A Demon Scorned

Anita

The next day a messenger was dispatched to the palace in Kerath's capital to tell King Hector that the High Lord of Cendan wished an audience with him. Saban and I didn't wait for the king's reply, though, or for the large encounterage that was being organized for the trip to Kerath. We set out on our own.

I needed to see my family, and reassure them I was well. Saban wanted to apologize for the attack and kidnapping me. He assured me that no one had been harmed in the attack; they were all just stunned. That matched the memories I had of tranq sticks and stun spells, so I believed him.

It felt odd to be riding Saban in horse shape again. After all, he was not my familiar anymore; he was the High Lord of Cendan. However, Saban enjoyed carrying me, and, with his unnatural speed and endurance, it was the fastest way to travel.

We decided not to use an official crossing point. It was entirely possible that the guards there would balk at allowing a demon from Cendan to enter, and I didn't want to get into any fights. Instead, we traveled through the woods. However, we joined up with a road soon after crossing the border, mostly because I was getting sick of ducking low hanging branches.

We stopped for the night in a large town not far from the border. I wanted to sleep in an actual bed, and Saban didn't see any reason to avoid the place. I knew of the town by reputation, though I'd never been there. It was reputed to be home to a sizable black market of illegal imports from Cendan, which had a much more lax policy on drugs and mind altering spells than Kerath.

The brothels there also had a reputation for being some of the best in the kingdom. Between that, the drug market, and the large number of gambling dens, it was a popular vacation spot for a wild partiers.

I, personally, had never seen the appeal of drugs or gambling, and I wasn't much for wild parties, so it had never tempted me. Its convenient location near the border was the only reason I was visiting now.

As we crossed the main square, Saban halted, frowning up at one of the brothels. I looked up at him. "What's wrong?"

His frown deepened. "There's a demon in there. I can sense her. And I'm getting conflicting readings on her power levels. Interesting."

"Want to check it out?" I asked, though I wanted nothing more than to lie down in bed, and maybe ask Saban to give me a massage. Riding was hard on certain parts of the anatomy.

Saban nodded. "I'd like that, yes."

We entered the building. The front room was simply furnished and dimly lit. I could smell incense and perfume on the air. Directly across the room from the door was a desk. The man at the desk smiled. "Welcome to the Red Lily! How may we pleasure you this evening?"

"We've heard you've got a demon here," said Saban. "I'd like to get a look at her."

The man nodded. "Ah, yes. Dross. She specializes in catering to clients of... Unusual taste." He rose and went through a curtained doorway behind the desk.

*

Saban

My eyes narrowed. Unusual taste? What did he mean by that? The man rose and disappeared through a curtain. Instantly his footsteps were inaudible. A sound dampening spell?

Not long after the man vanished, I heard his voice again, muffled by the spell. I could only hear him because he was yelling. A human wouldn't be able to hear him at all. "Dross! Stop idling and get your perky little ass out to the lobby! A client wants to see you!"

I felt the demon approaching, and reached into her mind. I could feel her tense. She'd never encountered a demon lord before, but she knew what I was, and did not resist me. Good.

Apparently the dual readings I'd been getting were the result of her ability to hide her power level. Interesting. I could feel another special talent in her, an extension of the first, but before I could get a reading on it, she came through the curtain, and I got my first look at her current form.

Beside me, Anita gasped. "She doesn't have a mouth."

The man came through the curtain behind her. "As I said, she caters to our more unusual clients," he told us.

I knew what he meant by unusual now. I could see it in her mind. She catered to those who enjoyed causing pain. I reached into her memories of her time here, reading them. I'd never realized how sadistic humans could be. A few of her clients almost rivaled my father in their technique. Interesting.

I could feel her other talent now. She could decrease other demon's sense of her power until she seemed not to be there at all. I decided I wanted her for my own. But how to get her wizard to release her?

*

Anita

Saban looked thoughtful. He cocked his head, staring at the other demon. Then, suddenly, a woman burst out of the back room. "Dross!"

Before, the demon's power had been the equivalent of a vague sort of buzz in the back of my mind. Now it was a roar, almost like Saban's. I doubted she was anywhere near as powerful as my demonic lover, but I had never been able to get an accurate fix on exactly how powerful Saban was. If I had, I doubted I would have kept him as my familiar.

Saban smiled. "She's more powerful than you realized. And, as I'm sure you can see, she has the potential to grow."

I couldn't see that, but the woman, who I assumed was Dross's wizard, likely could. Wizards could usually sense more about their own familiars than other wizards could.

The woman nodded. She looked nervous. I could see why. She wasn't that powerful a wizard. Barely powerful enough to qualify as a wizard, not a lesser mage. If Dross got much more powerful, the woman wouldn't be able to hold her.

The woman looked a bit stunned for a moment, and then smiled. "I thank you two for bringing this to my attention." She turned to Dross, obviously wondering what to do with her. She sighed. "It's no good. I'll have to dismiss her."

Dross looked alarmed.

Saban smiled. "Perhaps not. We can take her off your hands."

The woman looked at us, really looked at us, and gasped. "You're them! Anita and Saban!"

Saban nodded, looking a bit startled.

"But I heard Anita dismissed you!" the woman continued.

Before Saban could speak, I cut in. "It's a long story, and one I don't really feel like telling." Also none of her business. "As Saban has said, we would like to purchase your demon."

Just like that, the woman was all business. "Yes. Of course." She smiled at us. "Come into my office, and we can work out the details."

Half an hour of negotiation later, we left with Dross. I turned to Saban. "Why did you want her?" I hissed.

Saban smiled. "Well, for starters, her power levels aren't bad, and she has the potential to grow. For another... He grinned. "As you may have noticed, she can hide how powerful she is. That's useful. She can stifle others' sense of her power until she's effectively invisible to that sense."

I blinked. "Ok."

Saban turned to Dross. "Show her."

Obediently, Dross nodded. She had a mouth now, but she still hadn't said anything. Slowly, my sense of her demonic nature faded, until it wasn't there at all. She could pass for a human now.

I stared. "I had no idea demons could do that."

Saban shrugged. "It's a rare ability. I've got more demons who have special talents than most lords because my father was breeding for them." Suddenly he looked a bit haunted. "He often had the imps who were born without unusual abilities killed." He looked down.

I placed a hand on Saban's shoulder. "Want to talk about it?"

Saban sighed. "I was in charge of part of the breeding program. I... I didn't like disposing of the imps that my father rejected." He looked at me. "In many ways, I'm a monster, Anita, but I take care of my own. It was hard to do that when my father had me marked."

Saban's father, I remembered, had expanded his empire by marking his own children, and then killing them when they grew old enough to potentially challenge him. Saban had killed him.

A voice spoke from behind us, halting. "You... take care of your own. You will take care of me?"

It was Dross. She looked almost pathetically hopeful. When Saban met her gaze, she flinched, but didn't turn away.

Saban smiled. "Yes, Dross. I will. Provided you obey me, and follow my rules."

Dross looked a bit nervous. "Your rules?"

Saban shrugged. "We'll get into more detail later, but, to start with, you aren't allowed to harm or kill anyone without my permission, unless you need to defend yourself. In short, play nice with the squishy humans."

Dross nodded. "I can do that."

*

We made it to the hotel. My heart sank when Saban only paid for one room. Our funds for the trip were sadly depleted by the purchase of Dross, but I'd figured Saban would spring for separate rooms so he and I could have sex.

When we reached the room, however, I got a surprise. "Sleep," Saban ordered Dross. She immediately went limp. Saban caught her and laid her down on the second bed. Then he turned to me. "So," he purred, "We now have the room to ourselves."

I nodded slowly. "I guess we do."

Saban tugged me to the bed. "How about I give you a nice massage, and then we have some fun."

I looked at Dross doubtfully. "Are you sure she won't wake up?"

Saban nodded. "She won't wake until I allow it."

I let Saban lay me down on the bed. "Ok, then." He began to undress me. Before very long, I was completely naked. Saban, of course, just made his clothing vanish.

As Saban dug his tentacles into my aching muscles and spread a healing cream on my chafed inner thighs, I relaxed, and thought about what we could do tonight. There was one thing I really wanted, but I was kind of embarrassed to ask... "Saban?"

He didn't look away from his task. "Yes, love?"

I bit my lip. "Do you think you could, well, when we fuck, do you think you can pin me down?"

Saban froze. "You want me to pin you? With my tentacles?"

I nodded, blushing. "I kind of like it."

Saban sniggered. "I knew that. I can taste your emotions, remember? I just never expected you to admit it."

In seconds I was flat on my back. Saban had both of my hands pinned above my head and my legs spread wide. I squirmed, and found my mobility severely limited.

"You do realize," Saban purred, "That if we do it this way, I'm not going to let you go until we're done."

I nodded. "I'm counting on it."

"No matter how much you beg," Saban continued.

I squirmed again. "That's ok." Saban would know, and stop, if I was really in distress.

Saban grinned. "Lovely." Then he flipped me over onto my back.

I struggled against my bonds. "What are you doing?"

"Whatever I want," Saban murmured in my ear. His fingers ran down my helpless form, leaving goosebumps in their wake. "And you can't do a thing about it." I felt the gentle press of claws on my back and gasped. The light touch of something so very, very sharp was surprisingly erotic.

As Saban traced patterns on my back, never quite breaking the skin, his tentacles wrapped around my waist and torso. I was lifted into position for doggy style, my hands pinned firmly behind my back. I moaned as a tentacle began to toy with my nipples, first one, and then the other.

Saban's claws lifted, and I felt him shifting on the bed. The next thing I knew, his mouth was engulfing my clit, his tongue flicking across it in light, fast strokes. I gasped, and felt a tentacle slide into my mouth. "Mmph!"

Gagged with something that felt a lot like a dick, I could say nothing as Saban began to slowly, ever so slowly, push me toward orgasm. All I could do was whimper, moan, and fruitlessly struggle as his tentacles began to expertly work my nipples. A tongue like tentacle began to lick me, leaving long trails of tingling wetness over my body.

I couldn't get away. Saban was too strong. The fact that I didn't want to get away was irrelevant. Saban would stroke and tease me all the way to orgasm, and then hold me there until my mind turned to jelly. I moaned.

After lot of gentle teasing, Saban released my clit. I felt his cock line up with the entrance of my pussy, and whimpered. I whimpered again as he slowly, ever so slowly, entered me. He began to move me, and move within me, pushing my helpless form forward and back as he thrust into me.

A tentacle found my clit, and I screamed into the tentacle gagging me. I fought to dislodge my gag, not because I actually wanted to speak, but because it aroused me to remind myself how helpless I really was. I had placed myself utterly and absolutely in Saban's power, and he could do with my body whatever he pleased.

I moaned as I began the final climb. This was it. This...

I screamed into the tentacle gagging me once more as I came, hard. With the tentacle in my mouth, I couldn't tell Saban to stop, that I'd had enough, so I just had to endure the rolling waves of almost torturous pleasure.

After what felt like an eternity of rapturous torment, Saban stopped stimulating me. I gasped as his tentacle withdrew from my mouth and he lowered me onto the bed.

He grinned. "How was that?"

I yawned. "Great, but now I'm sleepy...

Saban lifted me up and slid the covers out from beneath me. Then he laid me down and tucked me in. As he slid into the bed beside me, I drifted off to sleep.

*

Saban

I lay awake staring up at the ceiling as Anita slept beside me. I glanced over at her, and my mind returned to the thoughts that had plagued me all day.

She wanted children, and I could not give them to her. Demons and humans were too fundamentally different to interbreed. I'd been forced to make her the host for my offspring once before, but that wasn't the same thing. Estries, my child, had nothing of Anita in him, and was, mentally speaking, a fully functional adult. Newborn demons always were. They couldn't rely on their parents for care, because odds were high said parents would be long gone.

I would need to allow a man to impregnate Anita. The idea of Anita having sex with someone else made me stifle a growl. Even if they didn't actually fuck, his sperm would have to go inside her. That made me almost as angry.

There was another problem. I had no idea how to help care for a human baby. Humans had the instinct to nurture and care for their offspring. I'd seen evidence of that often enough. I, however, had no nurturing instinct. Actually, a demon's natural response to something small, weak, and mortal was to think of it as food. I winced. I was more than capable of controlling my hunger, especially if I was well fed, but the niggling sensation that this small, squalling pink thing was food would never go away.

However, Anita wanted children. I decided that, for her sake, I would stifle my possessive instincts. For her, I would learn to nurture. I would do whatever it took to make her happy, and to make her my wife.

*

I must have slept, because, next thing I knew, I was waking up to the light of the sun. I nuzzled Anita's hair. "Good morning," I murmured.

She yawned. "Mind untentacling me? I need to pee."

I released her, and watched as she padded across the room into the bathroom and closed the door.

-Dross,- I called with my mind. -Wake up.-

Immediately, she awoke. Eyeing me nervously, she said, "Good morning, my lord." The sound of her own voice seemed to startle her.

Out of curiosity, I asked, "How long were you at that brothel? Without a mouth?"

She shivered. "Years. Nearly my whole life."

I frowned thoughtfully. "So you were summoned as an imp?"

She shook her head. "I was born here. There was this man, a wizard. His name was Lino. He bred me."

Lino... The name sounded familiar. "He wouldn't have had a son, would he? Named Thorn?"

She nodded. "He did. How did you know?"

I scowled. "I've met his son." Thorn was the one who'd forced me to make Anita the host for my offspring. "Why didn't he use you in his experiments?"

Dross looked down. "I made myself seem really weak. I saw what they did to Vice, and I didn't want them to do it to me. Since I seemed useless, they sold me to the brothel."

Vice. Ah, yes. I'd killed her and Thorn for what they'd forced me to do to Anita. "And you've been there ever since?"

She nodded. "Until now."

Anita reentered the room. "Ok, I'll get dressed, and eat breakfast, and then we'll get going." She paused. "Dross, when was the last time you fed?"

Dross shrugged. "It's been a few days."

I scowled. "You are not feeding her."

Anita sighed. "Of course not. But you can transfer power to her, right?"

I nodded. "I can. Dross, come here."

Obediently, Dross walked over to me. I gripped her shoulder. "This will hurt," I warned. Then I forced open her inner mental shields.

A demon could lower those shields on their own, but it took practice and trust. Dross was completely vulnerable to me right now. I could kill her, if I wanted. I could twist her mind to suit my own purposes. I could do all sorts of nasty things to her while she was open like this. Instead, as I held open her innermost gates, I fed her, forcing great gulps of power past her defenses. As she instinctively fought to close her shields, pain lanced through her. She whimpered.

Soon it was done. I released Dross, and she collapsed against the bed. I didn't try to help her up. Odds were high she didn't want me anywhere near her right now.

Anita frowned. "It didn't affect Estries like that."

I shrugged. "Estries trusted me more than she does. He didn't fight as hard. She'll be better in a minute."

Slowly, Dross straightened. She bowed to me, wobbling slightly. "Thank you, my lord." She smiled weakly. "It's been a long time since I was this well fed."

Anita frowned. "So they starved you, made you mouthless, and let people pay to torture you. That's..." She shook her head. "Even back when I thought demons were unequivocally evil, I would have said that was cruel."

Dross shrugged. "It was what it was. But I'm glad I'm not there anymore."

*

Anita

We made it to my parent's house around noon. My family was thrilled to see me, and a bit startled to see Saban and Dross. I told them the whole story over lunch.

After lunch, I helped my mother clean up in the kitchen. She seemed troubled. "What's wrong?" I asked.

She sighed. "I trust you to know what's best for you, dear. But... Saban had you kidnapped. Are you sure you want to marry him after that?"

I shrugged. "He's a demon, Mom. No matter how much he loves me, there's always going to be a part of him that thinks about things in a very... Cold sort of way. He will always be possessive. He'll always have a bit of a vindictive streak." I shrugged. "I can live with that."

My mother frowned. "Would he let you go? If you decided to leave him?"

I sighed. "I... I don't know." Probably not. "But, Mom, I love him. Demony bits included."

My mother passed me a plate to dry. "I suppose no relationship is perfect. Yours is... A bit strange, but if you think it's for the best..."

"I do, Mom," I told her.

She sighed regretfully. "I suppose this means you'll never give me grandchildren."

I chewed my lip thoughtfully. "I might. Saban has said he might be willing to share. We just need to find the right guy..."