"Did you have fun out there, playing the hero?"
Kaffe stood at the castle gate upon Avlakoi's return from a week in the countryside. The supposed lord of all demonkind was bloody and some injuries had been patched up, though the vast majority of the blood had not been his; he'd been busy for days clearing a straight path from the nearest village, only half a day's walk away from the seat of power.
His mages, Leikos and Tein, dragged their exhausted bodies across the finish line after the unplanned week-long excursion. Likely the two would go straight to bed, together, and wouldn't be seen again for a few days.
"There were things in the forest that I was not aware of." Avlakoi continued his long stride into the castle interior, Kaffe in his wake. He wouldn't allow himself to be intimidated by this woman who was even shorter in fact than his own 'daughter', no matter what dirt she had on him, not while he was still riding the high of his morning's battle. "The fortifications here were not made to be easily supplied, their former owner was too paranoid for that. I did not think that the magical beasts he stocked the nearby lands with would be so formidable."
The short, tan court mage came to Avlakoi's side with a skipping step that kept pace despite the legs of an eight-foot monster propelling him. She said, "It is the demon lord's castle, of course, now. It is meant to be the final challenge to a divine champion, thus it is natural to have fearsome beasts guarding it. I apologize that you feel it is in a disagreeable state."
"No need for apology, those choices were made before either of our births and were appropriate enough for the times. But I've seen the way people live on the demon lord's lands and I return disgusted." He sighed once they were out of sight and leaned against one wall. "Tell me what suffering awaits Fosi today."
The mage grinned wide then whispered the activation word and Fosi was there, clutching Avlakoi's bloody wrap around herself in a far too familiar way as an improvised dress.
No rest, then. Not a second.
Another quiet bit of spellcraft by Kaffe cleaned the blood off.
"Don't want people putting the pieces together, do we?" Kaffe laughed. "Oh, don't look at me like that, you did return home within the time limit like an obedient bitch, didn't you? Yes, that's a good girl, isn't she?" She reached up to muss Fosi's golden hair and laughed all the more when her hand was shaken off.
Suddenly aware of her near nakedness, Fosi stole glances around herself and the corner to ensure she wouldn't be seen by too many others. The hall they'd stepped into wasn't widely used and her worries amounted to nothing, yet irritated her for their mere existence. "Mage, have the garrison's captain meet me in the war room. I have staffing decisions to make."
"But miss, I think you should first attend to the one waiting on your father's return."
Fosi spun and glared.
"Yes, I could have told you about that beforehand, but you were in such a rush to resume our game, and your
father
is hardly required for this. To answer your next question, no, you will meet the visitor as you are, or of course you may wave him off." Kaffe dismissively waved her hand with an evil glint behind it. "Do try not to fuck him; you wouldn't want to hurt dear Peris' feelings any more than you already have."
His 'feelings'? How could I possibly hurt him in this body?
"What? Never mind, who is calling on the demon lord that you are so comfortable with offending?"
"You will, of course, want to get dressed first?"
-o-
Vormise, the Boar demon king in the flesh, barely fit within the meeting room.This sort of creature was the reason for the kind of high, vaulted entryways found in buildings throughout the demon lands, taller even than Avlakoi, or would have been if his hunch-backed form were more than barely bipedal. The piggish look of Pacchus the barman was gorgeous beside the true brutish shape of his blood shown in Vormise, coarse brown fur covering rolling hills of bestial muscle, tusks that could (and had, Avlakoi had seen when the man had only been a prince) punch through plate armor and rend it like paper, and the remnants of what had been hooves in prior generations, now sharpened and polished black fingertips capped by decadent inset filigree. Boars were known for their irritability, more than even other demons, a persistence of fury that carried them up the lengths of spear and sword to gore the wielder before blood loss did its job.
Mundane boars were nothing compared to the Boar demon king. He looked at Fosi only half a second before slamming his fist on a side table and cracking it into three pieces. "You! I heard but could not believe the whelp had abandoned his post and appointed a wyrmling whore to address his affairs. Now, will you tell me that he won't even meet his equal himself!?" His black and wrinkled lower lip was wet with bubbled spittle, he clenched his fists in a wholly inadequate ritual to calm himself.
Great, now I have to figure out a lie to cover this situation as well... Damned Kaffe.
"Lord Vormise, my father has secluded himself in study for the war to come. You must understand that he would of course come to the side of an old friend if his work could be interrupted."
Old friend, hah, his forces had to be avoided on a shared battlefield or they would kill as many allies as enemies!
"'Old friend', idiot child." Beady eyes narrowed further somehow. "The lies he tells you aren't my concern. How dare you make me wait a week for an audience!? I should march my forces to your front door and remind our
dear
lord of his place."
Fosi quietly sat, smoothed out the wrinkles in her skirt and took her sweet time carefully arranging her mantle such that it did not fold uncomfortably behind her back. She wasn't sure that she would ever get used to the array of outfits that Kaffe had ordered in her absence, her own ignorance of style requiring Merrili to act not only as lady's maid but also consultant. Avlakoi would have been fine to walk around naked if he pleased anyway, his typical wrap was more a concession to propriety than anything necessary. When Vormise was snarling, Fosi decided that she'd made her point in treating one of the most politically and physically powerful people in existence like furniture.
"Sire," she said, internally cringing at placing herself below the hulking mass of fur and muscle, "please state your business. My father trusts me with his authority in a wide swath of affairs; I am certain we can come to an understanding."
The boar demon king sat, in the way a mountain sits in a valley, in the chair across from her and snorted. One did not become even a vassal king without learning one's measure of tact, though this tact restrained the man like strings already tensed and fraying. "I-"
The door swiftly opened, Peris arriving short of breath. His hand came off the pommel of his sword as he surveyed the current situation, pretending as though he'd not been prepared to draw, only controlling his blade as he ran. "My lady, I apologize; I was supposed to be here before you, but I was far away when word came of your return." He bowed deeply to Vormise, who seemed to appreciate the supplication and became somewhat less tensed. "Lord of the Western woodlands, you honor us with your presence."
"Save it, lamb," Vormise spat. "And you, mutt, I've come to dispute the annexation of my lands! Woodsmen were found along a stretch of my domain, pilfering my lumber, and they offered documents stamped with the seal of the coward Avlakoi who
