Chapter 4

"There is really no reason that you should help me, Mistress Hawkworth. But I beg you have pity on my daughter, either free her from the Goddess, or bring her truly to Her service, so that she and i can be free of the tormenting dreams that prey on us."

"'Tormenting dreams', quotha? How, 'tormenting'?"

"Ummm -- dreams of men and... and... of women... and of... other... things..."

"Ah! That kind of torment -- and you wake in the night to wet bedclothes and a need that cannot be satisfied, not matter how you try... ?"

"Yes," muttered Snow, head bowed, blushing hotly.

"MmmmHmmm. What is Diana's age, exactly?"

"Fifteen -- as well you know."

"Oh, aye -- that's right. Fifteen is just a little early for this, but since I'll be leaving here soon enough, now will do fine. Step a bit nearer to me, Diana."

Not knowing why she did so, or what she expected, the girl did so. The witch reached out, taking her chin with a firm but gentle hand, and lifted her face to the light, turning her head this way and that, studying her features in detail. Apparently she was pleased with what she saw there.

Taking a half-step nearer the girl, she lifted her chin again, and bowed her own head, bringing her lips gently but firmly to those of the startled child. Though the shock of the kiss almost completely distracted the girl's attention, yet she was aware of a warmth somewhere in her body that seemed to rise a bit in response to the witch's lips on hers.

She knew that she ought to draw back, that this was unnatural, and, half-heartedly, she attempted to do so.

But, somehow that gentle hand had left her chin, stroking soothingly across her soft cheek, and now pressed softly but strongly at the nape of her neck, pressing her forward into the older woman's kiss. A kiss that suddenly seemed more intense, as she felt the lips that touched hers open a bit, and the tip of a hot, wet tongue tracing along the line of her own closed lips.

Somehow, it seemed as if her own lips, her own mouth, knew what to do next -- tilting her head a bit to the side to allow the other woman a better angle of contact, she allowed her own lips to part, just a bit, allowing the tip of that hot, questing tongue to slip between them, to tap at her teeth, to demand further access. And, as she surrendered herself entirely to that hot, impatient, conquering tingue, she felt another hand at her hip, pulling her body toward the taller woman's, feeling with a strange thrill for which she had no name the sensations as their breasts pressed together, each yielding a bit under the contact. And that strange warmth within her suddenly seemed to increase as she realised that, through the thin cloth of the witch's gaol garb and the somewhat stouter but soft material of her own bodice, she could feel the hard little pebble-like bumps of the other woman's nipples pressing against hers... and knew that her own nipples were rising and hardening and that surely the other could feel hers as well.

Her mother and the gaoler, who had not been given permission to do otherwise, watched. Watched as the older woman kissed the younger again and again, some of the kisses upon her lips, some upon her slender white throat. Watched as the witch's hand stroked the girl's hips and her lower cheeks, gently fondling and massaging the firm young flesh.

Watched as Mistress Nicola stepped back from Diana, eliciting a small moan of protest from her obviously-willing partner.

"Oh, yes, my dear; time and past time that you were instructed in the arts of womanhood, so that your service as the Goddess's Champion in Man's World might begin..."

Turning to the two involuntary witnesses to her apparent seduction of the girl before her, she looked at them, and then spoke.

"All right, Snow, you can get up from his knee. Master Gaoler, I'd appreciate it if you would remain seated there, keeping an eye on me, of course."

"Right you are, Miss," the gaoler cheerfully said, reluctantly helping Snow to rise from his knee -- she might be in her thirties, but she was still a fine figure of womanhood, and the feeling of her soft weight on his knee as his hand unconsciously stroked her smoothly curved hip had been qite refreshing.

"Oh, yes -- Master Gaoler, it might be best if you were to remove your trousers now; there may not be time later." "Yes, Mistress, of course..." he said, fumbling with buttons.

"What... what are you going to do to my daughter?" the older woman asked. "Are you going to harm her?"

"Harm? My dear woman -- remember again the night that you were sealed to the Goddess and ask yourself if you came to harm?"

At that, she paused, and her mind cast back, seemingly of its own accord (actually with a bit of urging from the witch) and she remembered that cold night in the snowy wood -- how, in a glade suddenly not snowy or cold at all, she had been confronted by the Being Who represented Herself as merely a Messenger of the Goddess she was henceforth to serve. The Messenger was magnificent -- at least seven feet in height, She had long, curling, wavy auburn hair that fell past Her waist. Her eyes were green -- a true green, almost a grass-green, and Her cheeks were dusted with freckles.

She had a cheerful expression -- mischievous, the widow would have said if they had met under other circumstances.

Her shoulders and hips were broad, Her legs long and strong, and Her bosom was high and full. And obviously naturally well-formed without artifice; She wore not a stitch of clothing.

And she had brought the woman who now called herself Driven Snow Blanchett to heights of pleasure she had never previously known...

There in the Messenger's arms, she had felt more and more alive; she had soared higher and higher, craving release but fearing that once it came she might never know this pleasure again.

Stimulated by the Messenger's oral ministrations to her womanhood, driven higher and higher by the two fingers that slipped maddeningly in and out of her hot wet opening, she knew that she was... almost... there... And then the Messenger slipped another finger into her other opening.

With a wail, her eyes rolling up till only the whites showed, she began to cum. Her anus clutched at the invading finger, her internal muscles began to spasm and her hips bucked frantically against the Messenger's tongue and lips, as her convulsing cunt wept for joy.

And, just at the height of her orgasm, when she was so far gone in pleasure that it seemed she might never again do anything but seek such pleasure again, the Messenger's tongue touched her clitoris for the first time.

The wail became a scream of pleasure so intense it was almost pain, and her entire body arched till only head and heels touched the ground, rising up, curved like a drawn bow, mindlessly seeking more and more of that gratification until, finally, she gave one last gasp and moan, her hips twitched and bucked several more times and, exhausted, she collapsed to the ground.

"Oh, aye - I remember," she said, returning to the present. "Ruined me for any man I've met since."

"Ah -- but if you'd been true to your vows to Her, the Goddess would have seen to it that you met a man who could bring you pleasure like that... but you didn't. No -- you went back the the loveless Church of your died and risen God -- a Church that He seldoms deigns to visit, since it has twisted and perverted His teachings.

"Well, that's all water over the dam -- or jism not over your bedsheets -- and we're going to set things right here."

She looked around her.

"Well, it's not ideal -- there's a grove near my cottage that would be perfect -- but we have everything we actually need here. Diana -- " she turned back to the girl, who was suddenly surprised to find that she still held the witch's hand " -- do not be afraid of anything; neither your mother, nor the Gaoler, nor even I, whatever some might say, will harm you this night. You have a heritage and a calling beyond that of almost any other woman; a wondrous destiny that will make your name a synonym for courage and heroism beyond that of almost any mortal man.

"Understand, after tonight, you will no longer be as you are -- you will be much more. And, in fact, you may not even be -- strictly speaking -- human, but what you will be will be a symbol of good and justice to all.

"This is in accordance with a promise that your mother made in your name, when you were four. And, while you are the perfect one to be the vessel of the Goddess's justice in Man's World, She offers you the chance to make the decision for yourself; to turn aside from this without penalty or pain, or to accept Her Gift and become what you may be.

"Understand, though you will be strong and wonderful in your power, still there may be those who could prevail over you. You will almost certainly know times of suffering and despair, times when you may doubt that the Goddess truly chose you, times when you may feel as if you will die -- you may well die, fighting something too great for even the powers the Goddess grants to prevail.

"But you will be the Goddess's Own Champion. You will be powerful beyond most men's imagining. You will wield great strength in the battle against Evil. And, in the end, if you fall, you will be with the Goddess forever more."

All three adults' eyes were upon the girl. And she knew that she had to Choose. Choose then and there, and her choice had to be the right one.

She stood, trembling, before them, a slender girl of fifteen, her blue eyes wide. One would hardly have anticiated a less likely choice to be Goddess's Champion -- though she showed promise of eventually equalling the beauty her mother had had in her twenties, now she was at that stage of adolescence that almost all girls seem to go through, her arms and legs suddenly too long, her body changing shape in strange and almost frightening ways. She felt sudden surges of nameless emotions and passions, her mind wandered and she forgot things... and she was ashamed to ask for guidance, because all of this seemed, somehow, caught up with those parts of her body that she knew were the shameful and secret parts...

Sometimes, at night, she would touch herself, gently, under her blankets, teasing her own nipples until they stood hard and hot like two little pebbles, aching in a way that was pleasurable and almost painful at the same time.

And, sometimes, even more daring, she would reach downward and touch and fondle herself in the place where hair now grew where none had been before... And, shameful as she knew it was, that was the best yet.

And she remembered the feeling of the witch's hot nipples pressing against hers through no more than two layers of thin cloth. And she longed for that again, and perhaps more; yearned for the older woman's kiss again, for the feel of her gentle but insistent hand, stroking her, bringing feelings that she had not imagined possible before in her young life...

And she let herself dwell upon the thought that, if what Nicola said was the truth, she would become a Goddess's Champion, something she could not really comprehend or accept, but it was something that sounded as if someone had to do the job and that she was the "someone".

And she looked up, first at her mother and then at the witch, and she said "I accept. I will become what the Goddess wishes to make of me."

"Well done, little one," Nicola said, taking her fully in her arms and kissing her again, full upon the lips and with such a passion that the girl thought she would faint from it. "And, now, we begin the celebration."

"In some of her avatars, the Goddess requires a Maiden, a Mother and a Crone to manifest. Luckily, we are not dealing with one of those, since you, while a bit older than I, are hardly a crone, and I fail to qualify as either maiden or mother... Diana is certainly a Maiden -- right, dear?" (she swept on before Diana could quite answer that one) "But, as she is the one to be consecrated in this ceremony, she could hardly play a Server's part.

"Fortunately, this avatar is represented by a Witch, a Woman... and a Hunter; in this avatar she has a male component. The powers that will be granted to Diana will be rooted in those three aspects.

"I, obviously, am the Witch. You, as obviously, are the Woman, and..." They all turned to face the Master Gaoler. As their gazes fell upon him, he arose from his bench and stepped toward them; and as he did a change swept over him.

His face seemed to alter -- narrowing and changing until, somehow, it seemed not quite human. His ears seemed to rise now to small but visible points at the top; his cheekbones were more prominent, in a face narrower and longer than had been a moment before. Green his eyes became, and his hair seemed to grow longer and curlier on his head and about his face, and to increase over his already-hairy body. When he smiled, it seemed as if perhaps even his teeth had grown to points.

Slenderer overall, he seemed, but with solid muscle under all and long slender hands and feet.

But it was none of this that the three women's gazes fastened upon; all three, with varying degrees of surprise, shock and embarrassment, found their eyes fixed upon the shaft that rose from his crotch, and on the massive balls that hung below.

At least ten inches long, and thicker than some babies' arms, it rose proudly upward and outward, its shiny purple head already adorned by a driblet of precum. One of his hands rose, almost as if of its own volition, and lazily stroked the obviously steel-hard shaft.

Stepping forward, he took Diana's mother by the arm, and led her across the gaol cell to the prisoner's bed. Diana and Nicola silently watched the couple as they passed by them; the older woman moved as if entranced, making no effort to resist.