The Demon Chain: Pt. 03

"If you'll let my friend go, I'll come with you," she said.

"An observant one, are you?" the man shot back, narrowing his eyes.

Behind them, Jalissa heard the click of two crossbows sliding bolts back. Beside her, she saw Bandric's hands glowing green.

"Stay that shit, mage," the man barked.

"I can melt you where you sit, sir," Bandric said through gritted teeth.

"Aye, you might get that spell off before those bolts go through your skull. Do you want to try?" his hand came to rest on his sword.

"Just let him go," Jalissa said again. "Take me. You can do whatever you like."

The big man looked at Bandric's glowing hands, and then Jalissa's tits. Then, he decided that raping her would be preferable to murdering a mage or being melted by magical fire.

"Alright," he said. "Stand down mage. We'll have the woman."

Bandric's hand glowed brighter. Jalissa put her hand on his arm.

"Do this. For me. Go and live. Don't worry about me. We have more stories to tell one another," she said.

He lowered his hands and the glow dimmed, then faded.

"Gods go with you," he said and took her hand.

She felt him press something into her palm. She clutched it. It felt silky, like a rose petal. He gave her a quick grin and added, "The petals of the Canilian rose burn as brightly as your beauty, lady. Until we meet again."

Jalissa hopped down from the wagon. The leader waved his hand, dismissing the mage, and the men blocking the cart's path moved aside. Jalissa turned to the mounted man, who offered her his hand. She took it and he swung her up into the saddle with him, his arm encircling her waist.

"Fine choice you've made," he growled into her ear. "Promise I won't let 'em damage that pretty face."

Jalissa didn't reply. She watched the cart trundle down the road as the other bandits closed back in around them. The demon only offered her exultation. It hungered.

***

Jalissa was not surprised that they didn't take her right then. There were likely other patrols on the road. At some point, the missing patrol would be noticed. It wouldn't do to be found gangraping a woman on the side of the road while wearing the crown's livery. Instead, they rode for nearly two hours while the bandit leader fondled her, molested her, and described in detail the things they'd do with her. She stayed silent and clutched the rose petal in her hand.

Finally, they dismounted in front of an old farmhouse behind a fallow field. The place looked like it had been deserted for a long time. The field had gone to weeds and even a few saplings had begun to spring up from the soil. The bandits tied up their horses behind the place, while the leader ushered Jalissa into the house.

The inside had the marks of a hideout. All the necessities of uncomfortable living were here, including bedrolls and dented cookware. The place seemed quite disused, and she guessed they hadn't been here long. Likely they'd be moving on just as quickly, considering they'd murdered at least six men today.

The leader wasted no time in pulling off her light blouse and groping her breasts. The other five men entered the house and arrayed themselves around the room, chuckling, grinning, rubbing their crotches, and pulling off their clothes.

"Free me! Feed! I will make these insects suffer for you."

Jalissa made no reply.

"Compliant bitch, aren't you?" the leader said. "Thought you'd be a bit of a fight."

"I told you I'd do whatever you wanted," she said, grimacing as he put his mouth around her nipple and sucked it.

"I say we keep her for good," another of the men spoke up.

"Damn fine cunt, she is," yet another added.

Jalissa trembled as she unlaced her trousers and slid them down. The coin, on its chain, swung back and forth as the leader's rough mauling and sucking jostled it. His rough hand dipped between her legs and he made an appreciative grunt when he found her wet. He pulled his mouth off her boob and pinched the nipple between his fingers.

"Wet little slut, aren't you?" he said.

Jalissa didn't reply. The man laid her on her back on his bedroll and pulled her legs apart, staring at her sex as he undid his pants and slid them down just enough to get his cock out. Jalissa didn't feel impressed, but then she didn't want to be. She shuddered, anticipating more the horror that they were about to experience than the rape that she was. How would they react when their leader became a cloud of dust? Perhaps they'd kill her and put an end to the demon's plans. Of course, they might just steal the demon chain off her corpse and start the cycle all over again.

"No. You and I are one. They will die for what they do."

Jalissa shuddered again at the whispered words in her head as the man pushed his cock into her with a groan. This time, she had the power to shut her eyes, but he didn't like that. He slapped her.

"Look at me, slut," he growled.

Jalissa opened her eyes again and impassively looked into his face as he buried his dick in her. His hand went around her throat, and he squeezed it hard enough to make her cough, then held it there as he fucked her in hard, short thrusts. His eyes flicked from her face to her jiggling breasts, then back and he growled in his throat. She whimpered through his hold on her as he continued to jam his cock into her.

"That's some good cunt," he hissed. "Yeah, I think we'll keep you a long time. Might even whore you out a bit and make some coin."

His thrusts became harder, faster. Jalissa's heart quickened as she anticipated the moment of his death. This time, she did not feel sorry. His kind was vile. She could feel the demon's hunger in her mind as it turned and turned, like a caged rat looking for an exit. It hit the ward on the coin, hissed, and continued to turn.

Then, in the span of a second, the entire world around her descended into total chaos. The bandit leader growled, grunted, and ejaculated into her. The first pent-up cumshot filled her insides. Even as he came in her, the other bandits laughed or whistled. The rear door of the place burst open in a sharp crack of splintering wood. A chunk of it rocketed outward and struck the bandit leader in the head. In his moment of pained confusion, Jalissa slapped the rose petal in her fist against his cheek.

He cried out in pain and surprise as he reeled back from the dual assault, then screamed as the petal seared his flesh. His abrupt withdrawal also removed his hand from her neck, but it caught in the chain and ripped the necklace from her with a snap. The other bandits had barely turned to face the door before a ball of green fire engulfed the one closest to the splintered portal. The demon, freed, surged forward like the coiled snake that it was, and took control.

Jalissa's fist punched through the astonished bandit leader's chest, and she stood, holding his body aloft, her arm straight through him, gripping his still-beating heart in her hand. The burning bandit by the door screeched in agony as he fell to his knees and the green fire set the place alight. Jalissa, now a prisoner in her mind, stared through her eyes at her rapist's dying face. Another bandit screamed as a second ball of mage fire engulfed him.

Bandric rushed through the doorway as the remaining three bandits drew steel, waving a hand that quelled the green fire in less time than it took to breathe. The smoldering corpses filled the room with the scent of cooked meat. The dying man, impaled on Jalissa's arm, gave a howl of pain that stopped everyone else in their tracks. In horror, they watched their leader's body, held aloft by this stick of a woman, crumple in on itself like a sheet of dry paper and burst into ash.

"Jalissa!" Bandric cried, but his voice was far away.

The power of the stolen life flowed through her body, bringing with it that orgasmic rush, but this time the demon didn't take it in fully. It did something with it, channeling that power away from itself and outward. Bandric took a step back through the door, his eyes wide with disbelief. The remaining bandits made a dash toward the doors, but the demon was faster. From her prison, Jalissa watched the angle of the room change, the press of her feet against the floor disappearing.

She hovered, a foot off of the ground as her arms reached out toward the remaining men. The demon drew her lips up into a smile of pure, unadulterated glee at their fear. Red tentacles of light lashed out from her hands, struck them where they stood, coiled about them, and drained them of all that they were. Bandric's gasp of terror was barely a whisper to her, it seemed so far away. The demon's ethereal appendages sucked the life from the men, and she could feel that life flowing like a river into her. Then, it turned toward Bandric.

"No! Not him!"

Jalissa beat at the monster with everything she had. She flung a lifetime of rage against it, pulling from every indignity she'd ever suffered, every injustice she'd witnessed, every moment she'd stood by and watched a cruel world destroy innocence and beauty. It wasn't enough to stop the thing. The demon looked through her eyes at him for an instant, and it relented.

The entirety of the existence of those three remaining men flashed in front of her as the demon consumed them, fed on them, and destroyed them where they stood. They dissolved into ash on the wood floor. She felt her feet touch the floor again and then she pitched forward. Her body twitched, convulsed, and then she shrieked, an inhuman cry of otherworldly pleasure as the demon drank in all that life at once. Together, they shared in it. Her pleasure and Succubi's were one, as they were at each feeding. She felt the full weight of that pleasure, but even that word couldn't describe it accurately.

This was the touch of something divine, like drinking a well of stars from the heavens. Her body rolled and shook with that pleasure, her mouth open in a silent scream of ecstasy that seemed like it would never end. However, the life had been tainted this time. This time, they had died in terror.

The rush of pleasure gave way to an immense, soul-crushing fear. Jalissa clawed at the wooden floor and screamed as the last moments of those lives assaulted her. In their dying moments, she saw the horror that she'd become. She was the demon, powerful and beautiful beyond their comprehension. She was a naked thing, awash in blood, with eyes black as pitch and mouth turned up in the smile of a child who had been given a new toy.

She wept for that horror and that pain. Evil as they were, they didn't deserve this. Their sins hadn't warranted the annihilation of all that they'd been in order to fuel the blood-soaked monster that she'd become. Was this the reason that the demon had made her fuck the previous kills? Was it somehow sparing her this feeling, giving her only the pleasure?

Through her screams and her convulsions, she felt hands on her, real hands, human. They pulled her close, held her through the fit, through the grief, even as she spat and cursed. There was a voice behind them, calm, saying her name. Jalissa. That was who she was. She was not the monster. She was the monster. It all came so fast, the press of memory and the storm of emotion. She tried to hold onto the voice, but it slipped away just like all those moments of stolen life. And then the world went black.

***

When she was able to stitch her mind back together, she realized that she was in control. The demon rested, consolidating its power. Bandric hovered over her with tears in his eyes and the most genuine look of concern she'd ever seen. She felt cloth against her naked skin and, as she forced herself to look down, she saw that he'd covered her with one of the bandit's cloaks.

Clarity returned. Her movements were leaden as she sat up, heedless of her nudity.

"The coin," she blurted. "Where is it?"

She cast about wildly, falling over on her side and then pushing herself onto her arms. Gods, her body felt so heavy. She spotted the coin on its broken chain a foot away, lying in a heap of gray ash. She scrabbled for it and held it tight, breathing with relief as she collapsed. Bandric was by her again, pulling the cloak around her, holding her to him. The blood from the dead man soaked into the cloak as she huddled beneath it.

"Are you alright?" Bandric asked and then the two of them chuckled nervously.

"I told you to go," Jalissa whispered.

"And miss my chance to be the clumsy mage who rescues the princess? What sort of ending would, 'he rode away like a coward and left her to her fate' be for a story?"

His hand found hers and held it as they sat in silence. The smell of blood and death, the reek of melted flesh hung in the air around them.

"Jalissa," he said after a time. "What are you?"

"Tired," she said. "So tired."

"Can you stand?"

"I think so."

Bandric let her go and found her clothes. He set them aside and helped her to her feet, and then to a barrel that contained rainwater. He averted his eyes as she dropped the cloak and splashed the cold water on herself, washing away the blood. When she finished, she dressed again.

"Bandric," she said, and he turned around. "Thank you."

He bowed humbly, his wispy, white hair, falling over his face.

"I left the cart nearby. We should retrieve it," he said.

"You're not going to go on your own?" she said, incredulous, "After... this?"

She looked around at the chaos, taking in the charred bodies, the burnt floor, and the piles of gray ash that had once been men.

"My lady," he said, "The seven demons themselves couldn't keep my curiosity at bay."

If she'd had the strength, she might have laughed.

***