Lindholm was a mess of anachronisms to William’s sensibilities – and never moreso than at night. Sword wielding guards in the royal colors of black and gold marched the streets in pairs, their steel breastplates gleaming in the pale light of the gas-lamps lining the cobblestone streets. Horses and carriages filled the roads, while overhead massive airships drifted through the skies, occasionally dropping down to dock with the massive sky-towers that dominated the skyline.
Pretty much all those vessels carried the colors of the Royal Navy, but a few held sigils displaying their allegiance to various countships or duchies, visible due to the spotlights of the towers or other vessels.
Elves, humans, dwarves and even orcs from all stratas of society occupied the moonlit streets, coming to or from the city’s many workshops and factories. And while not many in number, working boys of every race but the first loitered outside brothels, watched over by small groups of stern-faced women armed with clubs and knives. Meanwhile, merchants of all stripes shuttered their store doors or packed away their stalls.
Much like the architecture that surrounded him as he walked through the streets, the whole thing felt like some strange seamless mixture of feudal, renaissance and napoleonic sensibilities.
"Hey pretty boy," a voice called from a passing band of factory workers. “What are you doing out all alone at night? In need of a little company?”
William raised an eyebrow, as he turned to regard the speaker, the orcish woman’s red face showing that she’d clearly managed to drink something potent in the short time between the end of the workday and now.
“Anna, that’s a noble! He’s got a bow-pistol,” one of her companions hissed. “He’s probably an academy kid.”
Those words made the first woman pale, as she glanced down to confirm that, sure enough, William did indeed have a pistol at his belt. Quickly, she turned away, the group of women practically scampering down the road.
William watched them go with some amusement.
He would admit that, as a young man, he was taking something of a risk by choosing to walk to the restaurant, having asked to be dropped off just short so he could stretch his legs a little and take in the sights properly. It was a small risk though. This was a fairly affluent part of the city. The presence of so many patrolling guardswomen was evidence enough of that. Indeed, the last brothel he’d passed had been of the higher class variety. The kind where ‘escorts’ or ‘companions’ was the parlance rather than ‘johnnies’ or ‘whores’. And while the woman who’d just accosted him had been a blue collar worker, the shard insignia on her lapel signified her as an employee of some kind of shard producing workshop and as such placed her as a trained professional a cut above most menial workers.
Albeit, one who apparently has something of a drinking problem, he thought.
He was still shaking his head in bemusement when his date for the evening chose to make herself known.
“William? Where’s your carriage?”
He turned, ready to make some glib remark, when he found himself lost for words.
Xela looked incredible. True, the dress she was wearing was but a few loose stitches away from being outrageously scandalous, but she wore it with such confidence that it might as well have been armor.
The slinky black number clung to the wood elf’s curves like a second skin, though strategically placed slits along the sides meant plenty of actual skin was on display as well. The skirt could barely be called such, exposing almost the entirety of the woman’s delicious thighs and ensuring that any attempt on her part to bend at the waist would surely reveal the exact coloration of their owner’s undergarments.
Assuming the wood elf chose to wear any.
She certainly hadn’t bothered with a bra, as brazenly displayed by the fact that the v-neck of her dress dipped all the way to her navel. Which was pierced, the gleaming golden orb there glinting in the streetlights. Though it certainly wasn’t alone in that. The tight nature of Xela’s dress and her aforementioned lack of bra meant he could see that her nipples likewise held some manner of adornment beneath the fabric that fought bravely to constrain them.
This was a dress that wasn’t so much designed to titillate as proudly announce to the world what the owner had to offer.
What they’d cultivated, given the woman’s clearly exposed lean muscle structure.
The female equivalent of a gym bro’s tight tank top, he thought faintly.
Swallowing down his surprise, he flushed slightly as his gaze finally moved up to his date’s face and saw the woman had both clearly noticed his staring and was both amused and smug about it.
“Like what you see?” she asked.
“It’s a little bold isn’t it?” he asked.
Another woman might have been offended by that. Xela just laughed.
“I’m a ‘shock and awe’ kind of woman,” she said as she strode up to him, linking her arm with his.
He twitched as he caught a whiff of her perfume. Pine trees and peaches. Fitting.
“With that said,” she continued, her eyes trailing over him appreciatively as they started walking. “You don’t look so bad yourself.”
Yes, well, he’d certainly planned for some shock and awe of his own, though it had unfortunately been undercut by Xela’s own entrance.
His jacket was open, displaying the shirt beneath which was tighter than it needed to be, serving to show off the defined musculature of his chest. Along with a few slits that served the same purpose more directly. Likewise, his pants were uncomfortably tight. Tight enough that he was more than a little worried they’d split every time he bent over more than a few inches. He was also wearing a sort of ‘shoe-sandal thing’ that he’d been assured during his recent shopping trip was quite fashionable right now. To his mind, the footwear seemed less like footwear and more some foot fetishist’s idea of lingerie.
In short, the entire ensemble worked together to give off a veneer that was just a little slutty by the standards of Lindholm. Not outright, but close enough as to be eye-catching.
And not for the first time, he found himself thanking the gods that, for all that some social mores were reversed in this world, it hadn’t truly extended to clothing. Oh, certainly, women’s clothing was a hell of a lot more practical than it had been in this time frame on Earth, but by and large, fashion remained much the same.
Women wore dresses. Men wore suits. The only real difference was that said dresses were usually designed to be easy to move in and with a number of belts and pockets for weapons. Indeed, despite the rather sparse amount of fabric available for Xela’s dress, the design had still managed to leave room for both a sword-belt and a shoulder holster. Both of which were in use, with a bolt-pistol filling the latter slot and a naval saber filling the former.
“Black with red and blue highlights,” Xela murmured as she ran a finger boldly along the stitching of his jacket. “Someone’s wearing their allegiances on their sleeve.”
“A fortunate coincidence. Despite the image our house colors might present, I’m normally a man partial to more subdued colors.”
That was another factor in this world’s fashion, he supposed. Men typically wore bright, eye catching colors while women wore more subdued ones. He wasn’t a fan. With that in mind, he was actually rather lucky that the Royal color was black.
“Huh, I can’t say I expected that, given how bombastic your usual behavior tends to be.”
He laughed. “What can I say but that I’m full of surprises.”
“Well, I can’t argue that. My time as your second has been interesting if nothing else. Though I have a feeling the biggest surprise is yet to come.”
He smirked. “You’re not wrong. I fully intend to blow your mind tonight.”
He saw it.
A slight stiffening in her gait as she nearly missed a step. Her wide eyes glanced back at him, trying to decipher the exact meaning of his words and what they might be in reference to.
“It’s a hell of a secret after all,” he finished innocently.
Satisfied in finally getting one over on his date, he ignored her irritation as they stepped into the restaurant. As promised, it was a fairly fancy place, and as such the wait staff were prompt and professional in guiding the pair to a table. If they were at all perturbed at seeing an academy student out with a woman more than twice his age, they gave no indication of such.
Though to be honest, that was likely because they were accustomed to seeing similar pairings. Sugar-daddies had been a thing back on Earth and sugar-mommies were most definitely a thing here as well. Elves likely only made it worse.
With that said, his date did look a little uncomfortable as she sat down. Though clearly whatever quibbles she had about their age gap weren’t quite enough to dampen her libido.
The two quickly ordered, neither truly interested in the meal itself.
“I’ll be honest, I find myself a little curious,” he said as the waiter retreated with their orders. “I was a little surprised when I made my offer earlier, I half expected you to decline on account of some previously unmentioned sweetheart. You’re a knight after all and were the interim-governess of Redwater until recently. So, nobility, but not so ennobled that a match with a commoner would raise eyebrows. To that end, some part of me imagines you’d have a small fleet of local lads banging down your door hoping to be the next Mr. Redwater.”
The wood elf snorted, eyebrow raising at his opening question. “Low nobility or not, even I know it’s in poor taste to needle a woman about her lack of romantic partners.” She sighed. “Still, you’re not wrong. Once upon a time I did in fact have the, uh, proverbial pick of the litter. As you said, a real noble might be out of the range of a common lad, but a knight isn’t.”
He nodded, before a thought suddenly occurred to him and a wicked smile slipped across his features. “You overdid it, didn’t you?”
The elf sagged, as if he’d physically struck her.
“Yeah, pretty much. I went from village to village and did a lot of sleeping around.” She eyed him, as if to see if that admission bothered him.
After all, while a woman’s virginity was hardly the trophy it was back on Earth during this rough time period, there were certainly men here who avoided women who played the field too much. Much like a playboy might be on Earth, the perception was that those same women would be too likely to stray once actually in a relationship.
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William, for his part, simply maintained his quietly interested expression, given that he really didn’t care what his partner’s did prior to his metaphorical engagement with them. It wasn’t like his own record was clean in any way, shape, or form. Nor would it be after he got involved with a girl, given that he was expected to both form a harem and sire bastards when the opportunity presented itself.
All in the name of producing more mages for the good of the nation.
“Naturally, when you’re taking a new lover in pretty much every village, it doesn’t take long for the locals to realize that you have no intention of settling down and marrying any of them. For the most part, I’ve been getting the cold shoulder from the locals on the romantic front since.” She scoffed. “I mean, what did they expect? I was fresh out of the navy and only forty. A bunch of guys throwing themselves at me? How the fuck was I supposed to resist?”
William chuckled.
“For the longest time I thought Redwater would be a temporary thing. Some dumpy little town that was somehow a backwater while right next to the capital. Dirt so stony you’d struggle to grow weeds from it. Or trees so dense and with roots so deep you can scarcely shift them even with magic. And the people are much the same.” She swished her wine in her glass. “Of course, it grew on me. Like mildew. Even after my suitors dried up. These days I struggle to imagine leaving. Though I’m also struggling to imagine spending my entire life there. Still got a hundred and sixty years left in me after all. And there’s a lot of world left to see.”
She eyed him. “So yeah, you can say I was a little excited to receive your offer. Even if I’m pretty sure this whole thing is just a means of buttering me up if your little secret proves to be less mind blowing than you hope.”
Before William could respond, the waiter returned. "The main course, lightly broiled depth fish in a butter-garlic sauce with a side of seasonal vegetables."
It smelled incredible – and better yet, given it wasn’t entirely comprised of ingredients one might find on Earth, so William wasn’t immediately bombarded with thoughts on how he’d have done it better if it had been him in the kitchen.
“So,” Xela said as she speared a chunk of fish. “Is all this just a prelude to you unveiling your secret? Because I believe I was promised a proper shot at you?”
“A shot at me?” he laughed. “Am I some stag to be hunted to your mind? With language like that, I can’t help but wonder how your suitors lost interest.”
“Outwardly.” She smirked. “Plenty of those I ‘hunted’ found themselves coming back to me in secret to be hunted again.” Her expression soured. “At least until you arrived and the cowards scarpered like a school of tuna because I suddenly had a few more eyes on me – worried for their ‘reputation’ and all that tripe. As if a guy has anything to worry about on that front.”
“More than you’d think. We may not have to worry about suddenly ending up pregnant like you girls do, but we do have to worry about our future or current wives getting annoyed if they feel they’re being ‘outperformed’ by another woman,” he pointed out. “While I know it’s heresy to say, sex isn’t everything. A good relationship with a group of local girls you’ll likely end up marrying is worth more to most than the occasional enjoyable evening with a woman who has little time for you otherwise.”
Xela harrumphed, but did acknowledge his point.
He sipped his wine again. “So, now that you’ve painted your recent romantic history in vivid detail, I hope you’ll have no issue with me switching the topic to something a little less recent. I mean, if you’ll forgive me asking, how does a wood elf come to Lindholm?”
Xela went to answer, before stiffening as she felt… something against her leg. His foot specifically, as it moved up her thigh.
It was funny, back on Earth, a woman – or a man – would be well within their rights to call a first date right then and there after that kind of unprompted touching. Or at the very least quite explicitly ask the one doing it to stop.
Here though?
Well, men were rare. And as Xela’s story showed, she was both feeling pent up and incredibly horny.
So she didn’t ask him to stop. In fact, she went very still as his foot crept along her thigh to somewhere altogether more intimate.
And as silly as William felt playing what to his mind was traditionally the woman’s role in playing ‘footsie’ that sensation was more than drowned out by his amusement at just how quickly the woman’s silky feeling undergarments slickened under his touch.
“Xela?” he asked innocently.
The woman let out a breath she’d apparently been holding as she sent him a look that promised his brazenness would not go unpunished before the night was out.
“Y-you asked how I came to be in Lindholm?” Her voice had a small quiver in it as she tried to focus on something other than his motions below the table. Amusingly, she didn’t move away though. “Same as most e-everyone else. I suppose. Kicking, screaming and covered in goop. My parents though, they came here in a ship. Though to hear them tell it, theirs wasn’t too dissimilar from my own experience.”
“Rough trip?” he asked.
“Standing room only to hear them tell it. In water-ships.” There was no missing the mage-knight’s disdain in that last word. “Going from the Old Growth to here must have been a hell of a culture shock for them.”
“Old-Growth,” he said. “That’s part of the Old Continent isn’t it?”
Truth be told, he didn’t actually know all that much about the traditional home of the wood elves. Which he was hardly alone in. Few people did and misinformation was rife.
“It is, though I’ve never been. Only heard stories from my folks growing up.” She poked her antler-crown. “Though I imagine you know they don’t practice void magic over there. They use what they call spirit magic, which is apparently different somehow. For one thing, it only works in the Old-Growth itself. Calls on the power of the land or some shit.” She shrugged. “Which seems basically the same to me though. You need something done and you call on some otherworldly beasty to do it for you.”
“Shit like this,” she said as she tapped her antlers again. “Apparently, it’s part of the contract the first wood elves swore when they became wood elves. Which seems a little unfair given I’ve never even called on the land for magic. I mean, I don’t hate being a wood elf or anything, but these things can be fucking annoying when I’m trying to sleep or… do other things.”
He smirked as she shifted a bit, pressing against his foot now.
“I know my mother certainly wasn’t happy about it.”
William winced. “You mean?”
“From birth, yeah?” she muttered. “Which, I’m not going to lie, worries me too. Sure, whichever kid I have could have scales, hooves, rabbit ears or some easy shit like that, but there’s a decent chance they’ll have horns like me.”
“Huh, so the specific trait isn’t always inherited?”
“It’s magic,” she said. “According to the alchemists, us Wood Elves are literally just regular elves that have some kind of magic happen to us in the womb. Even if we’re born overseas.”
Willaim frowned. “All that from a thousand year old contract? That’s some powerful magic for it to persist that long.”
She shuddered, her timbre growing deeper as she shifted in her seat. “I can’t argue that. A-apparently druid magic is some really top tier shit when the situation is right. There’s a reason neither the Lunites or Solites have tried more than once to take the old growth. It might not have as many warmachines as the dwarves, but that doesn’t matter much when the fucking trees can move. That forest eats armies and shits out fertilizer.”
“Ever thought of going there?” He asked, almost forgetting that he was in the process of stimulating his date with his foot.
“Nah,” she grunted distractedly, definitely pressing against him as both her hands gripped the table. “They’re all cunts.”
She was getting close.
“Cunts?”
“V-void magic,” she hissed. “I’m tainted. By that and ‘technology’. Whatever the fuck that means. Horns or not, if I showed up at the Old Growth I’d be treated as just another invader. Probably get impaled by a walking tree. It’s happened before to wood elves hoping to ‘return home’.”
Huh, that almost made the forest sound less like an army and more like a body’s immune system. One that reacted violently to anything that seemed foreign. It was possible the wood elves didn’t even actually control it. Which would fit with the whole ‘nature’ vibe the wood elves had going.
Or they were all just xenophobic isolationists of a more conventional variety who had total control over their ‘tree army’ and chose to kill any of their returning kin.
Either option was possible. Or it was something entirely else, given he was working off a half-baked theory he’d concocted while playing footsie with the wood elf providing his information.
A wood elf that seemed more interested in getting off via said foot than speaking – or keeping a low profile, given her… shuffling.
His foot was now thoroughly soaked as her slick thighs practically pressed down it.
Still, this behavior was a thorough reminder that for all that they were both competent older women, Xela wasn’t Griffith. For all that she’d become a bit of a succubus, her transition between arousal and duty tended to be one filled with reluctance and embarrassment.
If he’d played footsie with her, she’d be whispering at him to stop while looking around and secretly getting off on it. Xela’s response to him effectively fondling her under the table was to dive into it, totally uncaring of any onlookers.
Ah, if Griffith’s like Marline then Xela’s a Bonnlyn, he realized with some amusement as he glanced at the slightly flushed wood elf.
To her credit, her impending orgasm wasn’t totally obvious. Her face was slightly flushed and her gaze was smouldering as she stared at him across the table – but it smouldered with challenge.
As if daring him to up his game. To send her over the edge.
So he didn’t.
Instead he enjoyed her affronted look as he withdrew his foot, sending her innocent smile.
“William!? What are you-”
“You know, I’m not much feeling dessert. I’ve other appetites I’d rather see fulfilled. And as those of knowledge, conversation and food have been quite thoroughly quashed, I can see only one remaining.”
It was admirable, how quickly the wood elf switched gears, leaning forward – almost aggressively, as she might leap over the table at him.
“I could help with that,” she said.
He was aware they had eyes on them. More than a few had been attracted during his little… conversation with Xela. Some looked disgusted. Some disdainful. Some interested.
One table in the far corner was party to both, with a rather nicely dressed dark elf disdainfully glaring at him while her dinner partner – a much more scruffy looking human woman – seemed barely a moment from loosening her belt in the name of enjoying the show.
He didn’t dare look at the wait-staff as he realized that, yes, he’d made the right decision in cutting this little escapade short.
So instead he turned to his date for the evening who was waiting for his next words with bated breath.
After all, it would be the ultimate dick move to end the evening here, to leave her both frustrated and wanting more, in the name of furthering some kind of power game.
He didn’t say that.
He said the one thing he knew would ensure the rest of the evening was most interesting.
“If you think you’ve got the energy for it?”
------------
“How Crass,” Anaria muttered as she watched the boy practically be dragged from the restaurant by the wood elf woman.
Then again, what else could one expect from an impure and a non-elf. An impure’s follies spoke for themselves, practically animals, while it seemed the humans only trait worth mentioning was their ability to reproduce like rabbits and occasionally produce a mage of middling quality.
Unfortunately, quantity so very often proved to have qualities of its own. If it didn’t, both her nation and the Solites wouldn’t be importing as many greenskins as they could get their hands on. Nor would the dark elf be speaking with the reprobate opposite her.
“Shame the show’s over,” said reprobate grunted as she leaned back in her chair. “I bet you she’s going to ride him ragged before the night’s done. Big gal like her.”
“I’d prefer not to think about it,” Anaria grunted as she turned to the pirate. “I’m just thankful I don’t need to be subjected to it any longer.”
Indeed, she’d been half a second from demanding the serving staff throw the pair out before they’d thankfully stopped of their own volition and decided to leave for locales more suiting their low-class disposition.
Which was saying something, given that this establishment was already pretty low-brow by Anaria’s standards. Even prior to her instatement as the Lunite Ambassador to Lindholm’s assistant, she’d been accustomed to dining in far more refined establishments.
And dealing with more refined people, she thought.
“You should loosen up love,” Kanna Velinsky crooned in her colonial accent from across the table. “Maybe enjoy a bit of what the boy’s no doubt about to get. I’d even be willing to help you out on that front. That little show’s got my sails flying and while I might not have the parts, you’ll find a woman’s got ways of compensating for that. Helps to know the plumbing.”
Anaria didn’t try to hide her disdain. “I’m married.”
“Invite him too. Never had a dark elf before. Male at least. Hell, invite the sister-wives. I’m sure I can round up enough gals to make it even numbers and then some.”
“I’d sooner die than allow my husband within a thousand yards of you. So can you just shut up and agree to the terms already. They’re more generous than they should be already to hire on a water based fleet, so don’t even try to barter any higher.”
She’d normally have been more diplomatic, but the pirate’s constant chatter, insinuations and propositions had been fraying her nerves all evening. The actions of the wood-elf-human pair had just been icing on the cake.
Not for the first time, she cursed the ambassador for setting her to this task.
She didn’t even know why the ambassador suddenly wanted to hire on all these water-based ships. The exact details and payment for the operation would only be handed over a few days before… whatever it was the ambassador had planned.
The downpayment Anaria was to hand over tonight was just a downpayment to keep said pirate fleets in the area.
More to the point, this meeting was but one of several she’d need to carry out over the next few months.
“Aw, come on,” the disguised captain opposite her continued, her sunbleached blonde hair shifting to partially conceal her startlingly green eyes. “Don’t be like that. A little exoticism in the bedroom can bring a marriage closer together. A little spice and all that. I mean, it seems like you need it. A girls that’s getting fucked on the regular shouldn’t be as tightly wound as you.”
Anaria resisted the urge to slam her head on the table.
It didn’t help that the damned human was at least partially right.
Korvell hadn’t touched her in months. Instead he focused all his time and energy on those sluts Teela and Meyla.
“Struck a nerve did I?”
Anaria didn’t scream but it was a close thing.