Her Little Knight

"This is the last stage of your training, Adam."

"I-I..."

"You want to be strong, don't you, my little knight?"

OOO

Growing up, I was just a sickly child that spent most of his time indoors, helping around our little house. My parents were afraid that my already weak body might give out if I strained it too much. I was always envious of the guys who left to join the army from a young age, apprentice at the local blacksmith, or even just work the fields—but whenever I tried to join in on any of those activities, I'd always end up laid up in bed with a fever afterwards, out of commission for days.

I didn't get to meet Aries when she first arrived at the village, since I was laid up in bed with one of those very fevers at the time. According to the other villagers, she just showed up one day—another face in a small crowd of travelers that would occasionally pass through the area. However, the monster attack on our village gave her an opportunity to show just how unique she really was.

The rise of the new Overlord brought with her a wave of monsters that were much more human-like in appearance. Not just humanoid—they appear to be all-female, and incredibly beautiful. Don't let their humanoid appearance lull you into a false sense of security, though. They were more aggressive and intelligent than ever, and they seemed hell-bent on pillaging towns and kidnapping men with an almost manic glee.

We were a relatively remote town, with nothing more than a monster den several miles away whose denizens generally kept to themselves until now. What's more, we were nestled deep within our nation—we feared no bandits, no incursion from outside nations, no roving monsters, and consequently saw no need to have any real defenses. The band of monster girls crashed into our town with only minimal resistance. Orc women, towering over our tallest men; women with bat wings for arms swooping down and raping men in the streets-it was a nightmare. They didn't even have weapons—the few men who had blades handy to swing at them found them easily batted out of their grasp.

My own house was attacked—the front door easily reduced to splinters. I found myself hoisted over the bare shoulder of some orc woman. She was half way out of the village with me when Aries stopped her. With a large piece of timber—possibly the splintered crossbeam of a wagon, she bludgeoned every monster that tried to leave the village. Precise stabs and slashes with her makeshift weapon forced the monsters to drop their quarry and scurry back off into the night. Some didn't have the privilege of getting to limp away—I remember a good few satisfying crunches as she smacked the bat-winged women out of the air and they crumpled like tissue paper, only to be scooped up by their orc friends that still had functioning hands as they made their retreat.

Once all the dust had settled and all of the monsters had been routed, she called everyone in the town together. Although I think everyone would have congregated around her anyway in amazement and curiosity after the display they witnessed. I was exhausted from my ordeal, and had only just managed to drag myself up from where I'd fallen when she started lecturing the village.

"You people are the most pitiful bunch I've yet encountered on my travels. Here we are, the new Overlord on the rise, monsters on the prowl, and you have done nothing! This may be a more secluded village, but surely you've heard of what is happening out there? Surely you weren't so naïve as to think it would never come to your doorstep? Yet you crumple like wheat beneath a storm when a mere rabble of these kids comes through."

The townsfolk had the decency to look sheepish at her words. But what were they to do? They'd never had to fight regular monsters, let alone these new creatures.

"If you hope to keep your lives the next time they come 'round—and those girls will come again, mark my words—then you must strengthen yourselves," she said.

The villagers' collective pride was injured. A single girl in light clothing was calling them weak, and lecturing them like a displeased Sunday school teacher, and they could say nothing. Indeed, what were their options? In their small town naivety, many of them thought their strength equated to prowess in battle, but when faced with a truly alien threat that wasn't cowed by bluster and sword rattling, they found themselves virtually powerless. Their wounds were fresh and their egos still humbled, yet they couldn't just tuck their tails between their legs and run to the relative safety of the cities—their whole lives were here.

"Luckily for you all I love a good project. I'll train you all and whip up a fighting force that can help repel at least the casual bands of monsters like this one. Once you guys prove you won't go down easily, smaller groups like that will be more wary of approaching your village directly. Who will step forward to help?" She looked around expectantly.

I don't think anyone there doubted her combat prowess after seeing it firsthand, but lingering shame or pride held the villagers back from volunteering. This was obviously not what she expected, and I swore I could see a spark of fiery annoyance flit across her amber eyes.

"I volunteer..." I raised a shaky hand. Probably a combination of an adrenaline crash coming on and my already weakened body. "You saved my life back there. There was nothing I could do-it was because I'm so weak. I'm sick of being helpless...if you can help me get stronger, even just a little bit, I'll do anything."

That dark look vanished immediately when she turned to look at me, leaving behind only a warm red glow in her eyes that enveloped me. I was afraid she would scoff when she saw me, frail as I was, but instead she almost purred. "Hmm... You have spirit that doesn't match that shell—I can work with that. What is your name, boy?"

"Adam."

She leaned in to get a closer look at me, giving me a clear view down her low-necked tunic that my eyes followed unconsciously. All that womanly charm on display for a guy that hadn't had many opportunities to interact with the opposite sex was a bit too much. "Huhu, yes, I can work with you alright," she whispered. Her fingers trailed down from my ear to my chin, and it felt like time had frozen all around us. "What do you say, my little knight? Will you be my number one?"

"Y-yes ma'am!" I said, a little overeagerly.

She smiled, a small smile that I knew right there was private, just for me, and then turned to face the crowd, her grin turning more mischievous.

"You see that, you whimpering bunch? This young one stepped up before any of you! You aren't going to let him lay bare your cowardice like that, are you?"

That good-natured ribbing finally knocked the townsfolk out of their stupor—many of the men and even a few women ended up volunteering right then and there.

Aries carved a niche for herself with that, training up a militia for the village. I would have thought the headstrong men would be loath to follow the orders of a woman in such things, but whether it was her actions that day or the way she seemed to effortlessly command a crowd's attention—she never had anyone directly challenge her authority. That might be partially due to how tight a shift she ran—anyone that got out of line or tried to shirk their daily duties got fixed with her dark glare. And the really dense ones got a walloping from a wooden training sword.

I managed to avoid drawing her ire, somehow. Despite having to take frequent breaks and even fainting once or twice early on, Aries never once seemed annoyed. Quite the opposite, offering me water and a place to sit and catch my breath. I expected to at least get called out on it (and even her preferential treatment) by the other people in the group, but they seemed to regard me with even more apathy than usual. All the while, I couldn't shake that feeling I had when Aries first looked straight into my eyes. Not a single person who had been there mentioned it, not even my parents, even though I was sure I'd get all sorts of ribbing over it. In that single private moment in front of all of those people, it felt like I'd been ensorcelled.

"Adam—"

And ever since, I feel like I've been in a weird world, overlapping the one everyone else was in, yet separate. Much like the one I'd been in before when I was isolated at home all the time, but with one key difference.

"Adam, everyone's already packed up and left—are you asleep down there or what? Do I need you carry you back home like I did the last time you fainted?"

I jerked out of the daze I'd been in, sitting back against a fence near the field we train in.

"N-No, I was just...thinking, sorry."

"You've been doing a lot of that lately," she huffed. "If you're not careful, your training will slip—"

"It's about that, actually," I said, interrupting her. "My 'training,' I mean... I've been thinking—after two years of solid work, I'm still a mess compared to everyone else. I can't swing a sword for half as many repetitions as the other guys and I still have to take multiple breaks in a session. Maybe it's time I quit."

Aries tilted her head. "And throw away everything you've built so far?"

"But compared to—"

"Stop comparing yourself to other people. You were the one who volunteered for the training before any of those lunks stepped forwards—I was this close to rescinding my offer and just going on my merry way to the next town, you know!" I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes—I heard this every time she was frustrated by the group's performance.

"But still, compared to—"

"What did I just say about comparing?" Whoops, there's that flash of red. Her eyes should have been intimidating, but I found myself constantly intrigued watching how they caught the light. "If you want to compare, look at how far you've come. The boy from two years ago could barely lift a sword. And when you did, it's safe to say it swung you. You're walking to and from training without getting winded, and you haven't had a fainting spell since that first week. Are you saying you want to go back to those days? Be a pretty little housepet for your parents that can't pull his own weight?"

I didn't expect her to react so strongly. "N-No, I just thought that it would be better if I trained on my own from now on. Thanks to you, I've gotten this far, but I can't stand holding everyone else back—it'd be best for the group if I just practice at home from now on to keep my health up, and that way you don't have to waste time with me..."

That was definitely the wrong thing to suggest, judging by her annoyed glare. "Don't profess to know better than me what is best for 'the group,'" she warned. Her glare turned into a maliciously teasing smile. "Besides, is my number one 'little knight' going to desert me now, after all this time?"

Oh gods, she never did drop that title after all this time. I never could tell if she was mocking me or being serious. I threw up my hands in surrender. "Okay, I'll keep at it—I won't quit-so please, spare me the title."

"Of course you will—and consider your request rejected," she said with a grin. She tousled my hair. "Maybe when you grow a bit more, but from where I'm standing, you're still little to me."

"I'm already eighteen, I'm not likely to catch up to you at this point," I sulked, shielding my head futilely. "Besides, you're unnaturally tall. What do women from your country eat to grow to such heights, and where can I get some?"

She laughed and cocked a hip. "I'm a bit of a special case," she said.

Indeed she was—easily standing eye to eye with the tallest men of the village, and towering head-and-shoulders over little old me, who'd probably lost valuable years of growth to illness. Her pose really emphasized her long, leather-clad legs, hugging her hips in just the right places to hint at the toned muscle underneath.

Aries offered a hand to help pull me up from my spot on the ground. But her grip lingered for a moment once I'd gotten up, her expression unreadable. Had she caught me ogling her legs? Her eyes almost glowed red in the rapidly fading twilight.

"But you really have grown. And I admire your concern for those around you, misguided though it may be. Maybe it's time I move your training to the final stage," she mused.

I was surprised, of course—sure, I'd improved a lot from the frail boy I used to be, but was I that far along? I set aside my doubts. She'd gotten me this far, she probably knew what she was doing. I clasped her hand between both of mine.

"If you think I'm ready, I'll take it on. I still want to keep getting stronger."

"Oh yes, I'm sure now. You're ready," she said with that same private smile from the first day. "Now, march back to your home, my little knight, and rest while you can."

And march I did, that smile occupying my thoughts every step of the way.

OOO

I woke up to see Aries, standing in the middle of the common room of our house, moonlight streaming in through the cracks in the window shutters. She was wearing her usual outfit—the low-cut tunic with tight leather pants.

"A-Aries?" Her eyes were so red I could have sworn they were emitting their own glow.

"I think it's time you and I move on to the next step in your training," she said.

"W-what do you mean?" I felt like I should have been more alarmed than I actually was. But those warm eyes, the way the moonlight brushed against her skin, her clothes—her whole presence was mesmerizing. There was a heady aroma in the small building, too, one that I had never experienced before. Sweet and humid, the air was thick with it.

"I mean exactly what I said, my little knight," she said, straddling me in bed without hesitation. "Your next step is joining together with me."

Without listening to my confused yelps and questioning, she reached down and pulled my tunic up. She stopped straddling me for just a moment to lift my legs up and yank down my pants unceremoniously.

"W-wait! My parents are sleeping right over there—" We were relatively poor, even amongst our own village, in part because of my health issues up to this point, so that meant we lived in a small one-room house and naturally slept in the same area at night. My poor old parents slept right on the other side of the room.

"Ah, is that what you're worried about? And here I feared your first objection would be me stripping you," she grinned. "Nothing we do here will be a bother to them. They shall not even hear a peep." I realized that all this time she'd been speaking at a normal volume and my parents hadn't even rustled.

I looked back to Aries as it began to dawn on me just how in over my head I was. Her usually flaxen hair had streaks of bright, blood red running through it—a slightly lighter color than her deep red eyes. She basked in my gaze, dragging a hand down her neck, between her breasts, tugging at the collar of her tunic only for it to burn away at her touch with heatless, ash-less flame. Only scant scraps of black, shiny material covered her large breasts and her privates, leaving her chiseled abs and wide hips fully on display. With a start, I realized she had large horns curling out of her hair, bat-like wings on her back, and a tail with a heart-shaped tip.

She leaned down before I could formulate any further comments and pressed her lips to mine. Those lips that I always remembered quirked up in a smile just for me—they were so soft. One hand was splayed out against the side of my head to keep me steady, while the other groped its way down my body. Her hand was like fire against my skin, stroking my chest and then tweaking a nipple before trailing down further. The tips of her fingers stroked ever so lightly around the base of my cock, making me shudder

My twisting and turning in response only made her hold my head more firmly. Soon I felt her tongue prodding my lips, but I didn't open them because I was so overwhelmed. She leaned back slightly.

"Open up for me," she said, holding her own mouth open with her tongue out. I followed her command on reflex, just in time to catch a bit of saliva that dripped from her tongue to mine. It tasted so sweet—she chased it down, crashing back into my mouth and exploring it freely now. I only made half-hearted attempts at responding, overwhelmed by the sensations invading my mouth while her soft breasts pressed up against my chest.

We could have been making out like that for less than two minutes or an hour, I'd lost so much sense of time, but I finally worked up the presence of mind to shrug away from her a bit.

"A-Aries, wh-why are you doing this—who, or what, are you?"

"I am Ariesoth," she said. "As you have probably gathered, I am not a human. I was hoping to spare you these explanations and cut straight to the important part, but I suppose I owe it to you—I am a succubus. One of the first new succubi, in fact, created by the Overlord herself.

"I was traveling this land in search of the one who would become my mate, and I happened to stumble across this village. While I was staying here, monsters from some local cave attacked, and I decided to help out."

I must have looked a bit incredulous at that, which seemed to have wounded her a bit.

"Do you think I would just stand idly by while humans have their village ravaged in front of me? Not all monsters are unsympathetic to the plight of humans, you know. But those monsters—they were clearly relatively new, it may have been their first heat. The full moon comes out, they are assaulted by feelings they can't control—you remember how they had come to the village? Not a single weapon, they just waltzed right in. Sex was all they had on the brain."

"So you were actually looking out for us," I said.

"Yes, well there's that," she said with an impish smile. "And I hadn't finished scoping out your little village for myself—what if my man was amongst the ones those thoughtless oafs were hauling off? I couldn't stand the thought. And, sure enough..."

Suddenly it all came together: her uncommon strength for her size, her persuasive power over the village. Perhaps even those feelings for her I couldn't shake out of my mind from the day we met.

She nodded knowingly. "Ah, you feel it too, don't you? We had a connection almost from the moment we laid eyes on each other."

"But then...why? Why not just carry me off then and there if you knew you wanted me..." I asked.

She looked perplexed. "Why? Well, I'd already offered to help the village form a defense force—as I said, I'm not unsympathetic to humans, and I like a good project. Besides, while your spirit was just as strong then as it is now to reach out and take an opportunity for growth like you did, your body was not so strong. If I took you, then and there, there was a good chance you would not survive the process. I may be a monster, but I will not be a murderer—especially not of the man I love."

My situation was utterly insane, straddled by a succubus who'd been living under our noses for multiple years without a single moment of suspicion, who had me naked and helpless before her, and I still blushed at the forwardness of her confession.

"I resolved to stay by your side and support you until you grew to be a man who could handle me. And that time is nigh."

"So all that about my 'last stage of training' was really—"

"Yes, you will be having sex with me," she said bluntly. "I believe your body is now strong enough to endure the...changes that would transpire upon having sex with a being like myself. And with that transformation, you would finally be able to cast aside the frailty that is holding your body back."

That was a powerfully tempting prospect. "But at what cost? Surely there's a downside."