Part 11B

Danica returned to her room in the main complex of the Forge with a heavy heart. She knew that another task awaited her, this time without companions to stand with her.

Celes revealed that she planned to return to Zoraster's complex that day. She had left some things half finished, and wanted to get back to them. She also felt saddened by the breakup of the Companions of the Forge, and knew that staying here would remind her constantly of that loss.

When Celes left, Danica sat down to talk with Brandon. "What do you plan to do?"

Brandon shrugged and replied, "No idea. Zoraster told me to accompany you, so I'm with you until you leave." His smile revealed that the prospect of remaining with her wasn't an unwelcome prospect.

That lightened Danica's spirits a little.

Zoraster trampled her hopes when he arrived not long after. He walked into the room without the couple even noticing his arrival. They both started when he spoke. "Brandon, you have served well. Return to the complex through the portal in Danica's lab. Know you have served me well, and shall be well compensated. I imagine I shall find other work for you now that you have revealed the full extent of your abilities."

Brandon nodded to Zoraster, offered Danica a last smile, and then walked to the portal as instructed.

Zoraster and Danica locked eyes in a staring contest. Zoraster smiled and said, "Know you have served me well also, little rose. It is a pity they managed to marshal their stinking hordes. I was eager to see if you could capture any of the other four who conspired against me. Marlena is proving to be a most interesting young woman." He then laughed and Danica felt a chill run through her.

"I had thought I might have to personally intervene here when the final attack commenced. I feared the place lost. This enterprise is too important to my plans to allow to fall. Fortunately, Geflon and his midgets, and Mindblind and his vagabond sell swords prevented the need. I did not wish to so overtly play my hand here, showing the importance of this place to me. Your task is half complete, and well done. Are you ready to embark on the next part of your task?"

"Just tell me what I'm supposed to do," Danica snapped.

Zoraster laughed. "Ah — there's some fire. Very well, little rose — your task is to glean through those who sell their bodies in the House of Women. You are to find the most skillful and interesting of them, and coax them into my employ. They will be paid by me instead of relying on their own charms to make their living. Any who refuse, you are to send away. I am sending one to oversee them, and she will aid you when necessary. I want at least thirty young, attractive women, and at least two young handsome men working for me in that house before your task is complete.

"Find the disadvantaged and offer them hope in the coin I will pay. Bring them here and fill my house. You shall have the freedom to move about the farmsteads and villages of the area to seek them out. You will know if you have traveled beyond the set boundaries, I assure you. When you have filled the house, return and your task shall be complete — your freedom granted to you. Do feel free to sample those you bring into my employ. I rather enjoy watching."

"I understand," Danica responded in a dismissive tone.

Zoraster laughed again. "Ah — yes, yes — let the fire in your eyes match your fiery hair. Just remember, send that fire against me in more than words and glances and your punishment will be severe. Good day, little rose." With that final warning, the Archmage turned and left.

Only a few minutes later, a knock sounded on Danica's door. Danica opened the door to find Zoraster's promised Madam. She and Danica went to the house, and there they sat in the back room to watch the women at work. The Madame knew her trade well, and she quickly pointed out those who should stay and those who should go. They selected twenty women before the day ended, all of whom agreed to Zoraster's new arrangement. The Madam sent the rest of the prostitutes away and told them not to return.

Danica then moved into the city of Oakhaven to seek out more. She found two young men the Madame deemed suitable the first day in the city, and enticed five women from the local bawdy houses into Zoraster's employ.

With the possibilities in the city exhausted, Danica moved out into the countryside to seek out the hopeless. She filled the last spot in Zoraster's house some two weeks later. Danica took great care to find those who truly had few other options in life and could truly benefit from the offer she had to make. She went about the task with a heavy heart, though. Somehow, she knew that Zoraster had more in store for the House of Women than he revealed.

With her task was complete, Danica returned to Zoraster's complex, and her familiar rooms.

Zoraster smiled, satisfied to have yet another house of whores under his complete control. Each house of ill repute would prove useful once he winnowed through the chaff to locate those who would serve him in a greater capacity.

Every element, every level of society had a place in Zoraster's plan. His agents would be within every nook and cranny of the world before he acted.

Sitting back in his chair, Zoraster considered Danica, deciding to hold her back for some time. The encounter with the half-breed and the Dwarf could prove troublesome under the wrong circumstances, and it would be best if she were away from the stage of his great play for a while.

The manipulation of the wish-based illusions created by Danica's pendant ensured that Geflon and Mindblind were unlikely to associate her with Devan's sister, but Zoraster could not ignore the danger.

A few gestures and words of magic increased the dosage of the drugs that Danica's pendant regularly administered to her. Zoraster smiled wickedly, knowing the drugs would ensure Danica spent most of her time dealing the increased needs of her carnal desires, keeping her out of the public view.

With those thoughts came arousal. With a growl of anticipation, the Archmage turned to leave and call upon Danielle. The young clone proved eager for him to deflower her once more.

Danica saw that the last of the many things she had commissioned had arrived during her absence. Someone had placed each item in more or less the exact place she wanted them. Danica smiled when she saw notes from Heather saying that many of her spell component jars were ready for her to pick up.

Her pulse quickened when she thought of Heather and Grant. Having ignored the needs of her body during the second half of Zoraster's task, her body ached for release now that she allowed the feeling to settle over her.

Danica immediately went to acquire the sixteen beautiful jars from Heather, sharing the couple's bed with them long into the night. She didn't sleep when she returned to her rooms, but instead took some of the alertness drug and returned to her studies.

Now that she had the time, Danica was determined to learn the spells of teleportation. Her assistance in transporting the Companions would have helped a lot in the time before Mara arrived to join them. She knew the magic would probably come in handy again.

Over the course of the next several days, Danica studied the spell. On the fourth day, she felt her blood burn and knew the magic was hers. She walked out onto the grounds, and then teleported from the front door of the main building to the front gates of the complex. Danica laughed when the guards — who should be used to wizards — jumped when she popped into existence right in front of them.

She walked back to her rooms, feeling arousal building inside her. While wrapped up in studying the spell, she had ignored those needs, and her body now rebelled against that denial.

Danica felt disappointed when she found Andrea and Damian both busy, but in truth, she wanted something different. She wasn't even sure what she wanted, but she knew she wanted it badly — and now.

Thinking of her time in Oakhaven, Danica decided to go there. She went to her rooms and used the portal to return to the room permanently set aside for her at the Training Grounds.

Everyone smiled and spoke to Danica as she passed through on her way out of the complex and down to the city. She wandered around at a leisurely stroll, taking in the sights rather than just the looks and thoughts of the women she passed this time.

She noticed several shops that she planned to revisit soon. She found only one bathhouse, all but deserted in the cold weather. The cold couldn't dissuade Danica, and she enjoyed a long, warm soak. The rumbling of her stomach prompted her to find a good inn and a meal after her bath.

Danica passed by one, but found another that spoke of higher quality shortly thereafter. She found the food good, though not nearly as fine as the fare in the inns of Montbank, the city near Zoraster's complex.

The entertainment was a different story. She didn't notice until the show started, but few women patronized the inn. The entertainment likely explained why. Nearly nude dancers — a half a dozen at a time — moved around the floor of the inn. The dancers attempted to entice coins from the patrons, placing the tips — or having the patrons place them — in small pouches hanging from the waist of the skimpy bottoms of their dancing costumes. The jingling of the coins added to the music that accompanied their dance.

The women were very beautiful and talented. Danica felt ever-increasing arousal spreading through her as she watched the women dance. One in particular, a young dark-haired woman, made Danica quiver every time the dancer looked her way.

The women mostly avoided Danica, assuming that a woman sitting alone wasn't a likely prospect to fill their coin purses. The dark-haired girl spun to a table and paused for just a moment. A handsome, but stern looking man at the table put a coin in one of her purses. Danica noticed the patron say something to the dancing girl.

The dancer immediately glided toward Danica, smiling and pirouetting around the table until she danced in front of Danica. Danica's mouth, and something else, watered as the woman danced in front of her. Pulling a coin from her pocket, Danica slipped it into one of the woman's coin purses.

The girl smiled and spun around, bending her back to look back at Danica as she glided away. The position offered Danica a very good view of the upper globes of the woman's firm breasts. Danica quivered as she watched.

The music wound down, and the current dancers left the floor. Six more dancers stepped out of a back room when another tune, faster in tempo, started playing.

The women were no less beautiful or talented. Danica enjoyed their dances — a lot. Apparently, someone had noticed Danica putting the coin in the one girl's purse, because the women stopped avoiding her table. Danica tried not to think of how many coins she slipped into purses while feeling the soft skin of the women's hips in the process.

The man to whom the dark-haired dancing girl had spoken to glanced in Danica's direction quite often, and something about him made Danica terribly uncomfortable.

She didn't really feel like leaving yet, so Danica stood and took her drink with her to find somewhere else to sit, out of range of the man's stares.

Danica sat in a corner booth for a while, but even when she couldn't see the man, she felt his eyes boring into her. It didn't take long for Danica to leave. She looked in the direction of the man's table as she left, confirming that he was indeed looking in her direction. A final glance over her shoulder revealed the man finally turning away.

Danica decided to assuage her curiosity, going to the House of Women at the Training Grounds. Danica noticed little difference, save the quality of the bedding had improved. As Danica watched the men — and a single woman — coming in to pay for their companionship, she noted that the prices charged varied greatly. The woman was not charged at all, but allowed to choose one of the two handsome men to sport with free of charge.

Danica knew Zoraster was using this bawdy house for some sinister purpose, but she simply couldn't fathom what. After a short while, she left the house to return to Oakhaven.

Danica walked in the chill air by the light of the full moon. About halfway back to the town, Danica remembered a sheltered glade enclosing a small pond with a hot spring fed pool on one end. She'd found it during her search of the countryside to fill Zoraster's house. Something about that glade had called out to her when she passed it, and she answered that call now.

When Danica reached the glade a few minutes later, she walked up to the pool and kicked off one of her shoes. Dipping a toe into the water, she found the temperature just below the point of uncomfortably hot. Danica smiled and disrobed. She'd heard about the relaxing and healing properties of hot mineral springs like this, and couldn't resist experimenting.

Danica eased into the water, the biting contrast between the chill air and the hot pool uncomfortable at first. Once fully immersed, she breathed a sigh of content and floated in the steaming waters.

Danica noticed that she floated far easier in this water than she would normally, and remembered something in her studies about that being a property of certain mineral springs. Danica relaxed her body and let the pool buoy her up. She floated easily, and her nipples grew pebble hard where they emerged from the pool into the chill air. Danica reached out a finger and ran it over one of her nipples, thinking she could probably cut glass with them right now.

The touch also ignited the still pressing need for release inside her. Danica rubbed her folds beneath the steaming water, moaning blissfully as she gave in to her needs. Just as she spiraled upward toward release, faint voices startled her. She heard the voices not with her ears, but with her mind.

Danica looked around, but saw nothing. She concentrated, and noticed she could still hear the voices. The only thing she could make out was a she.

Danica continued to look around, trying to figure out where the voices were coming from, but she saw nothing. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement.

Snapping her eyes to the area, Danica saw nothing at first. After a few moments of staring, she saw what looked like a reflection of a woman in the water of the pond. As Danica watched, the Nymph rose up out of the water and glided toward Danica. At the same time, another Nymph stepped out from behind a tree and also moved toward Danica.

Danica didn't know what to do. The Nymphs did not appear threatening, and she knew they weren't evil. Nymphs sometimes caused men to die of exhaustion while coupling with them, because they sought out men for their seed to bring new Nymphs forth from nature when one passed away, but the deaths were rare and occurred purely by accident.

Danica looked at the forest spirits as they approached, appearing almost as wary of her as she was of them. The water Nymph, also known as a Naiad, naturally had bluish-tinged skin and very light blue hair. She was very petite and had small breasts with dark nipples and areoles that blended together. A thin strip of hair adorned her mound.

The tree Nymph — a Dryad — appeared much the same, except her skin was greenish in color, her nipples and areoles lighter, and her hair much darker. She too had a thin strip of hair on her mound, and Danica wondered how this had incorporated itself into the Nymphs whom she'd always seen depicted and spoken of as having natural, untouched pubic hair in their human forms.

The two Nymphs moved close together, and the water Nymph said to the other, "See, I told you it is a She of men."

Danica could not help but feel aroused. Nymphs were naturally some of the most beautiful and sexual creatures in existence. Danica suppressed a shudder as she watched them — still wary, but feeling her body strongly responding to the sight of the beautiful nature entities.

The two Nymphs both shuddered in unison. The tree Nymph said, "It does not feel like a She of men, or smell like a She of men. It feels like a She sister. The Shes of men do not have the magic as we do to call to the Hes of men like this one."

Both of the Nymphs hands strayed to their nether lips to cover them, and Danica noticed just the faintest hints of a scent in the air. It smelled like a spring shower in the forest — warm, inviting, and sweet. Danica felt her arousal spike higher and saw the Nymphs both shudder again. This time both Nymphs slipped a finger between their nether lips.

"The Shes of men do not call to us as this one does, but it is not a She sister. It is a She of men, I say," the Naiad asserted.

The two Nymphs closed their eyes for a moment, falling into what Danica thought looked like a prayer-like state. When the Nymphs opened their eyes, they both looked at each other and smiled.

"How are you called, She of men?" The water Nymph asked. Both of the beautiful sprites moved closer to stand at the edge of the hot spring fed pool.

"My name is Danica."

"I am Xara", said the Dryad.

"I am Xaqua", said the Naiad.

"I can leave if I'm intruding. I don't wish to bother you in your home," Danica said.

The two Nymphs laughed. "You do not intrude — you interest us. The Mistress likes you, and we like you too," Xaqua said and giggled.

"Will you come away from the hot place?" Xara asked.

Danica's ever-heightening arousal confused her. She knew this happened to men when they encountered Nymphs, but she had never heard of it affecting a woman. Her hand strayed between her legs, and the Nymphs continued to rub their folds as well. Danica also slowly moved out of the hot pool toward the Nymphs.

The air should have chilled her wet skin to the point of making her shiver, but Danica didn't feel the bite of the cold at all, as she exited the steaming waters. As soon as she was within their reach, the two Nymphs each stretched out a hand and touched one of her breasts.

The three shuddered in unison, and Danica felt the wetness inside her freely flowing. She knew she would start dripping soon.

"We seek a He of men for his seed. Will you join us in our seeking? We are but two and have not seen a sister for many moons," the water nymph said and then both sprites moved their hands from between their legs. They took Danica's hands and placed them over their folds, covering Danica's folds with their own hands.

All worry and care evaporated from Danica. Somewhere in the back of her head, she knew she was under the Nymph's spell, but at this moment, she didn't care. Danica caressed the two wood spirit's labia and gently probed her fingers between their lips. The Nymphs likewise did the same for her.

The two Nymphs took deep breaths, leaning close to Danica to drink in her scent as the three masturbated each other. Danica noticed the Nymphs shivering after each breath, and she could feel their wetness dripping off the back of her hand as she probed between their nether lips.

Danica didn't know how long they stood touching each other this way, but when the two Nymphs guided her down to the ground, she noticed her own scent of arousal seemed just as strong as that of the Nymphs. The three scents mingled as one — strong, sensual, and intoxicating. Once again, Danica noted that she felt no bite from the chill air. As she reached the ground, Danica noticed that the earth felt as warm as a spring day.

Danica lay down on her side, and the Naiad moved in front of her. Danica ran her tongue along the parting of the nymph's lips, and moaned in response to the taste. The Nymph's juices tasted like perfect spring water sweetened with fruit juices. The nectar dripped from the Nymph in a steady flow as Danica lapped it up.

Out of the corner of her eye, Danica saw the Dryad lie on her side in front of the other Nymph, parting her legs. Xaqua slid her tongue between Xara's wet lips as soon as she could reach. Xara then maneuvered her body so she could get her head between Danica's legs. Danica gasped as she felt the wood Nymph's tongue wash over her.

Danica's moans mingled with the musical ones of Xara and Xaqua as they all flicked their tongues over each other. Danica felt that she should go slowly, teasing and tantalizing with her lips and tongue, slowly building the fires in Xaqua, as Xara did the same for her.

Time lost meaning as Danica lapped the continuous flow of intoxicating juices from Xaqua. Danica slowly built toward release, but felt somewhat disconnected from the sensation as she washed her tongue over the Nymph's sex. Normally, the level of arousal she had reached would have distracted her from her lapping by now, but she continued to probe Xaqua's folds at the same steady pace as she drew nearer to orgasm.

When her orgasm gripped her, Danica quietly emitted a long moan of release as she continued to lick Xaqua. She felt Xaqua's body quivering under her tongue and Xara's head shivering between her legs. From those movements and the moans she heard, Danica assumed that the Nymphs must be coming too.