest, then leave to go stay somewhere else till they were ready for a new quest. Little by little the Guildhall was growing less busy. Less people sleeping here means less people filling the common room. And if you’re back from an adventure and looking to drink, party, and fuck you’re gonna want to be where the action is, right? Well, as the action slowly moved to other inns and taverns even less people wanted to stay here.
“It was eating him up! He had to do SOMETHING. Had to get us all back, or at least as many as he could. It’s been slow but steady since then. The Guildmaster hired a serving wench. Then had the kitchen expanded and added a kitchen staff and a few more serving wenches. There are maids now to keep the nicer rooms clean. There’s a stable girl so Adventurers with mounts will stay here and not go somewhere else. He’s added whole wings and floors to the place and I have a feeling that as long as the city keeps growing he’ll keep expanding to keep men and women like US here.”
“The staff is the most surprising thing to me,” the younger Adventurer said. “The Guildmaster always seemed stubborn about hiring a staff. Like he loved the job so much he wanted to do it ALL himself.”
“I’d say that’s a pretty accurate assessment,” Filio said with a sagely nod. “But if he wanted to keep the Adventurers here he had to make some concessions. I think it nearly killed him. You’ve been to plenty of Guildhalls, you know he’s a Guildmaster who likes to do things his way more than most. I think that’s how he made his peace with it, by doing the staff HIS way.”
Filio leaned in again, once more lowering his voice. “All women,” he said. “Not just the serving wenches, but the kitchen staff. The maids. The stable girl. Everyone. Now some might raise an eyebrow at an older man hiring so many women that way, especially with so many being young and attractive. But I think you were here long enough to know this Guildmaster, he’s got a softness when it comes to women and NOT in a bad way.”
The younger Adventurer nodded. “Everyone knows he gives female Adventurers chances they might not find anywhere else. I mean, hell, I look around the room and I see a LOT of female Adventurers. In this part of Alaria there tends to be almost as many women Adventurers as men, but I’d say there are more women in this room than men and that’s a rare thing even in the most enlightened places I’ve traveled to.”
Filio nodded. “That Guidlmaster, he’s got a heart of gold. Gives women chances they might not find elsewhere. The staff has been the same. They’ve all been women that needed the job and might not have found one somewhere else.”
“Oh?” the younger Adventurer said, raising an eyebrow in interest. “You always know all the gossip, Filio! Tell me about what you know.”
Filio crossed his arms and leaned back, grinning contentedly. “You sure do know how to make an old fool feel needed. Always prided myself in knowing what’s what, although I don’t know if I’d say I KNOW about the staff here. It’s more rumors. I’ve HEARD things, ya know? Why not pick someone and I’ll tell you what I’ve heard.”
The younger Adventurer looked around the room, glancing at a few of the serving girls making their way through the crowd of Adventurers. “How about that one,” he said, pointing to a Faun woman. “Don’t see many Fauns in this part of Alaria. Having known a few Fauns I’d say she’s exotic even for a Faun.”
“That would be Petrova,” Filio said. “If she was a Human or even an Elve that stark silver hair and that elegant, slender, tall body would make her stand out in a crowd. But it’s them antlers that REALLY make the woman stick out, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” the young Adventurer agreed as they both looked at the woman’s deer-like antlers. “Always found the half of their race that was more slender and had the deer-like antlers more striking. The shorter, buffer ones with goat-like horns make good fighters, but when it comes to a serving wench? Tall and slender and pretty wins out in my book.”
“You say you’ve known a few Fauns?” Filio asked. When the younger Adventurer nodded he went on. “Then you notice how abnormal her antlers are, yes?”
The younger man furrowed his brow. “I suppose I haven’t known enough Fauns to realize hers weren’t normal.”
Filio spread his fingers and put his thumbs on the top of his head, imitating antlers. “Most Fauns with antlers got ‘em sticking up and out like so,” he said. “Always thought it had to be a huge pain in the ass,” he muttered before shifting his hands. “But our Petrova, her antlers ain’t like that. They’re pulled back and in close to her head. Makes the woman look like she was made to run. She’s so sleek and slender, and them antlers just add to it.”
Before lowering his hands he moved his fingers back through the air as though tracing pretend horns. “And then there’s the designs etched into her antlers. Beautiful patterns, like them artistic Druids like to weave into living arboreal artwork. Only Faun I’ve ever seen with her antlers carved like that.”
“Suppose I’ve never seen that either,” the younger Adventurer admitted. “There has to be a story behind it all,” he said, smirking to show he was certain Filio was about to tell him the story.
“We’ll get there,” the man assured him. “But first take a moment to watch her. Pretty, yes? And exotic! At first glance she looks pale-skinned like you and me, but on closer look her skin’s more fallow colored. Let’s you see the white speckling on her cheeks. And when you look at them big deer-like ears she’s got and see how the hair on her head turns to soft fur on them, gives you a sense of the animal in the woman.
“Then you take in her face and you see how truly exotic her beauty is. Nose is oddly shaped, but you don’t notice that at first. Kind of big, yet a bit flatter than you find on pale-skinned people. Hard to notice with that black coloring on the underside of the nose that makes her look so deer-like. Distracts you a bit from the strange, ageless beauty of her features. Almost Elven in the way you struggle to place her age. Is she a young woman who looks much older, or an older woman who looks much younger? So hard to say. That long silver hair that’s wrapped around the base of her antlers and hangs down to her ass only adds to the confusion.”
“You know,” the younger man said, “I don’t even know how long Fauns live. Longer than a Human, I remember that, but can’t recall how much longer.”
Filio nodded. “Everyone here’s on just about the same page as you. Maybe she’s only middle-aged for a Faun, but that might mean she’s sixty or one hundred years old. Her features are confusing, but you look into that woman’s eyes… There’s no youth there,” he said, tone suddenly dark.
He nodded to her, lowering his voice again. “Keep watching her. See how she moves? Elegant. Quick. But skittish. Look! That one there tried to sneak a grab of her ass, but she dodged the grope like she’s got a sixth sense when it comes to people touching her. Oh, I know that look. Yes, EVERY serving girl learns how to avoid a grope if so doesn’t want to be pawed at. But watch Petrova, it’s MORE than that. It’s like she’s allergic to being touched, she never lets anyone so much as accidentally bump into her. Even in a crowd when this place is full and people are standing shoulder to shoulder she finds a way to move about without ever being touched.
“Which brings me back to her eyes. Woman’s beautiful, but it’s a cold, icy beauty. And her eyes, again, beautiful, but so cold. They’re intense and sad. That’s a woman who has seen and been through things that left her that way. Cold. Skittish even for a Faun. And never, EVER touching anyone or letting them touch her. Even the way she dresses. A form-fitting dress that shows off her slender, fit figure, yet she wears long sleeves and gloves even when it’s sweltering hot in here. Sometimes she even wears scarves to cover up her long, slender neck, like she can’t bear to have her skin exposed when people can see it.”
“But why?”
Filio leaned in closer, lowering his voice even more. “Petrova’s a quiet woman. Almost never speaks, only in response to people and only when she has to. A lot of people come through here never hear her say a single word. But if she does? That accent! So thick, so foreign. Before I settled here I traveled wide and far, and I can tell you I ain’t never heard an accent like that. Neither has anyone else I’ve asked about it.
“But people talk. Rumors spread. I’ve heard it suggested she’s a refuge from some faraway land. Traumatized by some great calamity that’s left her the way she is. Some say it must have been a war, some say no, it was a more personal tragedy. They say she’d been wandering for a long time before she reached Midgate. Struggled to find work anywhere cause of how quiet she is and how strange she is about touching.”
He leaned back, the dark expression on his face softening. “Then she met the Guildmaster over there. Word is he’s the only one that knows her REAL story, that he managed to get it out of her then, having taken pity on her and being the excellent, kindhearted man he is, gave her a job here.
“I can tell you that she was a shite serving girl at first. Would jerk away every time someone reached for a drink she brought them. Wouldn’t talk. She’s cold and broody now, but there’s almost a kind of charm to how untouchable she is. But back then when she first got here? She was a right surely bitch.
“I remember early on when people didn’t know her well there was this one hulking Barbarian, didn’t want to take ‘no’ as an answer. Only time I remember seeing someone manage to get hold of her.” He went silent and shook his head sadly at the memory.
The young Adventurer waited for Filio to go on. When he didn’t he scoffed in annoyance at being denied the story. “So what happened? Did the Guildmaster intervene and kick the Barbarian out?” He glanced over his shoulder at the middle-aged, plump man sitting behind the Guildhall’s main counter. “With experienced as the man is I always imagined he’d be a terror if he ever needed to unleash his true potential. Everyone knows he’s a powerful magic user and that he’s got a lifetime of enchanted loot squirreled away.”
“All true,” Filio said with a nod, “but there was no need for the Guildmaster to step in. I was there that night but I’m not even sure what I saw. Petrova moved so fast… I seen them deer-like Fauns in fights, they move fast. But that night? It wasn’t natural. It was a blur. And then there was blood and the man… let’s just say he won’t ever be groping a woman again even if she’s saying ‘yes’.”
* * *
Petrova left the kitchen carrying a tray filled with drinks and steaming hand pies. She went to the Guildmaster’s counter and leaned against it, setting the tray down before placing a drink and a hand pie in front of the man. When he eagerly reached for both the Faun woman jerked her hands back, a rude gesture the Guildmaster seemed to take no notice of.
“Busy night,” he told her pleasantly. “And feeling like it might get busier. Good crowd, too,” he added. “A lot of new faces, and a few old ones.”
Petrova glanced out at the crowd of Adventurers filling the large common room and shrugged. “They’re still mostly new to me,” she said, her thick accent twisting her words strangely. She looked over the crowd, stopping and narrowing her eyes when she saw Filio. “Except that old gossip,” she said, husky voice low and menacing. “Man talks and talks and talks. He talks to much.”
The Guildmaster took a sip of his drink then laughed. “You only complain because he’s talking about YOU.”
Petrova side-eyed the Guildmaster in an insolent manner that would have gotten most serving girls fired from most establishments.
The look only made the Guildmaster laugh harder. “He’s useful,” he told her, lowering his voice so only she could hear him. “A hopeless gossip that everyone believes because the old fool has been nursing a drink in the Guildhall’s common room longer than I’ve been running it. People come to him to tell him stories because they want to feel like they know more than him, which just gives him more to tell. They all come to him when they want to know something, they all listen to whatever he says and take it as truth.”
Petrova narrowed her cold eyes. “I see. His ‘truth’… It is often misinformation and lies you want spread?”
“Perhaps,” the Guildmaster said evasively as he glanced at Filio. “What are they saying about you?” he asked, quickly changing the subject. “I know how good your hearing is,” he added, glancing at her deer-like ears.
One of them twitched before they both moved back as though having him looking at them was something she could feel. “He was talking about where he thinks I come from. Why he thinks I am the way they think I am.” She paused, her voice turning ice cold. “And he talked about the night with the Barbarian.”
The Guildmaster nodded slightly. “I suppose that would explain your surlier-than-normal mood. Ignore him,” he added quickly. “I’ve work for you.”
Petrova’s ears perked up. “Work?” she asked, a hint of excitement in her voice. “Not serving these fools, but WORK?” She quickly looked over the Guildhall, eyes linger on each of the female Adventurers. “Your secret work? Your true passion?”
“Yes,” the Guildmaster whispered. “It’s time to take care of another woman whose career as an Adventurer needs to come to an end.”
“Which one is it going to be?” She turned back to meet his eyes, the cold sadness gone from her eyes and replaced with the eager anticipation of a vicious predator. “And how much of her demise will I get to take part in?”
The Guildmaster leaned over the counter, lowering his voice further and pointing. “That one,” he whispered, holding his finger out only long enough to ensure Petrova looked in the right direction. “Elliose Tarradesh, the small Elve that always keeps that hooded cloak over herself like she’s afraid to let the world see what she’s wearing under it.
“She’s nearly as mysterious as you and has a reputation for being even worse with people. She’s a powerful and skilled Sorceress but has had a hard time staying a member of any party for long. She usually only lasts a handful of quests before she’s asked to leave. Yet the Elven woman is so powerful she always finds a new party willing to take her in, even though she has a reputation for lacking people skills.”
Petrova had been staring at the cloaked and hooded Elve as the Guildmaster talked. She now looked back at the man, concern on her face. “I’ve seen her around, but never taken much note of her. Quiet. You say she’s a powerful Sorceress? Those silly tokens you give out, what’s hers say about her?”
“Her guild token says she’s a level eight Sorceress,” the Guildmaster said begrudgingly as though he hadn’t wanted to reveal just how high level the Elve was. “Too powerful for me to hope she’d be taken care of on a quest, especially since she always manages to find another party to take her in. That’s why I’m having you do the deed.”
“Alright,” Petrova said, expression growing serious. “What do you know about her?” Petrova demanded.
The Guildmaster had seen this before on her. Once she was appointed a task like this she would be all business with him. Until the task was over she’d have little patience for the “indulgences” he took with her as payment for taking her in. When she was doing THIS work for him it was the only kind of payment he’d receive.
“Almost nothing,” the Guildmaster said as he leaned back and set his hands on his plump belly. “Supposedly she’s from one of those hidden Elven enclaves, which means she’s not some half-blooded Common Elve. Those who have worked with her say she trained at a fancy magical university there and has an impressive and even frightening command of Elven magic. Word is she’s only taken up the life of an Adventurer as a form of academic research.”
“And?” Petrova asked, impatient for him to go on when he stopped.
The Guildmaster shrugged. “That’s it. If it was going to be easy I wouldn’t be sending you to deal with her,” he added, grinning and winking at her. “You asked how much of her demise you could take part in? How about all of it if you so wish? With as powerful as she is she’ll need a careful, subtle touch, just the kind of thing you excel at. Think of her as a long-term project, someone you can slowly work on when she’s here in between quests.”
“You know that’s how I most enjoy this work,” Petrova said after glancing at the Elve. Hunger had appeared in her eyes, transforming the normally skittish deer-antlered woman for a moment into something that looked more like a predatory beast eager to stalk its prey. She’d positioned herself so only the Guildmaster had been able to see her face, not wanting anyone else to see the flash of the true her.
Only after putting back the mask of the servile, skittish serving girl did she turn and look away from the Guildmaster. “The day you found me was a lucky day for me,” she told him. “Almost like the master I serve above all others led me to you.”
“And perhaps they did,” the Guildmaster replied. “So you’ll do this? You’ll ensure that this Elliose Tarradesh does not remain an Adventurer?”
“Leave her to me,” Petrova said, voice low and full of menace. “It may take time. If she’s as dangerous as you think I may need to go slowly, or I may just want to indulge in the joy of my work. But when I’m done she’ll no longer be an Adventurer, this I vow to you AND my true master.”
The Guildmaster grinned and nodded. “May the gods be with you then,” he said in dismissal.
* * *
An Adventuring party sat crowded around a table. They had all just returned from their last quest, still covered in adventure grime. A heavily armored Fighter had just finished dividing the payment they’d earned between the members of the party. Normally at that point they’d have started to go their separate ways to spend several days debauching till it was time to take on a new quest, but a tenseness that had been building over their last few quests lingered heavily at the table between them and they all knew it had to be dealt with before any of them would be able to unwind.
The heavily armored Fighter, the leader of their party, cleared his voice. “Elliose, we’ve all talked this over,” he started awkwardly, sounding like he wasn’t eager to say what he was about to tell her. “And we think it’s best you part ways with us. It’s not that we don’t think you’re useful on a quest,” he quickly added. “Far from it, you’re a terror in a fight. It’s just that… well… we don’t think you’re the best fit for our party,” he said weakly as though the words weren’t quite what he’d wished to say.
Elliose bowed her head in acceptance, pulling her hood down to further hide her face. “I understand,” she said, voice quiet and full of refined Elven grace nearly free of emotion.
“That, right there,” a Dwarven woman said as though Elliose’s reaction had proven her end of some argument she’d been having with the others. “I’ve never met an Elve so damn cold and removed! She said two whole words, yet they were dripping with more Elven disdain for everything that ISN’T Elven I just—” She stopped, growling and slamming a huge meaty fist on the table. “I’d have throttled the haughty Elven twat if I had to endure another quest with her!”
“Calm yourself,” the party’s leader said. “It’s been decided and Elliose has accepted, there’s no reason for us to part harshly. Perhaps you should apologize?”
The surely Dwarven woman harrumphed, crossing her arms and slamming herself back into her chair. “SHE should be apologizing to me,” she grumbled, refusing to say more.
Everyone at the table looked at Elliose, waiting for some kind of reaction. Some of the faces around the table looked as though they WANTED to see the maddeningly quiet and calm Elve explode with anger.
She sat with her back perfectly straight and her face hidden. “There’s nothing else to be said,” she finally said, no hint of emotion in her voice.
The reply seemed to anger a few of the people sitting around the table. They looked like they were about to verbally explode the way the Dwarven woman had.
“Sorry, love,” the party’s charming Bard said to break the tension. “I’m sure you’re lovely under there, but this distant cold thing you have going on? Somewhere there’s a party it will work for but it’s not us. We want HEAT in our party and you just… don’t have it.”
The Fighter grabbed a few coins from the pile that was his share and slid them across to the table towards Elliose. “A little parting bonus,” he said as he and the rest of the party started to get up from the table. “To help hold you over till you find a new party, or maybe to just drink yourself into a stupor tonight if being kicked out of the party is something you even care about.”
“Can’t imagine she does,” the Dwarven woman grumbled as they all grabbed packs of gear and weapons. “Come on,” she added, sending one last glare at Elliose before the party left the Elve sitting at the table alone. “Let’s go find some of that fire she’s been freezing out.”
Petrova agilely weaved her way through the party, deftly keeping any of them from bumping into her. “Perhaps a drink?” she asked the cloaked and hooded Elve who’d been left sitting alone.
“Yes,” Elliose replied. “Some Elven wine,” she added, sliding a coin from in front of her towards the serving girl. “Red if you have it, and lighter in potency.”
“Whatever you wish,” Petrova said, snatching up the coin once the woman had withdrawn her hand.
As the Faun made her way to the bar to prepare the woman’s drink her furry deer-like ears twitched. The girl had barely spoken but she’d revealed much thanks to Petrova’s experience reading people. As a Faun her heightened senses allowed her to pick up things most members of other races wouldn’t have been able to.
She was upset, Petrova thought as she slipped behind the bar and looked for a bottle of Elven wine that would satisfy the woman’s request. Nearly in tears but hiding it amazingly well. How intriguing.
It suggested things that might make her task much easier. Pure-blooded Elves were cold and less emotional compared to the members of almost every other race, at least until they underwent their sexual awakening. Many Elves never went through a sexual awakening, a reason for why they seemed to be a dying breed across Alaria. Even if an Elve did go through such a change it was as likely to happen when they were several hundred or even thousands of years old as it was to happen near the time they came of age.
That her voice had so much emotion that she was trying so hard to hide suggests she has started to undergo her sexual awakening and is fighting it. Perhaps it’s something new enough and doesn’t even realize it’s happening. Or there’s a chance I’ve misread the situation… Elves might be cold, but they still feel things. Perhaps she’s just struggling to deal with the culture shock of how different the world and people outside of the Elven enclave she comes from.
Before Petrova poured the Elven wine into the glass she’d set out she made sure to position herself so no one in the busy common room could see it. She reached into a pocket, pulling out a small pouch. The Faun opened the pouch, pouring some of the fine powder held within into the bottom of the glass. After returning the pouch to her pocket she slowly poured the wine into the glass, grinning fiendishly as she saw the powder sizzle then dissolve. By the time the glass was full there was no sign the serving girl had added anything to the drink.
The powder was a drug known as “Sylvulva’s Essence”. It was a potent mix of rare roots and dried leaves blessed by Priestesses of Sylvulva, the Goddess of Sapphic Desire.
It was a strange drug. It did nothing to men, an aspect that could make it useful in discovering women passing as men. When taken willingly it did little unless part of a religious ceremony tied to worshiping Sylvulva. The only exception was if a woman snorted it. In that case as long as the woman was partnered with another woman she’d ride out intense sexual highs that often came with even more intense religious visions given by Sylvulva.
Most commonly it was used by women lusting after other women, especially straight women. It dissolved quickly in drinks, was easily hidden in food, and was entirely flavorless which meant it was perfect for stealthily drugging someone. When dosed the drugged woman would feel a potent rush of sapphic sexual and romantic attraction. If the woman was already attracted to other women this rush would be intense and go mostly unnoticed, explained away as a sudden attraction to whatever woman was nearby when the drug took effect.
When given to someone who had little to no attraction to other women the results were less extreme yet always noticed. Even a single small dose could leave a woman questioning her sexual orientation and even if never dosed again could lead to a permanent change in her attraction to other women.
But it had its drawbacks. The roots and dried leaves it was made of were rare in this part of Alaria. None of the plants they came from grew on the massive central continent that covered so much of Alaria, and only a scant amount of the ingredients made their way across the sea from the distant lands where they grew. The priestesses who knew the correct blessings required to turn those rare ingredients into Sylvulva’s Essence were never shared with outsiders and Sylvulva’s followers only ever allowed a small amount of the drug to be sold on any open market.
That was all fine for Petrova. The rarity of the drug made using it easier. She was certain few who came through the Guildhall even knew the drug existed and those that did would think there was little chance of more than a slight pinch of the stuff existing in the region. None save the Guildmaster had ever suspected Petrova had a secret stash of the stuff, one so large she could have sold it for a fortune that would have allowed her to purchase the whole city of Midgate four times over.
It was important she could use it freely as certain races were more resistant to the drug than others. Elven races in particular were resistant, especially purer-blooded Elves. And if they’d yet to have their sexual awakening a pure-blooded Elve would require a substantial dose for the drug to have any effect on them at all, one that would be dangerous to give to most other races. A dose that size given to say a Human could lead to a dangerous overdose.
Petrova had put plenty of the drug into the wine, more than she’d ever dared to use before. What little they knew about Elliose suggested the Sorceress was a pure-blooded Elve and even if the cold woman had begun to go through her sexual awakening she was early in the throes of that change and the drug would still require a substantial dose to have any meaningful effect on her.
I’ll deliver the wine then wait and watch. I’ll find reasons to come by her table. I’ll be able to pick up on things non-Fauns wouldn’t, especially when it comes to smelling the woman’s level of arousal. And once I’m certain it’s affecting her I can begin.
* * *
Elliose sipped her wine, stewing in her frustrations. Another party had kicked her out. Another attempt at becoming companions with a group of non-Elven Adventurers failed. Once her wine had been delivered she’d gotten up and moved to a small table in a dark corner as far away from her former party as possible, hoping she’d simply disappear into the background of the busy common room like she’d done so many times before.
I just don’t understand them, she thought as she took another sip of her wine. And even when I do I struggle so hard interacting with them in the ways they want. Everything was so much easier back home amongst my people. I understood the world there. I could be myself, even dress the way I feel most comfortable.
She shifted, pulling her cloak tighter as she thought about how what she’d just thought wasn’t exactly true. She wore the same clothing she’d always worn, the kind worn by everyone in her secluded, hidden homeland. But since leaving there she’d struggled with how different the fashion was from what was commonly accepted in the rest of Alaria. She’d taken to wearing the hooded cloak early on and had become an expert in using it to keep her outfit covered up.
And my head, especially my face, she thought, pulling the hood down a bit further. Some simple enchantments woven into the cloak help her keep her face better hidden in an unnatural shroud of shadow. In her homeland she’d thought very little about how she looked and never had a problem with the way others looked at her. But since leaving…
The way they looked at my body, she thought, glad the cloak was keeping her body hidden from all the eyes in the room. She knew that with as revealing as the clothing she wore was most of those eyes would have looked at her lasciviously at least once, if not lingered there as long as she remained in the common room.
Or at least that’s how she remembered it going before she started wearing the cloak. It hadn’t even been just about the sexual looks that made her so uncomfortable. These people out here saw something different than the people of her homeland saw. If she displayed herself openly they saw someone and something she didn’t think of herself as and she’d quickly learned she couldn’t stomach that.
That, however, was an aspect of why she hid she often tried to deny. Instead, she told herself it was all about the sexual looks people would give her. Especially the way the men’s eyes would linger, she thought with a shudder. Such lascivious looks in their eyes, even the ones who tried to hide the vile things they’d be thinking about my body. None of the Elven men in my homeland looked at women THAT way.
The ones that did always left. The tradition of her people was to take to wandering Alaria if you had your awakening. You’d wander till it was either out of your system or you’d learned to tame such distracting desires. Because of that she’d never had practice dealing with men or women looking at her that way and had no intention of learning how to deal with it now. There was no reason to. She hadn’t left her homeland to “wander”, she was simply conducting research on monsters and ancient long-forgotten magic.
She took another sip of her wine and let out a long sigh. Another lie I tell myself, she thought. She knew that being sent out to conduct research had been a false pretense. They sent me away to make me deal with the changes I’d been going through, she thought bitterly, not mad at them but rather the way her body had betrayed her as she’d reached her womanhood. Those changes had forced her, and the people who had raised and trained her, to admit she WASN’T like them.
Elliose reached a hand into her hood and tucked some of her long black hair behind one of her ears. It was a simple motion that left her feeling a sick sense of unhappiness with her body. Too easy a motion to carry out, she thought. Disgusting rounded ears, not elegant, beautiful long pointed ones.
She’d been raised as an Elve. Treated as one of her people even though she wasn’t. Human, she thought, hating to even think the word. You’re not REALLY an Elve, you’re just a Human.
Since donning the hooded cloak she’d let no one see her ears. She’d never outright lied about her race, but she’d also never corrected anyone when they’d mistaken her for Elve which was something everyone had done since she put the cloak on.
Why should she correct them when she thought of herself as an Elve? She was culturally one of her people. She had grown up among them, wore their fashions, and spoke the way they did. She’d even mastered the magic they used, something that had more than impressed those at the academy especially since she was so young. By Human standards she was barely of age, and by Elven standards she was looked on as even younger.
But I’ve reached that time in a Human’s life where their constant sexual desires become a distraction. I tried my best to ignore them, but little by little it became a struggle that interfered more with my studies.
She thought about simple things like the revealing clothing her people wore. She’d thought nothing of that, nudity was even something common in many parts of their lives. But her body had changed. Suddenly her eyes lingered on other people’s bodies in ways that had made them uncomfortable. She hadn’t understood this till she was out in the larger world and had to deal with people looking at her that way.
So they sent me to “research” things out here amongst all these non-Elven people. They never said it, but I know the truth. Taking up the life of an Adventurer isn’t really about researching monsters or finding ancient artifacts or long-lost magic to bring back to the academy. They just want me to learn how to deal with these distracting desires. This is my “wandering” they just can’t call it that because I’m too young in their eyes for it.
Elliose took another sip of wine, glaring into the cup when she set it back on the table. I’m going to learn to IGNORE those feelings, she vowed for the thousandth time. Not embrace them and get them out of my system, especially not with a MAN.
She blinked, a little surprised by how she’d worded the thought. It was a strange way to put the thought. Why “man”? Was she implying she’d be less opposed to embracing those feelings with women?
It wasn’t the first time she’d wondered about that. The warm tingling she got in her womanhood had always been more intense when she had THOSE kinds of thoughts about women. As memories of desires flooded her mind Elliose’s cheeks flushed then started to burn. Now that the thought of women being things to sexual desire had come to the forefront of her mind it was a thought that was refusing to leave.
Distracting, awful thoughts, Elliose thought in frustration. She wanted to be thinking about finding a new party to join, not how warm and tingly the form of a woman’s body made her feel. But now that the shape of a woman’s body was in her mind the image wouldn’t go away. Slender, thick, it didn’t matter. Feminine curves in all their glory danced through her mind, leaving her breathing heavy and her heart pounding.
Un-Elven and undignified, she thought, angry at herself for feeling and thinking such things. It had NEVER been this bad. Was it just that she was so distraught from being kicked out of another party? She was having to fight the urge to look around the room and stare at women. ONLY women. That in itself was a little strange. Till then men’s bodies had often been as distracting as women’s when “the mood” overcame her, yet in that moment men held absolutely no interest for her.
“You look like you’ve had a rough night and could use some company,” the Faun serving girl said as they sat down across from Elliose.
Elliose blinked, confused at first. It wasn’t often someone tried to join her without invitation. With as covered up as she kept, her feminine form almost completely hidden, she never got random Adventurers joining her to hit on her. Why would someone be joining her now? Especially when she so clearly pulled away from the rest of the crowd to be alone.
Her mind was muddled by the wine, that had to be it. Shouldn’t have ordered Elven wine, she thought. As much as I think of myself as an Elve I’m not and the stuff is too strong for me. Although I have only had one glass, and I haven’t even finished it yet…
“I could leave if you’d prefer,” the Faun said when Elliose didn’t reply to her arrival.
Elliose blinked again, confused she was having such a hard time focusing on the woman. Her heart was pounding and her body was hot all over. Had she been that way before the serving girl had sat down with her? Or had she only grown so flustered after she’d joined her?
After, she realized. Because she’s a woman. A beautiful woman. Her name’s something strange… Petrova? She’s strange and skittish with those even stranger antlers that have grown in such an uncommon way.
“Don’t leave,” Elliose blurted out when the serving girl started to get up. “I’m sorry,” she quickly muttered, her voice dropping so low she feared the woman wouldn’t be able to hear her. She didn’t know how to deal with non-Elven people, especially when their presence left her so flustered.
She’s stunning, Elliose thought as she stared at the Faun. And there IS something almost Elven about her beauty. She has that agelessness Elves have… Is that a Faun thing? I didn’t think it was, but really what do I know about the other races?
“It’s alright,” Petrova told her. “It’s getting late and the common room is starting to empty. Yet I see you here, alone, still nursing the same cup of wine. I wonder if Elven girl is needing company perhaps to ease her pain, if she is feeling pain.”
Elliose blinked once more, trying not to focus so hard on how attractive the woman was. Those strange, sleek Faun features… Those sexy antlers standing out so starkly amongst all that white hair with those stunning, intricate patterns carved into them. Even her furry deer-like ears were exciting Elliose. It made the woman exotic and animalistic, and that aroused Elliose in ways she didn’t understand.
Stop thinking about how attractive she is. Focus on something else. Her voice, focus on that. Such a strange accent, and sometimes the way she talks… Like the common tongue isn’t something she’s fully mastered. And her voice, soft but husky. There’s a sexy rumble to it at times.
Elliose closed her eyes, her mind filling with a vivid image of the Faun’s face pressed into her crotch. The woman was speaking, that rumble in her voice vibrating Elliose’s womanhood in a most pleasing way…
The vividness of the mental image shocked Elliose, as did how moist it had left her feeling between her legs. She was shocked to have had such a clear, sexual fantasy. Thankful her face was hidden from the woman she forced herself to put the vivid fantasy out of mind and tried to focus on the Faun. They were having a conversation, that meant she needed to be talking.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you join someone like this,” Elliose said. It was an attempt at parroting the kind of small talk she heard others fill their time with, but as the words came out of her mouth she realized the comment was perhaps more insightful than she’d meant it to be. She had never seen the Faun sitting with anyone. If anything the skittish woman seemed adverse to being overly friendly with anyone, and she appeared to be as averse to friendly banter as Elliose was.
“That’s because I rarely do,” the Faun told her, her strange attractive voice making Elliose shiver slightly. “So many are men and men interest me little,” Petrova added.
The comment left Elliose almost dizzy with a strange feeling. Was it excitement? Hope? Eagerness? Was it all of them at once? She didn’t quite understand, nor did she understand how that feeling was so intermingled with a fresh wave of arousal.
“I’m not a man,” Elliose said, instantly hating how dumb of a thing it had been to blurt out. Her figure and face might be hidden by her cloak, but people COULD tell she was a woman.
“I’m aware,” the Faun told her, her voice lowering into a kind of playful purr that left Elliose feeling light-headed and giddy. “Although you keep so covered up… I’ve no idea what kind of woman you are under there. Elven they say, but what kind of Elve are you, Elliose Tarradesh? Your lands here, they are strange to me, your Elves even stranger. Tarradesh has an Elven sound to it, but Elliose? That, it seems, is a strange name for an Elve in these lands.”
Because it’s a Human name, Elliose thought bitterly. I was given an Elven surname when I was adopted but my adoptive parents left me with the first name I’d been born with.
She didn’t tell the Faun that. She wouldn’t LIE about being an Elve, but she could never bring herself to say out loud she was only a lowly Human. She didn’t think of herself as one even though she knew she was. Elliose did what she always did when the topic of her race came up, she chose not to correct someone’s incorrect appraisal of it and changed the topic.
“You came to Alaria from somewhere else?” she asked.
She’d seen most people out here in the rest of the world liked talking about themselves. The Elves of her homeland had been fond of talking about their accomplishments, but out here they just talked about themselves. It was a subtle but unpleasant difference she struggled to endure. She’d asked the question hoping to distract the woman, but now that she’d asked it she was suddenly curious to hear the answer. She knew there were other lands across the sea, but she didn’t know anything about them.
“Sometimes it amuses me that the people here often slip up and call their continent ‘Alaria’. Alaria is our entire world. This place is the largest chunk of it, but still only a chunk. A wild, dangerous, scared chunk. But you know that, yes? As an Adventurer you face those dangers and see the scares of great calamities that have left the wild places filled with ancient ruins.”
Elliose felt herself nodding. She was only half following what the woman was saying. She’d noticed the Faun’s lips. Her mouth was wide and her lips narrow and thin, yet her bottom lip had a subtle plumpness to it that left Elliose feeling things. She found herself watching Petrova’s mouth as she spoke, wondering what it would be like to kiss those lips or feel them kissing her.
She realized the woman had stopped speaking. It was her turn to speak, that’s how this went. She had to keep the conversation going, had to keep the woman sitting with her so she could keep looking at her, keep being close and feeling the tingling warmth the woman was making her feel.
Elliose told the Faun why she’d taken up the life of an Adventurer. She told her about the kind of things she was researching, about how she strived to learn about monsters and hoped to discover lost artifacts and misplaced magical knowledge or even forgotten histories to bring back to her people.
The Faun followed what she said with rapt attention that further flustered Elliose. She wasn’t used to someone paying her so much attention, not in a situation like this. She felt seen by the woman, but not in a way that made her skin crawl as most attention by non-Elven people often made her feel.
Elliose realized she was dropping the speech patterns of her people, letting emotion flow freely into her words. It was liberating. She was letting down the protective mask she wore, thrilled she felt comfortable enough with the woman to do so.
That just left her feeling flush with fresh flustered arousal. Normally that would have angered her. Sensual arousal was such a distraction… Yet at this moment it didn’t feel that way. It felt nice. Just talking with the woman and getting to look at her and occasionally allowing her mind to wander to dirty places was making her happy in ways she’d never let herself feel before.
At one point the Faun set a hand on the table and started to trace the lines of the wood grain. Elliose swore the woman was intentionally tracing the lines in a way that moved her hand closer to her and began to think it was an invitation to touch her.
Or is that just what I want it to be? Because I DO want to touch her. For the first time ever I don’t want to ignore these feelings. I want to embrace them. I want to explore them. She gave into the desire for physical contact, reaching to touch the woman’s hand.
The Faun instantly yanked her hand away. It happened with alarming speed, as though Elliose’s hand had been something so hot it had scolded the woman’s skin as it neared.
“I’m sorry,” Elliose muttered, pulling her hand back and hiding it under the table. “I misread the situation,” she quickly said, allowing her voice to fall flat and free of emotion in the Elven way of her people. “I do that,” she added, not wanting to pull away completely from this interaction like she normally would have. “I don’t understand things out here away from my homeland. I don’t understand all of you non-Elven people and your strange, complicated ways.”
Petrova made a disproving clicking sound with her tongue. “You did not misread the situation,” she said, sounding frustrated, but not with Elliose.
Elliose felt a rush of hope and excitement. She put a hand on the table, leaving it there as a subtle, hopeful invitation for physical contact.
“As you said, I rarely sit with patrons,” the Faun told her. “Few interest me the way you’ve interested and intrigued me. And although I’ve yet to so much as see your face I find myself…” She trailed off, making the disproving clicking sound again. “I have things in my past,” she said, as though struggling to explain something beyond words. “Things I struggle to deal with. I… don’t like to be touched,” she said bluntly after an uncertain pause. “But,” she added, reaching out for the hand Elliose had resting on the table, “I sometimes like to touch others.”
The Faun stroked the back of Elliose’s hand. It was a gentle thing. Sensual. Soft yet domineering. Elliose had never imagined so much could be expressed in a single touch, not thought one touch could make her feel so much. It left her shaking. It left her panting. Her womanhood had gushed at the touch, so much moisture flooding from her she felt as though she’d wet her seat.
Elliose stood. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, voice as shaky as her legs were. The simple touch had lit a raging bonfire in her loins she had never felt before. She had to deal with it, had to find a way to put out that fire. “I… I feel ill,” she said, the words not a complete lie. “I need to get to my room, I need to be alone,” she said, turning and rushing away.
* * *
Petrova watched Elliose rush away, intrigued that the touch had caused so much havoc. She’d learned much from their short interaction and suspected even more. I must find out if my suspicions are right, she thought as she got up.
She went about the motions of cleaning the table, snatching up the half-empty wine glass then pulling out a rag to wipe down the table. As she did she leaned down, getting her face as close to where Elliose had been sitting without looking like she was trying to sniff the seat.
As a Faun her sense of smell was incredibly sensitive to the aromas of arousal in others. She could not just smell it more acutely than other races could, she could smell such odors further away too. From what she’d seen most needed their faces shoved in someone’s crotch to get even a hint of what she could easily smell from across the room. And if she got close… Oh, the things she could learn.
The scents of arousal and the things they told her didn’t just come from a person’s body. Those scents lingered on clothing and surfaces, especially when it came to women. Getting close to where the Elve had been sitting was enough to give Petrova a small tome’s worth of information on Elliose and the things she’d been feeling.
Petrova’s ears twitched at what she was smelling. She moved a little closer, risking how odd it would look if someone saw her practically sniffing the seat where the Elve had been sitting. She pulled away, exhilarated by what she’d just discovered.
As they’d been talking Petrova had seen the subtle signs of the drug she’d slipped into the Elve’s drink working its wonders on Elliose. Then she’d been shocked to smell just how turned on the Elve was. That had confused her. Yes, she’d used a large dose, but it should have barely effective the pure-blooded Elven woman. And she’d barely drank half the glass of wine meaning she hadn’t even ingested the full dose!
For a moment she’d wondered if the wine was too strong for Elliose. Elves weren’t easily inebriated so their wine tended to be strong. A seemingly impossible idea had entered her mind. What if Elliose WASN’T an Elve, or at least not one as full-blooded as they’d assumed? She’d dismissed it at first, but now…
She’s NOT a full-blooded Elve, Petrova thought. She had no doubts about that now, not after all she’d learned from reading the stink of arousal Elliose had left damply lingering in her seat. She wasn’t even a Common Elve with blood diluted with that of some other race. No Elven cunt left a lingering, deliciously rank smell like she’d left behind. Elliose was Human, pure Human with not a drop of any other race’s blood running through her veins.
And she’s young, Petrova thought, shuddering slightly as she savored the scent of the girl’s youthfulness that was still lingering in her sensitive nose. Only just having become a woman by the scent of her cunt. And sexually inexperienced. Perhaps the girl’s played with herself a few times but nothing more. Maybe never even to completion, although she SHOULD have done at least that by this age.
Pieces were falling into place in Petrova’s mind. If the girl was raised as an Elve and thinks of herself as one that would mean she’d look on her budding sexuality as a kind of distracting curse. She’d be trying to deny those urges, to ignore or banish them.
Petrova stopped, gasping. Gods above! Half a pinch of the drug would have been more than enough to send a Human girl with hormones raging like that into a sexual lather. What is such a massive dose going to do to her?
* * *
Elliose slammed the door to her room closed. Her body was on fire, her chest rising and falling from the deep, desperate heaves of air she was taking in. She’d never felt anything like this. Hints of arousal, yes, warm feelings threatening to distract her, those had come in faint flashes. But nothing like this, she’d not even imagined one could feel ANYTHING this intensely.
She threw her cloak off, desperate to lessen the heat consuming her body. Some relief came once the heavy cloak was abandoned, dropped to the floor and quickly forgotten about. The outfit she had on below was normal garb for her people, scant and tailored with impressive Elven skill that had woven subtle but powerful spells into it.
It was an important part of Elliose. She felt wrong without the clothing on, felt too Human. Yet Elliose wore her heavy cloak for a reason. This region of Alaria was not as warm as her homeland, and as she’d painfully learned the skimpy outfit scandalized most who lived here while causing the others to look at her in ways she despised.
The bottom layer of the outfit was little more than a bikini made of sheer fabric just transparent enough to show a shadow of her nipples and the outline of her womanhood. Over this she wore ornate layers of leather straps, a top that was little more than sleeves attached across her back and around her neck, and thigh-high boots with impractically large heels.
It was an outfit she wore to match those of her people, yet it served other functions. It helped her affirm her identity as one of them, using subtle Elven magic woven into the fibers of the garments to help her feel and look more like them.
The bikini top was woven with enchantments to help make her breasts appear slightly more perky and full-looking than they were, leaving her feeling her body was more like that of the Elven woman she identified as. It also lightened the shading of her nipples. Her Elven people all had light skin and pink nipples. Her skin was nearly as light as theirs, but her hair was jet black and it seemed this darkness that betrayed her Humanness had leached into her nipples, leaving the skin of her areolas far darker than her fellow Elves.
Southward the bikini bottom was sewn to be more transparent than the top, allowing all who looked at her a clear enough glimpse of her womanhood so they could see it was hairless.
This was important to Elliose because no Elve had pubic hair. Even those whose Elven blood was so faint they were no longer considered an Elve tended to have almost no pubic hair. Since puberty Elliose had been forced to endure the shame of having a thick patch of dense, dark pubic hair that had left her disgusted with her body. She kept it freshly shaven, attending to it on a nearly daily basis the way many Human men attended to the hair on their face to hide even a hint of a beard.
Completing the outfit were thigh-high boots with impractical heels that helped the short girl make up for the height she was lacking. Even with the added boost she was left feeling short compared to the Elves she strived to feel one with, but even so it pained her to stand without the heels on. They also forced her to step and walk carefully, allowing her to move with mock Elven grace she had to intentionally work to mimic. Powerful enchantments she was always refining and working into the boots helped her both maintain this grace and made wearing such impractical footwear not detrimental to her career as an Adventurer.
She’d rarely noticed how the outfit left her functionally near naked. Only when the distasteful lingering of non-elven eyes was upon her body had she truly noticed, and since beginning to wear her cloak she’d not had to endure such things.
Now, though, with a barely endurable fire heating her from the core she felt how exposed she was and thrilled at the feeling. The rented rooms of the Guildhall had often felt uncomfortably cool to her, yet at that moment she was glad for that coolness. It soothed her exposed skin, at least for a moment.
The fire kept growing, making the moment of relief from the inferno short lived. The fire cascaded down her body, soaking into her womanhood. Leaving it aching. Damp. Throbbing. Wet. The aching kept intensifying, a maddening swelling need Elliose didn’t understand and felt she wouldn’t be able to endure for long.
With a pained whimper the girl dropped to her knees. Her hands moved on their own, one shooting to a breast to squeeze it to try to work out some of the strange need for attention it felt. Her other hand went to her crotch so she could grab her aching womanhood.
The pressure of her hands’ firm, clumsy gropes brought more relief than she’d expected so they kept going, moving of their own volition. Soon one hand was moving from breast to breast, squeezing and massaging out the aching fire in them. The other remained on her crotch, no longer just grabbing a tight hold of her womanhood. She massaged her pubic mound, moaning in confusion at how intense moving the meaty swell of her pussy felt. Soon she was rubbing at herself through the skimpy but by then damp cloth covering her sex.
The groping and rubbing brought relief yet made everything worse. The release brought with it a ramping up of need. Need for more stimulation. Need for more refined stimulation. Relief turned to pleasure which muddled her mind even more fully than the maddening heat had.
Her hands felt a strange guidance. The hand moving from breast to breast began focusing less on the meatiest bulk of her small firm breasts and more on her nipples. She rubbed at them through the thin fabric of the bikini top. Her nipples were so hard and swollen they ached as much as her throbbing cunt, yet rubbing wasn’t enough for them.
Elliose found herself pinching them. She gasped in delight, amazed that something that she’d thought would be painful could bring such pleasure. She pinched harder, gasping more. It did hurt a little, but the pain was… good. Pleasurable. Bringing the relief her body so desperately needed.
Soon she wasn’t just pinching. She was twisting and tugging on her nipples, gasping in delight and using the stimulation to work out the tension in her body. She felt driven to push the relieving pleasure downward, letting it lead her into rocking her hips so she could better work her pussy against her hand.
As she rubbed furiously at her sex she lost herself in a haze of maddening desire and overwhelming pleasure. Slowly she realized what she was doing. She was masturbating! She’d never masturbated before, but she knew it was a thing people did. Her education had taught her people pleasured themselves in such ways, although she’d never wanted to learn the specifics of just how a woman went about doing it.
It had felt safer that way, especially when the distracting urges had grown stronger. There had been times she’d been glad she hadn’t known how. Times at night when she’d been alone and felt her body demanding attention she refused to give it. It wasn’t proper. Wasn’t Elven. And if she wanted to think of herself as one of them she’d known she needed to never give in to THOSE kinds of wants.
As she knelt there, panting and gasping and moaning so lewdly it shamed her to the core, she regretted having never learned how to do this right. The pressure to pleasure herself was so intense it felt like it would burn her away from the inside out if she didn’t give her body what it craved.
Her hands, driven by the intense heat, were trying to feel out to do. But she worried they weren’t skilled enough, that the swelling inside her would explode before she could understand and deal with it.
Elliose experienced a brief moment of lucidity after she figured out how to rub at her clit without overstimulating herself. During that brief period of lucidity she thought this intensity couldn’t be natural, that something must have been done to her. She wondered if someone had drugged her, slipped her something that had caused her sexual feelings to swell like this. Or maybe it was a spell or some curse cast on her by one of the people in the common room.
But who would do such a thing? One of her former party members? No, she was certain of it. There had been an unpleasant parting of ways, but it was done. Even the hot-blooded Dwarve would not have done something like this even if she’d had the ability to.
Perhaps one of the men in the common room had wanted to get her worked up to take advantage of her? But why? None had so much as seen her face and wouldn’t have known if she was attractive. And how would they have drugged her? Slipped something in her drink? No one had come close to her or her drink, no one but the serving wench.
The serving wench then. If she’d been drugged it would have had to have been her. But there was no reason for it! And she’d been so nice… So kind and interested in her. Their pleasant conversation had awoken things in Elliose…
Heat built once more, fogging the temporary mental clearing. Images of the strange, alluring Faun filled her mind. Desire for the woman, desire she barely understood, washed over her. The need for sexual stimulation swelled in her. As vague erotic images of the Faun flashed through her mind Elliose pulled her bikini top and bottom to the side, exposing her breasts and pussy so she could play with her nipples and cunt directly.
The lewd images of the Faun grew clearer in her mind as her fingers found fresh inspiration to better work her body. She tweaked and twisted and tugged on her nipples, bringing relief and pleasure. Fingers slick with the slippery wetness leaking from her cunt danced pleasingly on her slit and clit, her hips rocking to better press her throbbing womanhood against the fingers working it.
This is the way.
Elliose moaned and whimpered, surrendering to whatever was guiding her. It wasn’t just instinct. It was more. Something outside of her. Something that had just spoken to her in her mind.
She let it guide her, hoping it would help her bring an end to this madness before it burned away all she was. The external power guided her fingers, leading her to slide two of them down her slit then slip into her sopping wet hole. She was so wet that she slid in easily, the hole feeling hungry for the stimulation of the penetration.
Almost as soon as she started thrusting the two fingers in and out of herself there was an explosion of pleasure. Her whole body felt as though it was pulling in on itself. For a fraction of a moment she thought she’d need to curl up into a ball as her body began to convulse in pleasure. Then something else happened, the pulling in she felt exploding out with a second layer of pleasure.
The force leading her to this release she’d been building towards told her to yank her fingers out of her cunt hole. As she did her vaginal muscles clenched and spasmed as waves of pleasure ran through her body and soaked warmly into her mind. Her fingers flew to her clit so she could rub it from side to side, helping cause the swelling explosion to push out of her loins.
Pressure that had been building blasted out of her cunt in a torrential, explosive flood. She felt as though water was spraying out of her, then realized fluid WAS blasting from her cunt!
You’re squirting as you cum, the voice in her head explained. Keep rubbing your clit, slide your fingers from side to side. Press into the blasting release, make it more intense. The more pleasure the more relief you’ll feel.
If not for the voice’s explanation she’d have thought she’d pissed herself. There was certainly enough fluid spraying from her to make her feel that way, although it had blasted out with far more force than she’d ever felt while pissing.
This “squirting” was something wonderfully intense, something like but apart from the sexual climax she was experiencing. Part of it perhaps, yet its own thing. Something her body and mind needed, bring far more relief than just the orgasm would have.
Good girl, Elliose Tarradesh, the voice in her mind said. It was clearer now. Female. Powerful. Perfectly alluring and intensely domineering. This is the way, it continued. But your body needs more. The pressure will build quickly again. You still need so much relief or it WILL drive you mad. Keep masturbating. Keep going till you squirt again. And again. AND AGAIN.
The need to get off had only been lessened by the orgasm and squirting but already she felt the need returning. The burning inferno threatening to drive her mad had been dimmed, but soon it would heat till it was trying to burn away all she was again. She needed the voice. Needed to let it lead her.
“Yes,” Elliose gasped, body already sore and weak but knowing she had to keep going. “I’ll do as you say. Show me the way, please.”
The voice led her. Telling her to touch herself this way. Coaxing her to touch herself that way next. Showing her how to build the fires in her to better release them. How to ease more comfortably and intensely into that release. How to ride the waves of pleasure that exploded from her loins and how to indulge in the muddling warmth those waves of pleasure sent cascading through her mind.
Through it all the voice also guided her to do more than work her body. It pushed her to fantasize about someone helping her feel these things. No men, only women. That was important. As women flashed through her mind her thoughts were guided to one woman. Her. The Faun. The serving wench Petrova.
Picture her, the voice commanded. So mysterious. So kind. So sensual. Imagine your hands are hers. Try to picture her body naked. All her womanly curves. The musk of her womanhood. The feel of her mouth on your most sensitive and private places.
Elliose gasped and bucked then came again. She felt her body pull in then explode, squirting again as she rode the waves of her climax.
The voice didn’t let up. It pushed her to keep going. Slowly, as Elliose gave more of herself to the voice, she began to understand what it was. This was not the voice of someone using magic to speak to her in her mind. This was more than a mortal voice, it was something more powerful. Something divine.
It was a goddess, touching her and giving her a blessing of divine guidance. Divine inspiration had saved her, showing her how to masturbate and bring herself relief while letting her know if not for her intervention Elliose would have been driven mad by whatever had happened to her.
Divine inspiration led Elliose to cum. Then led her to cum again, squirting as she did. It pressed her to keep going. Her cunt ached. Her knees hurt. The floor under her was a wet mess. The room stank of her sexual juices. Still she couldn’t stop. She had to keep masturbating, had to keep fantasizing about Petrova.
Do it in my name, the voice of the goddess commanded. Shower upon me your faith as payment for the divine inspiration I’ve given you.
“For you,” Elliose gasped, not knowing the name of the goddess who was divinely leading her to the safe haven of sexual release. Then, her faith flowing to the goddess, she DID know her name. “For you, Sylvulva, Goddess of Sapphic Desire,” she moaned out in prayer. “I pleasure myself to the images of Petrova the Faun in your name, take it as an offering to you!”
Elliose had prayed to gods before. She’d felt the flow of faith leaving her body to nourish the deity she was praying to. But she’d never felt it like this. The goddess took all Elliose offered and more, leaving her feeling empty. Yet it was a good kind of empty, one that left her eager to offer more of her faith to Sylvulva once it built back up in her.
The prayer pushed her over the edge again. She came once more, squirting as she did. The explosion of pleasure and release was so intense this time she saw stars, nearly blacking out.
As the black haze subsided slightly Elliose could feel her body had reached the point of exhaustion. With a whimpered moan of pleasure she collapsed, her body convulsing and her cunt still gushing. She continued to shake and moan for a few moments then went limp, passing calmly into the deepest, most exhausted sleep of her life…
* * *
When Elliose woke she thought, for a moment, the previous night had just been a dream. Then the soreness in her cunt made her release it couldn’t have been. She was also still on the floor, lying where she’d passed out.
Although she was able to tell it hadn’t been a dream she was still confused. She’d nearly been driven mad or perhaps even died, that was clear. How she’d gotten so horny it had threatened her life she knew not, and looking back she realized she didn’t care. It had led to something amazing.
Not the pleasure, although that had been life-changing. She’d need time to process that, to process her desire for more and how, for the first time in her life, she didn’t want to fight those urges even if they threatened to destroy the illusion she’d weaved that she was an Elve and not a Human.
No, the amazing thing was the divine revelation she’d been given. Before that moment she’d never felt that kind of connection to a god, never imagined she’d feel one’s touch so strongly she’d be left wanting to devote herself to them and only them.
But Sylvulva had saved her. She’d never heard the goddess’ name before the previous night but there was no doubt in her mind she would spend the rest of her life worshiping Sylvulva, Goddess of Sapphic Desire. She just didn’t know how. She’d never encountered a Priestess of Sylvulva, never heard of her temple, or even heard whispers of her existence.
Yet she felt lingering divine inspiration giving her a clue. It had been important that Sylvulva had pressed her to fantasize about the Faun serving wench. Something about Petrova was important, important to her and important to learning how to properly devote herself to Sylvulva.
But getting closer to her won’t be easy, Elliose told herself with a heavy sigh as she forced herself to get up. I’ve no idea how to go about attracting anyone’s amorous or sexual attentions, especially a woman’s. I have to find a new party and continue my life as an Adventurer to further my research and ensure I have the coin needed to live this life.
It would take time. Time to process what she’d felt. How it changed how she viewed herself. How to deal with these new feelings, especially those for the Faun woman. A new party would do her good. An Adventure. Killing things. Delving into ruins. All of it would do her good and give her time to think.
And then, when I’m done, we’ll come back here and I can try to attract Petrova’s attention, Elliose thought.
What happens to Elliose next? (Choose up to 9 options from this poll)
Philo Hunter Erotica 