Wolves' Teeth
Chapter 1: Mallen's Point

Copyright© 2014 by Mack the Knife

Fantasy Sex Story: Chapter 1: Mallen's Point - This tale follows the path of the elven apprentice wizard, Daenellis, as she comes of age in a war-torn neck of the Western Realms while following the increasingly desperate struggles of her mentor, Nembariel, to keep them out of the conflict.

Caution: This Fantasy Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa   mt/ft   Ma/ft   ft/ft   Fa/ft   Consensual   Romantic   Reluctant   Coercion   Magic   Lesbian   BiSexual   Heterosexual   Fiction   High Fantasy   Tear Jerker   DomSub   MaleDom   FemaleDom   Light Bond   First   Oral Sex   Anal Sex   Masturbation   Petting   Sex Toys   Cream Pie   Exhibitionism   Voyeurism   Slow   Violence   Prostitution  

Rain drenched the pair of them as they dragged themselves into the village. Despite the spells Nembariel wove about them, they were muddy, wet and cold, shivering as they finally left the boot-sucking ruts of the road behind and found firmer footing on packed and graveled streets. Like the last village, it looked half-deserted. The elven wizard put his cloak around his young apprentice's shoulders as well as he felt her shivering beside him and wove a quick warming spell within, the young elven girl's teeth chattering together as she smiled feebly in thanks.

"I give apologies my dearest Daenellis, for bring you into this horrible mess," he said softly. He spoke the Westron tongue, as they had since entering the region almost a year ago, and both were quite fluent with it, but retained enough elven formality to speak it stiffly and with what many Westerners considered a 'fancy' accent.

"You could not have known, master. And learning with no adversity is not truly learning," she said, repeating something he had told her seemingly long ago, though it was truly only a few months.

Now that they were no longer slogging in knee-deep mud, he wove again and most of the remaining, clinging mud slid off their boots and his leggings. She wore a dress and it was partially cleaned as well. She had taken to dressing as the Westron girls did, to avoid too much notice, once they realized the area they traversed was under threat of war.

The war had touched this village, and many villagers surely were gone now, pressed into the army of this nation's rulers. Still, human settlements were stuffed to brimming with people normally, and still had a rich abundance even half empty, to elven eyes.

They had left Windir in summer, and enjoyed their first few stopovers in the Western Realms, but as they moved north and west, it had grown cooler with the coming of fall, and now it was very nearly winter and the lands they traversed were torn by battle, a seeming endless progression of small, petty nations with equally petty and never ending conflicts with one another. He had tried to go around, but worse now lay south, and rumor came that the way back east as well was rife with intense battles. There seemed to be two loose coalitions of states – aligned along mountain ranges that ran northwest to southeast. A wide, jagged front that wove along two river valleys with a sort of hellish no-man's-land between them.

So far the two alliances had fought to a stalemate, more or less, but lately the more aggressive northern nations were gaining momentum, and no one was certain why. Whole companies were slain in the night, with little sign of what did the foul, messy killing. The southern alliance, mostly apparently interested in the war ending, was slowly crumbling under the onslaught of the north and soon would fall.

The village they found themselves in was in dense forest, but still along the southern of the two accursed rivers. Mercifully, it was also on the southern bank, and unlike the burnt ruins of villages on the northern bank, was still intact – mostly. A small contingent of armsmen passed, marching in shuffling imitation of formation as they went by, casting curious, suspicious looks at the wizard, though only his oilskin cloak was truly visible – hardly an especially suspicious garment in this weather. Perhaps it was the odd way it bulged, as if he were hiding something beneath it.

"We need shelter and food," he told her. The coin had run out weeks before. But they had tender that was of use most places – their magical arts. Every village sported an inn, though, and they soon found this ones. They walked up onto the boards of the porch and tried to make themselves a little more presentable before entering, straightening their clothes and themselves. The clothes looked the worse, as elves seem able to resist too much dirtying of their own bodies, by some odd trait of their race. Even soaked through, their sleek, straight hair looked much as it did when dry and it resisted mud and dirt as if the stuff could not hold it.

It was already dark, and the inn showed bright compared to the feeble candlelight from some of the house's windows. A large fire burned in a central fire-pit, and that drew the younger elf's eyes hungrily in its direction, wanting some of that warmth.

Many eyes turned to them at their entry, some suspicious, others curious, and most conversation stopped. That they were not humans was patently obvious due to the five-inch ears that protruded from their silken hair angling upward so that the tips were more or less equal with the crown of their heads. They moved freely, too, and in their current mood had drooped considerably from their high peak, down to almost horizontal, though even then they flicked toward sounds nearby.

The innkeeper was a broad-shouldered, muscular man with a deeply-lined face with a neatly trimmed beard upon it. "What's needed?" he asked curtly, resting one hand on the bar.

Nembariel suspected the other was resting on something quite heavy with a knobbed or spiked head. "I am a traveling mage and I need room and board for a time," said the elf. Hedge mages were common in the Western Realms and a well-respected profession, if not immensely renumerative. It had served them on the way for room, board, and sometimes small goods and coin.

The innkeeper looked dubiously at the mud spattered pair. Even hedge mages made efforts to put on a good show, and wore flashy, colorful outfits. Theirs had not been particularly bright even before they had been sullied, though Nembariel did own a very fine red velvet jacket. He was pretty sure it was sodden to the core at the bottom of his knapsack, that felt about twice its normal weight. "Prove it, we've had enough of charlatans and trinket peddlers in these parts and no luxury to spare for toys."

Nembariel nodded and let the young elven girl slip out from his cloak's protection. In a sodden dress, she looked quite tiny as she stood apart to give him room, shivering. The innkeeper waved an impatient finger at her that she should go nearer the fire and young Daenellis was in no mood to argue, shuffling between them to stand as close as the heat from it would allow her to. He was not a viciously cruel man at least, she thought.

Nembariel was not at the top of his reserves, nor given to huge displays in any case, so he wove a spell that would have a telling effect, but not be flashier than needed, though some flash was of course necessary. He held his hands out and a coruscating blue ball of energy formed between them, the men murmuring at the appearance of it as he fed more energies into it. Hairs stood on the back of the necks of men nearby as the unseen energies were tapped from the air about them. Daenellis knew he was low on his own powers and quietly performed her own magic, her lips barely moving to enable the incantation, sending him a thin, small feed of her own remaining energies, nothing to amount to wonderous, but still a help. He smiled as his apprentice, unbidden, aided him.

The ball started to pulse as if the surface were water, ripples spreading around the surface as music began to fill the room. It was a complex harp song, played well and the sound was as pure as the finest crafted harps could sing. It floated up there and continued to play as the innkeeper nodded. "It will continue? He asked as the customers seemed to murmur approval of the quite, soothing music.

"Until middle-night or near enough," said the wizard.

The innkeeper nodded again and eyed the girl. "One room? I'll need more of you than just music for two," he warned.

"I will render services as expected of my profession on the morrow for your benefit," said the mage formally. The innkeeper seemed less than totally pleased by that but agreed. The man was a mage and it did not do to upset them without good cause. "You can eat after you bathe," he told them, grabbing one of the serving girls and telling her to show them the bathing room.

The room was small, with only three tubs, but none were in use, which was a relief to the young girl. While Nembariel had seen her bare many times, and she him, she was still shy about human men doing so, and even more skittish of the idea of seeing a human male in a state of undress. They peeled out of the sodden clothing and clambered into the tubs as the girl brought in the first of the heated water to warm the baths to something not chilling, at least.

"Master, are we staying here long?" asked the young elf softly as the human serving girl left.

"I do not know, dearest," he told her truthfully. "If it proves a safe place to wait out the conflicts around us, we may well."

She nodded. Too many days had passed since she had bathed properly and even this was not proper bathing by elven custom. She scrubbed herself with the brush provided and made generous use of the harsh lye soap that filled the buckets by the tub. She was in the end, quite pink and clean, but not properly bathed – this meant much more to an elf than merely clean.

The warmish water and the bath itself did help restore her a bit, and she had the energy to use a spell to dry a fresh dress from her pack, and pulled it on. She was acutely aware of her master's regard as she moved around nude. Being comfortable with something did not mean it was meaningless. He always watched her when she was nude, but not with the spark of desire in his eyes, more as if appraising her.

She was tying on the dress as the serving girl entered, dumping the last of the buckets in Nembariel's tub. He thanked her and she smiled flirtatiously. Half cleaned up, he was once more revealed to be quite a handsome man – actually a beautiful man, a prime example of mature elven maleness. He was past his hundred and fiftieth year, and would be old by human measure, but he looked no older than his early thirties and was a trim, lithe figure in the tub, despite the mud browning the water. Daenellis smiled. Her master only slept alone by choice most places. She took her leave to let the pair get acquainted, slipping out with her sodden knapsack, as well as her mentor's clothes he had worn into the inn.

She asked another serving girl, this one busy carrying beer to the thirsty men in the common, where the laundry room was and was told, going there to wash the garments they wore that day. They could hang dry in their rooms tonight. It took her a long while to scrub out the clothes, working on her knees in the little tile-lined room. She looked up after a bit to see the innkeeper watching her. "Why not magic them clean, lass?" he asked her.

"I do not yet have that skill, sir," she said respectfully. "And we are very weary after walking the muddy highway."

He nodded, his expression understanding. "It's nary better further along the road. You might encourage your master to stay a spell among us, we could keep you both comfortably enough," he said.

She smiled. "I will speak to him," she said. "But I cannot promise he will listen."

That got a chuckle from the innkeeper. He was noticing, now that she did not quite look like a drowned rat, that she was actually very pretty – beautiful, in fact. She had that elfin inhuman loveliness and glow of innocence about her that drew the eyes of folk. "How old are you, lass?" he asked.

"I have seen twenty springs, sir," she said honestly. He blinked, then recalled elven folk slowed at the onset of their adolescence, and aged far more slowly than humans. "That makes you – to us?" he asked.

"Fourteen, sir," she said. "Though there is debate on the exact calculations to use for that."

He chuckled. "Still quite little for that, then," he said. "But damn site easy on the eyes."

She smiled at the compliment. "I am pleased you find favor," she said dutifully. Elven custom required at least a pleasant acknowledgment of compliments, even if delivered badly.

"I could find coin as well as favor for a gel who knows how to be friendly with a fellow," he told her cooly, watching her reaction. She blinked and looked up at him, not understanding the implications.

"I thought we were being friendly," she said softly, the confusion in her tone obvious. "Have I given offense?"

"Nay, lass, I only meant..." he was cut off by a rather curvacious and well-made serving woman coming in.

"Leave off the gel, Dennel, she don't know what you're on about and you'll spook her if you tried to explain it," she told him, flicking his chin with a fingertip. He grumbled and gave the saucy, buxom women a slight glare. She had a heavy basket propped on one ample hip and seemed coming in to work. He pushed off the wall and nodded to Daenellis before leaving.

"What did he mean?" asked the elf after he had left and the large-breasted woman hunkered down to work near her.

"Never you mind, sweet child, just forget about it," said the woman with a good-natured smile. "You're too young and fair to be tangled with the likes of him. Lord knows I was when he first set hooks in me."

Daenellis, ever a respectful youngling, did her best to forget about it. She would, of course, ask Nembariel about it when she got the chance. Though from the warm smiles that younger serving girl had been giving him, that might be morning.

"I'm Kella, by the way," said the large-breasted woman, aiming another florid smile at the girl.

The little elf smiled back. "I am called Daenellis," she said, ducking her head in a modified curtsey, given she was already on her knees. "My master is Nembariel."

The woman accepted the names and only glanced up a bit. "I thought all you elven girls wore those silken skimpy things," she said. "They're lovely but sure show a lot of your smooth skin."

Daenellis nodded. "I have a few such outfits, yes," she said. "But – it seemed inappropriate in the current days – with the fighting and all."

"Wise of you, I think," said the brown-haired woman. "Men might forget your tender age if you wore such as that. You're a damn site too pretty for your own good around here as it is."

The elf looked at her oddly. While she understood things like rape, they were so alien to elven culture that she was unsure she truly believed it happened. She knew no one it had happened to, for certain. "How can I be too pretty?" she asked finally.

"Men forget their manners when war is about, and start thinking they should do whatever comes into their addled minds to do at a given moment. They get those stupid ideas all the time, but during quiet, peaceful times, they at least think twice before acting on those urges." She shook her head, as if negating all the follies of the male gender.

To the elf it sounded almost like being taken by a fey. All elves had one, and it drove them to unreasonable behavior toward certain goals or behaviors. Her own had landed her in deeply more than a few times. A fey was a burden to elves, part of their price they paid for their long lives and magical natures.

Daenellis' fey was secrets – just that – secrets, and it might seem innocuous enough, save she would go to great lengths and hardship to acquire snippets of little-known facts, and would protect her own with a manic zeal that bordered on outright insanity. Once she had decided some part of her life or bit of knowledge was secret, it might as well be sealed beyond the Gates of Forever. She wondered if the innkeeper's cryptic and odd offer was the beginning of one for her to cherish and let her fey gloat over, like a dragon on his hoard – it had the proper feel. She would be circumspect in asking Nembariel for advice.

"They might force attentions on me," said the elf after a time.

"To put it mildly, aye," said the woman, and reached out to pat her shoulder comfortingly. "So best you dress like a proper gel while in these parts, and I think you'll fare well enough at your master's side."

The girl nodded. Nembariel had already had to protect himself and her a few times, mostly from being robbed, but once from people seemingly intent on trying to end them. And even as an apprentice, she was far from helpless. All elves practiced with a hyandai, a slim, curved long knife or short sword of exquisite keenness. She wore one on her hip at all times since coming to the long valley.

She was also a wizard, even if one of modest skill and power. It took surprisingly little magic to quickly turn a fight in one's favor. In the most recent, and deadly fight, one of the assailants had grabbed her arm, intent on dragging her apart from Nembariel, only to find himself holding an arm gone hot as molten steel, burning through his gauntlet and maiming his hand before he could make the extremity let loose the youngling. Nembariel had been forced to kill two of them to convince them they were not targets worth their lives, and the rest had fled, realizing they could not even reliably grab the smaller of the two without ruin.

Nembariel did not take lives lightly and wept that night with Daenellis cradling his head as he sobbed and begged her to forgive him for bringing her to this dark corner of the world. She had told him time and again she did, but he still did it from time to time. That night had been one of the most painful moments of her short life. It was not easy to see one's idol in tears. Before that, she saw him as some near omnipotent demigod, a legendary wizard among elves, and she had been honored beyond words at his selecting her to be his apprentice. But he became mortal that night and a bit of her heart and childhood died.

"Are you okay, lass?" asked the woman, seeing tears dripping from the elf's nose as she scrubbed at one of the shirts on a washboard. "I didn't mean to put such in your heart as that, just caution."

"I just remembered a thing of great sadness, mistress," said the elf. "It was not your doing or words."

"Well, I can't do much about a sad memory, but say it'll pass," said the buxom woman, returning to her work. "All things do, in time."

She finished with the washing and offered to help the woman with hers. "You look worn enough already, girl, go about your way and get food in your belly, then a bed under your bottom."

Daenellis smiled at the slightly off-color manner of describing going to bed and took the wet clothes out with her. The innkeeper directed her to her room with some gestures and told her their food would be ready when she got back. "It ain't exactly feast fare worthy of elven folk, but it'll stick to your ribs and keep you going."

She murmured that she was sure it would be quite wonderful, then went to hang their clothes in her room. The room she had been given was noticeably smaller than her masters, but she saw that as fit enough – she was smaller, after all. It was actually more a large closet and under one of the eaves of the inn, so that the ceiling sloped steeply down to within a foot of the edge of her bed against the wall. She could sit up on the near side, but only with inches to spare even over her low head. To a human the room would be positively claustrophobic. To her, it was pleasantly snug, and the tiny iron stove in the corner was warm and the room held a nice temperature, warmer than the hall had been.

It further had a wash-stand and basin, and a table but no chair, there was no room for one. There was a long wooden rod across one end of the room that she hung the drying clothes on. She then unpacked her knapsack and laid out the sodden goods out of it on the table before hanging the sack to dry, too. The only thing not soaked was her notebook. That valuable item, the only thing in the pack she would be devastated to lose, was proofed against wetting, even if immersed in a pool. That had been one of her first duties after Nembariel had given it to her, was to ward it against wet and soil and fire and many other potentially damaging things. Bugs would not eat it, and even other people would be wary of touching it, getting a decided nervous feeling of being watched if they thought of picking it up. Actually doing so would burn their hands, though only mildly, her magic was not up to truly hurting them with a ongoing ward.

She arranged and spread the other items to dry and scooted the table closer to the little coal-stove, then decided food was the next step.

In the common she was alone for most of her little meal. Nembariel was obviously enjoying the company of the serving girl in the baths. She smiled at the thought. He needed companionship for he had a lot of worries. Perhaps the company of a woman would improve his depressed mood.

The meal proved to be as unremarkable as the innkeeper promised. A thin stew with far too much meat in it and not nearly enough vegetables for her elven palate. Still, she ate without complaint, she was very hungry. She would suffer some discomfort later as her stomach tried to digest the meat-rich meal. She did not ask after the provenance of the meat, and suspected it was horse. He had kindly provided them each with a somewhat shriveled lemon, which after the stew she carefully peeled and made sure to eat every bit of the tart, dry thing she could scavenge from it. It tasted like One's own nectar. She even spent a short while sucking at the bits of peel before the innkeeper seeing her and feeling a little pity, brought her another. This one, also, was soon a fond, sour memory. There was also a rather stale half of a loaf of bread, which she soaked in the last of her stew's juices to soften and ate carefully. Too often they had to forage for a little to eat these weeks and she would not waste a bit of prepared, finished food if she could help it.

Nembariel entered the common then and sat with her, looking in better humor if more tired. She grinned at his state, as his neck now sported a subtle ring of red circles. "You caught lover's mumps again, master," she teased.

He sighed and nodded. "It gets me every time," he said resignedly, flashing the girl a smile. "You think I'd learn to stay away from serving girls – they seem to carry it."

She nodded in mock soberness at the statement. He started with his lemon and showed every bit as much desire for the sour little thing as she had. The innkeeper, however, did not offer a second to him, she noted with a slight smirk. He muttered over the stew, and said he would be spending half the night in the necessary and she gave him a shocked look at such talk at the table.

He chuckled. "You are correct, dearest, I have grown crass in this dark place," he said in that resigned tone that was not masking amusement.

"I think you should probably risk more mumps with that serving girl," said the young elfling. "You seem to forget you are an elf sometimes."

He widened his eyes and looked surprised himself, but finally lowered them. "From the lips of the young, wisdom oft spills in truth," he said quoting an old elven saying. He was falling into his melancholy again and she got up and went to him, tugging one arm out to crawl up into his lap, curling against him and sighing. He embraced her to him with that one arm. They did not look a master and student to the people of the inn, but more father and daughter. The nature of such relationships in elven culture were not quite so as human, though enough masters did the same over time among human apprenticeships.

He seemed to take cheer in her scent and the warmth of her against him, and from her silken hair, which he petted and caressed and groomed. She did the same, but pretended this was all for his benefit, at least to herself. He smelled 'right', unlike the humans around them, an elven man, strong and protective of her – had killed to protect her, in fact. She wondered if she would be so strong if the situation demanded, and hoped she would. She nuzzled into his chest warmly and even lifted her head to kiss his chin. He smiled. Their open affection was drawing a few eyes, but most minded their own affairs in these dark days. In their minds if the elf was diddling his pretty apprentice, it was no matter of theirs, not that he was.

"I think you are for bed, little one," he told her. "And ward your door, even if there is a bolt." She nodded and got up at the pat to her bottom. She kissed his cheek and wove through the common and up the stairs to her room.

She warded the door as he said, setting a barrier there to it opening and another to alert her to it doing so, regardless, in case enough force was applied to open it by main force – humans could be mightily strong. Then she quickly set another, pest ward, on her bed, and gave any varmints a few minutes to get out of the lumpy-looking thing. She removed her dress, which was simplicity as she did not go in for the human custom of layering on clothes until one was encased like a baby in swaddling and got into the bed.

She did not need more than a few moments to find sleep, it had been lying in wait for her.

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