“Hello!” The wolfkin said in thickly accented Dyo’i’ian as she stared up into his yellow eyes. She felt a full body blush rush up her spine as the awkward situation caught up to her. She struggled to stand upright, which forced her to lean more into his chest briefly before she was able to get her feet underneath her, which seemed to make him grin more.
“Hi.” She said weakly, as she stood up and stumbled back from him explaining awkwardly, “sorry about that, I was just trying to move away from someone.”
“Is that what happened?” He chuckled, “I was watching the juggling and then suddenly there was a pretty girl in my arms. It was quite magical.”
“Oh, you’re a charmer.” Dya said unimpressed as she stood up strait and looked up at the wolfman. He was about 3-four inches taller than her, a not insurmountable height difference. She relaxed a little as the crowd moved around them and the lights floated overhead.
“I do try to be charming.” He grinned, “Especially when the girl falls into my grasp.”
Dya couldn’t help herself but blush and snicker a little. Yeah, he had her there.
“You have experience with this sort of thing, then?” She asked, tossing her head back and looking at him out of the corner of her eye, and it was his turn to laugh.
“Not nearly as much as I’d like.” He admitted, and then reached his hand out in a human style greeting, “So why don’t we try this again? I’m Ponti, how wonderfully normal to meet you!”
“I’m Dya.” She took his hand, shook it, then pulled it up into a flat palm on palm greeting, mer style. “And it is nice to meet you; normally.”
He laughed and gave an uncertain little circle, which she mirrored and gave a soft laugh as well as she pulled her hand back.
“I’m surprised you didn’t give me the traditional beastkin greeting.” Dya said.
“Most non-beasts find the exchanging of smells too forward a greeting.” Ponti said, his eyebrows raised, “Though I certainly wouldn’t mind a chance to rub cheeks with you.”
Dya blinked and looked at him in surprise as a blush creeped through her cheeks. “I thought it was just air kisses.”
“That watered down gesture? I’ve seen the domesticated kin around here exchange that greeting, it is just a ghost of the actual exchange.” Ponti said dismissively, “It tells you nothing of the other person.”
“You can’t smell someone well enough from a couple inches away?” Dya asked skeptically.
“You don’t touch, you don’t exchange scents, you don’t get the upsoron-- the – the- the feel of the other person like you do when you give a proper greeting.” Ponti said passionately, grasping the air as though he could grasp the words from the sky to say. “Here, let me show you. We’re strangers, right? So we greet each other as strangers, right foot to right foot.”
He stepped around to face her “properly,” his boot next to her bare foot, and Dya felt her eyes dilate in alarm as he stepped in close to her.
“Now as strangers this will be brief, but you press your shoulder against mine and we rub cheeks. Breathe deeply to catch my scent.” And he did exactly as he said. Dya pushed back up against his firm shoulder, and giggled as she felt his slightly scruffy cheek glide past hers. His scent was all pine, sweat and a bit of spicey something.
And then he was gone and he had stepped back, grinning. “See? Much better than, how did you put it? Air kisses?”
“I-” Dya started, stopped, giggled, and then started again, “I don’t know how to respond to that. We don’t deal much in scents under the water- breathing deeply under water is a bad idea.”
Ponti blinked. “But I thought that sharks could smell blood?”
“That’s sharks, not mer. Not most mer anyhow, and those that can don’t smell it, they taste it.” Dya stuck out her tongue and waggled it a little. “We hold our breath, not inhale the water.”
“Oh!” Ponti said, and then started laughing. “So you must find the smell thing extremely strange.”
“Extremely.” Dya laughed back, “but very-“ nice she stopped herself from saying, instead saying, “interesting.”
That’s when the guard showed up. They were a pair of mer in wraps and carrying thick looking hooks—more cudgels than piercing weapons. They looked perfectly human, with dark skin and long black hair. One had dark shark eyes and the other a tobacco brown that hinted at a golden or orange when in the water. Honestly, the only reason Dya knew they were mer was because they were mer, she doubted that Ponti would be able to tell except that they were suddenly looming over him and asking her in Jayin, “Is this beast bothering you?”
“No, he’s not the one.” Dya shook her head, suddenly brought back to how she had met Ponti in the first place. She looked back over where she came from and sure enough the creep was still back on the edge of shadows, glaring at Ponti darkly and looking around at the other mer. She didn’t see his friend nearby but he wouldn’t be far, she was sure. “The human looking lurker with the face like a fang tooth eel. He and his friend, a wolf-pup, were talking like followers of Ochleton.”
The male guard frowned, and the female got a disgusted look on her face. “It’s almost always the young idiots that speak that way. They usually get straightened out once they get past their raging desires and find willing partners.”
“If they can find willing partners.” The male guard snorted.
“If the price is right, there is always someone willing.” The female guard shrugged. “At least as long as they treat their paid partner with respect.”
“We’ll take them to the tents. That’ll probably keep boys like them busy for the night.” The male guard headed off towards the creep, who was starting to edge up on another mer girl. The female guard smirked and swung wide, keeping an eye out for the creep’s partner.
“What was that about?” Ponti asked, having wisely taken a step back from Dya when the guards loomed out of the crowd.
“That boy over there was creeping up on me earlier, so I sent for help.” Dya said coolly, facing where the guard had laid a firm grip on the shoulder of first boy, but watching Ponti out of the corner of her eye, “He and his friend are going to be invited to the other end of the festival.”
The wolfkin next to her frowned and then jerked away in surprise to see her staring at him with her side eye. She turned her face to him and smiled, satisfied that she’d not see anymore of those two creeps for the rest of the night.
“Why wouldn’t you just get help yourself?” He asked, now giving her a very confused look.
“I just told you that I did.” She said, frowning.
“No, I mean, why wouldn’t you go to get the guards yourself?” He insisted.
“What, and give away my position to our prey?” Dya shook her head. “They’d have run off and circled back around. This way the guard will handle them and put them where they won’t do any harm.”
“Your prey? Was this a planned trap?” Ponti asked warily.
“Hardly, but we are in a spawning. Don’t know what happens on land, but in the ocean, when there is a spawning, the predators come out to eat. Same principle here, only for the intelligent species it’s a little different so we as a community plan for it. Young fry like that are rediverted to the exhibition tents at the end of the beach where they can enjoy themselves with a little coin or a bit of … willingness to work.” Dya gave a single shoulder shrug to cover the myriad of options that last bit covered. “The older predators are delt with much more harshly, if they can’t be content with what is freely given or what they can pay for. The fish farms will have fresh chum in their waters tonight.”
Ponti blinked, looked at her, looked at the waters, looked at First Boy being marched down the pier, and then burst out laughing.
“That’s what I love about you merfolk. So strait forward and practical.” He smirked. “Teenage boys are horny? Send them to the titty tent to take care of business.”
Dya sighed, “No, a horny teenage boy can try to find a willing horny teenage girl to make out with. What happened here is that teenage boys were being inappropriate and aggressive, so they’re being kicked out of the portion of the festivities where they could do harm. They try to corner a girl in the exhibition and they might find themselves on the receiving end of a harsh lesson or learning that they like harsh lessons, depending on the mood of the girl.”
“See? Practical!” The beastkin crowed.
“What would you do back in your home town?” Dya asked, taking a look over at the tavern. The wolf-boy took the hint easily and took a step towards the tavern with her.
“Oh, kick his ass and send him to go lick his dick in the shadows.”
“Uh-” Dya was not sure she’d heard that right, “don’t you mean lick his wounds?”
“That too.” The boy gave a rakish smile. “We beastkin have high stats in flexibility, something to remember if you’re ever looking for a fun time.”
“ohmygod” Dya breathed and giggled feeling like her eyes were going to pop right out of her head while she was sure she was now a bright red mer-girl instead of a bright orange one. The beastkin boy laughed and confirmed it.
“That is a lovely color on you!” Ponti’s wicked grin was topped with a wink, and then to soften it all, “Let me buy you a drink, to make up for my forward behavior.”
Dya rolled her eyes but she smiled and went with him against her better judgement. She was having fun, they were surrounded by people, and the tavern was well lit. She could hear the waves call to her nearby too, so if nothing else, she could just go under water, right?
----------------------------------------
True to his word, Ponti went and got her a cider while Dya maneuvered around the crowded tavern and found them a place to rest. A small low table opened up in the performance area, where a troop was performing the kayzhayǂ , to the amusement of the crowd.
“What’s this then?” Ponti asked as he sat down and gave her the mug of cider, sharp and sweet on her tongue.
“You’ve never seen the kayzhayǂ?” Dya asked, licking her lips.
“Not from this area, my new pack is travelling south for the season.” Ponti shrugged, “I’ve got a lot to learn as we go. They’re training me in my job, I just have to choose between hunter or wilder as primary to get started.”
Dya nodded, a little jealous of the clarity he had, but only a little. “Well, the kayzhayǂ are the stories of the beginnings of the Mer. They’re pretty good entertainment for festivals, and there’s enough of them to vary for different festivals.”
“Wait, the beginnings of the Mer? As in multiple?” Ponti asked, an eyebrow raised over his mug of cider. “You don’t have just one creation myth?”
“Nope, and they’re not so much myths as legends.” Dya said, taking another sip. “They have a root in reality but… well, it’s been a long time and figuring out how to preserve writing underwater was a pretty big task for the clerks. Ink is far to much of a solution to work under the waves.”
Ponti gave her a confused look and hid behind a thoughtful slurp of his drink. “I suppose I could see the problem.”
Dya rolled her eyes, and moved on. “The Mer are the chosen of Salt, but Salt didn’t just choose one set of people. She chooses people who exhibit characteristics she admires, who in turn reach out to her in their moment of need.”
She nodded at the stage where a mer dressed in fancy garb spouted fake blood and fought a beautiful but failing fight against a very large man wearing a hat with horns. Behind them black dressed actors skipped back and forth with painted waves, growing higher and higher to signify the fight drawing closer to the sea.
Ponti let out a strangled chuckle and Dya smiled, glanced at him, and then looked away, resisting the urge to laugh. The actors with the waves were being a bit much and were distracting from a fight that was clearly over-practiced and a bit stilted. The two actors were shouting at each other the traditional lines of the Oyna, so Dya started to interpret for Ponti.
“He says, ‘You fight well. It is disgusting and unbecoming for one such as you to learn to fight.’
“Now they say, ‘I learned because I must, to do otherwise was to languish in terror, to never be able to stand up for myself and say that I am worth more than this gilded cage you have put me in.’”
“Whoa, that pissed him right off.” Ponti said, as the horned hat warrior roared.
“He’s saying that the cage is made of gold and the chains of finest silver, he would never stoop so low as to try to put a his treasured rabbit in a gilded cage.” Dya said.
Ponti let out a disbelieving laugh and Dya tipped her mug to him. “It’s even more over the top in the original Jayin, especially the rest of it.
“’I am the Oyna, the ruler of the Golden Hoard!’” Dya tried to give a manly growl but failed and both of them laughed quietly. “His entire thing was that he was the richest, mightiest, most powerful in all the land. If it was beautiful and unique it was his to take, and he would take it. But Niepa didn’t want to be taken, and, oh. Here! Here they go. They say, ‘Belong to you? I would rather belong to the sea!’”
The actor playing Niepa made a grand sweeping gesture with bot their arms and scooted back on the tips of both toes, and the actors with the waves swirled around and past them, while Oyna took on a shocked position and expression and then scooted off the stage while moving his upper body as little as possible. Actors switched out regular waves for waves with some sort of shiny metal laid into them, or maybe mother of pearl, Dya wasn’t sure, but the effect was “look, its magical water now!” Then they moved the waves in and out in complicated patterns while Niepa spun in circles and their opulent costume came off them in layers to reveal a simple shift top and the actor having transformed into Mer form.
Now it was clear they were a siren, with beautiful hair, dewy eyes and gorgeous tail—just the perfect image of the beautiful mermaid and they opened their mouth to sing a song of praise to Salt while the actors in black carried them around the stage. It was objectively ridiculous, but their voice was so beautiful, they were so beautiful that the strangeness of the scene was forgiven by all who saw it. That was, Dya thought ruefully, probably why the Oyna still had this as the traditional ending after so many generations. Siren’s magic let them get away with the most bizarre performances.
When the song had been sung and all applauded, because of course a siren would be applauded, the performers bowed and the stage was closed to be reset for the next of the kayzhayǂ. Ponti took a drink and Dya swirled hers in the bottom of her cup, enjoying the moment.
“So are they all like that? These stories?” Ponti asked, gesturing to the black clad actors carrying props and waves across the stage.
“Like what? Dramatic? Of course. Ending with a siren’s song? Not really, almost all the core jobs get some show time. Well, except for the children’s march, which of course just has children. Though, that one is only shown in the early morning and mainly to the parents and families of the participating children, bless Salt and all of her ormers.”
“Ormers?” Ponti asked
“Yes. They look like ears that are stuck to the rocks so they can’t hear.” Dya said. Ponti Laughed.
“The March of the children comes from a time when a city was at siege and they ran out of food. The orphans were of course the first to go hungry and the first for the more—uh—cannibalistically open minded people to go after for food.” Dya stumbled, almost saying bestial but catching herself in time.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
Ponti smirked and said, “It’s not cannibalism if they’re not the same species.”
“But if they’re intelligent?”
“Morally objectionable still.” He agreed.
“So, the kids turned to Salt and she took them in. They’re why mer babies can breathe water, apparently. Or that’s how the story goes: she called them into the waves and in they marched and never looked back.” Dya shrugged. “The mer swimming by took them in and swam them far far away from that warring city.”
“Wait, mer babies can breath water but the adults can’t?” Ponti asked.
“Yup. We’re amphibious.” Dya grinned. “Ribbit.”
Ponti laughed again. “Well, you don’t look like frogs. Believe me, I’ve seen plenty of frogkin and salli-kin. They’re cute but they got nothing on you.”
“Yeah, we’re mammalian in most ways.” Dya shrugged and drank the last of her cider. “It’s really just such a weird mix of characteristics that makes it clear how much we are a magical race—how much we are a god’s race, you know?”
“Yeah, tell me about it. Been born looking human but then Wolf decides they like how you act and suddenly you start to have fuzzy ears and crave raw meat.” Ponti took a last drink from his cup and signaled for another from a passing barmaid. Dya asked for some sazhle too, to put some food in her stomach. Her head was feeling a little poofy, and the crispy apple and cheese munchies sounded perfect to help anchor it in place.
“Had a friend who used to collect marbles and then one day he sprouts a feather crest, starts climbing trees and stealing any bright thing that isn’t guarded. Says he can’t help it, the shinies just call to him, said that Magpie said it’d take a while for that to even out.”
“Oof.” Dya shook her head. “That’s rough. At least our jobs don’t come with personality shifts.”
“It’s more like primal urges to do the things that we wanted to do anyhow. Just stronger.” He gave a dangerous wolf’s grin and leaned towards her. “It helps us, really, to get to know who we are and what we want, deep inside.”
“And apparently what your friend wanted was shinies.” Dya said, booping the wolfkin in the nose, making him laugh.
“Yes, that is what he wanted; I suppose. He hadn’t taken a job yet when I left but most magpie-kin end up in either arts or rouge jobs. Sometimes both.” He accepted his mug from the barmaid while Dya took her sazhle and another cup of cider.
“So the kids fled being eaten, the siren fled being kept in a cage.” Ponti said as they got resettled. “Seems to be a theme there.”
“Right. Let’s break that. Relia killed the man who killed her sisters and offered his head in exchange for fins. Batutho meditated in the shallows for one hundred days and nights, offering himself to Salt out of pure love. Gueduk sought to be Salts lover but just managed to hurt himself pretty badly, though he made her laugh, so she granted him a place in her ocean.” Dya held up her fingers about four inches apart, “a small place in her ocean.”
“Ouch!” Ponti laughed and gave a sympathetic wince.
“It’s actually a favorite story around here, it’s really funny.” Dya said, taking a sip from her mug. “And it ends well enough for Gueduk.”
“If you say so.”
“I do.” Dya nodded and popped the apple fritter into her mouth. “But overall, yes, there is a bit of a theme to Salts chosen. Most of our ancestors were fleeing oppression. Some of it was famine, abuse, racism, that sort of thing. There are some of the darker stories. The ones they don’t tell in the bars or on the piers.”
“Really? What are those about?” Ponti perked up a little, watching her as she took another drink.
“Well, we’re in a bar and on the piers so I’m not going to be telling you now am I?” Dya smirked, then frowned at her cup. She didn’t remember drinking all her cider. Didn’t she just get this cup? Damn, she was going to give her mer resistance to toxins a workout at this rate.
“Argh. You’re right! Yen yen!” He exclaimed, and stood up, holding out his hand to her, “You must take a walk with me then, so you can tell me on the beach.”
As they walked to the beach Ponti kept Dya talking about different kayzhayǂ . He got her going about her favorite one, the Praxeris where the Queen of the ancient city of Douurs fled the Mad King Praxeris with all of her servants and loyal citizens into the icy waves of the north to become the first of the northern clans. Retelling that story took them past the market, through the circus, and just past the edge of the crowd watching the flexibility stage. Or rather, where there had been a crowd, but the stage was now empty, though beyond, in the woods that edged the beach in this direction, there was the glow of the tent shows, and a few isolated houses that signaled the outskirts of town.
Above a slivered moon cast down light and a few wisps of light wavered weakly overhead. Dya stopped, balking at going any further out on the stretch of sand. It didn’t go too much further, not really, maybe half a mile down to where the rocky precipice rose up and the arm of the cove reached out into the sea with the altar to Salt at its tip. The dark beach wasn’t abandoned, but the shadows that moved on it were quiet and private. Spread out so that they didn’t bother each other. Dya glanced at Ponti considering whether or not she wanted to spend a night in the shadows with him, and finding herself not uninterested in the idea.
It wasn’t that she was sexually attracted to him, exactly, the human form had never really “got her engines going” (whatever that was supposed to mean) back in her previous life. The mer form, and apparently the beastkin form as well, was just a thing that existed. It was… She still didn’t get it, and that was fine with her. Being asexual had never really bothered her, other than dealing with the burden of society.
However, what did make her excited and, ah, open to the sort of games he might want to play in those shadows was how they met, the flirting, the feeling she was getting that he was pushing at her, the sense of danger coming off him. So the exact reason her older soul was sending up some sort of warning flair from the distant island of reason it had been banished to for the night.
“Don’t want to go further out?” Ponti asked, turning to look back at her with the moonlight reflecting brightly in his eyes.
“Not just yet.” Dya said, the internally kicked herself for implying that she might want to later. To distract him she followed by saying with a warm darkness “Why? Aren’t you afraid of being alone near the water with a mermaid?“
And Ponti’s smile grew even wider and he stepped closer to her, reaching out to carefully, softly run his fingers down the back of her arm. “Thinking of dragging me out to sea?”
“’Deep in the waves where the sirens keep their lovers.’ Isn’t that how the story goes?” Dya said, lifting her chin and hooding her eyes.
“Oh, I like that.” He growled, leaning into her. Dya refused to back down, and stared back at him as he loomed in close to her and bent his head towards her. “because first, before you even try to get me wet, we have to be lovers.”
Dya blinked, damnit. Ponti laughed and Dya started laughing too. “Oh, goddess, you got me there.”
“So we’re no longer on the pier, nor in a bar.” Ponti noted, “What about those darker stories?”
“Why are you so interested in them?” Dya asked, giving him a bit of side eye.
“Because they seem dangerous, and I like dangerous things.” Ponti gave a slow, sharp, toothy grin, and Dya felt a shiver run up her spine.
“Yen, let’s go further out and you can tell me about the darker origins of the mer.” He grinned and Dya rolled her eyes, and sighed, and they walked out on the silken sand, up on the dunes where they could see the waves and shore and feel the ocean breeze.
“So there are three major stories of the dark arcana, with more than a few apocrypha.” Dya said.
“Awhat?” Ponti asked
“Stories that may or may not have been made up to add to the cannon. At least that’s what we mean for the kayzhayǂ. Some of them are clearly more for the tent shows to perform. Clearly the quest of Täwe Ses was made up for enjoyment, it’s about a courtesan assassin who brings Salt the heads of three of her enemies but can’t transform until she experiences the oceans pleasure.” Ponti coughed and chuckled and Dya blushed again, glad that the color couldn’t be seen in the moonlight. “The major three are not usually performed outside of specific circumstances. Or at least that’s what I’m told, I’ve never seen them performed, it seems to be a priests only thing or something like that, and I’m pretty ok with that.”
“You’re ok with secret rituals and hidden stories being kept from you?” Ponti asked, interrupting her.
“Well, the stories aren’t that secret, and of course the priesthood has secret rituals. Everyone has secret rituals of some sort so that’s not a big scary thing to me.” Dya shrugged, and stumbled in the deep sand of the dune, “I just wouldn’t want to see a performance of these stories.”
“Really. Why? Yen, tell me.” Ponti asked.
Dya followed him further up the dune until they crested the top of the first dune to see the field of them with their sea oat tops waving gently in the wind and more than a few writhing shadows in the moonlight. Sighing, she spoke to allay his curiosity,
“The first is the story of Anias, the Spider King.
The second is Baharute Gyxtol, the Demon.
The third is Oyee Nopal, who captured Desire.
Anias wasn’t really a Spider, and truth be told, he wasn’t a king either. He was human, but crafty in the way of men who see the paths of power and can manipulate the outcomes. He had no interest in being the head of state, but he delighted in making the dukes and barons, the princes, and the princesses dance on his strings. He would trade in favors and interests and had no compunction trading in flesh.
Calowyn was a lovely young girl of 14, new to womanhood, for at that time human womanhood was measured by the moons blood and little else, and her twin Caltan a promising young warrior, just starting his training. She showed promise in the magic of nets and weaving and loved to walk by the shore and wade in the shallows with the fish.
But weaving and nets were the domain of the Spider, and through some misfortune, Calowyn caught his eye as she wove her spells by the shore.
I’ll spare you the back and forth of the web he wove to capture them both. I don’t have it memorized and I’d bungle the retelling. Just, know that in the end they found themselves trapped, enslaved as ‘willing’ servants in his house. Calowyn spent her days learning to maintain the magics of the house and the in preparation for being a magus and Caltan was trained to be a house guard, then her guard, and at night they would both go to polish Anias’s weaponry to his satisfaction.
For five years they lived in his house and served him as favored servants. For five years he enjoyed their presence more and more, and, becoming ever fonder of them, he decided that he would make Calowyn and Caltan his concubines when they could take a job and eligible to marry.
When night came that they could choose jobs, they both despaired. Keeping their status change secret, they left Anias sleeping in his armory, and crept into the sea in nothing but the gauze shifts and golden ribbon that he used to bind their necks together. With a sharp shell Caltan cut open a vien and offered his blood to the goddess, saying, “Take my life, oh goddess, but before I die give me the strength to end Anias.”
And Calowyn took the shell from her brother and opened her vein and said, “Take my life, oh goddess, and send me the power to tear down his house before I die.”
And the goddess said, “I claim your lives then, and demand that you give me much of them. Here is your strength and here is your power. Show the spider the teeth of my children.”
To Caltan she gave the skin, the teeth, the fins, the strength of the hak giezyu—the king shark, the megalodon. To him she granted the job of the Bij, the Champion, her warrior.
To Calowyn she gave the skin, the teeth, the fins, the stripes, the power of the haynaw, the tiger shark. To her she granted the job of the poid, her mystic elementalist.
Calowyn called up a great wave and sent it into the house and across the lands and the city that sheltered Anias, and Caltan swam through, tearing apart the guard that would protect him. Again, I’ll spare you the detailed destruction of that wicked home. Just know that in the end Calowyn and Caltan stripped the meat from Anais bones with their new teeth and scattered what remained deep in the trenches where only worms could find him.”
Ponti’s expression was hidden in shadow so she couldn’t see his response, but his voice was both wondering and horrified, “They ate him?”
“One last time, the story says.” Dya nodded, stepping over a mound of sea oats.
“But they had been human, so that would have been cannibalism, right?”
“Maybe? It’s something the priest’s debate in their free time, but no one really cares because no one is turning from human to Mer and eating their abusers in vengeance on a regular basis.” Dya shrugged. “Mostly we get, ‘don’t tolerate sexual slavers and those who abuse the young’ out of that one.”
“Wait what? I think I missed something in there.” Ponti had stopped completely so she stopped too.
“Don’t worry about it. The only version I know is the kid’s version that’s told on Hallow’s Eve. Learning to read between the lines of it is a coming-of-age rite of sorts. I’m sure there’s a more detailed version in the darker corners of the temple library, but honestly, I haven’t gone looking.” Dya shrugged. “The other ones were less disturbing on that front.”
“The demon and the … desire?” Ponti tried to remember as he began walking through the dunes again, weaving a long path through the grasses and avoiding any more active shadows.
“Baharute Gyxtol, the demon, is actually an epic tale of a Demon who established a principality on the Isle of Alkemie off the cost of Shiir. The demon kept a harem of captured warriors, both male and female, that they would either impregnate or use to impregnate, because you know, demons. Creating Shadowkin to be thralls is much more reliable than summoning lesser demons or keeping control of a cult, apparently.” Dya held her hands and shoulders up in a shrug and looked around, they were still in the dunes, closer to the woods than before. She could still see the waves from here but they seemed far off, further off than she had been from them in 18 years.
“Kwako and Jip were the Champion and Mystic of their age. In the epic they join with three other warriors from the tribes of land to take down Baharute Gyxtol. They started by getting Jip, the Champion, captured and Kwako taken in as a servant. The next part of the story--at least in the version I found in the dark corners of the temple library-- is the couple seducing their way through the harem and eventually shtoinking the demon so hard that it slept for a whole week after.” Dya felt glad that he wouldn’t be able to see her blush again in the pale light of the sliver moon, and then looked back again to the ocean. She’d feel better if they were just closer.
“Were there pictures in this temple library book?” Ponti asked, “because if there are, I’m seriously considering changing religions.”
Dya laughed, and relaxed a little, “Then let me tell you about our lady Salt and her naughty picture books. Because there were so many pictures.”
There were more chuckles and then Ponti was leaning up against her, warm skin in the cool breeze. He reached out his arm around her and delicately traced his fingers and claws down her should her, side, butt, outer thigh and Dya gasped, shuddering a little under his touch. Emboldened, he brought his hand around her side and pulled her closer in, and, still feeling a little confused but also enjoying the warmth, Dya leaned in.
“Yen, why don’t you tell me about the last one.” Ponti said softly, bringing his other hand over to give her arm a light stroke as he guided her gently into the shadows of the woods.
“Oyee Nopal, who captured desire.” Dya said, frowning, trying to look back to the ocean, but having to remember the story.
“Oyee was a great wizard, known far and wide for his wonderous spells and powerful incantations. He was known to be a benevolent beastkin, who had the wisdom of an owl, the cunning of the wolf and the power of a horse. He was known to be one who helped widows and gave small children candy, that sort of thing. He had a secret power, however, that none but the unfortunate knew. He could bind people’s desires to his will. Control what they wanted, and when they wanted it. It is easy to seem benevolent when you can make people want the answer you have to give, no?
In his travels he would pass through many cities and saw many beautiful women. When he desired those women, they would always find themselves desiring him above all else. For the most part his dalliances stayed where they were, one night and done, sometimes two. But sometimes a woman would capture more than just a day or two of his attention. There were those that he found something more in, something that fascinated him. Something that he saw no reason to leave behind.
In the lagoon behind his tower he kept his harem. They hid in the lagoon and lived in the lagoon because he wanted them to, and because he wanted them to they wanted to. Even though they longed to go home, to go back to their families, to do any number of things that weren’t caving to his desires they stayed, unable to leave.
But keeping a captive in a lagoon is a bad idea, as the sea is boundless and the ocean is unforgiving. Feeling abandoned, the women abandoned all other gods and turned to Salt, praying for release. And Salt came to them and said she could not give them back their homes, she could not send them back to their families, and that the lives they had before would never come back, but she could give them the freedom of the ocean and new lives like they had never known.
What happened next is up for debate. Some say they lured Oyee into the lagoon and drowned him. Some say they cut their hair to trade for a knife to kill him. Some say they simply smashed him against the rocks. In the end, what matters is that the body of the wizard was found bobbing in the water, his tower empty of treasures though his gates still locked and his spells all in place.”
As Dya finished up the story she took a look around. They were in the woods now, fully in deep shadows and she did not want to go further. She couldn’t quite figure out how she had agreed to come out so far. The danger of the situation had stopped being “fun” danger and started being worrying danger as soon as they had stepped into the shadows of the leaves.
To give herself a few minutes to think she pulled away from Ponti and leaned her back against a tree. It was bumpy and scratchy, some sort of coniferous pine tree. Ponti followed her with hungry eyes, and stepped in close to her again, once again reaching out to gently touch her. He stepped in close and pressed up against her, nuzzling her face and kissing her deeply.
Very distracting that. If she could get him back out to the sandy dunes, she was definitely open to seeing what else he could do with those lips. Damn.
He began kissing down her neck as his fingers slid down her torso, and she could breath just a little as she stared over his head into the gaps of the leaves to look at the stars. Right. The dunes. Why weren’t they in the dunes? Hell, why weren’t they on the beach? His fingers gently brushed down the chains that held up the bikini top to expose her chest and she let out a low moan as his lips found the sensitive spots on her chest were not nipples, exactly.
“Gods…” Dya muttered, her eyes fluttered, and she lost her train of thought completely as he moved against her and did more interesting things with his tongue and her chest. She moaned again and then, playfully echoed Ponti’s verbal tic, “Vey…”
And she felt him freeze up. It was just for a second, just a forgettable second but saying it also made something click like a loose gear in her mind, and she felt a little clearer.
“Ponti,” Dya asked, trying to pull her head from all the raging hormones and desires, “What does ‘vey’” mean?”
“It's nothing.” Ponti said evenly, and unconvincingly. “Vey, just ignore it.”
And she did, for a second, but then pushed him away and pulled her top back up. “No…no, no! There’s something not right here. I’m not comfortable with being this far out. I’m going back to the shore.”
“and we were having so much fun.” Ponti said, a bit sadly, a bit wistfully, and a bit like he wasn’t really talking to her. That set off a whole new set of alarms and she knew, she knew she was in it now. Damnit.
“We could have fun in the dunes.” She said, stepping towards the dodgy trail that passed as a path for them on the way out, but Ponti mirrored her, staying in front of her. “Ponti, what are you doing, let me go.”
And Ponti’s slow, wicked smile grew, but this time it wasn’t charming or cute, but predatory and terrifying because she knew it was all for her.
She tried to dodge to the right to get around him but he was there, and he easily paced her to the left. He let her back up and she fumed at her inability to just go over his damn head--to swim through the branches and breach the crowns of the trees like they were the waves of the ocean, but the land was dry and unforgiving. The water was too far away.
Dya looked to either side and saw that there were spaces between the trees that she could run through but she had no idea where it would lead, where it could lead. The left might take her back towards the city, she thought, the right towards the altar of Salt. The trees weren’t so dense as the forests could be back on earth, when humans had let them over grow so she could, maybe, make it. Physically possible at least, though she worried about her chances of outrunning the wolfkin blocking her way.
There was probably more space behind her too, but that was even further from the ocean, even further into dry land.
She looked to her left and right again, and back at the wildly grinning Ponti, who was on his toes, practically vibrating in anticipation. “Ponti.” Dya begged, trying again to appeal to something more human in him.
Ponti’s smile opened, his teeth shining and sharp and his fingers curling down into pointed claws and she knew with a sinking heart and desperate mind that there was nothing left human in him in that moment as he growled out, “Dya.
“Vey.
“Run.”