The Wicked Tower Pt. 06

"A box, mistress?" Merope dared not look up at those steely blue eyes, but she also could not meet her husband's gaze either. She hoped very much that her rosy cheeks were not betraying her shame to all those in the room. She wanted desperately to run from this woman, but she did not move. And, even worse, a wetness gathered between her legs. She desperately hoped that her poor Nicias suspected nothing. "I must finish these dishes."

"My box takes precedence, I'm afraid." Brynhild's face was tight with anticipation.

"Maybe I can help you with your box." Nicias moved between the women. He did not like the interest the sorceress had taken in his wife ever since Merope had forgotten the dishes. Was the giantess punishing Merope in secret? His wife had been taciturn the last few days.

A sardonic grin crossed Brynhild's tight lips. "Thank you, gentle Nicias. But I require your wife's skills." She turned and walked out of the scullery, without looking back. "Now come, Merope."

"Yes, mistress." Merope finally met her husband's gaze. She could see he meant to put himself between them again. "Shh, it's fine, Nicias." She patted his shoulder. "She has shown me kindness. I will be back with you at work in no time." She tried very hard to smile for him, and followed the tall woman out.

"See you soon, my love," Nicias called after her. His wife gave him one quick, reassuring look over her shoulder and was gone.

Out in the hall, Merope hurried after the sorceress. She found it hard to keep up with the woman's long strides. She watched Brynhild's rump sway under a long skirt that swept down to the stone floor. Had she really experienced such pleasures while grasping that butt with her own two hands? That memory seemed to be from someone else's life.

"We are far enough away, and the climb back to my chamber is too long a wait." Brynhild turned, took the woman's wrist with her left hand. She nearly pulled the woman off her feet in her urgency. They were in the long curving corridor that connected the temples. They turned and entered Venus's sanctum. The circular room was small, with the bountiful goddess standing in statue form in the middle, offering her large breasts to her followers. There was no door, but that did not matter. People rarely visited the temples. "This will do."

"The box ... is in here?" Merope found it hard to think. Brynhild's heat spread through her grip on her wrist, and moved into Merope's core. She found herself pushed to her knees, then somehow, she was under Brynhild's skirts. The smell of excitement from the sorceress was a powerful indication of what the woman expected of her. Tentatively, Merope reached up and felt the downy tuft of hair above Brynhild's vagina. There was no underwear between Merope's hand and the woman's secrets. Hating herself for the lack of doubt in her mind, Merope crouched on her feet for her tongue could not reach its destination while on her knees.

"There now, my little marsh flower. Drink what I offer you. Yeeeeesssssssss." Brynhild nearly lost her balance when that hungry mouth fastened itself to her pussy. She reached out and put her hand on Venus's cold, stone breast to steady herself. She looked down, but only the faintest outline of Merope's bobbing head could be seen under her skirts. "You have found the box that so needed your skills. Wash it ... yesssssss ... delve it ... I'm going to ..." Brynhild shuddered out her first orgasm standing in the sanctum. As she tried to control her cries, the sorceress knew that it would be just the first of many climaxes that day.

Merope reached up to those wide, round butt cheeks and squeezed them hard as she worked the tall woman's button. She felt that she might climax herself just from giving the sorceress such pleasure. Her whole world had turned upside down.

~~

The morning wore on and still Merope did not return to the scullery. Nicias tried to make explanations that did not involve some secret torment for his sweet wife. But after more than an hour, he could not continue with his duties. He had to rescue her. "I'll be back in a little while."

The other servants eyed each other, nervously. One was not supposed to break this early in the day, but they knew he worried over Merope. They said nothing as he left.

Nicias went straight to Brynhild's chamber, but found no sound from within and no answer to his knocks. He then doubled back and went down to the main floor. After a while, he stopped in the corridor outside the temples. A mewling sound greeted his ears. After a minute's investigation, he found that was coming from Venus's sanctum. He entered and stopped, wide eyed. There was the sorceress, holding the bust of Venus. Her face was clearly contorted in some sort of religious ecstasy. "Oh ... um ... forgive my intrusion."

Merope froze. She now had two fingers in the other woman's clenching vagina, and her tongue stopped as it was mid-lick on her button. She was hidden under the skirts, but recognized her husband's gentle voice. Her heart threatened to beat out of her chest.

"Ah, Nicias. You have caught me giving my devotion to Venus." Brynhild composed herself a bit. It helped that the wife had stopped her ministrations. She made a show of squeezing the stone breast she held.

"I ... uh ... I ... thought you worshiped the Northern gods." Nicias felt like he had intruded on a very intimate moment, and wanted nothing more than to quickly exit. But he had to ask about his wife.

"I find my pantheon to be open and accommodating." At these words she rocked her hips a little, trying to spur Merope back into action.

Merope could feel the pussy clenching around the fingers of her right hand and Brynhild's hips wiggling. She still held the right butt cheek with her left hand, and felt it clench under her grip. She knew the woman wanted her to continue even as she spoke to poor Nicias. How depraved did she think Merope was?

"Oh ... I see." Nicias could see the woman's curvaceous body writhe a bit, in what he assumed was her continued religious fervor. He needed to leave. "Have you ... um ... seen my wife?

"Maybe your wife is nearby. Would you like to see her?" Brynhild glanced around the room as if searching for someone.

"I ... um ... don't see her." Nicias did not understand the woman. There was nowhere in that small space for a grown woman to hide.

Merope understanding the threat, pumped her fingers again. She tried to do this gently, for she did not want her husband to hear the squelching sounds she made. She pursed her lips and sucked on the button before her.

Brynhild laughed. "Of course, I jest. I sent her on some errands about the castle. She's probably already returned to the scullery."

"Oh ... okay." Nicias backed toward the exit. The woman's hips were now rocking quite rhythmically, like a dance. "I am sorry to have disturbed you, mistress." He turned and left.

"I am not disturbed, Nicias." She called after him. When he was gone, she whispered down to her skirts. "Very good, little one. Now ... ah ... finish me off. Yeeeesssssssss." And she climaxed again.

Before sending Merope back to her tasks in the scullery, Brynhild pulled the young wife from her hiding place. She lifted her up, swung Merope's legs over her shoulders, and tucked her head under Merope's stola. As she ate out the servant, and listened to the woman's frenzied whining, she thought that perhaps she was not so well hidden as Merope had been. But she knew Nicias would not return. It was almost midday by the time she patted Merope's butt, advised her to wash her face, and sent her on her way.

~~

The morning after she had spent such a wonderful time in the tower with her brother, Naevia woke up before sunrise and settled herself just out of sight from her cousin's room. She did not wake Vel for fear that she might get waylaid in his room. Naevia wore a stola, with a bow and quiver slung over her shoulder. She could not imagine that Dellia would do her harm, but if her father was worried, she figured she might as well be cautious.

Just as the first rays of daylight fell into the hall, Naevia heard Dellia's door open. She peered around and watched the young woman march with purpose away from her down the hall. Naevia followed, sticking to the shadows.

They traversed the viscount's castle, and Dellia slipped into the aviary. Naevia sneaked to a nearby balcony so that she could watch her cousin through the glassless windows of the aviary. Dellia wore her battle tunic, and even from a distance Naevia could hear her sword jangling at her side. Naevia watched her spend time at her pigeon cage and then approach the window. Naevia removed her bow and notched an arrow.

It all happened quite fast. Dellia strode to the window, tossed the bird outside, and turned back to the door. Naevia let the arrow fly just as her cousin's back turned itself to the outgoing message. The poor pigeon exploded in a puff of feathers and fell with the arrow to the rocky outcrop below. Naevia glanced at her cousin but Dellia was already leaving the aviary. She hadn't seen what befell her messenger.

Heart thumping in her chest, Naevia waited a good long while before leaving the balcony. She crept through the castle, telling herself over and over that the message's contents would be banal and benign. She prayed it was so. She exited the castle, crossed the north lawn, and found the dead pigeon and her arrow on the rocks where they'd fallen. She retrieved her arrow, tossed the pigeon into a nearby wood, and tucked the still sealed scroll into her stola pocket. Now it was time to wake her brother. She hurried back into the castle.

~~

Birds sang in the trees of the courtyard. The portcullis rose as Cassia stood waiting with her retinue. She wore a gold circlet in her hair, and her stola was interwoven with glittering silver thread in floral designs. "Smiles everyone." She reached up and patted Bantia's shoulder. They could hear the horse hooves approach. This was the day Lord Hostus Gala's family would formally propose marriage to the Tullius clan.

A horn sounded. Cassia's smile left her like smoke on the wind. That was not the sound of the Gala family. That was the royal horn. It was supposed to be reserved for the princess in waiting. But, as a column of horsemen entered the courtyard pulling the royal carriage, Cassia could see that it was now used by the queens regent. This was the royal guard. Beside her she felt the sorceress's stance shift uneasily. Bantia reached for her mother's hand and squeezed it tight.

The carriage pulled around the courtyard and stopped in front of Cassia. The duchess stood a bit straighter. She could see another carriage rumble through the gate. The banner waving from it was the gull on a blue field. The Gala sigil. Why had the Gala's not told her the queens were with them?

Guards descended from their positions about the carriage and opened the door. First, the consort regent, Tiberius, exited. He smiled at Cassia and held his hand out for his wife. Queen Valeria took his hand and stepped out of the carriage. She held her free hand behind her, and Queen Cesphea followed her out. Cesphea had never married, so the carriage had no more passengers.

"Welcome, Your Majesties." Cassia curtsied low and Bantia followed suit. To her right, Brynhild paused for a fraction of a second, and then curtsied, too. "It is an honor and a blessing to have you with us." She stayed in her curtsey, eyes on the neatly trimmed grass below her.

"Rise, Duchess." Valeria held up her hand in a magnanimous boon to all present. "The gods bestow their love and charity on you. Now rise."

"To what do we owe this glorious pleasure?" Cassia looked on the perfect, pale faces of the queens.

A guard handed Valeria her scepter with the goddess Salacia sculpted out of patinaed copper. "We are here for the blessed joining of two of the kingdom's most storied houses." She looked around with a faint smirk and raised eyebrow. "But where is the duke? Could he not greet us?"

"I apologize, Your Majesty. My son is across the sea negotiating a trade compact." Cassia bowed her head.

"Well, it is good that he is working hard for Ostia Novus. We would not want him running hither and tither on personal errands so soon into his ducal duties," Cesphea said. "Come then, let us help you celebrate this momentous day." The queens and consort walked past Cassia into the front hall.

Cassia glanced at her daughter whose olive complexion suddenly looked quite wan. "Welcome the Gala family and your husband-to-be. I will attend to the queens." She watched her daughter nod and rush off to the second carriage. Then, Cassia turned, cursed herself under her breath, and headed into the main hall to welcome this new intrusion into her home.