Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Salacious Sorcerer

I had four health left when my mana ticked up to ten. I cast [Shadow Stitching] the moment it did, but the sound of my shadows piercing my flesh was the only sign of the skill activating. My body had reached its limit for pain, it seemed.

I patted the spider underneath me. “Sorry, buddy, looks like one of us walks away after all.”

The spider didn’t reply.

Now that I knew I wasn’t going to die, I should probably come up with a plan. I searched out for my senses, and it wasn’t long before I heard the echoes of combat. My friends were fighting spiders, but from the lack of earth-trembling crashes I knew they weren’t fighting anything like a royal. In my state there wasn’t anything I could do to help them, so I had to have faith that they could handle themselves.

First things first, I should see if the new skill I’d unlocked could help me out. I looked at what I had available and laughed. “Well, shit! Thanks for the level,” I said to the spider’s corpse. I took the skill without hesitating. It would make me a very dangerous person.

Assuming we made it out alive, that skill would be a massive boon. If someone was out here hunting the blade, I knew they’d be strong, This would be just the equalizer I needed to skate past such an encounter. I dismissed my interface. The fighting had ended, and I hoped that meant my friends had come out on top.

I tried to stand and head for them, but my body simply wouldn’t respond. My shirt hung in tatters and my pants weren’t much better. The jacket I’d worn wasn’t much more than a few strips of fabric at this point. I could have conjured a lantern, but right now I didn’t want to see how bad my body looked. I could smell the blood drying on my chest. I’d probably picked up a few new scars today.

I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths. I was pretty sure a few of my ribs were broken along with my left collarbone, and my left arm was currently held together by muscle and stitches. One of the threads had cut through the bone just above my elbow. I’d be limited to one-armed weapons for a few days at least until Serena’s skill could patch me up.

Serena. Rhallani. Noelle. I tried my hardest to picture them in my mind. To remember how they sounded. The feel of their embraces. Their smells. Their tastes. If I held onto those memories hard enough, I could keep the ones at the edge of recollection at bay. The ones that came when I pulled the Zaren who’d been Slave Thirteen out of his box. I should have brought a lantern out. Lit up the area. It would have helped remind my brain that I wasn’t in the catacombs any longer. That I’d escaped. That I’d survived. I just couldn’t bring myself to.

The other reason I didn’t bring out any light was because being in the dark helped me keep an ear out for my friends. The intensified pain also helped keep me from passing out, though already my eyelids were starting to droop. I’d pushed myself too far, then I’d pushed even harder. I hadn’t felt this battered and bruised and defeated since—

Don’t think about it.

I shoved the memories away. I couldn’t afford to spiral. Not right now. I needed to find a way to keep busy. I couldn’t stand, but my right arm was mostly functioning. I combed through my storage looking for anything that might help. I pulled out a splint and some bandages and started tying them around my severed arm. Hopefully the bone was lined up right, but I didn’t really have the time or ability to make sure at the moment. It would be just a tad ridiculous to survive the royal only to die from poking and prodding my injury.

It was around then that they finally got close enough that I could just barely hear their voices. They were coming from a tunnel maybe thirty feet above where the spider’s body leaned against the wall with me on top of it. I strained my senses to catch their words.

“—just saying that it’s been nearly an hour now since we’ve heard whatever the fuck he was fighting,” Tiana was saying.

“He’s alive,” Serena insisted. “I know he is. His armor hasn’t faded.”

The tremor in her voice made my gut twist with guilt. I’d been so quick to simply accept that I wasn’t getting out alive. That my only course of action was to take the royal out with me. Had I really progressed so little from the Zaren who didn’t care if he lived or died? Was it that easy for me to just give in? Had I grown so little?

I would do better. I had to do better next time. For them. For the people who’d suddenly made my life worth living. Then I heard Rhallani’s voice. “He’ll be okay, we just need to find him soon. We’re almost out of mana potions.”

I heard Noelle sniff. “I smell him. His blood. A lot of it.” Her tone trembled, and I could hear a low hum coming from her.

They were close enough that I could hear the uneven gait of Elisa being carried, which meant all five of them were at least alive. Relief floored me, and I let out a tension I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. That was a mistake, because I almost passed out the second I did.

By the time my ears stopped ringing they were running. I could see the light of their lantern flickering against the walls above. They hit the edge and stopped. I took as good a look from them as I could manage, but my left eye didn’t seem to be working all that great. A quick wipe revealed my face was covered in blood.

They were a little worse for wear, but I didn’t see any severe injuries on them. At a guess, the royal had sent its underlings to keep them busy while it dealt with me. The light around them wasn’t a lantern, but something else. Brighter, constant, hanging from Serena’s hip. I couldn’t make it out from here, but already I could feel it dampening my senses.

I conjured up a lantern before I could pass out. Elisa saw me first and shrieked, pointing. The rest looked down and there were cries of surprise and alarm all around. I raised my good hand in greeting. “Everyone alright up there?”

I winced at how hoarse my voice sounded, then Serena cried out. I looked down and realized I looked so much worse than I thought I would. The spider had split me open from collarbone to kneecap on my right side and ripped a jagged line across my chest just above my nipples. It had taken most of my clothing with it, leaving the puffy torn flesh straining against thick black stitches on full display. I wasn’t even sure if she could see it under the blood that caked me either.

When I looked back down she was falling towards me. Her feet pushed off the air, [Step of the Skydancer] allowing her to control her descent. Her feet had barely touched the carapace of the spider before she lunged for me. Her arms wrapped around me and I felt the warmth of her healing spread through me.

The room swam when she jostled my arm. “Careful, there!” I groaned. “My bicep isn’t really attached that great right now.”

She pulled back with tears in her eyes and I felt the warmth lessen. “Goddess, Zaren! Are you alright? How bad is your health?”

I brushed my hand through her hair, then winced as I unintentionally smeared blood through it. Red blood, not green. “You don’t want me to answer that. I’m alive, and that’s what’s important.”

She looked down and turned a shade of green. She ran her glowing hands along the long vertical gash. “You… You’re…” She choked back a sob, then looked up to where the others were all looking down at us with different levels of concern. “He’s alright!”

I conjured some of the rope we’d used earlier and a weighted hook. “Here, toss this up to them so they can tie it off. We can climb out after you put a little more health in me.”

She didn’t take the rope right away. She studied my face closely, and whatever she saw made her bottom lip tremble and tears collect in the corners of her eyes. She cupped my cheek, then softly kissed me. “You’re alright, now,” she said for me just as much as she did for her.

Only then did she take the rope and stand. She managed to get it up on her first swing, then she returned and sat in my lap. “Mana potion, please,” she said. I raised a brow, and she set her jaw. “We climb back up when I say you’re sufficiently healed. Now give me a mana pot.”

I did and she downed it, then she leaned into me and pressed her face into my neck. Her hands slid under my ruined shirt to touch my back, and I felt her tense up when they trailed the wounds there. “We heard the fighting. Felt the tunnels shaking. Then it all just went quiet. I was so scared. I didn’t know where you were. If you were…”

“I’m sorry. I’ll be more careful in the future.”

I frowned. The warmth wasn’t just coming from her hands. It came from her forearms that pressed into me. The flesh above her breasts that pressed into my exposed chest. Her face against my neck. The warmth grew more intense, and I could feel my wounds closing faster.

“Serena, did you just start using more mana?”

“I would if I could!” she said angrily. “It seems my stupid skill only has one level of healing!”

I wasn’t so sure. I pulled up my health. “Dismiss your arm guards.”

She screwed up her face. “What?”

“Your bracers. Dismiss them.”

“How?”

Ah, right. That was probably useful information. I knew she could, which meant if I focused on the skill… “Touch the gem at your neck. The one on your collar. Then focus on dismissing them.”

She did, and immediately I felt the warmth coming from where they’d been. She put her arm back and I watched my health closely. After a few seconds, I was sure. “Serena, read me the exact wording of your skill, please.”

“‘When touching a creature, expend mana to restore their wounds.’ Why?”

Well that was interesting. For one, most healing spells specified that they restored or regenerated health, but that was something to deal with later. It was the first half that was interesting to me, especially after the skill she’d obtained earlier. I couldn’t help but notice that no warmth was coming from where she sat on my lap or anywhere else clothes or armor separated us. “Try not to freak out, but I think we might have misunderstood your skill slightly.”

Her eyes shot up to mine, which had the unintended effect of pulling her away from me. Now the only part of her touching me was her hands. Sure enough, the speed of my healing tanked. “What do you mean?” she demanded.

I put my palm to her cheek and felt the warmth coming from it again. “If I’m right, the strength of your healing might be directly tied to how much you’re touching your target when you activate your skill.” Her brows furrowed. “How much—ah, skin-to-skin contact you’ve got with them.”

It took her a second, then her eyes went wide. Another second later, her face was completely red. Then, wordlessly, she touched the gem at her neck. All the armor on her torso melted into thin air, leaving only the collar on her neck. Then she quickly stripped what was left of my shirt away.

She looked up and down my now-uncovered body with tears in her eyes. “Why didn’t you take potions?”

I winced. “I did. I took enough that another might kill me.”

Her bottom lip trembled, but she just nodded. Then she pushed herself into my chest and wrapped her arms around me, making sure there was as much contact between us as possible. I let out a sigh at the wave of warmth that flowed through me. I’d been right, her skill was much stronger now. Especially since baring her breasts had surely boosted her Divine. I wrapped my arm around her as well and pressed my cheek to the side of her head to further increase the contact. I hadn’t even realized I’d passed out until I felt feet hit the carapace nearby.

I cracked open the eye that wasn’t nearly crusted shut with blood. Rhallani looked down at me with worry clear in her eyes, but she put on a brave smile. “I guess she missed you a lot.” She tried to be upbeat, but she was as near to panic as Serena.

I chuckled, then I explained what we’d learned. Already I was feeling much better than I had just a few minutes ago. Once I was done, she knelt down and ran a hand through Serena’s hair before leaning in to kiss me softly. “It is totally not fair that she’s getting all the pervy skills. Doesn’t your goddess know I found you first?”

“I’ll be sure to bring it up with her next time I see her.”

Rhallani pulled out her paring knife. “You’d better.” Then she left us behind to start cutting into the abdomen to the side of where we sat. “Noelle wasn’t happy about it, but she stayed up top to watch over Tiana and Elisa. We need to take a break soon or Elisa’s going to pass out. She’s a trooper, but she can’t keep going for much longer with that leg.”

I slowly stroked Serena’s back and she started to relax. “Noted. I need a minute to catch my breath, too.” Rhallani glanced to me with wide eyes as if surprised I’d made such an admission, but now that my injuries and the venom were fading I could tell how close I’d come to developing full on magic poisoning. I needed to let my mana regen. In an hour or two I might be able to stomach a mana potion. I looked back at her. “How are you?”

She bit her lip and turned back to cutting into the carapace. Luckily for her, it seems most of the blood had drained out of the holes I’d left on the top of the creature before it had flipped. “I’m terrified. I’m scared I’m going to have to watch someone I care about get hurt. I’m scared that something will slip past you and come at me and there’ll be nothing I can do about it. I’m scared that one of you will get injured trying to save me because I can’t protect myself.”

I couldn’t blame her. “I’m sorry. If it’s any consolation, I regret dragging you down here. The Valax colony is much larger than I thought it could possibly be.”

She shook her head. “It’s fine. I’m glad I’m here. Every kill brings me a little closer to being able to protect myself, and if you’d left me behind then I’d be going mad with worry. I’m scared out of my mind, but there’s nowhere I’d rather be than right here with you.”

Serena’s arms tightened. “The same goes for me.”

I ran my hand through her hair and kissed the top of her head. “And I wouldn’t have anyone else at my back. Now come on, we should go back to the others.”

Her head jerked up. “No! Not till I’m done!”

I chuckled. “Serena, I’m healed. You’ve gotten me up to full.” Numbers-wise, at least. It would still be a few days before my body fully recovered from the extensive damage, and my natural health regeneration was probably gutted.

She opened her mouth, then closed. Rhallani paused where she was trying to pry out a silk sac half as big as she was. “No fucking way.”

Serena searched my eyes. “You’re not lying, are you?”

I caressed her cheek. “I have never and will never lie to you.” I trailed my hand down her body, running a thumb along her breasts before I even knew what I was doing. “Your skill and our new discovery patched me right up.” It had also had another effect on me. The heat that had filled my wounds had collected in another place, and I could tell she realized as much when she leaned back in my lap and sat on my erection.

She smiled softly at me, then her smile fell. “Oh no. You don’t think my skill—”

I touched the crystal at her neck and her armor reappeared. “Let’s figure that out when we aren’t sitting on the corpse of a giant spider that nearly killed me.”

Serena very quickly stood and pulled me to my feet. Once we were both standing, she pulled me closer for a kiss. “No more almost dying.”

“I’ll do what I can.” Hopefully it would be that easy, but I wasn’t going to hold my breath.

She went to help Rhallani with the silk sac. Once they had it separated I banished it to my storage. Then Serena climbed up the rope with ease, followed by Rhallani who struggled a little. I could move my left arm again, but I didn’t trust it to hold my weight. I tied the rope around my waist and let them pull me up, using my arm and my legs to help as much as I could.

When I got to the top, everyone but Elisa was helping pull. Once I was safely up the ledge, both she and Tiana took a look at my chest and their jaws dropped. A part of me hoped it was mostly because of my physique, but I figured the angry red lines and stitches that would likely remain for a few hours were the real draw of their attention.

Elisa blushed and looked away, but Tiana drank in my every detail hungrily. I couldn’t help but notice she was red in the face, and I thought I saw her lick her lips. Then she shook herself. “So what’s a powerhouse like you doing down here? You a family friend of her girlfriend’s or something?”

I shook my head. “Nope. Just passing through. Cynthia saw me and pegged me as someone a lot stronger than their rank and offered to hire me to bring back Elisa’s body.”

Elisa, who was sitting on a rock, straightened. “Body?!”

I nodded to Rhallani. Her and Tiana helped Elisa up while I talked. “Your former party member told everyone you were dead, so yes. Body.” I started walking and everyone fell into step behind me, though Serena stayed at my shoulder this time.

“She—” her breath caught. “She thinks I’m dead? What money did she offer you we’re—” she gasped. “She offered you our stash. Everything she had. Otherwise someone as strong as you never would have cared enough to come.”

I looked at her over my shoulder and arched a brow. “Actually I told her she didn’t have enough to hire me, so I didn’t take a copper off her.”

She practically snarled at me. “You asshole! Why did you—” her words died when she realized that I was in fact the one who’d saved her life anyways. “I—I mean—”

“It’s fine. And to answer your next question, no I didn’t tell her you might be alive. I wasn’t sure at the time, so I didn’t want to get her hopes up just to crush them.”

Tiana grimaced. “Damn. That means my parents back home probably got a death notification already. I bet my sister is all kinds of fucked up right now. We need to get back soon.”

I nodded. “I agree. The sooner we get out of here the better. Unless we’re supremely unlucky, that royal Valax was the biggest thing down here, but it might not have been the only one.”

Nobody looked particularly thrilled by that. I took another glance at Elisa. Rhallani was right. She was panting already, and there was a thick sheen of sweat on her pallid forehead. There were dark bags under her eyes, and I could see her trembling from here. I kept my eyes out for any alcoves that could make defensible spots to rest.

“That doesn’t answer my question,” Tiana said. “No offense, but people with your levels don’t usually give a shit about people like me and her. You can’t really expect me to believe you came down here out of the goodness of your heart.”

I shrugged, and it didn’t escape my notice that her eyes raked down my bare back when I did. I should probably put a shirt on, but it would do little against Valax claws so I hadn’t bothered. “Whether you believe it or not, the main reason we came down was because I assumed there was a chance you were still alive. The levels and Valax silk were nice bonuses, but I made a promise to myself a long time ago that I wouldn’t ever let someone die a horrible death if I could stop it.”

She chewed the inside of her cheek and looked away, readjusting her grip on Elisa. We’d just found a crag that opened into a small space when she said, “I’d really like to clear something up.”

I took Elisa from them since it would be easier for one person to carry her through the gap. “Go ahead.”

“I acted horrifically when we first met, and I wanted to explain.”

Elisa cried out softly when her leg was jostled, but other than that made no sound until the sigh of relief when I set her on the floor inside the room. “You were under the influence of magisbane venom. Nothing to be embarrassed about.”

She slipped in as well, followed by the others. Noelle still brought up the rear. Then Tiana shook her head adamantly. “That’s like saying it’s okay to cheat because you’re drunk.” It was big enough for all of us to sit, so we sat in a circle. The golem was too big to fit in the crag, so we left it outside. I’d set Elisa on one side of the small little room, now lit by our lanterns and the light at Serena’s hip, and Serena sat next to her to look at her leg. Rhallani pulled Noelle into her lap and sat on one side of me, which left an embarrassed looking Tiana to sit on my right.

“The fact is that when you woke me up I was really horny, but it wasn’t venom that did it.” She took a deep breath. “I have a detriment class.”

Rhallani’s hands shot up to her mouth, but Serena and Elisa both looked confused. I raised a brow at Tiana. Suddenly I understood why her magic was so strong.

“A detriment class,” I explained to the others, “is a class that has some kind of drawback in exchange for more powerful than normal skills.”

“Like mine,” Noelle offered quietly.

Tiana’s eyes shot to her, but I merely said, “that’s right.” I got Tiana’s attention. “You’re sure you want to tell us?”

She swallowed, not meeting my eyes, but she nodded curtly. “I’d really like to live to see the sun again, and after seeing the thing you killed I know you’re my best chance at that. You need to understand all the tools at your disposal.” I urged her to go on and she shifted, rubbing her thighs together. “It’s called Salacious Sorceress. Horrible name, I know. It’s my secondary class, my primary being Arcanist. A more run of the mill mage class.”

It was hardly one I’d heard of, but I didn’t interrupt. “I was in a committed relationship at the time, and I really liked the guy. I liked the sex just as much, so when I got the option to take a class that said it would strengthen my magic through intimacy I took it. Later on, after my boyfriend of the time turned out to not be the man I’d hoped he was, I learned he wasn’t quite as good at it as I’d thought. I hope the girl I found him with figured that out too.” She added the last part under her breath.

“Its core skill strengthens my magic based on how…aroused I am.” She fixed her eyes on the floor, her face turning crimson. “What I didn’t know at the time was that I would always be horny because of it.”

Noelle was starting to turn purple again from how hard Rhallani was squeezing her. “Ren, is it too late to shoot for a different class?”

I threw a small rock at her, but she dodged it easily. “Yes, though knowing you anything is possible. We can always shoot for a pervy class in your third slot, and you’ll have an evolution sometime in the coming months as well.” I turned back to Tiana. “Cards on the table, no judgment. Like you said, we need to work together to make it out, and your class is hardly the most ridiculous I’ve dealt with. Are you telling us this because you want me to…help you power up?”

She shifted, her thighs rubbing together again. She nodded without looking up. “In the months since I unlocked it, I’ve been offering that to adventurers. If they let me join, they could feel me up all they wanted. It boosted my strength and it made it possible for a nobody like me to actually find decently strong groups, even if they were full of pervs and assholes.” Her hands clenched around her robes. “I never fucked any of them, though. That’s what I wanted to say, at least. That despite how I acted when I woke up, I’m no slut. I’m just…”

Elisa looked shocked, Rhallani looked intensely jealous, and Serena had pity in her eyes. Noelle seemed as impassive as usual, though she was the only one watching me. I silently got Rhallani and Serena’s attention and sent them both a questioning look.

Rhallani rolled her eyes as if to say, do you really have to ask? Serena gasped softly, blushed, then nodded a little too quickly. I raised a brow at Noelle, and her pupils narrowed to slits. She glanced at Rhallani then Serena, who had also looked to her, then back to me. Then she tilted her head in an almost imperceptible nod.

“I see,” I said finally. My voice made Tiana jump. “And is that offer only open to me? Or would you be willing to let my household here assist as well?”

Her fingers curled into her robes. “O-of course. If that’s what you think is best.” Rhallani, despite her excitement, poked me in my still-tender ribs. She’d heard the same note of disappointment as I did.

“I only ask because once we’re back in the tunnels it would be easier for Rhallani since you’re both backliners. When we’re resting, like now, I’ve got no problem helping you.” Her head snapped up, her turquoise eyes locking on mine, and I lifted my arm towards her. “I’d like to know a little more about how it works, though.”

I thought she was hardly breathing when she scooted over next to me. She was stiff as a board until I slowly slid a hand behind her back, around her waist, then up the side of her body until I slid it forward to cup her breast. I barely squeezed it and she let out a throaty breath and practically melted into me. She leaned her head on my shoulder and looked up at me through eyes half-lidded in clear pleasure. “Mmff, wh-what do you want to know?”

I gently started kneading her breast, capturing her nipple between my two forefingers. All eyes were on us, though Serena was at least still healing Elisa’s leg a bit. “As much as you’re willing to tell me, in all honesty, but let’s start with limits. What you’re comfortable with.”

She put her hand over mine and rubbed her body against my side. “I—ah—I’m okay with what you’re okay with, sir.”

I chuckled. “First off, no titles. I’m just Ren. Second off, if you knew my household, you probably wouldn’t be so quick to say that. For now I think it best if you set the limits.”

Her hand started to caress my thigh and I kneaded a little harder. “Nng—no sex.”

“Sex as in…?”

“Your cock in my pussy,” she gasped. “I don’t—I don’t want to fuck someone just because of a skill. If we fuck, I want it to be because we both want it.”

Rhallani prodded my leg, clearly wanting me to explore that last sentence, but I gently shoved her with my injured arm. Then I slid it out of its sling and twisted so I could pull Tiana back into my chest. She lifted herself up and onto my leg. She was barely shorter than me standing, but her legs seemed to go on forever. It put her at just the perfect height that I could rest my chin on her shoulder when she was in my lap. I ran a hand along her thigh, starting on the outside and sliding over to caress the tender flesh between her legs. She moaned, and I slid under her robes where her uncovered slit sat waiting. When I ran a finger up her lower lips, she arched her back and her grip on my own thigh tightened.

“Oh fuck. I knew you’d be good with your hands. Of fucking course you are,” she breathed. She spread her legs wide enough so they were outside of mine. One of her hands covered my own between her legs and the other went lower to caress my own inner thigh.

I blew air across her throat and she leaned her head back on my shoulder, already starting to gyrate her hips on my very-stiff member. I started slowly fingering the outside of her core while my other hand continued to work her breast with ever so slightly increasing fervor. “No vaginal sex. Understood. What else?”

She bucked her hips trying do slip me inside her, but I just kept caressing the outer folds. “What else? What do you mean what else? I’m not—fuck—I don’t even know what else there is to take off the table. What exactly do you want to do to me?”

Feeling her squirm in my grasp, there were a great many things I wanted to do to her. That could come later, though. After we were no longer in a spider kingdom. “Is there anywhere you don’t want me to touch? Do you want me to use my mouth?” Her hand had started stroking my length through my tattered trousers. “Do you want me to use my other equipment at all?”

She seemed to only just realize where her hand was. “Shit, sorry! I didn’t mean—”

I left her breast long enough to guide her hand back to my length. She seemed to have been enjoying it. She hesitated for a second, then went back to stroking it. “Turnabout is always fair play. I’m not going to sit here and explore your body then tell you that you can’t do the same.”

She looked at me with heat in her eyes and bit her lip, then she ran her hand the entire length. “Fuck me…” she breathed. Then her eyes widened. “An exclamation, not an invitation!” she said quickly.

I chuckled throatily. “Duly noted. My question?”

Her brows came together while she tried to recall it. “Um, I don’t—ah, I mean, whatever you think is best, I’m okay with it. You can put whatever you want wherever you want except for that one thing.” She bit her lip. “I’m sorry, did you say your mouth?”

There was a hint of desperation in her tone, so I leaned my head down and trailed my lips across the top of her shoulder. Thanks to her being a far away from the spider-blood fountains and Rhallani’s cleaning spell, she didn’t smell or taste bad in the slightest. She shuddered, and the hand on mine reached up and sunk into my hair. “I did,” I told her. Then I finally slid a finger inside her and she clenched around it. Her fingers tightened in my hair and she came with a gasp, throwing her head back.

I traced my lips up her neck and kissed the bottom of her jaw. “I suppose that brings me to my next question, how exactly does it work? Your skill, I mean. Is it just arousal that it’s based off of? Pleasure? If you orgasm, does that reset it?” The entire time I started working my finger in and out of her with increasing speed. Her breathing was already starting to quicken.

“I—oh—I don’t know! I’ve never had someone—” She spasmed and clenched my hair again. Her head turned towards me and her eyes flicked down to my lips with her own slightly parted. I leaned forward slightly and that was all she needed to close the gap. She tasted sweet, faintly enough of strawberries that I figured she must have been wearing lip balm at some point in the last day or so. She pulled back with her eyes closed. “I’ve never had someone I trusted enough to test it out on.”

You can trust me, if you want. The words died in my throat. I couldn’t say them out loud. Not now. Not down here. Not again. A cold shudder tore through me that had nothing to do with pleasure, but I hid it as well as I could. Instead I slid my fingers out and started rubbing circles around the nub at the hood of her lips while I pinched her nipple between two fingers and gently rolled it between them.

“So what should we do then?” I asked her. Her breaths were coming quicker. Her chest heaved. “Should I leave you at the edge? I imagine you’d be pretty aroused then. Or I could finish you off and promise that the next one will be even stronger. I’m guessing spending the moments we aren’t fighting thinking of what I might do to you would be pretty arousing too.”

“Th-that one!” she gasped. “The last one! Gods, I’m so close. Please. Promise me. Promise me that if we survive you’ll make me cum again.”

I smiled. “Very well.” I picked up the speed on her clit and grabbed her massive breast in one hand that was nowhere near big enough to contain all its flesh, then I squeezed while I pulled it and pressed my lips to her earlobe, then whispered, “When we get out of here, I’ll make you cum however you want. With whatever you want.”

That was enough. She went over the edge and clung to me, her hand slapping over her mouth to muffle her moans. She came with her entire body arched against mine and squirted into the center of the room. I kept fingering her clit through the climax until she went limp in my arms, then I switched to gently running my fingers up and down her outer lips.

“So the arrangement is agreeable then?” I asked her.

She let out a throaty laugh and pushed herself up. “Fucking hells. You are dangerous.” She looked back at me and I thought she looked much more relaxed than I’d ever seen her. “But I’m going to hold you to that.”

I inclined my head. “You should probably set some ground rules with Rhallani as well.”

She frowned, and Rhallani pinched my side. Tiana looked to my little Arelim uncertainly. “Well, she can’t exactly fuck me since she doesn’t have a cock, so why bother?”

I placed a kiss to Rhallani’s temple. She was drooling slightly. “Because this one is more creative when it comes to perversion than I’ll ever be.”

I looked over to where Serena and Elisa were. Elisa had fallen asleep, but Serena was looking at me with a neutral expression. Her eyes were fixed on mine, and there was a question in them that I couldn’t decipher. Had I taken things too far? Was she upset with how I’d handled Tiana somehow?

She noticed me looking and stood. “Ren, can I have a word with you outside for a moment?” she asked in a carefully controlled tone.

Warning bells went off in my head. In my admittedly limited experience, those words with that tone were rarely a good thing. But I had no reason to deny her, so I stood. I looked to where Tiana, Rhallani, and Noelle sat. “You two talk it out, I’ll be just outside. Noelle, would you keep an eye on Elisa?”

She nodded, and I followed Serena back through the crag. The golem didn’t acknowledge us, but the tunnels had been dangerously quiet since I’d killed the royal. She walked a few feet away and stopped with her arms crossed over her stomach.

I resisted the urge to wrap my arms around her. She was upset, and I wasn’t entirely sure it wasn’t my fault. “What’s wrong?”

She turned to look at me. She didn’t answer, but her emerald eyes were dark with emotion. Finally, she said, “before I ask you if you’re alright, I’m going to remind you that you promised not to lie to me.”

Damn. I understood why she was upset now. Of course when I had a beautiful, half-naked girl cumming in my lap, Serena’s eyes had been on me. She’d seen that moment of hesitation. That flash of pain that came from within. I let out a long breath, then I sat down on the ground with my back to the tunnel wall. I patted the ground next to me, and she sat, then leaned against me after a second’s hesitation.“No, I’m not alright. And it doesn’t have much to do with the giant spider.”

She sniffled. “When I found you I thought you were just upset about almost dying. I can’t help but feel like a fool, now. I doubt you’ve ever been overly concerned with close calls.”

I winced. “I’m sorry.”

She wrapped her arms around my good one and shook her head. “No. No more apologies. Not from you, and not from me. We do it too often. We stop saying sorry and start fixing the actual problem. Both of us.”

I pressed my cheek to her temple. “Alright. I guess I’ll start. I was upset when you found me, but not because I almost died. Honestly, I was upset by how little almost dying had bothered me in the moment.”

Her lips became a thin line. “I suppose that’s progress, at least.” She looked up at me. “And back there? I wasn’t sure when I found you, but I am now. I see that same darkness in your eyes as that day in the woods.”

I didn’t need to ask which day she meant. The day we’d met Kat, paladin of Tydarr. I hadn’t thought about it at the time, but it had been Thirteen that had reared his ugly head at her words. “Coming down here might have been a mistake,” I admitted.

She didn’t react, but her eyes searched every corner of my face for what felt like forever. Then she reached up and touched the gem at her neck, then pushed up enough to throw a leg over my lap so we were chest to chest. She ran her hands up my chest, then caressed my face. “Why?”

I closed my eyes, letting my hands roam around her hips and lower back. When she leaned forward I felt a distinct lack of armored panties against my erection, which meant she felt just how hard I was after her healing and my time with Tiana. “Being down here threatens to drag me back to times best left forgotten.”

She placed a soft kiss at the corner of my mouth then, with a slightly bashful look towards the golem, reached under her armor’s skirt and fished my member out of my pants. She lined me up without fanfare and sheathed me inside her, letting out a satisfied breath at the sensation of being filled. Despite her reservations, it seemed our display had gotten her plenty wet. I groaned as her heat enveloped me, then gave her a pointed look.

“I can’t take away your pain, but I can at least give you a little pleasure,” she said, her cheeks rosy.

I slid my hand along her cheek and into her hair, cupping the back of her head so I could pull her in for a real kiss. She started slowly sliding up and down my length while her tongue gently probed its way past my lips. But she wanted answers, so I pulled back.

“I spent some time in pitch black catacombs when I was younger,” I said while she rode me. She put both hands on my shoulders and used the leverage to speed up, her eyes never leaving mine. “They weren’t good times. I spent most of them injured, afraid, and expecting to die at any moment. I buried a number of friends in them, too. I went through things nobody should ever have to, all before I even turned sixteen.”

She shifted her hips to get a better angle and gasped softly, then kept riding. Her walls wrung a soft moan out of me and her lips quirked upward. The slow, peaceful movements spread the pleasure out wonderfully. I ran a hand along her thigh and she smiled at me in full. It was a reassuring smile, and it worked wonders on the aching pit in my gut.

“I survived, and I thought those times were past me. You and Rhallani and Noelle, you’ve been like anchors. Without meaning to, you’ve all helped me stay tethered to the present. You’ve helped me keep the darkest parts of myself locked away where they can’t hurt anyone, not even me.”

I started trying to thrust back into her and she stopped, holding me down with a pointed look. Only when I went still did she continue. I understood. She was the one pleasuring me this time. “I thought you three would be enough, even in a place so like the one I’d been in before. I was wrong.” I trailed my thumb along her bottom lip. “I’ve never had the luxury of choosing my trials, so I thought I’d be able to manage. But as soon as we were separated, I fell apart. I started losing the fight and I regressed. I’m…ashamed.”

That caused a hitch in her rhythm. “Why would you be ashamed?”

“Because of how quickly I gave up. As soon as it looked like I wasn’t walking out of there, I stopped thinking about how to survive. The only thing that mattered was making sure my enemy couldn’t hurt the people I cared about. Living or dying simply didn’t factor in anymore.”

She slowed to a stop, sitting with me still buried in her. There were tears in the corners of her eyes, but she blinked them away. “But you survived. You made it back to us. To me.”

I didn’t want to say what I knew I had to say next, but I’d said I wouldn’t lie to her. “I’ve got a long history at throwing myself into fights I had no business winning and walking away. In spite of my best efforts to the contrary.”

She leaned back, suppressing a moan when I shifted inside her because of the movement, and trailed her fingers down the long vertical scar on my chest. It had closed, but a long angry red line still remained. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you wanted to die.” She hid it as best she could, but I could still detect the faintest of accusations in her voice.

“I don’t,” I reassured her. “I swear to you, I don’t. But,” her eyes flicked up to mine, shrouded in the silver of held-back tears, “I did. For a long time, I did. I kept throwing myself into those fights hoping I wouldn’t walk out again, and I guess that part of me wasn’t as dead as I thought.”

She swallowed. “Will you at least tell me why? Why you would choose such a horrible form of taking your own life?”

I couldn’t meet her gaze after a question like that. “Because then I could at least convince myself it wasn’t suicide. It would have been a fight gone bad. One I’d tried and failed to win. Then, at least, it wouldn’t feel so much like giving up. Like—” a lump formed in my throat, but I swallowed it, “like breaking.”

My voice broke on the last word and she heard it. Her hand on my cheek guided my eyes back to hers. I could see the question in her eyes. The one she had no idea how to ever ask. I took mercy on her. “Eliya was the last of Karn’s experiments to survive. Other than me. Every time Karn took someone from me and I shattered, she was the one to put the pieces back together. But then Karn took her, too.”

I gripped her hips and leaned my forehead on hers, closing my eyes. “She died in my arms. She knew she was dying, and she knew what that meant. That there wouldn’t be anyone left to pick up the pieces once she was gone. With her last breath, she begged me not to let her death break me. Then she was gone. I couldn’t—I didn’t want her final act in this world to be driving me over the edge, so I held it together. No matter how bad it hurt, I didn’t let myself fall apart. Not completely, at least.”

Serena’s hands slid slowly up and down my back. I kept going. “After that, no matter how bad things got, giving up wasn’t an option. If I let something push me over that edge, it would be like admitting what happened was worse than when she was taken from me. It would have been a betrayal. I was the only thing left in this world that had her mark on it, so I wanted to do good. It was as if everything I did had a little bit of her in it, and I couldn’t bring myself to snuff that last ember out.”

She sniffled, but she still didn’t interrupt. “We didn’t have names. We had numbers. We chose our names in the dark where Karn couldn’t hear us and whispered them to one another in the only act of rebellion we could manage. She was the one who chose Zaren for me after I failed to come up with anything good. I was the last one who knew her name. Her laugh. The sound of her voice. I couldn’t take that from the world, but I couldn’t keep going with it either.”

“So I kept fighting. Kept winning, even though every time I came out alive disappointed me to some extent. Then, after I killed Grimsbane and saved everyone under his thumb, I finally figured I’d done enough. I’d taken the gift she gave me as far as I could. I could rest. It wasn’t giving up, it was…finishing things.”

She brushed her lips against mine. “But you’re here now.”

The corner of my mouth lifted in something that was almost a smile. “Yes. Allura convinced me to hang around a little bit longer,” I slid my hand to cup the back of her neck, “and I’m glad she did.”

She started riding me again, slowly and deliberately. She kept our heads pressed together, even when her breathing started to quicken. “I can’t take away your past, but I can do everything in my power to promise you a future.”

It was a foolish thing to ask, yet I felt myself asking it anyways. “If you want to promise me anything, promise me you won’t die. Give me someone to come back to, and I’ll find my way back to you every time.”

Her movements started to pick up speed. I could feel her twitching around me. “I will. I’ll live, Zaren, so you have to live, too.”

I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her down onto me one last time and came. From her shuttered gasp, I knew she was cumming too. I filled her up, and we sat there for a while just holding one another.

“Thank you,” I said finally.

She laughed softly. “See? Doesn’t that sound so much better than ‘I’m sorry?’”

I couldn’t help but agree. While I held her I did everything in my power to lock Slave Thirteen as far in me as possible, but I knew it was futile. I’d broken the seal, and I’d have to deal with the consequences.