Arcanum Of Steamwork And Magic Ch 16

November 1

st

, 1885

The elven city of Quintarra swayed beneath my feet – moving and groaning like Edward Teach's ship at the high seas. I gripped onto the thin rope that served as the only security as the elven woman Raven led me from the base of the platform leading to the residence of the Silver Lady to the front entrance itself. Raven was, despite her earlier smiles, a woman that seemed to be quite severe in temperament. The earlier flare of sunny disposition had vanished beneath the storm clouds of focused concentration, leaving her feeling as unapproachable as a distant cliff – though just as achingly beautiful. Watching her climb the tree ahead of my self, I was reduced to a fumbling, hamfisted child, rather than a fellow who had scaled a few cliffs in his day. There was simply no contest between my scant months of practice and what untold eons this beauty had passed clambering through the treetops. Despite this, her face showed no scorn as she reached the highest branch. There she stood, her feet firmly planted, bare against the hard bark, her clothing tight and fitted for movement and grace – not modesty. She held out a hand to me and I grasped it.

Here, I at least could feel some measure of comfort. Her muscles tensed and I felt only a slight pressure against me own weight. It was less of an assistance and more a guidance, showing me where to push myself to with my own leg muscles, but it was good to know that at least elven grace was paid for by a lack of the more brutish application of muscle.

Standing beside Raven, I looked to her for instruction – and she jerked her elegant chin to a door that looked to have been carved directly into the living wood of the tree, taking advantage of knotholes and curvature of bark to form hinge and seam. It was quite an elegant design, nearly invisible from a distance, but breathtakingly beautiful to behold up close, covered in subtle geometric patterns. I traced one pattern with my finger, then looked at Raven. "What are these patterns, Miss Raven?"

She looked into my eyes. "An elf can no more create a stag or a wolf in bark than you can on parchment with ink. We simply don't lie to ourselves about it."

Ah. Fascinating,

I thought. But then the door swung inwards with a push of Raven's hand and I beheld the vast emptiness of the tree – unlit and dim. I spared a glance back to my companions: They all seemed so very small down there on the platform. Had we really climbed so far? So fast? And yet, despite their smaller stature, I could clearly see the look of intense concern upon Virginia's face. I lifted my hand to her and waved. She clutched to her chest, but then waved back with a mail clad hand. I turned to face the darkness. As my eyes adjusted, Raven murmured softly in my ear: "Mr. Cog, I have heard your tale from Whysper. It is a disturbing one – dark and full of mystery. I hope that my mother gives you the answers that you seek. But..." She paused. "The Silver Lady is a being of great magickal power. Her spirit swims in the

flow

, rather than upon the shore of time, as we do. She is more of other worlds than this one. Her answers are never what one expects. Listen carefully, no matter how distracted you may become."

I nodded, keeping my eyes focused ahead of me. Within the dimness of the chamber, I could see a silvery lump of fabric and flesh, seated upon a chair I could not

quite

make out. The figure seemed hunched and elderly, a thought that took my breath away. I tried to picture just how ancient an elf would need to be to show a wrinkle. How many generations, how many millennia, could a single person witness and still remain sane? With a feeling of creeping dread, I squared my shoulder. Raven, her voice soft, murmured: "Your weapons, Mr. Cog."

I started. But of course. I withdrew my pistol from my coat, and took off my electrical charge rings as well, not wishing to risk the effect of even the slightest technological field within a magickal place such as this. Before I forgot, I too removed my pocket watch – finding that it had completely seized up. Not even a single

tick

.

Thus disarmed, I stepped into the chamber of the Silver Lady.

The door closed and darkness became absolute. And then, like the universe returning, a light came – first a spark here, then there, then everywhere as the walls became coated in a fine patina of faerie lights. It was as if an entire colony of fireflies had roosted at once upon every whorl and knot of wood in those ancient walls. And I do mean ancient: The scent of the place was rich and must with generations of decay and new growth. The floor was covered in a soft moss that grew in a slow, lazy, not

quite

symmetrical spiral, leading inevitably towards where the Silver Lady sat...upon thin air. Now that the room positively glowed, I could see that the slender, shriveled lump of white and silver silks that was the Silver Lady sat upon

nothing

. There was simply emptiness between her lotus crossed legs and the mossy ground. Her body shifted – was that her shoulder? Or a head? A pair of almond shaped, brilliantly silver eyes gleamed from between the folds of that oddly shaped robe, and a voice like crackling leaves and rasping leather came from her throat.

"Hello...I welcome you, traveler."

Her voice did not arrive in my ears at the same time it left her lips. It overlapped and echoed, like the sound coming from deep within a well...and yet completely unlike. Sounds from a well sounded distorted, after all. But this felt oddly natural – as if there was no other way for her to

sound

. My body leaned into it and I felt my whole form tensing. An eerie, crawling sensation prickled along my spine as it struck me just how vast it was, this world of ours. I had traveled into the depths of the Wheel Clan. I had seen were-rat armies on the march in the darkness of long forgotten mines. I had trekked across the Morbihan Plains, seen first hand ancient wonders washed up on the shore of the Isle of Despair, and even stepped through the life of another man via a phantasmagorical encounter with a specter. I had spoken with ghosts, matched wits with necromancers, and even witnessed the vile Arronax himself – the fell shadow that even now crept across Arcanum like a death shroud.

And yet...

I had

never

seen anything, heard anything, like this.

"I know you have come far," that echoing voice continued. "And I have expected you for a long time now."

"What do you mean?" I asked, my voice horse.

A soft chortle came from beneath the sheets. "I've seen you approaching from the east and from the west, Resh. You bring them with you, you know. All of them. They have

no

choice but to follow." She chuckled at how I tensed up.

"How do-"

"How do I know that you call yourself this, deep within?" She asked. "You told me, Resh, darling."

Her hand reached from beneath the robes – and for a single panicked moment, with my heart racing at a million miles an hour, I swore that it was a skeletal

thing

reaching for me. Bone white fingers, knobby and twisted and ancient. But then that finger touched my chin and the warmth of youth and life filled it. I saw her hand was more akin to silk, and the sheets she wore slipped aside as the Silver Lady unfolded in the air, spreading herself like the butterfly does when it sheds its cocoon. Standing nearly as tall as me, with hair the same pure silver-white as the sheets she had worn, the Silver Lady was ethereally beautiful in a way that stole my breath and stilled my heart to barely a motion. Her breasts were firm and high and tipped with nipples so pale pink they were nearly the same hue as her porcelain pale skin. She was utterly without blemish – no marks, no scars, no discoloration. Even her feet were dainty and perfect, and they remained in a ballerina's pose as she floated in the air before me. Her hair rippled and shimmered as if it were under water, and she looked down into my eyes as she crested upwards, her silver painted lips twisting into a wry smile.

"We have done this already," she said, quietly. Her fingers worked at the buttons of my shirt – and while her voice still echoed, it no longer rasped. It, instead...rang. Like chimes. "And we shall do this again."

I felt as if I were in a dream as her elegant fingers undid button after button. My shoulders rolled of their own accord, the motion subtle and gentle. Languid, even, as if I were a snake shedding my skin. My green muscles shone faintly under the firefly light and the Silver Lady leaned her lips forward. They were cool as they touched to the joining of neck and shoulder muscle – tracing the line of my strength. Her voice was a quiet croon. "But I admit, I do always

enjoy

it..."

My undershirt hit the floor behind me and the dreamlike feeling snapped, like a rope drawn taut across a knife's edge. My lips skinned back into a grin and I looked into the Silver Lady's face. "Is this absolutely

required

for the answers I seek, oh Silver Lady?" I asked, reaching up and cupping my hand upon the rump of a woman who likely was older than most human historical records. It was as smooth as a peach and as deliciously tight as any woman I had ever felt. Squeezing her, I drew an echoing, magick infused laugh from the ancient being.

"Without a doubt, Resh Craig. Without a

doubt

."

And with that, she was upon me. She weighed less than nothing – touching her made me feel as if I was floating in the air. Her lithe, limber legs wrapped about my hips and hooked against the small of my back. Despite her frail stature, there was an iron strength in her, a strength that shocked me. It was the strength of ages – of magick and primordial time. It pressed the heat of her sex to my belly, and held my fast as her arms wrapped around my shoulders. Fingers worked into the long queue of hair I wore – and before I knew it, she had undone the tie and was caressing my hair out into its great, untamed length and wildness. Her lips, though, were the most busy of all: Locked on mine, she was plundering my mouth with a surety and grace that only ten thousand years could glean.

My hands gripped her thighs and I dragged the Silver Lady to the ground. My knees pressed to the matted moss under me, and I realized how grateful I was not only for her lightness, but also for the gentleness of this ground. My hands slid from thigh to back to breasts, finding her nipples with my fingertips. I stroked her – and when her lips drew back and she let out an animal fierce groan, I used my strength upon her. I twisted and tugged, drawing her taut breasts out and forcing her spine to arch as her head rolled back. Her silvery eyes glowed and she crooned. "Ah...what is it you seek, Resh?" She gasped, then moaned. "We...speak different languages, ah, you and I. The things I see? They are wrapped in the past..." I sucked one nipple into my mouth, my lips as soft and gentle as my fingers had been fierce. "Mmmrr, shrouded in the veils of magick. Ah, gods. I cannot

translate.

You must, mmhh, yes, keep doing that..." I kissed a slow, gentle line between one breast and the other, my free hand stroking her glorious silver hair.

The Silver Lady regarded me – her face alight with pleasure – as I looked up at her, my lips sucking on her other nipple.

"What is you seek, Resh?" she purred.

I drew my mouth back. Suddenly, my lips were dry. I pressed my chin to her chest, feeling the sleek heat of her.

"Am..." I looked into her eyes, steeling myself. "Am I the Living One?"

Her eyes sparkled. "The Living One?" She laughed, showing sharp teeth. "Oh, Resh, why do you think

I

would know such a thing? The answer is no clearer to one such as myself, living both in and out of the stream, than to you...one who...walks along the shore." Her finger stroked my cheek, then tweaked my mustache. "The flow swirls about prophecy, my beautiful human, my lovely orc. Prophecy can only be seen when they are ready – and when that comes...well...who cares

who

pointed the finger at

what

."

I nuzzled her, my eyes closing. My voice was wry. "It would be...nice..." I paused between words to kiss her belly, pushing her upwards. Her legs loosened enough to allow her to glide up my body, taking advantage of her own graceful floating. This still left a line of her slick eagerness against my belly and my chest, and the friction against my body drew a musical moan from the ancient beauty I held. I kissed her belly button, licked around it, then continued: "If Molocheans stopped trying to kill me for it."

She grinned. "They can see only what follows in your wake, Resh. Pass your hand through a flame, the smoke dances. If you are tired of the pattern, then stop dancing to it. Shed your mantle. Change your name and vanish." She squeezed my hair, tugging my head ever so slightly to the side, where I could kiss the beginning curve of her hip-bone, sharp against her slenderness. "If you won't, then do not be surprised at what lost children do, my sweet."

I kissed the start of her groin – the flat plane between belly button, right before the gentle folds of her lips. For merely a moment, I longed to nuzzle into Virginia's soft pubic hair, to breathe in her scent. My eyes closed and I breathed out: "It

would

be nice..." I kissed down to her clit, then slowly circled it. "To let this go and just retire quietly..." I closed my lips around her clit and sucked, drawing out a languid, sighing moan from the elven beauty before me. Her chortle was a mixture of kind and cruel, dancing on the knife's edge of mockery. Her finger, though, was gentle as it wound its way through my hair, coaxing me to tenderly nurse her clit, to lick and suckle her as my fingers began to slide up and down her cunt, feeling her arousal drip and flow.

"But you have not," she said, quietly.

I drew my mouth back from her sex, nodding. "Well. I have a clan of dwarves to rescue." I grinned lopsidedly up her body, looking at her face between the valley of her breasts. The fact she floated in the air before me left me feeling faintly jarred – part of my brain expected to feel the warmth of a bed under my belly, but no. I was kneeling, she floating, in this dreamlike space beyond time. The Silver Lady gripped my head, pushing my face between her thighs, which locked around my head, enfolding me in silky darkness as my mouth opened and pressed to her sex. My tongue slid into her, tasting the exotic flavor of an elven mystic. As I tongued her sex, the Silver Lady spoke – her voice hitching with pleasured gasps and slow, almost pained groans.

"I can see them, Resh. But...ah, the ravens are circling. And the storm rages..." She closed her eyes and her back arched. "Ah! Ah! Yes! Yes! The storm...subsides..." She quivered, and a flow of her juices slid along my tongue and into my throat – tasting of strawberries and the fresh smell of dew on the grass. My hands cradled and cupped her athletic rump, holding the Silver Lady to me as I drank form her as a man pulled from the depths of the Morbihan might drink from a cup. "And yet there is lightning. Nnnh. There is shadow. The storm! It howls away,

tearing

. Tearing, I...I cannot look!"

I opened my eyes to see that she had twisted herself above me, rolling and thrashing from side to side. Her thighs tugged my head about, and I focused upon her words and upon tonguing her center of pleasure, even as the Silver Lady's eyes closed and she jerked her head backwards. She screamed her bliss and her legs tightened about my head...and then, slowly, relaxed as she began to float away, her ankles unhooking from behind my body. I gripped her legs and tugged her down. She moved as if we were both under water, and her hair flowed with her movements, sheeting around me, trapping me in a cocoon of refracted, silvery light. Those glowing eyes met mine and she grabbed my head. Her voice came as a soft croon: "Look, Resh. They've taken him in. The small child, fleeing the broken crown, with the machine dreams and hands of hinged metal and heart that ever waits to be stoked and filled with coal..." Her tongue slid along my lips, even as I stiffened.

Well.

Part of me already had – but even my member was far from my thoughts in that moment of realization. "You're speaking of Gilbert Bates!" Excitement filled me. Then, dashed. "But that happened in the past, not the future...he's an old man now..."

The Silver Lady chuckled. "Is he now? I..." Her brow furrowed. "I don't

know

, Resh. Listen." Her hands were cool against my cheeks, despite how hot her sex had been. "I see a flame atop a hill, burning so brightly it would

blind

you. And below is a field of wheat around a pool of water..." She licked her lips. "The flame spits, and burns, and it consumes the lake and then it

loses

itself." She closed her eyes. Her body grew colder. Of their own accord, my arms wrapped themselves about her shoulders, drawing her close, seeking to warm her. But she was growing more and more frigid in my grip, chilling past the point of hypothermia.

"It is so

dark

here, Resh. So dark. So cold. But the flame is here too..." her lips touched to my ear and she whispered, so softly I could nearly not hear her over the chattering of my teeth. "This flame burns black onyx and shadow is its child. Are

they

here as well?" Her eyes closed. "I...I can't see that far."

I felt her beginning to warm. Slowly, I laid the Silvery Lady back onto the moss. Her thighs spread and despite the chill that still coated my body, my member remained achingly hard. Her sex looked as welcoming as her eyes – which were lidded and looked at me with glowing eagerness. She had bit her lower lip, drawing a thin line of blood that gleamed along her pale chin, shockingly red even under the warm light of the fireflies. My palms pressed to either side of her head and I loomed above her, looking down. My voice was soft. "What else do you see, Silver Lady?"

Her grin was slow. "Please, Resh...please. We both know it fits."

I shook my head. "Of the

future

..." I tensed, then, as her finger had pressed to the very tip of my member. Her finger pressed to the eagerness welling from me, growing tacky and slick with my pre-cum. Her eyes grew somber and sad.

"She'll never bear your child, Resh," she said, quietly. "Your guide through your afterlife will stay, until separation comes again and you walk alone into the furthest sky. But there will not be another Resh, another mixing of the peoples. Take comfort in what

is

. Not what will be." Her hand slid up and she clenched her fist around my cock. Her strength and the eerie pressure of her eyes guided me forward. Her hips lifted off the ground to meet me and almost against my will, I penetrated her. It was not forced – it was more that her eerie predictions had so unsettled me that I hardly wished it. But once I had entered into the Silver Lady, feeling the silky slickness, the heat, the

pressure

. All of it. My balls rested against her ass as I hissed softly.

"I see a plane of mirrored glass," the Lady whispered. "A sky of white. A lone figure. Which is the reflection? Which is

real

. I...ahhh..." She moaned as I kissed her neck. "I do not know."

I began to thrust. The movement was fierce and feral, a sudden need to be in control of something, even if it was merely the physical movement of my body, exploded through my body. I grabbed onto the Silver Lady's ankles, spreading her wider as I

slammed

into her body, my balls slapping against her ass like a palm. The slap slap slap slap of body meeting body within this otherworldly room was strong and earthy and brought a grin to my lips, even as the Silver Lady's back arched and she gasped and mewled in pleasure.