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Heart of the Lion, Part One
All stories on this web site are purely FICTIONAL. The people depicted within these stories only exist in someone's IMAGINATION. Any resemblence between anyone depicted in these stories and any real person, living or dead, is an incredible COINCIDENCE too bizarre to be believed. If you think that you or someone you know is depicted in one of these stories it's only because you're a twisted perverted little fucker who sees conspiracies and plots where none exist. You probably suspect that your own MOTHER had sex with ALIENS and COWS and stuff. Well, she didn't. It's all in your head. Now take your tranquilizers and RELAX.
Heart of the Lion
Part Three
[In parts 1 and 2, Wulf the Freelance, sole survivor of an
incompetent military expedition to the Veldt Lands, is saved
from execution by the warrior maiden Ushandra, who proves he
is not an undead zombie by having energetic sex with him.
She gives Wulf a magical stone which transforms him into a
n'doro noko, or lion-man, so that he can travel across the
plains undetected. In lion-man form, however, Wulf
encounters a pride of female n'doro, who have lost their
alpha male, and all five of them (you guessed it) want to
have wild, passionate sex with him, a desire which Wulf is
only to happy to oblige.]
As it turned out, they did get tired of sex, anyway.
Later experience revealed to me that the lion-people seemed
to believe in quality rather then quantity when it came to
bonking. They only did it once every two or three months,
but when they did it was a virtual orgy. Once that was over
(I suspect they simply saved up their libido for weeks
beforehand and spent it all at once) they had virtually no
interest in sex.
My new body shared the sentiment, and when I awoke amid
the sleeping lionesses the following morning, sex was about
the farthest thing from my mind. Not that it wasn't fun,
mind you, lying with a half dozen massively muscled warm
bodies, gently stroking and grooming each other awake, then
lounging around in silence for an hour or so, each enjoying
the simple presence of the others.
"I think," Eldest Female said at length, "that
introductions are in order. I'm Khurru."
I nodded (a human mannerism which seemed to puzzle
them). "Wulf," I replied.
The others were Khasshra (the bracelet-wearer),
Gandr'ssh (the necklace), Drhurr (black eyes), Hrakhll and
Ghorra (the two youngest who had seemed so intent on each
other). As I had noted the night before, now that they'd
managed to satisfy their instinctive urge to get laid, the
females pretty much went about their business and ignored
me sort of like real lions, I noted.
We stayed together for a few days, hunting, eating,
sleeping, roaming the plains. It was not until evening
reddened the sky over the plain nearly a week later that
Khurru finally got to the heart of the matter.
"There are no other males on the plains, Wulf," she
told me. "You're the first one we've seen in a more than a
month."
"What do you think happened to them?" I asked, secretly
dreading the answer.
"We've asked the other females," Khurra replied. "Like
our male, they went on their pilgrimmage to the Heart of
the Lion, and never returned."
"The Heart of the Lion?" I asked. "What's that?"
It was a mistake. The females looked at me as if I was
demented.
"You don't know?" Khurra demanded. "How can that be?"
I mumbled and searched for an answer. "I'm not from
around here..." I said, hoping that it sounded more sincere
when I was a lion-man than it did when I was human. "My
people... My people live on the other side of Sholanti
territory. We don't have... pilgrimmages. At least, not
since the Sholanti came."
They looked doubtful, but the notion that I was a
hairless one masquerading as an n'doro never seemed to cross
their minds.
"The Heart of the Lion," Khurra said slowly and
carefully, "is the great stone which lies in the Alabaster
Temple near the center of our lands. Each male must go there
once a year to commune with our ancestral spirits and obtain
guidance and advice for the coming year. We females have our
own temple, as well, where we gain guidance, and males are
not allowed."
I frowned. "Who built the temples?"
"The spirits built them," Khurra said casually, as if
it was the most natural thing in the world. "Now, the males
are not returning from the Alabaster Temple. Something is
happening there. Females cannot go there, but you are a
male. You can go, and see what happened to our males. If our
males do not return, the n'doro will die. Perhaps not your
tribe, but ours certainly will perish. We have discussed
this among ourselves, and decided to ask you. Will you help,
Wulf?"
Well, I suppose I wouldn't be much of an adventurer if
I turned them down, now, would I? Besides, I suspected that
if I did I wouldn't make it off the plains alive. Still, the
notion of going alone to some ancient haunted temple, to
find out why no one else had returned did not fill me with a
great deal of enthusiasm. Throughout my career I've been
nothing if not cautious, and this didn't seem terribly
cautious to me. All the same, there was a mystery to solve,
and my curiosity had been aroused.
"Sure," I said, trying to sound casual and brave in a
noble, lion-man kind of way. "I'll help. It's the least I
can do, given your kindness."
"You know that if you find our male, he will take over
the pride, and we will follow him."
I shrugged (another puzzling mannerism, apparently).
"Such is the law," I said,"and we all must live by it."
That seemed to satisfy them. We slept huddled together,
in the assurance that at dawn I'd go off to find their
vanished men-folk. Needless to say, doubts assailed me,
along with images of the demons and monsters which awaited
me in the horrific depths of the Alabaster Temple.
Gods, I'd stepped in it again.
The pride accompanied me until we were just in sight of the Alabaster
Temple (it was apparently quite a violation for a female to even see the
temple), and then I had yet another bittersweet parting -- this entire
journey was becoming a series of sad or tragic goodbyes, and I would have
been only too glad if it ended as quickly as possible.
I carried a spear and my sword, hanging from an
improvised leather baldric. Beyond that, I had little in the
way of weapons, save the paltry collection of spells I had
carried from my unsuccessful career at the magic academy. I
was anything but sure of myself, but the lure of the
Alabaster Temple and what lay inside drew me on.
The temple lay in a deep river valley, set about with
greenery -- low underbrush, succluents and lush thorn-trees
-- beautiful, sprouting pale white flowers, but bristling
with spikes the size of my thumb. The structure itself was,
indeed, white as alabaster, though I couldn't be certain
that's what it was made of. A series of low galleries
converged at a central nave, over which rose a weathered
onion dome. Smaller structures surrounded the main one,
most now in ruins. I knew, as if by some scrap of n'doro
instinct, that the Heart of the Lion lay in the main
structure, beneath the cracked dome.
I walked along the shallow ravine, where the river
rushed and bubbled through red clay. The temple loomed
before me, the doorless portal of the nearest gallery
yawning like a dragon's maw. After a quick glance overhead
to see if any vultures were circling (they were), I decided
that this was as good a place as any, and stepped over the
threshold, into the dim, stifling interior.
Light shone but faintly through various holes in the
roof, revealing a floor which was once richly inlaid with
painted tiles, and walls once lined by proud white columns.
The interior was hot and dusty, and the entire place had
an air of antiquity and ancient abandonment. I had no idea
who might have built the place -- perhaps the lion-folk
themselves, in some forgotten past era.
Whatever its origin, the place also exuded a tangible
aura of menace, as if everywhere I went, eyes were watching
me just beyond the limits of my vision. Though the place was
silent as a tomb, my instincts told me that there was danger
here, though I couldn't say exactly what it was.
After a few minutes' walk, I had reached the hexagonal
main structure. This place was better preserved than the
hallway; the tile was gleaming white and relatively clean,
with only a few missing. On a low circular dais in the
center of the room, a circle of white columns surrounded
what I could only assume was the Heart of the Lion. It was
a massive white, crystal, suspended at least ten feet off
the ground, hanging without visible support in mid-air. It
glowed with a warm inner light, and my minimal sorcerous
training told me that it was an object of considerable
power. Exactly how much power, and what kind, I didn't know.
Whatever it was, I knew a good number of wizards who would
give several major organs to possess it.
I stood staring at the Heart for some minutes before I
heard it. From nearby, a sound scratched at my ears -- a
sound obviously made by a living thing.
How can I describe it? It was part moan, part plea,
faint but insistent. And it was definitely originated in a
n'doro throat.
I drew my sword, and kept my spear at the ready in my
left hand, then moved carefully, at a crouch, toward the
sound.
It grew louder as I approached the entrance to another
hallway, yawning in dusty darkness. Cautiously, I entered,
hugging the wall, all my senses jumping and tingling with
anticipation. Ahead of me lay a crumbling opening, where
a door might once have been. Heart racing, I stepped
through, and saw what was inside.
There were two n'doro males there, hanging on the
walls, wrists bound by manacles, attached to chains which
were threaded through stout iron staples located nearly
eight feet off the floor. As large as they were, the two
males hung suspended, feet dangling. Both were in bad shape,
tattered and bruised; one was unconscious, proud maned head
lolling limply, while the other gazed at me through slitted
eyes. It was this one which made the horrible sound.
"Please..." he muttered. "Help us... Or kill us, now...
it is the same thing..."
I hastened toward the male, intent on setting him free,
but his tired eyes widened suddenly, as if he had seen
something else, just over my shoulder.
Instinctively, I spun around, sword whirling, only to
strike empty air. There was nothing to be seen, but my
senses registered a malign presence, somewhere nearby. I
struck out again, hoping to strike something, but it did no
good. I whirled again, desperately searching the dimness of
the room for an opponent, and suddenly...
I saw it. A patch of deeper black in the darkness, an
amalgam of serpent and human, with an impossible number
of limbs, and -- worst of all -- twin, slitted eyes, which
glowed red and raced toward me. I threw up my sword, but it
didn't work. Paralysis swept over me, and I felt myself
enwrapped in serpentine coils, and fell into darkness.
Mine was not an especially pleasant awakening. The
constant pain in my shoulders tugged at me, and the dawning
horror of my situation brought be to complete consciousness.
I was now in the position of the two prisoners I'd
seen. I hung, naked and alone, from the wall of one of the
temple's grim, rubble-filled rooms, a few errant rays of
light shining through cracks in the ceiling, illuminating
columns of dust motes. I pulled feebly at my bonds, but I
was held tightly, the weight of my body constantly dragging
me down, seeking to dislocate both shoulders. Already I was
in pain -- a pain which would soon turn to agony.
The shadows nearby stirred, and with a hiss and a
scrape of scales, my captor slithered into view.
Mind you, now -- I've an eye for women of many
different nations, races, and even species. Some might
consider me a little out of the ordinary (I've been called a
pervert by one or two, but they were Kyborist fanatics who
call everyone else "pervert," then go and bend over an altar
boy, so their opinion didn't hold a lot of weight), but I
figure that an attractive woman is an attractive woman,
whether she has skin, fur, scales or feathers.
This one stretched my limits, however. From the waist
up, she was a slender, exotic-looking human woman with long,
shiny black hair and an impish, triangular face, sporting
tiny, pursed red lips and dark, almond-shaped eyes. She was
naked, too, with a pair of substantial breasts and a
slightly-rounded belly. She was done up nicely, too, with a
silver circlet, fanciful ear- and nose-rings, a graceful
necklace in the form of an inverted triangle of bangles
pointing down into the dark valley between her breasts,
armbands, bracelets and rings -- the whole ticket. If it
weren't for the fact that she had four arms, she's have been
a perfectly normal human woman. A stunningly attractive one,
but a human woman nonetheless.
Above the waist, that is.
Below the waist, she was something entirely different --
nothing less than a massive, heavy-bodied snake, emerald
green and black scales, wide white belly scutes and all. She
moved with a sinuous grace, and her entire nature suggested
a deep and sophisticated evil.
Overall, I was intrigued.
"I see you've awakened," she said. No, wait -- she
didn't exactly "say" anything. Her lips did not move, though
her hot, dark eyes stared at me fixedly, and her voice
echoed in my mind, soft, husky and honey-sweet. "I thought
that all the lion-men were guests here. It's a pleasure to
have another."
I didn't respond, but returned her stare with as much
hostility as I could muster.
Her lips curved into a voluptuous, scimitar-smile. "You
needn't speak, lion-man. In fact, the less you speak the
better, for my purposes." She slithered closer, and I could
smell her. I had expected a stench like the basement of the
White Emperor's reptile house, but she actually smelled
clean and spicy -- not at all unpleasant. "You're different,
lion-man," she continued, voice booming inside my skull.
"You're not like the others. I feel a different undercurrent
in your soul. Not like a lion-man. Like..." she paused, and
drew back, like a cobra about to strike. "No, you're more
like a human."
She turned and slithered toward the crumbling doorway.
She glanced back over her shoulder before she left, and
sent me a parting thought.
"That's good, I think. I like the taste of human. Don't
fret, my strange lion-man. I will be back. Sooner than you
think."
Oh, gods, I thought. I'm bound for her cook-pot. As it
turned out, my fate was considerably more interesting.
I hung there through the day, as the sunbeams slanted
and shadows lengthened. I heard a scream from a different
part of the temple -- a long, drawn-out shriek of agony, of
the sort which one expects on the seventh basement level
of the Temple of Slaerth on all ages night. It didn't do my
morale a bit of good.
Of course, I tested my bonds, tried to pull my hands
free, tried to pull the staple from the wall, wear away a
link -- just about everything I had learned at the Stoneburg
Thieves' Guild (where I'd ended up after washing out at the
magic academy). None of it did any good. My enhanced lion-man body
was useless here, and I was as much a prisoner as
the two wretches I'd seen that morning.
By the time my captor returned, I'd managed to wear
myself out pretty thoroughly, a fact which was not lost on
her as she slithered back into the room.
"Oh, my pretty!" The sound of her thoughts explaimed in
my mind, all mock sympathy. "You've tired yourself out. Now,
how can you perform for me, your new lover?"
As I'd expected to simply be eaten, her words came as
something of a shock to me.
"I see you're surprised, sweet lion-man who isn't
entirely a lion-man," she thought. "Oh, I intend to use you
for nourishment -- no doubt of it. I simply feed differently
than you and your kind. Let me demonstrate."
With that, she slithered closer, scales scraping dryly
on the rough stone. Her snake-body sank down to where her
face was at the level of my crotch, and she thought to me
again.
"Oh, you are a fine one. I don't think I have another
lion-man with such a beautiful organ." One of her four hands
reached out and caressed my cock. "I think we'll have some
fun here, my little pet. Amuse me before I feed, my pet."
Despite my exhaustion, I realized that, whether I
wanted to or not, I was growing stiffly erect at the
ministrations of the snake-woman. In a few moments, my cock
had sprung fully and uncomfortably upright, and she was
stroking it enthusiastically with two of her four hands,
gazing at it with loving, but hungry eyes.
"Oh, yes," her thoughts sighed. "A fine, beautiful
organ you have. With a fine, beautiful load of seed, I am
sure. Would you like to show me?"
The hell I would, I thought, straining with what
strength I had remaining, at my chains. I might as well have
been trying to collapse the Rose Quartz Citadel by throwing
pebbles at it -- I was a helpless prisoner, and the snake-woman
seemed intent on pleasuring me for her own enjoyment.
While her first two hands pumped at my cock with slowly
increasing intensity, the snake-woman's other two hands were
busy, stroking my thighs, running up my side, and gently
touching my nipples, sending shock after shock thorugh my
body. Despite my best efforts, I was growing increasingly
excited, and a tidal wave of wanting swept through me.
"I'm having an effect, aren't I?" she asked, her
thoughts dripping with dark carnality. "You want to come for
me, don't you? You want to shoot your seed all over me,
don't you?"
A thin groan escaped my lips as she dug long nails into
the delicate flesh of my nipples. My cock was tight as a
drumhead, and her touch upon it was delicious agony. I was
her prisoner, and she meant me no good, but I still wanted
to come, just as she said.
"Come, lion-man," she thought to me, hands moving in a
blur, now, twin fists tugging, squeezing, caressing my hot,
tight cock-flesh. "Come now and feed me."
Another moan, and I felt blood and energy rushing
toward my center. I couldn't stop now.
"I feel you," her thoughts echoed. "I feel your desire.
Come now. Come now and feed me."
Energy seemed to constrict into a tight ball at the
base of my cock, then burst free violently, sending wracking
spasms through my body, making me strain and heave against
my chains, pain lancing through my shoulders. I came in a
jetting fountain of hot, white fluid, streaking across her
face and shoulders, into her open mouth, and across the
taunt skin of her breasts.
A delighted grin spread across her face; I felt more
than simple orgasmic energy draining from my body. With
my explosion, part of my life force passed from me and into
the snake-woman. I cried out in pain and terror, even as
she wiped sticky white come from her breasts and licked it
from her fingers, and smeared it all over her face, laughing
out loud now.
"You feed me well, lion-man." Her thoughts were blackly
joyous, full of sadistic glee. "You do taste like a human.
Your thoughts are like a humans when you come. I like this,
my strange little pet. You will probably live a few more
days -- I will learn more of you then."
She basked in the dark glow of my stolen essence for a
few more moments, laughing and slithering about, then
departed my chamber.
"Sleep, little lion-man," she told me. "I will take you
again tomorrow. I will take you so many ways before you
die. I will take you in my hand, I will take you in my
mouth, I will take you inside my secret orifices. You will
see, lion-man. You will die, but in death you will know that
you are feeding me, and you will love me for it. You will
see."
Then, she was gone, leaving me to hang from my chains
in battered exhaustion, and wonder how to get myself out of
this mess.
I'm sorry to say that I was unable to come up with any
decent plans.
Snake Woman (she never deigned to share her name) came
back to me again and again. I heard sounds from other parts
of the temple which led me to believe that she was giving
the other captive lion-men the same treatment, draining
their life energies through various sexual gymnastics. Under
her ministrations, the entire species was likely to become
extinct, but she seemed driven by a pitiless wickedness,
deriving apparently orgasmic satisfaction from the fact that
she was, literally, fucking us to death.
And she seemed insatiable. No sooner had the groans --
and, I was saddened to hear, death rattles -- of her other
victims subsided, than she slithered into my chamber, to
take pleasure from my rapidly-weakening body.
She would rise up on her snakey body, thrusting firm
breasts into my face, bidding me suckle at her nipples.
Once, in a fury, I bit into her, sinking white fangs into
demonic flesh, and tasting bitter black blood. I couldn't
tell whether I had plunged her into agony or endless
pleasure -- for her, the two seemed interlinked. Whatever
the cause, she sucked me with rare enthusiasm and cruelty,
bringing me to the edge of orgasm a dozen times before
finally allowing me to come, jetting semen across her cheeks
and onto her red, swollen lips and tongue.
"Ahhhhh," she sighed -- out loud this time -- hot white
come dripping from her chin. "You serve me well," her
thoughts echoed. She rose up again, breasts once more level
with my face. Dried, black blood still clung to her white
flesh. "You think you hurt me, lion-man? You think I feel
pain when your sharp white teeth cut me? If you do, you're
wrong. Agony is pleasure to me, lion-man. I adore the pain
you cause me, and relish every sting. Perhaps I'll let you
rake my flesh with your claws. Perhaps I'll let my hot blood
drip into your mouth. I'll watch my blood splash across your
tawny fur and it will make me come and come again." She drew
back. "A pity that you must die, lion-man. You've become
quite my favorite."
She came to me more often after that. Though up until
that point she had only used her mouth or her hands on me,
or rubbed my cock between her firm breasts until I came,
licking them clean even as I felt more and more of my life
essence drain away, now she truly fucked me. She paralyzed
me with her gaze, and helpless I allowed her to chain me,
spread-eagled, to a low stone altar. Then, her hands stroked
my cock, thighs and nipples until I was erect, and she
crawled atop me, the long, flat scutes beneath her human
appearing belly and navel opening up like a flower to reveal
a soft, pink cunt, where my cock slipped and lodged, sliding
in and out as she rose up on me, plunging me in and out,
gushing hot juices all over my stomach and thighs.
"This is the most exquisite of my people's tortures,"
her thoughts told me, breathlessly, as two arms supported
her body and the other two held my head immobile, staring
straight into her eyes. "It is how we take the lives of our
most favored concubines and catamites."
To my surprise, she began to actually speak. "You
should see what it is like, lion-man. I am from far away,
and someday I will return home, but for now, I will take
what I want from your people. Oh, yesssssss." An orgasm
wracked her, and she shuddered heavily, breasts heaving,
light sweat springing out across her forehead and her
flushed, pink breasts. "Our palaces are places of death by
the most exquisite pleasure. Not a slave or concubine dies
unhappy, lion-man. We take what we want, but we give much in
return. Yesssssss."
After several orgasms, she released me, and slid back
down, leaving a trail of hot juices along my legs, and
finished me off with her mouth, swallowing my come as I
pumped it down her throat, part of my life energy going
with it.
She tongued the last drop of come from the end of my
slowly-deflating cock and looked directly at me, slitted
snake-eyes glittering and malevolent.
"Next time, lion-man." Her thoughts sounded in my mind
once more. "I will take it all from you next time. You will
die to feed me, and your memory will live forever in my
heart. The love of my people is like no other, lion-man,
for with it you will become immortal, your memory living in
the minds of my daughters, and their daughters' daughters,
as the memory of my ancestors' lovers lives in me. Next
time, lion-man," she continued, slithering back to the
floor. "Lie there, and think on it."
After she was gone, I thought on it, sure enough. But I
wasn't filled with the joy she expected of me. Frankly, I
was damned scared.
Is this how it was going to end, I wondered? Chained in
a forgotten temple, my last dregs of life sucked from me
by some hellish monstrosity who thought she was doing me a
favor? And me not even in my own body?
I realized that, despite its limitations, I wanted my
own body back. I wanted to be human, to walk on paved roads,
ride horses, buy dinner in a decent tavern, sleep in a
comfortable bed... I wanted those things now -- perhaps
I'd taken them for granted before, but now even those
minimal comforts seemed more desireable than the palaces of
kings.
I'd always been a failure, I lamented. Making my living
stealing the fruits of another's honest labors, running
from the law when things got too hot, slipping quietly away
whenever any kind of responsibility reared its ugly head...
Gods, I'd had a chance at the Academy, but I didn't
have the knack. Either that, or I was just too gods-damned
lazy. I'd thought that I was trying as hard as I could,
stretching to the limits of my abilities, but I'd been
wrong. I had coasted all the way through the academy,
causing trouble and then trying to avoid blame. Gods, even
the dullest student had been able to turn lead into gold
(mind you, the transformation isn't permanent, which is why
no one with any intelligence will accept gold from a
wizard). The best I'd been able to do was turn lead into
copper...
Blast it all, was there ever a more useless skill, I
thought? Change one worthless metal to another... I might as
well have changed iron to tin; it would have been as
foolish...
Wait...
What remained of my mind finally caught something. Iron
to tin... yes... The process would be identical, and if I
could summon up enough basic magical energy...
But no. Good magicians draw energy from their own souls
-- unscrupulous ones from their apprentices. I couldn't do
it. I had nothing left. Unless...
Unless there was another source of energy somewhere...
You've probably already figured it out, but I think I
can be forgiven for taking a few minutes longer. My mind
was not terribly sharp or swift at this point, given my
imprisonment and mistreatment, but at last it came to me,
shining white in darkness.
The Heart of the Lion.
Nearby, it pulsed with untold magics, and enough energy
to blow a Xeshite dreadnaught out of the water. It was so
far away... If only I could reach it...
Again, my efforts fell short. I was too damned weak,
and I might not have been able to touch the blasted thing
even if I'd been at full strength. I was just never that
good a wizard.
Despair tore at me. So close, I thought, so close. Now,
it was all for nothing -- my escape from the empire, the
idiotic battle on the veldt, my capture, and the love I
still felt for...
Ushandra!
Her image snapped into sharp focus in my mind. Oh, my
dearest. Nukali.
"Wulf?" her voice sounded as if she was right beside
me. "Is that you? Am I dreaming?"
"N-no," I muttered. "Darling. It's me. Help me..."
Her face grew distraught, then vanished from view,
blurring out into nothingness.
My heart sank. Had she really been there, or was I just
delirious? I prayed that, if nothing else, I could at least
really speak to her before the end.
Then, she was back, appearing suddenly in front of me,
a wavering, transparent overlay on the grim chamber. Beside
her stood a tiny, wizened man -- Mokura, the Sholanti
shaman.
He recognized me immediately, despite my changed
appearance.
"Wulf, the pale one," he said, in perfect imperial
common. I didn't have time to be pissed off. "You are
imprisoned. Ushandra tells me to help you, and I am pledged
to help her."
"Can you --" I gasped. "Can you get me out of here?"
"No, Wulf. I can give you the energy you need, however.
The Heart of the Lion is nearby. It was created over ten
thousand years ago, and holds the essences of the n'doro's
ancestors. Use what I give you to reach out and take that
energy into yourself."
Mokura bowed his head, and I felt a sudden influx of
strength, flowing through my battered limbs. Yes, I could
do it...
"Take this, pale one," said Mokura. "Destroy the evil
one, or once she has destroyed the n'doro she will destroy
the Sholanti. I must go now."
"Goodbye, Wulf. I love you, Nukali," Ushandra cried
out. "Stay alive, darling. Please."
Strength grew and multiplied inside me. "I will,
Ushandra," I said. "I love you. Goodbye."
Then they faded away, and I was alone once more.
But it was different now. I was filled with the
shaman's energies, and I felt the Heart of the Lion, glowing
and pulsing close by. I sent magical fingers out from
myself, to touch the great white crystal. I saw legion upon
legion of ancient lion-men and -women, standing around me,
sending strength back to me. Yes. They knew that I needed
help.
White-hot magic filled my heart and soul. The words I
had learned at the academy formed on my unfamiliar, inhuman
lips, and the images of transformation formed in my mind.
Yes.
My chains began to weaken. Iron softened, thinned, grew
bright. I tugged, and felt the once-iron, now-tin, give
way metal links pulling, bending, tearing. One hand came
free with a clang, and the other followed a moment later.
With a single swipe of my claws, I shattered the links
confining my ankles, and leaped to my feet, atrophied
muscles protesting, straining, but holding the weight. I
threw my arms up, hands balled into fists, and roared.
"Uuuuuuusutuuuuuu!"
It echoed through the empty chambers, and through the
tiny rooms with their chained prisoners. It boomed back
upon me, again and again, and I knew the Snake Woman must
have heard it.
My hunch was confirmed a moment later, when black
clouds suddenly rolled down the corridor, like ink boiling
through still water.
"YOU FOOL!" the thought exploded inside my skull. "YOU
ARROGANT ANIMAL! YOUR DEATH WILL BE ANYTHING BUT PLEASANT!"
I didn't reply, but leaped away from the inky cloud,
H Hracing down the corridor, toward the central domed section,
where the Heart of the Lion glowed whitely.
The clouds rolled after me, a tidal wave of blackness.
I sprinted up the shallow steps leading to the central
dais, and stood with my back to the Heart of the Lion. The
dark clouds billowed up the steps, and in an instant
surrounded me.
I was plunged into blackness, and felt claws rake my
chest.
"Little lion-man," the voice dripped honey, now that
she thought she had me at her mercy. "Your death could have
been wonderful..."
The power of the Heart of the Lion surged through me. I
saw images of hundreds of lion-men, long dead, and with
their power I thrust a beam of light through the darkness.
The black became gloom, and ahead of me I saw a shadowy
figure, surmounted by two glowing red eyes. I coiled to
spring, then launched myself at the snake woman, my own
claws finding flesh.
A pained hiss dragged out into a scream, and the
blackness vanished. I held the snake woman in a deathgrip,
my claws and teeth lacerating her foul flesh. She struggled
against me, but the power in the Heart of the Lion was
unstoppable.
"No!" she screamed, out loud, forgoing her mind-talk.
"You cannot!"
I ignored her as denials became entreaties, and finally
subsided into tearful begging. I hefted her writhing form
over my head and flung her bodily against one of the white
pillars. She struck heavily and fell, still writhing and
moaning.
Behind me the Heart of the Lion flared to a new hot,
white intensity. I turned to see the giant crystal opening
like a flower, a glowing tunnel appearing in the side,
leading to either the center of the crystal itself, or to
some unimaginable realm beyond.
"Give the devil to us," a thousand voices urged. "We
will see to her punishment."
Like a man in a trace, I complied, gathering up the
snake woman's feebly moving body and carrying her toward
the opened crystal.
"No..." her pleas were far beyond terror. Her inhuman
eyes showed a horrified realization dawning, that her crimes
would soon be answered for a thousandfold. "Please... I'll
serve you... be your slave..."
"What kind of slave would a devil make?" I snarled.
"You sought to kill me and my people. See how the n'doro
nuka avenge themselves."
She shrieked and fought to escape as I once more lifted
her up, then flung her into the white-hot inferno of the
crystal. A final, hopeless wail sounded in my ears, as the
crystal closed itself and was once more whole.
"She will see what it is to suffer and never, never
die," echoed a voice in my head. "The n'doro are hunters,
and we shall hunt her for all eternity."
I shuddered as the Heart of the Lion returned to its
normal warm, white glow. Evil she had been, and terrible her
punishment was.
But, I wondered, did even the most wicked of creatures
deserve such a fate?
I simply didn't know.
I spent the remainder of the day seeking out the snake
woman's captives and setting them free, wrenching iron
staples from walls and breaking manacles, sometimes
softening them with magic if they proved too recalcitrant.
She had taken over a hundred n'doro
males, and of these only sixty or so survived. All were
tired, starved, and virtually at the point of death, but I
suspected that the grateful females of the veldt would see
to their health once they returned home.
Our various possessions had been flung into a common
room. Here, I reclaimed my sword, spear and other
essentials, and returned to see to the liberated lion-men.
After a few discreet inquiries, I discovered that the
male from "my" pride still lived, as well. His name was
Chuma, and I told him I had seen his females.
"You have?" he grunted, some of his old territoriality
returning. "Did you touch them?"
I held up a hand. "Perish the thought," I replied.
"They simply asked me to find you. I would never touch
another male's pride."
It seemed to satisfy Chuma. I decided that my skill as
a liar had survived my transformation, after all.
"We will remember you, Wulf," Chuma told me. "We will
sing songs of how you saved our people. Perhaps we will meet
again one day."
I hoped not, especially if his females spilled the
whole story.
"I am on a quest," I told him. "I must go to the land
of the hairless ones. Perhaps someday I will return."
Chuma grunted. He and his friends had decided I was
some kind of wandering mystic or something, so my behavior
was excused as understandable eccentrcity.
"Good hunting, Wulf," he said. "My females and I will
sing for you tonight."
I think they've already sung for me, I thought grimly.
Hope I'm far away by the time you find out.
I bid the lion-men farewell, and set off across the
veldt once more.
It was many days before I finally saw what I might call
civilization. I hunted the veldt, brought down zebra and
water buffalo, and once I was forced to flee from an angry
elephant, but in general my journey was uneventful.
On the extreme northern tip of this scrap of continent,
Ushandra had told me, lay the city of Vang, where our fleet
had put in for supplies. It had seemed horrifically hot and
filthy to me on our way south, but now it looked like a
virtual city of the gods. I approached its outskirts with a
light heart; a ship home was only hours away.
When a woman looked up from her wash, saw me and
screamed, I realized that something was terribly wrong.
You guessed it -- I was still in n'doro form; the old
fakir's spell still hadn't worn off.
I tried to mumble an apology or explanation, but it
didn't come out anything close to intelligible. In an
instant, the mud street was full of Veldtlanders, some with
weapons, others with nets. Hopelessly outnumbered, I turned
to flee.
Too late. A pair of bolos entangled my feet and I went
sprawling. An insant later, a net fell over me and I was
helpless.
Shit.
As usual, I was on the verge of safety, and the gods
threw up on me. Typical.
I was thrown into a dank hole for a few days while the
locals argued what to do with me. I tried to reason with
my jailer, a mental defective with no tongue, but got
nowhere. After an interminable period, eating boiled lentils
and licking water from the rocks, I was once more bound, and
shoved out of the cell at spearpoint.
Out into the blinding sun I was marched, pushed along
by a squad of brawny local militiamen. They seemed to be of
uncertain ancestry, and I let them know it in no uncertain
terms. Though amused at a cat-man who could pretend to speak
(they apparently didn't understand imperial common), my
captors were unmoved, and uncermoniously pushed and dragged
me into an open courtyard, crammed with sweating individuals
of a hundred different races and nationalities, and up onto
a low platform.
Oh, gods, was this what I thought it was?
"Lorrrrrrdzzzz and ladeeeeeezzz!" declared an obnoxious voice in
heavily-accented Litharnan from nearby. "Our next item up for sale is a
real novelty! A virile, muscular lion-man from the far Veldt Plains. As
most people know, these savages rarely submit to capture, preferring death
to enslavement. This individual is apparently a somewhat cowardly example,
as he has made no moves toward self-annihilation..."
I stared in stunned silence. A fucking slave sale! Now
I'd seen it all...
"I'll start the bidding at one hundred suns!"
I tried feebly to speak in imperial, but one of the
guards cuffed me heavily and I shut up. It was all going too
H Hfast... I couldn't think...
"One hundred suns!"
"One hundred and ten!"
"One hundred and fifteen!"
I was apparently a popular item. The two main bidders
were a jaded-looking White Empire nobleman with a sneering
expression, and a grizzled warrior of uncertain nationality
-- probably a gladiator master wanting an exotic fighter for
his stable. Neither looked especially appetizing.
"Three hundred!"
"Three hundred and thirty!"
The auctioneer, a fat Veldt-lander man clad in a
leather breechcloth and baldric, seemed pleased, and let the
bidding go on without interference.
"Four hundred and ten!"
"Four hundred and fifty!"
"Five hundred!"
That last bid, from the foppish nobleman seemed to be
the winner. The gladiator looked unhappy and shrugged.
"Five hundred is the bid!" declared the auctioneer.
"Any further bids? Very well, then --"
"One thousand golden suns!"
A stunned hush fell over the throng. I sought out the
source of the bid, and my jaw dropped.
She lay on a plushly-upholstered platform, held aloft
by four brawny male bearers, who were secured to the sedan
by gold chains around their necks. She was dressed in gauzy
trousers and voluminous clouds of pink fabric, and gazed
straight at me with red, gleaming eyes, their natural slant
enhanced with dark kohl, in sharp contrast to her white,
white skin. She wore a jeweled headdress, with a triangle of
red gems in the exact center of her forehead, and coils of
snow-white hair piled in an elaborate coif.
No one moved or spoke for a long moment, until the
auctioneer realized what was happening and shouted, "Sold!
To the Countess Sylara of Xesh!"
I sagged in my bonds. Sold to a Xeshite noblewoman...
Gods, what horrors did she have planned?
And that is how I, Wulf the Freelance, sole survivor of
Lord Heatham's expedition to the Veldt Lands, came to be a
slave on the jungle estate of the wicked and perverse
Xeshite noblewoman, Sylara. As her trained team of
hippocampi towed Sylara's sybaritic pleasure-barge out of
the harbor the next day, under close escort by a squadron
of Xeshite cutters, I realized that my Veldt Lands travels
were over, for the moment at least.
What the hell was next?
Once more, and not for the last time in my life, I had
no idea.
--END--
[The end for now; Wulf returns in "Jungle Moons," and learns
that certain women really dig lion-men as social companions...]
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