Taking Flight

The warrior's free hand traced circles on her hip as they lay in silence for a moment.

"Actually," Niox said and then hauled herself out of bed and began to pull on her dress clothes. "I need to report in, I am actually the fifth highest ranking survivor."

She stopped and turned at the tent door, "I'll be back to break down in a bit."

Getting out of bed, Vira felt stronger, stronger than she had ever been. Still curious, she wanted to test herself and cast about for something challenging. Her gaze fell on Niox's shield, something she had needed both hands to lift before. The metal was cool against her skin, but quickly heated in her grasp. Preparing to heave, she was thrown completely off balance as the shield rose off the ground with relative ease. She was startled to muscles much larger than she remembered rising out of skin under the slight strain.

Intrigued, she began to mimic Niox's exercises as was rewarded with muscles that rivaled the fighters coming to bear all over her body. The more she worked out, the more she seemed to slim down until she was visibly muscular all over and still somehow so very curvy.

"This body is incredible!"

Arms wrapped around her waist, "Indeed it is."

"Ni, I..."

"Was experimenting, I can understand." The fighter bit her lip while looking her up and down. "Besides, I like this you."

Over the next hour they broke down their tent, all of their worldly possessions fitting into three trunks and a canvas-wrapped bundle. Retiring to bathe for what might be the last time in the foreseeable future, the pair stopped in at the watering hole off the river that had been designated a woman's bathhouse.

They sank into the water and let out a sigh.

Niox wasted no time in resuming her own explorations of Vira's changes. Eager fingers dragged over her cut shoulders before beginning to massage her massive bust. As this was going on, Vira was slowly feeling a heat build. Stronger than her normal arousal, it felt almost like she was casting a spell. A twitching sensation rubbed her thigh and she gasped a moment before Niox did.

The warrior rose off her lover as they both looked at her crotch.

"Are you..."

"Manifesting a toy with my energy? It does seem like it."

Niox reached for it. "You did say your hidden power grew from love..."

"So why not lust as well? I suppose I just haven't had this much spare-OH!"

Not waiting for Vira to finish her thought, Niox had already began to stroke the energy-phallus. Unlike the glass one they used on occasion, there was sensation—and a lot of it. She was bent upwards, rising out of the water and giving Niox the opportunity to suck on the curved end.

"This is amazing," she said after letting go with a pop. "It feels like you're caressing my tongue."

"Your tongue is doing quite a bit of caressing of its own, don't stop now."

"Actually..." Niox straddled her and slowly worked herself down the glowing shaft. With arms around her neck, the fighter herself up and down. Vira felt the heat rise further as her body began to move on its own. Her hands gripped her love around her waist, guiding her. Her pelvis rocked back and forth in a clumsy circuit as she tried to rub as much of Niox as she could.

In their passion, they did not heal the warning bell. It was only that Vira looked up at the right moment that she saw the Hillxian mage standing at the edge of their pool. She had time for a single word as she rose and threw Niox behind her in one movement. The inky black ball of mana was not stopped by her barrier, but it passed through her as well.

A cascade of glowing flechettes hit him in the chest with enough force to pin him to a tree some yards away. Vira turned to offer her hand to Niox, but the fighter lay face down in the water. An inky blackness was spreading from her body.

Fishing her beloved out of the stained water, she could feel her still breathing but her pulse was erratic. Groaning and gasping, she was coughing up a seemingly endless supply of ink.

"The spell wasn't for me...It was...they..." She pulled Niox to her, pouring healing energy into her limp body, but it did not seem to help. The warrior continued to spew dark liquid, the fluid coagulating around them.

'I see my acolyte was successful.' The voice seemed to come from everywhere. A sinister hiss that chilled the very air. A mass formed from the inky pool, the vague shape of a humanoid. Glowing eyes opened in the solid shadow.

"Hilluk!"

'Virasviel. Consider this my gift to you for your ascension. The pain will forge you into a formidable foe.'

Vira spat and shot a barrage of energy blades at the inky form. With a laugh Hilluk's presence faded.

"I won't lose," Vira said as she turned back to Niox. "I can save her."

-*-

Niox was floating in relative darkness. Submerged, but able to breathe. Angled shafts of light penetrated the far away surface, illuminating other shapes in the water. One drifted through a column of light revealing the ghostly image of a soldier she had lost during her first command. She recoiled, but the movement seem to awaken the sleeping shadows.

One after another, the mass of dark shapes flared into the ghost of another person she had be responsible for killing. Allies and enemies alike reached for her, their dead hands cold against her skin. There was no battle plan for this situation, no strategy to execute. She was going to be torn apart by her past and that was that.

'Fight!' Vira's voice said in her mind. 'Don't give up!'

A desperate back hand knocked one of the ghouls away and into a few more. Pushing off one that was grabbing at her ankles, she got free of the crush of undead but there was still no way to escape. Hundreds of bodies lay in repose in every direction.

Far above, on the other side of the surface, a green light was growing brighter. Vira was looking for her. She began to paddle up, trying her best to avoid the specters and not get dragged down by them. It felt more like climbing a mountain than swimming. Each ghost of her past both a handhold and a challenge to overcome.

She could see Vira standing on the surface now, looking for her, calling her name. There was only a few feet left. She put her hand out to break through and was met instead with a solid barrier, almost like ice. Banging on it did nothing, shouting made no noise. She was not even sure Vira could see through the surface to her.

A hand grabbed her ankle. Another, her calf. Steadily her past was catching up to remind her that hope was an illusion. She would die alone, injured and forgotten on the battlefield. Only ever be a tool for others.

'That's not true!' Vira knelt, her hands beating at the barrier. 'You mean something to me!'

Shaking of the fatigue, she wrest her hand out of the mass. Bathed in Vira's, she fought as she sank back into the black abyss.

'I won't lose you again!'

A sound like a thunderclap rang out and the twang of tight string being plucked echoed across the ice-like barrier. Another clap sounded, along with a cracking. Above her, a spiderweb was appearing in the surface. On the third strike, a hammer burst through and green light poured into the sea of darkness. The fluid pushed back against the light, but tendrils of energy crept towards her.

Her specters recoiled at the brightness. Their grip slipping as she grabbed hold what she knew was Vira's energy. The emerald tentacle wrapped around her arm, its essence sinking into her skin. Another rope of light reached her, brushing her other shoulder before also knitting itself to her.

Magic flowed into her. It felt like being heal only more profound. Was this ocean death? Had she died? Just what was Vira trying to? Resurrect her? Was that even possible? Not that it mattered, the cleric would never give up.

A low rumble rose from below as thousands of arms reached towards her. This time it was not just a weight that was dragging her down, something was pulling her towards it. Was this the grip of Vashyi, the goddess of death? Whatever it was, the surface was fading into a murky memory. Its light choked out by the distance. She felt heavy. The tendrils of energy flickered, their surface starting to pit and wear away.

Above, there was a flare of green. The sound of hammering once more filled the dead ocean. Vira punched another hole through the barrier and sent more of her energies down.

Grabbing hold, the green light turned orange. She could feel herself heating up like during a run. The fluid around her began to boil as her temperature continued to rise. Flames ignited where she was being restrained, hands burning away only for others to replace them. Slowly, steadily, she rose towards the surface as death's literal grip on her was broken again and again. She struggled her hands clawing towards the barrier between this world and the last. Lashing out, it was not just her hands and legs that fought for inches. Like a limb awakening, she became aware of something sprouting out of her back. Flaring into being, feathers of flame beat against the darkness like it was the night sky.

The sound of her hand meeting Vira's was a clap louder than the hammer blows. So loud in fact that her perception shattered. For a moment, everything was searing light and pain and burning.

She could not breathe. She could not move. It was worse than being dead and then the world snapped back into place. She was on her back in Vira's lap. The cleric's face was ashen and streaked with tears. The flickers of power in her eyes were weak and infrequent. The bright green in her hair had faded.

Niox struggled to sit up, to bring her face closer to Vira's. The curious sensation of pushing off the ground with something that was not her hands washed over her as her very real wings lifted her to her partner. The kiss that followed was the sweetest feeling. The world, the pain, the war, and everything else just dropped away in that moment as they looked into each other's eyes.

They leaned on each other as they rose on shaky legs. Already Vira's accents were returning, her power slowly recovering even after such a grueling spell. Aside from feeling like she had run five miles uphill, Niox had never felt better. Finally on her feet, the feeling of her wings faded to a dull ache and a whisper of feathers on her back. The hair in her face seemed to glow, as if burning from within.

She took a step and stumbled when her leg did not end where she expected it to. Looking down, she was noticeably larger and considerably more buff. Her wet shirt clung like a second skin to a superhuman physique. That she had boobs of actual size was mind-boggling as she cupped them. Her arms alone were breathtaking in their size and definition, but the rest of her was almost too much to grasp.

The only other humans she had ever seen close to this level were the Arzan Berserkers to the north. Among them were men who could stand toe to toe with a bear and not only survive, but win. She was pretty confident she could take five bears.

Vira's wings flared back to life and she let out a sigh. She looked up at Niox for the first time and her wide-eyed reaction, followed by her licking her lips, was priceless.

"Hey, Em, do you want to see if I can fly, too?"

The cleric simply nodded.

They leaped into the air and into a new world that only they shared.