M&L03 - SS (19 page)

“What other ways do sorcerers
compete?” Angela asked.

“We each get a chance to
transform Supernova using whatever theme we choose. Then all of you will vote
for whichever theme you like best. The winner will be announced during the
feast on the final night of the tournament.”

Angela sat forward, eyeing me
curiously. “What theme did you choose Solomon?”

“He won’t tell you,” Rook
answered from beside her, running his fingers through her long blonde hair.
“It’s the same every year. None of the sorcerers reveal their plans ahead of
time.”

I grinned at him. “The
surprise is half the fun. Not knowing what to expect really ups the wow factor
in show business.”

The group continued talking
while we finished eating. Just before it was time to head inside, we noticed
Jasper moving from one cluster of people to the next. Each time he stopped, he
said a few words and then he moved on to the next group. Upon his leaving, the
people he’d just spoken to jumped up as if they’d been set on fire and hurried
off to some unknown destination.

When Jasper finally reached
us, he said, “They’re arm wrestling up by the main entrance to Supernova and
that new guy Noah has already finished off fifteen opponents.”

We all jumped up and started
in that direction. Arm wrestling was always a popular event with lots of
betting opportunities that often led to even more exciting fights.

The gleaming white edifice
that housed Supernova was very Greek in its design with a wide marble
staircase, towering pillars, and ornately carved relief sculptures decorating
the pediment. Those marble steps and the grassy area surrounding them were
currently overflowing with eager spectators, cheering and chanting for one
brawny arm wrestler or the other.

The crowd was circling Noah
and his latest challenger, a wolf shifter from one of the European clans. The
cheering grew louder as the two opponents struggled against each other’s
strength and skill. Moments later Noah slammed the wolf’s hand down for yet
another victory. Scarlett threw her arms around Noah’s neck and kissed him
enthusiastically while the crowd went wild. The wolf stepped back, cradling his
arm and was quickly swallowed by the excited mob as they wondered who Noah’s
next victim would be.

“Enough!” Gunther roared, his
voice deep and growling as he stepped into the circle of people and leveled his
eyes on Noah. Scarlett’s entire body went rigid. Anticipation had the rest of
us watching the six-six, brute with rapt attention. “No more lightweights for
you whelp; it’s time you took on a real man.”

Noah whispered something in
Scarlett’s ear then he set her aside and met Gunther’s dark gaze without
flinching.

“Bloody hell, I need to find
a bookie.” After a quick scan of the area, I found three bookies and hurried
over to the closest one. Renee was tight on my heels so we wouldn’t be
separated in the growing mass of people.

Once I was finished placing
my bet, Renee asked, “Who did you bet on?”

“Noah,” I replied, nearly
shouting to be heard over the crowd. Her eyebrows flew up and I explained,
“Gunther is a mountain of a man and strong as hell, but arm wrestling takes
more than strength. It takes skill, and I believe Noah has that in his favor.
If I’m right, I’m going to win a lot of money because the odds are not in his
favor.”

We pushed our way to the
front of the crowd. As two of the shortest people here, we wanted to get close
enough that our view wouldn’t be blocked by all of the people towering over our
heads. They were using a large tree stump as the table for the arm wrestling
match. Noah and Gunther approached the stump and planted their elbows on its
rough surface. Their eyes locked as their hands came together. The challenge in
Noah’s eyes went far beyond this match and signaled trouble ahead. I couldn’t
really blame him. Gunther was an asshole and he’d likely been riding Noah’s ass
since he joined our world.

Gunther and Noah nodded when
they were ready, and then the crowd counted down, “Three! Two! One!”

Their bodies tensed, both of
them grabbing onto the stump with their free hand. For the first few seconds
nothing happened.  Then ever so slowly, Gunther began lowering Noah’s hand towards
the stump. Noah concentrated harder, focusing with everything he had until he
was finally able to push Gunther’s hand back up, and then past the midway
point. Both men were growling and I thought if this kept up their beasts might
just take over. It went on like this for several minutes, each of them taking
turns on top. Then suddenly, Gunther’s hand was slammed down onto the stump
with a deafening roar from Noah.

Their hands came apart and
Noah stepped back. The crowd was chanting his name but he paid them little
attention, keeping his focus instead on the enraged bear shifter in front of
him. Gunther stood there trembling, his nostrils flared, his face red with
fury. He looked like a bull about to charge. His claws shot out of his
fingertips and I was sure his attack was imminent. Then Dragon stepped forward
and slapped his hand down on Gunther’s shoulder. Gunther’s head whipped to the
side and their eyes met. For a very long moment they just stared into each
other’s eyes. The crowd grew quiet, watching as Gunther brought himself under
control.

Finally, Gunther’s claws
retracted and Dragon said, “If you tear into him now, I won’t get a chance to
beat him.”

Gunther inclined his head to
Dragon with a grunt and stepped back. Murmurs spread through the crowd like the
buzzing of a thousand bees.

Dragon turned to face Noah.
“Think you’re up to another match? Or do you need to rest your arm?”

Noah rotated his shoulder a
few times. “I’m good.”

Dragon smirked at him and
placed his elbow on the stump. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

I barely had time to get my
bookie’s attention before Noah stepped forward to meet Dragon’s challenge. I
let him know through hand gestures that I wanted to let my bet ride. This match
went about the same as the previous one, only it was a little longer and Noah
had a much harder time making the back of Dragon’s hand meet up with the tree
stump. When it was over Dragon bowed slightly to Noah, which seemed to startle
the younger man, but he recovered quickly and returned the gesture. That was
when Doyle emerged from the mass of spectators.

To Dragon he said, “Step
aside old man, let me show you how it’s done.”

Dragon chuckled and indicated
Doyle should go ahead. “Just remember, if you beat him it’s only because
eighteen of us wore him down before you were man enough to step forward.”

Doyle cocked his head to the
side and asked Noah, “Are you feeling worn down?”

“Nah, I’m just getting warmed
up,” Noah replied with an easy grin.

At this point, I decided it
was best to change my bet. Noah was good, but I was pretty sure Doyle was
better, and no matter what Noah said, his arm had to be getting tired.

This time when the crowd
finished counting down, Noah wasted no time and nearly slammed Doyle’s hand
down with his initial burst of energy. Doyle recovered just in time however and
brought Noah’s hand back up to the starting position.

“You’re good kid,” Doyle
admitted, looking right into Noah’s eyes. “But I’ve been at this for a few hundred
years.”

Slowly, Doyle began lowering
Noah’s hand towards the stump. Muscles bulged and sweat broke out across both
their brows, but Noah couldn’t stop the slow descent of his hand.

“We’ll do this again real
soon, when no one can say I only won because you were already worn out,” Doyle
promised as he pressed the back of Noah’s hand firmly into the tree stump.

The crowd surged forward
and I went to find my bookie.

~ Solomon ~

Eventually we climbed the
wide marble steps leading up to Supernova and found ourselves hovering just
outside the doorway. Apparently there was a costume party going on inside.

“Who do you think we’ll be
once we cross the threshold?” Renee asked me.

I looked into the club and
shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”

Renee hesitated but I took a
few steps inside the club and was immediately transformed by Merek’s spell.
Within seconds, my entire body was covered from head to toe with stretchy red
and blue material. If that wasn’t enough to tell me who I was supposed to be,
the web design on the clothes and the mask over my head were pretty good
indicators.

It was obvious the spell made
everyone inside the club look like comic book characters, but I had a feeling
the magic went beyond simple appearances. To test my theory I reached out
towards Renee and flexed my hand. A sticky white substance shot out of my wrist
and latched onto her hand when she raised it to shield her body. I gave the
spider web a tug and Renee came towards me, laughing all the way.

Once she crossed the
threshold, her hair grew longer and the color changed to a dark, fiery red.
Then her hips and breasts filled out to near sex demon proportions. The
transformation was complete when she wore a pair of skintight blue jeans and a
low-cut top that accentuated her new curves perfectly.

“Damn, so this is what it’s
like to have cleavage,” Renee exclaimed, palming her rather large breasts. 

Watching her squeeze those
perfectly round globes was such a turn-on that a half growl, half groan escaped
my lips. Her eyes snapped up, and then slid over the length of my body, pausing
for a moment at my groin.

She raised an eyebrow and
cautioned, “You’d better be careful Spiderman, or everyone will know exactly
what’s on your mind tonight.”

“Well if Mary Jane would stop
fondling her own breasts I might be able to control that a little better,” I
informed her.

She just grinned and gave her
breasts another squeeze. I bent down to kiss her, thinking it might be time to
hit a base run, when I realized the mask needed to come off first. I reached up
to pull the mask off my head and found myself being transformed once again.
This time I was wearing a pair of jeans, a button up shirt with a loosely tied
tie and a pair of eyeglasses.

“Huh.” Renee let her gaze
slide over me again. “Are you supposed to be Peter Parker now?”

“That would be my guess,” I
agreed, slipping the mask into my back pocket. Maybe later I’d put it back on
to see if I could crawl up the walls.

Getting back to my earlier
impulse, I was just about to kiss Renee when a mass of green muscles came
bounding up beside me. “Do you think Danarius would be too upset if I threw him
around a bit and called him a puny god?” Doyle asked, describing a scene from
the most recent Avengers movie where the Hulk does that very thing to Loki.

“Somehow I don’t think that’s
a good idea,” I advised.

Danarius was across the room
talking with a group of sex demons who seemed very interested in what he had to
say. Unlike the movie version of Loki, his long hair was blonde and he wore a
green suit with pale fur accents and a gold helmet with long curling horns.

“Can you turn into Bruce
Banner Doyle?” Renee asked the green giant beside me.

He shrugged his massive
shoulder. “Sure, but where’s the fun in that?”

We all chuckled at that and
moved farther into the club. For the next few hours we mingled with our
friends, dancing and experimenting with our new superpowers. I found that I
could indeed crawl up the walls, and along the ceiling, and pretty much any other
surface large enough to accommodate my body. Dragon had a great time pulling
the two sides of his shirt apart to become Superman, while Serafina stayed by
his side as the gutsy reporter Lois Lane. Rook and Angela turned out to be
Batman and Catwoman, Lucien and Liliana were Cyclops and Jean Grey, and Claire
was paired up with Kalen as Mystique to his Magneto.

Just about every comic book
character ever created could be found somewhere within the walls of Supernova,
but one in particular seemed more fitting than most.

“I’m surprised Bran was
feeling up to coming out tonight, and that he was brave enough to show his face
here when we’re all just waiting for an excuse to finish him off,” Katerina
commented when she noticed the traitorous wolf shifter enter the club.

Renee and I were sitting at
the bar with her and Doyle, resting our feet after a long night of dancing.

“What character is he
supposed to be?” Katerina asked, her nose scrunched up in distaste as she
examined his blue and gold suit.

“That is Booster Gold,” Doyle
explained. “He was something of a fake superhero, which suits Bran to the T.
Booster Gold was a glory hound that went back in time to gain popularity. He
joined the Justice League and became famous using stolen technology from the
future and his knowledge of historical events to make himself seem larger than
life.”

Katerina smirked. “Sounds
like a deceitful twit.”

Doyle inclined his head. “As
I said, the character is perfect for Bran.”

“I recognize most of the
characters here tonight,” Renee began, looking up from whatever she’d been
drawing on the back of a paper coaster. “But I still can’t figure out who
you’re supposed to be Katerina.”

“Honestly, I’m not sure
myself,” Katerina admitted.

Her blonde hair hung in waves
to her waist and she wore a short green dress with long matching gloves and
over-the-knee boots.

I cleared my throat, not sure
if she would appreciate the irony of the character choice the way I did. “Um
Kat... I think you’re supposed to be The Enchantress.”

She narrowed her eyes on me.
“And why does that seem to amuse you?”

“The Enchantress was very
often tangled up with Loki in his plots to take over the world,” I informed
her, laughing when tiny sparks flared in her eyes.

She glanced over my shoulder
and I turned to see Danarius on one of the smaller stages with Lacey. The bench
he was straddling was covered with purple velvet and had just enough of a back
to support his upper body in a reclined position. Lacey’s naked form was
undulating above him with a slow, sensual rhythm that was both graceful and
hypnotic. Danarius was still fully dressed but his fly was open and you could
see enough to know the sex was not being simulated. As Lacey continued her slow
ride, her head fell back and her hands slid over her shapely thighs, and then
up her flat belly to her firm breasts. She teased her nipples, circling and
pinching the rosy tips as she increased the tempo of her seductive dance.

By this point the sex demon
pheromones Lacey was putting out permeated most of the club and anyone whose
attention wasn’t glued to the action onstage was pairing off to put on shows of
their own. I wanted to reach for Renee but I knew I wouldn’t be able keep us
from hitting a home run if I did.

Danarius sat up slowly,
skimming his hand up Lacey’s spine to her slender neck. Angling her head to the
side, he leaned forward and sank his fangs into her tender throat. Lacey cried
out, sending a burst of pheromones to the rest of us and I closed my eyes,
imagining it was me and Renee up on that stage.

Her blood rushed over my
tongue, hot and sweet with that hint of spice that was uniquely Renee’s. My
fingers curled in her silky hair, holding her head in place while my other arm
snaked around her waist, aiding her urgent quest for release. Her hips slammed
down, harder and harder, faster and faster. Warm, wet and quivering, her tight
sheath swallowed me whole again and again. The pleasure was like nothing I’d
ever known before. I never wanted it to end but I couldn’t hold back any
longer. The orgasm rolled up my spine, exploding out of me as I impaled Renee
on my long, hard shaft. She screamed, her inner muscles rippling over my flesh
as my cock pulsed, filling her with my hot seed.

I sagged forward, resting my
forehead on a soft feminine shoulder.

“Sometimes I really love
those pheromones,” Renee murmured, a shiver making her wiggle on my lap.

I lifted my head and looked
into her bright green eyes. “When did you decide to climb on my lap?”

“I don’t think it was
actually a conscious decision on my part,” she confided, brushing my hair out
of my eyes. “I just got so caught up in the moment, in the pheromones, and then
you closed your eyes and I had to know what you were seeing, what you were
feeling. I’m honestly not even sure how I wound up on your lap.”

I smiled at her, framing her
beautiful face with my hands. “I’m glad you did. It’s nice to know we shared
that experience, even if we did skip a few bases.”

Her lips curled seductively
and she leaned in to kiss me. When her velvet soft lips met mine desire flared
between us, fueled by the pheromones still lingering in the air. Suddenly,
nothing else mattered except for the way our mouths moved together, totally in
sync as if we’d been doing this all along. After a few moments, she trailed
kisses over my neck, and then up to my ear where she whispered, “I won’t hold
that against you. After all, I’m the one who invaded your private thoughts, but
if you’re ready to get out of here, I think it’s time we explored the next
base.”

“It hasn’t been twenty-four
hours yet,” I forced myself to say when she nipped at my earlobe and then
swirled her tongue just inside my ear.

“It’s been at least twenty;
can’t we just call it close enough? I mean this morning wasn’t even the first
time we kissed.”

“That is the pheromones talking.”

“Pheromones, shmeromones.”
She continued her sensual assault on my neck and ears, rolling her hips the
entire time so that her denim-covered center was grinding against the front of
my pants and the impossibly hard shaft behind them.

I was about to give in to
temptation when Rook approached our table and cleared his throat.

“You have got to be kidding
me,” Renee snapped, glaring up at the amused time demon.

“I’m sorry to interrupt
Renee, but Dragon needs to see Solomon and Doyle right away.” He was trying
hard to keep a straight face but his lips twitched once or twice while Renee
continued giving him the evil eye.

Everyone always thought the
mating frenzy was funny until it happened to them. Having felt its pull and the
frustration it could cause, I almost felt like I should apologize to everyone
I’d ever laughed at before.

Renee growled and climbed off
my lap. “I’m going to head home now. Will you meet me there?”

She grabbed the coaster she’d
been using as a sketchpad off the bar and handed it to me. I glanced down to
see Spiderman thrusting his cock between Mary Jane’s very impressive breasts.
My eyes shot up to Renee’s and she winked at me.

With a groan, I stood and
spoke directly into her ear. “We haven’t reached that base yet. That’s at least
third; although I’m sure some people would say it’s a scoring run, but since
you did such a wonderful job, I think you should be rewarded. When you get
home, find somewhere to relax and then take a look at this coaster. Don’t look
at it again until you’re sitting down and alone.”  I pressed the coaster
securely into her hand, whispering a spell as I did.

Stepping back, I met her
curious green eyes and told her, “I’ll see you as soon as the meeting is over.
Do me a favor and use the portal in your office. The fox would be a lot calmer
knowing you’re not walking from the other portal alone.”

“I’ll do it, but only because
I understand what you’re going through.” She kissed me briefly, melting against
me with a sigh. When it was time to say goodbye we were both reluctant to let
go. Our arms extended out so that our hands could hold on for as long as
possible. Her fingertips were still touching mine as she turned to walk away
from me.

When she was gone, Rook
smiled at me. “I’m glad to see you two are working things out.”

“Thanks, we still have a ways
to go, but at least we’re on the right track now.”

Rook led me and Doyle to the
office Dragon used when he was visiting Supernova. Inside the office, about
twenty division heads along with Claire and Katerina had already been gathered
and were now seated around the conference table. I was surprised Katerina beat
us there, but then I realized she’d already left before Rook came to get me and
Doyle. Serafina was lying down on the sofa watching wearily as Dragon paced in
front of her. 

Doyle and I quickly found our
seats and Rook began the meeting. “There’s been a lot of chatter and from the
information my team has gathered so far, a kidnapping attempt will be made
during the tournament. We’re not sure yet who the target is, but our best guess
is Serafina.”

No wonder Dragon was wearing
a path in the carpet.

“Security has already been
increased,” Rook continued, “but we wanted to make all of you aware of this
threat.”

“We also wanted to know if
any of you have seen or heard anything that might be useful,” Dragon added, his
usually brown eyes burning red and locked on Claire.