Uleni's Gamble (12 page)

*

Riese swept through Egeria as quickly as he could, but it was taking time. He set up a camp about ten miles from the border, and he was moving from town to town by himself. He did not fear death, and the people that did not convert, had no idea what he was. Usually be the time they figured out their magic wouldn’t work, he had already gutted them.

Those that he gathered at the towns he left simple instructions, gather all the bows and arrows you can find, and head to the camp for weapon training. He realized quickly under the old style of war, magic was often the most used, if not only used distance weapon. Without it, the few soldiers that bothered with distance weapons wouldn’t be good enough.

The ones converted may not have his god acquired knowledge and experience in combat, but they were all prime warriors in speed, reflex and strength. It wouldn’t take them long to improve in sword use, or even at least become decent at firing a bow. Still, he hated taking the time, as soon as he was done recruiting, he would take the war back to Abelaweth.

He had grand plans, he decided since Abelaweth was in the middle, he would build a new city named after him once he was undisputed ruler of all three. He would become the first emperor of Cytherea. He frowned, there would have to be a new name for their world. He decided the rulers of the three kingdoms would be under his authority, and he considered a test of arms, let those who were the best fighters rule under him.

It wouldn’t be long now, he only had a few towns to go, then the capitol. No… it wouldn’t be long now.

*

Katrina laid there in bed, unable to sleep. She loved to pleasure Justin with her mouth, how she could control it, bringing him to a fast finish as she woke him in the morning, amidst his other mates and the women she now considered sisters while they slept. Or she could keep him right on the edge, teasing him for a long time, when they were alone. She loved the feeling it gave her, in fact, she quite often got off on it.

Smaller orgasms to be sure, but they were still orgasms.

She also felt a little dirty when she cleaned up after her sisters. She had enjoyed tasting Nora on his manhood that first time, which was an accident. She wasn’t really attracted to women, but the idea of it was so dirty it thrilled her, and it wasn’t like she hated the taste, quite the opposite.

She had enjoyed the different tastes as he added more intended mates. And her mind spun as she stared at the ceiling, unable to sleep. Simply because she was absolutely dying to taste Sara off his hardening cock, the thought got her wet at least an hour ago, and kept her that way. It was the middle of the night and everyone else was asleep, so she just had to, if she ever wanted to get any sleep tonight.

As quietly as possible, she maneuvered between his legs, uncovered his cock and slurped it into her warm eager mouth. She closed her eyes, concentrating on the sensation of his manhood growing inside her mouth, licking and sucking him as he slowly filled her mouth. The new taste of Sara along with the salty taste of his juice made her moan, she couldn’t help but reach between her legs and tease her slit with a fingertip.

When he was fully extended, she started to get to work, bringing him toward his bliss even while he was still asleep. She expertly brought him pleasure with her oral skills. She felt his right leg jerk, like it normally does when he awakens, but his left leg hadn’t moved.

She peered peripherally to her right, and saw the blanket moving between Sara’s legs and her eyes widened as she looked up. She looked at the expression of pleasure on Sara’s face, Sara was staring at her pleasuring Justin with her mouth. She had always wondered what would happen if she got caught.

When their eyes met, it was like she was struck by lightning, and she immediately felt her center explode in bliss along with a flush of shame that turned her on more, she sucked harder as her body tried to gasp, eyes locked together she could see the moment Sara followed her over into ecstasy. It was so intense. Without conscious thought, instead of stopping, or even going faster, she kept eye contact with Sara and started to go slower, giving her newest sister a show as she pleasured Justin’s manhood.

They never spoke, but they reached their bliss two more times, piercing green and light brown eyes locked together. Sara clearly enjoyed the watching as much as she had enjoyed the showing, before Justin woke and filled her mouth with his seed…

Chapter 10

Justin quickly realized his plan to spend time with the family for two days was naĂŻve. Apparently the soldiers were having trouble figuring out how to use the sights, so he was on a field, giving a class to a hundred men at a time on how to aim. They made some targets and gave everyone five practice shots from fifty yards out.

If they could hit the target consistently in the same spot, he would zero their sights for precise shooting and set up sniper teams, at the end of the day there were only a handful of those. If they hit the target, but all over, he just gave them a pass. Most of the soldiers fell into that category, but about five percent couldn’t aim at the ground and hit it, so those went back to bows and arrows for distance shooting.

He spent ten hours, thirty minutes per class, which was only about a third of the soldiers at the end of the day. Luckily Nora had started a second class when he got his third group, so they should have them all finished by noon tomorrow. He felt kind of stupid about it actually, handing out weapons and not teaching people how to aim, squeeze the trigger, or hold their breath halfway through an exhale.

Still, they were getting it done. When they got to the first ambush point at the border, they might even have time for more training, he was kind of rushing things so they wouldn’t be caught unprepared. The last thing he wanted was to go down there and find burned out villages.

They were all invited to dinner with the king and prince Anton. So after Sally got them all cleaned up they got dressed and followed Nicole to the dining room. Despite taking a leadership role the last few days, only because he knew how non-magic wars were fought, he felt distinctly uncomfortable as everyone stared at them when they came in.

Apparently this wouldn’t be a little dinner with the king, it was crowded with people. He could almost hear Nora’s voice in his head telling him to get the fuck over it as they were led to the head table and seated at the king’s table. He tried to maintain at least a neutral body language, he was afraid if he tried to smile he would grimace, there seemed to be a lot of whispering and sidelong glances at him and the ladies with him.

A few minutes later the king was announced and everyone stood, he appeared in good spirits as he came in from the other doors and made his way to his seat. Once the king sat everyone followed suite and the servers started bringing out the first course. He had been expecting a speech or something, and felt a little relieved, of course he didn’t know the tradition… maybe that would come later?

That didn’t help his nerves, but it was just a dinner after all, not too dangerous. He followed the conversations going on around him as best he could. He wished someone had bothered to tell him about this, at the least he would feel more prepared. Once dinner was finished the king stood and cleared his throat.

“Tonight’s feast has been in honor of the return of your princess, and our guest of honor the Flame of Cytherea. They, along with the others at this table, have done much to keep Abelaweth safe over the past weeks. Despite this new threat, we know they will continue to keep us safe from our enemies, both mortal and otherwise.”

The nobles and other guests started to clap. Some looked heartfelt about it, and others merely polite. The king walked over to Nicole, and escorted her out into the empty area. He groaned under his breath when a lute and some pipes started playing and the king led Nicole in an upbeat dance. After the first song, many others got up and started dancing in a celebratory way.

He was worried about two things; he had yet to meet the enemy in battle. Although he thought his plans were good, he was aware the enemy usually did something unexpected. It was a lot of pressure and he had been trying not to focus on it too much and just do what needed to be done. The king’s speech kind of brought all that to the fore.

The second thing he was worried about was he had no idea how to dance…

*

Nora grinned at the weak look on Justin’s face, and dragged him out of the chair. She wondered how dance had never come up between the five of his mates, but she pulled him out onto the dance floor and taught him the basic steps. He was a little stiff at first, but loosened up by the second song. Actually, he was kind of terrible at it, and she felt guilty, dance just hadn’t ever come up and she would have to rectify that when they got a chance.

The air bullets he had showed them made her feel a bit better about protecting him, she didn’t even really need one of those rifle things, she could control the direction until the last ten feet shooting one from her palm. She just had to carry enough so she wouldn’t run out of ammunition, something she had never had to be concerned about before.

She also started to make sure she had real weapons on her, two long daggers. She was pretty decent with weapons, but wasn’t really happy with her current level of skill without her magic, and had spent a little time in practice with Trina.

Trina had seemed to be making more of an effort to get to know her lately, and she was undisputedly the best with weapons in the group without any magical assistance. She thought Trina might even be better than Justin was. What disturbed her most is none of them would really have a chance against Riese if he closed in. They had to kill him from a distance.

She snickered when she saw Nicole walking up, apparently the bedroom wasn’t the only place Justin would need stamina to keep up with the five of them. She turned him over to Nicole and grabbed Sally for a dance, she didn’t want to sit down yet either…

*

Nicole felt guilty and took Justin back to the table after just one dance. His uncoordinated dancing was really her and the other ladies fault, no one had even thought about it though. Her dad was sweet, and had meant this as a surprise welcome back, but as a result they had no chance to introduce the customs for a royal feast to Justin.

“Would you like to dance?”

She turned and saw her brother there, a big smile on his face. She looked guiltily at Justin and he just said she should go and enjoy herself. She smiled and kissed him on the cheek, then turned and let her brother lead her onto the dance floor.

She was having a good time, and the day after tomorrow they would be heading off to war, so she decided to just enjoy herself. They could teach Justin for next time…

*

Sally begged off after the fourth song and went back to the table. She was out of breath. She saw Kat trying to teach Justin how to dance on the side of the dance floor. She had to admit he was already getting better although he had a long way to go. Trina and Sara were dancing, and seemed to be having a good time of it.

Trina had surprised her earlier, offering to help her blade work when she had come across Nora and Trina sparring. She had accepted, simply to get to know the woman better. She was awful with blades. Luckily she would be able to attack with magic from above in another form. Justin had suggested storms, but she was wondering if she could launch stone spears from the ground.

Unlike the fire and air, when the magic was cancelled, the stone would hold together, and it would have plenty of momentum behind it to impale a soldier. She had also been considering other possibilities, but none seemed as promising. A lightning storm was a good strong attack, but it took time and a lot of effort.

She gasped as she felt it come into existence. A new talent. Nicole was pregnant. She was taken aback by how powerful the talent felt already, and examined it. It was complicated, and she wasn’t entirely sure, but she thought it may be a dragon shape shifter. She wondered if that meant anything, that talent hadn’t been given to the royal family in a few generations.

Did Cytherea see something coming that required that talent? She thought two gods should be enough to deal with in one lifetime, didn’t they deserve peace for a couple of hundred years maybe? She grinned. Maybe not, that sounded boring.

What made dragons so powerful was not only their changed form. They had a multitude of natural talents, in addition to being mages so they could develop others as well. She dismissed her worried thoughts, this should be celebrated. She got up and went to Nicole to do just that.

*

Justin was a bit overwhelmed finding out another of his mates were pregnant. They started their own celebration back in the rooms, just spending time with each other. As the night wore on, Nicole took him quite firmly by the hand and pulled him away for a private little celebration between the two of them in the second bedroom.

He was pretty much over the stress of the dinner and dancing by the time Nicole was done with him and they joined the others for sleep…

The next day he and Nora finished the rifle training. He was looking forward to their last afternoon with his family before leaving. Of course, that didn’t happen, Ross showed up right after lunch with a large contingent of mages to learn how to fight this new enemy.

The king asked him to join their new guests to keep an eye on things. Which was reasonable, eight mages could do a lot of damage if they decided to betray them and he wasn’t around to suppress their talents.

Instead of a second contingent for a peace treaty, the actual mage who was crowned the new king of Uleni, Luis, was there. Things didn’t get off to a good start when he and his mates greeted him with the king.

King Luis turned red and said in outrage, “You dare greet me with a witch present!”

He said with a bit of steel in his voice, “You are not in your kingdom, here she is my honored mate, do not press me on this point.”

The king was a bit more diplomatic as he added, “Please, come with me and we can discuss peace between our lands. The Flame of Cytherea and his mates will be showing your mages around and getting them trained.”