You May Now Cuff The Warlock

You May Now Cuff The Warlock

I cannot tell you how excited I had been for this day.

There he was, the man I'd been trying to get my hands on for years. Standing right in front of me at the altar, wearing a cute black suit and that trademark silk neckerchief of his, with the floral pattern.

Not especially tall, that boy, a bit on the skinny side, too. He was wearing little epaulettes to make his shoulders look wider. But for me, he was a sight for sore eyes.

There was that cocky smile I had seen so many times before. He made an effort to maintain an upright, dignified posture, and stand perfectly still, but if you looked for the signs, you could tell how giddy he was. The little twitch in his fingers. How he shifted his weight. How he occasionally reached up, to push a strand of his perfect, almost shoulder-long, silky black hair out of his face. He was like a tightly packed coil, ready to launch back into his high-energy self. He, too, was so eager for the prize he'd been yearning for. Devouring me with his eyes.

The high priestess finished her sermon. "Do you, Sir Cutlass of the West, take Lady Kolakia as your lawfully wedded wife, under the light of our Mother Goddess shining upon you today?"

"Yes, I do," he said with a radiant smile. The sort of smile to make a bride feel like she was a chocolate bunny, melting into a puddle.

-"And do you, Lady Kolakia, take Sir Cutlass of the West as your lawfully wedded husband, under the light of our Mother Goddess shining upon you today?"

"Yes, I do," I said, very nearly exploding with anticipation.

Now it was time for the rings. He reached out, and delicately slipped the golden ring upon my finger. His hands so firm, yet gentle. So confident, too. As if he had already done this a thousand times.

Which, of course, he had.

Time for MY rings.

I unceremoniously put the golden ring on him, but firmly held on to his hands. No getting away, now!

For the first time, there was something like doubt on his face. Something was off...

But of course by now it was too late for him. It all happened way too fast.

"You may now cuff the groom," the priestess gushed, unable to repress a big, toothy grin of her own.

I put the handcuffs on the poor, startled boy, and triumphantly lifted the veil from my face.

The look in his eyes, and the loud gasp, were priceless. "YOU!" he cried. "Sergeant Thornwell? But... No... This is impossible..."

He tried to remove the handcuffs with magic, though he had to know it was a pure formality. Sergeant Thornwell, catcher of dark sorcerers extraordinaire, would not be so stupid as to forget to bring magic-repressing gear!

"Sir Cutlass of the West," I said, keeping my voice as steady and formal as possible. "And all the other names you go by. I, Sister-Sergeant Tori Thornwell of the Lawful Order Of The Goddess, heir to the house Kolakia, are hereby placing you under arrest. You have the right to remain silent."

By then, however, I could no longer contain myself. "As for ME, I don't wanna...!"

I let out a primordial scream of triumph, and all over the temple, my disguised sisters were rising up amongst the very confused rest of the congregation, cheering, hollering, clapping.

"WE GOT HIM, GIRLS!" I cried out.

I started doing an irreverent, unsightly, entirely undignified little victory dance, and many of my merry sisters joined me. I even saw some decidedly un-godly twerking.

My freshly-baked husband was absolutely floored. He actually leaned against the altar, for support. The high priestess, cackling as hard as the rest of us, playfully ruffled his hair. "Wow! Keeping a straight face was the hardest part!" she sang.

"Tell me about it, sister," I wheezed, my face hot. I was sweating like crazy under my beautiful, opulent wedding dress, for which the sisterhood had spared no expenses. "Holy SHIT... all of those years... All of those YEARS..."

I punched the boy on his shoulder, admiring my catch once again. Still unable to fully believe it. The poor little warlock looked so, so confused. Probably wondering if this was a nightmare he would wake up from any moment now. I had never seen that usual cocky grin wiped off his face so quickly and completely. It didn't even look like he'd ever be able to produce it again. So cute!

"How..." he finally stammered. "How is this possible...?"

I patronizingly patted him on the cheek. "Poor Cutlass. You thought you had it all figured out. Just another innocent little country princess, just another sham marriage? Little did YOU know that this time, it had been Yours Truly, all along, just having inherited that title...! Oh, but you didn't even bother to check who you were actually getting married to. Did you now? I was just a name to you, and another estate to plunder. And that's how you finally dug your own grave..."

I narrowed my eyes. "Actually, you dug your own grave years ago, when you swindled that poor South Coast girl, and murdered her family, in MY district. The first heinous crime of many. Oh, how I have longed for this day..."

He took a deep breath. He was still very pale, but the warlock's pride demanded he'd try to recover his composure. "Very well played, Sergeant. We had a good run..."

He stretched out his hand. I casually slapped it away. "Personally, I prefer the destination. For YOU, it's a cozy little cell, and the gallows. For me, it's the AFTER-WEDDING PARTY!"

My sisters hollered at this, and the first bottles of cold, sparkling wine were popped open. The first of many.

Later, I'd throw my bouquet, wishing the girl who caught it that she, too, would soon solve a case as big as this.

~~~

Despite my best efforts, I was a little hung over when I visited Sir Cutlass in his cell, the following day.

I was wearing my uniform now, and he was in his flimsy little prison gown. He was sitting on his bed, looking up at me like the trapped animal he was. He still looked a bit stunned.

But now, also angry. "Oh, and to what do I owe the unexpected honour, Lady Kolakia?" He gazed upon my clothes and scoffed. "Or should we go back to Sergeant Thornwell?"

"A little conjugal visit," I said, unable to contain a gleeful little smile. "I AM your lawfully wedded wife, after all. We had our sister-lawyers double check the procedure, it's legit."

"You switched the fake priestess I hired with one of your wretched sisters," he mused. "I knew I shouldn't have accepted when she called in sick and announced a last-minute replacement..."

"You knew nothing," I snorted. "You just failed, kid. You lost. Big time. And I saw to it that you'd die as a respectable married man. At long last!"

I sat down on the bed next to him.

With no warning, the young warlock turned his eyes into glowing yellow fires and spread wings of pure darkness, stretching from wall to wall.

I, of course remained completely unfazed. The parlor trick dissipated as quickly as he had manifested it, and the boy flinched in pain. "Oh... right... magic-repressing cell..."

"Very mature," I commented. "The rings are enchanted as well, by the way. Even outside of this cell, you wouldn't be able to use magic against me."

"I was wondering why the accursed thing won't come off my finger," Cutlass said mournfully. "Even tried chewing the damn finger off, to no avail..."

He grinned humorlessly and briefly turned his incisors into huge, nasty rodent teeth, to illustrate.

"Charming," I said.

"Gotta be honest. Never thought a cop would one day get the better of me," the warlock confessed.

"Paladin," I immediately corrected him. "We are a proud order of PALADINs, enforcing the sacred laws of our Mother Goddess. Call us "cops" again, kid, and I will have you executed by stoning."

"Same difference," he snorted dismissively. "Just a bunch of uniformed bullies keeping people from living their truest lives. Damn, I WISH I was stoned, right now..."

"You are a MARRIAGE SWINDLER," I felt the need to point out.

-"I lived my own truth..."

"You MURDERED people," I felt the need to point out.

"That ONE time!" he whined. "Also, I like to think I DEFEATED them. They had swords. Really pointy swords."

-"You also 'defeated' the family's cat? And ate it. That was gross and weird, by the way. A side-effect from your shape-shifting? I always wondered about that."

"Nah," he said with a shrug. "Sometimes I just eat stuff."

He manifested a chameleon tongue, and snatched an unlucky blue bird from between the bars of his window. He swallowed the bird whole, the bulge travelling down his torso. Sad, muffled chirping could be heard from his tummy, under the prison gown.

All of that had happened in the blink of an eye. Some of the feathers were still floating in the air.

I made a mental note of this - either the window needed extra protection, or the frequency of the cell's anti-magic pulse had to be further increased. Preferably both.

"That reminds me... I brought you a little something," I said, unwrapping the bread roll I had pulled out of my pocket. It was fresh, and still warm. "A little peace offering. Your favorite, I believe." I winked at him. "Plus, you could clearly use more fiber in your diet, mister."

The warlock stared at the bread as if it was a poisoned dagger.

I rolled my eyes. "You can refuse it, or chew it up and spit it in my face, or whatever. I don't know if you'll ever get another chance to taste one, though."

Reluctantly, he grabbed the bread roll, and bit into it. While he tried to preserve his angry frown, he seemed to enjoy the treat.

"So, what is this, really", he finally asked, gesturing towards me, still chewing.

I shrugged. "I just finished writing my report - a real fun report, by the way, one of my best - and I thought I'd check on you. See if you are behaving yourself. If they treat you right. We've worked together for years, after all." I gently bumped my shoulder into his. "And we ARE married, are we not?"

"Until death shall us part, Sergeant," he snorted. "Next week, I believe?"

"No comment," I said. "But that reminds me..."

I gulped, and gingerly slipped my fingers into the neckline of his prison gown, and pulled, to catch a glimpse of his tattoos underneath.

As nonchalant as I could manage, I said: "While I still have access to you... Now that all of this is legally mine... I kinda want to check out your warlock tattoos. They're what allows you to shapeshift, correct? Really unusual power for a warlock. No obvious ripples. That's part of why it was so hard to track you down... I'd really love to study them... I've been thinking about this ever since we first met."

He looked a bit puzzled, but then he shrugged. "Whatever. They ARE some pretty awesome tattoos, after all..."

Without skipping a beat, he pulled off his gown, and was completely naked. He leaned back, showing no impulse to hide anything. I had to repress another gulp. This was moving a bit faster than I had expected.

"Oh, haha... No hesitation," I chuckled nervously. "No shame. Then again, I don't know what I expected, from you..."

The boy shrugged. "I am a man who works with his body, Sister-Sergeant. What are you gonna do, lock me up?"

I didn't dignify that with an answer. Plus, I was genuinely captivated by the skin art. The tattoos were scattered over the warlock's entire body, from the neck down: Winding serpents, birds and bats spreading their wings, snarling cats and wolves, swarms of fish and hundreds of crawling things. Several mysterious runes, too.

"Wow," I said, genuinely excited. "That must have been DAYS of work..."

"Weeks," the boy corrected me, sounding mighty smug. "Especially with all the arcane rituals that went into them. They say the process drives you insane."

He wriggled his eyebrows, and turned his eyeballs into creepy, golden orbs with horizontal pupils, like those of a frog. His lips curled upwards, and turned into an obscene, worm-like little trunk.

Unfortunately for my little comedian, his bit fell flat, because I was too distracted by the biggest of his tattoos. It was a magnificent snake-like creature, its fanged mouth opening where the boy's stomach was, and its body roughly tracing the path of his intestines.

"Can you turn around for me, please...?" I said.

He immediately adopted a four-legged posture on the bed, his irreverent butt pointed towards me. Though between the perky butt and the testicles dangling underneath, my poor eyes were not quite sure where to focus. The flesh, as they say, is weak.

A bit overkill, that pose. The warlock knew that, of course, judging by his shit-eating grin. "As you can see, Sergeant, Yes, the snake does indeed go all the way to the other end. Oh, what is that...? Are you blushing, Sergeant? Oh, my."

He reached back, and spread his little round buttocks.

I instinctively averted my eyes, as I realized I was enjoying this way too much for comfort.

"You really DO think the sun is shining out of your ass, don't you..." I scolded him, but then something gave me pause. "Oh, wait... It DOES. Would you look at that..."

Indeed, where the tail of the snake ended, there was what looked like a sun tattoo. Where the sun doesn't usually shine.

"It's a fire starfish, actually," Cutlass lectured me with a haughty snort. "But yeah, I insisted on the specific placement. Hehe."

Trying to retain my professional composure, I climbed onto the bed next to him, reached out, and traced the lines of some of the tattoos with my finger. To my immense satisfaction, the boy flinched under my touch. His bravado clearly was only skin-deep, no pun intended.

"What's the matter, Sir Cutlass," I teased, glad that I had gained the upper hand again. "Are we ticklish?"

"And they say I'm the shameless one," the boy growled reproachfully.

Ha! He was actually blushing himself, now! What a treat.

Maybe that's what encouraged me. My mouth was watering. I unceremoniously grabbed the boy under his armpits. Using his helpless shudder to my advantage, I flipped him over, and now sat on top of him.

He looked really nice, from this perspective. Pinned down, startled eyes, all bare and vulnerable beneath me. Very warm, too. Very smooth skin.

That really was a boost for my confidence.

"Nothing to be ashamed of, right? This is a very exclusive relationship." I took a deep breath. "That reminds me... Since we are getting to know each other and all... I believe it is time we consummate our marriage, good sir... While I still have you."

I had tried to make it sound like a joke, so I still had the option to back out. But I found it became increasingly less of a joke, with every second.

The boy looked genuinely taken aback. "Consu... Wait, you mean you want to fuck me?" A criminal mastermind, indeed.

I swiftly pinched his nipples, and was rewarded with a delightful little cry and rodeo.

"Consummating a marriage blessed by the Love Mother is a beautiful, sacred thing... No mere 'fucking', you heathen," I said. Then I grinned again. "But basically, yes." I was already shifting my weight on top of him, as my nether regions were growing restless.

I gently slapped him on the cheek. "You really owe me satisfaction, you know. After all of those nights I had to spent out in the rain and the cold... Chasing you from town to town..."

He shook his head. "Sorry, Sergeant, but, uh... No offense... You are not exactly my type...?" He almost seemed to shrink physically, underneath me.

I snorted. "Oh, right. Your type. What was it again? Vulnerable teenage girls, several years younger than you, barely even nubile, down on their luck and desperate for love, throwing themselves at that mysterious nobleman who lures them in with promises of a happy, respectable life?"

"Don't say it like that," he mumbled, wriggling a little. "Besides, that was just business..."

"Look at you now, you serial seducer, you grand breaker of hearts..." With grim delight, I lowered my face towards his. "Admit it. You are scared to pick on someone your own size! Always have been. Say, for instance, a grown woman about three years older, who has some experience in these matters..."

"Experience?" the boy scoffed. "You're a sister-paladin. What 'experience' could you have anyway, ma'am? Isn't chastity before marriage a big deal, with you ladies?"

"Bold of you to lecture me about my own laws," I said. "Well, SIR, what you clearly don't realize, is that there are some pretty obvious loopholes..."

I bit my tongue, knowing instantly that I had said too much. I knew this guy well enough that I could anticipate what he'd say next almost word for word.

And sure enough, I was rewarded with the biggest, most shark-like grin I had ever seen from the warlock. "Loopholes, eh? Let me guess where your 'loophole' is located, dear Sergeant... You have already seen mine, of course..."

Welp, the day was ruined. Nothing left to do but to remember the old wisdom that offense is the best defense.

In an angry sequence entirely less graceful and sexy than I would have wanted - the boy scratched his head, as he observed me - I whirled around, stripped out of my pants, and planted my ass smack on his stupid face.

There! Truth be told, I had always wanted to do that to him.

Married or not, the profound joy I felt at his squirming and muffled protests was definitely a sin. Had to be.

But to the boy's credit, he quickly adapted. That was his thing, after all. The little chameleon.

I shuddered in delight when I felt him tentatively move his tongue around, under there. Possibly enhanced by his shape shifting powers. He reached up, and grabbed my butt cheeks with both hands. I felt a bit self-conscious about how deeply he sank in - I had lost some weight, to squeeze into that fancy wedding dress, but the slim young cadet I used to be was long gone, for sure.

The boy switched between gentle caresses, and almost painful squeezing. At the same time, I had instinctively started grinding down on him. Before we knew it, we had a rhythm going.

I closed my eyes, and allowed myself to get lost in the moment. It was only when the boy's squirming suddenly grew more urgent that I realized he probably needed to come up for air.

I lifted my butt a bit, which was immediately followed by a greedy gasp from the poor warlock below. He couldn't enjoy the fresh air for long, of course, because I immediately came down on him again. I squeezed him between my thighs, to remind him who was in charge here.

The orgasm was surprisingly abrupt. I had managed to control my volume, so far, but now I let out a loud, entirely undignified moan.

The young sister-guards stationed outside that door probably laughed their - still perky and firm - little butts off, at my expense.

("There we go,") I heard the boy's muffled gloating underneath. ("I believe your 'loophole' is pinching me, madame. Har har.")

With am exasperated sigh, I let myself fall flat down on him, which produced a satisfying "Urk!" - sound from my little prisoner. "So lame... You are never gonna let this go, are you?"

"Nope!" the boy confirmed.

Curious, I glanced over my shoulder, and admired my work.

The boy's face looked delightfully squashed, covered in a glistering layer of my fluids, and his normally smooth and silky hair was a chaotic mess.

I wrinkled my nose. "You talk mighty tough, for a guy who's face looks like a flounder and smells like dead fish."

-"Meh. I've seen worse, madame."

He picked a stray pubic hair out from between his teeth. "I have notes, though...?"

"Keep them to yourself," I pointed out, giving him another little slap. "If you don't want your execution date moved up to 'right now', good sir."

-"Understood..."

I handed him a handkerchief, after drenching it in the nearby sink. He immediately put it to good use.

Once he lifted the improvised towel from his face again, he found that I had adopted a new position.