“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” someone said from behind me, and I turned.

The woman standing there was instantly recognizable as yet another laoi. Like most I had seen of her race, she appeared somewhere in her twenties. For clothing, she was wearing a loose assortment of gray and white robes that had been cinched at the waist with straps of leather and a headscarf draped over her head that flowed down her back almost like a gossamer cape. Some of her hair was still visible despite it, though, which had been dyed a metallic silver. I say dyed, because it was obvious from the green coming in at her roots that she had been neglecting her usual routine, likely owing to the recent Dungeon event.

“I’m sorry. Do I know you?” I replied.

I certainly had no memory of this woman, but after recent events, I did not want to assume. One never knew when a goddess might have shown up in one’s dreams, offloaded a few pages of expository dialogue, and then vanished, expecting you to have remembered more than a passing remark—as if dreams worked that way. But they apparently did for the natives, so I could understand why the local pantheon might have become a little confused when dealing with a human.

“I wouldn’t expect so, no,” she informed me, to my relief. She then pulled out a scroll of paper and began to scan its contents. “You are Donum, head and founder of the Clan of the same name, are you not? No known aliases. Often accompanied by one Donum Jax—” She glanced at the redhead, who, judging by the way her eyes were whipping between our former antagonist and this new arrival, was deciding whether this conversation would need to take precedent over the previous one. “—which would be you, I’m assuming. And recently by a Donum…” Her eyes went to Xyn, blinked back to her scroll in confusion, then began scanning the rest of my company until they landed on the dusky skinned Dolilim still tucked under Xyn’s arm. She tilted her head down and to one side to examine her face. “…Arx, is it? Yes, there you are. Hmm…” She straightened again and studied her scroll, frowning. “Dear-oh-dear… I don’t seem to have any information about these other two.”

I took a step back warily. She had made no move to threaten me, but when a stranger walks up with your name and associates on a piece of paper, it can be hard not to get at least a little nervous. I surreptitiously made note of the mace and pouches hanging from her belt.

“And you are?”

Jax spat to one side and sighed. But she made no move to put herself between me and this new woman. Xyn apparently remained the greater threat in her mind. “Don’t get yer sack twisted, Ma—ehm… Donum,” she hastily corrected herself. “This one ain’t of them what’s after ye.”

After me? Who would be after me? You could make an argument that Ahnbe or Xhinn might still have been a little upset after our recent tussle, but I could not think that they would send anyone like this my way. Unless she’s a bounty hunter?

But then I recalled Jax’s hobby of making up an increasingly elaborate backstory to fill in the gaps of what she knew of my origins. At last count, I was a deposed lord from the Floating Isles who had run afoul of a foreign noble lady by the name of Stevie—a real human girl I had carelessly mentioned one day—who had attempted to seduce me in the guise of a chambermaid. Incensed by my refusal—even though the real-world event had been closer to the opposite—she had vowed revenge, claimed I had raped her, made up a pregnancy, and a variety of other things worthy of a daytime soap-opera. The details changed from day to day, but the end result was that I was now being chased across the land by the forces of my former people.

I was still debating whether to sit Jax down for the true story, but frankly, it was a little dull by comparison. She knew I was foreign, and that was all that really mattered. Also, I had been warned that revealing my actual origins might be damaging to her psyche. For ‘reasons.’

Jax sneered at the woman. “This one be a priestess of the Lawmaiden, or I’s a tube.”

“Technically, I’m still a Novitiate,” the newcomer informed us. “I would normally have been accompanied by one of my superiors for a task like this, but… as they remain missing…” A brief flutter of concern overcame her features before she schooled them.

I allowed my own to reflect hers in sympathy, but otherwise held my peace. There was an argument to be made that I had been the root cause of everything that had transpired here, but that was a bit like saying the walnut was at fault after smashing your fingers with a hammer. Of course, in this simile, the hammer had been more like a sledge, and the fingers had been an entire town. So I was not about to offer myself up as a convenient scapegoat.

“No matter,” she continued. “I have been reliably informed that the Dungeon becomes far more complex as you increase in Stratum, so I expect they’ll be along presently. In the meantime, the rest of us have duties to carry on with.” She gave a slight bow from the waist. “My name is Ysel.”

“Okay.” After an awkward half-second, I opted to return her bow in kind, though I felt a little silly. “And what can I do for a Novitiate of the Lawmaiden?”

“Do?” Jax cut in aggressively. “We ain’t broke no Laws. She can piss off!”

Ysel did not seem offended by Jax’s attitude. If anything, she appeared smug. “That isn’t quite true. You see—”

“Hey!” The judge from before called out to us from across the arena. “Are you going to heal this guy or not?”

“Be right there!” I turned back to the Novitiate, pointing over my shoulder toward the man. “Uh… can we speed this up? I’ve got a thing.”

“You’re a healer?” She glanced back at her paper. “Oh, dear…”

“Is that a problem?”

“Of course!” she exclaimed—though I was beginning to detect something… off about the way she was speaking. A stilted cadence here, an over-emphasized word there… almost as if she were reciting lines from a poorly memorized stage production. “You see, I needed to inform you of your outstanding debt to my lady. Eighty-six gold, to be precise. But—”

“Eighty-six?” Jax looked like she was about to choke. And was putting some serious thought into choking this woman to the ground, just on principle. “Whoever… my mangled… I outta…”

I placed a calming hand over her shoulder. Not that I was feeling in any way calm, but when someone starts brandishing sums like that around, you can be sure there is a mistake somewhere. And I said as much. “That… doesn’t seem right. Why would I owe the Lawmaiden money?”

Ysel’s mouth worked for a moment, giving me a lost and floundering look. You would have thought that I had just gone wildly off-script and was now forcing her to improvise. Eventually, though, her shoulders bunched into an exaggerated shrug.

“I don’t know! I just work in collections,” she replied, in a much more natural tone. “All I have written here is: one hundred gold owed for—”

“A hundred?!” Jax wailed.

The priestess ignored her. “—for the exploitation of an unforeseen loophole in the Laws of the Land minus fourteen for assorted deeds of merit. Eighty-six in total.” She straightened quickly and raised an imperious finger. “But—”

“Loophole? Deeds of merit?” I pressed before she could return to whatever routine she was in trying to get through.

Ysel’s expression turned to one of exasperation. “That’s all it says, I promise you. Whatever blasphemies you have committed are between you and the Maiden. Be thankful she has limited your punishment to such a small fine.” Again came the stiffened pose. “However, your accrued merits are—”

“Small?!” Jax could not help but to cut her off in her rage. “We could buy a shop front in the upper city of Enbraden fer that kind of money, ye bawheaded twally!”

My hand tightened on her shoulder. “Let her finish.”

“Thank you.” Ysel bobbed her head once, then paused, her lips visibly working through her lines until she recalled where we were. “Ah! As I have been trying to explain, your merits are completely out of date. You see, our shrine was destroyed in the recent Swallowing, and until it is rebuilt and consecrated, we have no way of updating the Divine Writ.”

Jax folded her arms. “Good.”

Ysel stamped a foot and jeered, “No! Not good. This man is a healer. We can’t just—” Her hands balled into shaking fists and she firmed her lip, then turned back to me, stalwartly ignoring the heckler. “Without an updated Writ, we cannot accurately assess your disaster relief efforts. And I’m sure you’ve been extremely busy these last days.”

That final bit had been delivered with all the gravitas of a grade-school production about the importance of the five food groups, so I was now completely convinced she was putting me on. Not that she was lying, exactly—Jax would have been quick to notice something as simple as that—but there was more going on than what her poorly memorized lines could account for.

So, figuring it best I play along, I comported my features into my very finest pained nod. “More than you can imagine.”

A slight gasp escaped her lips, and she placed a hand upon my chest as though deeply moved. Jax glared at the appendage like she was putting some serious thought into chewing it off.

“Um… yes.” Ysel jerked her hand back and began rubbing at it as though checking for tooth marks. She returned to her natural speaking voice. “The short of it is, I can’t exactly collect anything without a proper tally of what you owe. And we’ve all much to do, so… I’ll just… let you get back to it, then, shall I?”

“Very gracious of you,” I agreed.

Assuming at least the bullet points of this priestess’ little performance had been based in reality, I was fully intending to skip town before a single brick of that shrine was ever laid. There was no way we could pay off a fine that large even if Jax took first place in the coming bout, and whatever merits I had supposedly accrued, they had by no means been through healing. With the way my powers worked, that might even earn me demerits, so jumping on the medic bandwagon at the last minute was out of the question.

A moment passed where everyone stared at one another in silence. Despite her words, the woman was making no move to actually leave. She just kept watching me, bouncing on her toes with expectation.

What’s happening? Do I have a line now? Is there some formality I’m missing here?

“Uh… what’s the due date on this fine?” I tried, hoping that by stalling with questions, someone might clue me in. “Assuming I don’t work it off first?”

“Oh!” Her fingers began tapping a nervous staccato on her scroll. “Well… normally, such debts are called due at the time of collection, enforceable with a good, old-fashioned Cursing! Not that I would ever assume someone of your stature would require such a measure,” she added hurriedly. Then, glancing around, she stepped close so she could lower her voice. “Look, you don’t have to worry about me spreading this around. I take my vows seriously, so you can trust my discretion. No one of my order would want an embarrassment like this to stain your reputation.”

I nodded along uncertainly. Reputation? Embarrassment? Who gives a rat’s fart about that? Getting myself branded as an Outlaw without so much as a word of explanation was not high on my to-do list, but it was not as if I would be ashamed. More like pissed beyond reason.

But then I clocked Jax seething in my periphery. She clearly hated this woman if for no other reason than by simple association, but given the threat that had just descended over my head, she was being awfully restrained. I would have fully expected her to summon her axe and tell this woman to pound sand by now, so there had to be more going on than met the eye. Something contemptible… yet inevitable. Something we could not fight.

Right! I remember now. These people have a reputation for being all kinds of corrupt. This is a shakedown! I blinked as the implications of my own deduction became clear.

Aw, man…

Internally fuming, I carefully sculpted my features into an expression of facetious upper-class concern. “In that case… perhaps you might allow me to make a donation?” I offered. “For the speedy rebuilding of your shrine, of course.”

“Of course!” the woman agreed with obvious relief. “The standard rate would be—” She caught herself with a little jolt. “I mean, uh… might I suggest a donation of, say… ten percent of your outstanding balance?” She glanced down at her scroll again, like she was checking a concealed cheat sheet. “That would come to… eight gold, four silver, six copper, and three pieces of eight.”

I just stared at her.

She grimaced awkwardly. “Sorry. I did say I was a Novitiate.”

Ysel excused herself a few seconds after I had finished counting out her ‘donation,’ every coin of which Jax glared at like she was contemplating their value in the woman’s blood.

“Fecking cunts, every last one of ‘em,” she grumbled, turning away from the woman’s retreating back. “What kind of bollocks were that, anyway? A loophole… Who ever heard of a flaming loophole?”

“That just means I was taking advantage of something that’s against the spirit of the law,” I informed her. “But what law? Honestly, what a circus. They ought to at least have the decency to tell you what you did. Otherwise, how am I supposed to know not to do it again?”

Jax threw up her hands. “Bah. Probably made the whole thing up just so’s they could wring a few coins out of ye. And they’ll keep wringing every time we cross paths with one o’ them roasters—until ye pay that fine, least-ways. I’ve told ye, Master, and mark me: them lot’s a bunch of melted plabs.”

Whatever that means… “You’re telling me they won’t even count the money I just gave them as a payment?”

“What payment?” she returned, scowling. “Ye said yer ownself it were a donation. But even if ye didn’t, she’d’ve called it interest and buggered off just the same.”

I gaped at her. “What a bunch of gangsters!”

“Like I said: melted plabs.” She sighed. “Ah, well. No helping it. We just gotta keep from towns ‘til we save up the coin. They won’t go chasing us through no Dungeons, that’s sure.”

Speaking of…

I glanced over at Xyn, who I suddenly realized had watched the entire exchange without uttering a peep. “You’ve been awfully quiet. Got anything you’d like to add to this conversation?”

The blonde bombshell was still staring off in the direction the Novitiate had disappeared into. But instead of offering some sage insight into the frankly odd encounter, she made an abrupt horking sound, and spat a coin into the dirt. A solid gold coin.

“Whew…” she exclaimed with relief. “I thought she’d never leave.”

Jax and I stared down at the thing for a solid beat, rendered momentarily speechless.

“What the fuck?” I said finally.

“Language,” Jax admonished with a gentle swat to my backside before turning to the taller woman. “The feck, ye reeking reprobate. Ye got another one to gob at our feet, or were ye saving up special? Where’d ye even get that? I know y’ain’t had a hand free, else I’d’ve fingered ye fer pocketing it off one of them rubes out there.”

“I beg your pardon?” Xyn returned. “Me, steal? Never. Or certainly not something so uninteresting.”

I squatted down curiously to examine the thing. Other than the light coating of dirt and saliva, it looked exactly the same as any other piece of Dungeon Gold we had encountered. “Is this real?”

“Of course, it’s real,” she said. “Mother told you how coins are made. Why are you two acting surprised?”

“What that one told us were that coins was made from them what snuffed it,” Jax reminded her. “What’s that got to do with this?”

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Xyn chuckled. “Snuffed it? Oh, I do so love your turns of phrase, my dear.”

Jax began to growl.

“Alright, alright,” the blonde said placatingly. “Coins are Life Energy, lilim harvest Life Energy… You know this. Why would we need to kill people for it? I was just getting a little overfull from standing in the crowd, is all. No need to get so testy.”

I stood, coin in hand, and began cleaning the thing off on my robe. The garment was already the color of pea soup, so I figured a little dirt could only add to its appeal. “You’re saying this is the accumulated Life Energy of all these people? Just from watching Jax’s match?”

She lifted one shoulder. “Not only that. I’ve been here a few days, so some of it is from you fooling around with each other. And then, there’s a bit from the people in the neighboring rooms getting annoyed over it. Quite a lot is from the patrons in the bar below us trying to drink themselves deaf…”

“Yeah, alright. We know what we be,” Jax interrupted. “Yer saying the Queen lied to us, though. Coins ain’t made from dead folk?”

“Well, no,” Xyn admitted, before amending, “Or yes. They are. We do harvest their final breaths, should it come to it. No need to be wasteful, after all. But Mother wasn’t lying. Just… not telling the whole story.”

“Okay…” That Xhinn would deal in half-truths was practically a given, so I saw no need to comment on that. But for the rest… “So that means you have to spit out a coin every once in a while?”

“Only if I’m getting full,” she reiterated, sounding bored. “Which would be frequent around here. And before you ask, yes. I can spit out smaller denominations. I just don’t feel the need until it gets to be a gold in value.”

“And all lilim can do this?”

Jax sucked in a breath, catching the implication in an instant.

Xyn gave us a bit of a side eye and chuckled indulgently. “It is a standard ability, if that’s what you’re asking. We don’t all of us have masters to funnel our Life into when we’ve built too much. But I doubt our resident splinter would allow it. Riches are not meant to be amassed in that way. You would only attract the attention of more like that one.” She tilted her head in the direction of the recently departed Novitiate. “Their kind is tasked with the destruction of coin, if you didn’t know. It is one of their holy tenets.”

Jax’s eyes widened. “Sacrilege!”

“To us, yes. Coins are Life, and Life is Power. To destroy one out of hand is unthinkable. But to the world below? Coins only have so much value. If they are allowed to accumulate, they will begin to lose that value, eventually becoming worthless. And it is never wise to view Life as worthless.”

Jax pulled a face. “Ooh, that were smooth like butter. Ye could sell a brace of swaybacks with lines like them.”

She just rolled her eyes. “I’m over three-thousand years old, girl. You’ll have to forgive the odd proverb. Now, here.” She tossed Lynnria’s still-unconscious body to my First like a sack of grain. “My arms are getting tired. You can shoulder some of the burden for a time.”

“I weren’t talking about no proverbs,” Jax began, momentarily fumbling to secure the limp teenager. “I were talking about how ye and yer’n ain’t no better than them lot. Treating folk like… like chaff!” She glanced down at Lynnria then effortlessly slung the lesser Dolilim up into a fireman’s carry. “What happened to these two, anyhow?”

Xyn ignored the jab to reply, “That one is sleeping off a spell Mother cast on her.”

“What?!”

Xyn ignored that outburst as well. “And this one remains in torpor. I expect they’ll both awaken within the next few hours. In the meantime, our master has agreed to a task. Which he should soon set himself to, yes?”

“Oh, right!” I said, then hastened to the side of the arena where the judge had been impatiently waiting the whole time.

“Where’s his leg?!” I shouted.

The judge, whose name I had discovered was Egger, only shrugged. “Burned it. Didn’t want the flies getting to it… nor other things, what with the walls down.”

“But I could have reattached it! Now, I’m going to have to regrow the whole thing from scratch.”

Egger only looked at me placidly. “That a problem?”

“Only if you were expecting me to be conscious by the end of it. Do you have any idea how much effort it takes to regrow a limb?”

He folded his arms. “I said he was in a bad way. Not my fault you assumed this’d be easy money.”

All I could do was stare up at the gently swaying canvas above me and sigh. The medical facility we had been led to was just a nearby tent, one of many that had been erected to serve as temporary shelter for the destroyed town. But this one at least had a cot, hot water, and plenty of medical paraphernalia scattered about. I would be needing none of that, but from the bloodied bandages already wrapping the patient’s stump, I could assume someone around here had been plying a brisk trade in restorative field techniques.

“Yeah, alright. Get out,” I said. “This might take a while.”

“You’ve got five minutes,” he countered, moving to obey. As he pushed his way through the tent flap, however, he turned to add one last thing, “I’ll pay you one way or the other, but after that, this guy forfeits his match.”

The ‘guy,’ a wolugh whose name I had yet to catch, was quick to snatch my wrist. “You gotta hurry. I can’t miss this match, Doc! I can’t!”

“Hands!” Jax snapped, and the man shrank back from me, startled.

Xyn tsked, straightening from where she had settled Arx off to one side of the tent. “Why so protective? The way you act, you’d think the master was a porcelain figurine, handled at peril.”

Jax rolled her shoulders, allowing Lynnria to fall in a heap behind her. I might have heard a soft grunt escape the girl at the rough treatment. “I be First. Be me job to care fer me charge. And anyhow, what’s all this master business? He ain’t no master o’ yer’n!”

While the two bickered, I turned my attention to the wolugh—one of the rhino-horned dwarven people I saw from time to time. I say dwarven, but they were not dwarfs like a human would be. Or little people? I was not sure what the current preferred nomenclature was… not that it mattered anymore. In any case, these folk were wide and stocky, like the fantasy race I had envisioned from Tolkien’s work. About four to five feet tall on average, and almost as wide. No beards, though.

This individual had the pasty sheen of a man deep into fever and shallow of remaining blood.

“Alright, here’s the deal, guy,” I began. “My heals work a little different from how you’re used to. First off, it’s a regeneration buff. I can make that fast, or I can make it slow. But the faster we go, the more juice I have to use.”

“Fast!” he begged, being careful not to touch me this time. “Fast, please. I don’t know how much Egger is paying you, but I’ll double it if you can get me to my match on time. I swear!”

I nodded curtly. “Yeah, alright. Let me finish. See, there’s a catch.”

“A catch?”

I deliberated for a second before deciding to just come out and say it. “My heals are pleasurable.”

“Okay…” he said, smiling nervously. I caught his eyes flicker to the pair of supermodels quarreling at the foot of his cot. “Why is that a catch?”

“They’re extremely pleasurable,” I elaborated. “And I do not… do not… want to explore that with you. You get me?”

His head tilted back, catching on. “Ah. You’re saying I’ll… I’ll probably…”

He made a motion with his hands.

“Probably,” I confirmed.

His eyes flicked toward the girls again. “So then, they would be here… in case I want to, uh…”

Jax’s head jerked toward us, the topic of her argument forgotten.

“Not a chance!” she snarled at the same moment Xyn proclaimed, “That costs extra.”

Jax whirled back to her, outraged. But before she could speak, the man asked, “How much extra?”

“I have a 17 in Charisma, honey,” Xyn replied with a casual flip of her hair. “What do you think?”

“Wow…” the wolugh breathed, licking his lips.

“What do ye think yer doing?!” Jax hissed.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Xyn ran a hand up her flank, hinting at but not quite touching any of her more enticing bits. “I’m tempting a sick man with a spectacular bookend to an experience he’ll already remember for the rest of his life. For money. Which our master needs a great deal of. Remember?”

“Not like that, he don’t!”

“Oh?” Xyn turned to look at Jax. “And now you suddenly care? How interesting…” Her eyes found me. And then down to where my knuckles had gone white, gripping the side of the man’s cot. “How very interesting.”

The man seemed to deliberate internally for a moment before turning his head away from the pair. “No. I’m sorry, I… That’s tempting, but… but I can’t afford…” He swallowed. “I have my own debts. And I just need to get to that match. Okay, Doc?”

I nodded as the tension drained from my shoulders. Xyn and I were not truly together, however much my emotions had been hijacked to believe otherwise, so she would have little reason to consider my feelings when deciding her actions. She could use her body however she wanted, and I would have no right to complain. Besides, it was not as if I was lacking for alternatives.

The trouble was, my emotions had been hijacked. Just imagining her with this… this guy…

I swallowed back the bile that had risen into my throat. She wouldn’t actually do it. She’s just messing with you. Trying to get a rise out of you. You know how they are.

When I glanced back at her, I found her grinning speculatively at me, her tongue tracing circles around one of her sharpened eyeteeth.

Uh huh. I’ll bet she just wanted to see if she could make me jealous. Probably wanted to know what it might taste like.

I turned back to the man. “That’s fine. I’ll try to make this quick for you. As for them, you can look, but don’t touch. They’re more dangerous than they appear.” I cast a significant glare at Xyn once more. “Especially that one.”

In response, her scales rattled up her body, as though from a shiver, giving me a flash of the skin beneath. When they settled, her outfit—really nothing more than a protective coating of metallic, black plates clinging to her skin that she could make appear or vanish at will—now resembled a strapless one-piece with a keyhole at her navel and a single glove extending from her claws all the way to just over her bicep… the whole of which was now rimmed with spikes.

The wolugh stared at her, wide-eyed, for a moment, before allowing his head to thump back into his pillow. “Got it. Ready when you are.”

I heaved a sigh, casting my mind to the task ahead.

I knew that in doing this there would be an inevitable buildup of influence, so there was little doubt of this man coming away from the experience with a considerable dollop of concern greater for my wellbeing than he had begun with. But it was not as if we were initiating some Binding Ritual—even as informal of a one as I had performed on Lynnria. So I did not fear that I might change this man. I just needed to keep my distance and let the influence naturally ebb away.

He would be fine. Probably.

That aside, I had never actually attempted to regrow a full limb before, but there was nothing in my skill description to make me think it was impossible. My own experiences with the ability had shown that a person could recover from some absolutely brutal injuries… if provided with enough stacks of the spell. The trouble was, those experiences had always come at the behest of a convenient monster to drain the Healing Energy out of. Which we did not have.

So all of it was going to have to come from me.

“Alright.” I cast an unwilling glance at the man’s crotch area, which had been covered by a thin blanket for modesty. The leathers and chain he had been wearing for armor had been tossed to one side, so there were no problems there. But if he had been wearing undergarments, there was no sign. “If you need to adjust yourself, now would be the time.”

He grimaced. “Right.”

I turned away before I could see his hand slip beneath the sheet. “Jax, be ready to cut that bandage away. I don’t want it interfering once the regeneration starts.”

“Master,” she agreed, stepping close.

For all her admonishments, it was easy to see how eager she was for this. I knew she would have no interest in this man as an individual, but she was a creature who drank the emotions of others like most would a fine wine. Sex, specifically Lust, was just about her favorite thing ever. That I was about to bring someone to the heights of it right in front of her had her almost quivering with anticipation.

Xyn seemed much calmer in comparison, though I noted how her eyes had fixed upon the man. She was awaiting the feast to come every bit as impatiently as Jax was.

The redhead slipped a claw beneath the bandage, then gave me a quick nod, signaling her readiness.

“Okay. Here goes.”

The first cast came and went in a heartbeat. The Words to the spell had been so ingrained from constant use I could probably have uttered them in my sleep, however I could tell the instant the effect hit the man that one stack of regeneration would be insufficient even if I pushed as much Energy into it as I could. He would be left with nothing but a healed-over stump.

The man sucked in a breath. “Oh… okay.” He licked his lips to steady himself. “That’s… not so bad.”

Jax tensed, but I did not give her the signal just yet. Nor did I bother to look at the man. “We’re just getting started.”

The moment I felt the effect begin to wane, I quickly cast a second atop it. And then a third.

That forced a gasp out of him. “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Take it easy!”

“Can’t,” I muttered, still focused intently on the man’s leg—for obvious reasons… and other obvious reasons.

Jax let out a low whistle. “Lad’s got more than just the one horn, I see.”

“And so backed up,” Xyn agreed, subtly moistening her lips. “Three months, at least, the poor thing. Mmm~ a lovely bouquet, too. Do you think he’ll cry? Oh, I do hope so…”

Jax cast a reproachful glance at the other lilim before her eyes inevitably returned to the matryoshka tent the man had erected. “Ain’t never tasted such off a man afore…” she muttered.

“Then you’ve never lived!” the other exclaimed with the sudden enthusiasm of a connoisseur. “You can’t imagine how much a few simple tears can enhance the flavor, to say nothing of the complexity of a nut so beautifully aged. The heady burst of desperation as it gives way to the lingering aftertaste of relief… all mixed with the bright yet fleeting notes of inadequacy? Oh~ It’s exquisite!”

I was used to this sort of talk, so it scarcely registered for me that the words, ‘a nut so beautifully aged,’ had just come from her mouth. The wolugh was far less immune.

“What are you talking about?” the man managed through his gasping. He turned to me. “What’s she talking about?”

“Just ignore her. She’s teasing you.” I gave Jax the nod. “Now, please.”

As my First busied herself with cutting the bandages away, Xyn directed an indignant sniff my way. “Teasing nothing! You have an infant’s tongue or you’d not say such things. There is more to an orgasm than simple Lust, you know.”

“You know perfectly well that I don’t have a tongue,” I returned, sticking to her metaphor for the sake of our company. “Now, hush. I’m busy.”

The bandage came away to reveal a stump already writhing with regenerative tissue, but it was not moving anywhere near fast enough to get this man on a second foot within the time allotted. I did a quick mental assessment.

Five more stacks, maybe? Six? I cast a speculative look at the man. He needed to be able to fight after this, so I had to avoid knocking him too much on his ass.

I was about to get the next spell going, but then Xyn muttered something innocuous… yet decidedly odd.

“Do I?”