The Soul Refiner Bk. 01 Ch. 01-03

Chapter 3

I was expecting to fall into a deep and dreamless slumber, for my next moment of awareness to be waking at some ungodly hour the next morning. Instead I floated in a gray, smothering mist. It felt as though the space around me was filled with drifting cobwebs, sticky and unnerving. Waving my hand about, I could feel it resist my movement slightly, feel the mist collecting on my skin, powdery rather than wet. The sensation irritated me, and I swung my arms in great sweeping arcs until the obscurement began to thin.

Though the odd mist retreated a little, there still was not a great deal to see. A pale sky sky above, pale ground beneath it, and no horizon in sight. The light was dim, and had no source, but I saw a few clumps of shadows around. With nothing else in view, I picked one such patch of darkness at random to walk towards. My goal had seemed fairly distant, and I had expected to walk for a few minutes at least, but within three strides I found myself stepping out onto the street of an unfamiliar city. Or at least I thought it was unfamiliar, the buildings were nothing but dark shadows. The street teemed with traffic, but all the figures were faceless, blurred and indistinct.

A flash of red caught my eye, the first spot of color I'd seen in this washed out place. I pushed through the crowd, their vague bodies falling apart at my touch. Just more fog and cobwebs. My goal turned out to be a young girl, perhaps five or six years old. Her eyes were a familiar crimson, though her hair was lighter colored, and more varied. When she shifted, it rippled with all the colors of a bonfire through its gentle waves. Finding myself in Myta's mind was a surprise, though perhaps it shouldn't have been. Our spirits were linked through the slave bond now, mana flowing freely between us. I thought perhaps this place lay somewhere between her dreams and memories. Holding past events that had shaped her, that her unconscious mind dwelled on.

Child Myta was surrounded by other shadowy children, who stood threateningly around her. They pushed and spun her about, keeping her disoriented while shouting insults in her face. As I approached, I could feel her frustrated anger, but also her resignation. Even still she tried to strike out at her attackers.

*How long will they torment me this time?*

The thought wasn't my own, and the hopeless rage in it sparked my anger. I swept my hands through her tormentors, and their bodies collapsed into gray mist. Breathing in the festering mana of her soul sickness, I sealed it up to be cleansed.

"Do you need help getting home?" I asked the child, giving her some space now that the phantoms were gone. More shadows tried to rise up around her, but I dispersed them before they could form.

"No one helps me." It wasn't a accusation, or a complaint. She sounded... confused, staring at me with a mixture of gratitude and disbelief.

"Everyone needs a little help sometimes. You deserve that as much as anyone." I wasn't sure how much my words could really reach her in this almost-a-dream state, but I projected sympathy and understanding as much as I could. We stood there for a while while she thought through that, but finally she nodded and took my hand. The scene dissolved completely as she did, leaving me in the gray mist once more.

Seeing no way out but through, I set my sights on another shadow, scars of the soul. This one showed me novice Myta, being punished by Pure priests. Teachers who set her up to fail in her classes, then praised other students for doing half as well. Once I resolved that, I moved to the next scar, and the next.

Myta in combat training, with bruises and cracked bones. Which were never fully treated by the healers.

Myta in her family home, blamed by her father for him losing a work contract.

Myta, no longer among the Pure, now a menial slave. Given the filthiest labor, and treated spitefully even by the other slaves.

Her history, her dreams, were a long grind of deliberately inflicted misery. At each step, I pushed back the shadows that tormented her, and left what words of support I could. The only real blessing, was that I never saw her mother in the visions. I didn't want to develop a hatred of Pedu's sister, it might make things awkward when I visited Kuru again next year. As it was, I felt the wear on my own soul, just from witnessing the constant stream of abuse.

At least I learned the basic arc of her life. First a childhood in a home that spent too much money on seeming more well off than it was. Her father seemed to have actively despised her. Although if there was any reason behind that, I hadn't seen it. Then, slavery to the Pure monks, including more privation and abuse. I thought they might have rather seen her die than complete that training. At least I understood that sentiment from them. The Pure Way was founded on the principle of hating those who were different, so she was never anything but a target for them. But after that the Pure monks neither used nor killed her, and that I did not understand. Instead she was sold off as a menial worker. I think the part of it that hurt me the most to watch was her hair. As a child, Myta's hair shone and flickered like a living flame, but its color died as her spirit waned.

I dispersed perhaps a score of these scars, and after each one I could see a little farther across the gray plain. Finally, after helping child Myta recover her new doll from a sewage gutter, I found something new. Instead of another simple patch of shadow, I saw an angry red glow, the sickening color of an old scab. I headed toward it, and this time my destination seemed to push me away. Though the gray plain gave no real landmarks, I could feel myself sliding backwards with each step I took. Like trying to push a heavy stone, while standing on a sheet of ice. My focus narrowed as I willed myself forward, until I could see nothing but my goal.

*I'm worthless, even for this.*

Self loathing and despair hit me, alongside the thought, and abruptly I was within a new scene. This one was vastly more solid and detailed. Not an old scar for her, but a raw wound. Myta was in a richly appointed bedroom, seated upon an elegant chair. Her body was the healthiest I'd seen it, lean and toned from her training with the monks. And for once she was uninjured. I judged her to be in her late teens, perhaps early twenties, and the ritual scars that marked her forearms were fairly fresh. No more than a year old at most.

Clad in a silken nightgown, she also sported a thin silver collar around her neck. It was an affectation, collars on the spirit bound served no practical purpose. They were used only as ornamentation, to highlight the wearer's status as property. That, combined with the large and lushly appointed bed, told me clearly that this was a brothel. A maid, or more likely a caretaker, brushed out the spirit touched's hair. Said hair was now longer, and well tended, but its color was nearly the most subdued I'd yet seen it within the visions.

"It's easy work. They may be a bit rough with you, but compared to what you've been through that'll be nothing. Men come here when they want to take charge, so it's simple enough. Just do what they say." The caretaker spoke brusquely, but not unkindly. And her hands were careful as she ran the brush through Myta's locks.

*I haven't had my hair tended like this since I was a girl.*

The thought came to me tinged with nostalgic longing, and then the scene seemed to blur. I felt the passage of time, highlighted only with a sense of anxious anticipation. When things settled again, my companion was standing before the door. Waiting, with her hands folded demurely in front of her. She remained relaxed, even as the door was flung violently open, a very large man barreling into the room. Well, 'man' was perhaps a generous descriptor. Though tall and broad, this boy had a soft face that hadn't yet known hardship, graced with a malicious grin. That grin morphed into a snarl as he saw Myta standing calmly. Apparently he'd thought to provoke more of a reaction.

"How may I serve you my lord?" Her quiet words came as the man moved close to her, his bulk overshadowing her. Apparently her calm demeanor was some kind of assault on his fragile pride. He raised his hand to strike her, which is when I grabbed his wrist. I was not a large man, but despite his bulk I expected this phantom to crumble like the others at my touch. Instead, I felt the vision twist, and suddenly I was in the place of the brute, my hand raise to strike.

*He struck her across the face, knocking her to the ground. The bond sapped her strength, but her surprise was what undid her. As he grabbed her by the hair and dragged get to her knees, she was consumed by disappointment and confusion.*

"On your knees," I snapped at her, while shedding my tunic and breeches. I felt the vision stretch, as I acted outside Myta's expectations. It was a balancing act, as I needed to push these boundaries as far as I could without disrupting the scene entirely. When I finished disrobing, I stepped into the redhead's space again, my quickly hardening member sitting just above her current eye level. She had fallen to her knees almost violently, torn between my instruction and her more brutal memory. As part of the memory now, I could more clearly feel my expected part in it.

*The brute grabbed the ends of her hair, painfully dragging her face to his crotch. With no preamble, he tried to force his half erect member into her mouth. Unsure and disoriented, her mouth opened only a little, her teeth scraping his manhood. When he cursed and thrust to the back of her throat, the intrusion made her gag violently. Only through sheer force of will did she keep from biting down any harder.*

Wrapping one meaty hand around the back of her neck, I slid my fingers into Myta's hair, then clenched my hand into a fist. Her blood red locks tangled around my fingers, pulling taut against her scalp. The perfect grip to control the motion of her head. I pressed her face against my shaft, which smelled of my own musk and soap, rather than the unwashed fetor of the phantom.

"Use your tongue and lips to stroke my cock. Make sure I'm nice and wet while you do. And on no account apply your teeth." Myta stared at my shaft with fear. Some echo of the brute's rancid manhood attempting to surface in her mind. But I pushed those memories back, pulling her lips toward me. Grounding her in my version of events. Tentatively, her dark gray lips parted, the tip of her light pink tongue darting out to flick at my head. She caught a drop of my fluid, already beading up in anticipation, and made a noise of soft surprise.

Seeming to find the taste to her liking, she extended her tongue more confidently, licking along the underside of my shaft. As she did so, I shared my sensations with her. When the soft, silken wetness pressed against me, she shuddered. When her tongue passed the edge of my rapidly retreating foreskin, the feel of her touch against the sensitive skin of my head drew a moan from her, alongside my own grunt of pleasure.

Glancing to me for permission, she raised one hand to grip the base of my shaft. Rising to full hardness, it wanted to point nearly straight up, lying flat against my belly. It was at this point I realized the phantom's body had warped to much more closely match my own. But the vision was still intact, so I found it difficult to care as the touched woman angled my cock down toward her face. Her hands were dexterous, with long fingers. Slender and agile, their delicate appearance belied their strength. I could feel the hard callouses of a fighter, softened by some treatment of skin cream or oil. The contrast was remarkably arousing as she squeezed me firmly. My own senses allowing her the perfect, snug grip to stimulate my lower shaft. When I was situated to her liking she set to work.

What she lacked in experience, Myta made up for in diligence, and a methodical approach to learning. Having the positive feedback from my sensations made her eager, as well. First she lapped at the tip of my cock, then swirled her tongue around it, and then caressed it with her moistened lips. Each time she found a particularly pleasurable spot or motion she would test it a few times, then move on to something else for awhile, only to come back again later. Working back from the head, she stroked my shaft with her tongue, and nibbled at it with her lips. Without my prompting, but again glancing at me for permission, she brought her hands more actively into play. Using a combination of her saliva and my own fluids, she began to stroke my shaft, even as she brought her mouth back to the head.

Tentatively, she slid her lips over me in a tight ring, then pushed forward until they rested just behind the ridge where my foreskin had fully withdrawn to. She swirled her tongue around my tip, then lapped at it, and finally sucked gently. Nursing at my cock like a babe at a teat, squeezing my length gently with her hands in rhythm with each pull of her mouth. Only minutes of this treatment had me spending my seed into her mouth. She shuddered, mewling around my flesh as she shared in a measure of my climax.

*Enraged, and in pain, the man dragged her onto the bed, striking her again. He ripped off her silken gown, apparently intent on taking her, violently. But, between the pain of his bitten shaft and his otherwise lacking constitution, he was unable to rise to the occasion. Instead, he settled for beating her. The blows were nothing compared to what she had endured in her martial training. The shame of being unable to complete this supposedly simple task hurt her far more.*

I had already pushed this vision farther than expected. And seeing the brutal incompetence with which some spoiled merchant's son had treated Myta, I decided to press my luck. I drew her to her feet, before untangling my fingers from her hair. In the wake of my climax, my own form had completely supplanted that of the phantom, and she now stood slightly taller than me. With deft motions I opened her robe, then drew it from her body, deliberately stroking her skin with the silk as I did so. When she was exposed, I neatly folded the robe, and set it aside, examining her form as I did so.

In keeping with her hands, the touched woman's whole body was lean, graceful, and strong. Her muscles were smooth and toned, practically radiating athleticism, and her nervous tremors could not disrupt her physical poise. A thin sheen of sweat caused her pale gray skin to glow, and it flushed in places to a slightly darker tone. A flush that became more pronounced as I silently admired her. In addition to the ritual scars in her forearms, her skin was marked in many places. Some were thin white lines that denoted the cuts of a sharp blade, others were ragged and raised, shading to charcoal rather than white. A tapestry of burns and lashes, bite wounds and claw marks. I felt my heart ache at the pain written on her skin.

"How may I please you, master?" Her voice was tentative, but hoarse with desire. It had a husky quality to it that sent a thrill up my spine. Rather than respond immediately, I stepped in close to her. Cupping her cheek with my left hand, I ran my thumb across her lips. Then I trailed the fingertips of my right hand up her inner thigh.

"Try to stay on your feet, and hold onto me as you need to." Not giving her time to respond, I pulled her into a kiss, soft but insistent. My lips capturing, and then parting hers. My fingers slipped between her thighs, their passage eased by the wetness I found there. Her legs rubbed together around my hand, and when it finally reached her sex she gasped. I took the opportunity to slip my tongue into her mouth, twining with hers in a playful dance. As if her spiritual affinity wasn't obvious enough, Myta tasted like fire. Her mouth was sweet and smoky, but also held that clean flavor that came from breathing near an open flame.

My fingers carefully parted her lower lips, which were already soaked with her arousal. Sharing in my sensations had more than primed her. When I grazed her pearl with a single stroking finger she almost fell. Grabbing my shoulders for support, she made an almost plaintive moan into my mouth. She was already so close that I'd barely caressed her for a minute before her climax hit. Hands clenching on me, her body writhed against mine. I was a little regretful, to be honest. As responsive as she was, I should have drawn out this joining. It could have been far more intense, and satisfying, for the both of us.

I had no more time now, however. As Myta reached her peak, the vision dissolved from around me. Poisoned mana flooded my spirit, while the last of my newly replenished reserves drained away. Once again my soul strained under the burden, but I fell immediately into a true and dreamless sleep.