On the other side of the citadel, at about the moment when the Watch Officer was approaching a store room containing 4 goblins in heat, another man by the name of Glarius stood guard.
The citadel was built atop a river whose waters ran through the city and under the outer walls. The design conveniently provided water for the residents, but also necessitated guarding the access points where the river flowed. Glarius was employed to keep watch over one of these accesses. He was poorly trained and received only a pittance, but it was easy work for a very low risk job.
The room he guarded was cavernous. It was built into the citadel wall and encompassed the main outlet pipe where the river was allowed to run out on its way to sea. Iron grating had been installed to prevent anyone swimming in through the stone pipe-work, but the grates were ill maintained and poorly affixed. An army would never be able to enter here, but a lone person holding their breath and swimming under the water might be able to manage it.
As Glarius paced the room, guessing that he was about halfway through his shift, a few large bubbles burped their way to the surface near the grating. He approached the water's edge cautiously. There was nothing to see at first, but as Glarius continued to stare, he caught a shimmer under the surface. He retreated to the entrance of the room to retrieve a spear that he sometimes used to prod the water. With the spear retrieved, he turned back toward the bubbles and something impacted his face.
Glarius could not breathe through his mouth. He felt a tightness on the skin of his face, and a strange weight. He dropped the spear at once and grabbed at what had struck him. It was slimy, rubbery, and stuck. He felt around it with his fingers, trying to map out its shape. The thing was rectangular. It was affixed across his mouth and cheeks, leaving his nose free to draw breath, which he did in shallow panicked snorts. Extending from each corner of the rectangle was a tentacle. All four of these limbs had secured themselves in place by sticking to his skin and hair.
Glarius tried to cry out, but very little sound escaped from the seal over his mouth. He looked to the water and saw nothing on the surface. Where had the thing come from?
He needed help.
He tried to run for the exit, but something tripped him up, causing him to fall prone. When he tried to right himself, he discovered that his legs were bound. Glarius flipped himself over and looked to his feet. Something ropey and wet-looking was wrapped about his ankles. It shimmered green in the torchlight.
A shape drew his attention. Something was at the water's edge, staring at him. Its whole torso was in view. The creature's basic shape was fairly human. Torso. Arms. Hands. Head. But its features were monstrous. It bore smooth lavender skin pulled over strong-looking muscles. There was an odd androgynous quality to it. Glarius could not tell if the bulges of its chest were toned pecs or perky breasts.
Most horrifying was its face. While its skin seemed entirely smooth, it bore twin rows of scales on its forehead resembling eyebrows. Its small, sunken yellow eyes were completely round, as if the creature did not possess eyelids. Its lips were massive in comparison to a human's. They protruded from its face, rubbery and red, like a pantomime of a drunk streetwalker who had smeared lipstick all over her mouth.
Glarius tried his best to scrabble backwards. As he did so the creature moved toward him, matching his depressingly slow pace. It hit the water's edge and emerged, providing him with a view of its lower half. Upon seeing the creature in full, Glarius screamed silently into the slimy thing sticking his mouth closed.
Even though the creature appeared somewhat human on its top half, its lower portion was entirely non-human. Extending down from its pelvis and buttocks were thick boneless arms such as an octopus might have. Glarius could see at least three of these limbs on each side. They were all as thick as his thigh and rippled with muscle as they moved. The arms writhed around each other, propelling the creature forward and obscuring Glarius's view of the creature's nether regions.
Glarius flipped himself back onto his stomach in an attempt to crawl away faster. He needn't have bothered though, the creature was on him in a moment, wrapping its immensely powerful lower arms around him and spinning him onto his back.
It crawled atop him, using its limbs to hold up its own weight, only dropping itself onto him enough so that he was stuck in place. It was a courtesy that suggested the creature had experience with being atop humans and taking their comfort into account.
Glarius only made one attempt at bravery. He interlaced his fingers and swung a half-hearted blow to try and batter the creature in its torso. His attempt at brutality bounced harmlessly off the creature's skin. It retaliated with a lazy strike that smacked Glarius's face like a mallet.
Glarius was left stunned and limp. He gave up on resisting. Now as he lay back he noticed a smell of fish.
The creature held itself above him in relative stillness, allowing Glarius to regain his senses after the blow.
As he came around, the creature seemed to nod. Glarius found himself staring into its little circular yellow eyes. They were so inhuman, yet something about them seemed mesmerising.
A voice spoke inside his mind. It was a pleasant tone, but it had an odd dual quality to it, as if he was listening to both a man and a woman speaking at once.
'Don't attempt any harm to me again. I doubt you really could harm me, but still, it's rude. Don't worry. It's alright. I'll speak in your thoughts, and you can do the same. Just focus on what you want to say.'
'Wh-what do you want,' Glarius cried inside his head. 'Please, I'll do what you want, but can you take this thing from my face?'
'Shortly. Don't be concerned. You'll be freed from what binds you...'
Glarius was now aware of the creature's skin touching his. It was slimy, but also very warm, like being touched by the embodiment of a hot bath. It was lovely. He could feel the creature's lower arms cradling up to his skin, enveloping him, stroking him. The arms seemed to taper off into little pointed tips. Two of these had found their way into Glarius's tunic and were snaking their way around his nipples.
'Dear one, why do you cover yourself in such things? Let's get you out of those strange items.'
The arms pull off his clothes with horrifying ease. Against those powerful limbs the meagre stitching of his tunic, leggings, and boots were as nothing. In a moment he found himself naked aside from loose strips that were still caught between his skin and the thing wrapped about his ankles.
He was now more aware of the smell of fish. The scent had become lighter though. Not overpowering and rank like a net full of sea creatures, but more like... like between a woman's--
'You are beautiful, for a land creature,' it said to him sweetly, 'Very pretty. A lovely mate.'
The word 'mate' caused Glarius to resume his struggling, albeit half-heartedly. Internally he was fighting a war between being terrified and intrigued.
