Secret Journey Ch. 03

8

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8

Gloriana's plan went off perfectly, I of course don't mean the one she told Goku and I about. I meant her REAL plan.

I found out about THAT plan when Goku started her assault. The bandit camp's guards cried out in wails as Goku tore into them. It says something about my current circumstances that I could tell from their cries of pain that Goku was sticking to the plan and was distracting them without despoiling them.

"Let's go," I grunted, "if we take too long she'll get bored and if she gets bored it'll be bad."

"She's quite a character, you both are."

"We get the job done."

"That's what I was kinda hoping for." She replied, "you ready?"

I tented my fingers and prayed to The Divine. I felt celestial power enhancing and empowering the Inquisitor.

She pounced as two scouts got too close. I followed behind as she glided through the trees. The sounds of Goku's attack barely faded so either she was unwittingly following us or more likely she was the eye in a hurricane of battle that was growing in size and intensity.

I prayed to the Deity of Darkness and Shadow for concealment. The shadows swirled around like smoke to hide us as we ran through the trees.

"I'll need enhancement for this next bit," Gloria whispered, pointing at a wooden barrier hidden among the trees. Behind it a few bandits with bows looked past us in terror.

They were scared of Goku obviously. Unfortunately they should've been scared of us or more accurately the deadly Inquisitor who vaulted over the barrier cutting down two men in a heartbeat before pinning a third to the trunk of a tree with the heel of her boot.

"You have a box, wooden, covered in runes, fancy-ass lock, tell me where it is and maybe I won't have to cut you down."

"Boss man has it," the bandit gasped, "I wanted to pawn it, but Boss-man said we were hired to steal it."

"Hired by whom?"

"I don't know," He hissed, sounding somewhat unconvincing.

"My friend is a dark cleric, you know what they're like, talk to me or you can talk to HIM.

All appearances to the contrary, I'm kinda fond of a little roleplay.

"Dark Goddess Loith,"I hissed in prayer, "this wretched man-creature stands before me opposing your dark design."

I pulled a knife from my belt and held the point to his face. "A payment of flesh to you Dark Queen, what use has he for eyes that will never gaze upon your beautiful visage. What use has he for a tongue that does not sing of your beauty?"

The man's eyes widened in terror. "He was rich, I never caught the name but he was a rich man with money ... maybe a merchant."

I tore open his shirt and lightly scratched arcane symbols on his belly.

"I mark you as tribute. She'll mate with you and lay her eggs within your writhing body. You'll be both lover and nourishment to her and her hungry young."

I kissed his forehead in benediction and the man actually screamed, squirming out of Gloria's grasp and running into the forest.

Gloria looked at me, "That was smooth pretending to cut Loith"s symbol onto him."

"Who's pretending," I replied, "I have no desire to get the attention of a Chaos Goddess and a cleric of the light speaking her name pretty much counts as attention."

"I thought clerics had to possess an affinity to chaos or light to even get the Celestial Court to hear them whether they be light OR dark."

"I'm a rarity amongst my brethren. It seems my prayers reach anyone who's listening."

"A true polytheist? I've heard there's only a few of you in the world. Why would they send YOU on a field mission."

"I volunteered, besides the bishops don't know how many gods I'm actually capable of talking to."

"They don't?"

"Some clerics can talk only to one God. Others have affinity with the Gods of a specific alignment or temperament. I'm one of the few who can talk to almost all of them."

"Even the Chaos Gods?"

"Yep!"

"The Old Ones?"

"The ones who haven't been sleeping for millennia have been stuck in the farthest reaches of the Abyss since the dawn of ages." I answered, "they like a good conversation as much as anyone else."

"That's impossible, how?"

"I was raised a whoreson before joining the order, if I'm comfortable talking to dark Gods, that's probably why."

"Then that symbol you drew...?"

"As long as he doesn't die or kill a spider in the couple of days it'll take to heal, he'll be perfectly fine."

"A spider?"

"Loith's totem animals and she's VERY protective of them."

"You're obviously well informed for a cleric of the light."

"I'm supposed to be good at my job, can't do that and pretend that The Divine didn't create good AND evil, Chaos and Order." I answered.

We heard more screams coming from the part of the forest where Goku was. "...sometimes embodied in the same being." I muttered.

"Let's go."

Gloria and I continued running, arriving at last at a wooden building near a big clearing.

I marveled at the ramshackle collection of buildings.

"This is more organized than I would have expected from simple bandits."

"That's probably because they're not just simple bandits." Gloria whispered, "help me with this lock?"

I whispered words of benediction to the lady of shadows and Gloria gasped in surprise when the lock she was picking practically opened itself.

"You're handy to have around."

"I told you, I'm good at my job." I replied.

I felt an all too familiar tingling in my nether regions.

"Time's wasting, Inquisitor, let's grab this thing and get out of here."

"Yeah about that..." Gloriana suddenly turned and punched me hard enough for the air to be forcibly driven from my lungs. I dropped to my knees and barely felt the second smack to the back of my head that knocked me out.

Which in hindsight was fortunate, This wasn't the best time for the curse to activate. But it was because of that coincidence Goku and I survived.

8

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8

I never knew my father, few whoresons did. Indeed, it was an embarrassingly long time before I figured out my NAME was Suki while whoreson was a general job title or general insult depending on who used it.

I had my suspicions of course. The fairy tales a child will tell themselves when the gritty reality of daily life has become so burdensome that a little fantasy no matter how painful is preferable.

My favorite story was The Playwright, a man who taught me and the others reading and letters to take the edge off his substantial bills. He was the one who taught me the stories about the Monkey King, though in his mind they were complex allegories for mankind's struggle with HIS own lustful nature, hence why The Monkey King could defeat whole armies single handedly but fell before a wise Guru who'd mastered himself to become one with the world around him. I once got a look at his actual bill and I can reliably say that of the two of us, I benefited the most from his admittedly pedestrian kinks and fetishes. I suspect his greatest fetish was a desire to see enlightenment and comprehension in young eyes. I thought it was being ruthlessly pegged by a sturdy female or his taste for dressing in women's clothing but upon attending one of his plays and seeing the vast array of pretty dresses, some even more exquisite than the ones he wore while romping with my mother or her friends, I'm certain that he liked teaching more than he ever would've admitted to himself never mind anyone else.

There was The Shadow Man as we children called him. A grim menacing figure who paid silver and occasionally gold sovereigns for intelligence about our customers. My friend Dotty and I excelled at this game. Indeed our most profitable win was ten sovereigns split between us. My five was for information about the upcoming birthday of a nobleman's wife, a birthday he was notorious for forgetting. Dotty found out about his severe allergy to kalaberries. Our childlike minds made no connection with our game and said nobleman's death weeks later apparently from an allergic reaction to the kalaberry infused make-up his wife was wearing when they made love after she got a particularly beautiful gift of jewelry. Dotty spent more time with The Shadow Man as we grew up eventually leaving the brothel to apprentice with him. The last time I saw her was at the ceremony when I took my final vows upon becoming ordained as a Cleric. She was a face in the crowd but I recognized her. I tell myself it was to see an old friend that she was there and the death of a high ranking bishop who was also in attendance mere happenstance.

The one I hope wasn't my father was a member of the church himself. He saw my mother once or twice a week and every so often looked in on me. We spoke only a handful of times, he asked me what books I was reading and about my life. He seemed to take an amused interest in my taste for banned or forbidden literature. To this day I still own a well thumbed children's book he gave me who's rhymes and limericks hid apocryphal tirades against the church establishment. Days after one of my birthdays, men came and every possession I had was packed up and my training to become a Cleric began. I saw the man a few more times and to judge by the treatment I received each time from instructors or church officials, my progress as a Cleric impressed him. He was also in the audience on the day I was ordained. He sent a note promising answers to all my questions.

But the answers never came.

He died of an assassin's blade. He was quite important within the church or so I'm told. Thus he rarely came out in public. His only deviations from that were his supposedly secret trips to a local brothel and my ordination.

I didn't know him well enough to be angry with my childhood friend for possibly killing my father, if that's who he was, but you can see why I'd still prefer to assume that he wasn't my father. The night the bishop died I found five gold sovereigns wrapped up in an old but familiar handkerchief in my private rooms. I'm not sure how she found me or why she gave back the money she won. I tell myself she gave me the money as thanks or repayment of some long forgotten debt. The alternative is one I'd obviously like to avoid considering.

It was my mother's request I "minister" to the brothels whenever possible and wherever I happen to be. It's a popular duty amongst the male clergy for obvious reasons so I'm often obliged to prove I've no ulterior motive for working with the women. Fortunately my mother wrote a letter of introduction. It's in the secret code of the brothel worker's guild so I'm not entirely sure what it says but it does open doors for me that are usually closed. Once I've done my thing the ladies, or whatever criminal guild controls the prostitution in the city I'm passing through usually ask I be allowed to return. And while the Bishop who recruited me to the order is powerful even in death; my mother wields seemingly equal power in life at least amongst the low born and criminal classes.

I will never forget where I come from because where I come from has given me access to places I'd never see were I a nobleman's or merchant prince's child. Besides I grew up serving such men and I know for a fact I read and write better then most of them and can fuck better then the few as learned as I am.

My introduction to sex was essentially the same as my introduction to my many potential fathers. I was obviously quite young when I became aware that sex existed. I was barely into my teens when I formally lost my virginity to one of the brothel workers. She'd won a bet with my mother. If you get the impression my mother's gambling had a profound effect on my life, you'd be severely understating the matter.

One reason I was particularly well read long before my formal education started was the number of times my mother paid off a debt by lending my reading skills to someone who couldn't or preferred not to read on their own. Of course my reading skills weren't the only thing I had to improve thanks to mother's gambling I've been told I have good eye for women's clothes and make-up I'm a decent cook and once I realized why I had to do so many extra things around the brothel house, a much better cards player then my mother.

My first-ever consensual sexual encounter with a peer was after the formal loss of my virginity. Mom noticed Dotty and I were spending a lot of time together and arranged for us to have a kind of date. Yet another reason why I prefer the sweet lies of childhood to the harsh truths of maturity.

I asked my mother about it and her response was as pragmatic as she usually was. "Everyone should have a good memory of sex." She told me, "It makes the good times afterwards better and the bad times more endurable."

If my attitude towards sex seems casual it is because I was raised to see sex and indeed most thing's in life as transactional. For you sex is the culmination of an emotional journey of discovery between yourself and whoever you're with. For me, sex is a series of compromises and negotiations with a friend and ally or its a demonstration of power and control over an opponent.

In a moment of stupidity I asked my mother which my conception was, a good time to remember or a bad time she endured. She responded by telling me the story in sinfully rich and graphical detail. I've since banished from my mind the images her story invokes but her amused laughter as I ran from the room to relieve my confused erection was a memory I carry to this day with the amused laughter of the other girls when she told the story with greater embellishments each time almost as vivid.

So if you're looking for where the dark side of my personality comes from, the part which in spite of my inclination towards charity and compassion for others took obscene amounts of joy in Goku humiliating those who crossed our path even as I occasionally chided her for her brutality, I come by it honestly.

8

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8

I wouldn't have thought feelings of horniness would wake you up but apparently they do though the guy shaking me definitely helped.

"You gotta stop her, she's crazy." He screeched as he shook me which only served to make my post-unconsciousness hangover worse.

I tried to ignore the throbbing pain in my head, "Who's crazy?" I moaned, dreading I already knew the answer.

"The monkey warrior, she's tearing up the place and says if we don't release you, she'll kill everyone ... if they're lucky."

Pretending not to understand his pause, I asked for the details, Gloria had apparently left me to the mercies of the bandits, presumably as she had always intended.

Unbeknownst to her; Goku started tearing the place apart looking for me. She knew that if she was still enduring the crippling waves of maddening pleasure, I had to be in a situation where I couldn't negate the curse.

That brought her into conflict with the Bandit King.

The bandit leader, a hulking brute of a man, wanted to do unspeakable things to us. Not unspeakable because of the terrible nature of the acts however, because he wasn't much for conversation. Everything he said sounded like unintelligible grunts and snarls that were apparently a foreign language of some distant land. The only person that understood him was the bandits 2nd in command, a man named Uzzah.

Unfortunately for the leader, Goku could understand him. Apparently her previous misadventures had taken her to many distant and strange lands and I could've warned him that his threats of violence and brutality were for Goku, foreplay.

Goku is dangerous and unpredictable at the best of times, Goku, made slightly insane by the curse, became an unholy demonic force of destructive excess that tore through the bandit camp and the bandits themselves like a whirlwind.

By the time I revoked the curse and she calmed down she'd slaughtered nearly every bandit including the leader save for those she took a sudden sadistic fancy to.

The sounds coming from the bandits lodge hall would be best described as primitive and animalistic. Since Goku could clone herself at will it was no trouble to essentially create an impromptu orgy with a couple luckless bandits smart enough to surrender or too cowardly to go down swinging as the guests of honour. I had the disturbing idea that the screaming and yelling heard throughout the camp was likely an accurate reflection of what she and I sounded like.

I contented myself with helping the poor unfortunate souls the bandits had captured, kidnapped or enslaved from the surrounding villages for many days and even weeks. I busied myself binding their wounds, feeding them what food stuff I could find around the camp, fixing torn clothing and generally assuring them that contrary to the sounds they were hearing, they had NOT in fact been rescued by some sex-crazed demon straight out of Hell itself.

Eventually order was restored to the camp with the surviving bandits practically begging for a chance to help tend to the injured. I'd love to tell you it was the Divinity that opened their hearts to charity but I'm pretty sure the ever looming threat of being left to the mercy of Goku's terrifying lusts played a significant role in their change of heart.

Nothing like a clear and present threat of being serial raped by a horny and crazed futanari to awaken long denied instincts for charity and good conduct.

She set herself up in the lodge hall tearing through the booze and food stores and occasionally indulging in any of the remaining bandits she had yet to ravage. Indeed she was content to remain in the camp for several days. And I had more than enough to keep me busy. Thus a few days passed before a young boy summoned me to the thieves guild hall where Goku sat naked on the throne that belonged to the previous bandit king while sipping some kind of warm clear liquor she'd taken a fancy to, occasionally stroking herself as if eager to return to her new found amusement, despoiling and ravishing her victims. Around the room, the bodies of male and female bandits lay discarded like a child's playthings. They were all alive, some moaning in pain from whatever Goku had done to them, others moaning in eager anticipation of a repeat performance. Others in the hall clearly found it distracting whenever her hand or tail occasionally stroked her hard shaft. I, who was kind of used to her casual displays of dominance and power, barely acknowledged them.

I decided now was the time to satisfy my curiosity about her newly discovered ability to resist the debilitating effects of the curse.

She blithely dismissed my question with some vague explanation involving her two decades plus study of The Tao.

"You have the ability to resist torture and discomfort and you just decided to use it on a whim?" I asked incredulously, "why?"

"For the same reason I don't fly us to where YOU'RE going or to my magic battle staff. It's more fun this way." Goku sneered, "besides, getting there is way more than half the fun."

"Meaning?" I asked, bracing for the karmic backlash.

"There's treasure in these hills." she announced.

"Say's who?"

"The 2nd in command around here. His name's Uzzah,"

"We've met." I acknowledged the man, holding a wine skin and looking like he really REALLY didn't want to sit down.

"Uzzah, tell the priest what you told me?"

"I'm a little bitch who loves the taste of MiLady's cock cream." he replied miserably.

"Not THAT, the other thing, ...about treasure."

Apparently there was a dragon's hoard, it had rampaged a few years back destroying lands and people before vanishing on the same night a star had mysteriously fallen on-top of its mountaintop lair. A few luckless adventurers had descended into the caves that honeycombed the mountain looking for the treasure left behind but had never returned.

Some rumors said a demon haunted the place now, luring young men foolish enough to try to get inside to their end.