Tanys Defiant Read online

  Tanys made no protest as he pulled her across his knee, seating her in his broad lap. Her fingers grasped a little too tightly, stinging a bit as he plucked the nearly empty platter from her grasp and set it aside. Grinning lasciviously, he fondled her, pressing his beaklike nose down into the fullness of her breast, inhaling deeply of the golden spores that coated her trembling skin. His eyes fluttered back into his head when he raised his face again, and he shuddered. Tanys flesh crawled to feel the growing hardness in his lap, pressing against the all too thin fabric of her silken thong.

  Tanys looked to Carathan out of the corner of her eye, but the sorcerer still knelt, motionless inside his magical cage of light. She’d lost sight of Misha, and her heart felt a flutter of unreasoning panic. The corpulent blood mage was breathing heavily now as he snaked a large oily finger down the line between her ample breasts, through her navel, and hooked it firmly inside the front of her loincloth. He tugged it down a little, allowing a few dark curly hairs to peek out as he ran his fingers along the inside of the waistband.

  Tanys’ breath came heavily as well, but from rage rather than passion. She feigned a sigh of pleasure as she stretched her arms back languidly over her head, grasping the hilt of the knife concealed beneath her hair. His face buried between the raven girl’s breasts, oblivious to his own mortal peril, the blood mage slipped his hand down her silken loincloth even as she pulled the blade free of her necklace. At that moment, a roaring voice filled the room.

  “Silence!” a withered blood mage shouted angrily from where he sat, nearest the sharp bend in the horseshoe-shaped table, “The interrogation will continue!”

  The interruption had startled the corpulent mage so that he had quickly snatched his hand back, forgoing his fumbling exploration of Tanys’ womanhood. He straightened in his chair and adopted the worried expression of a man not wishing to attract his superior’s attention. Likewise, Tanys thought better of her intent to open an exploration of the man’s innards. She was not, however, free to move away. The thumb of the man’s off hand remained securely wedged between the crease of her buttocks and the band of her belt, and, though the hardness in his lap grew softer by the moment, he seemed to have no intention of letting her go. Perhaps he was saving her for later.

  Tanys found it awkward, keeping her hands behind her head. As much as it pained her, she opted for subtlety, laying her body over against his chest and wrapping her arm around behind his neck. No one seemed to notice the flash of the blade tucked tightly in her grip before she slipped it neatly between the back of his chair and the folds of the mage’s cowled robe. Her free hand hovered hesitantly a moment before settling on his chest, an inch away from the obsidian talisman that the satyr had claimed would be proof against the mages’ dark magic. She wrinkled her nose against the magician’s pungent body odor, but resolved to bide her time until the moment to strike arose.

  Someone brushed her arm in passing, and Tanys looked up to see Misha refilling the corpulent mage’s wine cup. Their eyes met with mute understanding, and Misha moved on to the next mage at the table.

  On the floor, two mages stood on either side of Carathan. Each held aloft a silver bowl, chanting softly in an unknown tongue. Carathan seemed to take no notice of them, quietly preparing himself for their attack. With a sudden simultaneous shout, each man lunged forward, splashing the contents of his bowl onto the fiery shield that flickered around Carathan’s form. Dark blood sizzled and steamed against the burning runes, and for a moment, Carathan was engulfed in a pillar of green flame. Then the flames died away, and no trace of the blood remained, only the golden shield protecting him. Even through the shield, Tanys could see Carathan shake his head disparagingly, his laughter inaudible. The two mages withdrew, visibly shaken.

  The chief blood mage was a ghast of advanced years with a long gray beard, streaked with traces of black hair, protruding from the cowl of his crimson hood. Standing from his chair at the bend of the table, he spoke again, his words trembling with rage, “Enough of these games! We will settle this the old way. Bring me the faeblood!”

  The two mages whose spell had failed to break Carathan’s shield moved quickly to obey, disappearing out the same door through which Tanys and Misha had entered. The head mage lowered his voice in heated debate with the other mages at the head of the table, and hushed discourse spread throughout the room.

  “Do you think the old ritual will work?” the skinny pock-faced mage sitting to Tanys’ right whispered to the corpulent mage that held her captive.

  “How should I know?” the large man answered, annoyance in his voice, “I just hope there’s enough blood left to go around. I’ve had a request in for real faeblood now for six months.”

  “What are you working on?” the thin man asked with a curious smirk.

  “Wouldn’t you like to know!”

  The thin man flashed an evil grimace and turned his attention to his wine cup, drinking deeply. The large mage chuckled at his own joke and stuffed a scrap of meat into his mouth. He wiped the grease from his fingers on his robe and leaned back in his chair, pulling Tanys back with him. He seemed to suddenly take notice of the object Tanys had slipped between the seat of his chair and the cowl of his robe. Though she had turned the flat of the blade against his back, he sensed the touch of cold metal through the heavy cloth of the garment. He started to turn his head and reach back to discover the source of his discomfort.

  Thinking quickly, Tanys abandoned the passive, mindless stupor of a bloodslave and turned in his grasp, suddenly straddling him and slipping her free hand behind his neck, roughly turning his head to face her. The mage’s eyes widened in surprise, but his startled cry was muffled as Tanys pressed her lips hard to his.

  He tasted like salt and stale grease. Tanys tried to force her groans of disgust to sound like moans of pleasure. Her body rose and fell like a wild animal ravishing her prey. The mage could only gasp in amazement at the sudden animation of the raven-haired girl, wildly gyrating astride him. She tore open the front of his robes, exposing the wiry hairs of his broad chest, atop which lay the obsidian talisman, hanging from a thin chain around his neck.

  Tanys’ hot kisses trailed down his chest, her hips thrusting from side to side as she dragged her body down his. Her knees slipped between his, forcing them apart as her swaying backside upended a silver tray placed too near the edge of the table. She planted her feet firmly on the floor between his, her fingers still tightly grasping the color of his robe, pulling him forward in his chair as she crouched low. His wheezing breath came hard and fast. The dark fabric of his robe bulged tightly above his loins as he whimpered with need for her. Tanys looked up at him with wild fire in her eyes. The moment had come to act.

  Straightening suddenly, Tanys thrust her body hard against his. He grunted in pain as she forced him back into his chair, her head deftly threading through the loop of chain between the talisman and his chest as she came up. Tanys buried his face between her breasts, and he did not seem to notice that his talisman now hung backwards around her neck instead of his. The mage’s hands pawed weakly at her back as his body shook uncontrollably. Tanys’ knee ground against the hardness in his lap and he spasmed in mingled pain and pleasure, chocking on the aphrodisiac dust that coated her breasts.

  Tanys turned her gaze to catch the pockmarked mage watching with scarcely concealed wonder. She bared her teeth hungrily in his direction, and he quickly looked away, pretending to drink from the now empty wine cup. At last the convulsions of the corpulent mage beneath her diminished, and his hands dropped to his sides. The soft dampness against her knee told Tanys the mage was spent. She released him, allowing him to slump limply in his chair.

  He looked up at her with heavy lidded, unfocused eyes and mumbled in a slurred voice, “You’re… different.” His eyes fluttered once and then he lost consciousness.

  Tanys slipped around behind him, surreptitiously replacing the broken tipped dagger snugly inside the collar of her jeweled necklace, ensuring t
hat the stolen talisman hung concealed behind her hair as well. At that moment, the doors of the hall burst wide and the two disgraced mages returned, leading Haru’Luk the satyr into the room by a length of silver chain. His hands were bound behind him, a look of terror in his eyes. A murmur of anticipation surged through the room, and was just as quickly stilled to silence by the angry retorts of the head mage.

  Tanys took this opportunity to scan the room for Misha. A flash of red hair at the end of the table told her of the southern girl’s whereabouts. Tanys moved quickly. Misha obviously needed help.

  “Please, my noble lords,” the satyr’s pleading voice filled the room, “let me play you a song, and we can surely settle our problems with no further unpleasantries.”

  “Silence!” the chief mage shouted, “Let us end this quickly! I am weary unto death of all these delays.”

  "Not weary enough," Tanys muttered under her breath.

  The two mages leading the satyr brought him to the center of the room, near the fire pit where Carathan remained motionless and unheeding of their actions. They pulled the chain tightly through a large metal ring set into the stone of the floor, forcing the faun to his knees, head low, as one of them drew a silver dagger from his belt, the other going to fetch a large copper bowl.

  “If only there were someone here who had promised to help me,” the satyr shouted, loudly and fearfully, “I’m just saying that it would be altogether worth their while to rescue me!”

  The eyes of every blood mage in the room were riveted on the fate of the captive satyr, even the eyes of the wild haired young sorcerer that had forced Misha to kneel between his knees as he pulled his robes high, laying bare his pale and flaccid privates inches from the girl’s ashen face. The terror in Misha’s eyes flashed instantly to relief as she saw Tanys step up behind the wild haired mage. The grim look on Tanys’ face gave Misha enough warning to pull the mage’s robes down over her head, just in time to avoid being spattered with bright crimson blood as the raven girl calmly slit the wizard’s throat. His gurgling cries of alarm died, muffled in the palm of the hand she clasped tightly over his mouth.

  As the dead man slumped forward in his chair, and Tanys helped Misha to her feet, a distant, horrible cry rang out from a chamber high above. Tanys recalled instantly the warning Carathan had given about blood mages being linked with mystical bonds to the blood slaves they had bound to their service. The death of the master would drive his thralls mad as their mental link to him was suddenly severed. Fortunately, the young mage had apparently not accumulated many blood-bound slaves into his service before Tanys ended his life. Unfortunately, that poor wretched soul, screaming in mindless agony somewhere in the bleak halls of the blood delve, was enough to alert the mages to the presence of intruders.

  “Marshall the guards!” the chief mage roared, “We have uninvited guests!”

  Tanys stepped back into the shadows at the edge of the great hall, pushing Misha back protectively behind her. Misha cringed as Tanys passed her the black talisman taken from the body of the dead mage, still dripping with his lifeblood, but she took it all the same. It soon lay dark and heavy against a red smear between her small breasts.

  The far doors of the chamber creaked open, and a blood mage furtively entered the hall. “Master,” he cried out, “Captain Induss requests an audience with you immediately!”

  “Demands it, actually!” Carathan’s cousin strode hotly into the room, shoving his way past the two monstrously muscled and masked guardsmen at the door. Though he came unarmed into the hall of the blood mages, his commanding presence cowed into inaction those who half-rose to bar his entry. The ghast’s silvery hair streamed like a glowing mane behind him, his black scale-mail gleaming in the witchfire light. His cold eyes flashed with rage as he advanced across the room toward the chief mage.

  “That’s far enough, Captain!” the chief mage shouted, on his feet and livid with wrath.

  Induss halted in his advance, leveling a gauntleted finger toward the master of the blood sorcerers. “You were to deliver lord Carathan alive and unharmed into my custody no later than noon yesterday!” He suddenly seemed to take notice of his cousin’s plight, bound prisoner and cloaked in a fiery shield upon the iron grate and the helpless satyr awaiting execution at the hands of two startled blood mages. “By the gods! What are you people doing?”

  “Noble captain, I beseech you…” the satyr called out, pleading.

  “Shut up!” Induss roared, turning his attention back to the chief mage, “I don’t care what you do with your goats around here, but Carathan is my prisoner. You have had three days to retrieve whatever information he held, Klavicus. You will release him from these bonds and surrender him to my custody at once!”

  “You forget your place, Captain!” the chief mage Klavicus hissed warningly, “You hold your authority only at the whim of the Terjaan Council.”

  “I hold my authority by charter of the Divine Order, Klavicus, and you’ll do well to remember that!” Induss raged.

  Klavicus regarded the Captain of the dragon riders silently for a long moment before returning to his seat and tenting his fingers in front of his face in contemplation. When he spoke again, it was with a resigned sigh, “Send word to Captain Induss’ second in command… he’s due for a promotion.”

  Induss’ curse rang through the hall briefly, suddenly silenced as the chief mage’s spell hit him, a blinding arc of blue lightning that sent the captain flying backwards across the hall to land in a heap at the feet of the two hulking blood slave guardsmen. As the eyes of every mage in the room followed the captain’s flight across the room, one of the mages took notice of the slumped body of the man Tanys had killed, sitting in the chair next to his. As he opened his mouth to cry out, Tanys stepped in, delivering a brutal kick to the head that left him sprawling insensate beneath the table.

  A dark spell washed over Tanys like an icy wave. The black talisman tingled and burned against the bare skin of her back, but the spell seemed to have no further effect. The mage who had cast it, gibbered in wild-eyed fear, tripping over his robes to escape as the warrior girl of the Raven Tribe advanced on him, bloody knife in hand.

  A resounding crack of magical energy drew her attention toward the center of the room. Carathan’s fiery shield expanded and flew apart as he stood to face his tormentors. Sensing an opportunity, the mage with the silver dagger who had been poised to drive his blade into the throat of the cowering faun instead lunged toward Carathan’s unprotected breast. Carathan spoke a single word, his eyes flashing with golden fire, and the dagger-wielding mage fell back dead upon the floor, his chest a smoldering ruin of ash and charred bone. Carathan’s muscles tensed, and then he stood, arms apart, with the remains of the manacles that had bound his hands behind his back dripping as molten slag from his wrists. The mage that held the bowl to the satyr’s throat immediately dropped it and ran.

  Spells rained down like fiery hail upon Carathan, and, to a lesser extent, Tanys and Misha. Whereas the black amulets shielded the two girls from the magical assault, the sheer force of Carathan’s will shrugged aside the arcane might of the blood mage’s power. Glowing waves of magic force ripped the air between Carathan and Klavicus’ cadre of mages as they moved to surround him and drive through his defenses.

  The mages nearest Tanys fell back, ordering their blood slaves to hold back the dark haired girl who sought to end their lives with red steel and primal rage.

  Tanys fought against a wall of glassy-eyed harem slaves, interposing themselves selflessly between her blade and their cowardly masters. She had no desire to kill them, so she fought instead to fell them with blows of her fists or savage kicks when she could, using the knife only as a last resort. It was not enough. They pressed her like a wave of flesh, driving her to her knees beneath their onslaught. Painted fingernails raked across her skin as they pulled her down. She squirmed and thrashed madly, feeling their teeth upon her body. Someone tugged at her hair, turning her head sharply and painfu
lly to the side. A hand grasped the skirt of her silken loincloth, pulling it unbearably tight until it snapped free, leaving her sex, stinging and exposed as the pleasure slaves clawed and gnashed at her. Misha screamed from somewhere nearby, obviously taken in the same rush.

  Tanys went wild with fear and pain, breaking their bones and thrusting the dagger about with reckless abandon until she fell prone, beneath the writhing bodies of her assailants; her dagger was levered out of her grasp. They piled atop her until she felt she would surely be crushed under the weight of them. Her mind reeled against the intoxicating effects of the golden spores with so many dusted bodies pressing down upon her. The blood slaves seemed similarly affected as well, for where, a moment before, she had felt the pain of a slave girl’s teeth upon the delicate skin of her breast, warm lips now sucked greedily and fervently, taking her in. The raven girl shivered in fevered pleasure as the girl’s tongue rolled Tanys’ swollen nipple against the roof of her mouth.

  Tanys’ will to struggle against them faded by the moment. She felt hands between her knees, pulling them apart… she no longer knew why she resisted them. On her back on the cold flagstones… their bodies were so warm. Their mouths were upon her, hot and wet, kissing and sucking. Tanys surrendered, offering herself to them and the golden dream of unbridled lust. They fell upon her like starving animals. They fought for position between her legs, drinking her wetness like honeydew as she opened wide the petals of her flower and let them taste and tease new pleasures from the pink bud of her womanhood. Tanys’ thoughts swirled as she struggled to recall something vitally important that she was supposed to do, but the golden dream of the aphrodisiac dust enslaved her will like an unbreakable spell.

  Somewhere in the midst of a shuddering climax, Tanys became aware of a new sound. From somewhere, far away it seemed, someone was singing, an ancient song, in a language that was strange, yet somehow familiar. The floor shook beneath her, and screams of rage and panic filled the room. A familiar voice, full of pain or ecstasy, called out Tanys’ name. Misha.