Cam's Coterie

Cassia said, "Three shifts of just six. They change shifts at dawn, early afternoon, and just before the midnight hour. They have the four corners covered constantly, with two people that patrol in a circle on opposite sides. Just in case one is taken down, the patroller won't take more than a few minutes to walk half the wall, and they can give off a warning cry if one of the posts is down. The last two of the twenty are the commander and second in command. If the alarm is given, they all respond as well as the coven, spare sisters, and the apprentices."

"And, even if we take them out without an alarmed cry, the walls will report our presence as soon as we touch them?"

Cassia nodded, "Exactly."

"But the circle will have to give the alarm, so we'd have a few minutes to find the sleeping mercenaries and take them down before they can respond properly. Obviously, we're going to need to be sneaky, murderous, and stealthy, not look for a straight fight. I don't suppose there's a way to get over the wall without touching it, a tree or a tunnel..." I trailed off as the obvious occurred, "Oh damn, I'm such an idiot."

I started to laugh, as a plan came together in my mind.

"We attack tomorrow night, two hours after the shift change to ensure the rest of the mercenaries are asleep, and any midnight casting is done. It'll also give me one more opportunity to feed from you both. Here's the plan..." I continued to tell them the plan.

Chapter Ten

Once we had our plan, and merely had to bide our time, I gave into my constant desires without the need for guilt. There was no nagging responsibility being neglected, and the next thirty-six hours were mostly pure decadence, constant sex, and a great time with my Faith and Cassia.

I suspected it was my pheromones, my magic, and my nature, that contributed to their equally insatiable sexual appetites, but they sure as hell weren't complaining about it. The intensity and joy they took in the pleasure and countless orgasms I gave them, was enthrallingly captivating to me, they beguiled me.

I said mostly decadent, because we did more training the following morning for over an hour, and we also had to eat. I also spent time between rounds to speak with them both and learn more about them. By the next night, it'd been four days since I made my deal with Cassia.

Four days wasn't all that long, but given we'd spent virtually every minute together, and our chemical and physical attraction was through the roof, we were starting to get to know each other a lot better, and even started to lay a more solid foundation for our relationship. I admired my Cassia, for her morals, her fantasies, what she wanted out of life, and even for her power-hungry ambitions. Those ambitions were tempered by her obvious respect for life and strong empathy and desire for justice.

In short, despite all the sex, our warm feelings and need of each other was starting to be about more than that, and I had hope once she had what she wanted she'd choose to stay, but only time would tell. In truth, I was fairly sure I was besotted with her, truly in love, but I doubted myself. I was still young, had never been in love, and all the mind-blowing sex was definitely confusing the issue.

By the night of the attack, it was also two days since I'd claimed my Faith. Our mating was almost entirely instinctual and magical in nature. That need to own her and cherish her would never fade, and she'd never stop needing to obey and service me and my needs, in joy. But... the intensity of feeling each other's emotions during sex, and perhaps more importantly while not having sex, also led to a deeper and more solid connection, fairly quickly. She was a goddess no doubt, but she was also highly intelligent, wickedly clever, and completely loyal to me on all levels. Emotionally, physically, and submissively so. In short, I admired her as well as cherished her, and she loved the way I treated her.

There was a lot to admire about my ladies, not just their unsurpassed looks and devastatingly alluring playfulness.

We headed out that night with a plan, after I'd fed from them one last time. My heart pounded and my body buzzed with all the energy I'd harvested the last four days, as we left the inn in the small hours of the morning, and we headed for the upper-class neighborhood via the temple district, where the coven's mansion lied. In that moment, I wasn't so much worried about the possibility of failure, or the need to flee, even if that was a consideration in my mind, what really had me nervous was the danger my ladies were about to be in.

They'd fight with me, and they'd risk their lives to accomplish our join goals and ambitions. The possessively protective part of me hated that, and it was my one true fear, the idea that one or even both of them could die on that night. It filled me with a fierce and inexorable determination, we didn't have a choice, the coven would hunt us for the rest of our lives if we didn't act and remove the danger.

The witch's mansion, Shadow Lace mansion, was a large and vast building, which was surrounded by a twenty-foot wall that was much larger, to encompass their grounds, gardens, and grove of trees. Point was, the walls were long enough, and it was dark enough, that taking out a posted guard wouldn't alert the other three corner post guards, which was why they had two wall walkers.

We moved silently in the shadows toward the wall, using other buildings for cover, Faith and I by our skills, and Cassia by her magic.

We approached and crouched low by the wall, in the dark alley between the wall of the mansion, and the next building. The guard post in the front right corner was less than twenty-five feet away from me, and we waited patiently for the patrolling guards to pass, to time it. There was about two minutes separation between the sweeping guards, which was our window.

That part was probably the riskiest part of the plan, we had to take down six men without any of them crying out and giving the alarm. We also needed to split up, we couldn't just move in a counter-clockwise direction and take down the walking guards and posts as we went, because the last post would notice if the roving guard didn't show up and pass by, and they'd give off the alarm anyway.

The roving guard approached the corner along the front of the wall, as soon as the two men shared a nod and he passed by and was on the eastern wall, I pulled a dagger and threw it at the post guard. I was more confident in taking a neck shot from twenty-five feet, on the guard that wasn't moving.

On the other hand, the second guard froze in confusion, gripped his chest, and fell dead as Cassia's spell took him in the torso. My guard gurgled blood for a bit, then he too fell on the ground, never to move again.

I immediately started to run silently along the eastern wall, I had to reach the next post and take him out before he got suspicious about the roving guard not showing up, while simultaneously, Cassie and Faith ran along the northern wall. They needed to reach at least halfway, then wait to take down the second roving guard with another spell, that was their only other job, and Faith's was to protect Cassia if there was a need. That took care of the roving guards, I'd handle the posts.

Hopefully, if things went well, I'd have time to recover my four throwing daggers, because we couldn't afford to set off the wall wards until we were on the way out, and those it would alert would be dead. The second guard went down as unaware and unexpecting as the first. My heart pounded with excitement and there was a burning thrill in my blood, at the danger and the idea of avenging my mother's death and freeing me from the threat of my enemies.

The ones that had birthed me through a dark pact with my demon father, merely to suck out and steal my life and take it as their own, would be dead that night if I had anything to say about it. They'd lived for too long, were arrogant and heartless, and it was long past the time for them to move on from this world.

The third one managed to get out a hoarse and low shout, my dagger to his throat ended his life quickly as his life's blood spilled, but I hadn't managed to hit the trachea that time. Still, as I ran along the western wall to the north west corner, and the last of the six guards who lived, I heard no shouts. His hoarse and low cry must've gone unheard.

When I got to the corner, I frowned as I couldn't see the guard at all.

Cassia's sweetly dulcet voice reached my ears, "I took him down."

I grunted, that wasn't part of the plan, but perhaps I was being just a tad overprotective doing all the killing I could, and in only depending on my amazing ladies as little as possible.

"Ready?"

She smirked, and then walked over and tucked herself into my side as her arms went around me. Faith similarly tucked into my other side.

It was perhaps excusable, for me not to figure out right away the obvious way to get over the wall without touching it while we'd been planning yesterday afternoon, after all, I'd only had my wings for four days.

Large leather wings burst from my back, as I fed that power magic, and I spread them wide as I jumped, and flapped my wings. We shot up into the sky, far easier than I'd expected with two passengers, and I glided over the wall and circled down to the ground. As soon as we landed, my wings retracted and melted away, along with the drain on my precious and limited magic.

Cassia looked a little breathless as she stepped away, and I tried not to smirk too smugly at the look of naked desire in her warm brown eyes.

"This way," she said softly.

Cassia was in the lead for this part, at least in getting us where we needed to be, as she was familiar and had lived in the mansion. She led us around the side of the mansion, to a small sub-building that was the barracks for the mercenary company. She stood up against the wall, and then nodded slowly.

It wasn't a fight, as that part of the plan called for us becoming assassins. It was what it was, and as my mother said, if I was fighting fair, I was doing it wrong. There were still fourteen more mercenaries, and those odds would be overwhelming even for me, unless I blew some magic on it which was needed for facing the coven.

I wasn't proud of it, but it was tactically unsound to leave a live enemy behind us, one that would come to the coven's aid when we confronted them.

Faith gave me a feral smile, clearly as pumped up by the danger and violence as I was. We both pulled daggers, and we slipped inside the barracks while Cassia stood guard. It was a fiction of course, the guard part. My sweet witch was determined to help me accomplish my goals, and to perhaps revenge herself on the coven that had thrown her life away, while gaining her ambition in the tomes of magical knowledge that held the advanced spells that most witches could only dream about knowing.

My Cassia wasn't queasy either, and even got turned on by the thrill of danger, but she clearly didn't enjoy the violence part of things at all, it was just something that had to be done in her mind. Point being, we spared her the necessity of helping us with the grizzly task. On a more practical note, only Faith and I had the strength to hold them still and keep them quiet as they bled out.

It was one large room, and there were fourteen men asleep in beds as death silently moved among them. We covered mouths and slit throats, one at a time, until the ugly work was done. I didn't exactly enjoy it either, like I enjoyed a more straight-forward contest of arms, but it was necessary.

Phase one of our plan had gone off without a hitch, the mercenaries were no longer a threat, which honestly worried me a little, something always went wrong. A large portion of my mother's training had been about that, and the need to be adaptable when plans went sideways, which meant the wrinkle in our plans was still to come.

I cleaned my blade on the dead mercenary's clothes, and sheathed it, then drew my sword as we walked back out into the side courtyard of the mansion.

"It's done, let's go."

Cassia led us to the back door of the mansion, it was closer to the bedrooms. That was where the plan got more difficult. We suspected there was no getting around the wards on the actual mansion, and that once we walked inside the building, the coven would know they were being attacked, as they were pulled from their sleep by the magic.

The plan at that point was to race toward their rooms, and to try and kill them before they could dress and gather together in a common defense. It was the best we could do given the wards, and I was almost glad of a straight forward fight. We'd also be taking on the coven circle first, I'd rather face a combined group of apprentices rather than a combined group of ancient and powerful witches.

Although, if we hadn't needed to keep the library intact, I'd have considered burning them out a better tactic.

As for my personal tactics, I planned to wherever possible, use my sword, and only use my magic to defensively burn off the enemy's spells, but I also wouldn't hesitate to blast one of them with the fires of hell if I couldn't conveniently close within sword distance. That seemed the best way to manage my magic, plus I also had the witch shield, but I had no illusions that their magical attacks wouldn't be far more profound in understanding, and therefore in power. But... it would help, and conserve a little of my harvested energy, my witch magic was separate from that.

I also didn't expect to go in there and take a few hits of magic, and just slaughter them with my sword. My mother was an expert swordswoman, and I suspected all the ancient young witches of power and long life were similarly prepared to meet physical attacks as my mother had been.

My ladies were under orders to stay behind me, and to back me up if it was needed. Maybe I took too much upon myself, but I knew my mother would have destroyed either of them without breaking a nail, and I wouldn't, couldn't, let them face that danger. They were mine to protect.

Faith was tough, but she wasn't really a good fighter yet. One day she'd be better than me, but that day was far away. Cassia as well, would be more than formidable once she'd taken steps forward in her magic, and with the dagger work I was teaching her, but it'd take time. In short, I had to protect them and take the lion's share of the fighting.

We breached the door, and I moved as quickly as possible, but they slowed my speedy pace as I didn't want to get too far ahead of them. Not just to protect them, but it was Cassia's whispered directions that were guiding my footsteps and directions. She took us to the right and up a thin servants' staircase up to the third floor. The circle of course, had the top floor, along with the three extras.

The first magical trap was just above the second-floor landing on the staircase, I felt my skin itch with pins and needles as the heat rose to my skin from within me. I wasn't sure what the spell tried to do, but my witch shield was definitely fighting it, and by the time I'd reached the fourth step the spell was burned away. It'd taken very little of my harvested magic.

"First door on the right, just outside the stairway."

We could already hear yelling as the mansion woke up, the silent part of our fight was definitely over. To win, we needed to take down the coven, and the rest of them on the way out. If we were losing at any point, it would be difficult to retreat and run at that point.

I rounded into the hallway and then kicked the bedroom door open on the right. I should've known better than to think they'd bother with getting dressed. A sexy witch with dark hair was in a red negligee and already held a sword in her hand. She stopped short as she'd been walking toward the door to join the others no doubt.

I lunged forward, and it felt remarkably like practice as her sword came up in a startlingly familiar parry. I twisted to avoid the kick to the chest I knew would follow, as I stomped her knee. There was a loud crack, then my sword came around cutting the air with a whistle, and I decapitated the bitch. I laughed, I'd been trained for this, they weren't just master swordswomen like my mother, they also fought with her style, and I'd learned her every trick over the years.

My mother had trained me to be deadly to her style, even more so than I'd be against other master swordsmen and women. A style that she held in common with her old coven sisters. Of course, that one was a freebie, the others were gathering quickly, and I needed to move.

"Next door, just keep going."

I ran out of the room, and the door to the next bedroom opened before I arrived, I swung at the sexy bitch in the doorway, really it was a bit disturbing how attractive the ancient bitches were, and when she parried my sword in the expected fashion, I lunged forward with all my enhanced speed and plunged the dagger in my left hand into her cold heart.

Her eyes widened, and she gasped as I pulled the dagger out and her heart's blood pumped out of the wound, just to be sure of her I slashed her throat deeply as she fell to the ground. It wouldn't do if she managed to heal herself as I turned away, they were witches after all.

She also couldn't heal herself, if she couldn't chant the words of the spell, which would be hard with a blood-filled sliced trachea.

My skin flared and burned, then burned hotter still as my magic rose to protect me, and I looked down the hallway to see the other thirteen bitch sisters out in the hallway. They were all gorgeous, and none of them were dressed in anything but silk lingerie, two were even just naked. There was a shallow part of me that thought it was a damned shame they had to die, and that I couldn't find a way to have them warm my cock instead.

Also, our easy kills and sneaky plan had just came to an abrupt end, as I knew it would, but I'd hoped to have killed more than two of them before that happened.

"Room, now!" I growled, and my ladies dove into the room without question, as I also stepped over the corpse and out of their view. I'd considered charging, but that'd been suicide, the other ten had been casting, and I couldn't defend from thirteen spells of that power.

They couldn't hit me with a spell through a wall though, and they couldn't all charge through at once, the doorway was a good defensible position. Unfortunately, they didn't rush to comply with my plans.

One of them said, "Surrender now, and your death will be relatively painless and even pleasurable during the rite. Fight us, and I will torture you slowly, for days, before we finally grant you death and take what is rightfully ours. Your enslaved woman too, will beg for death for days, before we grant their..."

Tired of her mouth, I interrupted by leaning out of the doorway and shooting a stream of dark shadowy flames down the hallway. The flames billowed, expanded, and filled the width of the hallway as I pumped a lot of magic into it. It took a lot of energy, relatively, but only about five percent of what I'd managed to save up the last four days.

There were two loud feminine screams, and when I peeked it was just in time to see their bodies collapse in ashes. Huh, eleven to go, I guess they hadn't bothered to shield themselves from hellfire. The others all looked fine. I also guessed given the numbers they hadn't advanced an apprentice yet, or I'd be facing sixteen in total, not fifteen.

"Sorry, you were saying?"

I was a bit annoyed, why did everyone keep assuming I'd made them slaves, I had a coterie damnit, not a stable. Probably because it's what they would do in my place. They had no morality at all, just power and hunger for eternal life. Bitches.

She gritted her teeth, and threatened, "You'll pay for that."