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Story Codes: Fantasy, Magic

For a list of all The Rogue’s Harem, other World of Erasthay stories, maps, and glossaryclick here

Comments are very welcome. I would like all criticism, positive and negative, so long as it’s
constructive, and feedback is very appreciated.

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Click here for Chapter 36.

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Note: Thanks to WRC 264 for beta reading this!

Princess Ava – Princedom of Kivoneth, The Strifelands of Zeutch

“You need to… keep them alive,” I panted to Greta, my face flushed. I lowered Sven’s shoulders to the ground, holding his right side, my bedmaid the left.

Her youthful face glanced up at me. “What? Are you… going somewhere?”

I sucked in a deep breath, my heart racing from dragging Sven back to the fire where the others lay trembling and quivering, the poison raging through their bodies. My entire body trembled, fear clawing through my guts. They couldn’t die.

My family couldn’t die.

“We’ll keep them… alive, Your Highness,” croaked Nathalie, the only one still conscious, her face wan, and her body wrapped up in a blanket.

“But where are you going?” Greta asked.

“Az.” I drew in a deep breath and laid down beside Sven. I closed my eyes and let my soul slip out of my body into the feyhound’s form.

I settled into my new form, rising up onto the four legs. My body felt long and lean. I glanced around, my perspective lower. I breathed through the feyhound’s nose and… smelled. My other proxies had the sense of touch, I could be stimulated sexually through them, but I couldn’t smell. I couldn’t taste.

I didn’t even understand how I could imbue the feyhound. I hadn’t prepared it. I hadn’t bonded to it. It just… felt open. Emptied. It didn’t matter. I had to get help. I bounded away from the fire, my four feet slapping on the hard-packed road leading along the Forest of Lhes. My legs stretched out as I ran faster and faster, the land blurring beside me.

I felt no exhaustion. The feyhound’s form didn’t have muscles. The branches that wove its body into a wicker form didn’t need to rest. It had no heart that had to labor. Nothing but my will kept it moving.

And I would save my family.

I raced down the road dark as fast as a horse. As fast as the wind. The stars blazed clear above me, wheeling across the sky, the crescent moon rising towards a zenith. I hardly noticed because I dwelt in my fear. It squeezed my brain, compressing it. Terrors whipped at me to keep running, to keep flying down the road.

What if Sven died while I went for help? What if Kora? Zanyia? I didn’t even want Aingeal or Ealaín to perish. I had to save them all.

I had to.

How long would it take me to reach Az?

What if they died?

Slata, I prayed to the mother of all, watch over my family. Watch over those I love. Don’t let them perish. Please, please! And Rithi, sustain your priestess and her family! Let her live to keep producing art in your honor.

My fears haunted me every moment as I ran down the road.

The world lightened before me, a soft, green glow built ahead of me. The darkness of the forest didn’t race on my right any longer as Lake Verdant’s soft light lit up the night. Hope surged through me. The lake country. I neared Az. I could reach it in time.

I kept running faster and faster, passing Lake Verdant’s shimmering surface. Another light lit up the western horizon, a soft blue hue. Lake Cerulean. Az lay near it’s shores, built between the major lakes, each glowing a different hue.

I would save my family.

As the sun rose behind me, I crested the hill and spotted the city of Az sprawling before me, Lake Cerulean glowing to the south. I knew this city. I had lived here for several years, attending the University with the other powerful and rich of Zeutch and the surrounding nations. Not even the Strife had hindered the center of learning in the world. I raced down the road, passing the farms that ringed the city. Houses grew more and more common as I entered the outskirts of the city, racing by the growing crowds of people spilling out to start their days.

People gasped at the sight of me. I ignored them. I darted down familiar streets, snarling and growling, barreling around men pushing wheelbarrows, darting beneath the hooves of horses pulling draft wagons. I let nothing stop me as I wove through the streets of Az towards the Temple of Rithi.

Kora’s fellow priests were my family’s only hope.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ealaín

Heat gripped me. I swam through the fever. I groaned and trembled. Fear rippled yellow through the stifling darkness that gripped me. I was failing. My charge. Kora was dying. I was dying. How could I inspire her to create amazing art if she died?

I darted from the heat. I stumbled through it, searching for something. I didn’t know what. Why? I didn’t recognize my surroundings. Everything blurred around me. I grasped a wall, something smooth beneath my touch.

Something familiar.

“Mother?” I asked, stumbling down a hallway. My entire body shuddered and shook. I blinked, struggling to focus my eyes. “Mother?”

“My daughter,” a voice tinkled from around me, sounding like a breeze blowing through metallic chimes.

“Mother!” I gasped, the world spinning around me. “I’m… I’m dying, Mother.”

“Yes,” Rithi, Goddess of Art, whispered, her words spinning around me. “The poison ravages your mortal flesh. Your soul’s tether to your body is weakening.”

“Is there… Is there hope?” I asked. “For Kora? Her potential to create beauty in the world is so great…”

“There is always hope.”

“This is Sven’s fault.” I swayed, the heat growing so great. It boiled out of my body and infected my soul. I was wandering from my body, drifting through the Astral Realm. I’d found my way to my mother’s realm.

“Sven?” she asked. “Sven poisoned her?”

“He led her into the position to be poisoned.” I straighten, struggling to focus my blurry vision, to spot my mother’s form. “She’s just too much of a gentle soul to object to his whims, Mother.”

A blurry figure moved closer to me. I stared at her, struggling to see her form. She resolved into clarity as she stopped before me, mother’s slender and refined figure becoming clear, her skin as deep-black as mine, her long, flowing hair fell white about her shoulders, a color so pure it almost hurt my vision to gaze upon.

Her bright-purple eyes seized mine. “What do you mean, daughter? Her brother inspires her.”

“Her brother is killing her, Mother,” I said. “She loves him so much she has forsaken her craft. She has allowed herself to be swept up in his destructive quest for revenge. He has led her into a world of violence and placed her into harms way time and time again. He gave her the cursed necklace she wears around her neck.

“She will die, Mother, if she stays with him.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Princess Ava – Az, Princedom of Kivoneth, The Strifelands of Zeutch

“I need help!” I shouted through the feyhound’s muzzle, the words coming out harsher, deeper than my own.

I raced up the steps of the Temple of Rithi, my wooden claws clicking on the marble that ran up to the impressive columns holding up the triangular peaks of the massive roof. It was made of all stone, images of the Goddess Rithi carved into the building, showing her painting, orating, sculpting, dancing, love-making, writing, and more. She created art in every way possible, her features brought to life with such precision.

“Please!”

The baby-faced youth, wearing the white robes of a glimmer (a novice priest-in-training), straightened up as he stood at the entrance. He smoothed his robes as he stared at my strange body bounding up to him.

“Hurry, hurry! My family is dying. I need to speak with a priest or priestess. A… A radiant.”

“Family?” the young man asked, his voice quivering and cracking. “What? What are you?”

“That doesn’t matter,” I snarled, fear squeezing any patience out of me. “Kora Falk is dying! She needs to be healed. I need help! Right now!”

The glimmer blinked his eyes. He threw a look over his shoulder, peering through the open doors into the temple. Then he looked back at me. “Kora… Falk?”

I let out a whining groan. “You’re new. You don’t know Kora?”

He shook his head.

“She’s a radiant from this temple. She’s been poisoned.”

“Kora… Falk?” he asked again. “Are you… sure? You’re a… a…”

“It’s just a vessel,” I snarled. “Please, please, fetch a radiant. She’s dying. She needs to be healed. If you don’t, you’ll be responsible for Kora Falk’s death!”

“Well… I…” He shifted in his white robes, rubbing his hands together. “If you need healing, I’d go to the Temple of Slata.”

“Kora is one of you!” a howled. “You should be the one to help her. And there’s an aoi si. One of your Goddess’s daughters.”

“Kora Falk? I really haven’t heard of this radiant. You say she’s from this temple. Why haven’t I heard of her before? And an aoi si? Truly?”

“Because of politics,” a new voice said. Behind the glimmer, a pink-robed priestess appeared, red hair spilling about a mature, freckled face. Her blue eyes stared down at me, wide. “You say Kora Falk is dying, Princess.”

She knew who I was? “Yes! She’s been poisoned. Her and… others.”

“It is good to hear that she lives,” the priestess said.

“For now. We have to go.”

“Radiant Gertrude?” the glimmer asked, staring at the priestess.

“You heard the princess,” the radiant said. “One of our radiants and a demigoddess needs our help. Go and saddle my horse.”

Hope surged through me. “Hurry!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Zanyia

Throbbing pain pounded my skull. My eyes fluttered open, staring up at leaden skies. I whimpered, my thoughts muddled. My ears flicked. I inhaled, smelling stale sweat and sickness. I squirmed beneath the heavy blankets.

“Master…” I murmured.

“Shh,” a girl said, her face peering down at me. She had blonde hair framing her round features.

“Who… are… you…?” I asked.

“I’m Greta,” she said. “Don’t you remember me? I’m Princess Ava’s bedmaid. We’ve been traveling together the last few days.”

“Princess…?” My thoughts fought against the smothering lethargy. I could feel it on my mind, holding me down from thinking. “I… What’s happening?”

“It’s the poison. You fought the assassin and—”

I hissed and tried to sit up. I got halfway up and then the world spun around me. My vision fuzzed dark. I whimpered, falling back onto the ground. I had to get up. I had to fight that lamia-bitch. I had to claw out her throat. I hissed and spluttered.

“It’s okay, Zanyia, he’s dead,” Greta said. “You need to calm down. You’re very sick.”

“Greta!” the weak voice of Nathalie shouted. “It’s Kora!”

The panic in Nathalie’s voice shot through my smothering weight. I turned my head as Greta scrambled away from me. Kora lay beside the fire, her head pillowed on Nathalie’s lap. My Mistress thrashed and trembled, foam bubbling out of her mouth.

“She won’t stop thrashing,” Nathalie groaned. “Greta! I don’t think she’s going to last longer.”

“M-Mistress…” I groaned. I tried to throw my blanket off of me. But it was so heavy. “N-no. No. She can’t… She can’t.”

I sat up and—

The dizziness seized me. Darkness crashed over me. I fell backward as weakness drew me down, Nathalie’s crying growing softer and softer. I wanted to help.

To save…

Mistress…

To be continued…

Click here for Chapter 38.

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I have released a part 43 of the revamped Devil’s Pact on Smashwords. Read this post for more information if you’re interested!