Queen Yavara Ch. 15

ELENA

Five days ago, we burned Sherok's body. The Terdini and Protaki stood in solemn silence as Brock set the pyre aflame. He didn't show his sadness, but we all knew his wrath. The next day he began to whip the Protaki into fighting shape. He was brutal and merciless with the ill-trained men, often times beating them into submission when they failed. Despite his ferociousness, he was fair, or "fair" by orc standards. He fed them better than they'd ever eaten at the Bend, and let them walk with weapons amongst the Terdini. The contrast between the two tribes was stark; every warrior of the Terdini was almost a foot taller than their Protaki counterparts, and at least fifty pounds heavier. Brock had his work cut out for him.

But today was not a time for work, for today Trenok and Certiok were married, and for the first time since his wife's death, Brock smiled. The celebration devolved into an orgy (as most thing tended to now), but I did not partake. I sat on the roof of a hut, smoking my pipe as I watched the debauchery below me. The smoke rose thick in the humid spring air, pluming upward to dance in the full moon's light.

"You're not partaking in the festivities?" Zander asked as he sat next to me.

"I don't feel like catching a dick tonight." I responded around a puff of smoke.

"Oh, the Terdini know which way you swing." Zander smiled as he packed a bowl, "None of the men would dare touch you after what you did for them. The women on the other hand..."

I snorted. "Yeah. I'm just not feeling it, I guess. What's your excuse?"

"I'm not a fan of orgies." Zander said around his pipe, "Not unless I'm the only male present. I guess I'd make a concession for you though."

"Is that so?" I laughed, "Well come hop on my lap, Zander. Maybe you can shape-shift into Yavara for me."

"That would be cruel." Zander smiled. His smile faded as he looked at me. "You miss her."

"She fucked me, turned me into a new species, changed my gender, then threw me through a portal without so much as a peck on the cheek." I snorted, "Typical."

"Oh, that's typical for you and her?"

"In the same vein." I waved a hand, "She was always reckless, and I was always left to pick up the pieces." I sighed, looking up at the moon, "Yeah, I miss the hell out of her."

"She'll be here any day now."

"We haven't heard from her in almost a week."

"If she were dead," Zander said as he put a comforting hand on my shoulder, "Leveria would have let everyone know. She's alive, Elena, and she's coming here. Prestira would never let anything happen to her."

"I guess." I mumbled as I puffed. The crickets chirped over the raucous of moans and screams below, three of my slaves in the center of it all. The Protaki were quite astonished when they saw my succubus followers, and my followers were quite pleased to meet the Protaki. I daresay having depraved whores at their beck and call made Brock's hard-ass attitude a lot easier to swallow for the newcomers. Between the two orc tribes, it had gotten to the point where my slaves were doing nothing but sleeping and fucking, and I suspected they thought it was heaven on earth. I'd allowed Brock his pick of the litter since he'd come back. He'd disappear with one of my girls (usually Ruby) for hours on end, and I wouldn't ask any questions. What passed between them was his business. For the wedding ceremony, I'd offered Certiok and Trenok two of my girls for the whole day. They'd chosen Onyx for her color and wiry hair, and Opal because Trenok wanted to know exactly why she was my favorite. 'And what about you, Elena?' Certiok had asked me curiously, her eyes lingering on the bugle in my pants, 'Are you not on the menu?' And though Certiok was the most beautiful she-orc I'd ever seen, the memory of Sherok was too fresh in my mind. I declined.

I watched Crystal, Diamond and Sapphire get passed around a circle, filled and molested ceaselessly by man and woman alike.

"Prestira..." I said at length, "there's a story between you two you're not telling us."

"We got married, it didn't work out, we divorced. That's the story." Zander said curtly.

"Hmm, that's an interesting fucking story, Zander."

"I'm a scientist at heart," Zander smiled, "I'll tell you all you need to know, and no more. If you want the gratuitous details, ask Prestira when she gets here."

"I'm going to keep prying."

"Fine." Zander conceded, "Alkandi gave me the gift of agelessness so that I could put one of her incarnations on the Black Throne. It's my only purpose; my destiny, if you will. You can understand that this goal is an all-consuming one. It doesn't leave room for love. I distracted myself with Prestira for ten years, but I always felt Alkandi pulling me back to the wild. So, I left Prestira, even though I loved her. That was two-hundred years ago."

"Prestira is that old?!"

Zander nodded. "She has the gift of agelessness, like me, only hers wasn't given to her by a dark spirit; she took hers all by herself. When Prestira was in her twenties, she came across a book that detailed the process. It's a gruesome and timely task, and it requires you to devote your entire life to the procedure with no guarantee of success in the end."

"Details, Zander." I said.

"It's not something you should try, Elena. The process requires you to slough your youthful flesh and store it in a freezer. That's right; Prestira flayed every inch of her body over the course of five years. You can imagine how horrific she looked, scarred from head to toe with self-inflicted wounds. Even her scalp was stripped. She stayed in her hovel, an outcast, a crazy hermit. When she was ninety years of age, she had finally learned and done all that was required. She took her youthful flesh and threw it into a boiling cauldron, and then dove in after it."

"Holy shit."

"Can you imagine?" Zander said as he puffed on his pipe, "The strength and belief in yourself it would take to do that? To mutilate your body in the prime of your life, and then spend every waking moment of the rest of it perfecting something that might not work? When people say Prestira is crazy, it's because she is."

"That's amazing." I muttered.

"What's even more amazing," Zander said, "is that Prestira wasn't born with an ounce of natural ability. She learned and perfected the arcane arts all by herself. I was an infant conjuring rattles in my hands. I shape-shifted for the first time when I was five. I could cast perception spells, create an arcane shield and move objects with my mind all at the age of twenty. It took Prestira centuries to learn what she's learned, and now she's one of the most powerful beings on earth, all due to pain, practice and patience. That's why I loved her, why I still love her in some ways. No challenge is too great for her, no matter her limitations. She will surmount them all."

"After Yavara sits on the Black Throne and the war is over, will you two get back together?" I asked.

"I don't know," Zander said as he gazed into the night, "I've never thought that far ahead. Fantasizing about uncertain futures is a dangerous way to distract yourself from the problems at hand."

"You're right," I said, "you should get back together the moment you see her again. Life is fleeting, and uncertain; even ageless people can die from a well-placed arrow. You don't know what tomorrow will bring or take from you. You should seize the now."

"Elena-"

"No," I cut him off, "I spent most of my teen years hiding myself from Yavara because I was too afraid to just tell her the truth. I wasted those years sitting in stasis, never moving until the opportunity passed me by. A week ago, I saw someone full of strength and life die in an instant. One second, then the next. That's all it was."

Zander blew a slow cloud from his lips. "Maybe you're right."

"Don't give me this 'maybe' bullshit," I said, punching Zander in the shoulder, "if you don't get back with Prestira, I'm going to fuck her in front of you every day."

"You think she'd let you do that?"

"If I told her it was to make you jealous, I don't think there's a single thing Prestira wouldn't let me do." I grinned.

Zander snorted. "You've said a grand total of ten words to her, and you already know her, huh?"

"We'll be lurking around every corner, waiting to jump out and bone in front of you."

"You act like I wouldn't enjoy watching that."

"You're a pig." I laughed.

"Am I?" Zander grinned, and with a wave of his hand, conjured an ethereal image of me bare-backing Prestira Rasloraca against a foggy window. Her mouth consumed mine, her white flesh contrasted my dark complexion, our bodies glistening with moisture as our succulent curves squished between our pressing forms. Zander glanced at my crotch, and gave me a teasing smile. "Oink-oink, Elena Straltaira."

I blushed and pulled my knees up, concealing the tent I'd been pitching in my cloak. Zander winked, and abruptly transformed into Prestira. "How many drinks would it take for this to work?" Zander asked, Prestira's voice coming from his lips.

"I don't know Zander," I lifted his cloak, "do you still have all the male plumbing down there?"

"Not if you don't want it."

"Well, in that case," I smiled, rolling atop, "let's get weird."

BROCK

I stared at the map of the Great Forest. The arboreal midlands bisected the continent of Tenvalia, separating the Highlands in the west from the Lowlands in the east. The Highlands was a series of hills and plateaus that rose in elevation as it moved southward, becoming the Bearded Peaks, the western backbone of Tenvalia, where dwarves made cities from mines and mountaintops. At the southern-most tip of Tenvalia, the Lowlands, Midlands and Highlands converged into a part of the Great Forest called the Tropics, where mermaids, sirens and sentient crustaceans dwelt. North of that was the Palms, where goblins and ogres made hovels in swamplands, and north of that were the Willows, the ancestral home of the trolls. North of that was the Maples, where fractious orc tribes lived, sometimes mingling with the centaurs that made their home in the Spearhead Mountains that centered the region. Then there were the Spruces, where the nymphs lived in harmony with nomadic dawn-elves; then the Pines, where minor orc clans of note made their home. Foremost of these were the Terdini, who had bred selectively for generations to become the largest and strongest warriors of all orc-kind. But our size and strength meant for naught when compared with the sheer numbers of the great hordes to the north. A third of the Great Forest wasn't even forest, but northern tundra; the Tundra, to be exact. The Ten looked down upon the tribes of the Pines like the inconsequential tribes of the Maples. I would show them their error. I would show them all. My eyes drifted along the Knife River, a waterway that ran from south to north, then took an abrupt eastward path at The Bend. It traveled through the Gorge, and made its outlet at the northern-most point of the Lowlands. Where the Lowlands ended, the capital city of Alkandra began. It was just forsaken ruins that marked the edge of the Tundra and the Pines at the eastern peninsula of Tenvalia. But it would be home.

"What are you thinking about?" The succubus called 'Ruby' asked me, lounging in my lap. Her cherry-blonde head rested on my chest, her luscious red lips quirked in a curious manner, her ruby nipples pointing from her petite breasts. I'd poured my rage and grief into her five times already that night, and she took it with it relish. The bruises on her neck were already fading, and the handprints on both sets of cheeks were barely visible. Succubi healed fast when you fed them, and Elena's whores never wanted for food. Ruby was practically radiant with sustenance.

"Conquering the world." I muttered, examining the map.

"So that you can do what with it?" Ruby giggled, nestling my cock between her thighs, "What can the world give you that I cannot?"

"You are nothing to me but a vessel to dump my spunk."

"And I wouldn't want to be anything else." Ruby batted her brown eyes up at me, "I don't understand why the rest of you are always so uptight about everything. The purpose of life is to fuck, you know."

"That's a very shallow purpose, Ruby." I grunted, making a note next to the Willows. Possible allies?

"Oh, you know I'm not shallow." Ruby smirked. She eased herself upright, and with a shuddering breath, took me into her slit, encasing me in wet tight warmth. "I'm a deep, deep girl." Ruby hissed, consuming me to the base. Her succulent cheeks pillowed against my pelvis, and her tiny body undulated gently, doing all the work for the both of us in a sensual dance. "You'll never make allies of the Willow trolls." She moaned.

I raised my brows. "And why's that?"

Ruby licked her lips, gasping in sexual splendor. "The trolls there are pacifists, have been since their last shaman had a vision."

"How do you know this?"

"Mother used to take us out to hunt big game." Ruby giggled, her soft belly stretching to roll her wide hips, "We've been everywhere."

I pondered that, idly playing with the woman's breasts, pinching her ruby nipples to make her hiss with delight. "What about the Maple tribes? Is there any semblance of unity there?"

"They all parlay with the centaurs once a year in a gathering, but they mostly stick with their own. New tribes there pop up almost as quickly as old tribes die." Ruby dropped her head on my chest, her brown eyes aglow in pleasure, "An ambitious man might conquer them all with the right display of power. It would be wise to do so before going to The Ten."

"I don't remember asking for your advice."

"But I gave it anyway. What are you going to do about it, big boy?" Ruby grinned, her forked tongue flicking from her lips to tickle my chin.

I wrapped my hand around her throat, and squeezed until she squeaked. "Don't forget your place, slave!"

"Not your slave." Ruby croaked, making my hand fall from her with just a caress of her fingers. Her brown eyes twinkled with amusement, not in the least threatened by me. "Don't forget your place, orc. You're not my lover; you're my dinner. Are you really fucking me, or have you just stuck your cock into the jaguar's mouth?" Ruby winked, "And let me pose you this, oh wise chieftain; is the deer smarter than the wolf? Is the mouse craftier than the fox? Is the fish wittier than the eagle? Take my advice if you want it, or ignore it; it doesn't matter to me." Ruby rolled her vaginal muscles up my length with a predatory grin. "All I want is already inside me."

I looked at her for a moment, then snorted. "And I thought you were the cattle."

"But we're not the ones being milked." Ruby tittered.

"How willful is your slavery?"

"It's not a lie, if that is what you ask." Ruby planted her heels on my knees, and began to squat up and down, "I would throw myself into lava for Master to use me as a stepping stone." My cock slickened with her lustful excretion, our joining moistening every time she dropped her hips to impale herself, "I love her with all my heart. She gives me peace I haven't known since... since..."

"Since?" I asked, staying her motions with firm hands on her hips.

Ruby tilted her head thoughtfully, her breathing easing from its excited state. "I remember a voice. It used to sing in my mind like a mother's whisper, always calling me home. But it was not my mother's voice." Ruby looked up at me, a shadow of concern in her usually-jovial eyes, "My mother wasn't born a succubus, you know. She was part of something, but she can't remember what. Whatever it was, it called to me in my youth before the hunger took me." Ruby smiled, "Master is like that voice. She fills that void in my mind now."

I eased my hands from Ruby's hips, and she happily recommenced her lecherous dance, her delicate spine undulating against my torso like a writhing viper. The top of her head barely reached my sternum, but her playful tongue extended from her mouth to kiss my neck and chin. Such a soft creature she was, only her demonic little horns giving truth to her predacious nature. What a weapon she could be. What power Elena Straltaira could have if she were as ambitious as I. But did she even need ambition to gain power? Where exactly was the hermaphroditic hybrid on the Alkandran totem pole? Yavara's consort, or Yavara's spouse? I frowned at the idea.

"Do I not please you, Brock Terdini?" Ruby gasped, pulling me ever into her starving loins.

"You do." I mumbled absentmindedly, "I'm just distracted."

"Because of Sherok?"

I closed my eyes, letting the sudden wave of anguish wash through me. Ruby slowed her motions, gaging how I would react this time. I dared not show my weakness to the orcs, nor to Elena, but the succubi were discreet. Whatever form my grief manifested itself as, they would absorb it with a whore's nonjudgmental compassion. Whether wrath compelled me to be violent, or guilt compelled me to be punished, or simple sorrow compelled me to seek comfort, they would provide it with whole-hearted earnestness and desire. I felt a little hand caress my face, offering gentle solace with delicate fingers. I took Ruby's hand in mine, my palm larger than her splayed five fingers.

"No, not Sherok." I said, "It's your master that occupies my mind now. She's already taken control of my tribe once." I pondered, "Out of necessity, yes, but she still commanded my men, and they still followed. If she commanded me, I wonder if I would be expected to follow."

"Are you threatened by her?" Ruby inquired, her cheeks turning rosy with pleasure. Her tail uncoiled from the small of her back, gently wrapped around my testicles, and stroked them in contest with her pelvic drops. I groaned, and she tittered, pleased to have gotten a reaction from me.

"Yes." I answered gruffly, "Has she spoken of her intentions?"

Ruby grinned up at me. "Do you think I would betray her trust to you? Rest assured that Master's goals align with yours, so far as your goals do not extend past the Highland border."

"And if they did?"

Ruby smile broadened, and her tail uncurled from my nuts, snaked up my belly, and wrapped loosely around my neck. "Then Queen Yavara would have to yank her doggie's leash, wouldn't she? Are you a bad doggie, Brock?"

I grabbed her tail and tore it from my neck. "The Ten will not follow a Froktora who refuses to invade the Highlands, even with the Dark Queen's endorsement!"

"Then the path is simple, is it not?" Ruby asked, "Challenge the Ten one-by-one, and take what they refuse to give."

"A Tundra chief would never accept the challenge of someone from the Pines, even the Terdini." I sighed, "If Queen Yavara wants her army, she will have to make sacrifices. I believe that in time she might've realized this, but Elena will always stand in her way in this regard, won't she?"

"Yes." Ruby said thoughtfully, "But ultimately, Master wants only her Yavara. If she is forced to choose between her homeland and her love, I do not know which she will. Even Opal cannot fill that void in Master's heart." Ruby sighed, "Though Master sees fit to fill Opal's void every night. There have been whole days when I've been left wanting." Ruby's cheeks grew even redder, and she huffed with indignation.

"Jealousy kills families, Ruby. Do not bemoan your sister's fortune, but count your own blessings." I said into her hair, "And if it's any consolation, you're my favorite."

"Am I?" Ruby smiled delightedly up at me, "I always thought Onyx was."

"I like her color, but these red little nipples you have," I growled, twisting Ruby's nodes from her petite breasts until she was purring, "they drive me wild."