Curiosity of the Demon Ing

"What in the name of Hell do you mean 'she isn't here!?'" Fosi grabbed Pach's collar and shoved him against the nearest wall in Kaffe's laboratory. The scrawny mage, a muttish imp with too much mix to tell what should go where, simpered and raised his shaking hands in submission. "I am telling you that I must speak with the court mage,

now

, and you

will

tell me where I can find her!"

"It isn't that easy, miss!" Ugly, sunken features and bulging eyes made his desperate terror all the more clear. It wasn't that Fosi enjoyed meting cruelty on him, but if Avlakoi weren't allowed to transform back into his true form by nightfall...

She released him and nevertheless snarled, "Speak now and I may return your tongue to you after I've cut it out."

To steady himself, Pach turned and placed his hands on a nearby table, breathed deeply. It was a minute before he'd gathered the nerve to speak. "Lady Kaffe has gone out to procure a special ingredient and did not leave instructions on how to contact her. She's been gone for days now. I'm sorry, but anything you needed, I'm sure that I can be used as substitute if I have enough time to research the problem."

She wouldn't have given this imp the invocation which would transform me back. I wouldn't want him to use it anyway, while he can see it happen... Whatever Kaffe's intentions with this form are, she is at least bound by her word not to reveal its shameful secret, where Pach was not.

"Was there anything she left behind for me, in case of emergency?"

Without hesitation, on wings of terror, Pach took his path out of responsibility by sprinting to the other side of the room to take a sealed letter from one of Kaffe's many desks.

It can't be the incantation that will set me free... Unless, unless she's finished having her fun?

It was a stupid thought and the bubble of optimism burst even as Fosi took the letter and broke the wax seal; Pach stood back just in case it contained something that Fosi really didn't want to read.

'My dear lady,' it read, 'let it be known that it is not only the master of this castle who may take his leave for an extended period without informing others. He thought he was being sneaky, eking out so much freedom from his new and varied duties. Now, of course, you will be needed to administrate in his absence until at the very least the date of my return.' A small illustration of Kaffe's face with an eyelid pulled down was included and Fosi nearly tore the paper into a thousand pieces before going on. 'Should you have need of strength of arms, know that I've seen how the goat dotes on you; lean on Peris' shoulder and flutter your lashes and he would dispatch with any adversary you are likely to meet in your father's and my leave.'

Never!

'We have such a banquet of games to play yet,

girl

, so enjoy what respite you have while I ruminate on which I want to start with.'

And then Fosi did rip apart the letter while Pach trembled in a corner.

No support from her, then.

Fosi thought, grinding her teeth.

There's no chance that I'm going to Peris, either. If he knew what was about to happen, he'd just insist that I marry him again... Soon enough, he might think to simply take me and keep me until I concede... And if he finds out what was planned for that princess, Avlakoi knows too well what would break out without him to intervene.

She felt hot, trying her best not to remember her first night in the lovely body she currently occupied, what a drunken Peris had done to her, thinking she were just another common servant... what he might have gotten to if he weren't drunk enough for her to flee.

Damn woman! The minute I need you!

There, Fosi felt sick to her stomach and walked away from that place with terrifying emptiness of spirit. If it was not in the cards that she could rely on her

father's

power or his influence, it seemed there was only one path that her body could walk.

-o-

Throughout the remainder of the day, the boar princess, Suvir, wallowed in defeat. She went through the motions of dismissing Methystus, the former liaison, from his post along with his meagre staff, as though she had any to speak of herself. He'd taken hours to rouse from a drunken slumber which Avlakoi knew all too well from rumor; the connection he created to the forest realm was as minimal as Vormise could arrange without inciting actual retaliation, so his duties as such were to drink and sleep as a measured insult, suiting his temperament well.

Though Avlakoi never had the need to know, Fosi found out easily from Merrili that the drunken old fool was rarely even sober enough to grab a nearby succubus and use her. When he'd tried, drink had made it impossible to act on his impulses anyway.

Just so, the boar demon had to be urged into the carriage by all four of his servants pushing on his back. There was hardly any discontent visible in those present; they all had known for years that their role was merely to be present in a show of fealty.

His were not the quarters Fosi arranged to have given to Suvir, those would need to be cleansed with fire before they could be used for any other purpose than a nearly literal pigsty. Instead, some rooms branching off the end of the same hall were assigned for the her use. Fosi only wished that the princess had more than one trunk of her possessions to move in with her, almost as little as the belongings of the duo sent along as her erstwhile servants. It had looked like much more coming off the carriage.

So, the girl didn't take even the full day to unpack. For the best, maybe.

The evening wasn't busy enough for Fosi's taste, not enough to put her mind off the night.

She came to Suvir's door and rapped on the wood. It creaked open a fraction, only enough for the princess to peer out.

"Oh, it's the mutt..." Suvir said dispassionately, opening the door little by little while scanning the hall. She wore what Fosi now recognized as a romper, pink strings pulling its loose white cotton tighter around her elbows and knees, cute. "Out with it, then, mutt. Can't you see I'm about to retire for the night? What business could you have with me which cannot wait for the morning?"

Fosi magnanimously ignored the abuse. The princess had apparently broken out of the spell of docility cast through pleasure in the bath after she was allowed to dry herself, yet her freckled cheeks still burned. Fosi couldn't help but think she understood a little of what the princess was going through. "I wanted to ensure that your first night in the castle was restful," Fosi said and put her hand on the door so that Suvir couldn't close it in frustrated embarrassment, managed to loom over the princess, wedged in the small space as a bonus. "I've brought a blanket and my own pillow. Do you know that it's not uncommon at all for succubi such as we to hold one another while sleeping?"

"I would expect that of commoners." Suvir glared, but couldn't manage to do it upward into Fosi's face. "I will be more than warm enough on the furs that I brought along with me. Shouldn't you be somewhere else, getting fucked like a common whore?"

"Oh?" Fosi bent in closer to the princess' face, close enough to feel Suvir's breath on her skin, and gently turned up Suvir's chin with her free hand. The princess' eyes were uncertain; Avlakoi recalled eyes like those in enemy soldiers before a rout. "I saw how much you enjoyed our bath," she whispered, felt the quivering chin in her hand. When she'd felt the princess had enough, she pulled back and began pushing open the door without resistance. "My maid is bringing the two of us something to nibble before bed, nothing that you wouldn't like, so let's head inside while we wait."

The princess remained by the door as it closed behind Fosi on her way into the parlor. The king who'd originally built this castle had believed, as Avlakoi agreed, that visiting nobility and politic general should be given unto environs typical of their normal accommodations; while smaller quarters in full than they would have had they lived separately, there was provision of a parlor, a small kitchen, a master bedroom, and a boarding room for however many servants the noble cared to cram into the space. This room that Fosi had entered was, under treaty, the land of Vormise himself, available to Avlakoi and his staff only as they were invited.

Realistically, any situation which called for the violation of such borders would already entail war, and those inside would have become hostages in the initial volley. The liaison was more than the ear of one's neighbor, they were themselves leverage.

Nothing hanging, nothing spread out, no traces of an individual.

There should have been an indication, after unpacking, that Suvir intended to use the space for her own purposes, that she wanted familiarity in the place where she would be spending her time as liaison. Every other noble parlor Avlakoi had deigned to see had banners, tablecloths, silverware and whatever trinkets reminded the occupant of home, but Suvir had barely pulled out a chair from the table which had already been in the room. It made grave sense that they hadn't even sent these things along with her.

"We'll have to get something hung in here, I think," Fosi said, coming to a chair and sweeping her hand to offer it to the boar princess. The princess took her seat numbly with her nose turned up. Her pride wasn't completely spent after one failure, and the fact heartened Fosi. "The king has no end of skins, if you like the look of those. Perhaps a bear skin would be nice in front of the hearth, to warm your feet once winter sets in? I also know someone who could whip you up a few colorful banners to combat the grey and grey."

"I have no need." Suvir huffed.

"Need," Fosi said while taking the opposite seat, rested her elbows on the bare wood of the table with her chin on the back of a hand, "is not the only consideration to be made. What a man

needs

can be found in mud, strained through his teeth. We live to strive for more than what we need. Still, how did you decorate your rooms back in the forest kingdom?"

It took a while, staring across the table, to wear away Suvi's walls until she said, "Trophies... Father would go out in a rage and bring back mangled corpses, then he'd say I should keep the heads. It always felt like they were staring back at me."

"Banners it is, then." Fosi smiled.

"I never said I wanted any pretty banners." Suvir shuffled in her seat.

Pretty ones, then.

Send the princess, have her killed one way or another, blame the lord. The princess sitting before Fosi wouldn't have been endangered if the boar king were properly wary of war. So it was Avlakoi's weakness, still, which caused suffering for his people.

After some time, Merrili came to the door with Fosi's nightgown and a dish of sweets that Suvir sighed with relief at the sight of. Merrili had wanted to stay and attend to her lady's needs, but Fosi sent her away with the sentiment that she wanted to take some time to get to know the princess more intimately.

Taking Suvir's hand and drawing her along, Fosi brought her and the snacks to the princess' prepared bedding. Of what little the princess had taken along with her, she'd spread out a warm, plush fur that was large enough that both she and, after properly dressing by herself for once, Fosi could sit on their folded legs with plenty of room left over.

"From a powerful beast, I imagine." Fosi snapped a treat on her teeth and as always enjoyed the ability to actually taste sweetness. "A gift from one of your many admirers?"

"From my father." Princess Suvir barely partook, uncomfortably twiddling her thumbs.

Fosi lay back on the spread, crumbs already spotting the sheer white fabric of her nightgown. She closed her eyes and cradled her head in her hands, baring her belly with hope that the princess would take heart from the defenseless pose. "Instead of fathers, what should two women talk about?" she said, making no mention of what Suvir's father hadn't sent. "Your infatuation with the goat prince, perhaps."

It's not as though I disapprove of the man taking on lovers. It would be better for him to set his mind on someone other than myself.

A glance proved Suvir's ruddy shade just at the mention of that man. "Well, what of it!? Any woman would be..."

Not

any

woman...

"But you are, and that makes the difference."

Suvir paused, then said with a dull voice, "It makes no difference at all, and you would know that if you were your father's daughter in the way that I am to mine."

"Didn't I say we should talk about something else? What is it you like about Peris? I can't see it, myself. I know that he's attractive as an incubus, almost womanly features if I think about him in those terms. But, as a woman, I don't know..."

Of course I've never thought about him that way!... But that isn't to say I've never heard the other men in our company talking about it when women weren't readily available, or saw those same men walking from his tent with bloodied trousers. Peris has never been weak.

"I'd think you would hate him, what with how many of your clan's people he and my father killed over the years."

Suvir rolled her eyes. "This again? Mercenaries kill, and soldiers are meant to die. Who cares?" The smirk she had at the end hung under sadness.

"Soldiers, maybe." Fosi sighed. "Then, what of Peris' charms?"

Suvir bent over Fosi on her hands and knees with a sparkle in her eyes. "You haven't heard the stories? My maids told me about how he held the bridge at Arabetz castle while it was under siege by the Silver Falcon company, cut one man from shoulder to hip and kicking the next one into the moat!" She got more comfortable as she put herself into the story, rising up on her knees and acting out Peris' part, wobbling on one leg and nearly falling back onto the bed. "and then his sword broke in half on a bull demon's horns, so he tackled the enemy and curled his arm around the man's beefy neck until he passed out, then dumped him over the side to drown in the water, stained red by the blood of his dead companions! Don't you think it's amazing that an incubus could do something like that against a full-blooded demon!?"

"I do think that. He is an amazing warrior, though he didn't do that by himself. Avlakoi was within the enemy ranks, thinning them out so that the bridge wouldn't be overrun."

"Ah, yes, I suppose he was." Suvir scratched her cheek and deflated slightly. "That's the story

you

would have been told... I can only hope that the ancestors were not wrong again this time." Her lip raised briefly, Fosi knew not whether with anger or disgust.

"You hate Avlakoi?" Fosi asked quietly.

It wouldn't be a surprise, in any case.

The princess looked away so Fosi could not take anything from her expression. "If you'd have me killed for speaking frankly..."

Fosi rose and enfolded the princess in her arms, set her chin atop Suvir's head. She was not thrown off, the princess took on the pliant nature she'd shown earlier in the bath.

"He's supposed to be the one who'll defeat humanity and take over the world, to leave succubi as the final shape of demonkind, stealing the beauty of Heaven for ourselves. Just look at what a place he calls his home, a castle so small and so far from anything. All of the nobles talk about what a weakling has taken on the task and how he lives in poverty, and now look at who he chooses to have represent him!" Suvir was just short of shouting, ignoring whose arms were wrapped around her shoulders, so close to her thin neck. "If paradise will not come within my lifetime, then what am I to be except a tool for my people? I'll live for them, and I'll die for them... In Hell, the ancestors will know of my sacrifice..."

More scripture, no original thought in those words. How many of my people even believe it will come to pass after so long? No.

Fosi said, "How about we play a game before bed, to take our minds off such things."

The princess trembled. "I know what kinds of games you play..."

Fosi laughed. "I was thinking about a board game."

-o-

Once Suvir had finally fallen asleep, Fosi came out of bed and took care not to wake the princess on her way out into the parlor. She sat in wait with her hand on her chin, tapping her cheek, more certain by the minute that her appraisal of the situation was correct.

It might have even been apparent to Peris, who'd once nearly been on the other side of the same conspiracy at the hands of his noble father. However, Peris wouldn't think of potential war with Vormise as something to be avoided; he would think that conflict would bring Avlakoi back to his side for the duration, until their assured victory. The man had already questioned Avlakoi's decision to go without the traditional tour of submission before clearing the very castle they now occupied of monsters to claim it, and he would think it better late than never.

The previous high king, incapable as he'd proven to be in fulfillment of old promises, had put on such exhibitions of violence that no word of doubt dared pass through his peoples' lips. Avlakoi as a boy had seen the wriggling figures on those pikes, he could still see them as if no time had passed.

So, Peris could not be told Fosi's plan, and neither could anyone else, until Avlakoi's return...

The door opened on greased hinges as the only servants she'd been sent with entered. Either boar demon was broad enough that their shoulders brushed against the sides of the doorway despite turning into it as they stepped through.

It hardly mattered who it was that killed her. Suvir was only an excuse for war to keep the other vassal kings from allying themselves against the so-called injured party. They'd be all too pleased to sit on their hands with the flimsiest evidence of Avlakoi's guilt.

The first brutish figure put his black-fingered hand to a dagger on his belt.

Within the darkness of the room, Fosi said, "You two may take your rest in the servants' barracks. This place is for the diplomat and her personal servants. We will find maids and the like for her in the morning."

"No, you go." One of them stepped forward and engaged all of his meagre mental faculties in trying to act subtly.

Fosi came up and grabbed his free hand, pressed the knurled, calloused thing to her breast and whispered, "Your lord no doubt told you to humiliate me personally if you had the chance. Come along, and you may have me, so long as you spend the whole night with me."

She could nearly see the gears turning behind both demons' beady, black eyes, and the one before her squeezed her tit. "That's a trap," he said.

"Ovel, jus' kill'er," the other one mumbled.

Smarter than the common boar demon in Avlakoi's memory, though the remembrance was poisoned by the clan's berserk battle trance. In the present, Fosi took Ovel's hand in hers again and raised pitch-black fingers to her lips, slowly ran her tongue along his sour skin, repressed the urge to shudder at the thought of what she was doing.

But this wasn't really the same, it was its own form of battle. Thinking about it in those terms, she could grasp some semblance of calm within the feelings of disgust and terror.

"Haven't you heard what kind of lusty bitch stands before you? Do you think her rut extends only to the wolf clan?" Fosi looked up into the eyes of Ovel's looming presence with what she hoped was a pleading expression, licked her lips. "Come with me now, spend the night with me, and I vow that not only will I pleasure you, I won't tell a soul about this trespass. Then, tomorrow night, and the night after..." She nearly gagged on the words, but if there was going to be a sacrifice that night, she could at least choose who took on the role.