Tributes to the Dark Elves Pt. 02

Another Autumn had come to pass, the fertile fields nearing harvest time.

The human towns of the duchy were tense, for another group of dark elves would be visiting them below the surface for tribute, the price of peace.

Already singing could be heard from the cave exit as a trail of happy, cute, beautiful young dark elves, all female to a fault (and ever since two centuries) kept marching semi-orderly, bringing a caravan full of cages, armed to the teeth to exact their tribute from the human duchy submitting to them above.

Human tribute. They had come to collect slaves.

More white-haired, black-skinned dark elves, those monster women, beautiful, ebon-skinned, white-haired elves would come out to the surface, choosing some of the healthiest, most attractive sons and hardworking daughters and picking them away from their families to slavery, taking them to be sold to their underground cities. For most, it was a sad separation with a distant hope of returning depending on the Dark Elf Queen's mercy and hard work. For some, it was a dark desire come true, particularly for young and eager men who were enamored by the exotic dark-elven beauty, particularly young men in poverty who could have the quiet pride of fathering children, even non-human children in well-off families: dark elves would love (at least treat decently) the fathers of their children as husbands (as long as they knew their place). For others (particularly the poorest and smart- and mostly female humans), it was just an opportunity to become something else in a society where the race barrier was less abrasive than a human feudal structure bordering on a caste system; therefore, talented, healthy peasant girls with low pride were the prized merchandise to work below the earth, feet shackled and naked at worst, dressed in soft, revealing clothes at best: on top of that, all slaves had magical healthcare beyond the primitive human methods of the duchy.

And it was an unspoken truth that the demon energy of monstergirls made humans around them live longer and age slower...

More than a few poor families with talented, intelligent, and skilled children who could calculate and work smart gave them up, hoping in time their mistresses would allow them to buy freedom and return with education and money from the dark elves' underground metropolis. Their dark queen, as dark and domineering species as she belonged to, technically allowed it.

Such was fate when the small human duchy was situated away from other human lands, unable to protect itself from monstergirl raiders around it, as well as the detritus of the Third Demon War: Shadow demons, whose touch corrupted all human flesh and left monstergirls intact(of course, a shadow demon would still kill and eat said monstergirl, but mamono can fight back without permanent injuries.)

At least she had enough mercy to set up rules against picking too many at once. One boy and girl each in every fortieth household per year would suffice. The girls would toil as slaves in the dark elves' undercities in a variety of jobs, and the boys would be the consorts of a species that needed the humans they once detested.

To many, it would sound ironic that the dark elves' survival depended on the humans just as well.

*-*-*-*

TWO DAYS AGO:

The palace of the Dark Elven Queen was situated amid the circular metropolis designed with an obsessive need for order and control, hewn from obsidian, and basalt and reinforced with purple-and-black bricks iconic of dark elves. Below the palace, dark-elven citizens went about their business with their slaves in tow. Those accompanying the beautiful, sinister dark elves on leashes were mostly human and female. Traditionally, men belonged to the dark elven bedroom and kitchen, tending to their children during the day. Those slave girls were often busy following their owners on leashes as porters, or as secretaries taking notes, and reminding them of daily schedules. Seniority could be seen from their faces: red and shy if they were new, docile and neutral if experienced. Dark elves kept their human slaves naked in public to teach them vulnerability and helplessness, as well as breaking them of their notions of prudishness for nudity was nothing to be ashamed of. Senior slaves could be recognized by their casual approach to nudity after wearing nothing for years, working and happily chatting with their mistresses while carrying their items wearing only a backpack at most, and being gifted small articles of clothing such as skirts, loincloths, and vests.

Inside the palace, the court had assembled for the monthly decisions in the throne room, more naked human women continuously cleaning the palace floors and furniture, wearing only slave collars and shackles on their feet, seen but not heard.

The throne room was a wonder of engineering and architecture, with one door leading inside, a single block of obsidian inlaid with gold linings. Flanking the door were four armored dark-elven women with spears, whose plate mails and armament were more an erotic artwork than for protection, looking like silvery thongs hiding almost nothing.

Relaxing on her throne with two naked human women at her side with their hands clasped before them in servitude, the dark-elven queen, now pregnant again, listened to her advisors as they presented their pre-Tribute reports. Her feet were being rubbed and washed by another human slave girl in a ceramic basin with hot water: pregnancy had its burdens on the body. Yet the queen had to serve her people just as the humans served her race, for leadership came with its counter duties to the subjects...

The first report came from a bespectacled, bookish dark elf with a naked, bald, black-skinned human slave girl behind her, holding her papers and folders in her arms.

"Majordomo Thaalvi, speak." The pregnant dark-elven queen smiled kindly. The nameless slave girl, head bowed, handed the first folder to the majordomo.

"Your Grace," Thaalvi began, kissing her girl's bald head as thanks. "Our yearly treasury..."

*-*-*-*

The dreary task of ruling the kingdom was paused when Melasa dismissed the council with a wave of her hand for half an hour.

The queen was a bit soft at heart, something she didn't dare confide in others. She did not want her people to focus on an outdated, necessary evil for gathering human men. Tearing children away from their families to support her people's hunger for servants, slave labor, exotic luxuries (rubber-coated human girls made into living furniture was an expensive luxury) and sex was not a pleasant thing to think of. When alone, she felt often uneasy, even slightly guilty when she heard some human mothers wept: humans, as lowly as they were, had feelings too.

Still...

Superior beings used the lower beings as servants and cattle, it was the unspoken law of the world. The best thing she could do was outlaw abuse and permanent maiming, ensuring the human slaves were fed well, housed, and taken care of.

Perhaps in the future, arrangements could be made with the human empire. Migration with indentured servitude in return for open sexuality, healthcare, and free housing was one idea... Perhaps spies could seduce lonely, underachieving men in Lescatian society and snatch them, as well as any "un-feminine" tomboys, outcasts, lewd submissives, and single women for a society that doesn't care how they act and whom they love as long as they work.

"The tax-free sale of human men as sex slaves to single dark elf citizens has been a boon, allowing us to recoup what we pay our citizens and much more from private merchants. Years of conservation also paid off: the first captive-born generation of our pale cousins, High Elves, matured, and on their eighteenth birthday; the slave schools' graduates were sent en masse to Schwarzelfstadt, the surface. Every year we expect to export High Elf slave girls everywhere to replenish their numbers and a past wrong corrected. Lescatie buys and frees them, settling them in their lands and forests. Other smaller kingdoms also buy and free, or marry them. The slaves are happy to give birth and be pampered, we export High Elf mothers together with their children if they want it. However, this has murdered our food production: we are now a net importer, though this shouldn't be an issue as our surface citizens' slave farms report record harvests, so we can import as much as we want. Our mushroom caves and fisheries just won't do."

Thaalvi flipped to the next page.

"Our dwarven slave workforce also increased in number, though pregnant slaves drive down our digging efforts, as we cannot force them to use contraceptives all the time. We need to expand creches for new slave children born in captivity, dwarves, High Elf, or humans. Or we can sell slaves that aren't worth keeping, human charity Fraterni Caritas is willing to repatriate some taken humans whose families can pay."

"Assign educational zoning to reclaimed caverns immediately, and tell the human Fraterni to send a representative, as well as our dear Dwarven queen. I remember we harvested quite capable slave girls in infrastructure construction, they had restored most of the roads on the surface, correct?"

"Yes," Thaalvi nodded. "A selfless slave girl of some importance, Laura, or Lora, directed her slave battalion quite well. I think she was taken from a small town."

The queen replied with satisfaction. "Assign her and her slave builders, give her freedom and citizenship at the end of a five-year grace period, and a generous house to discourage return. Do not force her to stay: We can try to be kind and generous to hard-working humans." Then she munched on a peach before continuing. "And you shall prepare long-term plans for a High Elf reservation. It will be built in a forest, where the white elves will be left unmolested, not even by us."

The advisors and courtiers nodded along to her benevolence.

"Anything else?"

"So far our Coliseum's gladiatorial matches, male brothels, and free bread handouts keep the overcrowded citizenry satisfied. Additional steps will have to be taken to settle the surface, however." Thaalvi smiled. "Rents are too damn high, as some citizens grumble. Nothing else to report other than the rent starting to take more than a monthly wage. Our people are not averse to living together and falling in love with each other, but we are Svartalf: we need our space."

Everyone giggled.

"Next!"

The Marshal Quan'vri stepped forward as Thaalvi and her slave girl left. The dark elf was clad in an armored bikini, her muscular, short, stacked stature eliciting jokes that she might have had a dwarven futanari mother. The shortest dark elf to date, she was as muscular as a dwarf, and favored a twin-bladed battleax as her iconic weapon.

"Your Grace," She began, bowing. "The Cheldrai Combat Academy has a record rate of graduation, and we have more idle soldiers than ever. Though we cannot risk war, I must suggest using the soldiers in fortification projects to boost employment and raid small towns and villages for slaves without pulling too much aggression from Lescatie.

The queen held her chin, contemplating.

"No." She shook her head. Allow soldiers to compete in gladiatorial matches for glory, and male slaves and increase the escorts in Tribute parties. I will allow these soldiers to let themselves into the human families, or alternate lifestyles on the surface, but NOT Cheldrai. We have enough hands underground doing slave work. And the last thing we need is a war now, relations being icy with the human empire as it is."

Everyone knew what she meant. Tributes' empty houses could be seized, or the tribute collecting Svartalf could simply sell themselves into slavery to experience the other side of the chains, but only approved if it meant spreading the population into the surface, and the money sent to support their families. A queen who sold her population as slaves for her treasury would not sit well.

The Marshal was not too pleased, yet curtsied and turned to leave. "With your permission, Your Grace."

One by one, ministers, advisors, and diplomats stated their cases, the most interesting one being the dwarven diplomat, an overweight dwarven female with rich, thick braids, and a bespectacled face, wearing thick robes. She had pleaded with the queen for the return of some of the dwarven slaves citing dwarven mothers missing their taken daughters. The queen, heavy with pregnancy, touched by maternity and a soft heart, struck a compromise to circulate some of the younger dwarven women home in return for rare minerals and a few volunteer dwarf women to replace the workforce.

When all was said and done, it was time for her to order the Human Tributes. Summoning an up-and-coming young Svartalf, she handed out her sealed order to the kneeling girl to allow the next Tribute Harvest.

Bowing her head, the soldier received the order and turned to leave the stuffy city of Cheldrai, to muster her underlings for the surface.

When the daily grievances, arbitrations, and decisions were made, the queen dismissed everyone with a wave of her hand, leaning back and handing her crown to her eldest slave girl, a stoic white-skinned, blonde high elf woman to lock it away. The high elf was, like her kin, always nude in the presence of the superior Svartalvar, but her neck was adorned with a true art of work, a golden collar with four rubies large as eggs distributed evenly, the chainlink made of meteoric adamantine; her nipples were pierced and chained together with a length of silver, and her left buttock was tattooed the dark elf banner with gold, Tyrian purple and silver ink. Like her queen, she was pregnant: it was her duty to replenish the high elf population being conserved by her owners as an endangered species.

"My feet are killing me..." She groaned, instructing her flanking human slaves to rub her shoulders. "Girls, after we are done, take the day off in my harem. Pick a boy, or girl, whatever you fancy."

Giggling, the girls were seen running like rabbits at the end of the day.

The Queen's tribute caravan started another trek to harvest the humans above, rattling chains loaded into carts that would soon be full of young, attractive human girls and boys.

*-*-*-*

SSINRIG OUTPOST:

The outpost had weathered ages of war and natural disasters, ever so vibrant in the face of adversity, now reborn and rebuilt. With new tributes coming from the surface, they could now spare the slave labor to rebuild the buildings and refurnish them well enough, so even the human slaves had decent beds to sleep in, have sex, and socialize off-duty. The simple stockade serving as the temporary slave market had also been expanded with new cages, restraints, and even erotic bondage gear to display slaves in more erotic poses and store them in greater numbers. The tribute party from the underground passed by cages full of slaves in erotic displays: several dark elven girls falling into debt or misfortune were cuffed to X-shaped wooden frames for inspection and purchase, and a few human women sat half-asleep in cages, regarding the dark elves with curiosity and interest. A few surface dark elves were shopping for slaves, politely greeting the Tribute party, two rich Svartalvar in fur robes were arguing over the price of a pale High Elven girl, kneeling before them with her wrists and ankles chained to the floor. The slave trading matron had become also richer, sporting even more jewelry and even having a secretary slave, a bald-shaved black-skinned southern human girl with glasses next to her assisting with the sales, clad in a silvery thong loincloth with a big ledger chained to her right wrist.

"We can accommodate if you can pay." The dark elven Lieutenant overheard the slave trader matron talk with a human adventurer, a young man. "Would you like a dark-elven slave girl? Or a human?" She chuckled when she caught the young man staring in deep desire at a homely, muscular orcish woman chained to a pole, who looked back in confusion, with a blush spreading on her cheeks. The she-orc wasn't much to look at but her demeanor had made the young man's scruples disappear and his heart pound.

"I don't judge, young man." The matron put a hand on his shoulder. "Some men like big. Let's talk price inside, or perhaps, you can sample her in bed? I heard orc girls are savage yet caring lovers."

The bakery had also grown in size, the overweight succubus baker woman presiding over entire trays of pastries and foods, wearing only an apron that barely covered her fat, flour-caked breasts. Around her, sweat-covered slave girls labored endlessly, a short-haired, red-headed tomboy carrying bundles of firewood in her arms to the bakery, the tribute party catching a glimpse of her sweaty pussy hair as her hips swayed, right asscheek tattooed with the bakery's initials.

As there was no wind, the milling was done by a slave wheel with a bored-looking dark elf presiding over it with a whip, each beam pushed by a strong human woman or an orcish slave girl, wrists and ankles chained to prevent escape. A few of the mill slaves had very mild whiplashes on their backs which healed quickly: the dark elves would only hit just to give mild shocks of pleasure rather than pain to motivate them. Abuse would only be counterproductive.

The usual marketplace had also increased in diversity. All sorts of monstergirls were invited to visit: goblin and kitsune trader women hawking their goods to anyone who paid the price: even reluctant, unscrupulous, or uneasy human visitors who were permitted to come in, provided they did not interfere with the sight of their race being used as slaves in the outpost. Some human witches even bought a few women as bondage slaves dedicated to channel mana as they cast spells of extraordinary potency and the slave trader matron was allowed to sell mamono, dark elves or otherwise, to human men who needed submissive wives. To the dark elves, money had no racial prejudice, only worth the pleasure it brought to everyone who could afford it.

The tribute parties were, as usual, scheduled to arrive every day for a week, seven parties for seven areas inside the duchy to initiate speedy collection.

The Dark Elven Lieutenant was relaxing with her party at the tavern: a gaggle of forty dark elves, with a glass of wine at her side. She read the sealed order: the rules had changed. Ignoring the music and the laughter of the younger dark elves with the human slaves and waitresses, she read the paper, untying her long, white mane of hair and letting it flow behind her:

The Lieutenant had to take more human boys and girls than last year, but now had a small fund allocated to pay more to reluctant families. Even more shocking, the queen had added that some of her personnel could be traded to surface slave traders or given to human families as maids or adoptive daughters. The queen had, simply put, given her authority to sell her underlings if she wanted(as long as it didn't threaten the mission), each girl was well informed of the possibility: the Lieutenant had to get out as many dark elves to the surface as possible while filling the void with more slaves to make the lives of the Cheldrai citizenry easier. An addendum was added to the end of the orders to encourage the younger dark elves to couple and marry surfacer human boys to settle in towns.

"Sow our seeds to the surface, Lieutenant Shalasi; I have complete trust in your skills."

The queen had signed with her beautiful script and pressed her spidery emblem at the end of the letter.

Shrugging, she rolled the paper and put it in her boot, standing up and beckoning to a young naked man bringing wine to the customers, wearing a slave collar. He looked fine enough, at least the wine she had imbibed for the night was suggesting, warming her loins.