Assimilated

Saidi sneered at me. "You're not going to the Box. You don't even know what that means."

"You're all going to rut me," I said.

"And?"

I glanced at Faisa, but she was looking away. She seemed frightened, but I didn't know what she was frightened of. That I might fail? How could I fail at being tied down and toyed with by women?

"And Amora is going to rut me," I said, sitting up.

"Do you even know what Amora is?"

Again, I looked at Faisa. There were no answers there. "She is your leader," I said.

"She?!" Saidi stared at Faisa. "Gods and Ancestors, girl, what did you tell him?"

"He wants to do this," Faisa insisted. "Can't you see that?"

Saidi looked back and forth at each of us, her mouth open in disbelief. Finally, she seemed to decide how to respond. She unstrapped the sheath from her side and tossed it down in front of me.

"Do you want to kill me, Kwi?" she said. "Here's your opportunity. Take it, because you'll have more of a chance getting past me than pleasing Amora. Your friend Byam is already fish food." She stood squarely in front of me, willing me to pick up the weapon. I didn't move.

"I get it," Saidi said, after a few moments. "Faisa has feelings for you, and you for her. But she hasn't told you what your future holds." She glanced back at Faisa, who looked at me with dismal eyes. "I don't even think she's told you most of it."

"Just leave us alone," Faisa said quietly.

"Yes," I added. "Please."

Saidi paused. She sighed. "Fine. Figure it out for yourselves." She picked up her sword and sheath. She started to turn her back, but then had a second thought. "But I'll leave you with a story. It's a story you'll appreciate, Kwi, though Faisa has already heard it.

"After Wengu," Saidi began, "we Kong fighters were in full retreat, with the Queen's army pushing us from the south. We couldn't go north, because her Zambe allies in the Shanga Empire wouldn't let us across their border. We couldn't go east into Lake Kongo. So we went west, into wooded wilds that no one knew well.

"For a year, each time we tried to settle, Catamori's hunters would find us. So we kept moving. Finally we found a river valley with no people in it. The land was bountiful, and our scouts contacted villages further west with whom we could trade. The only catch was, that river and its streams were inhabited by a powerful water spirit."

"Amora," I guessed.

"Amora," agreed Saidi.

"Water spirit," I said. "You mean a demon." That was why there were no wards. Because they let a demon come and go freely.

Saidi nodded slightly. "A mondao, to be precise. The thing about demons is that most of them crave nothing more than to rut humans. And most of them are happy to mate with men or women. But this particular demon has a preference. Amora wants only human women. And xhe knew the primal magic that could transform a human male into a female. Not at will, like a demon can. Just once."

"That's not possible," I stuttered.

"I'll wager that's the last thing Byam said. I'd even bet he was absolutely certain on that point," said Saidi, before she returned to her narrative. "So, in order to settle in this valley, we made peace with the demon. Amora is not our leader, Kwi. Amora is our consort."

A water spirit. I remembered the wave that had lured Lily and Ginger away, just before we were attacked.

"I'll leave you two alone. Rut yourselves silly," Saidi said. She was no longer grinning. More than anything, she looked sad. "When you're ready for the Box, I'll be there."

She walked out. She swung the door shut behind her, leaving us in darkness.

Faisa got up. I heard her sobbing as she groped about, and the faint click of her flint before she lit the lamp again.

"You all joined forces with a demon," I said with disgust.

The lamp light flickered. I could barely see Faisa in the shadows, as if she was an image from a waking dream. "They don't call themselves demons."

"No," I chuckled bitterly. "No, I suppose they wouldn't."

The meaning of the story Saidi had said hadn't fully dawned on me. But I was beginning to understand how it answered all of the questions I'd had until now. And so many of those questions were about Faisa.

"Haven't you heard the rumors about Queen Catamori?" Faisa shot back. "It is said that she holds demons beneath her palace. She breeds them with humans."

"I don't care-"

"The world is not as black and white as you think, Djo! You can honor your Ancestors and not believe that every demon is evil."

"What was your husband's name?" I asked.

"What?"

"Where was he born? What village?"

"Just ask the question you want to ask," she said, resigned. "Don't make this harder than it already is."

"There was no husband. Or, the husband was you. You were an archer, in the army just like me. Did you desert? Or were you captured?"

"I was captured. During the month of Praise."

That was three months ago, at the beginning of the rainy season. "The month of Praise... that was you. You were one of the men Kabanji lost."

Faisa didn't answer. She didn't need to. It was the only explanation. "What's your real name?" I asked.

"My real name is Faisa. This is who I am now."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Her bitterness was clear even in the gloom. "Tell you what? That I was once a man like you? Or that I yearn to be a man still? Which confession would have helped you more, Djo?"

I shook my head in disbelief. "By all the rutting Ancestors, I trusted you! You were the only one who thought my life was worth a shit. You were the only reason I didn't go mad, or drown myself in that stream. I desperately wanted you to trust me," I said. "But you couldn't. You didn't."

"You almost killed me. I couldn't dare trust you at first... But I do," she said. "I do now."

"Oh. So now you're going to tell me about the demon that's going to murder me if I don't submit to primal magic and become a woman?"

She rolled her eyes. "Djo, everything I told you was-"

"Akile." I said.

"What?"

"Akile!" I shouted. "You're hurting me. I don't want you here."

I watched as she rose slowly and fetched her clothes.

"If I need the truth," I added, "I'll ask Saidi."

**

Head down, shield up.

Follow the rules, protect yourself. That had been my guiding philosophy since my early years in the war. My favorite proverb, I suppose.

That advice had kept me alive through many hard-fought battles.

It had also helped me endure seeing women screaming for their families as they were marched into captivity. It clouded the faces of men I'd killed, and friends I'd lost. It was how I accepted that a single man's yam farm could be built atop the ashes of an entire Kong village. But after a time, the war I hated fighting became indistinguishable from the forest in which I'd fought it.

There was so little from those years that I wanted to remember. Instead I blocked it, trampled over it, and thrust it away like an enemy. I kept my head down and followed the rules.

After Faisa fled the yam hut, I looked out at the parts of the moonlit village I could see. This was not an easy place to understand. As Faisa said, the world was not black and white, and this little settlement on the Honeycomb Creek was not either. I was still a prisoner, shackled or not.

And yet, I'd known a simplicity of purpose here, where people cared for one another, and no one named themselves king, queen, chief, or subchief. The demon Amora seemed far away from the daily lives of these women.

Faisa had left most of her belongings. I picked up the unfinished jar of palm wine. I poured some out to the Ancestors, as far away as mine were. As the moon passed behind the clouds and out again, I drank the rest, trying unsuccessfully to drown hard memories.

It wasn't until I'd swallowed the dregs of the wine, and the sky was beginning to lighten with dawn, that I noticed that she'd left my manacles and key on the floor.

A short time later, I trudged down to the water's edge and chained myself to the Box.

**

"I'm ready!" I shouted. "By all my rutting Ancestors, I'm ready!"

The village was just starting to stir. A couple of women carrying empty jugs upstream walked by me, giggling at me like I was a fool. So I sat down on the ground and waited. Lily came over to lick my face and get back rubs.

Saidi poked her head out of one of the huts, a hut I knew she shared with Faisa and other women. She spotted me, and, wrapping a skirt around her waist, sauntered down to the water to dowse her face.

"What in hells are you doing, Kwi?"

"You said you'd be here when I was ready for the Box," I said. I jingled the manacle chain, in case she hadn't noticed it. "I'm ready."

"The hells you are. I was being sarcastic."

"I'm serious."

Saidi wiped her broad face dry with the hem of her skirt. She came to stand over me, and bent so that we were face to face. "Let me explain this to you," she said, "because you probably think we are demon-worshiping savages. No one will force you into the ritual. Faisa likes you, even after your little spat. Unlike most Kwi, you seem like a less-than-horrible person. As long as you pull your weight and don't try to run home to your Queen, you'll be fine." She nodded in the direction of the yam hut. "Go get some rest. You've had a long night, and your breath smells like girlcum and palm wine."

I wondered where Faisa was, but I decided it was better not to ask. "I'm not going anywhere until this ass gets good and rutted," I said.

Saidi looked up at the sky, running a hand through her spiky, short hair. "Gods and Ancestors," she swore, and walked away.

By the time the elder, Sekora, emerged from her hut, and came to see the commotion I caused, the village was bustling. By this time, I had sobered up. But I hadn't changed my mind. Several women bathed near me, curious to see what would unfold. I hadn't seen Faisa yet, however.

Sekora went straight to the heart of things. "Understand what you are asking, Djoben. Once begun, the ritual cannot be stopped. When every woman here has had her fill and taken what she wants of you, you will face Amora. And if Amora does not accept you, xhe will most likely drown you on the spot. If you are accepted, you will take the first draught tonight."

"The first draught?"

She sighed with impatience, apparently expecting that I'd been told this already. "The first of a series of draughts of a potion that will make you one of us."

"It will change my body into a woman's."

"Yes. Irreversibly, when the series is done. But it will not be easy."

I nodded. "I am ready."

She took a long breath. "We will begin at dusk. Prepare yourself."

I had nowhere else to go. So I stayed there, chained to the Box, for most of the day. It was afternoon when Faisa came to see me.

She looked bathed and freshly oiled, although I had not seen her at the stream. She glanced at me warily before she sat down beside me.

She must have recognized the longing in my expression.

"Faisa, I'm sorry I-"

She looked down. "No, I'm sorry."

"I don't even know why I was angry."

"I do," she said. "You had reason to be angry. I let my own fear and regret keep me from helping you."

"I was headstrong," I said. "You were cautious, and right to be. I have always just charged in. Head down, shield up."

I turned to her. "I want to help you," I said. "Perhaps if we have shared the same experience..."

She nodded, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "But aren't you frightened?"

"Yes."

She took my hand. "Everyone here wants you to succeed. Even Saidi. They may seem indifferent, but that is only because they have watched others fail. Do not show fear or judgment. Be open to what you experience."

"I will try."

"Are you sure?" she asked. "You don't have to do this now."

"I am ready to put my old life behind me," I replied. "Will you still like me as a woman?"

She squeezed my hand. "I will love you even more," she said.

**

At twilight, when the sun was yet hidden behind the western trees, Sekora came to me, with Faisa and Saidi trailing her. The big warrior woman carried a large basket atop her head.

"Wash and prepare him," Sekora told the two warriors.

I unlocked myself from the Box and they led me downstream and around a bend. I went into the bush to take out my plug, squat and pee. Then Faisa accompanied me into the water, while Saidi set out a mat and other items.

Faisa washed me in the stream with her hands. She was very thorough, her touch lingering more than usual. I was somewhat light-headed from hunger, but after a few minutes of her caresses, my empty belly was forgotten. After she stroked my cock clean, she kneeled in the water, pointed the shaft towards the sky, and began licking my balls, one at a time. My knees almost gave way.

"Gods and Ancestors, girl! Don't you two ever stop?"

Faisa paused, her lips making a soft smack. "I want him to be ready. I want him begging to have a cock in him."

"He's spent the whole day begging."

Faisa sucked and stroked me more, until I moaned and my hips began to buck. Then she stood up again. "You'll thank me later," she told the other woman.

I noticed that Saidi was filling a skin bladder with water from a jug. The bladder had a nozzle at its end, which Saidi oiled up. I guessed where that was going. Faisa took it and, gently, pushed it into my stretched asshole.

The feeling of being filled was pleasurable at first. The water was warm, and I guessed that it had been recently boiled. But when I got the sensation of sloshing inside, I had to make an effort to hold steady. When the bladder was empty, and I was full, Faisa continued to wash me for a few minutes. Then she had me expel the water. They refilled the bladder, and then refilled me, twice more.

When I was clean inside and out, I went to the mat, where Saidi waited with the oil. "Don't make that face at me, Kwi. I'm just here to carry your shit."

"I have a name, you know," I said, lying on my belly.

"Oh yeah? What is it?"

I grinned at this, for Saidi surely knew my name by now.

Faisa, smiling too, oiled up the now washed plug. She fingered me slowly.

The ghost of a smile appeared, begrudgingly, on Saidi's face. "You should be learning all of our names, Kwi. So you'll know who to beg for mercy when they're riding your ass too hard."

Faisa inserted the plug in my ass. I whimpered softly as I was stretched again.

"Sing your song," she murmured. I did, and the plug came to life, stirring my insides and shedding a soft glow to the bank of the stream.

"Like a firefly," Saidi chuckled.

"That's what I thought," Faisa replied as she rubbed oil into my skin. "I never realized Sekora was such a joker, but her bush magic gives her away."

As they giggled with each other, my skin tingled. My cock twitched as the plug buzzed away in my ass. After I rolled over, Faisa applied the oil to my front. She leaned over my face, and her haltered breasts hung in my face. I nuzzled them, vividly recalling the night before. Moments later, she took my cock nearly to the root in her throat. She reached down and pulled her loincloth aside as she began to straddle my face. I stuck my tongue out eagerly.

"Gods and- will you two stop? It is already dusk!"

Faisa spread her yoni on my face. She was soaked, and it wasn't all from the Honeycomb. For a few moments, we both made greedy, wet noises until she lifted herself off me. I staggered to my feet and slipped on my sandals with some difficulty. Then, with her hand still tugging my cock, we made our way back to the Box.

The torches had been set alight, and all of the village women stood inside the ring. Some of them were naked. Most of them wore leather harnesses with phalluses made of wood, similar to my plugs. They passed around jars of oil, rubbing the lubricant into their fake cocks. A few of them snickered when they saw the lust-addled state I was in, and the light that winked at them from between my buttcheeks.

I was too aroused to deeply contemplate the challenge ahead. At that moment, I craved release. Release from the sexual tension building up inside me, but also release from my past, and the life I'd chosen to leave behind.

I clambered upon the box, resting my knees and elbows on the lower, fur-covered platforms.

"Tie him down," Sekora said.

Several did so, wrapping my limbs to the padding with plant fibers. They didn't tie the binds tightly, and I could shift my weight slightly if I became uncomfortable. Someone began to beat a steady rhythm on a drum, matching my rolling sense of anticipation. Once I was secured, the women backed away.

"Djoben of Malagande," Sekora said, in a voice resonant with authority, "you come before us to be accepted into our number. We will test you, in a way you have never been tested. You have been stripped of the trappings of your life as a soldier. You will endure all that we give. We will take all that you have. Then you will be judged."

For a moment, no one around the circle moved. My breaths fell into step with the drumbeat and the soft buzzing of the plug. The women seemed to sigh, collectively. The air crackled with floating embers from the fires, and perhaps a kind of bush magic. These were the people I'd chosen. I could only hope that they chose me too.

Saidi swaggered in front of me. "If no one else will rut him, I will," she said, her voice practically dripping with bluster. She was holding a leather harness with a curved wooden cock, but she hadn't put it on yet. Instead, she held it out in front of my face. "This is what I'm going to be claiming your ass with," she said. "Give it a taste."

I wasn't sure how to approach it and couldn't move my head far. She placed a big hand on top of my scalp and guided me. I obediently licked along the shaft. It had the mellow sweetness of coconut oil, and my tongue curled around it.

She turned the blunt head of it directly towards my mouth and slid it between my lips. "That's it," she said, in a quieter voice. "I knew when I first saw you that I'd either have to kill you or rut you silly."

I gagged a little with the effort, as she pushed it all of the way into my mouth. "Get it good and wet," she said. 'Coco oil works well, but there's nothing better than throat slime to get an asshole nice and frothy." She drew the phallus out, dripping with my saliva.

"Rut me, please," I pleaded.

"Oh, we'll get to that," she said, glancing up behind me. "But I think you're going to be occupied on that end for a bit. Taste my yoni instead." She pulled her loincloth aside and stepped right up to my face.

I licked the tender, salty flesh in the crease of her inner thigh. My tongue quickly sought out her nether lips, already moist. At the same time, I felt someone behind me, and the cool, steady drip of oil on the cheeks and crack of my ass.

Saidi's outer lips spread easily. She tasted surprisingly fresh, and almost sweet. I began licking her with relish. As frightening as she'd been in the beginning, I had begun to realize she'd been supportive of me in her own way. I was eager to please her.

"How is he?" I recognized Nika's voice, directly behind me.

"Gods and Ancestors," Saidi gushed. "Now I know what Faisa was doing all this time!" She backed up just enough to slide her loincloth down her legs and off, and then pressed up against my waiting mouth again. "He's going to make so many new friends..."

I moaned into her as I felt Nika pull on my plug. It was still vibrating, its thrum setting me afire. I'd never had it buzzing while I pulled it out before. Nika didn't move it entirely. She drew it out just enough for the flared head to stretch me, and then slid it back in. Again and again, she rutted me with the plug. I sighed and slobbered into Saidi's yoni.

The big warrior held my ears to keep me steady as I got sloppy. "Oooh," she crooned. "Keep doing that."