Echoes of Spring Ch. 02

But the hours flew by as they cantered along those waters, and soon the sun threatened to fall behind the mountains before them. They decided on setting camp behind a large rock beside the trail, a perfect abode for fending off the chill winds of night.

As was Eric's way, his first thought after tying up the horses was of food. Specifically, he thought of hunting. But, as was Erika's way, her first thought was to sate him, and also to threaten Eric with many a pout if he were to abandon her.

So, having no choice in the matter, Eric instead sat down atop the rock, watching Erika with much interest as she bent over at the waist to make a hearty sandwich from her stores. She knew absolutely that he was staring at her ass under her dress. She would also never blame a man for looking.

"Er-iic," she impishly sang as she invitingly swayed her hips, "I can feel your ga-aze hammerin' into my re-ear..."

"Uh - sorry," the penitent noble coughed. "Not that you could consider it my fault. You shove it in my face every chance you get."

"Hehe! Guilty," Erika shamelessly admitted. She folded the loaf together and snapped back, rocking her hips as she sauntered back towards him. She handed him the bigger half of the sandwich.

"Here y'are, m'lord. 'Tis a simple thing; lettuce, tamaters, tamater sauce, ham."

"Thank you," Eric smirked, taking the sandwich and taking a bite. "'Tis also a tasty thing."

"Hmm!" she beamed.

Erika thought a moment on planting her butt on Eric's lap, before deciding against it and snuggling up beside him instead. He didn't mind her being so close anymore. He likely wouldn't of cared if she'd sat on him, either, but the thought of testing the man's boundaries didn't seem the refined choice to her.

Together, the two of them sat on that rock beside the barely-used trail and ate their supper, looking out beyond the river and trees as the sun waned away once more. It was a pleasant time. Romantic, even, if one were looking for a pinch of love in their life.

"So, tell me about this friend of yours, Erika. The one we're venturing to meet," Eric then said out of the blue, being absolutely blind to romance. "You said she was a priestess?"

"Mhm! A priestess of the goddess Lassinia. You should know of 'em, yeah? Bein' from 'ere?"

"Yeah," he nodded. "Conversed with a few in my years. Traveled with one for a time. They're... interesting folk. Supposedly they've all taken vows where they cannot tell a lie, yet I oft find myself avoiding any discussion with them."

"'Cause sometimes the whole truth is only good in small doses," Erika softly agreed. "I'm the same; usually. But, this one's different. She's really intelligent, an' I think she figured all that out. That, if the truth would hurt summ'n to hear, that it's oft best to jus' stay silent instead. You'll like her, I think. An', um, if ya don't... then we can jus' keep travelin' alone. I pray she'll understand our haste."

The goddess Lassinia was a real curmudgeon when compared to the fun-loving Fiona. She was the self-proclaimed nemesis of falsehoods, sloth, and chaos, which ultimately made her a vigilant and virtuous wet blanket. Most of her priestesses followed in these footsteps, Erika's friend Severia - the priestess they were traveling to see - being the least crotchety of them all. Severia was instead reserved, well-mannered, and interesting, even having hunted a demon or two all on her lonesome. She also served Fiona in her own deviant ways, making her a good companion on the road.

Oh! And she was also a sorceress. Erika should probably tell that to-

"W-wait on! W-where are ya goin' with that hand?" she stammered in surprise, glancing at Eric to discover that he'd finished with his sandwich, only to find a new fascination with her.

And he now looked very, very confused. "Why... pleasing you, of course."

Erika slapped his hand away. "Out of nowhere?! With no build on?!" she thinly chastised him, raising her arms in exasperation.

"Mm-yeah? Is that not your custom? You did the same to-"

"Are you donatin'?! Are you a client o' mine, Eric?!"

"... No," he anxiously smiled, raising a perplexed brow. "I only thought that's what you wanted of me. Just like yesternight. And yester-yesternight."

"Yeah?! Well-"

Erika shut her mouth. That was what she wanted of him. Why in all the hells would she make an outburst now? What had this man done to her in just three short suns?!

"W-well... you're right. Um."

It was most fortunate that Erika hadn't access to a mirror that moment, for she was now wincing as if she were in pain, and her cheeks were now redder than the setting sun before them. Yet, she couldn't pry her gaze away from him.

"Well, why the change of heart?!" Erika asked him shakily. "I spent more'n half-an-hour tryin' to convince you at the inn, to no avail at all!"

"Don't ask," he said, returning his hand to her thigh. But she held him there, squeezing his hand this time rather than swatting it away.

"I'm askin'," she pouted. Erika just had to know. Even pure lust would be an acceptable answer to her now, having spent years of her life preaching the very concept. But Eric didn't seem the lustful type, at least when compared to your average lad.

"Okay..." Eric sighed, squeezing her leg. "I'm taken by your kindness, Erika, and I think... I know that, if the gods blessed you a thousand times under every sun, that they would still be cheating you of more. I don't think you realize how perfect a soul you possess. It's so innate to your being that it's but a natural experience for you; to share joy rather than take it, to give your all rather than get. And I think it's about time that you start receiving some in return, for no other reason than you just being you."

Erika didn't know what to say. The words were there, on the tip of her tongue and between her ears, but finding them now was like finding the needle in the hay. She'd already been told every line there was under the whole of Penelope's grand sky. Been paid every compliment that ever existed in all the histories of man. So why now, why here, did his seem so sincere? And why did it mean all the world to her? Erika didn't know, but, against the wishes of the butterflies dancing in her chest... she breathed.

She also grinned like an idiot. "Y-yeah?" Twin Eric... you've turned me into a schoolgirl...

"Yeah," he smiled so warmly.

He then took her hand, just long enough to help her from the rock, and only let go of her so he could kick open his bedroll. Erika's sandwich was gone, lost somewhere in the grass between there and here, but she'd already forgotten of her tomatoes.

Eric's hands were on her once again, meeting her waist with a sexy, firm grip. Her dress was over her head before her mind caught up to the moment. She at least found the capacity to reach for his belt.

"No, Erika. Only you tonight. Let me prove my words with act," he then said with soft, sure words, pushing her panties down her legs.

Only you. Now there was something Erika had never heard before.

"Oh, Eric... you don't gotta," she muttered incredulously as her heart thumped through her chest. But his gloves were already coming off, and soon he pushed her down, playfully towards the bedroll, and settled in above her.

"Oh, I'm gonna. But, uh..." his hand crept south, over her tummy and over her mound, "tell me if I'm doing anything wrong. You may've known the touch of three-and-a-hundred, but I'm unawares of any number larger than five," he suavely jested.

"You dolt," she giggled breathlessly, squirming to his touch. "They all meant nothin'... nothin' to me."

It was the truth. Erika had isolated herself from this very feeling since she left home all those years ago, but her defenses were utterly useless against Eric's words, eyes, and hands. A shield of wood, raised against an inferno.

Her thighs spread on the command of his fingers. Her lips parted as well, letting a soft moan escape them. Her knees quavered. Her eyes fluttered shut.

"Wow," she gasped, again like a moron. Eric's nimble fingers were already thrusting in and out of her soaked pussy. His thumb already teasing her clit with soft, sure strokes. He pushed on the spots inside her that drove her mad with lust, and rubbed her at near the same pace she herself always did.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah... right there..." Erika mewled, squeezing her thighs around his hand. Eric forced her legs apart, sending jolts of lightning through her lower half as he traced the insides of her thighs with his fingers.

He continued rhythmically pumping her cunt with two digits, with no advice needed from the priestess. She could only moan anyway, lost to the simple pleasures of two fingers and a thumb. A burning desire, that damned inferno, forcing her to cry and whimper as the sparks shot from her clit.

Her toes curled shut. The fire rose ever higher. And Erika soon convulsed atop Eric's bedroll, gasping for air as the quickest climax of her life consumed her.

"Ahh! Fuck, Eric!" she cried for some reason or another, remembering to breathe once again. Her eyes shot open to meet his.

"You're sensitive," he told her, smirking.

"An' you're... amazin'... an' still going..." she panted, failing to come down from her bliss. "Take me, Eric... take me... please..."

But he already had. His thumb traced laps around her swollen clit, and his fingers kept pumping into her sodden cunt. His other hand soon had to grip her leg, too, as excited as it was to move under the lord's assault.

"Yes! Yes! Ahh!" she yelped through her second peak, but an inch shorter than the first. His fingers slowed... his grip lessened... but dare she open her eyes?

She did, eventually, once her breaths had normalized and her limbs found themselves once more. She noted Eric had been staring at her pussy with much interest, but also a hint of concern. He met her gaze.

"Erika, I'd... I'd love to do something to you. Something else. But uh, well..."

Erika raised a brow and bit her lip, pushing herself up onto her elbows. If he were wanting to fuck her, she needed to assuage his fears. Now.

"Spit it out!" she pleaded.

"Have you any afflictions?" Eric hastily asked. "You're a Priestess of Fiona; surely you, uh - you know?"

"That I've... what? The pox? The drip? The clam?!"

"Perhaps all of them?" he shrugged, smiling nervously. Erika groaned as she rose to her butt, grabbing one of Eric's wrists.

"Is that why... you've been holdin' out on me? Scared of a little... a li'l pox?" she breathlessly giggled, flashing him a teasing smile. "I dun blame ya. But, did'ja wonder what all my inks were for?"

"I was, actually."

Then it was Erika's job to teach him. "They're hexes, instilled upon my body by sorceresses of Fiona. This one..." she whispered, lifting Eric's hand an inch from her pussy, "the one just beyond my pearl, inked in the shape of a tied ribbon? That's the Hex of Expurgation. It prevents me from transmittin' or receivin' any of those afflictions, as ya call 'em. I wouldn't be doin' much good if I was spreadin' the pox around, now would I?" she giggled. "You'll find another near my butt, an' another on the inside o' my lip. Do you wanna see?"

"I saw them already."

Erika rolled her eyes, giggling at his voyeuristic candor. She lifted his hand another three inches, towards the next hex; one in the shape of an '8' laid on its side. "Anyway, this larger one, above my womb? That's a Hex of Infertility. It ties me up inside, stoppin' the moon bloods an', obviously, ensures that I'm never burdened by summ'n's spawn."

"Interesting," Eric nodded.

Erika giggled and spread her legs further, noting that Eric hadn't lifted his gaze at all since she'd started the tour. She moved his hand to her inner thigh, rubbing his fingers along a tiny, heart-shaped tattoo.

"An' this pretty little thing ensures that I'm always ready to go. 'orny, as we say," she beamed. "An' um, that's all of 'em."

"What of the rose?" Eric softly asked her, finally lifting his gaze from her crotch.

"Oh! Right. That one's real. It'll always be a part o' me, even after I've renounced my vows. 'Tis a reminder of my service to Fiona, and, like, totally cute," she beamed.

"It is," he softly agreed, pushing Erika's legs further apart. He didn't reach for his belt, though. Didn't make any move as if he were to fuck her. He only pushed his head in between her thighs, planting his lips on her soaking petals.

"What're-! Oh... oh fuck, Eric... you spoil me..." the priestess uttered between shallow breaths, falling back onto the bedroll once more. His tongue traced miraculous shapes over her clit while his fingers plunged passionately between her folds. He was eating her... Lord Eric was actually eating her!

"Ohm... sweet... eee!"

And he was good at it! Eric may've only touched five women, but, by the heavens, what fortunate women they were! She wanted to tell him to go gentler, so she could better experience every tiny tingle, yet all that came out was a scream!

He pushed his hands under her ass, gripping her cheeks as if preventing her from escape. She was squirming, true, but she had no mind to... to...

"Guuh!" Erika groaned, humping her sweet lord's mouth with all she had left. "Ya gotta... gotta... ah!"

It was a gods-damned range of peaks; a cavalcade of lust that Fiona was only now teaching her. Eric sunk his tongue between her folds, kissed her, pierced her before returning his attentions again to her button, sheathing it between his lips and sucking.

"Eric, Eric, wa-iit!" she pleaded through her lust. Something was wrong. Eric broke her, or something, or at least broke any sense of control that she previously possessed. "Nuh! Staahp!"

Erika was panting for air, begging for it when Eric eventually lifted himself from between her legs. She could barely see his eyes over her heaving tits. "Stop... stop! I'm... I'm satisfied. Seriously," she exhaled, her arms falling limp into the grass.

"I'm not," he defiantly grinned.

"Then let me take care o' you..." she whimpered, almost lifting herself to her butt before Eric pushed her back down.

"I'll go slower. Sorry."

And so he disappeared between her thighs once more, keeping true to his word as Erika laid back and moaned.

-=-=-

Looking back on it, it was on the night of the Twentieth of High Star that Erika re-found her religion. Fiona, being the divine embodiment of lust, was a goddess that all souls prayed to whether they knew it or not. This, therefore, made her one of the strongest of the divines.

But Fiona was, ultimately, always subservient to another, be it to other gods or to mortal kings of man. The concept of lust was viewed similarly by her priestesses, in that women must do their part to please their man, and only in his satisfaction would they find absolution. A woman's lust was instead but the gift passed down by Fiona, to give an instant gratification to those performing their duties.

Erika now knew absolutely that this line of thought was false. Eric asked for nothing in return that night, instead only treating her pleasure as the most important piece of the puzzle. She now knew that there were no masters or slaves, ever, only a duality of desire that brought two souls together in passion. Erika thought on writing a treatise about this months later, before throwing the idea out upon realizing it would be labeled heretical.

It didn't help that Erika experienced this heresy again on the morning of the Twenty-First, either. Eric spent more time between her legs than he did anywhere else, and the number of orgasms she experienced that morning was somewhere between five and five-hundred; quite the rift when compared to Eric's none.

So, if the most important tenant of her Temple was wrong... what else was Erika missing? If finding out was even half as pleasurable as that morning was, she was certainly eager to discover it.

-=-=-

Eric and Erika eventually resumed their trek upstream around noon, venturing out of the lowland forests and into the gray mountains above. Today was an auspicious day; Midsummer, the greatest of all holidays outside the winter Solstice, and the reason why Erika was traveling to Moradria at all.

The trail they'd been following the past couple suns disappeared entirely after they ventured through another small village. There would be no more settlements this far into the mountains; only the meeting place between Erika and her friend, a hot spring known to no one else but them. Erika sure was glad she had the horse this year, which made the trek upwards a thousand times simpler.

They arrived at their destination late in the afternoon, about an hour or two before sunfall. It was an unassuming place, for the most part; a small, steaming spring, nestled beside the mountain and hidden behind a wall a granite, all but a stone's throw away from the river.

And there she was. Severia. Leaning against the stone, pipe in mouth, hand on her hip. She flashed Erika a devilish smile as she neared.

"You're late, honey."

"S'not my fault, Sev," Erika coyly replied, rocking her head towards Eric behind her. "Had a soul to save." She then dismounted as gracefully as she could, which was to say, not at all.

"Hm. You've put on weight since last we met," Severia smirked, taking one step towards her.

"So? You've bags under your eyes. An' are those... wrinkles?" Erika impishly replied. The two girls faked a glare then, as if they were worst of enemies.

If Severia had any faults, her visage didn't actually betray any. The northern blood coursing through her veins was obvious, what with her long, platinum blonde hair, gray almond-shaped eyes, and well-defined cheekbones; yet, she spoke like the highest of nobles thanks to the discovering of her magical prowess at twelve years of age, which allowed her to join the Temple of Lassinia quite young.

Her sense of style was unmatched as well, if only for her uniqueness. She wore pants - a rarity amongst her sex - but nothing that any man ever would; hers were instead skin-tight, black as night, and hugged her hips and flaunted her features, which were made all the more alluring by the heels she so oft wore. She regularly wore a cape of some animal or another above that, concealing the top half of her body under furs of gray and white. When she spoke, she squinted, giving the impression of detestation if one didn't know her. But Erika knew her all-too-well, having traveled with her for many a month in the past two years.

And so despite their glare, they soon skipped towards one another like schoolgirls, embracing, exclaiming one another's names. Then came the pleasantries, unpleasantries, and trivialities shared in high-pitched squeaks and joyous cries.

"Oh!" Erika giggled, rolling her gaze towards Eric. "An' I almost forgot myself! Severia, this is-"

"-I know who this is, Erika. Hello again, my lord," she curtseyed, albeit lifting her cape rather than a skirt. "An honest pleasure to see you again."

"Severia," Eric smirked and nodded, finally finding the moment to step forward. Erika's gaze bounced between her two friends, a dumb grin plastered to her visage.

"You two... are acquainted?" she asked through her teeth.

"Hyeap. Severia's the Lassinian I mentioned before. The one I traveled with in the spring," Eric reticently replied.