Enchantress 3 - The Last Elf

Seven of the eight wizards ran for the exit while Astral Feek stammered, "Uh... if you need help with the sourceress, call us for backup."

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Wægn Manor, Bear Mountain, Lancre

Nick watched in rapt fascination as the most powerful woman on the discworld slowly swallowed his cock. "Dear Gods," he groaned as her tongue slithered over the sensitive underside of his cock driving him out of his mind. She's been keeping him at the edge of coming for nearly a half hour and he was slowly going out of his mind. She felt a twitch in his cock and a little splash of cum entered her mouth and she knew it was time. Faster and faster her mouth moved up and down. Her tongue pressed harder and harder against his sensitive cock. "I'm... going... to..." he couldn't get the last word out. Nick collapsed back onto the fragrant lawn as he came, his cock shooting spurt after spurt into his wife's mouth. She drank every drop he had to offer and didn't slow down until Nick begged her to stop.

"That was a good one," she grinned as she crawled up and gave him a little kiss.

"That was a great one," said Nick as he pulled her closer for a long, sweet kiss.

"Show me more of this castle," sighed Octavia as they finished up lunch. It is so nice to lock the bookstore door, sneak back into L-Space and find themselves in Wægn Manor for lunch and a leisurely blowjob in their underground garden.

"Axemir and I explored most of it. It's empty rooms of different sizes. Some are furnished, some are not," said Nick as he pulled his clothes back on. "The dungeons looked dank, dark and scary and the fairies wouldn't go down there to light the way. So we stayed up here on the upper levels."

However amazing the castle was, Nick considered it mostly useless. The underground garden was useful, they could come here and swim and make love then pick fruit anytime they want and it was a special joy for Octavia to take a huge bunch of fresh bananas to her stepfather in his own library. Dad was so moved that all he could say was, "Ook." There should be another big bunch ready in time for Hogswatch.

The vast library that Nick "assigned" {he didn't make the library, he merely assigned that function to that room} was filled with books, but they were all written in an ancient language that so far no scholar has identified. There were more familiar languages the further in you went, but that's the nice thing about L-Space. You'll eventually find a book you like; however, you may find it in a different world.

They had two rooms full of weapons for defense, but they had no idea how many of the more complex weapons worked. Even though the bow was a simple weapon, Nick held one up that looked complex and terrifying to the operator. Nick dared not think of how the target felt, having the complex arrangement of wires and wheels and levers aimed at him. Was that rack of arrows on the side a fancy quiver, or did it automatically reload?

Octavia had no desire to inspect any of these weapons, but she found a device that looked familiar. "Honey? What do you think?" and she held it up, smiling. It was a trident with two more pointy bits making five spikes. The cross bar that the pointy prongs were affixed to was solid. "The handle needs cutting down but..." She rotated the weapons so the points were pointing down and she put a foot on the crossbar. "Think this would come in handy for breaking ground?"

The witch/duke/emperor took the weapon from her hands and said, "potatoes... this might do a good job for digging up potatoes. I've heard the farmers talking about the problems with digging them up."

"Potatoes?" People desired the Lancre Tater all over the disc for their famous white flesh and flavor, but any ground in the Ramtops that would be favorable for potatoes to grow held onto the root tightly and potato digging was hard work. Nick hoped that this might be the tool to break the potatoes free without breaking the potato.

"Let's see what our blacksmith thinks of this when we get back."

He carried the spear-thing over his shoulder and said, "Here's our biggest problem," and he opened up the vault. With the exchequer of the Agatean Empire insisting that Nick bring his paycheck home every week in gold, the amount of gold was building up in the vault. Gold is abundant in the Agatean empire and to them it's nearly worthless so they're happy to dump so much onto Nick and Octavia. They were grateful that the Emperor and Empress wasn't asking for something valuable, like aluminum or copper. Some of the gold piling up was in one ounce ingots, but the majority the money in the vault was Agatean coin, and the coins were stacking up.

The problem with having All That Money is that you really can't spend it on much because no one on the discworld has change for All That Gold. The vault contained huge heavy coins that were probably worth a fortune, but they would have to melt the coins into ingots. And that's a lot of melting. They were terrified of flooding the economy with gold. Octavia looked at the sacks of coins that were piling up in the vault and sighed. "We got all the money in the world and I was happier with fifteen dollars in our jar."

"Because we can spend that money in your jar. This is pretty, but we can't spend it... unless..." a grin broke out on Nick's face. He started studying the variety of coins laid out before them. "We have a thirteen hundred dollar tax assessment adjustment on Tallywiffle county."

"I don't like where you're going with this," said Octavia.

"We give King Verance this coin," he held up the smallest denomination Agatean coin, "this is easily worth fifteen hundred Ankh-Morpork dollars. We get two hundred dollars in change."

"That's illegal. It's not the coin of the realm. We will give it to the king's assayer who will accept its value in gold, rather than coin," said Octavia sternly, then she smiled. "We may make out better that way."

The vault was also collecting gemstones, but Nick and Octavia didn't mind them so much. Dwarves have no need for the more common gemstones, so Axemir and Eryri have been saving them. Nick hands them out to the mothers of the babies he delivers, and their collection is getting quite large now. "It's so frustrating," said Nick, as his shoulders sagged.

"What is frustrating?" Octavia put a reassuring arm around Nick.

"All this money, and we can't do a thing with it. We can't do any good for anyone... if we just threw it on the street, it would do more harm than good. Why can't we just be us..."

She loved her forlorn husband with all her heart and she held him close. Their son moved and made his presence known as well. "People love what you're doing with the gemstones, but the gold, you'll figure it out. I know you will."

"Thank you, my love."

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The Great Circle Sea

The gangs of mercenaries, thieves, and pirates that left ports like Istanzia, Ell Kinte, Gebra, and Ankh-Morpork were already counting their profits in their minds. There was an Ankh-Morpork boy on the throne in the Agatean Empire! Corrupt is as corrupt does and he should be ready for their arrival any time. They could picture the gold coins piled up knee deep in the streets and the lonely wenches crying out for Real Men as the pirates arrive and show them what Real Men were all about then toss them a thousand dollar coin as a tip. The unknown Ankh-Morpork boy on the throne will be shouting, "COME ON IN!" eager to share this bonanza with his brothers. All that gold, all those wenches, it's all too wonderful.

Before they left Ankh-Morpork, a wizard in Sto Helit had been bribed into summoning up a black Agatean Dragon. "Why should I conjure a dragon? There are dragons everywhere," said the wizard who needed the money. The wizard truly enjoyed the horse races, but Sto Helit Downs had a strict "NO PROPHESY" rule and now this particular wizard was deep in debt and was taking on all conjuring jobs, no questions asked. But this time, he felt compelled to ask.

"Not a swamp dragon, we want a proper dragon," said Horatio Tinsmith, "An Agatean dragon!"

"That's quite a tall order," said the wizard as he leafed through his catalog of Dragon Conjuring spells. It was hard to hide the smile because this was going to get him out of debt.

"That's the one!" said a pirate that was standing next to Horatio pointing at a snarling dragon.

"A black Agatean dragon?" gasped the Wizard. It's the smallest Agatean dragon but still a big job, a big paycheck, he can't lose the customer now.

"Yeah, black," insisted the pirate, "I mean, it sounds good, black dragon for black operations. Right?"

"That's as good as any other reason I guess," said the wizard and after a sack of coins changed hands, a few rites {and a bunch of wrongs} were said, Horatio Tinsmith finally had a dragon.

When chained, the Agatean black is docile and easily trainable, because the Agatean black is a docile and easily trainable dragon. It is vastly smaller than the Agatean Golden dragon and they're easier to wrangle because they're exceedingly stupid. That's ok, on this mission its principal job was to terrify the populace, unfortunately the optional flame thrower was not included in that model. It's too late for buyer's remorse, All That Gold was calling.

The hard crossing of the Turnwise ocean cost them a ship, in the sea of Wolbem a great beast reached up with twenty foot long tentacles that wrapped around the ship and crushed it, but they still had their dragon. As they passed the fabled islands of Rohtua and Ercoidem the sirens started their calls luring the ships closer to shore where they would be crushed on the rocks, but the helmsmen had wax in their ears and steered clear {Score one for bad hygiene at sea!} They continued on with their dragon because All That Gold needed liberating.

They were the most efficient sailors on the disk because their goals were clear, precise, realistic, and obtainable: GOLD! WENCHES! PILLAGING! RAPE! ALCOHOL! MAYEHM! ARSON! RAPE! and touring local sights of historical value.

The pirate ships neared the lighthouse at Sing Poo and lay in wait and soon the pirates were able to capture four large boats of local design known as Junks. These "liberated" ships were able to sail in shallow waters without raising any suspicion, so with their dragon, the pirates started their journey into the Agatean interior. No one stopped them as they entered Flung Poo bay, the normal stop for the Navy to inspect their ships, so they headed inland following the Hunghung river to liberate All That Gold.

"Hey, Benny," whispered one of the younger mercenaries, "what about th' army?"

"Git some sleep Harold," groaned Benny. "Their army ain't no matter to us. They can't git nowhere with all the roads and bridges out."

"Th-thanks Benny. Not exactly a walk in the park for them, eh?"

"Har, har. Good one Harold." After the sound of fist striking flesh and soon Benny was peacefully snoring.

For two weeks they sailed up the Hunghung river getting closer and closer to the seat of power. Swords have been sharpened, oaths have been said, last letters home written. It's Go Time.

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Partridge Cottage, Creel Springs, Lancre

Ember, the Discworld month of the harvest, soon gave way to December, a month of preparing for winter. And as December began, so did the snow. The snow in the Ramtop mountains is beautiful, but deadly. Many a hiker has been caught out in the open when snow hits only to be found again in the spring, frozen in an argument between frozen hikers, usually an argument about "who forgot to bring the matches." As this first snow of the season began to settle in, a breathless messenger on a fast horse raced up "Nana Partridges' Driveway" and leaped off of his steaming horse. He dashed up onto the porch knocked on the cabin door, causing Gula, the house gargoyle, to bellow "IIIIIIKKKK!"

"Back here!" came a voice from the sheds behind the cabin. The messenger walked back there to find a farm couple tending to their animals and a pair of dwarves and several humans assisting.

"I have a message for the Duke of Wægn from King Verance," said the young, breathless messenger.

"That's me," said Nick as he found a rag to wipe his hands free of the fecal remains of whatever animal took aim at him this morning.

"How can I be sure that you're the duke?" The young man looked nervous. Dukes don't tend to livestock; they eat them.

Nick sighed; he's used to it. "Tell the young fellow who I am, Axemir."

"He's Pommeraie de la Montesquieu Worblehat-Stein, the Duke of Wægn."

"That should be proof enough," said Nick, "dwarves don't lie."

Satisfied, the messenger handed Nick a scroll that he opened and read with a frown. "Tell the king we'll be there."

"Yes, your grace," and the messenger dashed off to his horse.

"What was it?" asked Octavia as she emerged from the chicken coop with a basket of eggs.

"It came from King Verance. He said that Ning and Jia were demanding to return to Hunghung. Ning was ready to take over as the Grand Vizier and Jia was demanding to be named crown prince to the empire and they wanted to be escorted home."

"I don't understand," said Octavia, "Jia was doing wonderfully in his classes and learning economics. He was supposed to come play in the snow with Gaspode tomorrow."

"Let's go wash up," he escorted her into the cabin where they changed and asked Eryri and Axemir "Can you keep an eye on the place till we get back? Then we'll talk about that business venture you mentioned."

"What about me?"

Nick bent over and scratched Gaspode behind the ears, "There's always next time, old friend, you need to watch the sheep."

"They're so stupid," muttered Gaspode.

"I'll go get the Ralli cart out," said Nick after they cleaned and changed. Octavia began to fill her colorful shopping bag with baby blankets. "Do you think you're getting that close?" asked Nick as he tried to hug her.

"I don't know. You've done this fifteen times more than I have." She was pretty unsteady on her feet as the snowflakes continued to spiral down from the slate gray sky. "I also put your medical kit in my shopping bag."

Nick helped her down from the porch, then called out, "Virga! Your mistress needs you!" Soon Octavia's

Walking stick stepped out on the porch and hopped down to where Octavia was waiting and Octavia leaned heavily on her stick. Nick pulled the Ralli cart out of the shed and brought it right to Octavia, then he stepped between the traces. He draped a couple of straps over his shoulders and became a horse that she could buckle to the traces. Even with Eryri's help it took her four attempts to get up on the driver's seat. With everything in place, Octavia flicked the reins, and they were off.

"The snow is so pretty!" said Octavia as they eased along the mile path into the village. Neither Nick nor Octavia had ever seen any actual snowfall outside of Ankh-Morpork. Snow in Ankh-Morpork is gray, sometimes in other colors, it depends on what was being burned that day and tainting the clouds. Other than the slush it brings, snow in Ankh-Morpork is just more soot with a different name.

Here in the Ramtop mountains, the snow was almost magical. The bare trees and bushes were being covered with a fine white dusting, and the evergreens were becoming a work of art. "This is what we sing about on Hogswatch Eve!" gasped Octavia. Now all those carols about snow that she heard as she grew up began to make sense. "Let's not go. Let's stay and watch the snowfall, and we'll cuddle by the fire and maybe Marlon will come join us."

"King's orders," came Nick's sad reply. He'd never disobey his king. Fifteen minutes later, they were at the bookstore. The morning coach from Lancre Town with Ning and Jia would be arriving soon.

"Where to, your grace?" asked Trei Metzgar.

"We're escorting our guests home," said Octavia as she daintily stepped off of her two wheeled Ralli cart. She clutched her stomach and occasionally winced as Nick returned to human form. He took the weapon that Octavia found from the cart and brought it to Trei. "What do you think of using this for digging potatoes?"

Trei studied the five pointed head and nodded, then held it up. "It would be pretty good. If you didn't like potatoes, this seven foot long handle makes the job a bit impersonal."

"I was thinking of exchanging that with a shovel handle," said Nick.

"I can do that, and I think I need to file down the tips as well. The points are pretty dangerous. They don't need to be that sharp. I'll have it ready by the time you get back yer grace."

Octavia's belly had grown to the point where she was afraid to move through L-Space for fear of getting stuck in the narrow passages. They were now focused on the baby as they waited for Ning and Jia and soon enough, the Day Coach arrived.

Ning and Jia hopped off the coach and were arguing fiercely; they stomped straight into the bookstore without a word directed toward Nick or Octavia. The driver of the coach hopped down and opened the coach door. "You folks ok in there?" The two passengers that left argued with each other in a foreign language for the entire trip.

"Just as long as the lecture tour is over," said one traveler.

"My ears are exhausted," grumbled the other.

"Ok, next stop, Quench!" The coachman swung up on the seat and with a snap of the whip, the coach was back on the road.

Inside the bookstore, Ning was impatient and insisting that Nick and Octavia hurry on with their robes. "Is anything wrong, Ning?"

"Nothing you would understand." Just as they were ready to enter L-Space, Nick peered into the little box that he took off the top of the heater and said, "Is everyone inside?"

"We're all here!"

"Let's all go this time," and Nick pushed the fairy's box inside Octavia's shopping bag, then he followed Octavia into the depths of the mysteries of L-Space.

Ning reverted to Agatean, and neither Nick nor Octavia understood what she was complaining about. When Jia tried to talk, she snapped at him. Instead of crying or pouting, Jia was getting angry, but he kept his mouth shut.

"I have no idea what you are accusing me of, Ning."

"Ankh-Morpork boy on throne of the Agatean Empire!" shouted Ning. "Money in streets!"

"I'm trying to give you the throne back without a civil war breaking out! We've laid out the groundwork for returning the true constitution to power, so Jia is the true heir to the throne."

"And you fill his head with hubland tradition! Dangerous ideas! Gometry!"

The moment they emerged from L-Space; Ning began muttering. "You will see!" she waved a hand and four heavily armed guards blocked the entrance to the Library, cutting Nick and Octavia off from home. "Sit on throne, one last time!" Ning demanded as Jia ran off.

As Nick and Octavia sat on the throne, the exchequer hobbled out with two sacks, "Here as you required, coins and ingots." He held a clipboard out and Nick signed for their pay. He took the small pouch of ingots and stuffed it in Octavia's shopping bag and the other sack sat at the end of the throne with them and then they sat and waited.

And waited.

Voices were murmuring on the other side of the curtain, shouts were heard occasionally, but most importantly Octavia whimpered in pain.

"What's the matter, honey?" Nick asked.

"I think it's Marlon." her face twisted in pain and she leaned forward, holding her stomach.

"Ok, lay back, bring your knees up," Nick traced his hands over her silk-covered tummy and felt the movements of the little man just a few layers of tissue away from him. It felt like Marlon was ready to meet his dad.