Solstice Castle

by Trane

Chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Part 1

Of course, if I had tried to gain entry into the Princess' suite while she was at the Palace at the capital, the King's Guard would have sliced me in half like one of the melons that Jenar serves to the monks. But, with the royal family on its annual visit to enjoy the cool air and the Solstice Festival here in Speysard, anything was possible.

* * * * *

The day began routinely. I rose early in my small cell in the back of the monastery, dressed in loose tunic and pants, and dashed to the kitchen to help fat old Jenar prepare the monks' breakfast. I quickly sliced the fruit and pulled the loaves from the old brick oven.

Jenar excused me from clean-up duties, knowing that Beseer had requested my help at the docks when the royal barge emerged from the river mouth and sidled up to the pier. Beseer's usual mead-sodden old helpers could handle the normal river traffic, but he appreciated both my youthful athleticism, when twenty or thirty mooring lines were being simultanously flung from the barge, and my cleverness with things mechanical, in the event a winch froze or a pulley broke. Being an orphan, I was not pledged to any one guild, and thus had developed skills from the dozens of tradesmen and craftsmen whom I had helped during my seventeen years.

The crowd at the docks cheered as the huge dark barge with its gaily colored flags and flapping sails came into view around the point. As long as thirty grown men laid end-to-end, the barge was the technological marvel of all of Vorlan. Its huge deck held the green and white canopy in which the royal party itself was relaxing at the end of its two day journey.

My eyes swept the deck, for the King was known to bring dozens of young maidens down for the festival, ostensibly as servants or companions for his daughters. Nonetheless, rumors abounded of the more salacious roles the slender nymphs played in the exclusive parties held at the Solstice Castle during the Festival's warm evenings.

"Jaze, you three-balled young whelp, get your skinny ass up to the main pier and catch those lines," came a gravelly voice behind me. I turned and grinned good-naturedly at Beseer's sun-wrinkled face.

Along with two identical young boys-Beseer's twin grandsons-I stripped off my blouse and scampered to the edge of the longest pier just as the barge lumbered up, its twelve-foot high sides slamming into the dock's slats. Eight of the portly dock workers lined up several yards back of us. Heavy hemp ropes flew from the boat to be caught by the dockhands. When lines overlapped, which inevitably occurred, the twins and I shinnied up the lines and freed them, tossing them to the appropriate dockhand to secure.

With all lines down, I pulled myself hand-over-hand from rope to rope up to midship, where in a fit of energy I swung myself in two windmill-like revolutions and released the rope, landing feet first on the dock with a graceful pirouette. Whistles broke out from both dockside and barge at my maneuver. Beseer cuffed me and pushed me toward the winch, where Beseer's brother-in-law Creen was starting to jockey the loading ramp into place.

Since I had no immediate duties unless a mechanical problem developed, I could watch the royal party leave the elegant vessel not ten paces away.

Creen smoothly dropped the ramp in place, and the party started down the ramp to the waiting carriages, where the horses, hearing the crowd's din, pawed nervously.

After the guards in their bright silk outfits and long sabers emerged, the tall, dark-browed King Abret and his consort, Queen Serjeena, stepped out of the canopy and, along with their retinue of elite Palace guards, paced down the plank to the cheers of the crowd. I had seen them in their deeply-hued robes from a distance at prior Festivals, but now was dumbstruck at the sight of the Queen. In the heat, she had allowed her veil to slip and I saw her piercing dark eyes, chiseled cheekbones, and ivory smooth skin. I had heard that she was only sixteen when her father, the Prince of Fanjoer, had matched her with Abret in the year of my birth as part of a political alliance, but she did not now look to be thirty-three-she could have passed for a student at the Abbey academy. She turned and spoke briefly with a lumpish-looking young man, obviously the Crown Prince, Phenshraw.

Behind the royal couple and their son emerged a gaggle of young women, only a few in veils, and each wearing light, saffron robes. All were astonishingly beautiful, and my throat became dry. At the head of the pack was a tall, golden-haired vision, and I was entranced at the way her full breasts swayed under her gown. I knew her to be Lorena, the lady-in-waiting to Princess Paleem, the King's only daughter. Again, I had only seen Lorena from a distance, and never had imagined that she was such a beauty. Her walk reminded me of a mountain lynx, proud but alert.

The group of maidens was delayed as the King's party entered its carriages, and Lorena's eyes casually swept the dock. Her blue-eyed gaze alighted on me and stopped, scanning up and down my frame. She smiled slightly, and one eyebrow rose almost imperceptibly, then the tip of her pink tongue peeked out from between her perfect red lips. My face froze in surprise, my eyes growing. I felt the blood rush from my head and swell my manhood. Lorena noticed the effect she had on me and her smile widened almost to a leer. The tip of her tongue slid to the corner of her closed lips.

Before I could react, the carriages for the assembly of girls moved in front of them, and Lorena's eyes moved away. For the first time I noticed a small figure in the midst of the throng, heavily veiled in a brilliant blue robe. My heart leapt; this must be Princess Paleem herself, who reputedly had been seen unveiled by no man save her family and the priests who tutored her. I could see only her hazel eyes, fastened on Lorena, and a wisp of deep red hair peeking from beneath her hood. Paleem's head turned to follow that which had fascinated Lorena, and her gaze found me. She stared at me curiously, unabashedly. Again I found myself paralyzed. Paleem failed to notice the group move, and suddenly stumbled forward as the servant behind her jostled her.

In a trice, the girls were in their carriages, and I was left with a suddenly flushed face and a sore shoulder, where Creen had punched me to draw my attention. "Aye, lad, if you stand there drawing dung flies in your open maw I'll take the top of your crown off when I bring the ramp around." I skittered out of the way, and helped Creen bring the ramp down off the barge.

With my duties finished, I retrieved my blouse and went into town to the market square to help Madame Blaven set up the wooden framed booth for displaying her handmade pots. The square was bustling with pilgrims and tourists who had come to Speysard for the festival. The craftspeople and food vendors had worked strenuously for weeks to build up their stocks, and booths were overflowing with garments, pots and utensils, jewelry, tapestries, and spices and dried fruits and meats.

I walked through the market, cadging a morsel of vra fruit from a seller whose framework I re-tied, and a burnt loaf of dark rega bread from old Bekdray the baker, whose oven I often had patched.

"He looks rather tall for a monkey, don't you think you think, Rebca?" The soft voice behind me was unknown to me, and I turned only because I thought the comment an odd one. I found myself facing none other than Lorena herself, accompanied by a smaller, slender young dark-haired beauty in simpler robes. A castle guard stood in the background, just out of earshot, fingering a ripe melon and trying to cajole its owner into passing it over as a courtesy to the King. I could find no words. "And, he doesn't talk; maybe he only chatters like a monkey, too."

My face flushed in embarassment and ire. "I am no monkey," I croaked. Her contemptuous grin annoyed me, her beauty notwithstanding. A riposte came to mind. I could not resist. "Are you perhaps missing a family member?"

Lorena's companion-obviously Rebca-put her hand to her mouth in a stifled giggle. It was Lorena's turn to flush. She recovered nicely, though. "Well, he does look like one of the gypsies who appear in the traveling shows one sees at the Palace, spinning around a rope or leaping from one swinging bar to another. Are you perhaps a gypsy from the Rhona lands, imp Jaze?" I started.

"Oh yes," she continued, "your little flying stunt caught the attention of Bishop Paddon, who boasted to us that you were a multi-gifted product of his Order's monastery here in Speysard. He said that Jaze could best any man in Speysard in the grappling ring, could fix any device the Guilds make, and yet recite his devotions as well as any priest." My eyes fell to my feet. Lorena stepped as close to me as propriety would permit and drew my eyes to her azure stare by the strength of its intensity. She smiled, "Perhaps we shall have need of one of your gifts, Jaze. Would you come if young Rebca brought you my message?"

"You mock me by your teasing, Milady. You have no call for one such as me and I have no pass for entry into the castle."

Lorena's guard headed towards us, his ruffy face scowling. A commoner as I had no business conversing with women of such standing. "Perhaps, perhaps not," Lorena muttered drily, as she slipped away with Rebca, the guard following in her wake.

I returned to the monastery with my head swimming. Never had I conversed with a woman such as Lorena. While she was no more than one or two years my senior, her regal bearing and overpowering beauty marked her in my eyes as woman to match any. I stumbled my way through the evening meal, almost spilling Brother Adelbert's soup in his lap.

I retired to my cell early, to read by candlelight a tract left at the monastery by the Bishop. Before I could commence, I heard scratching at my door. I opened it to find one of Beseer's grandsons standing erect, his fist clutched to his chest. "Jaze," he cried breathlessly, "a girl gave me a whole silver tren"-which he opened his fist to display-"to bring you to her." He grabbed my arm and pulled me toward him. I slipped out of his grip but followed him down the hall and out the small door carved in the stone building's back side.

"Well, I wouldn't want to keep you from earning a tren." I was curious but wary; perhaps a suitor of a young woman I had wooed was setting me up for vengeance. I had been careful and had suffered no such attack before, but had heard of it occurring.

Perhaps forty paces down the path we came upon a small hooded figure, and I sighed in relief. I patted the boy and shooed him away; "You have done well, but put the tren in a pocket before you lose it."

The figure lowered the hood and in the fading twilight I could just make out the features of Rebca. She handed me a scrap of linen, dubiously as though not expecting me to be able to read it. I snatched it, and read, "Master Jaze, your services indeed are required at Solstice Palace. Please follow Rebca. Silently. L."

I snorted, "Tell me, Rebca. What joke is your mistress playing upon me? Will I find a legion of the King's finest guards awaiting me somewhere?"

Her dark eyes looked at me beseechingly, and then she shrugged. I realized that she would not or could not speak to me, and that she probably would be punished if she failed in her mission. I could not think of any reason that Lorena would go to the effort to craft a hoax which would lead to my arrest, so I mimicked Rebca's shrug-at which she silently tittered-and followed her along the hillside toward the side of Solstice Castle.

The enormous castle had been carved over scores of years into the side of the soft grenha stone cliffs. All had heard rumors of many secret passageways behind the castle, and in my earlier years I had explored a few myself, only to be shooed away by the few guards stationed all year round at the King's summer palace.

We were met at a side opening by a scruffy, ill-clad young boy of perhaps eight. I recognized him as the only son of fat old Mayva, one of the village's better cooks who the king's own cook hired each summer to assist in finding and preparing the local produce. Without speaking, the boy turned and led us into a side corridor. Moving at almost a trot, he weaved us through a series of passages until we emerged next to what I recognized to be the castle's giant kitchen. I assumed I had been called to tinker with a vent on one of the large brick ovens, but we tarried only as long as necessary to be assured that no one was near, and then he motioned us to follow him up a narrow stairwell.

I was mystified. Why hide if I was there on a legitimate repair request? Then it occurred to me that there would be no reason that the Princess' lady would be beckoning repair men. By this time, however, I could not be assured of tracing my way back outside, and certainly had no excuse to offer when I ran into a guard, as I certainly would do. I tried to whisper a query to Rebca, but she quickly spun her head and, with a severe admonishing glance, silenced me with a slender finger to my lips.

We climbed several flights, and then waited again for the boy to check for guards. He led us down two passages to another stairwell. Without a word, he fled back the way he brought us, leaving Rebca and me to fend for ourselves. We quietly crept up the dark stairwell, and I suddenly was conscious of her fresh young smell and the sibilant rhythm of her gauzy robe brushing over the steps, propelled by her slim thighs.

At the top of the stairwell we waited as servants passed. As casually as I could, I pressed up behind her and lightly placed a hand on her hip, knowing that she could not betray us by reproaching me. Rebca stiffened and placed her hand on my own. Rather than pulling mine away, however, she gave it a quick squeeze and clutched it. She pulled me across the hallway into a large antechamber.

Beyond it was a heavy oak door, which Rebca pushed open, then she pulled me through. We traversed a short hallway, which ended at another door guarded by a heavy, ornate brocade tapestry. Rebca tapped lightly on the jamb. The door was unbolted from the inside and opened by none other than Lorena herself. Lorena quickly yanked at our arms, drawing us into a large chamber, brightly lit by scented yole oil lamps.

I held my arm over my eyes to let them adjust to the light. As they did, I marveled at the astonishing colors of the silk-covered walls and equally bright satin pillows littering the floor. A mammoth bed overwhelmed the far end of the room. Next to it stood a huge basin built in the very floor. I had seen bathing tins before, but it took me a moment to recognize that this basin was nothing other than such a tin, but at least as far across as a man is tall, made of Rhonan marble. On each side of the sunken tub were two large lamps resting on frames, and behind it was a portal of some sort, covered by a gauzy screen.

I turned to Lorena and realized that she was not dressed in the traveling robes in which I had seen her before. She was in a stark white robe made of a thin, clinging fabric. I did not realize how thin it was until she moved with a smile targeted at me, purposefully stopping in front of a floor lamp and casually turning in place. Her voluptuous form was silhouetted by the light. It was almost as though she were as bare as a newborn! I could make out every one of her magnificent curves. As she stopped briefly to face to my right, I could even make out the shape and size of the nipple distended from an abundant breast.

"Milady?" I stammered. "Was there some repair or?" God, I felt like a perfect ass. There was no repair in this wench's mind this night.

Her mocking laugh burned my cheeks for the second time this day. "Repair? Why yes, I believe there is some task for you tonight. Perhaps you can hammer in a dowel, for me unless you forgot to bring your hammer with you." She strode up to me, staring into my eyes with a nearly contemptuous grin. "You did bring a hammer, didn't you, my gypsy boy?" A stray blonde lock fell over her face, and she girlishly caught it between her teeth. I remained speechless, my wits traveling somewhere below my blouse.

Lorena turned to the raven-tressed Rebca and asked innocently. "My dear friend, our visitor doesn't know if he brought his tool. We must help him search." When Rebca hesitated in confusion, Lorena grabbed the shorter girl by her shoulders and swung her toward me. Lorena stepped behind Rebca and pulled the hooded robe off her shoulders, throwing it in the corner. Rebca, now clad in a shorter version of Lorena's gossamer robe, whirled to the blonde, but Lorena firmly planted her hands on Rebca's shoulders and turned her back to me.

Lorena planted herself directly up against Rebca's back, and reached around to grasp the young girl's small hands. "Now, Rebca. Let's see if his tools are under his fine blouse."

She guided the slender fingers to my waist and up under the shirt. The soft palms were guided to my slim waist, then gently up my stomach to my broad, lightly furred chest. Rebca stared at my chest, as though watching a contest of a pair of two-handed creatures fighting beneath the soft cloth. She allowed Lorena's larger hands to move hers over the hair on my chest, her mouth slightly agape.

Lorena sighed in mock impatience. "Oh, this is so inefficient." She suddenly jerked the joined hands to my shoulders. Unthinkingly, I raised my arms, and the two pulled the material over my head and off me, casting it in the corner with Rebca's traveling robe.

Now it was Lorena's turn to be mesmerized. I take great pride at the breadth and muscularity of my chest and shoulders from the lifting I do and the grappling training that I receive from Mard Hegran, a former King's guard himself. Again absently biting a golden curl, she reached over Rebca and stroked my chest. She clutched my upper arm and turned me slightly, as though to get a better angle of the lamps' rays.

Lorena released me, and placed her hands on Rebca's shoulders. "I do not see any tool there. Could it be hidden elsewhere on his person? Yes, that's it. Rebca, you must complete the search." Quickly, she pushed the girl to her knees before me, her ebony tresses falling forward to brush my calves. "See if there is an adz or awl strapped near his ankles, my sweet Rebca," Lorena continued. With that instruction, Rebca darted her hands under my cuffs and up slowly to my knees. Leaving her slightly damp palms pressed to the sides of my legs, the young girl looked over her shoulder with a look that I could only describe as devilish and shook her head.

As though absorbed by this troublesome puzzle, Lorena worked at the clasp holding the front of her robe together. Suddenly, the twin halves parted, opening the robe perhaps a handsbreadth all the way below her heavy breasts to her navel. My re-awakened organ again began to engorge. Pretending not to notice the exposing of the inside swell of her alabaster breasts, the blonde leaned over Rebca's head, baring each tit almost to the nipple.

"Yes, Rebca, I believe you're getting close," she uttered in a husky tone. She then straightened and stared at me. Her hands rose to straddle her long, smooth neck, and then slid together down past the hollow of her throat. The fingers arched in their descent, and then lightly rested at the peak of her hilly mounds, the edges held in the tips of her fingers. She slowly pulled the material apart, baring more of her flesh in agonizingly small paces.

In the meantime, Rebca's hands had traveled to the backs of my thighs, creeping up to cup the join of my ass and upper leg. My aching prick expanded to nearly full dimensions down my upper leg, just inches from the porcelain-featured beauty of the servant girl.

With an impatient jerk, Lorena swept open the top of her gown, exposing in full her high, lusciously round breasts. Never had I seen mounds that even approached her heavenly hills in perfection. Capping each was a pale pink circle, topped by broad, red-hued nipples, now almost angry in their arousal. Seeing my mouth drop in astonishment, Lorena grinned in triumph and stroked the fiery tips with the ends of her smooth fingers.

Rebca's hands suddenly descended my thighs and withdrew altogether. She again looked up at her mistress, then meaningfully jerked her head toward my crotch. Lorena clasped her mouth in glee. "Why I believe we've found just the tool. But can you be sure it is the right size? I believe 'caliber' is the artillerymen's term." The blonde lady-in-waiting dropped to her knees behind Rebca. "Oh do check, won't you?"

The dark-tressed lovely brought her unsteady hands up to the hasp of my belt. As she did, I dumbfoundedly noted that Lorena's hands were snaking around the girl, and gently kneading the youngster's small breasts through the satin covering. Determinedly, Rebca unloosed my belt and pulled at the buttons down the front, randomly brushing the side of her hand against my fully tumescent sword. Suddenly, the loose trousers fell, baring my ass in the back. They surely would have dropped to my ankles but for being engaged on my pride and joy, which now was jutting straight out.

Rebca's hands dropped away, and she stared at the cloth covered pole as though uncertain what her next task would be. She barely noticed as Lorena drew the straps of her gown over her shoulders and down her sides, pulling her willowy arms through. The small, pear shaped breasts impetuously poked out, the pale nipples as hard as Lorena's. Lorena whispered in Rebca's ear, and then she glanced over to the gauze-blocked vestibule. Rebca nodded, and grasped my pants at the sides, near the front, and slowly worked them down-past the tip of my cock-and down to the floor. The rod bobbed in front of them, and I could have sworn I heard a sharp drawing of breath elsewhere in the room. The two maids' faces momentarily were frozen; Lorena's in the open-mouthed smile of a child who has just discovered cocoa-based candy, and Rebca's in an indescipherable, mesmerized stare.

I have had but a few lovers, but those in a position to know-such as my renowned flute instructor Mademoiselle Jeara and Countess Fedragon (more of whom I will relate later)-tell me that the length and breadth of my sword is rarely matched by even the largest of grown men. It must be true, for I fairly can say that the two young women on their knees before me were suffering from the sort of astonishment one normally would associate with a great surprise.

Lorena pushed her face forward, gently biting the back of Rebca's shoulder, but her eyes never left my loins. Rebca, as though jolted, brought a hand to my groin; resting it next to the base of my member. She raised her ass slightly as Lorena pushed her robe over her hips, and then her knees and, finally her feet, as Lorena fully disrobed her. Lorena's right hand slid over the swell of Rebca's hip and then dove forward and down, obviously exploring in the dark down of the younger girl's loins.

Lorena must have reached the servant's sex, for Rebca's jet eyes snapped shut. Her fingers tried to curl around the base of my manhood. Failing in that, Rebca brought her left hand up to the other side, and slowly started pulling on the loose skin of my cock, her hips lightly swaying to the pleasant torture of Lorena's fingers.

Rebca's eyes again opened and focussed on the pole before her. Her fingers tightened around me, and her strokes increased in length. I could feel her quick, warm breaths on the tip of my phallus and the small drop of my fluid that she had harvested.

Lorena's free hand went to the back of Rebca's neck, and slowly pushed it forward. The girl's barely parted red lips collided softly with my red-capped tip, resting there without moving. I felt the young maid's tongue tip lightly probe at the small slit at the end, dipping at the milky substance. Opening her mouth further, the young girl lapped lightly, pulling her tongue back into her mouth to savor my essence, and then emerging again.

Rebca required no further prodding. Hungrily, her mouth captured more of the cap, dragging her sweet lips back to the tip in a steady motion. Soon, she was capturing the full cap and drawing part of my broad shaft into her warm, wet maw.

Lorena continued her prodding of Rebca's young pussy, but now had moved her left down the front of her own robe, and was stroking herself out of my line of vision.

I reached down and, as tenderly as I could manage in my aroused state, cupped the raven lovely's cheeks in my hand. She lovingly peered up into my eyes, and then without warning threw her hed forward, impaling her mouth on almost two-thirds of my sturdy lance with an audible sound. She lightly shook her head from side-to-side, commanding me to hold her face tighter in my hands. Honoring her request, I moved my hands almost back to her ears, and then firmly pulled her lips down my cock. She groaned in pleasure and nodded. I repeated the motion more urgently, pulling her lips almost to the base of my heated shaft, and felt the tip enter her throat.

I expected her protest, but encountered even more passion, as her hips bucked out of control under Lorena's touch. I repeated my joining of her mouth and my sword, and, in my passion, I fear I was not gentle. Still, she flung her mouth forward, and cupped both hands behind my thighs. My hips jerked to meet her slavering maw, as each stroke brought the angry tip of my cock from just outside her flecked, parted lips to the depths of her throat. We continued our dance, with Rebca taking me in deeply, her tongue flashing, again and again, deeper than seemed possible. Her firm breasts swayed forward and back as her hips rose off the backs of her feet and then descended, her flowing pussy clutching at Lorena's fingers.

"Rebca, you sorceress," I cried in my passion, "I cannot hold back!"

In a breathy pant, Lorena insisted, "Not there. You must We must be able to I want to be able to see you spend."

My first blast shot into the slender servant's mouth just as the tip was emerging, and a stream trickled out to the side of her mouth and down her chin. Her hands left my thighs to wrap around the stalk, her open-mouthed face just clear of the tip. The next stream struck her upper lip and cheek, dripping down onto her tongue. The next two shots hit her extended tongue, striking it as though with a whip. She continued to stroke me, and two more strings coated each cheek, with drops reaching her ebony hair. As my emissions began to subside, her lips again captured the tip and her eyes shut tightly, followed by a quiet shriek. I realized she too was achieving her ultimate pleasure, as was the jerking Lorena behind her.

Our passions slowly waned. Rebca continued to milk me with her lips, her cum-spattered cheeks hollowed with suction. As she pulled off, Lorena clutched the girl's head and turned it toward the curtained door. The blonde then extended her tongue to clean the seed from the maid's marble-smooth skin, loudly savoring each spattered drop.

Suddenly, Lorena leapt to her feet, causing her robe to finally fall from her thighs and drop to the floor. She pulled Rebca up with her, and, to my astonishment, drew her past the tub and lamps and throught the gauze screen and into the dark chamber behind it. I heard giggles just beyond the screen.

I knew not what was occurring. Having been sexually attacked by two of the princess' companions was startling enough. Why had they suddenly abandoned me? Was I to feel insulted?

Just as I had engaged the resolve to follow them through the curtain, Lorena emerged from it. Still, I heard giggling beyond it, leaving the mystery no closer to being solved.

Part 2

The tall blonde could not resist a grin as she strode toward me, her high, round breasts swaying slightly. "You have pleased us all, Jaze. Perhaps on your next visit I will deign to let you dip your magnificent sword"-at that her eyes dropped to my spit-soaked, re-awakening cock-"into my own pot of treasures." She continued huskily, "Yes, I would like that." My rod lurched at the prospect of a return to this magnificent summer palace and the soft flesh of these two young beauties.

Sensing dismissal, my eyes cast around for my tunic and trousers, but she stopped me by sliding her hand up my chest to the back of my neck. "Oh, no; you're not done yet. Not a young, virile man like you." She leaned toward me, and I grasped a perfect, bare ass cheek and pulled her to me. Her heavy tits pressed against my muscled check, and her mouth leapt to mine. Her full lips opened wide, allowing her tongue to dive into my mouth and I parried with my own. My thick staff immediately rose to almost full rigor, sliding between her alabaster thighs, to press up against the wet, puffy lips of that very cavern of joy that she promised I might soon visit. She lightly rose on her toes and descended, so that the thick shaft might rub against her swollen clit, the tip of my phallus peeking out between the taut moons of her ass.

My free hand reached up and tweaked Lorena's nipple and she moaned passionately into my hungry mouth. Suddenly, I felt an unexpained wetness engulf the end of my phallus. My lips slipped from Lorena's and I looked over her shoulder and down her long, slim back. Slender, youthful Rebca had returned from behind the curtain and was again on her knees, softly mouthing my pink helmeted tip she had devoured only moments before. Sliding her tender lips away, she tongued down my shaft and began laving Lorena's exposed cheeks in langorous circles. Rebca looked up at me with with a wanton smile, tinged with a pure innocent joy.

With her eyes still linked with mine, the raven-haired maidservant brought her thumbs to the insides of Lorena's buttocks, and pulled them apart. Her faced dipped forward, forcing the young girl's lips up against the older blonde's brown rear entrance. Lorena stiffened as if struck by lightning; "Yes, you little wench. Suuuck my assss!!"

Rebca noisily continued the pleasuring of her lady's ass, while fondling and stroking my fully erect cock. Just as it seemed that Lorena might try to force the rod into her own sopping hole, she pushed away from me, momentarily forcing Rebca's tongue even further into her ass. The blonde reached down and pulled Rebca to her feet by the nymph's long, dark tresses. The two women kissed briefly, but hungrily, Lorena tasting the traces of her own nether passage on Rebca's tongue. Lorena then clutched Rebca's hand and pulled her to the huge bed and its gloriously colored silk sheets and blankets.

Her golden hair streaming around her, Lorena flung herself back onto the bed, her shoulders and head resting against the ornately carved headboard. Splaying her knees wide, she pulled Rebca onto her heaving form, and moaned aloud as the girl clamped her lips onto the blonde's erect right nipple and started sucking vigorously. Lorena placed both hands on the girl's dark hair, and pushed her down toward the end of the bed. Rebca's red lips trailed down her stomach as her slim form rose back onto her knees, her lean ass jutting into the air. The sight of their wanton, lesbian lust and Rebca's youthful buttocks almost caused me to spend again.

Lorena moaned as Rebca's tongue began swirling around her engorged clit, and her fingers clenched at the the silk comforter. Lorena looked over at me through slitted eyes, almost laughing at my frustration, evidenced by my prominent, hard manhood. Lorena looked down at the younger girl burrowing at her loins and whispered, "Rebca, darling, do you want Jaze's huge cock in you? Bigger than any you've ever tried? Maybe he'll split you in two; can you think of a better way to go than with your pussy filled to the breaking point?"

Rebca responded by involuntarily diving her head and ravenous lips even further into Lorena's cunt, forcing her ass even higher-flaring her rosebud-like pussy lips toward me. Lorena nodded at me.

I kneeled on the bed behind the maidservant's raised ass and placed the engorged head of my manhood against her wet, dark-fringed young labia. The tip slipped inside, and I heard Rebca's audible gasp, muffled by Lorena's firm thighs. I retreated slightly and pressed forward once more. Despite the girl's swampy wetness, I could only enter a third of the way into her joyous velvet vice. After two more tentative stabs, I drew back and pushed forward-to the hilt. Rebca's moan increased to a high-pitched keening, and in her passion she must have sucked too hard on Lorena's primed pussy, for the blonde's eyes shot open. Lorena's hips then rose from the luxurious sheets, jerking and circling. She cried though gritted teeth, "God, yes! The little slut has never sucked like this. Keep fucking her. Fuck her harder!"

In my own passion, I did not stop to contemplate the inappropriateness of such language from a princess' lady-in-waiting, but rather did as she commanded, stroking my meaty pole into the sparsely-trimmed pussy from behind, my hips smacking again and again into her buttocks. Moments later, Lorena wailed out her completion, her hips churning and her ass still free of the sheets. As Lorena's passion flooded her mouth, Rebca joined her, the spasms of her orgasm squeezing my nearly bursting rod. As I shouted that I too was about to cum, Lorena shouted, "Yes-let me see it again!"

Lorena scissored her legs around Rebca's head and dove toward the foot of the bed, resting her cheek in the small of Rebca's back. She pushed at my hips, disengaging me from the girl, and grasped my surging cock with long strong fingers. Three strokes sent me over the edge, and my passion spilled in a long stream into the cleft of Rebca's tight ass. A second eruption shot onto Rebca's heaving back, and splashed against Lorena's pursed lips. She flinched, then smiled, her tongue capturing the seed I had deposited on her mouth. Her stroking continued as my explosion began to wane, my cum pooling on Rebca's back.

Lorena frowned as though repelled by the gooey mess clinging to her lips, but I could see her tongue quickly unfurl and retrieve the stray streams clinging to her pink cheeks. She then dropped to her back next to Rebca's still form, her lightly-furred, reddened pussy lips still wet and swollen from the younger maid's oral ministrations. Slowly, Lorena rose to her feet and padded off toward the screened off anteroom, explaining with a giggle, "I've got to return some thing to its rightful place, if I it's able to even move."

As she left, I turned to Rebca for some sort of explanation, but her face was covered with her long ebony hair, and her prone form was still. I sat up to leave, but her sleepy arm reached back and cupped my hip, pressing it up against her slim buttocks, which she wiggled back against my slimy, slumbering cock.

"No, my little vixen, Jaze has nothing more for you now. Well, at least not for a few minutes." She raised one leg slightly and, reaching down between her luscious thighs, contented herself with pulling my sleepy organ up to the entrance to her pussy and lightly rubbing the tip against her clit. My hand cupped her tender young breast, kneading it gently.

I had almost drifted off to sleep when I heard a shouted "No!" just outside the heavy chamber door that I had entered earlier. It was a man's voice, middle-aged; fear mixed with surprise. Rebca and I leapt up and ran down the short hallway to the door. She pushed my chest to motion me to stay out of sight, and then pulled back the iron bar and slid the door back a few inches. Over the girl's shoulder I could see a grey-bearded man in a dark tunic: old Lermin, the King's prime minister. Lermin was struggling with a figure in a green, hooded cloak, his antagonist's face hidden in its deep folds. Each was clutching an end of an ornately carved wooden chest about four handbreadths square, trying to wrest it from the other.

Suddenly, the cloaked-figure relinquished his grip, reached into the wide folds of his sleeve, and pulled out a short, stout oak club. Lermin's skinny forearm came up too late; the club whistled in a short arc and struck him in the temple. The minister dropped to the floor, the box clattering to the tile beside him. The lid sprang open, and several large gemstones and strings of jewels slipped onto the floor. I pushed the door further open, not knowing what instinct of foolhardiness compelled me to think that I in my nakedness could challenge a club-laden foe.

The figure bent over to pick up the box. The sounds of heavy feet pounding up the staircase spurred alacrity. Grasping the chest and re-engaging its hasp, the minister's attacker glided to the stairway entrance almost like a green apparition. A young, grey-tunic clad guard rushed up, staff at the ready. His glance took in the sprawled royal official on the ground, then his eyes widened further as he saw Rebca and I peering out of the chamber door, our upper torsos fully exposed. I tried to call out a warning, but the club struck again, and the guard too slumped to the castle floor from a blow to his head. The assailant turned toward us for the first time, but I could not make out the features beneath the deep green hood. Without a word, the figure thrust the chest and the club in the folds of his robe and dashed away.

I started to rush out, but Rebca pulled me back. I recognized the folly of starting a chase where I had no business being. She returned to the chamber and quickly donned her own robe, and slid out to the hallway to kneel beside the fallen Lermin. Instinctively ever the tidy maidservant, she pulled the stray gems from the floor and stuffed them in her robe.

At that moment, three guards, led by a huge, steel-armored captain rushed up. Taking in the scene at a glance, the captain grabbed Rebca by her upper arms and pulled her face to his own, his dark scraggly beard almost touching her chin. "Wench! What happened here? What happened to the prime minister and the private?" The young brunette remained frozen in fear, biting her lower lip. He shook her like a straw doll, and the gemstones fell from her robe and clattered loudly on the tile.

The captain's face grew red with anger. "What have we found? A scheme of a common wench to steal royal jewels from the minister? Where are your accomplices, you slut?!" Still, Rebca could say nothing. Suddenly it occurred to me that the beautiful maidservant had not said a word at any time during the day, and perhaps was incapable of doing so. The guard captain obviously had no such knowledge, and he threw her to the floor at the feet of the remaining two guards.

"Take this bitch down to the cells, where we can question her with a bit more persuasion," he ordered. "Beckon the royal physician to minister to these two men. I must report to the King and Queen of this treachery."

I remained stunned, still peering through the slightly ajar door that I had been hiding behind. My new lover was accused of conspiring to steal royal jewels! Moreover, if I was caught, I surely would be prosecuted as one of her accomplices-and, I had no way of leaving the now fully alerted castle

Part 3

I quickly donned my clothes and hid behind the large bed, covering myselfwith the silk bedclothes. Within moments, Lorena rushed in, looking wildly about. "Jaze", she whispered loudly, "are you still here?" Satisfied that she was alone, I emerged. The blonde beauty ran over and buried her face in my chest. She looked up, her beautiful blue eyes brimming with tears, and questions.

"What happened?" she demanded. I explained the mysterious attack on the Prime Minister and a young guard just outside the chamber door, with slight, dark-haired young Rebca arrested while trying to tend to the injured official, the late-arriving guards mistaking her tidiness at picking up a few jewels scattered in the robbery as an attempt at thievery.

Lorena pushed me away and began pacing. "Oh, dear! Rebca is my servant and at the very least my position with the princess is in jeopardy if I am found to have permitted a common thief to serve me." She froze and whirled to me, "And if you are found here, I will be sent back to my family in shame, if not arrested as one of the den of conspirators." She resumed pacing.

"Your concern for Rebca's welfare is touching," I replied drily. Lorena's golden curls whirled toward me as she started to snarl a reply. I held her by the shoulders, still distracted by her swaying bosom beneath the thin robe.

"Look, the only way to clear you completely is to convince the castle officials that Rebca was not involved. We need to find the attacker in the green cloak and determine who his conspirators are." Lorena nodded. "Whoever it was, the thief must have had connections in the castle to have been given access to it. So, we must be careful; we do not know who this enemy and his sponsor is."

I could see her thoughts speeding up to catch mine, her brilliant blue eyes dancing back and forth. "They tell me that both the Prime Minister and the guard who were struck by the villain are still senseless and likely to remain so for a few days." I breathed with relief, as the guard had seen both Rebca and I peering out of the chamber door, perhaps we had some time to seek the hooded assailant before I was identified as a by-stander in a place where I had no business being. "I will find out more information and meet with you in the mid-afternoon at the market square. For now, we need to rid this place of you."

My libido was returning, and my hands slid around her slender waist. "But I cannot think of a more idyllic hiding place," I protested. Her long slender fingers briefly rubbed along the front of my crotch, feeling my awakening hardness. "Listen, you randy young fool. The guards certainly will return soon to search the area. If we get this mess straightened out, you can hide yourself-and this," giving my rod an affectionate squeeze, "wherever you choose."

She walked to the heavy oak door to her chamber and peeked out. "Now, Jaze, all is quiet for the moment. All I can figure for your escape is to go down the laundry shaft into the laundry room, and escape out there." She said this casually, as though suggesting I step off of a wooden walk onto the street.

"Are you crazy?!!" I sputtered. "That drop must be five landings of the stairs. Surely, I'll break every limb I have. That would be convenient for you; no one would know from which suite I came, and I would languish a cripple in the dungeons until I'm an old man!"

Her voice grew husky in an effort to persuade me. "Honestly, I saw a huge pile of laundry at the bottom of the shaft this afternoon. You could land in it and fall as though into a cloud."

"And if they have washed that laundry.?" She shrugged. Still, I knew she was right; I had no choice.

We crept out of her room and down a short hallway, into an alcove. She pulled open a small wooden door, and I pushed my feet and torso halfway through, my wide shoulders catching in the jamb. I started to protest that perhaps the shaft was too narrow for me, when we heard the synchronized footsteps of guards approaching. She hastily whispered, "Then lose some weight," kissed me quickly but soundly, and pushed down on the top of my head, casting me into the shaft.

I barely noticed the sound of the small door slamming, for I was falling into utter blackness, the only sound that of my tunic brushing the rough stone sides of the shaft. The descent seemed to continue forever, as I desperately fought to keep my legs beneath me, but relaxed for such time as my fall terminated.

Abruptly I found myself enveloped in white, as I hit feet first and pitched into a mass of sheets and robes. The laundry was still there, and I was intact! My relief was short lived, as I felt a foot blindly strike my back, and a muttered oath in a male voice. I righted myself and looked out, seeing only a pair of wide nude male buttocks, as the owner lurched out of the pile, grasped a small stack of clothes, and darted out of room. His dark-maned head never looked back at me. My first thought was again one of panic. The man certainly would beckon the guards.

"Oh, fuck!" A young contralto voice behind me, slightly accented with the dialect of the gypsies of Bertrain. I whirled, and found myself looking into the dusky features and huge dark eyes of Lindea. The rest of her remained hidden in the sheets which covered us both, a mound perhaps four paces across.

I nearly jumped straight into the air. Lindea was the dark beauty of Speysard. Her family, like many of the gypsies, ran a laundry in the east end, where Lindea always could be found sweating over tubs and tables. I, along with all young men of the town, looked forward to dropping off my clothes, merely for the opportunity to glimpse the tops of her heavy sweat-soaked breasts exposed as she leaned over the steaming laundry tubs, her nipples visible 'neath the flimsy top made almost transparent by the steam and perspiration. I always imagined that she had a special smile for me as I brought the cassocks of the monks. Yet, no man had been known to spend time alone with the beauty. Rumor had it that her family was a deposed royal family of the Bertrain gypsies, and that her father would permit her to see no man who was not himself of royal blood. She always carried herself with regal disdain notwithstanding the menial nature of her work, giving only a curt greeting to each customer, and then returning to her scrubbing.

I could not decide which of us was the more starled, or frightened. She recognized me. "Master Jaze! What are you doing here?" she hissed. Her glance drifted up to the end of the chute out of which I had dropped. One brown arm pushed away from her head a mass of sheets that threatened to topple on her. I realized that the shoulder attached to that arm was bare, and suddenly I reasoned why she might be scared. The bare man's ass I had seen explained much.

I could not keep the grin from my face. "I could ask you the same. I don't think this is a way to get the laundry clean; in fact, you'll soil it in that fashion." I stretched toward her and pushed to one side a wad of white sheetsshe clutched before her, exposing the bare right side of her voluptuous form. I glimpsed a large round breast, floating in defiance of gravity, its dark nipple taut. She angrily pulled the sheet back in front of her.

"It is not your business what I do. Besides, he is royalty, like Lindea." Her pout broke; she threw her hand in front of her face as she realized what she had disclosed. Yes, I recognized the fleeing form now. It was Phenshraw, the oafish crown prince. No wonder he had bolted, afraid of being caught in the arms of a common laundress. I smiled and shrugged to assure her I had no desire to give away her secret.

Her regal manner returned. "Lindea has so little opportunity to be with a man. My father, he will not let me see anyone, saying I must wait for one worthy of our family. And now, when I have an opportunityto lie with not just any man, but the future king of our country, Lindea is interrupted by someone who is in training to be a priest!" She spat out the last phrase. Her sheet carelessly slipped, exposing the better part of one perfect breast and the swell of her womanly hip. Despite my two interludes with Lorena and Rebca, my loins suddenly stirred at the sight of the flesh that for so long had been the object of my fantasies.

"Wait a djarr," I interjected. I sat up boastfully, knowing my physique would match up to any prince. "Just because my abode is with the priests does not mean their path is my own. If you were but minutes ago in the room of a certain lady-in-waiting, you would see how unlike a priest I am." Now it was my turn to bite my tongue. By conceding I was on the wing where the ladies-in-waiting resided, I in one swoop had placed myself at the scene of the Prime Minister's attack, not to mention in a compromising situation in the boudoir of a high lady.

Lindea's glare softened, as her eyes swept me as though for the first time. Her eyes stopped at my crotch, noting my renewed swelling. She glanced up at me, and-her eyes remaining locked onto mine-she began dropping the clutch of sheets down the front of her smooth skin. She paused at the tips of her full breasts and gently kneaded the full orbs with fabric covered fingers. Her hands dropped further, displaying for the first time the magnificence of the fabulous breasts whose shape I had reconstructed in my mind so many times in the past. Her dark nipples and large areoles stood proudly, the heavy tits sagging not at all. She again espied my crotch, which now was fully tented in my excitement. She smiled for the first time, an uncharacteristic wantonness to her visage.

"Yes, Jaze, I see you are a failure as a priest novitiate. It is not your calling." She swept the sheets aside, showing her to be kneeling amidst the soiled linens, the thick forest between her legs drawing my eye and my passion. "I, however, am calling you. You owe me that which your ill-timed arrival deprived me of." With that, the auburn-tressed voluptuary rose onto her knees, exposing all of her glories for me to explore. Suddenly, I found myself pushed onto my back, with the raven beauty groping at my breeches' drawstring. Before I could move, the trousers were pulled down to my knees, and Lindea was straddling my midquarters, her strong fingers wrapped around my tumescence. Her eyes grew wide as I continued to grow as a result of her fondling, and she muttered, "No priest at all not this one." I felt wetness cover the tip of my cock, as she slowly sat back, taking me inside her.

Patiently, but firmly, she gyrated as she forced herself down on me. Her thick, lustrous dark hair fell forward, tickling my chest, her head bowed and brow furrowed in concentration. She rose slightly, then dropped her full weight down, taking my entire length into her with a sibilant sigh. Her head snapped up and eyes sprang open. Her lascivious smile returned. Her hips began rocking forward and back, her balance maintained by spreading her long arms out to her sides, her fists balled with the sweet tension of our coupling.

She then leaned forward, bracing herself with strong splayed fingers on my chest. She hastened both her pace and the length of her strokes. My hands found her dangling tits, barely able to encompass their fullness. My thumbs teased the already erect nipples, to her murmured approval.

Her passion escalating, she caught her lower lip with her teeth and closed her eyes. I could not resist the tease; "Is it some prince you now dream is beneath you, my wonderful Lindea?" Her gaze returned to my face, with surprising fondness. She shook her head.

"No, Master Jaze. No royalty bears a scepter such as yours," she giggled. Her features stiffened as she continued to ride me. "Besides, I question whether you are as common as you think. Such things are among those my people can detect, and I feel that"

Her surmise was cut off by a sliding sound above us. We both looked up just as a huge mass of sheets, a good half the size of our sexual bed, dropped from the shaft I had traveled myself. The force knocked us over, still entwined, but now I was on top, the gauzy light fabric imprisoning us.

Lindea did not falter, but locked her strong legs around my hips and drew me to her. I began to stroke deeply into her. Her fingers captured my face and drew her to her own, and we shared our first kiss, one of astonishing tenderness in view of the abrupt manner of our meeting. She sustained it, her sweet tongue shyly probing the inner edges of my lips, and then seeking my own. I returned her kiss with as much passion as I knew. Our eyes locked and smiled. We knew that in this castle filled with royalty, no two lovers had ever been enveloped in a tryst as worthy of being called regal as that which we now enjoyed. I slid my lips off hers and down the sides of her throat. I nipped with quivering lips at her breasts and nipples. Her hands stroked up and down my back.

Our frenzy caused the sheets to shift, flinging us onto our sides. We laughed aloud and began to roll to and fro, as children rolling down a clover-laden hillside. One would be on top for a bare instant, and then with a twist or thrust we would reverse positions. Finally, we found a firm oasis in the shifting fabric, with me in virtually a sitting position and Lindea astride me, still joined at our loins. Her hands rested on my shoulders, and mine at her hips. Our lurching passion increased, and I knew she was but moments from her peak of joy, as was I. She came to it not with a shriek, but a long, low-pitched wail.

With a jerk she pushed down onto me, her fingers digging into my shoulders. I could feel the pulsations of her inner walls as her moment arrived, sending me into my own paroxysms. I jetted my release into her as my hips rose. It seemed our spending would be without end. Soon, of course, it did, and we slumped back-Lindea outstretched atop me-in the near-darkness of our fabric tomb.

She tented her fingers on my chest and rested her chin on them. The dark pools of her eyes scanned my face. "Master Jaze," she uttered but then caught herself, laughing at her own formality. "Lover Jaze, I sense we may have much of an interesting future-at least in part together." Her features clouded,"But I suspect that future will be short if you are found here. Why are you in the castle, and why did you come down the laundry shaft?"

I already had alluded to a liason in Princess Paleema's suite. Still, Gypsy women are notorious for jealously removing an appendage or two of a lover who lies with another, and I suspected that she would grant me little allowance for the fact that the rendezvous upstairs had preceded my interlude with Lindea. Still, Lindea's knowledge of the castle and gypsy gifts might be of great aid. I told her as much truth as I could, that I was asked to assist on some errand upstairs and-before I could commence it-I saw the Prime Minister attacked and some poor maidservant unjustly accused. She did not ask for details of my alleged romantic tryst, and I volunteered none.

Lindea grew thoughtful. The gypsies are noted partisans of the wrongly accused, and I could see her heart go out to young Rebca, even though she knew the smaller girl only slightly. "The King's Guard will probably bring her to the storage catacomb down the hall from here," she said. "Perhaps if you are close enough, you can discover their plans for her." I nodded, and retrieved my clothes that had been flung off in our passionate frenzy.

When we both were dressed, she kissed me again. She tied her full thick hair back with a ribbon. "You must be careful, my love. I sense great intrigue and deceit in the castle. Those who would attack a Prime Minister would not hesitate to take a blade to one such as you." She kissed me again, and I slipped out of the room and headed down the hall.

Part 4

I crept noiselessly down a dank corridor littered with rags and half-broken oak cartons. Turning a corner, I say a torch illuminating the next cluttered hallway, held by a bracket outside an open doorway. Flitting from one pile of rubbish to the next, I made my way to the doorway and risked peeping in.

The room was yet another of the summer castle's storerooms, filled with furniture, wine casks, and crates of spices. The captain of the guard and two assistants stood with their backs to me facing the far wall. As the captain stepped forward, I saw where their attention was focussed. My lithe, lovely young Rebca stood with her wrists shackled by a short chain to the wall, still in her short white robe. The bearded captain strode forward, brandishing a short sword.

"Now, young bitch, tell me of the accomplice to your treachery!" I took advantage of his bellowing to slip inside the room and secret myself behind two crates to the side of the menacing tableau. Rebca saw me enter, but the clever girl made no sign. Her eyes jerked back to the captain and his sharp steel weapon. He placed the flat of the blade against her chest, the tip pointing to her feet. He slowly drew it down between her firm young breast, and, turning it slightly, pulled out with the blade edge, slowly tearing the bodice. Her white breasts became more and more exposed, as she whimpered. The officer halted as the rip reached halfway between navel and breastbone, leaving the dangling fabric fully displaying one perfect nude breast. He rested the tip against the side of the perfect half-globe, indenting the skin.

"Fool!" cried a stern woman's voice from just outside the door. The guard jerked, leaving a tiny nick next to Rebca's nipple. Into the room strode none other than the tall dark Queen of our realm, Queen Serjeena. Though it was close to the middle of the night, she carried herself as though at Court, garbed in a fine gold robe. The only sign of the hour was that her full dark locks, usually pinned and coiffed atop her head, cascaded over her shoulders, the sides pulled to her temples with simple sapphire clips. The captain stepped back startled, his hand falling to his side. Serjeena's dark eyes flashed in anger. "What allegations have you against this girl?" she demanded.

The guard fought to maintain his stern mein. "We found her standing over the fallen Prime Minister outside Lady Lorena's chamber. Jewels fell from her gown, and others had fallen around her. Now she refuses to divulge her accomplices."

"Idiot! Of course she would be at her Lady's room. She resides there! She did not run, did she?" The captain shook his head. The queen continued, "The young thing was probably collecting the fallen jewels for you." Rebca nodded enthusiastically. "That's how we train the maidservants to take care of clutter!"

The soldiers looked somewhat abashed.

The queen continued, "Besides, whom do you suppose she could have conspired with? She has had no family but us since she was a foundling, and she never leaves the royal retinue unescorted."

The captain sputtered, "But she refuses to say anything about"

"That's because she CANNOT say anything, imbecile! If you paid any attention to something other than polishing your own breast plate you'd know that the pitiful thing has not said a word since she came to us." The queen waved to the door. "All of you, out! I will find out what there is to know. Leave me, the queen, to see to her chains, and go find some real information about this treachery!" The three men, with exaggerated purposefulness, strode out.

The raven-haired queen advanced on Rebca. Sympathetic eyes scanned the girl's tear streaked face. "Now, Rebca, you will answer all that I asked, won't you?" The girl nodded. "You poor child," the queen continued, cupping her chin. "This must all be a fright, and I will release you in a second." The queen seemed to notice for the first time the torn bodice and exposed breast of the beauty.

"You must understand, though, that this attack is a desecration of our castle and a threat to His Highness, to all of us. You must hold nothing back from me. We must all help to rid our family of the treachery, and as family we will then give you what comfort we can." The queen's hand slipped down Rebca's throat to the bead of blood at her breast, touching it with her finger. "And we will make amends for this unfortunate wound."

As though transfixed, Queen Serjeena leaned over and lightly kissed the droplet, pressing in with her mouth and chin on the soft mound. A guttural groan escaped Rebca's lips. The older woman glanced up. "Then this does comfort you. I am glad." With that, her mouth again dipped toward the exposed breast, first touching the smeared blood, but then sliding sideways to the girl's stiff nipple. The queen kissed there as well, then gently laved it with her tongue. Rebca groaned again, and the queen's mouth opened, taking much of tender breast into her mouth. She began a soft suckling, and Rebca swayed forward on the chains still attached to her wrists, thrusting the tit into the working mouth of the king's wife. The woman then pulled aside the other shredded panel of the robe, exposing the other perfect orb. Her mouth voraciously went to it as well. Rebca's eyes closed in unabashed passion. I remained behind my crate, stunned at this common, animal action of the queen, my young staff rising at the sexy sight.

The queen by this time was muttering, "So perfect, yes!" She suddenly dropped to her knees, her grasping hands pulling Rebca's robe down and off her young ankles. Serjeena peppered Rebca's stomach with kisses, and traced a path into the girl's dark vee with her royal tongue. She probed at the girl's slit, then pulled her head away in confusion. She again pushed forward, driving her tongue well up between the girl's swollen pussy. Rebca's legs grew limp as her thighs squeezed the queen's face; she now virtually dangled from her chains. The queen again pulled up, startled. "There is the taste of a man!" Rebca blushed.

The queen stood up, her face bare inches from Rebca's. "Now, not that I know the pungency of a man's release, but well, what else could that be? Has one the guards, or a staff member, assaulted you?" Rebca shook her head. "An outsider?" The girl paused, and shyly nodded. "But how, in here?" The queen giggled, "Well, you may be just about the only woman here to have enjoyed a man in some time. The king and the other nobles with their gaggle of young wenches brought on these trips-well it makes it easy for some of us to be forgotten. So tell me, was this stranger pleasurable?" A nod. "Ohhh. Was he big-that way?" A vigorous nod.

Both women now were smiling. "So what is his trade? A nobleman." Rebca shook her head, and paused. She then pulled her hands together overhead, and pantomimed a carnival trapeze artist.

The queen straightened. "An acrobat?" A nod. "But where would we? Wait! You don't mean that broad shouldered stripling at the docks today, who swung on the ropes?" A nod. "This was that slut Lorena's scheme, wasn't it?" Rebca shook her head, no; then shrugged and nodded. "Well, you lucky things. Is it he who I taste in your luscious young hole and in your female down?" Nod. "Ahhh, then I will sample again."

The queen again dropped to her knees, and in a trice was again lapping at Rebca's cunt, clearly savoring the spunk I had left behind. My much used young organ began to swell; it stiffened at once as the queen opened the front of her elegant gown, and let it fall from her shoulders.

Who could of dreamt of her magnificence? Though I was to the side and slightly behind her, I could still see her full but firm breasts proudly standing out on her chest, topped by cherry red nipples. Her waist was trim, giving no sign that she had many years before delivered of two children, now teenagers. Descending from it was a taut, supple ass. Forgotten to my eye and loins was her regal station, I lusted for her as a woman, even were she common.

The queen moaned as she continued ministering to Rebca's soaked pussy lips. She jammed her own groin up against Rebca's lower leg, her hips churning against the young girl's shin. Serjeen took a long, manicured forefinger and slid it up between the girl's saliva-drenched lips, and began toying inside and out, further sending Rebca into ecstacy.

My own passion stirring, I vigorously rubbed my throbbing tool without thought through my thin breeches, bracing myself against a crate of myrrh spice. As Rebca's eyes opened and her head flew to the side, her eyes caught mine, and she recalled my presence.

She gasped. I started, losing my balance. The myrrh crate tumbled and there I stood before my nude queen.

As you might expect, the queen jerked in shock, but quickly regained her composure, sliding her thin robe back up her luscious form, and over her shoulders. Her eyes narrowed as she examined me, lying on my back with my legs sprawled over the myrrh barrel I had just knocked over.

"Ahh, and here's Rebca's young commoner himself." Before I could scramble to my knees, her eyes appraised the throbbing bulge in my breeches, which had yet to abate. Coolly, she commented, "And are you in the habit of spying on your Queen?"

I scrambled forward and knelt before her, with head bowed. Her regal station and bearing caused me to treat her with the reverence she commanded at the throne room at the palace, even though she was, in fact, sitting on a dirty floor in the summer castle storeroom, the sweet wetness of Rebca's sex still smeared across her lips. I reached for her proffered hand and kissed it and the huge ruby ring that decorated her slim fingers. Her hand slipped under my chin; the tips of two fingers raised my face so that my eyes fell upon hers.

I was lost, a child cast in the midst of a lightless, overgrown forest. Her brown eyes drew me in without pity, searching me, my life, my past, and the truths that I might have been able to hide from others. I believe she smiled benignly, but it must have been with her eyes, for they held me captive. "Perhaps you can tell me the tale that the poor mute urchin cannot." Her soft, deep tones swept over me, as physical sensation as an August breeze in a valley. I nodded dumbly. "Yes, but first we should untie your young lover, shouldn't we?" she continued. Again, I could force only a nod from my stunned head; in hindsight, I wonder that drool did not trickle down my chin.

I scrambled to my feet, and offered a hand to the kneeling sovereign. As she leaned forward to accept it, the front of her gown spilled forward, displaying the creamy whiteness of her wonderful breasts. To be sure, I had just moments before seen them in their entirety, but their semi-concealment now only aroused my passion. I must see them-all of her-in their full, brazen beauty again, or had I only dreamed it? I found myself returning to tumescence. As she stood, her porcelain-featured face rising only inches from my cloth covered staff, her smile grew. She stood facing me, only a few inches short of my stature. Her gaze warmed my flushed face, and the tips of her breasts poked against my chest, the erect nipples detectible even through the thin cloths of our respective blouses.

Like a dancer, Serjeen slowly turned away from me. The Guard Captain's key emerged from her pocket and into the right manacle that held the small dark-haired Rebca against the wall. She swore; the little-used shackle was rusted from disuse and would not turn. My arms reached around her from behind and grasped the key; working together-her hands on the cuffs and mine working the key-we managed to release it. Only as we similarly struggled with the other cuff did my consciousness realize that I was pressed up against her amazingly firm ass, and my rod was as stiff as ever.

To my amazement, my Queen was responding, lightly moving her rear against me in vertical circles, pausing when my length was aligned with her buttocks' cleft.

Needing only one hand to aid me by grasping the band on Rebca's wrist, she slid the other behind my back and deftly unknotted the waist string of my breeches, allowing them to fall to the floor. The long fingers wove a light spell around the head of my pride and joy, then stroked its underside, clear back to my soft balls. As my grip on the manacle became more secure, Serjeen took her remaining hand and lifted the hem of her regal robe to her hips, and then pointed my glistening tip down. Standing on her toes, she drew me forward, my thundering log sliding in the passageway between her thighs. My sensitive tip could feel the down of her lusty lips as it passed underneath them.

Fortunately, the remaining shackle just then fell open, for my concentration was understandably waning. Rebca fell to the floor in release, rubbing her wrists. The dark-tressed young girl gazed at us, her simple dress shredded, exposing her small but perfectly shaped burgeoning breasts. Serjeen and I paid her little mind, for our subtle dance continued. Her Highness dropped down to her heels, placing more pressure on my trapped shaft as it moved. Its recurring path was made easier, as I felt the womanly dew seeping from her cleft, lubricating my way.

I bent my knees so as to allow my phallus an angle up into her womanly passage, and the tip prodded at the entrance. Serjeen's hand reached behind her and grasped the base of my burning shaft. She rubbed the head against her swollen lips.

"Perhaps not, my young friend," she moaned huskily, over her shoulder. "Let us enjoy this frolic for what it is." I looked to her, perplexed, but Rebca picked up on the Queen's meaning. She flung up the front of the lavish robe and darted her head underneath. In a moment, I felt her young mouth capture the very end of my cock, and her finger tips hold the underside, pushing the shaft up against my Queen's mound. My hips involuntarily pushed forward, basking in the wet warmth of the young girl's sweet maw.

I pulled back and resumed my sawing between Serjeen's thighs. She groaned in exquisite pleasure, but not just from the pressure of my thick member. For each time I withdrew, Rebca's energetic tongue darted between my cock tip and the Queen's clit, alternating her sucking and licking between our two engorged organs. Rebca's free hand reached all the way past both our pair of thighs and lightly caressed my tightening testicles. Still, her hungry mouth did not slacken, and Serjeen's panting grew louder and more insistent.

Our lusty terpsichorean menage a trois continued, and our pace hastened. Just as I began to feel the stirrings of my own impending explosion, the Queen let out a curt shriek, her loins heaved to and fro, and then, leaning forward against the cellar wall, she pressed Rebca's porcelain-featured face to her pussy. At that moment-and I would swear it was an accident-I jerked forward and my member slipped into her flowering, orgasming regal opening. I surged in all the way, and felt the pulsations of her spasms on the full length of my organ.

As her pulsations subsided, Serjeen reluctantly drew her hips forward. My engorged manhood slipped out of her sheath with an audible plop. She leaned heavily against the wall, and Rebca's face, covered with the Queen's moistness as Serjeen's face earlier had been slathered with her own, emerged from between the older woman's thighs; the hem of Serjeen's robe fell to reclaim her regal modesty.

My Queen dropped to one knee to catch her breath, which still emerged in gasps through her smiling lips. She leaned down and caressed Rebca's face, then soundly bussed the maidservant in gratitude, accompanied by a whispered, "So many thanks to you." Still kneeling, Serjeen spun to face me-or at least my groin. She planted a firm, open-mouthed kiss on my still erect, still hopeful cock, and then drew my breeches up my thighs and over the tip of my elongated rod, and refastened the drawstring. She rose to her feet and cupped my pouting chin.

"Do not be disappointed, young." Her voice trailed off. "Jaze," I advised her, sheepish at the thought that my liege had not even known my name as she was allowing me such intimacies.

"Yes, Jaze," she continued. "I have can redeem any disappointment in many ways out of thankfulness for the pleasure that you have brought me. I have not known such pampering in some time. A King who has an entire land at his beck and call is not necessarily used to seeing to the physical satisfaction of others, no matter how kindly he might otherwise be." She playfully slapped me. "Besides, you are lucky that I do not have you beheaded for extracting such intimacies against my express instructions"-obviously meaning my penetration of her in the midst of her climactic joy-"even if such a monstrous intimacy was just the perfect accompaniment to Rebca's skillful ministrations."

Her face grew more serious. Regardless of her lustful interlude, this woman was still the consort to the most powerful man in our known world, and duty could never long leave her mind. "Tell me now, you big-staffed young stallion," she chided my blushing face, "what do you know of this attack and theft for which Rebca was held."

When I hesitated, she drew her face close to mine. "There is no point in further protecting Rebca's honor; the secret seems inconsequential now." Still, I paused. "You are protecting yet another. Ah yes, that harlot Lorena, no doubt." I nodded, slowly. "With those high, full breasts of hers, she tries to attract many a young buck, even though palace security thwarts almost all of her seductions. The resourcefulness of you both is commendable. Still, I'll see to it that she aids the scullery maids for a week or two to remind her of her responsibilities. Anyway, tell me what you know here."

I explained my presence in Lorena's chambers, with the Queen chuckling at my attempts to sidestep explanations of my activities there. I told her nothing of Lorena and Rebca's strange attitude towards and visits to whatever lay beyond the gauze screen in the chamber. I went on to tell of the sound we heard outside, and the green-cloaked stranger's attack on the Prime Minister and the young guard who rushed in to offer assistance, and added my surmise that the attacker was a palace insider.

The Queen listened to my tale with a grave frown. "Yes, it must be someone who is a part of our retinue, or at least an ally of such a one. But why the interest in the jewels? Any jeweler would know that stones of that magnificence must be from the royal collection, so they could not be sold." The beautiful, raven-haired Queen paused in thought, "Perhaps you see, there are old stories that the archivists tell that some combination of the stones, and perhaps others that have never been found, bring certain powers and enchantments-magic that revolves around the throne of our kingdom. If one found the remaining stones, the royal collection would become infinitely more valuable. Rumors of such finds have reached our ears, but we never dreamed"

I replied, "But would it not be much safer to offer to sell the newly found stones to the royal collection, rather than a daring raid on the most formidably protected castle in the kingdom outside of the main palace itself?"

"You are very shrewd, Jaze. Perhaps one of the finders feared that the King would simply confiscate such gems, or wished the full power of the stones, whatever they might be, for himself. In any case, we can solve nothing further here. And, there is not much I can do in my isolated position. I could perhaps put trusted members of the King's Guard to work on these suppositions, but it is difficult to know who might be the accomplices of this villain.

"Here is what we must do." She began to pace in thought, then turned to us. "Rebca, you must first cover your poor, abused body before you are raped." The girl modestly tucked her bodice under a nearly severed strap. "Because of your muteness, you can go many places in the palace unnoticed by those you are near; it is their stupid prejudices that suggest to them that you cannot hear. Listen for any clues as to strangers or actions that do not belong."

Her brown eyes found mine. "Jaze, with your size and acrobatic skills I would guess that you have talent as a fighter." I told her of my training with a retired King's guard, and modestly indicated that I probably would be deemed his most highly regarded pupil. "Fine, I will arrange for you to be invited to tonight's nobles' feast to celebrate the beginning of our stay here at the Solstice Castle; you can come to supply wrestling fodder as an entertainment feature. As the revelry continues, you might be able to pick up some hints from the men as they get drunk-as they inevitably do after the women are commanded to go."

Serjeen headed for the door, then turned briefly. "If your help in finding the traitor is as able as your 'assistance' here,"-her smile broadened-"you two will be amazed at the rewards I can promise."

Serjeen left. Rebca and I looked at each other, little dreaming that the risks and rewards to us both who far surpass anything that our Queen could have imagined.

Part 5

With Rebca guiding, I stumbled away from the castle by way of a cellar entrance and made my way back to the monastery, seranaded by roosters greeting the morning sun. I slipped into the kitchen just before old Bekray waddled in.

"Ahh, handsome young Jaze. Up early this morning, are you?" He patted my shoulder with his usual familiarity. I nodded eagerly.

"So responsible you are" I began to detect a little sarcasm in his voice. "You've already made up your bed. In fact, it seems as though it wasn't even slept in." He turned and peered at me, an inquisitor with flour dusting his pudgy features. I shrugged, noncommittal.

"I hope you weren't huddled in some alley with a loathsome street urchin, rutting like a couple of filthy animals." He shuddered in mock terror.

I could not resist the opportunity. "Well, actually, Bekray, I was invited to the castle to dally with the queen, a gypsy, and a couple of ladies in waiting. You know, my usual evening."

The baker stared for a moment, then took a playful swat at me with a dough-covered hand. Still, he scowled. "Now, let's not be defaming the honor and virtue of our queen, may she and King Abret long rule at the mercy of our God. Well, whomever lowered herself to lie with you, let us just hope that she practices a modicum of hygiene. It would not do to have you bringing some foul louse into our midst, where it could set up a colony in Brother Tomath's beard and we might not discover the infestation for weeks."

Bekray turned away dismissively, and I hurried to set up the dining hall for the monks who I served in return for my pallet in my small cell and whatever education the monks could provide. I somehow managed to serve them breakfast without spilling any of Bekray's porridge, and staggered off to my cell for the sleep that my escapades in the castle had denied me. As I lay my head on the oft-patched down pillow, Bekray's admonition about the sanctity of the queen rang in my ears.

Indeed, what sacrilege had I committed? My head began to swim with the realization of what I had unwittingly become a part of. Anyone in the castle might desire my head for a variety of perceived offenses, from the King's Guard for my mere presence in the castle to the Crown Prince, Phrenshaw, for my interruption of his assignation with Lindea, to the foul thug who had struck the Prime Minister and a guard and escaped with at least some of the castle jewels. Even in my fatigue, sleep took an uncommonly long time to find me.

I woke with a start and discovered Brother Niventa's gaunt face above mine; his large hand was clapped to my shoulder, shaking me. His usual monotone had risen to an unusually high pitch in excitement. From the color of the sun at my cell's small window, I could tell it was late afternoon. Sure enough, someone from the Queen's palace staff had requested that my wrestling mentor send over his most promising wrestler to add to the evening's entertainment at the Feast, and old Fremna personally had rushed over to tell me of my honor and to prepare me for whatever bout I might be thrown into.

I washed and dressed in my finest-and loosest-blouse and breeches, not wishing to be constrained by my clothing, all the while with Fremna fretting over me and offering trite warnings about wrestling strategy. When we emerged from the monastery, we found a King's coach with a two-horse team of black stallions in front. Fremna and I leapt in, and off we went to the castle.

Words are inadequate to describe the gaiety and lavishness of the fest. Bright banners flew everywhere on castle grounds. Elegantly attired, highborn men and women promenaded around the site, with armies of scantily attired servants, both male and female, omnipresent with food and drink. Small chamber groups played throughout the lush landscape. Randomly distributed tables featured games of chance for the nobles to test their luck against one another.

I had little chance to enjoy my first examination of the party, for a small, officious, balding official bustled up and claimed us from the guards who had delivered us. We went backstage at a small ampitheatre around which the festivities seemed to revolve. Trying to be alert to my surroundings, I peered into passages we passed. My heart stopped; just inside a room bearing the revelers cloaks I saw the distinctive green cloak of the villain who had attacked the Prime Minister. The man was here at the festival!

I had no chance to look further. Amidst a blaring of trumpets, I was pushed onstage, where I confronted a huge, hairy soldier-obviously my opponent. His skirt-like kra identified him as a member of one of the King's elite cavalry.

The assembled crowd began to drift toward the theater. I could hear the buzz of interest that a local boy-me-would be challenging an experienced warrior. Derisive calls reached my ears, as well as the long odds being demanded by a few of the local nobles who seemed inclined to bet for me more out of a sense of loyalty to the region than out of any belief I might prevail.

Pretending a jauntiness that I did not feel, I strode to the stage center for the ritual greeting. I offered a wish for the continued glories of the soldier's platoon; he grunted and asked me where my remains should be shipped. A drunk duke serving as referee waved his hand, and the battle commenced.

Given the man's size and experience, I knew my only hope was to get him overconfident and off guard. The strategy nearly was my undoing, as he took advantage of my feigned stumble to grab me by the shoulder and fling me seven strides across the stage. Only his desire to toy with me kept him from dismantling me on the spot. I thereafter used my slight speed advantage to dart in and grab an arm or leg, give it a twist, and then high tail away. The crowd roared at his frustration, but still sensed time to be his ally.

I waited until I had managed to slip inside his guard and tug at his shaggy beard before pulling on of Fremna's favorite tricks. I let the beast grab my arm on my next pass and fling me over his shoulder. I pretended to land heavily, with my leg extended at an awkward angle.

Sure enough, the soldier dove toward the opportunity to break it-or at least dislocate my knee. I quickly retracted it, leapt on his back and slipped on an arm bar, and twisted him on his shoulderblades. The crowd screamed in approval, the bleary-eyed duke raised his wine-spotted kerchief, and I was the victor.

The soldier roared in outrage, but several of his fellow warriors rushed onto the stage to tease him with mock punches and hustle him off, and I was left alone with the Duke, who clapped me on the back. Suddenly, a murmur began to run through the throng, which parted in its middle to allow the passage of a figure; King Abret himself was coming onto the stage. He bounded up, gave me a politic smile, and turned to the crowd.

"My friends," he bellowed. "I see we have further proof of the manliness of our subjects in our host town of Speysard." The local nobles roared. "Or at least of the effects of too much local wine on our soldiers unused to its effects I'd like to see this adroit young man to be truly challenged. If he's not too tired." He turned to me with a polite questioning glance; I nodded obediently then-realizing that this gesture might be construed as a sign I was tired-shook my head, then nodded again. Damn! How do I signal I was-of course-up to whatever he was suggesting? The crowd laughed at my eagerness. "If he's not too tired, I'd like to match him up against my only son, Prince Phrenshaw."

The crowd roared its approval. I froze in confusion. That lumpy guy with the bad haircut who I'd chased out of the gypsy queen's arms? Oh my Lord, what if he had spotted me there in the laundry room and recognized me now? My anxiety had little time to develop. The heir to the throne shambled through the crowd and, blushing, hopped onto the low stage. The King momentarily took him aside and exchanged a private word; a warning not to let a commoner defeat him upon pain of loss of a dukedom?

Phrenshaw strode forward with a stern expression, and the King himself led us to the center of the stage for the greeting ritual. I stammered out a blessing for his lineage's unbroken accession to the throne for countless eons. His features lightened and he said with an even tone and surprisingly warm smile, "I implore you to not ease up on account of my station, young man. I want your best in this contest. Bear in mind, I did pick up on your clever gambit to lure in your adversary; I will not underestimate your skullduggery."

The King waved his arm, and our battle commenced. The oafish-seeming youth began a measured approach, and we lightly grappled with our hands, each looking for an opening. I was astonished at his grace, enhanced by what was obviously outstanding training. The Prince recognized his lack of athleticism and wrestled within himself, not allowing himself to be overly aggressive or caught offguard. I did slip inside his guard, but found that with his big butt and heavy lower legs he was not easy to move. Soon, though, I caught him with a feint, slipped under his arms, and flipped him onto his side. I grabbed him before he almost reached the marble stage, and levered him up on one shoulder before he could properly brace himself for the fall. In trying to spin himself around, he planted his arm in an awkward angle and I realized that he could not fend off a pin. Just as I rapped him in a twisting arm and neck hold, I saw that the pinning move would likely dislocate his elbow, if not break his arm altogether, a not-uncommon result of grappling. The Prince's face grew white with the identical thought. In an instant, I made my decision, releasing him sufficiently to allow him to re-position his arm to safety, then I locked him in a cradle, his neck and bent knee wedged between my two elbows, my hands locked together. Alas, in trying to pin him, I leaned too far forward. He jacknifed his legs, and the leverage of his large ass caused me to somersault beyond him, where he reversed our fortunes and laid a quick pin on me, ending the match.

My self-directed anger was short-lived. The panting, beaming prince leapt up, and clutched my arm to help me up with the comraderie usually extended to equals. The crowd applauded and whistled its approval of our fevered match, and the King came up and embraced his son. "Well fought, lad!" He turned away from me dismissively-as I would expect-but Phrenshaw stopped him. "Father, we must invite my friend and able adversary to the post-festival revels tonight. By taking on two of us, he certainly deserves it." I beamed at the compliment and internally rejoiced; I would have further opportunity to search for the assailant! The King distractedly waved his assent, and led his son off the stage to awaiting group of nobles.

I scuttled from the stage, where Fremna waited to pound me on the back in congratulations, then good-naturedly boxed my ear for allowing myself to lose my match to the Prince. "Still," he continued, "it would not have done for you to have broken the Prince's arm. Ahh, lad, what I wouldn't give to be able join you in the fun later tonight" All grown men of Speysard had enviously shared rumors of the late-evening party that the men of noble classes enjoyed following the feast. The gossip centered on tales of dozens of nubile women, young and often virginal, who would service the men of royalty. As stories had it, virtually no sexual debauchery went unexplored, long into the early morning hours. My heart raced in anticipation.

I waited out the next two hours behind the small stage, chatting with Fremna, sipping on juices, and enjoying the brash stares of serving wenches who eyed me as they passed by. Soon, the families of nobles began slipping out, guided by servants,and the men started to drift through a grove of trees near the top of the natural ampitheatre.

I began to fear the Prince had forgotten his invitation, when a tall, slender, lithe young beauty with shoulder-length blonde hair, a slight inward curl at the tips delightfully framing her stunning features, emerged from the grove and approached me. Flashing green eyes and high, sharp cheekbones-she was a sculptor's dream. The billowing of the thin saffron robe revealed slim hips and modest, but high and well-rounded, young breasts. "Master Jaze?" she inquired with an obeisant smile.

I rose from my seat, as though accustomed to being summoned by royal servants. "I am Charel. I am to see you to the party, and to attend to any other needs you may have this evening." I tried not to gape; she nonetheless dropped her eyes modestly. She took my arm, I waved to Fremna, and we headed off through the stand of trees.

The golden-haired siren guided me up two flights of broad garden steps of red marble. Cresting a hill, we found ourselves at the top of another, but smaller natural ampitheatre: a bowl some forty paces across. Three sides of the bowl consisted of sloping turf interspersed with grassy terraces. The fourth side-the "front"-held four tiers of burnished aar wood, with the upmost level making up a small stage of sorts. There, a quartet of musicians played a throbbing, drum driven music, topped by groin-piercing flute music. On a platform on the grassy slope opposite the stage was a large tent. At the bottom of the bowl lay a rectangular, stone-sided pool, some eight paces by six paces across. My attention was not, however, drawn to the physical setting. Rather, I stared at the activity of the thirty or so noblemen and perhaps forty servant wenches. Each young girl-beauties all-wore a sheer, short robe, with their breasts and dark pubic hair visible through the nearly transparent fabric. One or two attended to each man, serving him fruits or wines, caressing his neck or back, or teasing him with nibbles or kisses about the face and neck.

I turned to Charel, who fingered the neck of her heavier saffron robe. "By your leave, Milord?" She wished to remove the garment worn in more public circumstances. I nodded. She took my hand and drew it to the loose knot at her neck that held it together. I untied it and slowly drew it down her front, exposing the gossamer fabric underneath. My hand stopped at her pert breast, brushing the tip with my thumb through its thin veil. I then dropped to one knee and pulled the outer garment over her hips. The thin dress underneath was almost as nothing, and I could feel the warmth of her slim thighs beneath my palms and see the downy blond vee underneath the hem.

She raised one leg to step out of the long robe, exposing her succulent young sex and trimmed bush to my eyes. I impetuously dipped my head under the hem of her skirt and planted a wet kiss at the apex of her slit. Her loins involuntarily pressed against me. My tongue lapped at the moistening lips and rapidly swelling bud. She sighed in a near chortle, and her palms pressed my face further into her. Through passionate gasps she protested, "But Milord, I am here to serve you!"

I silenced her by renewing my attack until she shuddered herself to a quiet orgasm, her fingers grasping my scalp in paroxysms of ecstasy.

I stood, and she passionately kissed me. "Milord Jaze. That was wonderful. The nobles never you know, lick me I will insure that you are served particularly well tonight. But first, you should wash a bit after your workout earlier."

With that she led me town the near slope to the water. We stepped over one trio prone on the grass-the drunken duke who had presided over the wrestling matches and identical twin lovelies, ample breasted sloe-eyed brunettes. Their dresses were bunched around their hips, and they were peppering the torso of the nude duke with open-mouthed kisses. One twin fondled his large, semi-erect prick, poking the sopping gash of her sister, who was straddling the man's thigh. My own organ was nearly stiff in excitement as well.

Charel stopped us at the water's edge. Perhaps ten royals were cavorting with half again as many maids in waist deep water. Only a scrap of clothing remained on any one of them. Fresh-faced young girls stroked the men they were tending. Hands churned just beneath water level, with a teenaged count in mutual masturbation with a curly-haired vixen. A plumper, dusky-skinned nubian was bent over the edge of the pool, being entered from behind by a middle-aged viceroy.

Charel turned and unfastened my blouse, then dropped to her knees and undid my breeches. She quickly dropped them to my ankles, then looked up to see my fully erect cock waving in her face. Attempting to re-establish the composure expected of servants, she stifled a gasp of surprise at my size, but her grin could not fully be surpressed.

Another, shorter goddess with straight black hair and a wide, red-lipped mouth appeared beside us, and Charel handed her my garments. She left to store them at a small shack to the side, my eyes following the bewitching twitch of her taut ass and the sleekness of her magnificent legs as she departed. Charel playfully nipped at the tip of my organ with her even white teeth. "Milord, some say it is rude to stare at another woman when one has one at hand, and perhaps it is not so wise when one's manliness is close to her mouth." She grinned playfully, and then wetly kissed my tip again in recompense.

"I apologize, Miss. Her beauty reminds me of your own, which far surpasses any other." Charel jumped to her feet.

"Well, some say my cousin Licia and I do remind them of one other, but you are wise to detect which of us is the prettier." I found myself becoming enchanted with this searingly intelligent lady, and wondered if she realized that my own background was, if anything, more humble than her own. She cut short my thoughts by leading me down a steps into the pool, still wearing her short toga. The clear water somehow had been warmed and carried a mildly floral aroma, and felt gloriously sensual.

A very young-looking, almost breastless young sprite spun away from a hairy drunk as I entered, and in her escape charged into me, my arms instinctively going around her waist. She felt my cock prod at her flat belly and grinned, obviously a bit drunk herself. "Hello, Big Guy! Where do I find you later?" Her arms snaked around my neck and she kissed me passionately, her young tongue slipping into my surprised mouth. I returned the kiss, mindful of Charel's impatient gaze behind me.

The hairy man staggered up and pried her away, giving me an almost apologetic look. I grinned back. She leapt into his arms and wrapped her legs around his waist, sliding down his torso until she obviously felt his organ prod at her opening. She bounced a few times, frustration growing on her face as he apparently was unable to penetrate her child-like pussy. With an exasperated frown, Charel reached over to a small indentation in the deck-beside the pool and pulled out a small glob of jelly of a sort. She strode to the unsuccessfully coupling pair and reached under the girl's buttocks, greasing her opening and her partner's cock. The girl slid down again and, aided by both the lubricant and Charel's guiding hand, signaled his entry by a grinning moan of pleasure. "Oh, Uncle Robdolus, that's just wonderful!" she cried.

'Uncle'? Oh Lord, what strange values these nobles have, I thought.

Charel laughed at my shocked face and guided me to the side of the pool, where the water came to just below the level of my still jutting rod. Her cousin Licia returned with a flagon of wine, and knelt to serve it to me; as I took it I could see through the gaping opening of her blouse two perfectly shaped, gravity defying breasts. Rather than slap me for my impudence, Licia remained where she was, then slowly drew one side of the loose top further to the side, further exposing her right tit, with its bright red areole and perky nipple.

I took a gulp of the proffered wine, barely noticing that its quality far exceeded the sacramental wine to which my experience was limited. I then leaned forward, as though drawn by magnetism, and my lips captured the wonderful nipple, nibbling and then suckling as though I were an infant. I felt Charel press against my other side. She reached around me into another bowl-shaped indentation in the decking and retrieved a soapcake. As my mouth captured more of Licia's soft breast, I dimly noted Charel's rubbing of the soap into a heavy lather, then felt her silky hands rub the foam over my chest and down my stomach.

I drew my mouth away from Licia's chest. She mewled and pouted in protest. I clutched her under each arm and swung her off the deck into the water with us. Licia shrieked in mock terror, but did not further protest when I drew the short robe off her body, exposing her slim but voluptuous body to my eyes. "Now help your cousin," I said. Licia's eyebrows rose; apparently she and Charel did not normally apprise others of their kinship. Still, she slipped behind the golden-maned, taller girl without protest, and drew her own robe away.

Charel did not pause in her vigorous scrubbing of my torso, and now handed part of the cake to Licia. The two started soaping me further down, rubbing my asscheeks-occasionally tweaking my rectum, legs, and tightening balls-but only lightly brushing my throbbing erection. I leaned against the pool edge, savoring the pampering and enjoying the sights around me.

Two older nobles leaned against the edge as did, I only two or three paces away. I overheard them debate the pre-eminence of their respective race horses. They seemed to be paying little heed to the two busty young women kneeling before them and deliberately taking the men's cocks deep into their slender throats, holding them captive for four or five seconds before releasing them to the warm summer air, then repeating the seemingly impossible swallowing of the men's organs. Up on the small stage to my left, a slender, ebony-haired vixen wearing only a gold scarf around her hips was performing a frenetic dance in time to the rhythmic music. Her wavy curls descended to the base of her spine, but in her gyrations the dark cascades swept around her shoulders and over her full breasts. Her hands entwined in her hair and then dropped to caress the swaying mounds. One hand dipped to slide beneath her scarf, and two of her long fingers caressed the length of her nether lips.

Just then I noticed a blonde maidservant enter the water carrying a small tray, on which she held a small but intricate water pipe. She wore only a series of twenty or so silver chains that draped her middle from hip to hip. Her hair was pulled back into a single long yellow braid that fell to her waist, its tip tickling the water's surface. She stepped up to the two nobles beside me, and each drew deeply from the pipe's curling stem. Even the two big-titted fellatrixes paused in their oral ministrations to suck from the pipe, allowing the stiff cocks in their charge to bob between their large breasts. Almost immediately upon inhaling, each of the quartet grinned in heavy-lidded enjoyment. The nobles stopped their chattering and for the first time seemed to concentrate on the maids sucking at their lances.

The blonde then stepped up to us, a sweet, slightly glassy-eyed smile on her face. "Good evening, Milord," she said in a foreign-tinged accent, gesturing with the long stem. "Would you care to partake?"

I shrugged, "I'm really not a smoker, but"

Charel and Licia giggled. Charel elbowed me in the ribs, "Milord, you will find this to be a bit more interesting than anything you've tried before. But if you're not accustomed to any smoke, perhaps Jenfeer here can help you out." I shrugged again in naive passiveness.

The blonde, Jenfeer, placed the tip of the curved wooden stem in between her rose-petal lips and sucked in. She pulled the pipe away and leaned up toward me, pulling my lips to hers. As they met, she opened her mouth and blew the smoke into my mouth, keeping a tight seal with our lips. Our tongues mingled for a moment, then she suddenly grasped my cock with a warm hand and squeezed it firmly. I inhaled in surprise, and pulled the slightly-cooled smoke into my lungs.

After a moment, she disengaged, then coyly looked up at me. "Oh, did we tell you that the most important part is to inhale?" Charel and Licia giggled, and then each took her own turn at the pipe. I found myself enraptured at the sight of their pursed lips caressing the stem tip, and then I realized that the tobacco in the bowl indeed had intoxicated me in a way that wine never had. I felt my skin flush and a tingling sense of energy infuse my spine, centering in my groin. I felt both in a fog, and as alert and energetic as I ever had in my life. It felt magnificent, otherwordly.

By then, both Charel and Licia had taken on the same stuporous look as the nobles, as I suspected I had. My hands cupped the buttocks of each of the two maidservants attending me, and my middle fingers slid down their clefts and into their flowing pussies, and I knew amidst the drug-enhanced fever that within seconds I would be thrusting my rock-hard sword deep into one or the other.

Part 6

Blonde Charel flexed her knees and forced my exploring digit further inside her. Licia bent forward slightly with her slim ass resting against the pool's edge, her dark hair covering her features, and reached down between her thighs to rub at her throbbing clit in concert with my probing hand. Charel leaned over and pressed her lips to mine. Her mouth opened and her tongue tipped at my own, and then she pursed her lips and sucked vigorously at my tongue, as though she wanted to draw it out by the roots.

An exclamation from the shorter of the two nobles next to us drew our attention. The young woman kneeling in front of him in the hip-deep pool had speeded the pace of her vigorous sucking, accompanied by the steady pumping of her hand. Her ample tits swung wildly as she drew at his stalk. Her mouth pulled back to the tip and her tongue quickly laved at the end, and then she threw her face forward, with an audible gulp as that same tip reached her throat.

The noble's gasp signaled his finish, and the honey-tressed beauty ceased her sucking, continuing only her hand's pulling on the base. She rested the end of the cock on her upper lip and opened her mouth slightly. Her blue eyes gazed up at the man to whom she was ministering, twinkling with anticipation. She barely flinched as his semen jetted out in an incredible spurt, a torrent shooting across her young tongue to the back of her throat. Charel giggled in astonishment as another, equally immense blast emitted from the tip and struck the roof of her mouth. Just after the the third jet struck her lower lip and chin, the girl clamped her lips together to prevent the sperm which she'd taken in from escaping her mouth, allowing successive spurts to strike her smiling, closed lips, chin and neck. The sticky emission dripped down her neck and rested on her massive mounds.

The neighboring noble, entranced at the erotic sight of the decoration of the face and lips of the girl, then reached his own explosion in the mouth of the darker-haired woman who was servicing him. We were denied a view of his ejaculation, as the girl clamped her lips around the man's shaft about a third of the way down. Even so, she announced his climax with a series of gleeful moans coinciding with each spurt, and her bloating cheeks indicated the massiveness of the man's spill. Finally, the torrent became too great, and rivers of semen escaped the corners of her mouth and streamed down her cheeks and onto her shoulders and full white breasts.

Next to me, Licia shrieked out her own completion, brought on by her vigorous self-rubbing and my finger's stroking into her channel. I kept up a gentle pace to allow her to finish. As her spasms subsided, she looked over at us guiltily, as though embarrassed at her selfishness. "I could not help myself, Milord, it just arouses me so to see a man spend so in the mouth of a maid. Perhaps it is why I love the smoke of the priests, as it both increases the amount of the spending, and enhances its taste."

Charel stepped around me-or at least almost, as my rigid lance brushed against her hip as she did, inducing her pleased yelp. She put her arm around the waist of her younger, shorter cousin and cupped the girl's perfectly shaped breast. "Yes, dear Licia, you have been thoughtless, and perhaps we shall make you pay. Since I have been deprived of my own joy, I will be the one to enjoy our lord Jaze's magnificent offering." Charel spun around and pulled herself up out of the pool, standing briefly with her back to me, taunting me with her splendid, heart-shaped young buttocks. She then dropped to her knees on the soft mossy grass next to the pool, still with her back to me. I was entranced at the magical shape of her form.

Licia lithely pulled herself out of the water and reached down for my hand, helping me leap up to the pool's edge, a task that of course would have given me no trouble but for the long, incredibly hard pole jutting from my loins which threatened to strike the lop of the stone edge. With a mock pout, Licia wrapped her slender arms around my necked and kissed me. "Alright, you may make nasty, pagan love to that blonde cow, if you wish. I would join you and perhaps enhance your enjoyment, if that is your pleasure milord." She wriggled her hips, causing my erect cock to rub against her flat stomach.

I glanced over at Charel, who peeked over her shoulder at me, her drug-addled passion still evident in her glazed eyes. "I would welcome her, lord, and anyone else who wishes to join us-but please make it soon!" she pleaded. She leaned back onto her elbows, and then turned away from me to lie on her left side. She raised her right knee, leaving her right foot resting on the ground, and smiled at me coquettishly over her shoulder.

Needing no other hint, I slid my groin up behind her ass, and she reached down between her widespread thighs to clutch my sex just behind the reddened tip. Her fingers guided me to her moist opening, placing the tip just inside. I reached around her hip with my hand and spread her lower lips, and I pushed myself forward, into her. Her heated wetness burned at me wonderfully, and I could not resist wrenching forward harder, to place myself entirely within her. With the beauty of the two nymphs and the aphrodisiac of the ritual herbs whose smoke I'd inhaled, I could not control my lust.

Her mouth opened and emitted a pleased sigh as I entered her fully. Her head fell to rest on her left forearm, as I withdrew momentarily. Then, I began a pulsing rhthym, stroking my hardness in and out of her with a steady pace. My finger remained at her pussy, as the tips of my ring and middle finger trapped the hood of her lust hardened bud, and slowly brushed the fold of flesh over her clit in a circular motion.

I sensed, rather than heard, Licia drop beside us, and then saw her lay supine next to us in front of Charel, her dark hair resting on the ground in front of Charel's loins. With her ass resting on the ground and feet slightly spread, Licia twisted her upper torso to the side and ducked her head into the luscious wetness where Charel and I were joined. Licia's fingers guided mine in their rubbing of Charel's pussy for a moment, and then I felt Licia's chin bump into the back of my hand. I rose up and, as Charel groaned, I looked down her torso.

Licia's pink tongue had emerged and was stroking the top of her blonde cousin's slick furrow just above where my hard rod was thrusting to and fro. Suddenly I, too, felt that magical tongue, which swept down the length of Charel's slit and onto my red, cunt-moistened shaft. She drew it along the length of my cock with long, greedy sweeps, finishing by tickling my lust tightened scrotum with the tip of her appendage. She traced the shape of the testicles inside, then Licia's sweet mouth took one sensitive orb into her mouth, softly suckling at it. With a moan, she drew the sack in more forcefully, and I realized that Charel was attending to Licia's passions as well. While I was fucking her with long strokes, Charel had leaned forward, resting her weight on one elbow, and she dove her face into Licia's spread loins, running her own tongue through the dark down of her cousin's bush and sucking at the girl's clit. Licia's taut ass, flattened on the soft grass, writhed and jerked at the attention.

With my advantage of height, I realized that I could move my head past Charel's shoulder and underneath Licia's trembling thigh, and thereby minister to Charel's flowering pussy as well. My lips met Charel's, which were descending from above, and together we sucked and laved at the fleshy lips and hardened bud. I nibbled at Licia's swollen nether lips, and then pointed my tongue inside her succulent young pussy, pushing my head forward. Our efforts were greeted by a muffled grunt at my loins, and I feared for a moment that her teeth might clamp down on my most sensitive parts. Fortunately, Licia allowed my treasures to fall from her lips and she began to mouth my shaft and commence her own licking and sucking on the cock-filled pussy of her cousin.

Charel's hips began jerking, churning, forcing her pussy down onto my large, steel-like rod, then up to my pressing fingers. I increased my rhthym and the pressure on her clit as I sensed she would not last long. A sibilant "Yesssss!" escaped her lips, then repeated itself in time to my charging hips. Her eyes clenched shut and her fingers clutched Licia's thighs as we came closer to our finish.

I watched as Charel's angelic face tensed in a rictus of ecstacy, and then her breathing changed to quick shallow pants. Her wet, caressing tunnel constricted in pulsating contractions, and I knew that she had reached her climax. I let myself go too, and with an audible groan released my seed into her, feeling her ankles lock around my right thigh, keeping my loins pressed to hers as we savored our joint explosions.

My semen shot in throbbing, draining sheets into Charel's tight channel, quickly spurting out the sides of my shaft and onto Licia's waiting tongue. I could feel her pursed lips suck in the fluid, and then felt Licia's own pussy flow and throb with her climax, punctuated by her liquid, panting, "Oh yes; oh yes," emanating from between my legs. Charel did not falter in the tonguing of Licia's electrically charged young clit.

Our noisy, hip-churning orgasms continued for a seeming eternity, our mouths insatiable in the immersion at the fluids we spent in our ecstatic passions. Both of my partners gasped for air, interspersed with shrill calls of pleasure. My own flow seemed to take forever to abate, and I could feel the moisture of my seed on Licia's chin and lips as she continued to nurse at Charel's overflowing pussy.

Drained beyond that of any memory, I slowly rolled onto my back, remaining locked to Charel's blonde-fringed pussy with my still twitching cock. Licia slowly raised herself up and then threw herself lengthwise atop Charel's damp form, their taut young breasts mashing into one another. I could now see the stickiness of the juices of Charel's and my combined passions affixed to Licia's lips, which now descended to press at her blonde cousin's mouth. Charel's tongue greedily emerged to lap at the wetness, savoring the sexual tang. Licia's thighs had slid between Charel's slightly widespread limbs, and I could feel the two maids' lust-engorged pussies press against one another. Clearly, they were not yet done. I, however, felt that I would never have the strength to again engage in an act of passion, so enervating was my own incredible explosion.

I gently rolled onto my side, and disengaged myself from their embrace. I sat up and looked down lovingly at these two young serving girls, knowing that I had enjoyed an experience of which most men could barely even dream of. As though reading my thoughts, they simultaneously turned their lust smeared faces up to me and grinned appreciatively. They then closed their eyes, and I could see that they would be asleep in moments in one anothers' arms-whether from the afterglow of their climaxes or the consequence of the wine and smoke I could not say.

I trudged down to the pool and hopped in to clean the sweat and juices of my maids from me. The young nymphet who had greeted me earlier again was coupling with her uncle, only now she was bent over the edge of the pool, taking his long, slim organ in her tight young ass, a practice with which I had little experience. The heavy-breasted, sweet-faced blonde who had a short while earlier in the pool received the seed of the nobleman on her soft lips and cheeks now greeted me with soap, and gently washed me. The softness of her hands again drew a stiffness into my loins which I thought I never again would see, and she looked at me with eyes that both offered and promised much.

At that moment, I saw a flash of dark green over her shoulder, and I saw a hooded figure step away from the far edge of the amphitheatre and into a patch of trees, out of my sight. My drug-fogged brain started, as I recalled my purpose-well, at least my original purpose-in coming to the festival's party up here for the nobles. I was to try to find the person in the green cloak who had struck the Prime Minister and had taken the royal gemstones.

I palmed the lovely cheek of the blonde and cupped one of her astounding, overflowing breasts. I assured her of her allure but explained that another call of nature demanded my attention first, but that I would return later to join her. She good-naturedly sighed and toweled me dry, and then assisted me in putting my trousers back on. I kissed her soundly, and then headed around the pool to follow the mysterious green-cloaked assailant.

Part 7

After slipping away from the scene of drug- and wine-enhanced debauch around the pool, I climbed to the top of the natural ampitheatre and entered the forested area, where sweet smelling eucalyptus and coastal pines dotted the otherwise mossy area. A sturdy fence a head taller than my own height ran along my left, with the stand of trees to my left. After stealthily proceeding some forty paces, I heard voices and stopped behind an eucalyptus, my hands resting on the peeling bark.

Peeking around it, I saw not one but two figures in green cloaks, standing in a quiet huddle, conversing. Their hoods remained over their heads, and I could not make out their faces. They were but seven or eight paces from me, but their voices were low and I could make out only snatches of their conversation, and their deep voices were similar enough that I could not even detect which of the two was speaking at any given moment.

Still, there was no disputing the conspiratorial tone of their meeting. Bits of sentences reached me: "King must not find out a few more of the jewels, with the power to help us trace the remainder of the set old gypsy who disclosed the ancient magic will not tell her tale to anyone else that damn girl who intruded on us thankfully is a mute think someone else may have seen Here is your pay, but will expect more."

At those last words, the arms of the two men came together, as they obviously were passing some coins for a task committed by one of them. I realized that the meeting was breaking up and that, if either man returned back down the path, I would most certainly be seen. I backed away from the tree quietly and headed back toward the pool area, but quickly stopped. At the head of the path stood two fearsome guards. I quickly realized that my tenuous role as guest of Phenshraw, the Prince, did not extend to snooping around in what was obviously the royal family's private arbor, and I likely would be banished from the castle if I was spotted there.

Given little choice, I grabbed the top of the fence and vaulted over, landing atop a scratchy juniper, which clawed at my bare chest. I heard the rustling of a cloak back on the other side of the fence as its owner rushed by. I scrambled forward and pressed my eye up against a gap between two slats in the fence. All I could see was the back of one of the retreating figures as he confidently strode back to the party, his arms swinging wide. My eye caught a red glint on his left hand from reflected light of a torch next to one of the soldiers. The man obviously had a great ruby ring on that hand. One of the soldiers saluted him as he passed by.

Crouched there behind the juniper, I tried to put the new information in order in my mind. Clearly this man with the ruby ring was plotting against the King, and the jewels which he had tried to steal from the Prime Minister lay at the center of the scheme. Some gypsy had told him of their magical powers and now her safety was at risk. If I could get this information to Queen Serjeena, she could certainly identify a man who possessed such authority and access and who bore a large ruby ring. She could order the man arrested, and I'd be a hero. And I realized that then I might well claim the reward of her own flesh that the lovely, dark-haired queen had offered.

I began to look for a place to re-scale the fence to return to the nobles-only party which I had recently left. On this side of the fence, the landscaping consisted of rolling green hillocks dotted with oaks and more eucalyptus, sloping gradually away from me. This area was bordered by the fence, which itself was lined with exotic bushes and purple and blue flowers. Torches were dotted about, every ten yards or so. Some forty yards beyond, I could see a path that returned to the Castle, and I somehow sensed that this was a private garden intended for the royal family alone.

I walked along the fence away from the direction of the party to make sure that I would be out of sight of the guards on the other side when I leapt over. Just as I reached up to begin my vault, I detected voices back behind me. I quickly dropped to a crouch behind a bush and looked over the top of the hillock behind it.

Through the filtered view of the bushes, I could see three female figures sitting about at the bottom of a ring of grassy hillock. I dared to raise my head further. Facing me were Lorena and Rebca, with a red-haired figure facing away from me. I realized that they were sitting with their legs tucked underneath then at the edge of a small pond. Girlish giggles came from their huddled heads. The women were wearing sheer gowns not unlike those that Charel and Licia were wearing back at the pond-or at least had been wearing until I had persuaded the two vixens to remove them.

Lorena's mouth opened in breathy excitement. "Have you ever seen such goings on?" she exclaimed. "I thought I'd go up in flames when I saw all those huge cocks pumping away." Rebca covered her mouth in mock shock in reaction to the statuesques blonde's use of the vulgar term for a man's most treasured member. Lorena continued, "I hope your father never discovers that one can see part of the pool area from that spot on your balcony."

The red-haired woman threw her head back in laughter, exposing her face for the first time. I sat stunned. It was Princess Paleem! She was unveiled, unshrouded and-if you take into account the silhouette 'neath her almost sheer gown as highlighted by the flickering torches behind her-almost unclothed.

Oh gentle reader. How can I convey to you the sight of one so fair? My mind gave little heed to the deadly risk that I should surely be sliced from throat to crotch in an instant should one of the King's guard espy me peeping at the princess while in such a state. I could only sit and gape, knowing that I was watching what surely was a beauty beyond any seen elsewhere in the land.

Her reddish hair flowed softly round her oval face and lit gently upon soft white shoulders. Her hazel eyes flashed with intelligence and impish curiosity. A small, almost button nose and her red bow of a mouth completed the picture that had me transfixed. In my thrall, I barely even noticed the treasures of her slim, but still buxom form.

Her laugh and her voice-how can I describe those. Soft, almost childlike, but bursting with wonder and perceptiveness. She laughed again and trilled, "But Lorena, when I am to be with a man, it will be gloriously romantic. I do not wish to be with some Duke's greasy son whom father forces me to have as a husband, who will take me like he's taken the kitchen serving wenches while out on cavalry maneuvers. I want a man of sensitivity, who will treat my fantasies and desires as a canvas on which to paint a masterpiece."

Lorena leaned forward in a fit of giggles, and even Rebca laughed silently into her hand. "Oh, milady," Lorena said in mock disappointment.

"How could you possibly imagine that a man of such artistry-and patience-walks the soil of our land? Men are rude and rutting monsters who will take what they feel they are entitled to at the first opportunity" Lorena paused and looked at Rebca-"and thank the Lord for that!" The two resumed their giggling, while Paleem blushed.

"Oh Lorena, you randy slut!" Paleem continued in mock disapproval. My organ, already stiffening at the sight of these three visions in their translucent gowns, grew to greater prominence at the sound of a princess and that perfect mouth using such language. "There are other men than those you drag into your bed at swordpoint. I can see him now, young and slim, with small hips and broad shoulders. His hair just a little longer than current fashion dictates." I squirmed-such a description matched my own!

Paleem continued, "He will come to me and gently lay me on a thick feather mattress" With that, the Princess leaned back against a grassy hillock, her arms stretched above her head. For the first time I fully noticed her magnificent breasts beneath the gauzy fabric, jutting straight to the stars in taut, rounded fullness. Her eyes closed as she went on with her tableau in dreamy fashion. "He will come to me softly, and I will beckon him to me" Paleem extended an arm and grasped that of Rebca, curled on the far side of her. Rebca giggled and played along, scooting over to sit alongside her mistress.

"And then he will run his knowing but unhurried hands over my face and neck" Rebca picked up the cue, and did so with rapt attention to Paleema's mezmerizig words. "And along the curves of my body and down to my hips" Again Rebca, with but a momentary hesitation, complied; placing a small hand on Paleem's shoulder, and then rubbing it over the tops and sides of the woman's breast, just bypassing her obviously erect nipple. The dark-haired young maid then traced Paleem's torso in a teasing path to her hipbone, then stroked horizontally across her thighs.

Paleem smiled and moaned, then raised and slightly parted her thighs, allowing the hem of the gown to ride down to mid thigh. "Yes," she went on, "his hands will caress my knee and inner thigh, and I will know that my time has come to be not just a daughter or a princess-but a woman." Paleem raised one thigh and grasped Rebca's arm, firmly yanking the girl atop her own sprawled form. Paleema reached behind Rebca's back and flipped the maid's skirt to her waist, exposing those marvelous slim ass cheeks which I had savored the previous night.

My mind raced. If Rebca wore no undergarment then perhaps Paleem too did not, and their bared loins must therefore be touching! From my vantage point, the hem of Paleem'a white gown still obscured her groin, and I thus could only speculate. Rebca braced herself on extended arms and began churning her loins in imitation of the act of love between man and woman, and neither of the two lovelies seemed to regret the substitution, as their faces were contorted in passion. Their mock sexual act took on a legitimacy of its own, as the two beauties' mounds ground together, and I could sense that this might be the first time that the Princess would react that ultimate explosion of fire at her center.

Lorena sat in stunned arousal. I could see her long-fingered hand slide down her own voluptuous body to descend under the hem of her robe to press against her inflamed pussy.

In my own aroused state, I was about to reach down and offer relief to my own now straining organ when I felt a talented hand press up against it. I whirled around and found myself staring into the face of Serjeen-my Queen and the mother of Paleem, the object of my voyeurism!

Serjeen quietly beckoned me away from the bush. I reluctantly followed, unable to resist casting a final glance back at the erotic scene, where I saw that Paleema's head was rhythmically rocking back and forth in growing excitement, her magnificent scarlet locks sweeping across her features. Rebca continued pressing her own sweet pussy against the of the princess, and her perfectly chiseled features were aglow in her own sexual excitement.

The raven-tressed queen, who now was attired in dark but simple evening dress, led me down along the fence back in the direction of the party, until we were out of both eyesight and vision of the salacious trio of girls. She turned and faced me with a wry smile. "When I asked you to keep an eye out for me, I did not expect that you would find it within your duties to peek at my daughter and her ladies-in-waiting, young Jaze. You must allow a young woman some privacy, particularly when she is discovering her own sexuality among her intimates." Obviously, Serjeen was not at all concernced that her teenage daughter was exploring such sexuality with the aid of another young girl.

I blushed and stammered that I was merely trying to escape from the malefactor that she had sent me to find. I proudly told her of the conversation between the two cloaked men and the identifying ruby ring worn by the apparent ring leader. She did not seem particularly relieved, as she said, "That's all well and good, but unfortunately such a ring is worn by most members of the Drofnast clan from the southlands. Still, it is good to know, as it limits the number of suspects and tells us that perhaps that clan is undertaking a conspiracy to take over the throne by the use of the jewels. The Drofnasts are such a tightly knit clan that it is possible that, with such powers, they could muster the forces to do so."

Serjeena smiled fondly and brushed a stry lock of hair from my eyes. "You have done well, my handsome stripling, and fully deserving of the rewards promised you." My trousers tented at the implied promise. "But," she continued, "now is not the time, as much as I too might wish it. You must return to the party and continue to make"-she searched for a word and then grinned-"connections with those who might help you. I will speak to my husband and we will determine how to proceed further. We are in your debt, young Jaze."

Her cool, dark eyes scanned mine, and she cupped my cheek with her hand. Serjeen leaned forward and pressed her lips against my own, parting them slightly. With a modest but increasing urgency, my Queen's tongue slid forward between our parted lips and danced with my tongue, skillfully gliding to and fro. She clearly wished to impart to me the promise of what ministrations such a tongue could deliver to my fondest appendage, which in response threatended to burst from my trousers. Serjeen finally broke our kiss and slid away. I could only lean against the fence in enervated wonder. With an effort, I revaulted the fence, slipped past a guard attempting to peek over the lip of the ampitheatre to see the lascivious revels continuing below, and returned to the party.

As I returned to the scene, I noticed that the sexual frenzy had not abated, no doubt due in part to the effect of the aphrodisiac herbs which nearly all had ingested. Partners had changed, but the nature of the activity had not. My blonde "attendant" Charel lay prone on the grass in apparent sleep, but her brunette cousin Licia was fully awake and lying on her back perpendicular to Charel, her head pillowed on Charel's firm young ass. Licia's knees were up and widespread, and the noble who I earlier had seen in the pool enjoying the oral attentions of the buxom blonde I had spoken to a few minutes ago now was driving his long staff into Licia's tight young quim.

At that moment, the rousing frenzied music slowed and then ended, with the dark-curled dancer who was swaying in front of the band slumping to her knees. Few of the revelers took notice of the change, so caught up were they in their lustful activities. I took my eyes from the stage and circled around toward the back of the grassy ampitheatre, hoping to find another willing beauty who might wish to share in the stiffness that my observation of Paleem and Rebca had brought on. In doing so, I failed to notice the tall slim blind-folded woman with a long linen sack move to the stage.

Part 8

My eyes made contact with those of Jenfeer, the stunning, high-breasted young woman with the long, blond braid who had introduced me to the smoking of the ritual aphrodisiac herbs. The fair creature was now seated at the edge of the pool, still clad only in the string of thin chains that cascaded across her hips. Her long legs were stretched in front of her to allow her feet to dangle in the warm water, and I now marveled at their absolutely perfect shape. She glanced at me and rolled onto her side, braced on one elbow, and she raised her topmost knee, exposing her inner flesh to me. Her broad smile to me completed the unambiguous invitation.

Two high-pitched blasts from the grassy "stage" drew my glance, as well as at least a quick glance from others who were not too deeply engaged in their lustful couplings. Phenshraw himself stepped forward and I noticed for the first time the woman with the blindfold standing quietly to his right. Could that be...???!!

"My dear friends," the Prince intoned jovially, "we have a treat tonight beyond all expectations. We have after no little pleading from my family been able to persuade the Goddess of Music herself to join in our celebration of the Solstice here in our summer home and her adopted town of Speysard. She of course must wear one of our finest silken scarves to protect her eyes from the glare of the torches" -- with that the crowd of nobles laughed -- "oh, and perhaps some of you are not sufficiently attired that it would be proper for such an honored lady to be assaulted by the visage of your flabby, white.... uh, rear ends." The laughter grew. "Please enjoy the offerings from our most honored guest, Madame Jeara!"

My jaw dropped to my chest. Madame Jeara! The most famous flautist in all the land, a reclusive woman whose gifts with the flute could bring armies to tears and priests to the point of savagery. Beyond that, she was my own flute instructor. And, yes, she was my lover, a relationship borne of my adolescent innocence and her pain at the loss of her husband, whose death in the wars in the East had sent her into refuge at Speysard. Her earnings had permitted her to acquire and live at a home out on the cliffs, where she spent her days playing dirgelike paens to her lost husband, but would play no further performances.

When Madame Jeara's friends had implored her to work through her grief by resuming some contact with the world, she compromised by agreeing to give flute lessons to the two best of the flute students in the local schools. With all modesty, I must concede that I had shown considerable aptitude for the flute, and few boys could challenge my skills as music was not considered to be the most masculine of pursuits by most young men. When I arrived for my first lesson with my slender, bookish classmate Linna, I was surprised to discover that the legendary figure was not a middle-aged matron, but a tall, grey-eyed woman in her late twenties, with long, straight hair with naturally alternating streaks of ash blonde and light brown.

Jeara (as she insisted we call her) carried herself with quiet solemnitude, and Linna and I at first felt reluctant to continue with the lessons, feeling that they were little more than the product of Jeara's sense of obligation to carry out the wishes of her concerned friends. The two of us practiced madly between lessons in order to please her, much to the dismay of Brother Bartone, whose cell at the monastery was above my quarters. After a few weeks, Jeara's attitudes toward Linna and me began to warm, as she discovered, as do many, that in teaching one must articulate the basis of one's craft and can often enhance one's own skills in that discipline.

Between us, Linna and I had plotted to further bring Jeara out of her melancholy. Beyond our efforts to please her by constant practice, my brown-haired classmate and I would compose silly parodies of popular tunes, taking off wildly in flights of whimsy, while showing sufficient respect for each melody's structure to demonstrate some virtuosity. From these rehearsals, a warm, platonic friendship developed between Linna and I, and I looked forward to our practice sessions and the opportunity to make her freckled nose crinkle in mock disgust at my sometimes crude attempts at composition. Linna clearly was the far more accomplished musician and envisioned herself a professional musician in a few years. Although, because of her shyness, she was considered by our classmates to be aloof, she was bright beyond measure. Linna was fully aware what an extraordinary gift had been handed to her in the lessons from Jeara, who she worshipped to the point of emulating her clothing style.

I thought back to that magical, warm afternoon only a few months earlier where so much changed among the three of us.

* * * * *

I had completed my chores at the monastery early and scampered up the dusty road to Jeara's cliffside home to arrive early, in the hope that she might assist me in some of the more difficult passages she had taught us so that I might catch up to Linna's skills. My light knock on Jeara's door went unanswered, but I could hear her flute wafting from beyond the thin wood. I slipped inside and headed through her main parlor to her back deck overlooking the open sea. The back door was pushed open to permit the breeze to cool the home, and through it I could see Jeara seated and leaning against a balustrade, her eyes closed, and her flute in hand.

She was playing a melody the beauty of which my simple talents cannot begin to describe. Her improvised melody captured the breeze, and the sea -- and her loneliness at the loss of someone dear. The dirge shifted into almost a military cadence, evoking images of her lost husband. One could almost see him in his uniform, tall and commanding.

The melody then softened, grew more intimate, as the man came to her -- yes, there was a melody by which she described herself: sure and gifted, but still open and submissive. The two of them jousted playfully, then more seriously. The pitch then lowered in pitch and volume, and my own loins stirred with the aural image of the soldier stroking the bare flesh of his lover, Jeara.

Sadly, the music started to fade, as though the two years since his death had started to unravel the fabric of her memory of him. I saw a tear of frustration bead at the corner of one of her closed eyes. I do not know what possessed me at my moment, but I somehow decided to pull my own flute from my belt and respond with a simple melody of my own, crafted on the spot. I tried to mimic her own smoky capture of the soldier's strength and grace, but unsurprisingly re-made him into an earnest but somewhat gawky young footsoldier.

Upon hearing my notes in my characteristic style, Jeara merely smiled wryly, and let her instrument fall from her lips. As my own playing began to flag in embarassment, her eyes opened and looked warmly toward mine, encouraging me to continue. She recognized that however limited might be my skills, I was truly beginning to feel the beckonings of the muse, and the powers of the music to capture and explore human emotions. With her eyes, Jeara beckoned me to recline behind her, while continuing my playing. As I lay back, she rested her head on my shoulder and joined in my tune.

With her wonderful tone, she guided me further into our tale, reassuring the young footsoldier to not be shy with the older widow. She replayed the sensual tone that had drawn me outside, and I nearly recoiled in shock at the intimacies suggested by the melody line. I suddently became aware that the softness of her slim flank was resting against my hip, and that the fragrance of her long, silken tresses gathered at the swell of my throat and wafted around me. I tentatively responded to her musical invitation, and she playfully teased me with snippets of sexy, ribald musical cliches. I grew more forceful with the sexual energy of the young, and she dared me to proceed further. I pressed on, with an almost cacaphonous fervor, my own young cock beginning to swell in my breeches. I began a salacious cadence, strong firm. She matched my own, hotly, and we lunged together harder and harder, higher and higher in pitch. I went on, synchronously stroking in a furious glissando, when I suddenly realized where I was and with whom I was engaged in this musical lovematch. Ideas fled from my young, amateurish lyrical heart, and I could only crash with the hellish heat of climax, spurting out blast after blast. Her flute soared while mine dipped, as we went on for what seemed like minutes. Playfully, as if to complete the story, we slowly descended with ever softer pulses and nips, and finally stopped and lay our flutes aside.

We sat there for a long moment, she looking out to sea; I gazing in the same direction over her shoulder. Our breath came out in surprised pants. My mouth dropped open in stunned exhaltation. Never had I experienced such a musical epiphany, and I expected that I never would again. Jeara slowly turned her head and shoulders to me, bracing herself with a hand on my thigh. I saw the first unabashed smile I had ever seen from her: 'Welcome,' her eyes seemed to say, 'to this new place where magic is created from music.'

She laughed aloud at the stunned expression on my face, and her free hand cupped my cheek in friendly greeting. Her other hand patted the thigh on which it rested. Alas, on that spot was the tip of my now fully-erect young staff, still stimulated to the brink by our sensual concert.

A range of emotions swept across her beautiful face then: surprise, embarrassment, and flattered pleasure. Our eyes locked for a moment and her breath seemed to catch, and then Jeara leaned forward and locked her arms around my neck. She pressed her lips sweetly to mine, and then pressed her body to me firmly.

I hesitated for only a moment, and then I pressed my arms around her waist and returned her kiss, communicating not only my adolescent, ever-present lusts, but my love and affection for this stunning woman who had opened this new territory to me. As the tender kiss continued, her hands began to explore me, to reacquaint herself with the body of a man. Emboldened, I allowed my own hands to drift over her torso, and I became enflamed by each slender swell and dip of her magnificence. Her loins pressed against mine, grinding her soft mons against my straining hardness.

Opening her eyes, Jeara broke the kiss but moved her face only inches from mine. Her unwavering stare probed me; I answered with hope, affection, confidence, and not a little lust. Seemingly satisfied with my response, Jeara pushed herself up off my shoulder and rose to her feet. Wordlessly, she dropped a hand to me, and I stood up, the front of my breeches now fully tented.

Taking my hand in hers, she led me into the house, through the parlor, and down the hall to a large bedroom that also opened onto a deck facing the sea. It was simply furnished, with only a large but simple bed, a nightstand with basin and candle, and a dresser.

Turning to face me, Jeara took hold of the hem of my shirt and drew it quickly over my head, cocking her head and smiling in acknowledgment at my slim but muscular form. My stupor at the series of events that led me to her bed chamber could not keep from me the realization that I had never seen Jeara so happy, so playful -- so alive. Her hands then quickly undid my belt and tugged my breeches to the floor. As my feet stepped out of them, her slim fingers drew up my thighs and then swirled around my throbbing, exposed member, measuring me, toying with me, enrapturing me.

As I groaned in pleasure, Jeara gently let go and turned her back to me. I picked up her hint and unfastened the drawstring at her neck which held up her linen robe. When she paused, I drew the garment over her shoulders and down her dangling arms. I leaned forward and kissed the sloping valley between neck and shoulder, then drew my lips down the middle of her back, taking the robe further down ahead of me. Her generous but taut ass came into view, and I dropped to one knee and rubbed my cheek against one soft buttock as the robe finally pooled at her feet.

I turned the standing woman to face me, and found my eyes no more than an inch from her downy valley. I pressed my lips to the center of her soft, light-colored pubic locks in tribute. My pursed lips descended to the opening of her fleshy folds, and the aroma of her arousal ascended to greet me. I kissed, I chewed, I worshipped those lips. My tongue stroked along the edge of the cleft, and then hungily slid inside, savoring her intimate juices. My hands, which were gently stroking her thighs, felt them quiver with tension and anticipation.

After long moments where her murmered endearments rose to muffled groans, she brought her fingers to opposite sides of my cheek and bid me to rise to my feet. As I did, her mouth again clamped onto mine, and her teeth nibbled at my lower lip. My hands brushed against the small, light-pink nipples that capped her modest but perfectly shaped breasts.

Together, we descended to the bed, and she pushed at my shoulders to have me lay on my back, as she knelt next to my hips. Her slender fingers again clutched at my stalk, but this time, firmly. She slowly drew her hand up and down several times, and I feared that I might spend if she were to continue too long.

A bead of my seed gathered at the tip. She leaned over as thought to examine my emission, and then barely parted her lips and took the reddened tip inside her mouth. I almost exploded as I felt her soft tongue tap at the pre-cum, and then slide over the lust-moistened end. After laving my rod for a moment, she slowly glided her wonderful lips back to the tip with slight suction, drawing the substance inside her. In my adolescence, I must confess, I could not help but think of what magic that this woman, the most accomplished flautist of our time, might bring to such oral ministrations upon my straining cock.

However, Jeara then pulled her mouth away altogether, and rose up onto her knees. The ash-blonde woman threw her legs over my hips so that her pussy rested just above my erection, and she guided me inside her with a sure hand. With only two firm pushes, I was completely inside her wet, tight glove. She rested her hands on my shoulders and then began to rock her loins on my hips, drawing me out of and then into her center of passions. I, on my back, clutched her hips and moved my own hips up to meet her fevered pushes. I gloried in the heated pressure of her tight walls on my burgeoning sword, as we continued our dance.

Her eyes flickered open and her mouth drew into an ecstatic rictus of pleasure as I further lunged up. She began to hum lightly, using her pitch, as well as the pace of her own hips to guide my tempo. She soon began to ride me faster, and I concentrated on postponing my own release until I was sure hers had come. I finally was rewarded with a muffled, shrill hum and felt her cunt muscles contract with pulsating jerks. I then cried out my own release, gasping as the seed spurted from me and filled the older woman's chamber. I lurched up again and again, spending deep into her each time.

As our ecstacy subsided, I closed my eyes and enjoyed the gentle sensations of Jeara's hugging moist channel on my deflating manhood. Long moments of such ecstacy accompanied by the warmth of the late afternoon sun completed my reverie.

Without warning, I felt her tense, and my eyes shot open. I looked up and saw her eyes dart in horror toward the door. My eyes followed, and saw standing in the doorway the slender Linna, flute bag in hand, her brown eyes welling with tears. Her lips quivered, and she barely blubbered, "No -- not the two of you; not together!" With a wail, she disappeared from the doorway.

Jeara slid off my now soft member, and we both quickly stood. Jeara threw on her robe and went after the young student, while I wrestled with my shirt and breeches. I came out to the main parlor, where I found the two women huddled on the couch. Linna's face was buried in Jeara's chest, and I could see the girl's light-brown curls and shoulders heave with her sobs. I crept by and motioned to Jeara that I would leave, but she instead motioned me to sit in a chair opposite them.

Through her sobs, Linna somehow explained that in coming up the hills she heard the sensual, and ultimately sexual, duets between Jeara and me. Realizing that I somehow had been elevated to some sphere of musical awareness that she, Linna -- considered the more musical of the two of us -- had not yet grasped. She crept into the house in curiosity, and saw the two of us embrace and then retire to Jeara's bedchamber for a lustful tryst. Crying into Jeara's chest, Linna now conceded that her despondency had at that point become complete, as she saw the two people who she most admired and loved -- musically, spiritually and physically -- were now locked into a union that could only exclude her.

As Linna finished her confession, Jeara and I sat in stunned silence. Suddenly, I realized how much my affection for the brilliant talents of this quiet, button-nosed girl really meant to me, and how much I physically cherished her as well. Jeara rocked the young girl in her arms, and Linna's tears finally subsided. Jeara then quietly explained how I had come upon her grieving playing and had joined the performance, which had led to our out-of-control joining.

Jeara explained, "Linna, dear, there is nothing to prevent you from performing with me in such a duet as well." She suddenly blushed as she realized the potential double meaning of her words.

Linna looked into her face with serious, red-brimmed eyes and protested, "But that's the point. How can I match the passion of your playing, and Jaze's, when the lust you can feel for him is what I feel for you and" -- there, Linna turned to me -- "and I've felt for the longest time for Jaze but you two don't for me?" Again, we sat in silence. Linna closed her eyes, as she could not bear to watch us after admitting such dual loves.

Jeara commended me to her with a soft, "Jaze." As I came over, she beckoned me to pick up the slender Linna, and led me back to her bedroom, with the girl in my arms. I gently dropped Linna's feet to the floor while holding her shoulders. The girl's eyes remained close until she felt the kiss on her lips, and, upon opening her eyes, was openly startled to discover that the lips were not mine, but those of Jeara.

Together then, Jeara and I stripped the flower-embroidered blouse from Linna's form and her full skirt from around her waist. We then disrobed each other and softly laid Linna back onto the bed. The older woman and I knelt beside her and took turns kissing the girl while allowing our hands to gently roam over her torse, lightly tweaking at the small, barely ripe breasts and lightly-furred mound of her loins. Our lips soon followed our hands, nipping and caressing her soft skin. She soon began to smile in raw pleasure at the sensualness of the pampering. Before long, however, the girl's sexual urges took over, and she began to almost wildly swing her head and legs about, finally shrieking as Jeara took the girl's virginal pussy lips between her teeth and began tugging at licking at Linna's sex.

One of Linna's flailing arms finally descended upon my re-swollen organ as I knelt beside her, and then her hand twisted around to grasp its thickness. Linna turned her sweet face toward me and impatiently flicked one of her lush brown curls away from her eyes. She then arched her neck toward me and took my thick cock into her pink lips. Her tongue lapped at the underside of the head and then swabbed at the tip, and I could tell she was exploring and savoring the taste of both my swollen cock and the the residue of Jeara's cuntal juices.

Linna's eyes flickered up to mine, and she kept them locked on me as she continued to nibble and lave at my engorged rod. The look of love and happiness and relief on her face gave to her a beauty that not even the most renowned of concubines could ever hope to match. She then closed her eyes and threw her face forward, drawing me further inside her heated mouth and bringing me closer to spending once again.

I pulled away and Linna instinctively drew her leg that was closest to me toward her chest. Needing no further communication, Jeara pulled her hungering mouth away from the girl and, with a soft tug at my thigh, guided me into the saddle of Linna's widespread thighs. Jeara darted to the head of the bed and sat sideways, allowing Linna to rest her head on the musician's lap.

Linna moaned slightly as my cock passed the portals of her inexperienced pussy, but she made no further complaint as I made my way inside her, except for one sharp intake of breath as I slowly ripped away the shield of her virginity. Throughout this entry, Jeara soothed the girl with gentle strokes of her temple, shoulders and breasts. After my pentration was complete and I began the most gentle surges I could muster, Jeara leaned over and gently kissed Linna, their tongues encircling and joining. My stroking of Linna went on.

In only a few moments, Linna emitted a soft, keening whine into Jeara's mouth as her spasms came over her. I waited until sure of her climax, and then permitted my own explosion, drawing a quick, surprised chirp from Linna as she felt the warmth of my seed splash inside her.

After a respite of only a few moments, Linna slid from the bed and pulled us outside, where she picked up our flutes. The three of us sat in the nude on the edge of the low wall protecting Jeara's deck from the surrounding cliffs, and began playing. We allowed Linna to take the lead, playing of children scampering around a pond, chasing a big green frog (with my impression of a basso frog nearly ending the concert from the women's laughter), and then telling of the young lovers who come to the pond to lie on its banks and engage in their trysts. The flutes of the two extraordinarily talented women soared over the milling gulls, while I, in my near exhaustion, contented myself with taking on the role of the willing but not-too-aggressive young men. Only darkness and the treacherousness of the unlit road back to the village ended the concert.

The final memories of that day some months before -- of Linna and I strolling hand in hand back to the village -- resounded through my head here in the ampitheatre at the crest of Solstice Castle as I watched the blind-folded Jeara pick up her flute and begin to perform for the assembled royals and the young maids who cavorted with them.

Part 9

I was torn. I had a raging desire to go visit the sultry, high-breasted and long-legged blonde beauty Jenfeer, who was giving me come-hither looks from where she was seated by the pool. Still, I could not take my eyes of the sleek, ash-blonde woman who was putting her lips to her flute.

Looking around me, I could see that more than a few of the revelers were keeping a least one eye on the stage, so great was Jeara's fame and legend. Several couples were lying on their sides facing the stage on the soft grassy slopes around the pool, with the male behind the maid who was serving him, driving his hard sword into her tender depths.

A soft, birdlike trill started slowly, and then became louder, as though tentatively filling the natural ampitheatre to its capacity. As her most apt pupil, I could immediately sense from Jeara's hard-edged tune her conflicting emotions -- annoyance at being commanded to leave her refuge and appear for the royals, humiliation at being led to a place of wild sexuality but being deprived of any participation or even view of the goings-on, and loneliness at having no one with whom to share the very emotions of hope and revelry that the Solstice Festival was to bring about.

I almost winced as I heard her descend into a tune very similar to that which I'd first heard on that afternoon on which we'd become lovers. Her melody sang of a couple, tall and gorgeous and very much in love, who have life and passion torn from them as the man dies in battle. Her tones, low and mournful, told of the woman's griefstricken travails, with all desire to touch or even to see others slipping away from her.

As Jeara continued, I could see that the frantic couplings had all ceased. Most of the rutting royal's organs had flagged, dropping limply from the juicy pussies of the young beauties who served them. Crown Prince Phrenshraw now sat at the edge of the pool below the stage, his elbows on his knees and his rapt head solemnly cupped in his hands, while a sandy haired young vixen, wearing nary a stitch, knelt behind him with her arms resting on his shoulders, her attention also focussed on the stage. Many a young girl was weeping silently as the melancholy tune brought a funeral, hopeless tone to her heart. The duke who had first started the festivities stood to the side of the stage, wringing his hands in consterntation at the death knell that Jeara's playing had dealt to the festivities.

But Jeara seemed oblivious, and continued her dirge-like tones, her head floating softly atop her shoulders, as though transported in a trance to another place. I could see that she might continue on in this vein for another hour unless intercepted -- and that no one would have the audacity to cut off the efforts of the most distinguished musician in all our land.

Again, impetuosity overcame me, and I found myself heading up to the stage. From Jeara's linen bag, I slid out one of her larger flutes, with a lower range. Seating myself near the side of the stage -- my legs crossed in front of me, I pulled the instrument to my lips and began a baritone countermelody to her own. Her head jerked toward me in confusion and not a little anger; who would dare to play on the same stage as she? I responded with a few signature measures that she was sure to recognize, and an unmistakeable -- but confused smile -- grew on her lips. All the while, she did not miss a beat as my playing meshed with hers.

I toyed with Jeara's song by playing a parody of it; making my own tune so sad and tinged with grief that she could not help but let a chuckle slip into her song. She now clearly recognized the pall that she had brought to the fest, and an apologetic peep was returned to me. I slowly shifted the song back to the first notes she'd played, taking the role of the soldier she'd sent off to war but never was to see again. As I now, more confidently, played the scene with my flute, the soldier himself now returned to her, an absurd trill announcing that the report of his death was an error of the bureaucracy. Jeara played along with my revisionism, and now re-cast herself as the overwhelmingly relieved and ecstatic lover, throwing herself into the arms of her returning beloved. In our notes, birds soared and danced in a duel in the skies.

The atmosphere in the ampitheatre visibly lightened, even if not all those assembled detected the details of the scene that was being playing by our flutes. I glanced down by the pool, and could see fires re-stoked by the lighter tone. The heavily- breasted blonde whose favors I had declined in order to chase after the green cloaked assailant now was astride a fleshy baron, her cunt filled with his hard cock and her hips jerking as she pounded down onto his loins in time to the music. Her paramour, for the moment at least, reached up while she rode him and cupped her tits and stroked her hardened nipples. The blonde glanced at me and blew me a kiss with what can best be described as a look of gratitude. Surrounding her were dozens of other couplings similarly synchronized to the music.

The young looking young angel who I'd earlier espied with the older man who she claimed as her "uncle" now was wrapped around a standing, slender boy who looked barely old enough to shave. She affixed herself to him by latching her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. He held her ass as she vigorously bounced on his slender organ. Somehow, he managed to retain his balance throughout.

Several of the serving maids were up on their knees swaying to the steady tune. Jenfeer rose to her feet and pulled up two of the wenches, and they resumed their passage through the crowd with flagons of wine and waterpipes full of the aphrodisiac tobacco that had so entranced the crowd earlier.

I saw several of the musicians who had been succeeded by Jeara now sitting alongside the stage, their feet involuntarily tapping time. I nodded toward them, and then toward their instruments. Each grinned at the opportunity to accompany the exalted Madame Jeara, and leaped onto the stage. The drummer, a shaggy haired young man, laid down a heavy pulsating beat, and the lute players added a lilting background to our solos. A half dozen nude or nearly nude courtesans who were not otherwise occupied slipped up near the stage, swaying their slim hips and clapping with the music, their firm young breasts bobbing along with them.

Charel and Licia, the two cousins who had first greeted me with their delightful bodies earlier in the evening, now hovered near the back of the stage, enthralled with Jeara's playing. I smiled at them and gestured with another nod toward Jeara. Licia and Charel hesitantly came forward, and the blonde Charel knelt down beside Jeara. The older woman sensed their presence but continued playing. I detoured to a quote from an old children's tune about animal friends beside a pond, and Jeara picked up the reference and visibly relaxed. Charel reached up and softly rubbed Jeara's shoulders and neck, and Jeara' flute trilled in delight.

Slim hands then covered my eyes, and I fought to keep my concentration on my playing. As I passed the solo over to Jeara, incredibly soft lips found my own, prying them open. A blast of sweet, spiced smoke entered my mouth and lungs, and I heard the brushing sound of a metallic chain and felt a high, firm, round breast press against my back. Of course: Jenfeer. I opened my eyes and saw her dancing blue eyes and chiseled, pale cheekbones, framed by her blonde hair that was pulled back and tied into a long braid that serpentined down her back. I slid my mouth from hers and nibbled on her ear and neck as she knelt before me; I remained sitting. I did not fight as she guided my mouth down to her left breast, taking as much of the delicious orb as I could into my mouth, while my trapped tongue danced over the taut nipple.

As my solo returned, I pulled my lips away from Jenfeer's breast and sat up, reluctantly taking the flute up to play. Ever the good sport, the platinum-haired goddess reached down and expertly untied the drawstring to my breeches. My improvisational skills lost a little focus as I felt Jenfeer's hands slide the waistband down to my hips, and I rolled onto one asscheek and then another to assist the girl in pulling the breeches over my butt, down my thighs, and off my legs altogether. The rush of the herbs and the awe inspiring vision of Jenfeer had caused my staff to reawaken fully, and Jenfeer lightly wrapped her fingers around it.

I looked back over toward Jeara, and I saw that she too was somewhat occupied. Charel still knelt behind the seated flautist and was rubbing her hand over Jeara's firm, silk-covered breasts. Dark-haired Licia was lying alongside the sitting woman and was rubbing underneath the hem of Jeara's robe; I could see the movement of her hand outlined by the fabric at Jeara's thighs. Licia's arm moved forward, and the lovely woman let loose with a surprised run up the scale. Licia's hand obviously was pleasuring my lover's mons.

I felt a warm wetness at my own cock tip, and looked down to see that Jenfeer now was laying on her stomach, with her long legs stretched to the side and lovely blonde head in my lap. She had taken just the cap of my manhood between her soft pink lips and into her mouth, and was caressing it with inch-long movements of her pursed lips. I tried to thrust myself further into the magical wetness of her maw, but found it almost impossible to do while sitting cross-legged with my hands unavailable to give me leverage. As though sensing my helplessness, Jenfeer slowly took my cock further inside her mouth, and sweet lips still gently hugged the shaft with a steady stroking, her sylph-like neck bowing and rising.

I raised my head and trumpeted a few blast of my own ecstacy. In doing so, my eyes caught a glimpse of white up through an opening in the canopy of trees, and I realized that several white-garbed women were watching us. Focussing on the spot, I detected Lorena and Rebca watching Jeara and me from a corner of a castle balcony, as I had heard them describe earlier inside the castle garden. A further movement caught my eye, and I saw a shock of red hair between the two lovelies.

Princess Paleem! The King's only daughter was peeking at the lascivious festivities as well. Her lovely hazel eyes gleamed as she watched while huddled behind her servants. I pretended not to see her, but broke off the chord changes I was exploring and cut into a subtle but detectable version of the royal family's official hymn. My gaze returned to her, and it took but a moment for her to detect the theme and see me staring at her; her hand rushed to her mouth as she came to the understanding that I had seen and that the passage was a tribute to her. She started to duck away, but Lorena and Rebca each grabbed an arm and pulled her forward to the thigh-high wall at the edge of the balcony.

My eyes remaining on the crimson-tressed princess, I permitted the royal theme to fade from the air, and then segued to an improvised story emulating that about which I had heard Paleem fantasize in the garden. A sensitive but strong young man entered the parlor of a woman -- yes, the princess, identified by just a snippet of the royal theme. Jeara, ever the master, picked up on my tale and after a quick musical query -- "a princess?" -- and my confirming, certain note -- portrayed the princess herself. Our notes slid together, as if my hands were sliding along the princess' neck and down her shoulders. A throbbing rounded note from Jeara's flute, and my pulsing strokes replied; Paleem brought her young hands to the breast of her elegant white robe, her firm hands pressing against her breasts.

Lorena, who was obviously delighted that the princess whom she served was becoming carried away, lightly rubbed her mistresses' ass. In conjunction, I lowered the pitch of my stroking notes, as though they were my own hands now which caressed her hips. The princess dropped her hands to the lip of the low wall in front of her and pulled her loins forward, pressing the swell of her mons against the firm stone wall, trying to simultaneously suppress and satisfy the lust obviously coursing through her.

Jeara and I permitted the teasing to continue for awhile longer, and then descended to a throaty, lustful melody. A major chord, an almost dissonant minor chord -- the princess could feel her thighs being parted. A growing, throbbing, compelling bass tone: I poised my manliness at the portals. A sliding, liquid glissando followed, with Jeara's responding sharp, shrill retort -- almost as the breaking of a pot. I had entered! The princess' mouth opened in delight and her hips pressed harder against the wall.

Throughout the ampitheatre, the randy couplings increased in vigor, as baron and serving maid alike each strove for the climax to which our music guided them. Wet slapping sounds of loins against loins permeated the air. Jenfeer too was caught up in the approaching crescendo, as she took my throbbing shaft further and further into her mouth and up against the opening to her throat. One of her hands was busy guiding my cock into her mouth; the other was tucked underneath her prone body and was pleasuring her own loins, which were churning against the ground. Licia had pulled the hem of Jeara's robe up to her waist, and the vigorous rubbing of the young girl's hand on the lust-inflamed labia of my playing partner was completely visible.

Our tempo now increased in pitch, as Jeara almost desperately implored me to hasten the end. Amidst the grunts and moans of the many fucking couples sprawled across the lawns, I heard no tell-tale signs that any had yet reached their completion, as though all were commanded to await our signal. While I felt that that voracious, wet-lipped sucking of my hard prick by the beautiful blonde Jenfeer could bring me off at any time, there was one woman whose pleasure was utmost in my mind.

I stared up again at the balcony, and could see Paleem's eyes now were desperately clinging to my face, as though only I could lead her to the goal that her shivering loins needed to attain more than any prize she could imagine. A light obligato, and then another -- I teased my fantasy lover. Jeara responded with a plea -- no, a royal plea punctuated by the royal theme. I paused a beat, then two...

Then I let loose with heavy bass tones, pushing as much into the instrument as my body would allow. Paleem's hips jerked from an almost invisible invasion. Rebca slyly reached down and cupped the princess' pussy mound through her thin robe, and I could imagine her fingers probing and stroking in time to my sharp, blasts. Paleem kept the girl's fingers pinned between her cunt and the balcony wall. In my lap, Jenfeer's mouth increased the urgency of its sucking, as though she could by commanding my own orgasm force me to release her own. She now spoke, gaspingly, for the first time since she'd joined me on stage: "Now, my love, spend in me; I must taste your seed in my mouth!"

Another plea from Jeara, and I almost laughed as I saw her flushed face underneath her blindfold. A low-C blast, then D, and F#. The drummer abandoned his left hand and pounded at the bass drum along with my ascending, urgent tones.

I glanced at the balcony; Paleem's hips pounded against the wall and the relief offered by Rebca's selfless hand. My princess paused, and then her body tensed and straightened, with small but hurried jerks of her loins against Rebca's fingers. Her red hair swirled around her face; her mouth opened and she visibly panted in short gasps. Rebca suddenly grinned, looked down at me, and nodded. Our princess was exploding with pleasure.

I clambered up the scale and signaled Jeara. She blew to all the call of her own release in sharp, ecstatic cries. We ascended together, and were joined by one, and another, and then almost all of the barons and dukes and maids and serving wenches and courtesans. The air was filled with cries and pleas and gasping sighs. Jenfeer's muffled cry on my cock and scissoring thighs told me that she too was achieving her release.

I yearned to watch each salacious couple as I could tell from the corner of my eyes that male seed was splashing into and onto the spasming pussies and asses of almost every maiden. However, my eyes were firmly affixed upon Paleem, tasting every moment of her jerking orgasm, her face contorting in ecstacy at each sweet spasm. As the contractions subsided, her eyes flew open and immediately locked onto mine, in lust and gratitude. Now that we were one, I let her share in my release. My jaw dropped dumbly in a stupid grin, and I released the gates of my explosion, surprising Jenfeer with a sudden spurt of seed into her slavering mouth. The blonde maid moaned in delight, capturing each blast as it shot along the length of her tongue. Paleem's tongue dropped onto her own lower lip and her hand involuntarily came to her chin, as though attempting to savor the acrid sweetness of my spending cum.

With one final blast of cacaphonous, atonal release, I dropped the flute and grasped Jenfeer's head near the base of her blonde braid. I guided the beauty's head further onto my spurting cock, and she took the additional shots deep in her hungry mouth. My emissions subsided, but Jenfeer continued to try to suction additional seed from my overworked member. Then, she worked her tongue over the beads clinging to the slit at the end and around the sides of the cap, lapping at each morsel of my manly residue.

For two beats, the crowd remained silent, except for gasping attempts to catch their breath. Then, all eyes focussed on the stage, and a spontaneous ovation erupted. Cheers, whistles, and shouted "Huzzahs" cascaded across the hillside. On the balcony, Lorena and Rebca waved their arms and pumped their fists; Paleem could only manage a weak grin as she leaned against the low wall, her slender hips still swaying.

I tried to bow my head modestly, but I could not suppress my pleased grin. Jeara slyly pushed her blindfold up to expose one eye; while wincing from the sudden light, she managed an unambiguous wink as though from one victorious teammate to another. The drunk Duke who had just ten minutes before been wringing his hands in concern at the funereal cast of the festival now jigged happily by himself, apparently oblivious to the wet spot on the front of his trousers where he had spent himself in his excitement.

I knew that as of tonight my life had taken a sudden, new turn. At the very least, I figured could enjoy a comfortable living as a musician sponsored by some royal patron, and certainly would be remembered fondly by most of the royalty present. Beyond that, any of the young maids who had been the beneficiaries of the lusty screwing which my duet with Jeara had spawned might find a decidely appropriate way to express their gratitude. Without a doubt, I had in a few short minutes placed myself in the most enviable position imaginable.

I turned my head back in the direction of Jeara to embrace her within my good fortune, and a familiar color caught my eye. Behind her, in the shadows, stood a man in a green cloak, a ruby ring glistening at the hand that rested at his side. Only one eye and the side of his face were visible, and only dimly at that. He was staring at me in recognition and anger. From his glare and the clenched set of his jaw, I knew that this stranger -- the mysterious assailant of the prime minister -- had figured out that I was the one who had come upon him in the midst of his attack.

At that moment, I would not have bet a rusty brass halfcoin on the value of my life.

Part 10

Notwithstanding the palpable chill that trickled down my spine, ill humor was difficult to maintain. Cheers still rang through the crowd, and Charel and Licia had rushed over to hug me at their excitement. Since they had been seeing to Madame Jeara's pleasure during our mad, passion-inducing duet, the two nymphs were not themselves the recipient of any lovemaking. They insisted that I join them for a further lustful threesome which, they assured me, would bring to me pleasure which I could only hope to imagine. Pulling my breeches back over my hips, I promised them that I soon would join them but was for the moment somewhat disabled by my second spending of the night. With a simultaneous glaring at the lovely Jenfeer, who still wore my seed on her lips, the two cousins flounced off.

I glanced up at the palace balcony on which Princess Paleem had enjoyed what I sensed was her first orgasm at the hand of another. I just glimpsed the back of the three young women's heads as they left the balcony. After a moment, Queen Serjeen herself appeared and glanced down at the grounds. Her eyes grew wide at the site of the nobles and young maids wandering about in various stages of undress. I can only surmise that until then she -- and most certainly the King -- were unaware that the site could be observed from the Princess' balcony. As she surveyed the scene, the Queen's eyes locked onto mine. I good naturedly waved my flute at her; she glowered back in mock anger as though to say, 'I should have known you'd be at the center of all of this.' Shaking her head in disgust, Queen Serjeen left the balcony.

Jeara and the musicians launched into another tune, a sprightlier, simpler song, to maintain the general blissful air of the party. Obviously, all of the nobles who had just themselves reached their releases were even older than I and not yet prepared to resume their lustful rutting. At Jeara's cue, I added touches of harmony to the tunes, but did not purport to further play as her equal. Jeara had by this point fully removed her blindfold, which seemed to trouble no one. She seemed genuinely flattered by the effect she'd had on the assembled guests, and I caught her appraising a few of the more handsome young members of the nobility, as well as a couple of the serving wenches, as potential bedmates. I suppressed an unbidden sense of jealousy and succeeded in feeling rather more pride and pleasure that the fest was wresting her from the melancholy and grief of the death of her husband so many months before.

The serving maids bustled around bringing glasses of wine and trays of chilled fruits and seasoned meats to the nobles, many of whom could not seem to erase from their faces broad grins of pleasure and not a little pride. I suspected that some of the older dukes and counts had not performed so lustfully for many years, but had managed to do so now with the assistance of the pounding music.

After several more tunes, I made sure my breeches were re-fastened properly and wandered down by the pool to find some refreshments. My transit was hampered by several smoke-impaired, hearty nobles, each of whom clapped me on the back and allowed how I was certainly the most promising of young musicians. One even uttered to me in a loud, drunken whisper that he was attempting to seduce the virtuous, beautiful young wife of one of his knights and that he would make it worth my while to come play another such lust-inducing tune at the scene of his next contemplated assignation. I politely assured him that I would with every expectation that the offer would be forgotten the next morrow -- abetting the cuckolding of a knight was not the action of a wise man!

I sat near the pond's edge and leaned against the sloping grass hillside. Charel came over with a glass of deep ruby wine and a pocket of spiced-meat pie and extended it reluctantly, her pout still affixed to her face. Sardonically, she uttered, "Well, milord, at least I can say that I enjoyed the skills of your lips before the rest of the crowd."

I tried to bow from a sitting position in what I hoped was a decent imitation of a gentleman. "My sweet, fair-haired maiden, I would much rather try to create music at your vessel than with even the greatest of orchestras."

Charel rolled her eyes in knowing disdain. "Oh, I see you have been working in the stables as well, for you seem to have brought their most prolific product with you." Still, she gave me a lovely if measured smile for my willingness to at least attempt to mollify her, and walked away to continue her serving duties.

"Here, here, good Jaze! What a festival you have made it!" I looked up dreamily into the reddened face of Prince Phrenshraw, who clearly was several glasses of wine ahead of me. On each arm was a maiden of astonishing beauty; obviously, the crown prince was entitled to favors which were not to be shared with just any noble. The tall, serene brunette on his far arm projected a stunning elegance, and I realized that her visage was not unlike that of Queen Serjeen; with a mother of such beauty, any fascination that the prince might have toward a lookalike was unsurprising.

Phrenshraw added, "For enhancing the revels, you have the gratitude of my family, particularly my father, who most benefitted from the inspiration -- or perhaps it is you who really benefitted, Onassa." He leered at the brunette to his right, who blushed and looked down. I tried to suppress my astonishment; the King himself was freely trysting with the maids on this evening. My guilt at my limited, but -- technically -- consummated coupling with the Queen the preceding evening abated considerably. The honey-haired, younger maid on his near arm giggled modestly, which gave me an excuse to stare at her own stunning features. She bore the slimness of Charel but was taller, with even more electrifyingly gorgeous features. Her small, narrow face with its huge brown eyes and bow-like mouth entranced me.

"My father would like to thank you himself," said Phrenshraw with a slight slur, directed more into the Onassa's neck, which he then was nuzzling, then toward me. "Auria here will escort you." He motioned toward the honey-haired stunner; she bowed engagingly.

Without waiting for a response, the Prince and Onassa staggered off, leaving me with Auria. She turned slightly, indicating with her eyes the tent on the far side of the pool from the stage, but I remained transfixed by her dark eyes. She laughed -- oh, could any musician hope to replicate that laugh? -- and held out her hand for me to take. The low fold of her simple, spare gown revealed under her outstretched arm much of her firm right breast. Despite my assertions to Charel and Licia just a few moments before of my inability to resume any lovemaking, I felt a thick lurch at my loins.

Shaking my head to clear it, I held out my arm for her to take, and we slowly walked around the pool, obstructed by groupings of nobles and maidens, who were slowly beginning to resume some of their libidinous activities. Just before we reached the tent, Auria stopped me and turned to me, again capturing me with her large brown eyes. (Yes, gentle reader, I know I repeat myself in waxing rhapsodic about those ebony windows into her soul, but you would as well if you had come under their spell).

Her voice was high, like a nightingale's song. "Milord Jaze? I too hope to be a musician, and have had some training from the castle musicians in the hope of being able to bring some pleasure to the royal family when they desire a simple tune. But, to be able to tell a tale of wonder as you were able -- and to play with Madame Jeara -- that is beyond their capacity to teach." She tentatively placed her hands on my chest, then drew them up behind my neck. "I could arrange for you to come into the castle to give me lessons, privately... if..." she hesitated, "if you would be willing to do so."

How could I conceivably have turned down such a request? "I would be delighted, milady, if it pleases the royal family." Her eyes widened with glee, and, I tell you, bringing joy to such a face sends flocks of doves aloft in one's soul. She impetuously pulled my face to hers and bussed me warmly. While I expect she intended the kiss to be one of gratitude, she complained not when I sustained it and placed my hands on her waist. Our lips remained locked and her sweet tongue darted forward toward mine.

As they darted and duelled, my hands cupped her slim, firm ass and lightly pressed her to me, such that she could feel my re-awakening member pressed against the flatness of your stomach. She groaned -- and not unhappily -- and pulled her face back breathlessly. "Well, I guess perhaps our lessons might be more encompassing than I expected," she whispered. She looked up at me and smiled shyly. "I suppose those are among the sacrifices a musician is expected to make to learn her craft." She paused and slid her long-fingered hand between our bodies and pressed it over my bulging trousers. Her face clouded briefly in surprise, and then pleasure, as her fingers measured me. "Yes, I will arrange for those lessons to begin very, very soon."

She quickly kissed me again and pushed me up the steps to the opening of the large, colorful tent in which the King awaited, gesturing to the guards to allow me inside.

The older of the two guards whirled and stuck his head inside the flap which now covered the entrance, apparently to announce me. He pulled his head out, now with a rather shocked look on his face. He conferred briefly with his partner and shrugged, then asked me my name. Turning back toward the flap, but not entering,the guard intoned, "Master Jaze of Speysard!" He pulled the flap aside and motioned me to hurry in. I lowered my head and stepped inside.

Words can hardly do justice to the scene in the royal tent. Though only perhaps six paces on a side, the tent was full of just about everything a sybarite -- nay, a satyr -- could desire. Near the entrance of low tables were flagons of heavenly smelling wines and victuals of every description. Several small pipes of the aphrodisiac herbs which I had described before -- the ingestion of which is normally rigidly controlled by priests for newlyweds to insure a successful consummation of their marriages -- were strewn across several tables. Three pipes remained lit and I could sense that, merely by remaining in the room, one would within ten minutes begin rutting like a bull.

Around the center and the back of the tent were various silken pillows of assorted sizes and shapes, most in various hues of red. Some were almost as couches or mattresses. Several flutes and a lyre lay near one side of the tent. Littered near the door were various official looking documents; apparently the King had been attempting to conduct some business before the festivities began.

In the center of all of this was the King, slightly overweight but otherwise heavily muscled and thick necked. He was as naked as the day he was born, sprawled on his back against several pillows. His eyes were closed, but he clearly was awake, but not entirely conscious. Three nude, slim beauties with long, straight blonde hair were attending to him. One knelt on each side of him, while the third was sprawled on a pillow above his head. All three were rubbing his head, torso and neck, almost as though they were trying to revive him. I could not help but notice that his royal member dangled somewhat limply at his groin, notwithstanding the ardor of the trio's ministrations.

One of the kneeling girls turned to me and smiled, without interrupting her stroking of the king's neck and dark beard. Her bright, almost translucent blue eyes peered at me. The other girls looked up as well, and I realized even in the dim light of the tent that the three were identical to one another. They must be triplets! Their slim hips and barely budding breasts suggested that they were mere youngsters, no older than thirteen.

The first girl greeted me, "Hello, young minstrel," and I detected from her husky contralto that no matter how young the girls appeared, they might well be my own age of seventeen years. Still, notwithstanding my own prejudices against against taking advantage of girls of tender years, the sudden blossoming of my own crotch forced me to admit that the girls' appearance appealed to some deep-harbored fantasy suppressed only out of a desire to avoid harm to such maidens' immature emotions and bodies. Such a fantasy obviously had at least as great an appeal to King Abret.

The King sensed the diversion of the girls' attention, and his eyes snapped open. "The mighty flute player appears," he intoned with the raspiness that comes from drink and smoke. "These girls are mad at you, you know. Your little tune with Madame Jeara got me so worked up that that little brunette, Ona... whatever, drained me entirely. That was quite a tapestry you two weaved. Recall that once I too was a young prince rushing off to lead an army into battle, and the story of the soldier's return to his lover drew strong memories from me." I was astonished that the King, in his drunkenness, still was perceptive enough to pick up on the storyline. He went on, "It's too early for the party to end, but I don't seem to have much left for this lithesome trio." He clumsily hugged the two kneeling blondes

My astonishment at seeing my King in such a state and my respect for the majesty of his position bid me to hold my tongue's suggestion that perhaps his ingestion of wine was at greater fault. I stared dumbly.

"So, little flute player, I was hoping that you could find another tune that would be equally inspiring. We would be grateful..." His dark-browed eyes were almost pleading with me. Surely my life had changed in the past two days! I nodded.

"Of course, Your Majesty. I live only to serve you and your family. Of what tale should I play?"

Abret frowned. "Hell if I know. You've got three luscious young girls here -- you ought to be able to think of something."

I scowled in thought, little wishing to tell the King that the girls' youthful appearance brought to mind little more than nursery rhymes, however delectable they might be.

The first of the kneeling maids walked over to me on her knees, her unsteadiness betraying her own ingestion of the lust inducing pipe. She stopped in front of me with a crooked grin and reached up to place a hand on my bare chest. A small finger serpentined down my sternum to the top of my breeches. Her hot breath against my loins re-stiffened my slumbering cock, and she smiled as she detected her impact on me. She looked up with a winsome, albeit crooked grin. "I am Helia. Perhaps I can inspire you, milord?" She pursed her lips and leaned forward, her kiss landing squarely in my navel. She extended her tongue and probed at the indentation, and then swirled it around the edges. She lowered her head slightly and liquidly flicked sideways, back and forth, on the light fuzz above my beltline that ran from navel to the top of the thicker hair covering my pubic region. I could not help but think that this fuzz appeared thicker than the soft down that I could see guarding the maiden's mons.

In an instant, a thought came to mind, just as the girl's tongue reached my breeches and began to trace the outline of my stiff member beneath the fabric. "Your majesty!" I managed to blurt. Helia giggled at my discomfort, and continued her torture. "Do you enjoy the sea, the mysteries it might unfold?"

The King's eyebrows rose. "Why yes. Very much. When I was a lad, swimming in the inlets below the castle here was one of the few pleasures permitted me where I was not surrounded by our family's usual retinue of governesses, guards and ministers. I always fantasized about meeting someone new, different."

I reached down and cupped Helia's chin, drawing her to her feet. She arched her eyebrows in anticipation of my own approach to her and pressed her slender frame against me, her lips nuzzling at my cheek. "No, no," I whispered to her, "I am not the sort who dallies with the King's maidens. This is what I envision for you." I then told her of the scenario I'd conjured up. She giggled and nodded, and rushed over to her sisters, pulling them out of earshot of the King. She whispered to them, drawing giggles from all three, and then they scampered back to their original positions around the King, but did not touch him. He looked at me questioningly. I picked up the most promising of the flutes nearby, and, after running an experimental scale to insure its adequacy for my needs, began to play...

* * * * *

I play first of the sea, of a warm day with waves crashing, and a lad, powerful but unworldly, who has slipped away from the castle and now splashes in the surf. The waves crash and pound, and the lad -- identified by a royal riff as the young prince -- savors the privacy and sensual refreshment of the sea. As the King closes his eyes to drink in the setting, the blonde girls flick their hair over his thighs to mimic the splash of the surf. With growing tension, a monstrous wave crests, and the girls rise, their long locks rising together up his torso and over his shoulders and head, which jerks in panic.

A lilting, piercing melody of beauty intertwined with the sea interrupts the lethal chaos of the drowning surf. The water has not subsided, but the lad begins to relax. The King's eyes open to slits. He sees three sea maidens, long blonde hair flowing, surrounding him, welcoming him to their lair and safety. I catch the eye of one of Helia's sisters and nod my head toward one of the burning pipes. All three lean over and draw from the stem heavily, and lean over the waiting King. In turn, each presses their lips to his slack mouth and breathe life -- air and fantasy -- into his waiting lungs.

My music becomes less necessary as the intoxicating herbs take hold and transport the three to the sea floor. I lower volume and pitch, as the quartet descends, the pounding surf above barely detectable in the silent sea. The girls swim over the lad, all four with tongues extended savoring the flavors of their flesh. As the loins of any one maiden nears the King's head, his lips descend upon her nearly hairless labia, and his tongue works its way inside, drawing tranquil screams from the girl. Hands and legs remain in motion, squirming over one another.

I duck my head to one side and see that the King's member has returned to a stiffened state, and lower my tone to a lustful, earthy state. As one, the three girls plant their lips on the King's chest, and slowly work their slavering mouths ever lower on his torso, tonguing at his hip bone and outer thighs. As though directed by an architect, the three find themselves sprawled before him on their stomachs in a star design, two stretched to either side of him and one with her feet pointing directly away. The identical, golden heads of the triplets point toward his groin, their breaths ruffling his dark pubic hairs.

With a thick, spine-clenching tone, I signal their advance, and the maidens' tongues and mouths travel up the King's thigh, their tongue tips tickling lightly at his balls and shaft. I raise the pitch slightly, and their exertions increase. With a steady throaty cadence, I lure the mouths of the two blondes splayed to the sides to clamp onto the side of the broad cudgel. The King's hips begin to jerk up and down this sleeve created by the suctioning mouths. Up and down they ride, almost meeting around the side. The third sister awaits her role as the King jerks and lunges; she is content to lightly rub his thighs and dangling pink balls. His breath grows harsher and his eyes clench shut, and I can see that in his mind's eye the fantasy is much more vivid than I could have designed. His hands rub up and down the slim backs of the two nymphs stretched out beside him, stopping to stroke and clench their long, yellow hair.

I increase the tempo and add a major chord, and the third sister -- I am amost sure it's Helia, although I've lost track of the girls' original placement in the midst of their contortions -- finally brings her head forward, lips slightly parted. As her soft pink lips reach and lightly brush the tip of the King's tortured organ, his hips rise off the silk pillows beneath him and drive his cock halfway into her mouth. I can barely make out his length, as his lap is obscured by the pale blonde hair fanned out over it. Yet, with the sounds of sucking and slurping and the bobbing of the middle lass' head, I can tell he is receiving constant, torturous oral attention.

I maintain the pace as it is. Satisfied that the participants are fully occupied in their oral attentions, I step carefully around the room, peering at the papers scattered about, looking for any information that might assist in identifying the mysterious assailant or the Drofnats clan that appears to be behind the plot. Most seem to relate to innocuous awards of franchises or concessions, and I am almost ready to give up, particularly in that the King's huffing and wailing seems to signal an impending climax.

Kicking aside a decree governing disposal of animal wastes, I see underneath an undersized sheet of paper with a more casual scrawl than appeared on the more formal documents. I can barely make out the words, which appear to say:

"Apprs. legitimate heir not all dead. Not enough jwls. to be sure. All holders must concur, but expect trouble from church and gyps. TN"

I read the message over twice more to commit it to memory, trying at the same time to not lose sight of the simple tune I am playing so as to keep the King's lurching loins from flagging.

As he starts to bellow, I kick the animal feces decree back on top of the mysterious note and start to blow with full force. Looking back on the lustful foursome, I see the King's hips madly pumping off the cushions, the tip of his stiff cock driving all the way into Helia's throat, and then pulling away with a loud suction. The lips of her sisters remain attached to the sides of his driving shaft.

With the crashing of the surf on my flute, the King roars again and his hips jerk up and lock in place, his ass a foot off of the pillows. Helia's eyes open in shock and she moans liquidly in gleeful surprise as the first jets of his sperm reach her young mouth. The second blast obviously overflows the capacity of her small maw, as a river of semen pulses from the corner of her mouth. She quickly pulls her mouth off, clamping her cum-spotted lips together, and directs the spurting tip to the mouth of her nearest sister, who eagerly capures it and drinks in his essence, while Helia continues to milk him with small fingers.

As the mouth of the second blonde vixen also overflows with the stream of the royal emission, she in turn passes the cudgel to her remaining sister, who takes the King deep into her throat, meeting Helia's hand where it clutches the base of the thick rod. Sister number three finishes the job, swallowing the cream that the King deposits, then licking at the final drops of cum that bead at the tip.

* * * * *

With two more jerks, the King's hips dropped to the pillowed floor with a muffled plop. His breathing was labored, but he smiled. His eyes cracked open and he gazed almost lovingly at the cum-spotted faces of his three identical attendants. "Thought your King was too old for a second go-round, didn't you?" he laughed.

"We never had a doubt for a moment, Your Majesty," chirped Helia unconvincingly.

Finally, the King looked over at me, suddenly remembering my presence. He said, "We'll have to find something to do with you in the castle, young man. You obviously have some uses. God forbid that you should ever play such tunes around my daughter, though. If she's got any of the wanton insatiableness of her mother she wouldn't have a chance of resisting you... and then of course I'd have to have you killed."

Part 11

I staggered from the King's pavilion with his admonition against any seduction of his sole daughter ringing in my ear. Staggered is perhaps the most apt word to convey my physical and emotional state, for in one evening I had been feted and condemned by the King and dozens of nobles, seen the King and a Princess in the throes of sexual ecstacy, and been offered the sexual favors of the Queen. And -- with all this -- my overriding concern had to remain the mysterious green-cloaked assailant, presumably the "TN" of the note on which I'd stumbled while in the King's tent. This conspirator clearly would as readily see me dead as flick a gnat from his sleeve.

Thus, the reader should not be surprised that I was exhausted beyond all powers of revival when I returned to the festival. The partygoers also were obviously feeling the effects of wine, drugged herbs, and rampant sexual congress, as many seemed debilitated as well. I saw more than a few handmaidens stifle a yawn as they served exotic coffees to the assembled nobles. Madame Jeara was no longer in sight -- but, then again, neither were two of the younger, more handsome members of the King's small orchestra with whom she played. I could only speculate if there were any connection between these disappearances.

Feeling that I could learn no more to aid my investigation into the cabal behind the attack on the prime minister, I took my leave of the party, stopping briefly to soundly kiss both Charel and Licia, the two cousins whose greeting had commenced my stay at the fest, and waved at the winsome Jenfeer, who smiled warmly at me though she was pinned in place by a sleeping older Baron whose head was resting in her lap.

The cool air off the harbor cleared my head some as I walked along the sea wall near the docks on my return to the monastery where I made my home with the monks.

The puzzle flew through my head. Why had King Abred received a note from somone who may well have been launching a society of traitors to undermine his own rule? Was he a sponsor or victim of their scheme? What function did the jewels have? Clearly the conspirators needed more of the jewels to carry out the unknown but nefarious purposes for which they were designed, and some gypsy woman was at the heart of the quest. What would be their next step?

I stumbled back to the monastery and was asleep as soon as I lay back on the pallet in my small cell. I was awakened by Bedray's pounding on the door to my cell, and I sleepily hurried through my morning ablutions and proceeded to the kitchen to help him prepare breakfast. His grizzled features eyed me warily as I sleep-walked through my chores. On several occasions during the morning, he seemed on the verge of giving me some advice but, as I was leaving at the conclusion of our cleaning of the breakfast dishes, he merely tousled my hair, and advised me to be careful.

I tidied myself further and headed to the laundry run by Lindea and her father, out of a hope that they might be able to tell me the significance of the stones targetted by the thug who had pummelled the prime minister. When I arrived at the rough-hewn structure in which it was located, the front door was almost completely closed, but I could hear wailing coming from inside. I stuck my head inside the door, where I saw Lindea's father, Migeal, pacing the floor, his hands gesticulating in the steamy inside air.

"I can't believe they have taken her," he cried to the three middle-aged gypsy women who surrounded him in simple black chairs, their hands wringing their brightly colored scarves each had affixed to the sleeve of her blouse.. "We have been the most loyal of gypsy families and have taken care of the King's laundry every summer for fifteen years with total loyalty. What could we have done to earn such a tragedy?!!"

Suddenly, Migeal espied me peeking in the door and rushed over to me. "You!" he shouted. I looked around, ready to bolt. Was this hysterical man somehow going to accuse me of some wrong? "Master Jaze," he cried, rushing over to me and grabbing my hands between his soap-chapped hands. He pleaded with his bushy-browed eyes. "My Lindea has been taken away by the King's elite guards! She told me she had seen you in the castle. Perhaps you know someone there who can find out why they have taken her."

I wrestled my hands away, protesting that I knew no one at the castle and was merely there on a delivery. I then paused. "I'm curious. Were the guards who took her -- did they look like they were from the Drofnats clan?"

A gleam of realization finally slowed the shaking man. "Why, now that you say this, I think that this is so -- the hawk noses and brittle jaw lines were all like those of the Drofnats... Is that important?"

I hesitated, not wishing to give too much hope to the distraught man. "It might. I doubt if I can do anything, but maybe a priest might know." I nodded politely to the sitting women and rushed away before Migeal could press me for further information.

If Lindea had been taken by the conspirators, they must indeed have some need of the gypsies to fulfill the function of the jewels. But why the beautiful, dark-eyed Lindea? Was she in fact the exiled gypsy queen that she claimed to be? The answer lay somewhere back in the castle, to which I had no reason to think I could gain further access. Or perhaps I did.

I raced back to the monastery and plucked my flute from my cell, then raced to the gates of Solstice Castle. I waited until I spotted a guard whom I recognized from the previous night's fest. After a brief explanation, he recalled me. I then told him that Auria, one of the King's concubines (well, I actually called her a maidservant), who had enjoyed my playing had asked me to come around and serenade her, but I had no clue as to which window might be hers.

The husky guard's eyes laughed in didain. "Oh, and a mongrel street boy such as you is going to woo the heart of one of the King's... er, favorites with his flute. Be gone with you, you insolent whelp. You'll not disturb the palace's peace with your whistle, even if the young lady could hear you from her room, unless you wanted to have the carriage horses accompany you. Be off, now!" He swung a lazy attempt at cuffing at me, which I easily ducked, and then I scampered away with a disappointed look. While I hadn't received much cooperation, the guard had at least disclosed a general area of which part of the castle the honey-haired Auria resided in.

I tucked the flute into the sash that encircled my waist and went round to the gate leading to the stable. I waited just out of sight of the guards there. After a few minutes, I saw the butcher's small wagon come into view, obviously with a delivery to the kitchens in the castle. As it clattered past, I dashed from behind and sprinted along behind in a deep crouch, so that the wagon would hide me from the guards. When they stopped the butcher, I dove underneath the wagon, grabbing the front axle with my hands and locking my ankles over the rear axle. Then, as the cart continued through the gate, I made body as rigid as possible, pressing it up against the underside of the wagon's bed. Only after we rounded a bend away from the gate could I permit my body to relax. As we pulled past some bushes some fifteen feet from the castle, I dropped my feet and silently slipped to the ground, then rolled to the side of the path.

After several servants passed by, I looked up to the overhanging windows and spotted some likely-looking rooms. I stepped out onto the path and began to play my flute softly, of a honey-haired enchantress who had won the heart of a brave but humble warrior, conveying the hair color of the beautiful woman by interspersing her lush description of a beautiful maid with the buzzing sounds of honeybees!

On the lower floors, several disheveled heads of scullery maids peered out the windows at me in astonishment. Breaking off from my tune, assured them that the King had ordered a minstrel to play as a reward for the commendable efforts of the hardworking kitchen and cleaning staffs. The round-faced women looked at me dubiously, but were willing to accept the truth of my words, for their back-breaking efforts certainly were deserving of that much attention, and far more. Besides, if I did not belong, I should not have been permitted within the gates. They opened their windows a bit further and returned to their labors.

Finally, a dark-haired vision popped up in one of the higher windows: the stunning Onassa. "What brings you here, little flute player?" she called.

"I have come to offer my tunes to your comrade in arms: Milady Auria." Onassa started to giggle at my double entendre. "A serenade for a concubine? We're usually not accorded such seductions."

"Not exactly. She had asked if I might provide her some lessons with the flute."

"We do not usually expect to have tradesmen soliciting for their services within the castle walls. I think the guards must be receiving a portion of your wages to permit such." I looked around quickly but saw no guard. Onassa smiled. "Ahhhh, you are not here under even a guard's concession. Well, I will beckon the aspiring flautist, but I don't expect that she'll wish to risk her lot with a clandestine lesson from a scruffy sort such as you."

She left the window, and I crouched back behind the thick bushes, anxiously. This entry was taking longer than I had hoped, and, while the focus of the guards was presumably at the gates to deny entry altogether, it could only be expected that they would have at least some patrols on the grounds.

After an eternity, Auria's golden head popped out the window, just as two garden tenders walked by, forcing me to remain hidden. Auria leaned out further to search, and I could see that, at least from the chest and upwards portion of her body which was visible to me, she was clad only in a green towel loosely wrapped around her torso, held in place by her hands. Just as she turned her head back inside, obviously to inquire from Onassa about her caller, I stepped from the bushes.

Auria's huge brown eyes grew even larger in surprise, and she squealed, clasping her hands to her lips. The towel immediately slipped from its position, baring her breasts. Ah, soft and full they were, not so large or taut as, say, Lorena's, but magnificently shaped and capped with lightpink nipples -- a perfect soft shape that cried out to surrender to a man's sucking mouth. Auria squealed again -- engagingly so, I should add -- and reached down to pick up the towel. Two female hands -- Onassa's -- reached around the honey blonde from behind and held her wrists. The darker-haired girl's head popped up over Auria's shoulder.

Onassa grinned. "The young man has come up here and braved the guards just to play for you,Auria. Don't you think he's entitled to some entertainment in return?"

Auria giggled, squirming to at least cover her chest with her upper arms and elbows butsucceeding only in pushing her mounds together, her nipples peeking out at me impudently. "Milady Auria," I called up in a stage whisper, "I have come to give you the lesson you demanded, if you would have it."

Auria's smile widened, but she paused in thought. "Well..." she said slowly, "I was about to practice, so I do not suppose anyone should be too upset if an instructor is with me. But, if you get thrown out, that will be your own affair."

"And well worth such a risk and more," I countered, bowing gracefully. Onassa released her hands, and Auria suddenly leaned forward, her hands resting wide on the sill, fully exposing her upper torso to me.

"Alright, we'll bring you up through the kitchen, but I wouldn't want you to get any ideas about stealing the silver... or anything." With that, Auria's smile broadened and she coyly rotated her shoulders, cause her taut breasts to shake at me.

My jaw dropped, and Auria turned away from the window with a laugh.

I scuttled over to the back entrance to the kitchen. A heavy old scullery maid, red-faced and covered with flour, walked out a few minutes later. She peered at me suspiciously, but dimly. "You the new music teacher?" I nodded. "Yeah, well Mistress Onassa sez I'm to bring you up to the music room by servant's stairs. Looking at ya, all scruffy hair, I guess I can see why they don't want you comin' in the front way. C'mon."

With that, I followed her wide ass in past the huge kitchen and heavily stocked pantry to a narrow stairway, and walked up three flights of stairs. The old servant was huffing as she got to the top. We went through a side door out into a magnificent hallway. I quickly looked around, trying to get my bearings to see if I could find a safe route by which I could reach Lorena's chamber. If I could, she could probably pass a message to the queen to see if we might find out where Lindea was being held by the assailant, "TN". No guideposts came into view. We stopped in front of ornate double doors.

"Whatya lookin' for, young whelp?" The fat servant's florid face eyed me suspiciously.

"Oh, just remembering some happier days when I was here before." Her brow creased in confusion; I expected a bead of sweat to pop out, so unused did she seem to the exertion of thought. "Oh, yes, I was here last year visiting my cousin Lorena, Princess Paleem's lady in waiting. Perhaps you know her -- her room I believe is over in the other wing. Big oak door, lots of reddish pillows," I added, describing the room from my visit two nights previously. The servant nodded slowly. "Tell you, what, if you would tell dear Lorena that Cousin Jaze is here in the music room, perhaps she might be free to stop by and offer a greeting." Again, the servant paused. "She and I just love to chat -- oh, about life in the castle, and we talk about what she thinks of the various members of the castle staff." I gave the pudgy woman a measured, firm stare. She started, and her wrinkled features softened. "I'd be pleased to pass along to her my views of your own fine service."

"Well, I have my duties in the kitchen to attend to; we'll see," she said abrubtly. She nodded toward the open doors, and then turned on her heel and headed back to the stairs.

I stepped through into a large music room, dominated by a huge piano resting at the far end of the room on the light-colored, hardwood floors. Auria, now dressed in a simple, short yellow gown stood inside the door, flute in hand, waiting for me. She smiled shyly.

"I am pleased that you have come back to give me my lesson, Master Jaze. I would give most anything to be able to exert the skill that you displayed last night. But, I fear that the room's echos are too harsh for our playing. We have a smaller waiting room for visiting performers that might be more apt. Here, come with me." Auria turned and led me across the room to a dark door. I stumbled dumbly after, entranced by her bewitching ass.

We walked into a small chamber, some four paces square. At one end sat a heavy overstuffed couch. On the floor was a thick round rag rug. Opposite the couch were a series of shelves holding various small musical instruments. Air and light came through two small windows looking out into an airshaft.

We sat on the couch to commence the lesson. I realized that if we started playing we increased the risk that an official passer-by might question my being there. So, I stalled, starting by examining the grip by which Auria held her flute, taking every opportunity to reach around her and touch her soft hands with my own. She smiled and glanced over at me frequently. I then reviewed her playing posture, pressing her waist and hips frequently, even though she really had no defect in her posture. Playfully, I pretended to try different positions for her, contradicting prior instructions. Again, she giggled, squirming away from me.

I asked her to show me her embouchure -- the formation of her lips against the intake hole of the flute's mouthpiece. She pursed them with the requisite overbite, and I again gave her unnecessary instruction, showing her my technique on my own flute. She protested, "That's exactly what I'm doing, see?" Again, she demonstrated perfect form.

"No, I think you're still not seeing it correctly from your side." Rather than face her, I slid tightly up next to her, my thigh pressing firmly against her own. I held her flute with my hands next to hers, and pulled the mouthpiece to my lips. "Now put your cheek against mine so you cansee exactly what I do." She did so, and I softly uttered a clean, low tone. Passing the mouthpiece to her mouth, I instructed, "Now you." She blew, with the same clear pitch and tone. "Let's do it again." I blew one note higher, and passed the instrument to her.

Back and forth we traded, with the pass of the flute occurring with increasing speed. Soon, it became a game, and our lips grew closer together. Finally, we became jumbled, and our lips reached for the single mouthpiece together -- and I dropped the mouthpiece as our lips met one another, pressing firmly.

Such softness! Oh, if the flowers could know such softness! Her lips melted into mine with the liquid gentleness of a dove's dream. Our lips clung, and then crept open, as our young tongues escaped to find one another, and play, and tickle, and sweetly sweep across each other.

My arm rose and rested on her far shoulder as we turned to face one another on the soft couch. My hand explored the swirl of her neck, then slid down her firm back. She moaned into my mouth, and her hand reached up to clutch the back of my head to pull my face tighter against her. Her lips pulled away, her eyes devilishly searched my own. "Well," she said breathily, "is it true?"

"Is what true?"

"Is Charel telling the truth when she says you are endowed like one of the King's stallions?"

I blanched in shock. "Charel told you this?"

"Most certainly. We women of the royal entourage have a great deal of time on our hands and not infrequently compare the attributes of those we are called upon to serve. She was quite complimentary about you."

My white face reddened. I stood up quickly. "It sounds as though you're comparing the attributes of a radish, or maybe a market hog." I was not sure I was mad, but felt I had a right to be.

"Oh, I've angered you." She looked up at me, and stared down at my loins, now just in front of her. Her hand reached up and lightly pressed her open palm against the lump jutting forth. I had hardly realized that the entrancing beauty had enflamed my lustful desires. She smiled and went on. "And I seem to have angered him, as well; poor sweet thing," she cooed. Her soft, full lips moved forward against my fabric-covered loins, pressing against the swell of my burgeoning cock just below the head.

I looked down at her sitting in front of me, her honey blonde hair framing her stunning features. The open gather of the neck of her blouse as she leaned to me exposed almost all of her magnificent titflesh. Her lips pulled away briefly, and then again pursed against my breeches, kissing the cloth and the shaft beneath with tender attention.

Sitting up, Auria now slid the strap of her gown from her right shoulder, pulling it down herarm, until the yellow bodice descended below one pear-shaped breast. Again I goggled at the fresh, almost innocent swelling of her soft bosom. Auria's finger traced an outline of my cock with tantalizing care, and then she looked up at me, her brown eyes again wrenching conscious thought from me. Her voice became husky. "Would you like me to make amends, my well-hung friend? To offer my apologies?" I was speechless.

Without taking her eyes from mine, her hands reached for the buttons descending just below my waistband.They quickly came undone, and she reached inside and lightly curled her fingers around my heated stiff rod. She pulled the heavy flesh out through the opening, my red tip bobbing just inches from her luscious mouth. Auria wrapped her fist around it, allowing only the tip to appear above her hand. Auria's eyes widened and for the first time lowered to cast their gaze upon my sex. Her lips parted in surprise. Her hand gently measured my length by stroking the loose flesh up and down.

"Astonishing!" she hissed. "I think making amends may be more of a task than I imagined. But a pleasant task indeed." With that, she again fixed her eyes upon me, and leaned forward, opening her tender lips slightly. She permitted my swollen cock tip to drop gently on her tongue, and I could see the first drop of pre-cum affix itself to its floor. The sweet lapper then drew back to the very end of my member, and then the two tips met, with her tongue endeavoring to probe inside the small slit at the end of my own. She hastened the pace of her hand's stroking, drawing out more of my leaking seed, which descended onto the tongue in a white string. Her eyes smiled even more warmly than before up at mine.

She stopped her stroking with her hand resting around the fleshy collar at the neck of my engorged cock, and then her lips captured the entire reddish helmet underneath her upper lip. My tip soaked passively in the wet furnace of her mouth, until she drew her cheeks in, sucking out more of the pre-cum. Her eyes closed only briefly as I saw her adam's apple bob, denoting her swallowing of my anticipatory essence. The brown orbs then re-focused upon my face with adevilish hint of surprises to come.

Her face moved forward slowly until her lips reached the end of her grasping hand. Then, both moved forward slowly, as she drew more and more of the thick, hard shaft into her mouth. In it went, and I expected at each instant that she would stop her capturing progress, but she continued to bore on further. I shuddered at the sensation of each succeeding inch being caressed by her soft lips. Her hand reached the base of my cock, but her head continued forward, while her hand flattened against my belly to give her mouth passage. I felt the tip scrape against the back of the roof of her mouth, and then probe at the opening to her throat, with several inches remaining outside of her sucking pink lips.

With an unwavering gaze upon my flushed features, she continued on, as I felt my tender cocktip enter her throat without pause or panic by her. With a wet smack, her throat absorbed even more, until I had given the beautiful vixen all of my length and her nose was pressed into my belly.

After at least five counts of the clock, she finally, reluctantly drew her mouth back -- again with maddening slowness -- clinging lips squeezing at my blue-veined flesh at each stage. She stopped her ascent with the tip again soaking in her sweet mouth. Her face darted back forward, now quickly garnering my cock's head with her throat, and again incarcerating her prisoner for at least a five-count, before withdrawing.

No man could remain impassive during such ministrations by one with the beauty and incredible skill of the stunning Auria. I began to anticipate her movements, and lightly thrust my loins forward. She took me easily down into her throat. I jerked forward some half a dozen times, and felt the rush of fire to my loins, so charged was I by the velvet torture of her talented mouth. To abate my early lust, I reached down and cupped artfully chiseled cheeks of her face and pulled her off my cock. The tip slid gently out of her wet, red mouth and descended her chin, leaving a white sticky trail of saliva and my seed. She arched her neck, and the hard, wet head of my organ bobbed below her chin, finally striking at her exposed right nipple.

In a playful fashion, I roughly pushed her straight back onto the sofa and fell to one knee. I cupped my hand around her perfect breast. It indeed was as soft as my mind's eye had imagined, except for the hard, excited nipple. I darted my face forward and took that same tip into my mouth, lapping at the tingling bud. Auria moaned in pleasure, pulling my face harder against her chest. I swirled my tongue around the nipple and flushed aureole. Urgently, I opened my mouth wider and took in even more of the downy soft breast, suckling at it feverishly.

As I knelt, my bobbing cock swayed against her slim thigh. As my sucking on her breast continued, I could feel her thighs tremble, and then twitch apart. Needing no further invitation, I dropped my head down between her thighs and pushed the hem of her short gown up toward her waist. Her knees parted further, and, to my surprise, I could see that the little tart had failed to don any undergarment after her shower, leaving her entire sexual region exposed to my feasting eyes. Her lightly-furred lips were swollen with passion, giving off a musty, aqueous air. I parted her labia with my thumbs and pressed my own lips against the flowering opening. She shrieked in pleased surprise. I looked at her quaking torso, over her softly quivering tit flesh. Auria's eyes were locked on the scene at her loins, savoring both the image and sensation of my kiss.

I allowed my tongue to lightly part her nether lips, and was greeted with a pool of her pussy's lustful emissions. I thrust my lapper deep inside, and wriggled it about against the walls of her sweet tunnel. She shrieked again. My tongue dove in several more times, remaining constantly in motion as it made its passage. Auria responded to each with a moan or keening chirp. Clearly, the maiden was afire with uncontrollable passion. I withdrew my tongue to the opening and ran it up her slit to her clitoris, swollen to solidity by her body's urges. My lips sucked and tugged at the heated node, and then my teeth, safely covered by my lips, nipped gently at it. She threw her hips up against my face with a groan. I tugged twice more and laved at the bud. Her staccato moaning rose to a nearly constant wail.

"Oh, Lord, yes, yes, yes!" she managed through her trembling lips. Her thighs swung open and closed against my slavering face.

With an unexpected force of will, she managed to subside the writhing of her loins and grunt out huskily, "Please... now, I want you in me now!" She sat up, drawing my chin up with her hand. She then kicked her wide-spread left leg over my head and stood up, and wrestled me up onto the couch and into a sitting position. My hard cock stood straight up in my lap.

The standing girl turned away from me, then pulled her robe's skirt up to her waist, baring her perfect, slim-hipped ass to me. Backing up, she gingerly sat back on my lap. I guided her down with my hands on her hips and ass. She reached beneath her and grabbed my hard rod. As she sat further, she guided my tip into her wet portals. I slipped in about an inch, and then snagged. She rose up and descended again, constricting me tighter as she forced herself down... and then I burst in. She dropped fully into my lap, encasing me in her wet tightness.

With a crooked grin, Auria turned her head and tilted it back to kiss me hungirly. As she did, her loins squirmed in a circle around my fleshy post that impaled her. I held her hips in my hands and increased the radius of her gyrations.

She spread her knees so that they rested outside my own, and then leaned forward, resting her hands on my kneecaps. With that leverage and the grasping hands on her hips and ass, she had leverage to rock forward, away from me, and then drop her tight, young succulent channel back down on my filling cock. The hem of her robe drifted down so that it obscured our joined loins. With a groan, she raised again so that my throbbing muscle came almost completely free. Almost immediately, she slammed her slim ass down, smacking audibly onto my loins. Her eyes pressed shut as she concentrated on re-ascending the peak of passion to which my mouth had brought her. From the short, panting breaths that accompanied her vigorous riding of my cock, it seemed that such a moment might not be too far away.

I levered against her pumping loins by clutching tightly to her hips and forcing my own reddened cockshaft heavily up inside her. Her wetness seemed to increase, and it trickled from her juicy cleft down my shaft, pooling in my nether hairs. Implorations to ram into her harder spat out of her pouting, panting lips. The demure young beauty I first had met had since been possessed by the soul of a wanton she-devil.

With no further warning, my lover's body tensed above me and her uttered oaths and profanities ceased, replaced by a sustained cry, rising in pitch and volume upon each second's passage. Her body shook, and her hips jerked in four long spasms. The pulsating tugs upon my own lustful organ only confirmed the obvious, her achievment of a stirring orgasm while riding my broadsword. I held her ass more firmly as she shuddered with each new rictus of her coming. Her wailing cries descended to pleased moans, and over her shoulder, I could see her stunning features split in a broad grin. She experimentally brought her ass up one more time, and slid her satisfied quim down again on my cock, obviously testing its rigidity, its capacity for further immediate relief.

Suddenly, the door from the main performance room swung open, revealing a shocked Lorena,the beautiful, statuesque lady-in-waiting to Princess Paleem. Rebca, their shorter, dark-haired (and equally beautiful) maidservant peered around her shoulder. Both were wide-eyed at the sight of our two sweaty bodies, locked together at the genitals out of sight beneath the hem of Aurina's skirt.

Lorena's features finally began working again, and she broke into a superior sort of grin. "So, if it isn't my long lost 'cousin' Jaze, once again dipping his wick at Solstice Castle, and now with one of the King's concubines."

Aurina brushed a stray blonde curl from her own face and slid the strap of her gown back upher right arm, re-covering her sweat-glistened breast. She glared back at Lorena, but made no move to rise from my lap. No one said a word.

Part 12

Even though she remained silent, Auria continued to torment my the unrelieved countenance of my soldier ennestled in her by affording it squeezes of strength and control, traveling from one end of my shaft to the other -- all while giving no outward sign to the two lovely intruders!

I finally broke the silence, stammering, "Well, you see, Lorena, the lady requested lessons on the flute..." My voice trailed off as I saw the blonde Lorena guffaw; even the demure Rebca silently tittered behind her slim hand.

Lorena japed, "I can see that she is receiving whatever lessons you're giving 'on the flute', but I don't see what kind of instruction you could be giving to an experienced harlot." Auria glared at her; Lorena responded in kind. I could sense considerable tension between them, each perhaps resentful of the other. Lorena had considerable education and probably considered herself near-royalty, but was limited largely to contacts with the lady she served, Princess Paleem. Auria, as the King's concubine, was educated largely in those arts that might amuse the King -- music, floral arranging, and perhaps, certain sexual amusements -- and enjoyed his ear and confidences, but was disparaged by others in the castle as little more than a whore.

I protested, "Well, it's more than that, milady. You see, I had to contact the Queen to apprise her of what I've learned regarding the conspiracy to steal the jewels from the Prime Minister, and this was the only means by which I could gain entry."

Auria's head whipped around, her venom now directed at me. "What, pray tell is this? I was merely your ruse to enter the castle??!! You vile little ass!" The honey-haired woman jerked her hips forward while her inner muscles clenched at my member, nearly ripping the beleaguered fellow by his roots. She then leaped to her feet, her gown's short hem maintaining her modesty by falling to her thighs. She whirled, and stung me with a slap to my cheek. She stormed by Lorena, paused as thought she were about to also slap the taller blonde, and then flounced through the door. I remained seated, stunned, with my still-stiff, cunt-wetted rod jutting toward the ceiling through my unbuttoned breeches.

Lorena looked at me disdainfully, and then turned to the cameo-featured brunette. "Rebca, dear, would you please aid this pervert in re-arranging himself as befits one in the presence of ladies?" Rebca nodded obligingly and fell to her knees before me. She grasped my thick, sticky cock in her slim fingers, the tips barely meeting around my thickness. Before attending to her task, she gently jacked me up and down, coyly looking up at me beneath lowered lashes. Lorena interrupted, "No time for playing, now, Rebca; and heaven knows he doesn't deserve it." Rebca sighed regretfully and tucked my manhood back inside my trousers, re-buttoning them with not a little effort over the bulge created.

Lorena plopped herself next to me on the couch, while Rebca curled up on her haunches on the floor. "Now, you little fool, tell me what makes you think that the Queen would have the slightest interest in anything you would have to tell her about the theft of the jewels. Anyway, Rebca seems to have been cleared of suspicious, so I don't see whey we need to get involved at all."

"It's not that simple," I replied. "If the Prime Minister awakes from his injured state, which could happen at any time, he could re-count that he saw a young man who had no business in the castle at the door to your chambers -- with Rebca -- at the time of the attack. This certainly would shed a new light that might return suspicion to her, and me. Besides, the Queen has expressly asked us to look into this matter. We have a very special commission."

Lorena looked at me doubtfully, and then glanced at Rebca, who lowered her eyes and blushed. "What is this special commission? You don't mean...?" I shrugged meaningfully; Rebca's head dropped even further. Lorena's jaw dropped.

I could see the wheels working in the ambitious blonde's head: if she could somehow share in our obviously intimate relationship with the Queen, her own stature in the castle would be enhanced. She set her jaw and looked at me sternly, "Well, I will pass your message, if I can get through to the Queen -- but if she insists she knows you not, I will look the utter ass, and will make you pay!"

Lorena stood and turned to Rebca. "You stay and deflect any visitors to make sure Jaze isn't discovered. And, would you two please not be naked when I get back?" Lorena rolled her eyes, as though lecturing mischievous children, and left the music room.

I assisted Rebca onto the couch, where she huddled against me. I placed my arm around her shoulder. The mute beauty looked up into my eyes expressively. Her gaze told of much she wished she could tell, if only she had the ability to speak. She impulsively leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek, a sign of gratitude for my efforts to clear her from suspicion, I supposed.

We remained there, voicelessly consoling one another with our arms wrapped around each other, until we heard footsteps just minutes later. I huddled in the corner while Rebca peered out the door. She stepped aside as Queen Serjeen strode through the doorway, with Lorena in her wake. The Queen, a tall, dark beauty with features chiseled as if by the greatest of sculptors, eyed me with not a little awe.

"Well, my wild young friend, it seems as though you have an infinitely varied capacity for breaching the castle's security. How did you manage it this time?"

Lorena coughed, "I'm sure Your Majesty has no desire to hear such a boring tale." I blushed for the second time. The Queen looked at me inquiringly.

I bowed and replied, my words tumbling over one another in a panic. "Well, Your Highness, it seems that the mysterious assailant bears the initials TN and has -- if you will accept my word with only the utmost of respect for His Highness intended -- he has been in some contact with the King. And, I fear the for some reason he and his Drofnats legion has taken the castle's laundress, a reputed Gypsy Queen named Lindea, as his hostage."

I then explained in some more detail the note I'd found in the King's tent at the revels in which this "TN" reported something about "legitimate heirs not all dead" and "not enough jewels to be sure" and "all holders must concur, but expect trouble from church and gypsies."

The queen stared vacantly in thought. "Hmmm. This TN must be Thaddeo Novan, a military administrator who I'd always thought bore more loyalty to himself and his fellow Drofnats than he did to the King. As for jewels, it seems they bear importance beyond their mere value as baubles on crowns. I have heard tales in the past of powers that might be possessed if a mass of certain ancient jewels were amassed and controlled, but all thought the stories to be apocryphal, even if all such gems might be found. The myths insist that they were scattered to the far corners of the lands. My husband seems to have been spending a considerable amount of time with Thaddeo, which I cannot understand, as he is such a dreadful, macabre man."

Serjeen began pacing. "This could be very serious. We have no way of knowing who can be trusted. I suppose we can at least check out the southwest corner of the lower basement of the castle, as that seems to be the lair of the Drofnats soldiers who are part of our castle guard. The three of you had best come with me -- Jaze, you look enough like you could be a footman assigned to assist me."

The Queen then strode out the door, not stopping to see if we were following her. We scrambled after her in pursuit.

For the first time, I could stride the halls of the castle without skulking around or diving into doorways at the first sign of a guard. Being with the Queen, watching all we passed bow low with respect, was extraordinarily heady. Still, I could not forget the dangerous, critical mission we were undertaking, one in which even the Queen was in the dark.

At the two long hallways, we came to a heavy door that led to dimly lit steps the the basement. From there, we traversed two further hallways until we came to a dimly lit room, beyond which we could see a further, intersecting hallway. The Queen turned to us and motioned us to silence, bidding us to stay where we were.

She went to the corridor and headed down it to our right. The three of us -- Lorena, Rebca and I -- peeked around the corner. We saw the Queen stop in front of a closed door guarded by a short, hairy guard -- clearly a Drofnats. The man clearly was not of the King's elite, he was ill-shaven and his uniform bunched unceremoniously around his sloppy girth. The guard clumsily bowed in surprise.

Serjeen impatiently bid him rise. "Good eve, Guard. I would enter this room, if you will make way."

The guard's eyes opened wide, and he began visibly sweating and stammering. "I would grant that wish... or any wish... of your majesty, but, you see, the tradition of the Drofnats is that none may enter when our religious rites are performed and... with the highest of respect to Your Highness, but... I can't!" His response rose almost to a wail.

"Guard, you will find your captain and obtain such leave. Do I make myself clear?"

The stumpy man began shifting from foot to foot in panic. "All the captains are inside, uh... praying, your highness, and I cannot interrupt them. Could you come back in an hour; I'm sure they'll be done then?"

The Queen stared at the little man, and stormed away, back towards us. Coming into the small room, she whispered hoarsely, "Well, of all the nerve. I'm sure there's something going on in there; the Drofnats' religion isn't THAT important to them. We've got to get past that dimwit. Lorena, I want you to go down and lure that man away from the door; use whatever wiles you require."

Lorena grimaced uncomfortably. "Wiles, milady? What would I have to offer to him to move him away from..." Her breath caught. "You mean, you want me to suggest to that fat, filthy little guard that I might be willing to...?"

Serjeen's voice was sharp. "I don't want you to suggest anything, you self-important tramp. I want you to march down there, open his tunic, and take his cock into your less-than-pristine mouth until we can get past him."

Lorena sputtered. "But Your Highness! Surely you cannot expect this from an educated lady-in-waiting to your own daughter, the Princess! What about Rebca?"

"She's mute, you idiot. How will she explain her purpose here to him."

"But surely there's someone else?"

Lorena looked hopefully at me. I shrugged, "I fear that I am not his type, milady. Lorena glanced at the Queen, who scalded her with a look conveying the idiocy of her unspoken suggestion.

With a bitter sigh, Lorena turned the corner and walked up to the guard. He looked at her suspiciously, but not without undisguised lust. The Drofnats were not known for the sophistication of their attitudes toward women.

Coquettishly, Lorena looked down at the man, trying to convey submissiveness notwithstanding her heighth advantage. "Oh my, I am lost here. I just love exploring this old castle but I seem to have become lost."

"You sure are lost; 'tis no way that a woman should be here in the realm of the Drofnats soldiers. We should have you in shackles for even being here. In fact, I may have to hold you until my captain comes out from his conference in here." The guard chuckled meaningfully, as though he had just figured out how he might while away the time with the tall, high-titted blonde as his temporary captive.

"Oh, please, sir. I was causing no trouble here. I certainly wouldn't want to embarass my Lady by getting into trouble here. In fact, I would do anything to avoid it." Lorena's long lashes lowered modestly. The guard seemed lost in thought at the significance of her statement.

To cut short his confusion, Lorena reached down and reached under his tunic, obviously rubbing his bulge that lay beneath it. "Perhaps I can find a way to make this problem... ease a little?" The guard nodded hopefully in response.

With a grimace, the tall blonde dropped to her knees in front of the guard. She reached under his tunic with both hands and pulled his brief ketchel -- or undergarment -- down his thighs. Lifting up the tunic's hem, Lorena exposed his thick but short organ, which impudently poked out at her. She clutched it roughly in her right hand and yanked at it. He sighed gutturally and closed his eyes.

With obvious hope that nothing more would be required. Lorena began stroking the shaft's loose flesh up and down with her long, tapered fingers. The guard's fat hips jerked up against her hand. She reached up with her left hand and cupped his hairy balls, then lifted and caressed them to hasten his release.

"Lord, yeah, you wench. That is a gift from the goddesses themselves!" Spittle dripped out of his blubbery lips as he exclaimed his release.

She stroked faster, and the fat guard's breathing grew heavier. Suddenly his eyes sprung open, and the Queen motioned that we should slip down the hall with her as he was fully distracted at the time of his release. Just as quickly, we stopped, as his wide-eyed alertness signaled nothing more than the onset of an idea. The piggy eyes looked down at Lorena.

"Hey, Wench" -- it now seemed to be her official name, in his eyes -- "you can do me better than that!" He bent over and roughly grabbed the shoulders of her gown, ripping them down almost to her waist, bringing her large, high breasts into view. His face grew red in excitement, and he grabbed the jutting orbs, squeezing them painfully. Straightening up, he grabbed a hank of Lorena's blonde tresses in each hand, pulling to either side. She quickly sensed his implicit command, as she parted her lips slightly. The guard backed away with his hips, as though cocking an arrow on a bow, and then rammed forward, driving the stumpy organ into her pink mouth. She grunted in astonishment and alarm, futilely trying to control his entry with the hand by which she held his cudgel.

"Holy sheep days, Wench," he spewed, causing us to be grateful to the Gods that we were not born as sheep in Drofnats, whatever may have been intended to be conveyed by his oath. "It's been so long since I've been with any woman, and Lord you are the sexiest one ever." He continued his lurching onto her mouth, fully removing his thick cock on each outstroke with an audible smack as it left Lorena's lips, and then driving it back in, nearly reaching her throat. "When I blast, you might well drown, ya got me so worked up."

On his next instroke, he held his loins and dirty pubic hair right up against Lorena's nose. She glanced over to where she could see the three of us peeking around the corner, glaring daggers at us in her discomfort. The Queen motioned with a twirl of her hand that she should position herself so as to turn the guard's back to both us and the door. Lorena did so with some difficulty, as the wild pumping of the guard's loins threatened to pitch her to the side. She remained kneeling only because the heavy-set man held her up painfully by the hair clutched in his hands.

After three more strokes, he began to bellow like a wounded animal and increase the length of his strokes. Lorena's bared breasts bobbed and jerked on her chest. She manfully tried to survive the assault on her mouth by the uncouth simpleton, moaning in time to each stroke. She tried to grasp the base of his cock when it next emerged from her mouth, trying to use her hand as a stopper to minimize the depth of his entry, but he summarily swatted her hand away and drove even further into her maw.

The Queen again motioned us to follow her, and we crept down the hall toward the oddly matched couple. As we got closer, we could hear his refraining murmur, "Gotta spew, gotta spew it," and then, just as we slipped behind him, he grunted hoarsely like a farm pig.

I glanced down just in time to see his still pumping cock emit a heavy stream from the tip, blasting straight into Lorena's open mouth. The tip and cock followed it in, and then emerged covered with her saliva and his own spend. He pushed forward again, but so wildly that he missed her mouth and so his next white blast struck off her cheeks. He continued to pump and shoot his sticky cream, some of it into her gaping mouth and throat, and some in cascades on her lips, chin and chiseled cheek bones.

I felt a tug at my sleeve. The Queen was pulling me into the doorway. I threw up the latch there as quietly as I could, glancing back to make sure that the still spewing guard was not paying us attention. Sure enough, his head remained thrown back as his seed cascaded over the arrogant blonde's features.

The three of us slipped inside the door, and were greeted by an astonishing sight. In the torchlit room, we could see an elderly crone, long grey hair askew, kneeling on the floor, chains linking her wrists and ankles. She was surrounded by three other Drofnats guards, each holding a large club.

Above her, chained to the wall, was the lovely gypsy Lindea. Her simple frock was nearly shredded by the slashes of a whip. Though angry red cuts and welts were visible through the rends of her clothes, the indomitable, dark-eyed, dark-haired woman retained a fiery, confident countenance.

In front of her was the object of her fury -- and her whip-bearing torturer. His face turned toward us and smoldered in recognition and anger. I gasped.

Finally, I was face-to-face with the green cloaked assailant.

Part 13

I barely abated the quaking that stirred within my spine from the glare of this man. His dark eyes glimmered with the sheen of the carapace of a poisonous thayl bug. Those eyes had seen evil; in fact their possessor had ordered its commission, and enjoyed the view. His thick, trimmed beard obscured but did not hide his thick-lipped slash of a mouth.

His demeanor lightened slightly, obeisantly as his gaze swiveled to the face of the Queen. "Ahh, Your Majesty," he croaked in an oily tone. "You will forgive me if I do not ask you to stay, but I am about the King's business, and the presence of the Queen would not be appropriate." He turned to the nearest guard. "Lanceman Walesh, if you would be so kind as to escort Her Highness upstairs, and please be sure to assist her as some dampness can collect and make the stairs treacherous."

Queen Serjeena did not move. "I do not recall that the King's business has involved the torture of young girls, Thaddeo Novan. And I will not leave until there is some convincing explanation for this!"

Novan sighed theatrically. "Your Highness, this gypsy wench and her people represent a threat to the continued reign of your husband, and I am merely seeking information. The King is fully aware of the threat and approves of these steps."

"My husband would not approve of such tactics! You are lying, Novan."

Novan sighed more heavily, as though confronting a wayward child. "Very well. Lanceman, if you will please go up and advise His Majesty that his wife is here and wishes a fuller explanation of our efforts to protect his throne." The guard hesitated. Novan shooed him away, urging, "Go ahead -- he will come." The young guard hurried off.

Just after the guard slipped through the doorway, two other guards came in, gently guiding the prince and princess -- Phrenshraw and the lovely, red-haired Paleem. Lorena, looking only somewhat disheveled, came in behind, wiping her face with the back of her hand; I could not suppress my grin at her predicament, to which she responded with a mouthed epithet apparently likening me to some part of my hindquarters. Phenshraw looked confused, and then grew angry as he saw the stunning Lindea (whose tryst with him in the laundry room several nights earlier I had interrupted) chained to the wall. Paleem appeared stunned, and not a little guilty. Her eyes refused to meet mine, but she did not appear suprised to see me.

A skinny, round-shouldered soldier, the taller of the two, stepped around them and addressed Novan. "Your Eminence, these two were lurking outside the door. I thought it best that you knew." Paleem turned to Serjeena, "Mother, I saw a scullery wench beckon Lorena to meet Jaze, and well, interesting things seem to happen around him. I brought Phrenshaw with me to see for himself... and, well, I was told you were all headed down here."

Novan squinted as if in thought, and finally smiled. "Yes, I suppose it would be best if your children were here as well -- to discover how much they too might have to lose."

Suddenly, the pieces seemed to fall into place, guided by the minimal explanation given me by the Queen. I stepped forward.

"So, Mr. Novan," I sneered. "You have somehow garnered enough of the jewels, and, with the coerced assistance of Lindea, have uncovered some information with which you are... perhaps, blackmailing King Abret."

The Queen turned to Novan. "I believe young Jaze may be onto something. What is the power of these jewels and how are you using them?"

A rasping croak erupted from the floor. The old crone rose gingerly and walked over to the Queen, stopping briefly to glare at Novan with hatred. "I will tell you of these jewels, Your Majesty. For they caused the ruin of my people, the gypsy people." The Queen nodded, and the old woman continued.

* * * * *

"It has been passed down from generation to generation, this story, few believing its literal truth. I know now it was not simply some legend. In the olden days, our land knew of wizards of modest but benevolent power, with which they could create animals of grace and beneficience and birds with a song to move the meanest of hearts, and keep the rivers clean and the crops plentiful.

"To enhance their powers, a convocation of all the world's wizards and the finest of craftsmen of precious jewels -- all of whom were gypsies -- was called. They assembled a store of the few truly precious gemstones in our land and carved and embued them with tremendous powers to see sights from both faraway lands and long distant times, as well as to control the powers of nature and even the minds of men. The priests were brought in to bless this undertaking, to suffuse their magic with the purpose of serving God and the deity's creations.

"Alas, at this time the old King, an ancestor of Abret and your two children," she added, nodding weakly at Phenshraw and Paleem, "suddenly passed away -- many suspected poison -- and his sole heir was a boy of only three. So, a regent was selected to govern until the boy was of age. The man chosen, Jackur, was a monster, from Drofnats." The woman spat out the last word, as though to rid her tongue of the taste of its speaking.

"Jackur had designs on the kingdom's powers and sought to turn the wizard's magic to his own uses. Knowing the beast's plans, the mages wisely refused and dispersed the jewels to many corners of the kingdom, although the regent seized some of them and stored them in the castle. To prevent their misuse, the stones' magic was altered so that it could be fully used only in the presence of a high priest, a king or queen of the gypsies, and the king or queen of the kingdom. In revenge, Jackur then had the wizards slain and the gypsies driven into exile. To impede the perpetuation of the power of the priests, he decreed that they should forever after remain celibate."

* * * * *

I broke in. "And somehow, Novan, you have collected most of the dispersed jewels, and were trying to force Lindea, who you believe -- as do we -- to be the rightful heir to the throne of the gypsies, to aid in your use of the jewels."

Novan's head snapped to me and his eyes roared in pained contempt. "Who is this ignorant young whelp and how did he get into this castle? What did he do, sleep with every woman in the castle?"

A sudden silence descended on the room. Novan did not seem to understand its significance, but Paleem stood straight and looked around. She looked not at Lorena and Rebca, and I suddenly knew for sure that it was Paleem who had spied on the three of us in our initial tryst in Lorena's bedchamber several nights before. Paleem's eyes lit on her mother's face; Serjeen flushed slightly.

"Mother??!!" the young girl cried. Phenshraw's gaze turned toward Lindea, whose dark beautiful features softened in guilt. "Lindea?" Her refusal to meet his eyes was all the confirmation he needed.

The Queen broke the tableau, muttering unconvincingly, "Don't be silly, dear." I looked for a quick exit from the room, but the stern visage of the guard nearest the door quelled any such thoughts.

Just then, the King burst through the doorway, raggedly dressed in a wrinkled blouse with shirt-tails askew and his breeches only half fastened. The Queen glared at him, and I could only speculate that he and the youthful blonde triplets with whom he had dallied the previous night had been interrupted in yet another visit to the oceanic fantasy I had weaved for them. Abret stopped as if struck in the forehead. His eyes slowly scanned the room, while his face changed expression at each stage -- as he espied his wife, his children, his laundress in chains, me (albeit receiving the least of his attention), the old crone, and -- finally -- his apparent confidant.

"Thaddeo," he roared, "what is the meaning of all of this?"

The assailant's voice increased in its insincere greasiness. "Your Highness, your family and their scruffy retainers unfortunately have descended by surprise upon the Drofnats' private quarters. They have interrupted the interrogation of which you and I spoke last eve. If you would reassure these well-meaning but misdirected members of your family that I am indeed carrying out the business of the throne and ask them to retire elsewhere, I would be quite grateful."

Serjeen strode over to the King, sneering at his incriminating dishevelment. "What is this? You agreed that this inhuman creature could put the whip to a laundress? I will not stand for it."

Abret's features softened placatingly. "Dear, there are serious threats about which you do not know. We -- Thaddeo and I -- are addressing them. Please do not ask further."

The dark-haired queen rose to her toes, and I realized that at her full carriage she was ever the equal in height to her husband. "I fucking well will ask further!" An audible gasp rose from the guards and the Princess, for none had known any queen to use such language. Her stare pierced at Abret's soul. His eyes dipped, and then he lowered his shoulders in defeat.

"Thaddeo," he murmured, "bring out the jewels and show them."

The beak-nosed man strode to a table next to the still-chained Lindea and opened a box. He motioned to the skinny guard, who unlocked Lindea's chains and pushed her over to stand next to the table, her hands still shackled. I remain astonished at the captivating, regal beauty and self-possessiveness which she conveyed.

In the box, I could see the mezmerizing brilliance of a collection of bright-colored stones of all hues. Novan carefully spilled the contents onto the table. Shimmering gusts of sparkle, of colors, of, for want of a better term, magic cascaded throughout the pile. Novan looked up triumphantly, grinning. "I have almost all the stones here. With the assistance of the King and at least the presence of Ms. Lindea here, we can read many things of the past. Most of these we wish to know, and others we would prefer others not to know. Come closer know, as the visions are not altogether clear in that we do not have the full roster of those who should attend."

The royal family stepped closer to the table. Lorena, Rebca and I -- being of lesser station -- remained behind them. Novan mumbled some incantation of guttural words, and a tableau appeared above the table. It appeared to display two figures about as tall as my arm is long -- a man and a woman. It was an astonishing feat, these figures appearing in the middle of the gloomy air of the dungeon, as though they were shadows projected on a wall, but in full color and in all dimensions. I craned my head to the side, and my view of them changed as though I was indeed walking around a couple of dolls. Still, the vision wavered, as though viewed under the surface of a running brook.

Abret took on the air of a carnival barker. "These two are Disproul -- Abret's cousin -- as she was some eighteen years ago; the man is some unknown person, a peasant perhaps, whose features we cannot make out. As you will see, Disproul will engage in some activity one would not expect from the unmarried niece of a king."

At that, Paleem, ever the observer of all things salacious, crowded closer to the table for a better look, leaving me room next to her to gain a better vantage. I stepped up and the figures became markedly clearer. The man was revealed to be a strapping, lantern-jawed, athletic fellow of about thirty-five. The woman, in her late twenties, had light brown hair and striking, firm features. Novan's eyebrows raised in apparent surprise.

Abret gasped in surprise. "I knew that man. He was... No, it is impossible. He wouldn't..." The king left the man's identity unspoken. The couple bore a vague familiarity to me as well, but I could not place their faces to save my soul.

The couple was embracing heatedly. She wore a short, light blue gown, from which long, athletic legs emerged. The man wore a long dark robe, almost a cassock such as those I had seen visiting church dignitaries wear. Suddenly, his strong hands grasped the front of Disproul's gown and kneaded her breasts through the thin garment; her excited nipples pressed against the fabric exposed between his fingers. After a moment, his hands grasped the top of her robe and gracefully pulled it below her firm breasts. Her arms snaked around his neck and pulled his face to hers, where their lips dueled in a passionate kiss.

Paleem squeeked in surprise and not a little excitement; her brother, Prince Phrenshaw emitted out a long, low whistle, which drew a rebuking glance from the king. Serjeena shook her head, muttering, "I don't think the children should be watching such carnality," but made no further move to banish them from the room, paralyzed as she was by her shock at seeing the tableau floating above the table.

Lorena and Rebca glanced at each other and pushed forward to view this taboo scene for themselves. Just then, sounds began to emerge from the couple in the scene, sounds readily identified as the sort of panting and sweet implacations of a couple lustily enjoying the fruits of one another's body. "Oh, Andis," her voice cried in tones that were no less regal for her passionate endeavors. "I know we shouldn't but, oh God I love the feel of you, and your strength."

The King glanced at Novan and accused, "I did not know you could elicit the sounds of the event." Novan shrugged, "I was not aware of this myself. Somehow, our powers with the jewels increase. Perhaps with more than one member of your family here, the use of the jewels is enhanced."

The man, Andis, a name that also tickled the back of my mind, quieted her with a kiss. In a voice of great timbre and obvious power, he admonished, "Hush, my sweet princess, we should not be using His name, and have so little time." He gently laid her on the ground or floor -- one could not see the surface on which they rested. Andis dropped his head to the beautiful woman's breast and began suckling voraciously. As he did, he slid the gown down over her slim hips and down her thighs, revealing her flat stomach and light-brown pubic hair.

His left hand slid over Disproul's stomach and cupped her mons. Her slender thighs sprung open willingly, granting him entrance. I could see his strong hand rub at her flowering cleft, and as her hips began writhing, his middle finger probe at the parted lips and then forcefully enter her. Her hips jerked up to capture his digit, pressing herself against the base of his hand.

Andis sawed in and out of her, bringing her to even greater passion. Her loins rocked mildly from side to side, as though in a dance, but the clenching of her thigh muscles revealed the nearness of her completion at his hand. With a muffled scream, her head darted forward and clasped his thick, dark hair between her teeth, and her hips jerked up and locked against fingers. It was apparent to all watching that her climax was upon her. Our room was filled with the sounds of our own heavy breathing, almost matching the loud breathiness of the stunning Disproul.

As her spasms subsided, she reached up and pulled at her lover's collar. "Come now, my love," she pleaded. "We have limited ourselves to play for too long. Come and take me, at least this once. The future is too uncertain to leave ourselves with regrets for consummations that we have let elude us."

When the man hesitated, Disproul wrestled with the collar and the buttons descending the front of his gown. She pulled it away from him, exposing a pale but heavily muscled, slim body. He was wearing a loose undergarment, a sort of short pair of pants, which was bulging obscenely with his own arousal. He looked down at the tented garment, as though surprised himself at the presence of this creature within.

Disproul leaned forward and wrestled the short undergarment over his hips, carefully drawing it over the tip of his stiff member. Her cry of, "Oh my lord!" coincided with the gasps of the women present: Serjeena, Paleem, Lorena, and Rebca, and even the shackled Lindea. Even though the figures were in miniature, perhaps one-fourth of their normal size, it was readily apparent that the man's cock was huge, larger than any I had seen displayed at the orgiastic festival the previous night.

Disproul grabbed the giant shaft and began to work her hand up and down its length, causing the essence of his seed to trickle out the tip and coat her fingers. "My love," she cried huskily, "I can claim no great experience in the dimensions of men, but this far surpasses what I might have hoped to enjoy from you or any man. Please, impale me with your sword now!"

Disproul again lay supine with her legs spread wide for her handsome lover. He awkwardly lay atop her and allowed her to guide his mammoth cock to the entrance to her tunnel. As the tip parted her flowering lips, instinct took command and his hips pushed forward. "Please, Your Grace," she protested with a wince. "Take your time, as it may take a moment to accomodate you."

Andis nodded and moved back, resting the cock head just inside her. He pressed forward more slowly, and then withdrew. When Disproul smiled, he renewed the motion with a hairsbreadth more force. He was clearly making headway in his efforts.

With five more insertions, each incrementally further than its predecessor, the man slipped all the way into her. Disproul's smile changed to an open-mouthed gasp, stretched as she was. Still, she encouraged him on, raising her hips in invitation. Resting his weight on his outstretched arms, Andis began rocking back in forth in that eternal motion enjoyed by passion-joined lovers. Disproul raised her knees to ease her accomodation of him.

He smiled down at her warmly. "I hope that I somehow am bringing you comfort, my sweet lady."

She grinned back, to the extent she could through the cunt- stretching sweet torture of her impalement. "My love, you are bringing me pleasure beyond my ability to described, and heightened as it is by my love for you." I could see tears of joy well in her eyes, and then Andis' face descended to hers in a kiss born more of true love than of simple passion.

Still locked in the kiss, Andis' hips increased the tempo of their lunges into her. Disproul locked her ankles together behind his ass and urged him to yet greater speed. After only a few moments, their lurching turned into a frenzied coupling, their loins slamming into one another.

With a strangled cry of "Yes, my love!" Andis held his hips to the loins of his lover, and one could almost see him jet his seed into the slender beauty. Her own explosion was just as obvious, but quieter, as she smiled into his dark eyes, panting through her finish. As their storm subsided, their loving kiss resumed.

Novan swept through the tableau with his hand and muttered another foreign phrase that we did not understand. The tableau slowly faded from view. All eyes in the room, save Novan's, were glazed in astonishment -- even those of King Abret, who I had understood had seen this scene before. Apparently, his previous viewings were without the clarity afforded on this occasion.

Queen Serjeena spoke up, her glinting eyes giving away her own excitement at watching the fornicating couple. Yet, her voice remained calm. "Very well, Novan, you have through this magic shown us my husband's long-dead cousin trysting with a man..."

"And quite an impressive one!" Lorena piped up.

"Oh, shut up, girl!" the queen admonished; the blonde blushed and backed away. "So what is your point in showing us this?"

Novan smiled, as though in triumph. "Well, Your Highness, it seems that as a result of this assignation, poor Disproul found herself with child. Her scandalized family sent her off to the Berkan Islands to have her child, to hide their shame."

"Some three years later, old King Wherel passed away without any direct heirs. So, it was left for the sitting cardinals to choose among the most direct heirs for the occupant of the throne. There were two candidates: his sister's son, young Prince Abret, to whom you had been married several years earlier. The other candidate was his brother's daughter Disproul, and a messenger was sent to tell her of the King's death so that she might return to stake her claim to it, if she chose.

"If she were to return, she would have had a very strong claim. Of course, the preference is to place a male on the throne where all other factors are of equal weight. Here, however, she might well have been granted the throne if she had sought it, as she was older than Abret, and exceedingly smart and talented, even musically so. The conventional view of your husband at that time, by contrast, was that he was a pleasant and well meaning young man, but not particularly bright or responsible, inclined as he was to savor the more hedonistic pleasures of life." Abret raised his head as though to protest, but remained silent.

"With this in mind, we come to the events that make it crucial for you to not interfere with the plans that I have made with the King's approval. We will now display a scene of a ship tossed about on the waves one sunny afternoon. On this ship was one Disproul and the twins that she bore as a result of her impetuous afternoon with the..." Novan broke off, as he espied the King standing there, shaking his head, his eyes staring at the jewels on the table. "What is it, Your Majesty?" Novan beseeched.

"I had no idea; no idea at all," the sovereign muttered through his dark beard. He looked up guiltily. "That man, Andis, the one who fathered Disproul's children -- he was the Cardinal for all of our country..."

Part 14

The King's announcement had a varied effect upon those of us in the room. Novan looked shocked. Most of the others looked startled at the thought that a cardinal should have fathered a child by a princess, but did not seem nearly as stunned as Abret himself. After all, this event had occurred some eighteen years before. I of course had heard of Andis from the brothers in the monastery in which I lived; a man annointed as the cardinal at a young age would by any standards be a legend among the clergy. As I recall being told, he had opted to renounce the mantle of leader of the faith many years before, though none would admit even knowing why he would have taken such a step. As the brothers related, Andis had served as a simple country friar for several years in the wilds of the uncivilized forests, where he ultimately had succumbed to one of the illnesses prevalent in the forested regions. His body now lay in the cemetery of the monastery.

The ghostly tableau re-formed itself above the dungeon table on which the multi-colored jewels rested. Now, we watched a sunrise at sea, with two ships in view, the smaller of which appeared to be overtaking the larger. The scene shifted to what seemed to be the smaller and older of the two vessels. Three men were standing in a cabin, the dried, graying wood suggesting that the ship had been long used and little maintained. A husky, young man with a dark beard sat while two slender men stood at attention before him. The sitting man turned his head, and we could see it was a younger version of King Abret himself. All in the room watching the figures floating above the table, save the King and Novan, gasped in surprise.

In the tableau, Abret looked up with a pained, weak look on his face. "Now, you two make sure that her boat is diverted by your men to Badger's Isle and left there for at least two weeks. By the time she can return, the cardinals will have selected me for the throne, and they would not dare rescind the selection and coronation, as times are unsettled enough as they are. And, do not harm her -- or anyone else at least so far as you can help it -- as Disproul is, after all, a princess."

The standing men nodded. One stepped forward into the light of Abret's cabin's lantern, revealing himself to be a gaunt, beetle-browed native of Drofnats. "As you wish, Prince Abret... or should I say to get into the practice, Your Majesty. All the same, you should remain below, for it would not do to have your cousin recognize you. This should appear to be mere piracy, and nothing more."

The scene in the tableau faded, as Thaddeo Novan again swept his hand through the figures. I glanced over at the King, who was nodding absently, as though confirming for himself the events that transpired. Queen Serjeen appeared beside herself with rage; Phrenshaw and Paleem looked merely stunned.

Novan smiled ruefully, as though witnessing the putting down of an injured horse. "So you see, my visitors, there was a little scheme -- some high stakes castle politics -- that assured Abret the kingdom and allows you to live as the royalty you are. Unfortunately, Princess Disproul's ship somehow was lost on the way to the island where it was to be delayed, and she never did appear to congratulate her cousin at his coronation. I trust you all realize the importance to you of keeping his participation in such a plan a secret, as the cardinals and the populace might not view the current royal family with such affection if they became aware of such manipulation of the throne."

Serjeen's anger and disgust was tangible. "Novan," she barked, "I would see more of this event. Please do whatever you must to place these ships and that day back before our eyes."

Novan simply shrugged helplessly. "Your Highness, I am afraid that I cannot. I am no wizard. It is only by luck and numerous unsuccessful trials that I have, with the aid of some ancient texts, been able to bring before you these few events. I cannot control the jewels so as to continue the story." The Queen looked skeptical, but obviously could think of no way to catch the dark-eyed man in his untruth.

I blurted, "Perhaps someone else can do so." All eyes turned to me, and I flushed at the intensity of the emotions stirring in the room, now directed at me. I turned to Lindea, who remained standing beside the table, her dressed still shredded to expose much of her smooth, tawny skin, including the hint of the areole of her generous, firm left breast. Her hands were still shackled, joinded by a thick, rust encrusted chain. "Lindea -- if you indeed are the rightful monarch of the gypsies, you should by the powers you inherited have control over the jewels. Concentrate on the scene that we just witnessed and see if you can continue its recital."

Lindea stared at me as though I had just requested that she grow wings and fly from the castle, but stepped up to the table slowly. Novan snorted in disgust and looked around to see if others shared his belief that this effort was doomed to futility, but all eyes were locked on the dusky beauty, mesmerized by her proud carriage and her determined and fiery dark eyes.

Lindea closed her eyes and furrowed her brow in concentration. After a few seconds, she released her breath in frustration and looked at me with pleading eyes. "Master Jaze, I sense much of the power of the jewels, but without practice or guidance, I do not see how I can direct my thoughts to create a picture of what you seek to see."

Novan threw his hands up. "You see, she has no powers. I think we are just not going to be able to see..." The King broke in, "Yes, I think Thaddeo has a point, as it seems that the maid just can't..."

Serjeena waved him to silence and peered into his guilt- riddled eyes. "Abret, my husband" -- the last word almost spat in mocking disdain -- "if you wish to continue as an ally of my father and his subjects, you will not interfere." The Queen nodded for me to continue.

I bent and stared into the eyes of the lovely gypsy. "Lindea, you can bring it to us if you concentrate on those events, on that day and hour. Remember the two boats, and the woman we know to be on the larger of the two. Feel the cool morning sea air tugging at the cloaks of the crewmen." Lindea closed her eyes, and soon smiled in satisfaction. A flicker of blue ocean and white sails appeared above the jewels.

Phrenshaw cried out, "Yes, I think you've just about managed it."

I continued describing the scene -- its sights and likely smells. Seized with a sudden inspiration, I began wordlessly singing -- little more than humming -- the tale as though playing my flute. I sang of creaking masts' timbers and crashing waves, of the sailors' chanties, of the hopes of returning to ones' homeland, and of the joyous faces of children upon finally meeting their father.

Suddenly, the tableau sharpened, and we were given a view of an interior ship's cabin, obviously from the larger and newer of the two boats. In a well-furnished cabin, the still-beautiful Disproul, clad in a heavy gown to ward off the sea's chill, sat up in the cramped berth and swung her legs over the edge. She glanced back at two small forms nestled under the thick quilt, and then lightly leaped from the bed. Cries erupted, apparently from the deck above her head. This scene too faded.

I looked over at Lindea, whose sweat-dotted forehead grimaced in anguish. Her eyes flickered open and looked at me beseechingly. "Oh, Master Jaze, I do not know if I can continue, as I feel terrible things about to occur." Queen Serjeen gently grasped the girl's arm; "My dear, it is important that you continue; please try." Lindea swallowed, and nodded.

I continued my song, of the smaller boat coming alongside as the sun rose to wash over the water-slickened deck. The tableau re-appeared, as tall and heavily-armed Drofnats soldiers quickly swarmed over the rails of the ship bearing Disproul. The sailors in the large wooden ship, either sleeping or engaged in the necessary affairs of sailing, were largely unarmed and quickly overwhelmed. Two who fought were impaled on the Drofnats' swords, their corpses flung over the side. The remainder were herded over one side of the ship and forced at knife point into a landing skiff, which the boarders winched over the side and set adrift.

In the corner of the tableau, I noticed a light-brown head emerge from the stairs that rose from below deck. Disproul stepped part way into the morning sun, and then gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. Two invaders grabbed her by the arms and yanked her from the stairs and dragged her over before the man who had spoken with Abret earlier in the latter's cabin on the other ship. The man's moustache twitched in delight while he feigned ignorance of her identity.

"Ahhh, we have a real lady aboard. Perhaps she has some riches -- a family treasury -- to make our raid most profitable." Disproul eyed him warily but said nothing. "Or perhaps, the greatest treasures of all are carried with her at all times..." He ran his rough-hands over her shoulders and down her chest, stopping to rest them on her taut breasts. Her hand quickly lashed out and stung his cheek. His hands dropped away as if burned. Catching himself, and embarrassed that the one blow from a woman could intimidate him, the leader's snarl deepened. "You may well pay for that, you snotty bitch."

Just then, Disproul's eyes widened as her gaze locked onto a sight on the far ship. Following her eyes, I couls see a dark head peeking from behind one the the rotting masts of the Drofnats' ship. The leering leader caught her gaze and the soundless enunciation, "Abre..." with her startled lips. The man suddenly leapt behind her and pulled both arms behind her back, pinning her wrists together in his large left hand. He then looked over her shoulder at the young Abret, face flushed with embarassment.

Her attacker's free hand rose from his waist. The morning sun's glint revealed a long curved knife poised over the woman's head. The attacker was not looking at Disproul, however, but rather at Abret; his face derided Abret for his stupidity, and the menacing knife informed the Prince that his throne now lay at risk if the woman lived to tell of his intra-family treachery. Young Abret's mouth opened to begin a horrified protest, but no words came out. He tried again, but failed to speak. Finally, with eyes pleading at Disproul's for forgiveness, the young sovereign sadly turned away in acquiescence, and before the princess could react, the knife swung down in a flashing arc. Blood gouted from the neck of the now dead woman.

From the stairway through which Disproul had stepped just moments before rose a child's terrified scream. A small girl of perhaps three years, with dark curls, rushed forward at the assailant. The man intercepted the child and roughly grasped her by the armpits, raising her to his face. Just then she was followed from belowdecks by a young boy of the same age, though slightly taller and with somewhat lighter-colored hair, who apparently was alerted by the girl's screams. As the lad raised his head and all were given a clear view of the boy, I started, for his features were somehow hauntingly familiar to me. Behind me, I heard a female voice, likely that of Serjeena, mutter "Oh, my god," as though she did recognize it. Two of the boarding attackers quickly intercepted the boy and literally threw him back down the staircase.

Disproul's slayer shook the small bundle of dark curls now clutched in his hands. The girl continued to shriek and try to twist away. As she did, her face turned toward me, and I heard myself gasp. I did recognize this face. It could be none other than that of of a young Rebca, the maidservant to Princess Paleem!

In the tableau, the murderer slapped the young girl into sobbing quiescence with a quick smack, as though wreaking vengeance for the slap received moments before from the woman he had killed. "Listen, you little bitch. You will shut up now, and if I or anyone else hears another sound out of you at any time for the rest of your life I will find you and slit your throat just like I did your mother's!" The girl's sob broke off suddenly. She remained hanging in his arms, her mouth and eyes wide open with a soundless wail of agony and fear. The man literally threw the child, young Rebca, at the nearest one of his attacking legions, who barely caught the girl before she would have struck a railing and tumbled overboard.

At that moment, a cry came from halfway up the rigging. "Milord, there is an approaching ship, and its sails appear to bear the crest of the Cardinal!"

The leader of the invading Drofnats muttered a curse. Swiveling his head as though to regain his bearings, he barked out commands for the boarding party to gather together on the deck. "We have only a moment to get our ship out of here before this new ship spots us. Leave those two children down below; they can't identify anything and will slow down this new ship if it decides to stop us. And for heaven's sake don't tell our client on the ship that we found children here; he's weak-livered enough as it is."

"Jaze, look out!" An unfamiliar female voice pierced the dungeon and the tableau winked out. By instinct I whirled just in time to see the blade of a heavy axe hefted by Novan arcing toward my head. I dropped to a squat and the sharp iron weapon whistled over my head, missing it by inches, and nearly struck Paleem. The blade's heavy weight threw Novan's center of gravity off to the side. Placing my hand on the floor for a base, I swung a kick around onto the side of the man's knee. With a scream, he fell heavily. Before he could rise, I scrambled to my feet and kicked him in the face, my instep planting itself neatly at the point of his jaw. Novan crumpled to the floor on his back.

Two of the Drofnats guards rushed over and grabbed me from behind, while a third pulled his sword and rested the tip against my throat. I could see his bicep clench in prelude to a backpull needed to drive the sharpened point through my Adam's apple.

"Enough!" The King's voice bellowed. The guard hesitated, as though measuring his chances of getting away with the completion of his stroke and insisting that the King's command came too late. Finally, he dropped the sword, and the two other guards released my arms. The King strode over to me, and as though addressing the walls themselves, intoned, "There will be no more killing for my throne, miserable seat that it is."

I stared at the King, all the while resisting the racing of my mind. If Rebca was the daughter of the King's cousin who was murdered but who could have been the Queen...

Abret walked heavily over to Queen Serjeena, whose eyes were brimming with tears of sadness and revulsion. After an emotional inner struggle, he managed to look into her face. "My wife, my queen; I know that ours was a marriage arranged of politics and the joining of territories. Still, I have given you children and the throne that my father promised you would be ours to hold jointly. Now you know the terrible secret that has haunted me for so long. And now, I know that there are others who live who are more entitled, and more worthy, to wield the sceptre of our kingdom than I. Even if those who viewed this recounting today were held to silence, the joining of the jewels has brought the powers of the mages back to the land, and somehow the word would leak out, like water from an uncaulked bucket. Were I to maintain the throne over the righteous abhorrence of the people, the name Abret and all associated with it would be rendered to a curse, an insult, for any who would carry them."

Tears now welled up in the husky monarch's eyes. He looked down at the floor, and then strode toward the door slowly. The guards fell in beside him. Abret stopped, and turned toward us. "I will be abdicating the throne. I have long contemplated that the sole salve for my tormented soul is a pilgrimage to the ancient holy lands of Berkeer. Perhaps in five or ten years, I can return and serve -- as a servant -- the new monarch. I can only hope that those who rightly inherit the throne that I usurped will treat my wife and children kindly." He nodded to the guards, who preceded him through the heavy door.

All in the room were stunned and silent, as if frozen in a winter's icebank. Paleem and Lorena stared at Rebca, who clutched her throat. At that instant, I realized that the warning to me of Novan's attack could only have come from Rebca. The ebony- tressed beauty was stunned from her muteness by reliving the very attack which had cost her both her voice and her mother. Lindea stared at Serjeen compassionately, realizing what the loss of her husband and his throne would mean to the woman. Serjeen, oddly, gaped at me. Only Phrenshraw acted, ordering the remaining guards to uncuff Lindea and arrest the groggy, stunned Novan; the guards shuffled uneasily, but finally complied.

Rebca stumbled over to me and grasped my hand. Her newly- found, soft sweet voice murmured, "Oh my, oh my, oh my...." Serjeen came over and awkwardly embraced the two of us, exclaiming, "What an amazing adventure you've had, and will have."

I looked at her, my amazement surely written all over my face. "Your Highness, I'm afraid you have lost me somewhere in here. Adventure?" Serjeen's dark, piercing eyes explored mine, framed as they were in her high, chiseled cheekbones.

She laughed. "You don't understand, do you?" My expression didn't change. "I guess monasteries don't carry very many looking glasses, and we would not recognize ourselves even as we are now from any vantage point other than that from looking straight into a glass."

Serjeen cupped my cheek thoughtfully. "Jaze, that young boy on the boat, the one who rushed to rescue his sister? That boy was you. Why do you think Novan attacked you? Rebca and you were the twins that Disproul bore from the cardinal. Had she been named Queen, you would have been Prince and Princess. What I'm saying is that you and Rebca are the rightful heirs to the throne."

My throat caught, and my heart pounded unmercifully. Only a miracle kept me on my feet as I stared into Serjeena's face, which exposed not a hint of doubt as to her conclusion. I glanced at the faces of the others, who all nodded in silent agreement; they too had seen an unmistakeable resemblance between that boy and me.

Phenshraw stepped forward and clasped my shoulders. "Think about it, boy, er, milord, uh... oh, the hell with it! That you, a mere foundling, should be born with such physical gifts that one would associate with those whose forebearers had used them to take a throne and carve out an empire: such gifts as athletics, and music and... I suppose there are others."

He looked around the room, and Lindea nodded, then halted, horrified at her implicit confession. "No, my Prince, it is not that -- well, not just that -- but I have sensed from him a regal lineage before."

The Prince smiled charitably, and continued. "Recall how the powers of the jewels -- at least the clarity of the tableau -- increased as you came close to them. And the sound came forth when Rebca joined the group." I thought back, and nodded. "That effect -- caused it is said when royalty participate in the jewels' use -- was not nearly so strong when my parents or Paleem and I were near. So, it would appear to be clear. The cardinal's vessel -- apparently sent out to escort his secret lover -- found the abandoned ship and returned with the two foundlings. The cardinal, sensing that the children were his own, could not of course reveal their identities as their very lives would be forfeit, and had them placed in the two settings that he felt were safe for them -- a monastery and the castle of the King himself. In his shame for his failure to maintain his own vows, the cardinal went on his own pilgrimage, which eventually cost him his life."

The crone, who had remained silently sitting by the side of the brick-walled room, suddenly stirred and and struggled to her feet, joining us at the table. Her piercing gaze probed at me, and then Rebca. "Yes," she croaked, "these are the children from the boat. The boy, the elder, and then his sister, born minutes later." Lindea, standing with her still-cuffed hands stretched over the glowing jewels as though warming them before a fire's embers, nodded in confirmation.

I turned toward Rebca, my vision blurring with tears. At last, I had a family! We hugged, squeezing each other tight, then simultaneously stiffened, recalling at the same time our amorous trysts two nights previously. I had both fucked and been sucked by my sister! After the initial shock, Rebca started laughing at our embarassment -- needless in view of our ignorance of our kinship at the time of our lustful joining. Paleem and Serjeena, who both had been witness to our lovemaking, joined in. A moment later, Lorena's eyes widened with realization, and she too doubled over with laughter. Phrenshraw and Lindea stared at each other in puzzlement.

The prince shook his head and spoke. "I know not of this jest that mysteriously has overcome you all, but we have more pressing matters to attend to." Turning to me, he somberly added. "Jaze, my cousin, it now appears that you are the rightful and, it would seem in view of your steadfast and intelligent pursuit of the villainous Novan, most worthy heir to the throne upon my father's abdication. I stand ready to serve you, Your Highness." With that, Phrenshraw knelt and bowed his head. He motioned to the others to do the same.

My face flushed with realization. The kingdom! It was mine! I was to be the King, and all would serve ME! I envisioned that festivals aplenty could be held at my command, with armies of young maidens, ripe breasted and wet with lust for their monarch, bidden to service me at my every whim.

The image flew through my mind in an instant. I would sit in the tent and watch as sultry maidens on the stage would dance before the assembled royals, but the fairest of the lot would come into my tent only. Jenfeer, the leggy stunner with the blonde braid that extended to the middle of her luscious buttocks, would arrive, and I would ingest through her kiss the sacred aphrodisiac herbs of the priests -- as much as I liked! I could almost taste the sweetness of her tongue dueling with my own. At the same time, the young blonde triplets who had serviced Abret would flit around me, disrobing me with tiny, skillful hands, their thin-lipped mouths caressing and sucking at each inch of flesh they exposed.

My organ began to stiffen as I envisioned three sets of lips wetly touching my hips; as their small hands tugged my embroidered silken breeches over my thighs and down my legs, two sets of lips would clamp onto each side of the shaft and two tiny tongues would lap lightly along the base and over my balls. A third lovely faced frames with the cornsilk hair shared by the sisters would look up at me from the front, and the girl's sky blue eyes would gaze into mine as her tiny mouth lightly sucked at my tip.

After enjoying their ministrations, I would receive the honey-haired Auria, and perhaps start by slaking my lust by prodding at the entrance of her moist tunnel while clutching her magnificently shaped ass. As she had earlier that day, the slender vixen would face away from me and drop into my lap and be impaled upon my stiff shaft. While she rode up and down on my cunt-filling cock, my hands would reach around her slim torso and toy with the perky nipples on her full, rounded breasts. While she rode above me, her dark-haired fellow concubine, the stunning Onassa, would kneel between our thighs and lap at the joining of our sexes, rolling her tongue around Auria's swollen clit and then descending to wash my rod as it emerged from Auria's moist tunnel, and even lave at my balls. Finally, I would be drawn to my release by Auria's clever and skillful pussy muscles caressing me as though they were fingers encased in a silk glove. As my seed spurted from Auria's overfilled love tunnel, Onassa would gratefully suck it in through pursed lips.

After a glass of chilled wine, Charel and her cousin Licia would revive my spent cock with their willing young mouths, and then my eyes would survey the grounds for the next morsel of young flesh who had been recruited for the corps of concubines and maidservants. Any woman would be more than grateful to receive the lustful attentions of her King. What a life it would be!

I looked around and saw that indeed all in the room, even the crone, had knelt before me, eyes locked to the floor -- all except for Rebca, whose ebony eyes searched my own uncertainly. Our thoughts, even our very moral values, danced in the shared vision that passed between us. Our hopes, and our duties, were aligned. At that moment, I knew in my heart for the first time that Rebca was indeed my sister, my twin. I smiled at her, and lowered my eyes.

"Please," I called out, "please rise." Everyone did. "The honor you accord tugs at the depths of all men's desires, and to be sure if makes for a terrific fantasy, but it is not my destiny to be King. Whatever may have occurred to my mother" -- I nearly choked on the word, having learned of her and then watched her die only moments apart -- "Abret has been the King for the past fifteen years and you have been raised as the King's Queen" -- I nodded at Serjeena -- "and the heirs to his throne. I have been trained to serve meals to the brothers at the monastery here in Speysard. I have no more business being King than I do being a bird or a fish. And, with Abret's abdication, the explanations that would be required for others to accept my presence on the throne would likely rend the kingdom apart."

Rebca was now beaming, and clutched my arm in affection. I turned toward the Prince. "Clearly, the throne should Phrenshaw's. On every occasion when he could have been low, or mean, or unmindful of those of lesser station, or taken advantage of his position of authority over others, he has instead shown kindness and insisted that rewards go only to the worthy. I gladly express my fealty to him, and to his family." Looking at Rebca, I added, "...and Rebca and I ask only for the opportunity to continue this service." She nodded her agreement.

Phrenshaw looked almost sheepish in his admiration for my act, and in his gratitude. Serjeen exchanged glances with her children, and she turned back to me. "In giving up your throne, Lord Jaze -- and henceforth you will be a Lord, my son will see to that -- you only confirm your royal lineage." She arched her neck and kissed me lightly on the cheek, pausing to whisper into my ear, "And have made my blood boil so that I insist that I be permitted to deliver by this evening's end that reward I promised you for your assistance." She smiled meaningfully as she stepped away.

Phrenshaw hugged me now and playfully punched at my shoulder. "Indeed, it will be Earl Jaze and Lady Rebca, and you both will be asked to serve in the Castle. Milord, the skills and ingenuity you have shown over the past few days have convinced me that you shall be my most trusted minister. The joining of the lineages of the royalty and the priesthood has without question created a young man of wisdom and... well, I'm not sure if holiness is the right word for one so randy; well, in any case, I might not ever permit you to return to the lands I will bestow upon you, so reliant will I be upon your counsel."

He then turned to the luscious, dark Lindea. He slowly knelt before her. Looking into her eyes, he uttered, "Milady Lindea, I have been in your thrall for so long, and pray that you did not think my attentions were simply the dalliances of a prince for a lass who served him. You are in all ways truly of royalty yourself. I ask that you take my hand in marriage, not only to help me rule this Kingdom as my Queen, but to join our peoples and end the second-class status so wrongly imposed upon the gypsies."

Lindea smiled, but certainly did not swoon the way one might have expected from one who heretofore had been a laundress. "But my Prince. Are you ready for marriage? To forsake all others but me?" Phrenshaw's smile froze, but he nodded. Lindea laughed. "Oh, just as I thought. Well, as long as you're discreet with your attentions and do not neglect me, I will not make this marriage a prison." Phrenshaw's smile resumed at full power. Lindea continued, "Besides, Lindea may have some discreet indiscretions of her own in mind." Her eyes flicked to meet mine momentarily, then returned to his, where they were greeted by his laughing assent. I nearly fainted; in the course of seconds I had been offered the favors of two different queens!

Serjeena interrupted the beaming couple. "This is fabulous! Lindea, you have just the sort of qualities I like in a queen; you don't take any bilgewater from your King. Come with me and I'll explain how a new queen and a queen mother can keep the Kingdom running smoothly. Besides, you need some more regal clothes; your left tit is showing." The two slipped through the door, with Phrenshaw's worried eyes following them.

The Prince turned back to us. "Lorena," he commanded. The disheveled blonde bounced forward, her old flirtatiousness now directed toward the soon-to-be King.

"Yes, Your Discreteness," she giggled, giving her full breasts an extra wiggle. Rebca punched her lightly in the ribs, hoarsely uttering in a stage whisper, "Lorena, it's not polite to address the King with a commoner's cum still on your upper lip." Lorena reddened and quickly rubbed at her lip while we laughed, then bristled as she realized her face was spotless and that Rebca was playing a joke on her.

"Lorena," Phrenshaw repeated, "you will please take care of accomodations upstairs for my cousins Jaze and Rebca. I'm afraid you may have to give up your own chamber for Rebca, as nice as it is, but I'm sure that the concubines will be more than happy to take you in for the nonce. And do see to this esteemed gypsy woman; she too is an honored guest." Lorena gulped, but nodded, slowly. Rebca strode out of the room with Lorena and the old woman at her heels.

Phrenshaw turned to me. "It has been quite a day for us all, and I imagine quite a week for you. I will go upstairs and lend comfort to my father. For all that he may have done, he is my father and a good man, and I will miss him while he is away. I will see you both soon." He turned and left, and suddenly the room, so crowded before, seemed very large with just Paleem and me.

I found my breath hard to find as I turned to stare into the lovely green eyes of the stunning princess. She smiled shyly. I started to speak, stuttered, and then finally made my voice work. "Your Highness, at last we meet. Somehow, I feel I've known you for some time."

Her smile brightened. My heart thereupon lurched, and leapt, and nearly left me. She extended her hand, which my own trembling hand took softly. "Oh, Lord Jaze -- or Second Cousin Jaze -- whichever seems more comfortable to you. I do seem to know a great deal about you, and what skills you possess. As a counselor to the new King, you would be willing -- would you not -- to share of those skills with his spinster sister?"

The lightness of my head was nearly set aflame with the fever that rushed through my body. I wanted to hold and squeeze and become a part of this magnificent woman-child, to caress her fiery locks and kiss her soft, ruby-like lips. I stuttered again, and she giggled, and then I recovered. "Oh, my Princess, I gladly would share with you whatever skills I have -- and with none other than you -- forever and ever, till the cliffs of Solstice Castle have washed into the sea."

Paleema raised her arms and put them around my neck. Her middle finger rubbed lightly at the nape, sending the heated chill of lightning from my head to my feet, with an extra stop or two in my loins. She leaned up, placing her lips close to mine. "Oh, I would not want to harbor for myself alone all of your gifts. That would hardly be fair to you, or others." Her lips pressed against mine, and I felt of a thousand rose petals, each delicately placed, kissing my own two lips. My knees shook, and I pressed her to me to keep my balance.

"Besides," she whispered into my mouth, "I not only want to partake of these gifts. Remember -- I like to watch..."

The End