The final inking cut into his flesh, and the stalwart barbarian didn't even grimace in pain, though a lesser man might have. Grinning instead, Gundor the Hammer clenched his fist. The ink-maiden--a shaman of the Tribe of the Thunderbeast--had infused the ink and her drawing with mystical power, and Hammer could feel the enchantment seeping into his flesh, becoming a part of him. As he held his fist clenched, he could feel a sensation of hardness and power flow into the bones and muscle therein.
Grinning, he used his other hand to slide around the back of the woman's neck, pulled her in close and kissed her savagely. She returned the kiss with equal fury, gnashing down hard on his lip. Laying back on a pile of furs, the naked barbarian spread his muscular thighs and clasped his hands behind his head. The ink-maiden coiled around his muscular body, fingers and fingernails dragging across lightly-haired, chiseled flesh. He looked up at the sky, the dark clouds masking the twinkling stars and the gleaming moon. He could smell the storm brewing, and he knew his mate could too.
Vyathan bit down hard, her teeth digging into the thin skin over his ribs at his side, causing him to wince reflexively. He grasped her hair and she glared at him with feral defiance. It was an aspect of her being that he adored and respected.
Heart pounding in his chest, he heaved her atop him, and the shaman's muscular, sleek body immediately began to gyrate, panther-like grace grinding down on his manhood as her musk filled the air. He bit her lip, kissed her, and bit again.
She reached down, her hand gripping his surging manhood, and promptly sheathed him within her loins. Hammer had learned the difference between the women of his clan and normal human women. This was their third lovemaking in as many hours. Her pace was vigorous and without quarter. A city-dwelling maiden would have been passed out, snoring in contentment after her first bout with him, but, imbued with the primal spirits of their land, Vyathan was a vigorous and eager as their first grunting, sweating, violent bout of lovemaking.
The barbarian felt the storm surging in the sky before her saw the first flashes of lightning. It invigorated him, and with a sudden surge of strength, he lifted his trunk upward, grasping Vyathan with large, strong, calloused hands by her hips, tucked his feet under his hips, and stood upright. Her hands gripped his boulder shoulders and she fell back, looking up at the sky. His head fell back, dark brown hair falling down around his shoulder blades as he thrust with his hips, jerking the shaman up and down as she laid back, suspended by strong arms and vice-like thighs around his powerful hips.
Lightning struck, perhaps drawn by their mutual primal attunement mingled together in the heat of passion, and split a sapling nearby, igniting it in flames. The thunder that followed was loud and cracked the air and sent shocks of force through both of their bodies. Hammer and Vyathan cried out in the sudden pain that thundered in their bodies, a pain that was quickly transformed into pure, electric bliss.
Still thrusting, still jolting her body, Hammer felt his blood electrify, felt the promise of the storm filling his primal soul. He pulled the shaman to his face, her eyes reflecting the his own, and they gnashed at each others lips and tongues, their kiss as savage as their lovemaking.
Lightning struck again, very close by this time, and their body hair stood on end from the latent static energy. Hammer felt his climax surging forth, but held it at bay with an effort of will. He'd be damned before he let himself spend before his mate. Luckily, she was close by. As if drawn by her impending climax, the rain began to pelt them, as if to douse their passion. Instead, it was like fuel to a fire, and when Vyathan's dusky-skinned body began to shudder in climax, Hammer used one hand to grasp her black hair and pin her against the hilt of his shaft. She clamped down, and he released, a torrent of molten virility pumping into his mate as her quivering body slapped and pummeled his own.
And when the thundering climax faded, the sky only wept rain upon their sweating, heaving bodies, gasping for breath. The thunder was a distant rumble, and the lightning a distant flash.
So distant, it seemed, that Hammer and Vyathan thought that, perhaps, they only perceived it nearby in the throes of passion.
Hammer grinned, his chest twitching with rumbling laughter as he knelt and laid the woman down beside him. Curling and purring against him, the shaman was slow to doze off.
Perhaps she knew what would come next, perhaps not. Either way, both were unarmored and effectively defenseless.
The ensuing flurry of chaos had creatures both large and smelly surrounding them and barking in a harsh, guttural language. Hammer shoved Vyathan off his body and leapt to his feet, immediately regretting his lack of weapon and hide armor. Vyathan pounced up as well, unbothered by her rough removal as she reached out to the primal spirits. A solid, wet thunk accented a creature's--Hammer recognized them all as bugbears--sentence, and Vyathan collapsed. Her spared her a glance, and that was all he needed to ignite his fury. Blood oozed from the back of her skull, and a dark rock laid beside her, spattered with her blood.
Rage unlike anything he'd felt before filled his veins. Naked and coated in rain and sweat, the barbarian charged the nearest bugbear, one that was laughing and poking a fat finger toward his mate. Without thought, he clamped down on the beast's forearm and bit the finger off. He spat, the foul blood in his mouth just long enough to give him a taste, and the finger went flying. Blood trickled off his lips and over his chin as he pulled the bugbear by the arm toward him, bringing his forehead into the hairy beast's face. Nose and jaw cracked, the bugbear grunting as Hammer bull rushed it to the ground. He rode the beast down, then leapt up, stamping down savagely on its cracked face. He turned in time to catch a heavy punch to the side of his head and, for a moment, the world was all blinking stars and swimming images.
His rage shoved dizziness aside. He lowered his shoulder into the shaggy goblinoid and, muscles straining, he wrapped his arms around its waist, lifted it up onto his shoulder, and slammed it head-first into the wet ground. A sickening crack signaled its broken neck, and it lay there limply.
But surprise was no longer on his side. He turned and saw more bugbears, all armed and stalking toward him. Rage overruled reason and he leapt for a sword-wielding bugbear. The blade knifed across his chest and stomach, rending flesh, but he ignored the pain by some feat of primal fury. He bit down on the bugbears neck, tearing savagely at the flesh and spit out gobs of gore. Blood--his own and the beasts--coated his chest and stomach, dripping down past his hips and thighs as the bugbear thrashed against him. He took the beast's sword out of its dying hand and leapt blindly to the side, where he hoped a bugbear would be there to greet him.
Rather, a shield stopped him, and the iron barrier slammed into his head and torso, sending him sprawling to the ground.
*****
Ellyet Ironsong's chest was rising and falling with a pace indicative of moderate exertion. The slaughtering of bugbears was not an overly difficult task for him and his cohorts, the League of the Falcon, and was also pleasurable business.
But they were not in it for free. He knelt and drew a long, curved knife, severing a misshapen ear from one of the husky beasts. He put it in a pouch and grinned at the other men and women doing the same. A dozen in all, the League had been roaming this part of the High Forest, near Grunwald, for nearly a year now, and had made good money from the town's officials keeping beasts such as these away.
However, he'd always made it his business to keep his bounty hunters away from the barbarian tribes that inhabited this region of the High Forest. He wanted no quarrel with them, and was pleased that, until now, he'd not run across any.
But now there was an unconscious man and woman in his midst, the latter likely dead, by virtue of the vicious head injury she'd suffered. The man was covered in blood. More blood than Ellyet had seen in his long, elven years. Brushing his thick chestnut hair back over his pointed ears, he walked over the kneeling woman between the barbarians.
"Well?" he asked. His voice was musical even in the context of a single word demand.
"She has a pulse, but I don't know for how much longer. The male is quite alive, just unconscious. You must have struck him hard. He was clearly under the influence of rage and fury when he turned on you."
"I'm not sure I was his target," Ellyet said, "at least, not for long. He didn't look before leaping."
The woman, called Lark, murmured a prayer that sent rosy light coursing along her forearm and into the barbarian, restoring him. He sucked in a deep breath, sat bolt upright, and looked around frantically. He stood up and cast about, looking for enemies.
The fellows of the League of the Falcon tried to hide their laughter as the bare naked barbarian's manhood swung about like a fleshy war-mace.
