It was the hardest promise that I had ever had to make. This world though, this land and the people in it, had become my home over the past few months. And if you weren’t prepared to fight for your home, what else was there worth fighting for?
We left the chamber after that. There seemed precious little to say. I was elated, but thoughtful. When the girls asked me whether we should head straight back to the dorm, I shook my head.
“I’ll catch up with you two,” I said. “I won’t be long. I’m just going to take a quick lap around the castle. Breathe the air. Try and clear my head.”
Elenari and Saya kissed me on the cheeks and smiled understandingly.
Chapter 4
When I arrived back at the dorm room that I shared with Elenari and Saya, I found the other two women already there. They were dressed in the same garments they had been wearing when they had left the Overseer’s chamber; the uniform of Rank One dragonmancers and their battle armor. Given our progression in the last few months, I doubted we would remain Rank One for much longer.
Saya was covered in grime and blood, of course—a lot of blood. None of it, as far as I could tell, was hers. It was one of the things I found so appealing about the tall, strong blonde: the fact that if she had been strutting about on Earth, on the streets of L.A., she would have been pigeonholed as just another vapid glamor model. However, she was far from useless and empty-headed. The juxtaposition between her outer appearance and her ruthless capabilities was one that I found uniquely intoxicating. She was as deadly and self-assured as any panther that stalked the forest.
Elenari, having arrived in the capacity of messenger, looked only windswept. Her eyes, though, burned with an urgency that I felt in my own chest. Clearly, she wanted to get moving as soon as possible. She was champing at the bit to get into the Subterranean Realms and find what we needed to craft a crystal for Wayne so that he could attain maturity.
Time was running out. Running fast.
Saya removed her armor and set it down carefully. Then, she pulled her filthy, gore-covered shirt over her head and threw it in the corner. She was revealed in all her glory then; the hard muscles of her arms and stomach etched out in her tall, athletic frame like they had been carved with a chisel. Her large, perfect breasts were coated in a layer of sweat and dirt.
She caught me gazing admiringly at her and smiled knowingly.
“Looks to me like I’m not the only one whose blood is up after that fight with the wildmen,” she said.
With groan-inducing slowness, Saya unbuckled her sword belt and let it drop to the floor with a heavy clunk. She kicked off her boots. Then, wriggling that muscular gymnast’s ass of hers, she slid her pants slowly down her thighs until she stood buck naked on the floor.
“I’m going for a bath,” she said, her eyes flicking between Elenari and myself. “Anyone care to join me?”
With little to no conscious thought, I stripped off my own armor and placed it by the foot of my bed. Then, I ripped my soiled shirt over my head, pried my boots off, and flung my breeches into the corner where they were picked up by whatever kind soul did the dragonmancer’s laundry.
Saya was right, my blood was up. It might have been the lingering effects of the battle. Could have been the anger and resentment that was slowly leeching out of me now that the Overseer had finally given us the go-ahead. It might have been a combination of the two. Whichever the reason, I could feel my sex-drive revving up. My insides burned with the need to lose myself in a sea of red lust.
My cock twitched in anticipation as Saya ran her bright blue eyes over my body.
“I guess that’s one,” she said.
I grabbed a towel from the stack and tossed one to Saya. The Amazonian blonde caught it deftly and wrapped it around herself.
“Elenari,” she said as she opened the door to the corridor leading to the dragonmancer’s private shower and bathroom, “I know you’re not dirty like Mike and I, but we can remedy that…”
Elenari bit her lip, glanced at me, and then pointed at the stack of towels. In the time that it took me to turn, grab another fluffy towel, and throw it to her, she was already out of her breeches and wriggling out of her long fighting shirt.
My breath caught, as it always did, on observing the beautiful waif-like elf. Her skin was as pale and flawless as milk, contrasting brilliantly with her long, red hair.
“Um,” I said, suddenly struck by something that must have been as close to parental responsibility as I had ever come. “Where’s the little guy? Where’s Wayne?”
Elenari’s excited face fell a little. She pointed over to her bed. Looking, I saw a slight haze of pale blue smoke coming from underneath it.
“He’s under there in a nest he’s made of yours, mine, and Saya’s clothes,” the elf said. “All he does is sleep now, basically.”
I opened my mouth to say something, some bullshit about sleep being the great healer or something, but Elenari shook her head and hitched a mischievous look onto her face with an effort.
“Come on,” she said, smiling wickedly as she wrapped the towel around her. “You don’t want Saya to start without us, do you?”
I grinned. “I can think of worse things to walk in on than that,” I replied. And the two of us walked out
