Uleni's Gamble (17 page)

Ross nodded. “It will be done your majesty.”

Anton said, “We can handle the city after they leave. I’ll also review the taxes, I have a feeling they are much too high, so at least we can give them good news along with the stuff they won’t want to swallow,” turning to Nicole he said, “Nicci, you’ll have to explain all this to father, and make sure he knows it was your man’s idea, would you?”

Nicole laughed vibrantly and said, “You bet I will. I’m sure our father will have words with him about the succession.”

He tried to look innocent and failed. He already had an idea about that. Actually a couple, but he didn’t think the world was ready for a queen yet, which was a shame. Nicole would look incredibly hot in purple, and be a brilliant leader. Of course, if the dragon child they had was a girl, they might not have a choice, unless the king gets another mate…

Still, it was the best thing he thought, putting Anton in charge here, for Abelaweth, for the people of Egeria, and hopefully for peace…

They decided to leave in the morning and head back to Uleni, possibly stopping at the capitol of Abelaweth on the way and letting the king in on Anton’s plans that he reluctantly admitted was suggested by him. The now King Anton, had the servants set them up a permanent suite in the guest wing. No doubt he would miss his sister and hope for visits in the future. This suite actually had three bedrooms, the extra for Trina.

Still, just moving as their group it would take two or three days instead of two weeks to visit, if it wasn’t so dangerous he might try and persuade Sally to learn travelling. He hoped however that their constant trips across the continent would be cut down drastically in the future.

At dinner Anton looked annoyed and filled them in.

“You wouldn’t believe how many oppressive laws there are here, I have done a lot of crossing out and adding. I might have to put off tomorrow’s expeditions another day, or at the least they will get a late start, possibly around noon tomorrow for me to finish up. The tax part is easy, I just wrote up a simple code and threw out the crap they had.”

Nicole and Sally offered to help, but Anton shook his head and said, “It’s a one person job really, but thanks for the offer. I should be done before lunch tomorrow, if I work on it some more tonight,” he made a face, “You could talk my intended mate into moving here though, and set her up with an escort if she agrees when you get back to Abelaweth?”

Nicole grinned, “Consider it done.”

After dinner they retired to their rooms, and Sara claimed his hand and pulled him into the second room. He smiled as the sound cut off when he entered the room, Sally must have already spelled it for privacy. She pulled him into a passionate kiss that had his pleasure hardening as she pressed her soft supple body against his.

He felt his heart race as he broke the kiss, cupped her face and asked, “Sara, I love you, for a long time now, long before we ever touched and you are more precious than life to me. Would you be my mate, have my children, and spend the rest of our days together?”

She had tears in her eyes when she said, “Yes, please yes.”

He felt his magic reach out, as hers did, and a bond formed between them, sealed by their love and oath.

They came together and kissed, softly at first but then it built, became hungry, passionate. He was fully extended, pushed up against her stomach as she melded her perfect sexy body to his. He slowly started to strip her clothes off and she eagerly returned the favor.

She whispered, “I love you, take me hard my mate.”

There was no doubt or fear in her voice, yet he still worried about her feeling trapped, so he would avoid missionary, and hope that was enough.

He lifted her up by her ass, and felt her legs go around him. He could feel the moist heat against his member, the promise of her tight silken delight caused his manhood to jump, pushing against her swollen wet lips. She was more than ready, so he picked her up a little higher, and dropped her down, his length impaling her velvety folds and driving into her hot wet heaven.

He carried her toward the bed as they kissed still fully joined. He put her on the edge of the bed, grabbed her legs and pulled them up and over his shoulders. Her beautiful full lips parted as she gasped and her piercing green eyes rolled back with her body. She arched her back and swiveled her hips as he started rocking in and out of her tight passage.

Her breasts started to sway and rock as he pumped in and out of her harder and harder. When he reached out his hands and pinched her nipples while gently twisting she cried out.

“Goddess Justin, fuck that’s amazing, don’t stop!”

He couldn’t take his eyes off her beautiful face as he brought her to ecstasy, her every reaction and sound coming through her lips held him captive. His length was squeezed and milked by her lush silken heat. It was harder to pull back during her bliss, he only did so half way, but didn’t slow down as he continued to slam into her hard and fast. He could feel her body tremble as her orgasm rolled directly into another.

He gasped as his legs went numb, her passage got tighter as he swelled inside of her, “Sara, I can’t hold on any more.”

She said breathlessly, “Fill me, I want to feel you fill me, make me yours and give us a child.”

He felt her body tremble a third time as her velvety core started to greedily milk his baby batter. When he started to come down, he gently caressed her long legs from foot to inner thigh, up and down as he stared deeply into her eyes.

He decided to try doggie style for their next round, not only did she not feel trapped by it, she was wildly enthusiastic as he hit places in her that she had never felt before. They spent quite a bit of time with each other before retiring for the night, completely sated, to the main bedroom with the other ladies.

*

Cytherea was both happy and troubled. Happy that Justin had found a way not only to stop Riese, but initiated the process that would make Egeria a better place to live for women. She didn’t interfere at all because of free will, but that didn’t mean she had no opinions on how things should be. He also took the unplanned fifth as his mate, which made her smile, she thought he deserved every happiness he could find.

What worried her though, was him giving her his free will and allowing her to work through him wouldn’t be enough this time, and she had no idea at all what would be. Ares was not truly evil, he was just a petty vindictive child of a god. She wished he would just withdraw from her world now that he had no mortals worshipping him. It had to be a drain keeping that connection with no power coming back to him.

She sighed, he would never do that though, he’ll bide his time until someone else decides they want to worship another god, then pounce on the person and make them an offer. Maybe he would grow up one day as she had, but she didn’t want him playing with her world in the meantime. She just wasn’t sure what was needed.

She smiled as she felt a hand on her shoulder.

“Do you not already know the answer daughter? Would it surprise you, that you not having it yet makes me proud of you? The old you would have figured it out right away. Not that it really matters, the question is, will Justin figure it out…”

She pondered what he had told her and she knew she must be missing the obvious. What did her old self want that no longer held appeal to her? She flushed when the answer came to her, it was something her old self would have wanted, demanded, and abused.

*

Nothing quite drove home the fact how far Sara had come from the scared mousy maid she had been than the looks of respect and fear from the people she used to work with, and for. She didn’t really feel that different inside, but as a mate of the Flame of Cytherea, things were vastly different for her now as far as how she was treated by the people around her.

It felt odd to her, and wasn’t truly important, what was significant to her was her new family. She couldn’t remember a time in her life she had been happier. She didn’t like the way the servants feared her though, and had considered trying to talk to them about it. She realized though, that it wouldn’t help, back then she wouldn’t have believed it either.

She hoped it wouldn’t take long for them to come to the truth of it, Anton would not be a harsh king and changes were coming, good changes that would take time to be believed. She caught herself touching her abdomen again and blushed. She was hoping she was pregnant, but if she wasn’t yet, she knew it wouldn’t be long…

*

Justin kissed Katrina fiercely after she woke him up in the usual way. They would be travelling in a little while, although now they could do so in their group of seven and at higher speed. It would only take a few days to reach the capitol in Abelaweth, then maybe two more days to reach Uleni and end this. Then he could get back to what he wanted to do, help run an inn, heal people, and help raise his family.

He released Kat as she got up, then enjoyed waking his other mates with roaming hands and kisses before escaping their sleepy wrath. He slipped into the main room of the suite as breakfast was being delivered. He waited until the ladies joined him, then they dug in before the food could get cold.

Anton came in as they were finishing up packing and handed him a letter.

“I expect you will explain things to my father, but give him this for me will you? It has my own thoughts on it all, and will tell him what he needs to know, about things that you won’t be able to answer.”

He nodded and said, “I will. Good luck Anton, we will be back to visit before you know it.”

They all said goodbye to Anton, and gave Nicole a few minutes in privacy with her brother before leaving. It felt good to run again at such a high speed and he enjoyed the adrenaline rush. He would have to figure out a way to find an excuse to do so more often. Although he was sure he would be tired of it after a few days. It had to be exhausting for Nora and Sally as well, but he kept them restored more or less constantly. Just their small group didn’t take too much out of him.

He still wasn’t sure what they would do about the altar and Ares. He had strong feelings what he had done last time wouldn’t work, and it didn’t feel like a pessimistic worry, it felt more like the morning he had awoken with that bad feeling. Eventually though, he stopped focusing on it, the answer not coming to him, so he let it settle in the back of his mind.

What he felt wasn’t exactly a new feeling either, he had known for a while it wouldn’t work. At first he had just ignored the feeling, choosing instead to focus on the immediate problem of Riese and his army. With that behind him, and only five days until they confronted it, maybe six if they spent a day with Nicole’s father, it became his focus.

He wondered if maybe the books currently sealed up with the stone altar would reveal a way, perhaps he could get in the room and back out and look for another way. He continued to let his mind work on the problem though, he wouldn’t depend on that being the answer.

The one thing he hated about this form of travel was it made it impossible to hold any meaningful conversation, though he did have a really nice view of Katrina’s and Sara’s sexy asses. Shallow perhaps, but something to distract his mind. For him, most of the time, new ideas happened when he wasn’t focused on the problem and just let it simmer in the back of his mind.

Something did occur to him, but it wasn’t very helpful for dealing with Ares. It was all the other things that had been bothering him. Things that he hadn’t had time to really think through. The fact there were humans on this world. The half truths Celia the high priestess had told in her story. The books of forbidden knowledge written in Latin…

Perhaps the goddess did come to this world a couple of thousand years ago, if that were true, maybe she didn’t come alone. Could she have come with her devout followers? Maybe those devout followers had texts and books about the other gods, and demons. But why hide that?

He sighed, he would probably never know the full truth, but he was pretty sure the ancestors of the people on this world were from Earth. Nothing else really made sense to him, although he had to admit he had huge gaps in his knowledge. Maybe there was another way to explain it, but it felt right to him. As for why they came here he would never know.

The animals were further proof. Deer, rabbits, tigers, birds, and many other animals that could be found on earth were here as well. Even if as unlikely as it was, there was some kind of convergent evolution that created humans here, the idea of adding other animals to that was absurd.

It was an odd concept, the Greek gods were real, perhaps they all left earth at the same time for different worlds? He never did pay much attention during English class when they went over Greek mythology and was regretting that now. He was burning with curiosity about it. Still, if he had to die before he could get answers to the reason why, he was more than happy to delay the learning of it.

They stopped for lunch at one of the villages, none of them were very into the idea of eating trail rations or even having to cook. After the long hard run they just wanted to relax a bit before continuing for the rest of the day. They stopped at a tavern and ate in the common room.

He said after trying the meat, “This isn’t all that bad, good really.”

Nora asked, “Where you expecting it to be bad?”

He shrugged, “They don’t have much, between taxes and then Riese stripping the villages as he passed…”

Katrina pointed out, “True, but they can still hunt for more meat, it will be the winter they’ll have trouble with, unless they can get another harvest in before then.”

Nicole said softly, “My brother won’t let them starve; if he can’t supply aid from the kingdom’s food stores he’ll contact my father for help.”

They talked about Egeria, and how long the country would take to recover from recent events for the rest of the meal before heading out. The people there seemed wary, but friendly enough, and they didn’t have any problems…

*

Katrina happily hunted for dinner as the others set up the tent. They had planned to stop at a village again, but when it started to get dark they realized they wouldn’t quite make it, so stopped instead. By the end of tomorrow they would be back in Abelaweth and a good ways towards the capitol.