Acolyte of the Pleasure Goddess Ch. 09

The sky above them was a dark gray verging on yellow, looming storm clouds that threatened rain. The tension weighed down upon them from above, quieting the group and the thick forest around them. The road they walked along was wide and made of paved stone, leading directly to the cliff shores of the Riversea. They were met but sharp winds, funneled towards them by the tree line, and despite the heat Delyssa shivered at yet another biting gust from the east.

It had been over a fortnight since they left Ankreot, almost fifteen days since Delyssa had her dreams visited upon. They had traveled over a hundred leagues in their slow pursuit of Vael, and in the last few days left the arid hills north of Gra'tan behind them.

This was the most foreign landscape of her journey beyond Gra'tan thus far: as they crept through the riverlands the days became humid and heavy, a different kind of heat than the one borne beneath the glaring desert sun. Here, sweating seemed to do no good against the thick air that threatened to smother them. The fabric of their clothes clung to their skin, and Delyssa found herself peeling her skirt off of her thighs so often that eventually she lifted it entirely and walked beside the cart with it wrapped up about her waist, but even the direct contact with the air did little to cool her down.

They were surrounded on all sides by a thick, teeming jungle. Delyssa was used to the sounds of the city -- the ringing of bells across the Street of Souls, the braying of mules hauling carts to the busy markets, the calls of the vendors, the goastherds, and the street urchins. Even though she lived her adult life behind the walls of the Temple of Shevlana, she was fluent in the way the city spoke.

That was not the case here. The jungle itself seemed to be a strange, temperamental beast whose moods shifted between the morning purr of rising songbirds and the howls and barks of its hidden denizens. The thick bush beside the road was always rustling with the movement of some unseen creature. A few days ago, near dusk, an enormous serpent, wider around than Delyssa was tall, slithered out across the road before them, and the pillar of its body seemed to go on forever. When at last its tail disappeared into the thicket of high ferns, there was no trace whatsoever of its passing. Since then, each snapping branch and rustling tree beyond the road caused Delyssa to jump and freeze like a startled deer.

The sky creaked and rumbled above them. It hadn't yet rained since they left Ankreot, but with each passing day it felt more and more inevitable.

"I think we're heading into the rainy season along the coast," Bryn said. "They say that once it starts raining in Dertath, it doesn't stop for months."

"Months?" Delyssa slowed, thinking. The rains in Gra'tan were infrequent and short-lived, sudden showers that pelted down for just long enough for everyone in the Temple to abandon their chores and rush out to the gardens to dance together in the downpour. Then the skies would always clear, and they would all be left glittering in the sunlight, returning to their work refreshed. She tried to imagine months of incessant rain, the pelting without the promise of the returning sunshine. It seemed frightening.

More hours passed without speaking, as each one of them focused on their own footsteps, until at last Cenhera broke the silence. "Del," she said after clearing her throat, "is your goddess one of those meddler types? No offense if she is, of course."

"A meddler? I wouldn't say so. We get omens and signs, I suppose. And, of course, Shevlana gives us her magic in return for our service, but she doesn't play an active hand in the world like some other gods. Our records say that it's been centuries since Shevlana has walked among mortals."

"I don't mean that she comes down from... wherever she is," Cenhera said, still sounding cautious. "I just wondered if Shevlana, I don't know, plays tricks on people. Changes them somehow."

"Shevlana doesn't deal in curses," Delyssa replied firmly.

"Not curses. Just tricks. Nudges, I suppose."

"I don't think so. I can't recall anything like that, but maybe in some older mythics. Why do you ask?"

"Well... it's just that ever since you joined us, we've been acting differently. Bryn's always been rowdy, but he never would have walked around with his cock out before."

Delyssa turned, and saw that the fighter was holding the front of his trousers down to just over his knees, airing his genitals in the humidity.

"Uh, I didn't have a cock before," he said in between long strides.

Cenhera blinked. "Oh, yeah. Huh, that's right. Anyway, my point is that since you joined us, it's been more fucking than ever before in my life, I think. I don't know about Bryn, but I'm doing things I never would have done with my party before you came along."

"Are you really complaining," Bryn said from behind them.

"No! It's just, I was wondering if there was anything, uh, supernatural about it."

Delyssa laughed. "Are you asking if my goddess has somehow enchanted you to be more aroused?"

Cenhera flushed, her pale face reddening. "It does sound kinda dumb when you put it like that. Earlier, when I was on watch, I cast a spell to see if there were any subtle enchantments around us, just out of curiosity."

"And?"

"Nothing except your ward, Bryn's sword, my knives, and those hoops around your tits. But my spell wouldn't have detected anything from a, uh, higher power, so to speak, so I thought I'd ask."

"Well, all I can say is that to my knowledge, Shevlana is never so direct." Delyssa glanced down at her chest. She was now fully accustomed to the light weight of the Wings of Amity around her chest. Sometimes, she forgot that they were there. "I'd still like to know what, exactly, these are enchanted to do."

"Your saint didn't elaborate?" Bryn asked.

"She was cryptic."

"Hah. Nice pun," Bryn said.

"What pun?"

"We found her body in a crypt."

"Oh."

"Never mind."

Delyssa turned back to Cenhera. "To what you were saying, I don't think anything unnatural is taking place. I can see what you mean, but this is actually the least amount of sex I've been having since I came of age," she said with a shrug. A few steps later, and she realized that the other two had stopped walking, and were staring at her.

"Are you serious?" Bryn said. "It was basically nonstop since before we even got to Ankreot."

"I lived in the temple of the Goddess of Love and Lust," Delyssa pointed out.

"I assumed that this was you cutting loose in the outside world," Cenhera protested.

"No! I used to spend my whole day in my cella, a little room where supplicants and worshipers would come in to lay with me until the Temple closed its doors at night."

"How many would you have every day?" Bryn said, his eyes wide.

"On an average day, I'd see around ten or twelve people. Mostly young men and women in the rite of emergence. On some of the holy days, where we work out in the main chamber of the temple, it might be closer to twenty or thirty, depending on how many acolytes are working that night. Otherwise, there's lots of chores to keep us busy that isn't sex."

"Thirty? In a single day?" Cenhera's mouth was open.

"Well, those are the holy days, and there's only one or two of those a year. Of course, that doesn't count when I'd lay with the other acolytes or the priestesses."

Bryn threw up his hands. "Why does anyone worship any god but yours?"

Delyssa shrugged. "I wonder if that's what Mesembre thought. But I do think that perhaps I enjoyed those pleasures more than some of the others. There are women who were initiated at the same time as me who are already on the path to being priestesses. And there's plenty of others who mostly work in the healing ward. There's quite a lot of variety within the Temple. Outside of it, I don't know. If I had found the Temple of Muridiel as a child instead of the Temple of Shevlana, I might be wondering why anyone would spend their days having sex with whomever instead of tending to the harvest." She frowned. "Hm. I don't think that's blasphemy."

Bryn scratched his chin. "You know, it's funny. A few weeks ago, and I think I'd have gotten pretty mad if someone I love just told me they'd been fucking ten to twenty other people every day for however many years. But now, I don't know. It doesn't seem like a big deal."

Delyssa walked back to the fighter and took his arm. "I think that's the first time you said you love me," she said with a smile.

Bryn straightened and blushed. "Um. Well, it's hard not to, when you're always showing off a body like this," he said, grabbing Delyssa's ass with his other hand.

"Excellent parry, warrior," Cenhera said.

They resumed walking, with Delyssa in between Bryn and Cenhera, the horse and cart picking up again behind them. As they walked, Bryn's hand stuck to her bottom, drifting down between her cheeks with each step.

"We still have a lot of ground left to cover today," she reminded him.

Bryn just laughed. "I don't think it's possible for me to slow you down."

Next to them, Cenhera clamped her hands over her ears. "It's bad enough seeing both of you naked as we walk. If you two start fucking around while we walk, I'll get too horny to think straight."

"What do you need to think straight for?" Bryn said. Between his legs, his cock began to twitch and grow, now half-hard and bobbing up and down over his sack as he walked. His fingers probed deeper between her legs, brushing up against her wet sex, his thumb pressing up against her other hole. She stumbled at the contact, and his grip on her nethers tightened as he caught her. She could feel herself dripping around him.

"Can you keep walking?" he asked.

She widened her stance a little and nodded. Still shoulder-to-shoulder, Bryn bent a little over to her, two of his fingers penetrating her, his thumb a flat pressure on her anus.

"Oh, goddess," she murmured.

Then Bryn tripped, his stride caught by his lowered trousers, and his grip pulled Delyssa down with him. She landed on all fours, distantly felt the sting of her elbows and knees grating against the cobblestones.

"Alright, that's it!" Cenhera snapped. "You two can't fuck while walking, you're obviously not agile enough and its slowing us down." As the tunling stood in front of them, Delyssa looked up and saw that her legs were flexing tight against one another.

"You're right," she said as she stood and brushed herself off. "For purposes of speed, we'll each be responsible for ourselves." She set off, dropping one hand between her legs as she past Cenhera. Despite the humidity, her juices felt hot against her skin as they trailed down her legs. It was a strange feeling, masturbating as she walked. Her thighs pressed both sides of her hand, each step shifting her weight, opening her in a new way. She took longer strides, enjoying the feel of the open air against her parted labia. She kept her palm pressed against her mound, buried in her pubes, teasing her clitoris with just the tips of her fingers. She glanced behind her and saw that Bryn was fully hard and following her, stroking himself. After a few shuffling steps, he stopped to fully remove his trousers, tossing them over his shoulder and into the cart. His sack, swollen with the heat, stuck to his thighs until his grabbed his balls and cradled them. Behind him, Cenhera didn't bother to strip and merely thrust her hand down into her trousers, working herself as the dark stain of her own fluids spread outward from her groin.

Delyssa let the two catch up to her, and they fell back in on either side. She looped one hand around Bryn's naked waist and rested the other on Cenhera's opposite shoulder. A prickle of sweat formed along her hairline, and she felt sticky and damp across her body, all over her skin. Beneath her breasts, her buttocks, below her arms and between her legs, she felt the sweat of heat and arousal begin to crawl across her. Bryn's back was slick against her hands, and the cloth of Cenhera's shirt stuck to the tunling's skin. The three of them marched in step together, even matching the pace of their own caresses.

"Tell me more about your Temple," Bryn muttered next to her. "I want to be able to picture you there."

"Alright," Delyssa said, shuddering at another shock of heat as her soft fingertips trailed around her clit. She resisted the urge to close her eyes, instead focusing on the cobblestones directly before her.

"At the start of each week we'd decide on a schedule for ourselves, what chores need doing and who'll do them, but we all need to take part in the rituals. I'd wake before dawn and head down from the dormitory to the main hall. Either I'd dress or I wouldn't. Some mornings there's a chill in the air and I'd wear my blankets like a shawl. Other times I'd just go naked. But that's so normal there."

Bryn sighed and let go of his cock, which throbbed and strained as it wagged in the air in front of him. Delyssa could feel how tense he was next to her, how close he was to coming. "Keep going," he said.

"We'd have our morning prayers together in the hall, and then go off to each of our chores before the doors open for services. After that, I'd--"

"What are your prayers like?" Bryn interrupted. "Do you all have to suck the priest's cock or something?"

Delyssa laughed. "No, nothing like that. And we have priestesses, not priests. Although that doesn't stop them from having cocks," she said, thinking of gentle Gala who laid with her the night before she left. The memory of those beautiful priestesses rushed down to her loins, and she felt the familiar swell of arousal growing once more.

"Is it true that your priestesses are naked all the time?" Cenhera said from Delyssa's right.

"Yes. As part of their ritual ascension into the priestesshood, they cast off their garments," she said.

"So someday, when you're a priestess, you'll be naked for the rest of your life?" Cenhera asked, and Bryn moaned, his hand clutching hard around the base of his shaft to stave off his orgasm.

"I suppose so," Delyssa said. "But I haven't really thought about it much. Not everyone becomes a priestess. It's not just about devotion -- you need to be wise, learned, patient, and skilled."

"You're all of those things, Del," Bryn said.

"Maybe. I don't feel very wise."

"Stop it. If you keep talking like that, I'll lose this erection and be very mad at you."

"Hah, alright," she leaned over and stroked his cock once and left him quivering.

"Keep going," said Cenhera. "Tell us a story about living there."

Delyssa nodded, and thought for a moment, searching for a memory that would fit their mood. She never before considered her life at the Temple, which was joyous and mundane, to be something worthy of a story. She pulled her fingers out of herself and sucked on them, stalling for time as much as lubricating her hand.

"Alright," she said after a dozen more steps. "I'll tell you about my coming-of-age ritual. The details are meant to be kept from outsiders, but there's no punishment for revealing them, and since you both already know about our secret forgotten saint, I suppose there's no harm.

"Those of us raised in the Temple all were inducted together in a single ceremony. There were three of us, another girl and a boy.

"The ritual starts in the main hall, which is closed to outsiders for the evening. Everyone gathers together, the whole temple, to witness. Our night started off with long prayers that I won't bore you with, but eventually it came time for us perform the rites. The three of us stripped naked before everyone and stood together at the altar. We were all so nervous, we held hands for comfort, until one-by-one we walked up to the priestess--"

"The naked priestess."

"We just went over this, Bryn."

"Sorry. Just trying to paint a better picture for myself."

"Well, picture this. We each walked up the priestess, who sits on the altar. I went second."

"What did you do?" asked Cenhera.

"When it was my turn, I stepped up before her, my back to rest of the cult. Then I suckled at the priestess' breast. She held a bowl in her lap, and when my mouth was full I spat the milk into it."

Delyssa felt herself pulse closer to orgasm as she recounted her memory. The sensations returned to her as she recounted them: the sweet taste of the priestess' breast-milk, the heat of the brazier, the crowd of naked watchers, the unbidden wet between her legs throughout the ceremony. Next to her, Bryn's fist was tight around his cock, drawn slowly toward and away from his bulging glans that looked like it was threatening to release at any provocation. Cenhera had fallen a few steps behind, too distracted with maintaining the quick patter of her palm across her vulva to match the walking pace of her longer-legged companions.

"Is that it?" Bryn asked, his voice strained.

"No. After that, the priestess picked three men out from the crowd and brought them up to the altar with us. She placed each of us in front of them, made us kneel. She was so gentle with us as she guided our heads forward to take their cocks into our mouths.

"I remember being so distracted by how my jaw hurt. That was the first cock I ever sucked -- I had seen the ritual before as part of the audience, and I wanted to wait for my turn, I guess. Anyway, I was so surprised when he came I almost pulled away, but I swallowed like I was supposed to.

"There were some more rituals after that, but soon we all moved to the feast hall, where there was spiced wine waiting for us to clear the taste from our tongues. They gave us a toast, and we all reveled deep into the night. It isn't part of the ceremony, but it's a tradition for everyone to leave the newly-inducted initiates with the other acolytes of the first circle. We had the whole hall to ourselves."

Delyssa could sense that her companions were close, so close, to the threshold, and let herself fall back deep into memory.

"Picture a dozen of us, all naked, fucking until dawn. Think of licking wine off of my breasts. Imagine sitting in a circle before the hearth, showing off our bodies, touching ourselves in the firelight. Think of the games we made out of it. All the girls gathered on one side to watch all of the boys stroke themselves, then how they watched us part our own lips and pleasure ourselves. Then we all fell upon each other in every combination."

She was orgasming now, suddenly, fluids streaming down her thighs and onto the bare cobblestone of the road, but somehow neither her step nor her speech faltered.

"Picture me sitting atop a boy's face, kissing the other boy who was fucking him. Then I was below, and the boy who entered me sucked the cock of the one above me. We traded partners as easily as meeting eyes, and I wasn't empty till dawn. There was always a cock, a finger, a tongue inside me or in my mouth, and I felt the warmth of mouths over my nipples, my fingers, all across my flesh, my sex, until at last we were all piled together as the light of dawn began to pour through the high windows, and the cooks chased us out of the hall with brooms."

Delyssa glanced beside her. Bryn's hands were messy with his cum, and his cock was dripping down onto the stone. The dark stain around the crotch of Cenhera's trousers grew wider as she ascended to her own squeaking climax, legs wobbling beneath her even as she walked. Delyssa removed her fingers from inside her and saw that they were glistening, the pads of her fingers pruned from her own moisture.

They walked a few more paces and fell in alongside one another. Bryn shook his hands, flicking cum off of them and onto the ground.

"That was a really good story, Del," he said.

"I can see that you both enjoyed it," she laughed.

"Too bad we made such a mess," Cenhera said. "I'm not looking forward to walking in wet clothes all day."