Queen of Nightmares

Author's Notes:

All characters in this story who engage in sexual activity are 18 years of age or older.

Please check the story tags if there are erotic genres you find distasteful and prefer to avoid. I like to cover a lot of ground, sometimes.

This story is the third of many in a series called, "The Children of Eros," which focuses on the experiences of several mythic beings who survive through the ages by harvesting the emotional energy of human sexual release.

Please, if you like anything in this story--or if you dislike anything--please vote and comment. The votes keep me motivated, and the comments help me to improve.

+~+~+~+

"

I don't know who you think you are

But before the night is through

I wanna do bad things with you."

-- 'Bad Things' by Jace Everett

+~+~+~+~+

Aranya scooted forward until she could reach Grant's big shoulders over the back of the driver's seat. He startled slightly when she put her small hands on them and began to rub.

"Oh, you're so tight," she cooed. "You've been driving for hours. Let me help." She watched from the corner of her eye as Miranda's mouth twisted. Grant said nothing.

"He's been driving for... 67 minutes," Miranda said. "Hardly hours. And you should buckle up. That's not safe."

"Little Miss Precision," retorted Aranya. "You're just jealous, sis. Switch places with me, and you can do the back rub."

Miranda rolled her eyes, but didn't respond. Too bad, Aranya thought. If

she

were in the front seat, she could reach a lot more of Grant than just his shoulders.

She rubbed harder, but her fingers barely dimpled the giant trapezius muscles beneath his shirt, and her hands were already getting tired. She kept at it, though, just for the sour look on her sister's face.

Miranda was still pissed, she thought, because her little sister had managed to insinuate herself into her weekend getaway with her new fiancé.

Aranya could still see the tiny cuts on her arm she had shown to their Mom to convince her that she couldn't possibly be left home alone, even though she was now legally an adult.

Miranda could either have let Mom's honeymoon in Europe be disrupted, or take Aranya with her on the lake cabin jaunt with Grant. Guess who got the short end of the stick in that dispute, Aranya thought, with a little smirk of satisfaction.

Miranda could have postponed their trip. The cabin at Spider Woods Lake had been in Mom's family for generations, even though Aranya and her sister were the only ones who ever went there anymore. It was very private, tucked in the middle of a couple hundred acres of undeveloped forest.

Miranda could have taken Grant there anytime, but they'd just gotten engaged, and Grant was going to have to fly to Japan for work. He would be away for a month or more.

She probably thought she'd be able to ditch her little sister and still get some time alone with her husband-to-be. We'll see about that, Aranya thought.

+~+~+~+~+

Grant was relieved when they finally pulled up in front of Miranda's family's lake cabin. Finally, he could put some distance between him and Miranda's sister. The little hellcat had been groping him most of the way up here.

She was a hot little thing, he had to admit--shorter than Miranda, with more generous curves and darker hair. Today she'd worn blue jean cutoffs and a tank top the color of blood. She'd not missed too many opportunities to brush her braless tits against him, so he had reason to believe they were something pretty special.

But the kid had just turned 18, and besides, she was

such

a brat. He'd stick with Miranda. She was a woman for a grown man, not a spoiled little girl playing pranks and plotting mischief.

He carried the luggage in and deposited it in the upstairs bedrooms. When he came back down, the girls were arguing in the living room. He went back to the car to bring in the groceries he and Miranda had picked up earlier this morning. He put them away in the kitchen.

The sisters were still bickering, and it was time for lunch, so Grant made sandwiches, grateful for an excuse to avoid the living room. When he had the meal ready and on the table, he waited, listening.

"You're not fooling anybody," Miranda said in the other room. "Everybody knows you're too much of a narcissist to kill yourself. You're the only person in the world you love." A pause, then, "Hah. I've gotten deeper scratches picking blackberries."

"Oh, yeah?" Aranya retorted, "then why did Mom make you bring me along?"

"She didn't want you doing something selfish and destructive while we were away, like burning down the house or something, just to get attention."

There was a moment of silence, and Grant took the opportunity. "Lunchtime," he called. "Come and get it."

Aranya was first to reach the kitchen, where she glued herself to Grant's chest and purred, "Oooooh, he even cooks!"

She massaged his pecs and stage-whispered, "I'm going to take mine down to the lake to eat, since I'm not too welcome inside." She stood on tiptoe and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Come join me if you get tired of the company in here." She grabbed the unopened bag of chips and strutted out the door.

Grant sat down and took a bite of his sandwich. Miranda did the same. After a while, she said, "Sorry about that."

He shrugged. "Can't pick your family," he said.

"She's not done," she said. "She'll find some way to ruin our weekend, even if it kills her."

"Well, she's not here now," he said, and grinned. She grinned back, and he chased her upstairs.

+~+~+~+~+

Aranya sauntered along, munching the sandwich. Instead of going down toward the lake, as she'd told Grant she would, she strolled up the hill toward the woods, swinging the bag of chips in her other hand.

Spider Woods was a dark, looming forest that oozed over the foothills and up the side of the mountain like mold on an orange. She wasn't sure what sort of trees filled it, but they were very large, and seemed to be all of the same type--some kind of oak, perhaps--with small, dark leaves that never seemed to drop all at the same time, creating a year-round canopy of dense foliage that effectively consumed the daylight before it reached the ground.

The forest was all private property, with approaches limited by the lake on one side and the mountains on the other. Their little cabin sat athwart the only point of access, and the road ended there.

She and her sister had played along the edges of these woods during visits all their lives. She'd never seen another person up here--or even down at the lake.

She stopped at the edge of the meadow and looked up at the forbidding forest. The girls had not been allowed into the woods themselves, nor had they ever seriously wanted to venture in.

Aranya remembered one summer when she and Miranda had dared one another to go, but the black wall of trees and the ever-present darkness beneath them had daunted them both, and they'd never played the game again.

Funny how the woods started so abruptly at the edge of the grass, she thought, as she started forward into the trees. She went slowly, allowing her eyes to adjust, as much as possible, to the gloom. She walked, not on soil, but on a deep layer of forest duff that muffled her footfalls to silence. No birds called, and Aranya didn't see so much as a squirrel. The forest was utterly quiet, save for the occasional rustle of her bag of chips.

One fortunate effect of the constant gloom, Aranya thought, was there were very few shrubs, and no grass at all. Just endless giant tree trunks jutting up from the cushiony leaf mulch. It was pretty easy walking, really.

The forest was so dark now, she couldn't tell how late it might be. She looked at her phone. There was no service, but it still told the time, and she saw it was only 2 p.m. It looked like late twilight.

This was far enough, she decided, and dropped the bag of chips. It was still unopened--she'd finished the sandwich, but hadn't eaten any of the chips. An empty bag of chips would simply have meant a litterer. An unopened bag of chips that she'd taken for her lunch was a clue--if not to her dimwit sister, then probably to Grant, and certainly to any law enforcement types who might be called out to search for a "missing" girl.

Cautiously, she made her way deeper into the forest, feeling her way forward. She could have used her phone for light, but she knew the battery wouldn't last long if she used it that way, and she

did

want to be found...eventually. She'd save the phone to call for help if she really needed it, she decided.

Because she had her hands outstretched, Aranya felt the first web before she blundered into it. She wasn't really surprised; it

was

called Spider Woods, after all, and she certainly wouldn't have come in here if she'd been scared of spiders.

Oddly, the web wasn't sticky, but tough and springy. Curious, she felt her way along it, shuffling sideways. It ended at a tree, which she stepped around, then walked on. Soon, she encountered another web, and she felt her way along it, as well.

As she moved her hands along the strands of web, she felt a vibration. She stopped, touching the web lightly. She felt the movement again, and sensed something of the direction of its origin--off to her left.

Should she go that way? It seemed to be more-or-less the direction she had been going, and she had an instinct that going the other way would eventually lead her out of the forest. She decided to press on, deeper into the woods.

Slowly, almost blind, she advanced into the pitch dark depths of the forest, one hand brushing the web, following its subtle tremors.

+~+~+~+~+

Grant caught Miranda just as she reached the bedroom, and snatched her off her feet. She squealed and kicked her feet playfully, but wrapped one hand around his massive bicep and spread the fingers of the other over the solid slabs of muscle that lay under his shirt.

He held her in his arms as he kicked the door shut and locked it, then kissed her. She kissed him back, and he laid her gently on the bed. He knelt beside the bed and kissed her some more. She sank her fingers into his thick, sandy hair and pulled his face closer.

Until two weeks ago, when Grant had proposed to her, Miranda had been a 25-year-old virgin. They'd dated in high school, but had decided to see other people when they attended separate colleges. Grant had dated a few women, but Miranda hadn't gone out with anyone else.

Almost as soon as they'd graduated, they had gotten back together, and it seemed inevitable that they would get married. Immediately after graduation, he'd gone to work for a promising tech startup, and--less than a year later--had been promoted to a management position. He broke the news to Miranda at a nice restaurant and proposed to her on the spot.

After she accepted his proposal, he'd been surprised that she wanted to have sex right away. He'd assumed she was saving herself for marriage, but, as it turned out, she was only saving herself for him.

They'd tried that very night, but it hadn't gone well. He had little sexual experience, and she had none at all. She was dry, and tense, and he'd hurt her when he broke her maidenhead.

They'd tried again a week later, after giving her time to heal. It had been even worse, and Miranda had cried for hours, as much for disappointing him as for the discomfort.

This would be their third try, and it already wasn't going great, with all the sister drama Aranya had brought with her.

"I'm going to enjoy it this time, I promise," Miranda whispered into Grant's ear, her arms wrapped around his muscular neck. She kissed him again.

Oh, how she loved kissing him. They'd been kissing since ninth grade. It was something she liked and knew how to do--unlike sex, which she'd thought would be wonderful, but had turned out to be painful and confusing.

"I know, baby," he said.

She sat up and took off her t-shirt. He pulled his off, too. She smiled at his magnificent muscles and took off her bra. He smiled at her sweet little tits and leaned forward to nuzzle them. She giggled and pushed him away so she could take off her shorts. He stood and finished undressing.

He was so big, Miranda thought, smiling up at him. She loved all his bulging muscles, each so clearly defined, like a sexy fireman in the calendar above her co-worker's desk. She loved how gentle he was, in spite of his size and strength.

Her gaze dropped to his penis, and her smile slipped. That was big, too, even though it wasn't fully hard yet. She thought about how it had hurt the first time, and she began to get nervous.

Grant saw her reaction, and went to one knee by the bed again. "It's okay, baby," he said. "Just relax." He touched her arm carefully, with only his fingers. She smiled tremulously and gripped his hand, pulling him onto the bed with her.

He propped himself on one elbow beside her and petted her for some time, kissing her and fondling her titties. She kissed him back and ran her fingers through his hair.

At length, he knelt beside her and took hold of the waistband of her panties. She lifted her hips so he could pull them down, then her feet so he could remove them.

Gently, he eased her legs apart and knelt between her knees. He ripped open a condom packet and rolled it onto his erection. Supporting himself with one hand, he leaned over and looked into her wide blue eyes. She was nervous, he could see.

"Are you okay?" he asked. "Do you want to go on?"

Miranda bit her lip, then nodded.

+~+~+~+~+

The darkness was absolute as Aranya made her way deeper into the heart of the forest, as if there were a black velvet blindfold over her eyes. How could it be so dark in the middle of the afternoon, even in the depths of this ancient wood?

She was actually proceeding more quickly now than she had earlier, when she could still see a little. Before, she had been feeling her way through a maze of the tough, dry webs. Now, they had merged into a tunnel, of sorts.

She only had to keep one hand in contact with the "wall" as she walked forward into the inky blackness, the other hand held out before her. It hardly seemed as if she were still in a forest at all. There didn't seem to be trees around anymore, or leaf mulch underfoot. There were only webs all around.

After walking for what seemed like a very long time, Aranya began to wonder what time it was. Had Grant already discovered her missing? Had they begun to search the area around the lake for her? Maybe they had already called the Sheriff's Department. Maybe they were already searching the woods for her.

She considered looking at the time on her phone, but hesitated. Did she really want to see whatever was crawling around in the webs that surrounded her? She shrugged. Nothing had attacked her so far, and Aranya was not the sort of girl to fear imaginary phantasms. No, that was her silly sister.

Taking out her phone, she pressed the button, but nothing happened. She tried again, pressed the other buttons. It was dead. How was that possible? It had been fully charged when she left the cabin; she'd made sure of that. She'd only used it for a few seconds, just to check the time once.

She felt a moment of trepidation, but shook it away. She was no worse off now than she had been ten seconds ago when she didn't know the phone was useless, even to tell the time or provide a little temporary light. She put it away and continued down the web tunnel.

Eventually, Aranya felt something--another web--in front of her, and stopped. She felt around. It seemed to block the path completely.

This new web was different from the others, as well, Aranya observed. Like them, it was tough and dry: springy, but not sticky at all. Unlike them, it seemed made of much thicker webbing, more like thick ropes than slender strands. She ran her hands along them, then felt something.

It felt like a...a foot.

+~+~+~+~+

"Oh, ow...stop," Miranda pleaded, pressing her hands against Grant's chest. "Please, it hurts." Grant froze immediately, holding himself above her, the head of his condom-clad cock barely pressing into her. He could feel her legs trembling with tension as she squeezed her knees against his hips. He eased away from her, kneeling on his heels between her legs.

"It's just so dry," she complained, though they both knew that was only part of the problem.

"I could do the spit thing," he suggested.

"Eew, no," she said, "Please don't spit on me."

"We could try the lube," he said.

"It burned the last time," she said, miserably.

"I got some more," he said, flushing with embarrassment as he remembered visiting the condom shop and asking the pretty brunette behind the counter for some fragrance-free, hypoallergenic lubricant.

The young woman had been surrounded by dildoes and vibrators, sexy lingerie, whips and flails and paddles and padded handcuffs. She'd acted as if that were the most natural thing in the world. He'd all but run from the store after paying for the lube.

"It's supposed to be made for...sensitive women," he said.

Miranda bit her lip, then nodded. He reached for the little bottle where he'd left it on the bedside table and squeezed some clear fluid onto his finger.

Should he put his finger inside her? She'd said she didn't like that, but surely it was better to start out with something the size of a finger and work up to something as big as his cock. He shook his head in uncertainty.

The handful of other women Grant had been with had all known what to do. They had pursued him--not the other way around--and they'd been ready for him long before the clothes had even come off. He'd hardly been expected to do anything more than show up. Never in his life had he felt his own ignorance so keenly as an impediment to success.

He settled for stroking the lube over her pale pink slit, then smearing it liberally over the end of the condom. The sex toy store clerk had told him it was safe to use with latex.

He poked his erection into her crotch, and she flinched, but it just slid off. He held it firmly against her little crack and pushed, but it only barely parted her lips, and she made such a plaintive cry of pain and anguish that he backed away, dismayed.

Miranda made him try, again and again, until she was weeping with pain and frustration, shaking with tension and anxiety.

Grant knelt between her legs, holding an erection that had been so hard for so long it ached. Periodically--at her insistence--he would try to force the lubed-up tip into her tiny pink slit, but it was clamped up tight as a fist.

"Please, baby, try again," she'd say, "I can do it, I promise...please."

But every time, he could only get in so far--she was so tight, so dry inside, even with the lube. He tried to put his finger in, but it had hurt her, and she finally let him stop.

She rolled onto her side, and he curled himself around her, holding her as she sobbed. Grant pulled the sheet over them both. After a while, her tears subsided, and they both fell asleep.

+~+~+~+~+

Aranya froze. The foot was warm.

Slowly, she felt her way up to an ankle...a calf...a knee...a thigh--it was a woman's leg.

"Careful, sweetie," came a creaky voice from above her. "Don't start something you're not willing to finish, heheheheh."

Letting go abruptly, Aranya took a couple of steps back. "I'm sorry," she said. "I wasn't expecting...."

What

had

she been expecting? Certainly not a woman--an old woman, from the way she spoke--among a great mass of spiderwebs deep in the eternal darkness at the heart of this ancient forest.

"Are you stuck in the web?" Aranya asked.

"Stuck," replied the old woman in a speculative tone. "Yes...and no. What's your name, child?"

"Aranya."