To Protect and Serve Ch. 06

"We have enough energy," the King gasped. Slowly, the conduit began to turn incorporeal, fading back into the ground like the mist it had begun as. Shamira was left lying on the ground, her body covered with light-green and glowing goo. She looked as exhausted as Renata could imagine a being could look. Frolthac continued, "Let this woman's message be heard, sent as far and wide as --"

"For the Goddess's sake," his wife said, obviously enjoying her husband's sexual attentions more than his speech. "If you don't transmit soon, you're going to blow up! And you're not done here yet!"

The King tried to glower, but he couldn't quite manage. He was far too excited, both intellectually and sexually, to even try and be mad at his wife. Instead, he came inside her, looked towards the sky, and then he and the rest of the circle flashed an impossibly brilliant green. The flash was accompanied by a "whoomp" sound, similar to an explosion happening underwater. Renata and Yosyp both felt a wave of magic sweep over them as it went about its predetermined course.

"Good grief!" the Queen said, looking happy and surprised at the same time. "I've never . . . never seen that much power in a sexual ritual before. She's kinky! I like her!" she said, glowing at her husband and sharing a brief moment of genuine intimacy.

Renata smiled warmly. Thorias had been right; they really did love each other. The werejaguar looked back to Shamira, then hurried to her friend's side. "Are you okay?"

"Was'n s'bad," Shamira muttered, struggling for the strength to get up to her knees.

The King and Queen both flew over and hovered in front of Shamira's face while Renata pulled the hair from her eyes. "You were incredible, my dear," Lillia crooned. "I've never seen someone outlast the conduit before!"

"How . . . how long?" Shamira asked.

"About an hour," Yosyp said, walking over and offering both his housemates a hand up. Renata had to get her friend's arm around her shoulder just to keep the girl upright. "I must say, that was an impressive display. I'm not sure that I'm going to be able to live up to your standards."

Shamira just looked confused, so Renata punched the new guy in the shoulder. "No teasing her. She's had a rough night." Renata looked at the two faeries who, having expended their energy, were much easier to look at. "Your Majesties, will you be able to contact us once you hear from the other Georgia colonies?"

"Georgia?" the Queen snickered. "My lovely kitty-woman, we'll be getting feedback from Canada with the pulse we just sent. The other colonies will respond if for no other reason that to find out where the Seven Hells we got that much sexual energy from. Can we keep her?" she asked of her husband.

"I'm afraid that Lord Stapleton has need of her yet," Yosyp replied cordially.

"If he's willing to share, we might be willing to make a . . . political arrangement?"

Yosyp smiled. The woman had value in more ways than she knew. "We will mention your generous offer to our employer."

"Have an area in or near the house that is green and growing," the Queen said, then handed Yosyp a small crystal from her belt pouch. "Place this inside some potted soil in the green area. It will allow us to contact you."

"You are most kind," the full vampire said, offering his tongue as Shamira had done earlier. The Queen curtsied and kissed his tongue.

"I like these people," she said. "We need to have them over for tea. Or sex. Maybe both."

Renata couldn't keep from grinning as they got Shamira dressed and took her back to the car. She LOVED faeries!

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Hours later . . .

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Shamira's eyes edged open, instantly meeting with the obnoxious glare of a digital alarm clock. She wondered why Clara, who had impeccable taste in the rest of her decorations, had a cheap Big Box Mart alarm. 'Why am I in Clara's room? Wait, it's my room too. How the hell did I get here?'

She remembered her time at the clearing; remembered it with a warm, glowing sensation deep down inside her core. Her eyes adjusted to the darkness to find that she was not alone. Clara was sitting in a chair across the room, glancing over a trashy romance novel using a dim reading light. Shamira glanced at the clock again. Four o'clock in the morning . . . it wasn't her safe day until sunrise.

"Mistress Clara, you don't --"

Shamira had barely gotten that much out before Clara looked up with bright and wicked eyes, lunged across the room and landed on top of the waking vampire.

"Okay, tell me absolutely everything!" Clara said, pinning her friend to the bed. "Renata gave me the quick-and-dirty version, but I want the long-and-dirty version."

"Shouldn't I report back to Shane?"

"Shane shmane," Clara said philosophically. "He's in his office on a conference call with a bunch of Southeastern lords, so he'll have to wait. Looks like we're putting on a party in a few weeks to discuss district zoning. Anyway, Renata told him what happened, and she says you were fucked by a weird Japanese anime octopus monster? Or something like that?"

Shamira grinned. Clara had died a teenager and, despite tremendous wisdom gathered over the 62 years since, she was still very much a teenager at heart. Teenage girls wanted to hear the dirt. "Yes, Mistress Clara. What happened was --"

"Babe, Shane gave you the rest of the night off. Said you probably needed some rest. So you're not on for the rest of the night."

Suddenly, a memory came back to the muscular submissive. She remembered that last image before she'd "won" the contest with the conduit . . . that dark yet pale imitation of this woman. And just like that, her libido switched back on just a little bit. She stretched like a person normally would after just waking up, but she made sure that every one of her muscles rippled under the skin as she did so. She saw Clara's eyes feeding on her.

"Are you SURE that I'm not on?" she asked.

Clara grinned. Shamira was growing into her sexuality, and far be it for Clara to deny the girl's personal development. She tied her lover's hands together with a scarf, secured them to the headboard, then tugged on the girl's nipples until Shamira confessed everything.

Well, not quite everything. Shamira withheld one bit of information: what the conduit had looked like to her at the end. She felt that was a bit awkward to explain, and she wasn't sure how to interpret it herself. Clara made her cum twice over the course of the story as a reward for going into exquisite detail on what had been done to her. The Shamira devoured her mistress's sex until the woman was satisfied. Clara could be a hard woman to satisfy when she concentrated. She was concentrating.

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The next day . . .

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Shamira awoke a few minutes before the alarm was supposed to go off, so she slid out from Clara's spooning embrace and turned the infernal contraption off.

'She's so beautiful,' Shamira thought. 'How can anyone looking angelic when I know damn well she's devilish?' She took a step towards the door and began to feel queasy.

"Headrush," she whispered.

"You okay?" Clara murmured, her eyes creeping open.

'Damn vampire hearing,' Shamira thought. "Guess I just got out of bed a little fast. Got a little light headed." 'Still a little light headed,' she realized.

"Babe, we don't get light-headed," Clara said, swinging her long, luscious legs out of bed. "C'mere."

"I'm fine. Really, I just --"

"Here." This time, Clara's voice came out even. "Don't make me ask you again."

Safe day or no, that was a tone that Shamira wasn't going to ignore. She walked over and sat on the bed while Clara placed a hand on her forehead, chanting softly.

"I'm feeling something . . . unappeased," she murmured and then with a grin, "and this time it isn't sexual." The grin went away. "Shamira, have you eaten? Blood I mean. Anyone but that time with me?"

Shamira shook her head. "No."

"When was the last time you ate conventional food?"

"Uhm --" Shamira looked towards the ceiling, trying to recall the last time she'd eaten. "I was too nervous yesterday and --"

"Good grief woman! Eating regularly is more important now than when you were alive, and drinking blood once every three weeks is NOT healthy."

"I'm sorry," Shamira grumbled. "I'll eat during the games today, okay?"

"You'll eat now. And we need to find you some fresh blood." Clara looked like she was pondering something. "I wonder if anyone has a donor we can call up on such short notice? Can't use Shane's, since the two most available are getting ready to be brought over. I've got three locally, but they're all probably in church."

"Church?"

Clara grinned. "I find the pious flavorful."

"Don't we have some blood packs in the fridge or something?"

Clara made a "ewh" face. "Sweetie, you really need to find some donors and stat. The less fresh the blood, the less power you can draw from it." She sighed. "It's up to you. We can warm some blood up for you for today, but only if you promise to help choose at least two donors before the first game is over. Deal?"

"Deal," the muscular woman grumbled. "It's just the idea of shopping for people is weird."

"It's a little more involved than that," Clara replied disapprovingly. "In Shane's house and for his children, donors are a valuable and precious resource. Everyone on the current or potential donor list could potentially be a fellow vamp some day, so it's important to develop a good relationship with yours." She kissed Shamira sweetly on the lips. "Don't worry, we'll find a couple of someones who are right for you, and we'll set up an appointment for Tuesday. Oh, we're going to have to cancel the rafting trip since things are picking up around here."

Clara seemed genuinely bumped, and Shamira was as well. "It's late in the season anyway. Water would've been cold."

"Yeah, but the guide we were going to have was on the donor list and he looks SO delicious."

"Clara?! I don't need you setting me up on blind . . . dates. I'll pick by own damn donors!"

Clara grinned. "That's the spirit."

By the time the first football game had gotten to halftime, Shamira had lowered the number of possibilities down to a handful. Their little television-watching party had grown, as apparently Bangaly the werelion and his werelioness Kira were both die hard fans . . . Detroit Lions fans, to be more precise. The pun had made Shamira groan. Renata showed up just for the hell of it, and spent a lot of time flirting with Bangaly. Between Henry and Clara, Shamira felt like she was shopping for presents with teenage girls when reviewing the donor list. It was a long string of "Ooh, look at that one. That one's pretty" or "You don't want that one. Too scrawny" or "Ewh! A vegan? They taste like crap!" It was a bit surreal.

In the end, Shamira chose a young married couple who owned a comic book store over on Canton Highway. Both were cute, in a geeky-pseudo-goth kinda way. He carried a couple of extra pounds and she had glasses so thick that she could probably use them to look at star constellations, but there was just something about them --

"Why them?" Clara asked, noticing that her friend had been staring at the same couple of pictures for a while.

"They seem smart, and fun-kind-of-geeky, and --" She stopped.

"What?"

"Because they're just as deserving as the other candidates, but no one else . . . I'm mean, they're not as 'attractive' as some of the others or --"

"In other words, you think the rest of us are shallow," Henry said, feigning offense.

"No, it's not that. Not really. But you have to admit, the ones who get chosen tend to be more . . . Beverly Hills 90210."

Clara kissed her friend's cheek. She figured these two reminded Shamira of Jimmy Fisk, the boy she thought she should have kept safe. Never mind that she had been a fourteen year old girl getting pushed around by high school boys. Jimmy Fisk had died, and Shamira had been protecting people ever since. Clara was convinced that part of the reason Shamira was a submissive was to compensate for her otherwise constant need to protect everyone. She was a dichotomy, and she was wonderful.

"Good choices," the Native American said, moving the laptop aside and laying her head in her friend's lap while sucking down another pizza roll. "Wait a minute," she muttered, glancing one last time at the screen next to her, "did you see the health section?" She sat up again. "They've got --"

"Yeah, I saw that. I can't be affected, right? And vampires can't be transmitters?"

"That's true."

"Then I want to do this. They should see someone's still willing to touch them."

Clara smiled, then kissed her friend long and soft before finally settling in for the game.

Renata smiled to herself as she watched the two interact. She wondered if Shamira had told Clara everything about what had happened last night, including the last thing the conduit had turned into before the ritual ended. Somehow, she doubted it. 'Oh well,' she thought. 'They'll figure it out for themselves soon enough.' But the whole incident had left Renata realized that she hadn't had a chance to play with Shamira yet, and it was something she planned on correcting very soon.

"Shamira,," came Shane's voice from on high, "could you come by my office?"

Halftime had just ended, and Shamira doubted that it was wise to keep the boss waiting for another hour and a half, so she gently worked her way out from under Clara's head. "Save my spot?"

Clara grinned and eyeballed Henry, who had moved to get the prime real-estate that had just been vacated. "I'd be glad to."

Shamira smiled, wondering how much of the lounge area would be intact when she got back. She had wondered why a house the size of Shane's had so few televisions, but she'd been told it was to make people interact more and establish a sense of community. Otherwise, everyone would just hole up in their own rooms, much like teenagers.

"Yes sir?" she asked when she arrived. There was an abundance of plant life in his office now that had to be new. Then, peeking out from behind a palm frond, Shamira spotted a faerie.

"Shamira, His Great and Royal Majesty the Most Illustrious Leader Frolthac and Her Delectable and Most Beautiful Majesty Queen Lillia of Nature's Glory have already sent a messenger. I thought you should be here."

The faerie, a young female by the looks of it, was staring at Shamira with something resembling hero worship. "I appreciate this," she squeaked, glancing at Shane. "And thank YOU, most illustrious Sex Goddess of the House of the House of Stapleton. It is an honor to be in your presence."

'Is she giving me the eye?' Shamira wondered, taken aback by her apparent new title. "Please, call me Shamira."

"Oh Goddess, I --."

"Shamira."

"Goddess."

"Shamira!"

The tiny woman stomped her foot in mid-air. "Their Majesties have determined that the first person to outlast the conduit will be referred to as the Sex Goddess! I must obey their royal wills!"

"For how long?"

The woman cocked her head. "How long must I obey? Oh, only as long as they're alive and --"

"No, how long am I stuck with that name?"

"Stuck?! It is a great honor --"

Shane was trying very hard not to laugh. "In your realm," he said, trying to be diplomatic, "she shall honor that title, but in my house, she must be addressed by her real name. It is our way," he said.

When Shane used that voice, people listened. The little faerie woman was certainly captivated. "Yes sir." Her face became more formal. "Their Majesties wanted you to know that we have already received directed communications from a number of colonies, all of whom feel this is a noble effort. And they really wanted to know how they'd managed to call up that much sex magic." She smiled and looked at Shamira. "You're famous now."

Shamira rolled her eyes.

"Anyway, we're getting call-backs from as far as Toronto. I didn't even know where that was, but apparently it's damn far. Anyway, we have a list of faerie colonies that are experiencing missing members." The woman handed Shane a very tiny scroll. Shane didn't look concerned, so Shamira assumed he could read it. "It may take a few weeks to hear back from the other Georgia colonies, but these are the quick responses."

"Thank you, m'lady," Shane said. "What was your name?"

The faerie blushed. "Glareen, your lordship."

"It was a pleasure meeting you, Glareen."

"Send our appreciation and thanks to their Majesties," Shamira added, offering her tongue. Glareen quickly flew up and kissed the offered muscle, then looked at Shane. Shane smiled and made a similar offering, which the faerie also took before vanishing into the plant life and then, with a green flash of light, disappeared completely.

"Strange people," Shane muttered. He looked down at the scroll. "This will take a while, but I want you to make personal contact with the other Georgia colonies once we get some more responses in. Get a lay of the land. You won't be able to hit all these places by yourself, so I'll put some of the other enforcers on it. I can't spare the security detail, since we've got this meeting coming up."

"What's that about?"

"The Tribunal just wants all the Southeastern lords to come together and discuss some zoning issues. And I believe there will be some words for Andrew Lacroix and his recent activities. A member of the Tribunal will be in attendance, so everything must be safe and organized."

"Will this Lacroix guy be there?"

"Yes."

"Why? I mean, he's trying to kill you and --"

"Allegedly," Shane said. "And any lord or lady who comes here under Tribunal order cannot be harmed for the duration." He smiled an put a hand on Shamira's shoulder. "You still have some things to learn about our world, but you're doing well. I am proud of you. Now go back to your game and . . . oh yes, remember that we're retrieving Tabitha tomorrow night."

"Yes sir. And tomorrow is another safe day for me. Oh, I've decided on a couple of blood donors. Clara's going to help set up a meeting for Tuesday. I didn't know if you had anything planned for me that day --"

"Don't worry about it. I'm glad you've finally found someone acceptable. I'll have an assignment, but it can wait until you're done. By the way, has anyone told you about donor etiquette? No? While sex with our donors is commonplace, I do no want you to engage in submission games with them. Humans really aren't capable of dealing with that kind of relationship with someone so much more powerful than them."

"Yes sir."

"Clara can fill you in on the rest."

Shamira headed back to finish watching her game. Clara had kept her promise to defend Shamira's spot. Henry was rubbing his shin and looking indignant. She filled everyone in on what she and Shane had talked about, including filling Bangaly in on the hunt for morning star dealers. The werelion took immense offense at the practice, making Shamira like him all the more.

At one point, Shamira got back up and headed to the kitchen to grab a case of microwaveable taquitos only to find that she wasn't alone. Renata had followed her and was grabbing a glass of lemonade out of one of the refrigerators. She walked past Shamira and sat at one of the many stools that littered the room.

"Hey, how are you holding up?"

"You mean after last night?"

"No, I mean after the other really weird mystical gangbang you've had recently."

Shamira gave the girl a frown. "Sarcasm doesn't become you." The she grinned and said, "I'm actually doing fine."

"That was some weird shit. You fantasize about that stuff a lot?"

Shamira shook her head. "I hadn't thought about that in a long time," she admitted. "I remember seeing this really creepy japanime flick called 'Curse of the Overfiend' or something like that once. I hated that none of the girls in those movies actually consent, but --" She paused. "This is going to sound sick, but the whole thing with tentacles . . . this unstoppable thing that just fucked you until you couldn't take it anymore just got me excited."