Chapter 10

We gathered the attackers into one area but I was fearful of poison. I used gloves to search for more of their weapons they thought were magic. The more obscene it was the more power they put to it. I prepared all the articles I found and made sure they would reference who had owned them. The horses were searched but here I would have to wait until I could question my guests to see which horse they were riding.

I continued to do my search while two men were sent to Toronto to gather some people to clean up the mess. Some of the guards had looked at what I had discovered. They were not pleased with what I had found either. A clean death was one thing but the paraphernalia on the ground were another.

Men armed with whatever they could find met us soon after. They had come to see what had kept me. My new guests were put into a couple of wagons and the dead were put into another.

The disgusting cargo was labelled as to where it was found and possibly who's property it was then put into canvas sacks.

It was four hours after the train wreck that I was able to get to a phone half way along the route and told my wives what had happened. They wanted to come immediately but I was not sure even now if it was safe of not.

My mind was going through all that had happened and what I had found up until now. Mages and perhaps the Huns were using children to fight with. I could not condemn them because I had used cadets to kill thousands of men.

What did disturb me was the way the youngest had been treated. I had worked with their body's efforts to heal them and in the course had found that they were sexually active. This was very common in this day and time and it was something intrinsic to the human animal. This did not make it right though. The books I wrote always condemned this practice. A small part of the problem was that rape of either gender was also seen as a way of control.

The children were beaten but so were the rest so I had to assume the master or masters were not in the group I found.

Klement called Park over to view the two bodies but he said, "I have seen these before. There was usually two more men and a woman with them."

Lazeez had arrived and I gave him the task of drawing a portrait of each of the corpses. They had to be buried soon and I had not worked too hard to make a photographic plate yet.

Patricia said, "What are you going to do with the children?"

"The boy tried to run a spear through me but I would have tried the same thing at his age if I had to. I guess they will have to stay with us for at least a while. I want them kept safe but I do not want them hurting any of us either. I want them kept very weak but awake enough to see that they are not being harmed."

"What about that woman?"

I assumed she meant the younger one. I could see a bit of jealousy here and said, "You are my wife. I have no need of this woman."

Patricia was a bit stunned at being caught and said, "You are a man and we have not been with you for a while."

"It has been two weeks and I know that you are healed by now. I just want you to heal naturally too. It has something to do with the mind as well as the body."

"I am healed more than enough and so is KhAvar."

"Then we will have to practice making our next batch of children."

Here eyes were sparkling and she said, "Really?"

"I want you to have a break between pregnancies. We talked about this before. The children should be spaced out a few years apart."

"Well... practising is ok in that case."

The new guests were put in the basement. One of the larger rooms would serve the women of 20, 40 something, the young girl of 7 and the boy of 9. Another room held the 15 year-old male and his 20 year-old friend. Another room held the two old men that were both near or over 60.

Each of the rooms were in different wings so sound could not travel from one area to another. If I could, I would put everybody in their own rooms but the children would live upstairs with us. At the moment it was better to have them stay where they were.

Park had a room upstairs by himself and both Klement and I asked him what he knew about each of the people. Some names he knew or guessed at and gave us a bit of background data but those that trained them usually kept social interchanges to a minimum.

The fact that there were three more mages out there bothered me and I tried to put myself in their shoes. They were very careful so that they did not get caught but I did not necessarily think that they were cowards. I would attack tonight while most people would be celebrating and thinking that the troubles had passed.

To give this impression I set up a party even though the men that died had families that should mourn for their loss. If they knew what I was really like then the party would seem a sham.

The wives of the security detail lived here while that of the engineer lived in Toronto. I made a phone call and after twenty minutes the grieving woman went to one of the few phones and called me. I did what I could over the phone and promised to see her in a few days. I also assured her that she had nothing to worry about when it came to her status within our community. As a capitalist, my heart was much too soft. Those that had fought for me and died deserved even more.

We ate a large supper and those that fought talked of what they had seen their friends do. This obligated the friends to return the favour. In this way none of the soldiers were any different. If this had been a Frisian home then the talk would be much more boisterous and the men drunk by this time.

The three men that lead the guard detail had been told to tell their men to act drunk but to be prepared for another attack tonight. I could see that the levity was just a thin veneer. At the same time a rumour was going around that it was time for me to get back in the saddle. I just hoped that the girls did not hear this because it was a ploy too in a way.

Soon after our meal I excused myself. Patricia and KhAvar had been finished even sooner and were anxious for me to start. We cleaned up then had a shower where the girls really got stirred up. At times I wished I had a few more arms to hold and caress my girls.

We were not completely dry by the time we got to bed. I had more or less turned off my responses in the last seven weeks. The girls had responded by using their mouths so I had to turn them back on again. Now they were ready for the real thing and I was even more so.

When AsA had questioned me about my powers in the bedroom I saw this as an omen and cut back on how I manipulated my wives' bodies. Now I tried to get a feeling for what they liked and just did this. I felt myself like an ordinary man in this respect but one that could last a long time and was empathetic to their needs.

I pleased Patricia while she pleased KhAvar then we shifted around. The girls climbed over me and tried to get me to come and did after a lot of work. I then took KhAvar and she used her mouth to make Patricia happy.

This was very stimulating to me too but I knew that I was still the bait in a trap. I got my subconscious to allow a bit more of my aura to show. If the mages were close they would see my control slipping.

The girls were worn out around midnight and I was running on empty. It took a while before my body could catch up to all the demands I put on it. As usual I slept on one side of the bed and after cleaning ourselves up we all went to bed to sleep.

I lay in bed not ready to sleep. My aura was still fluctuating as if I were having fun and in a way I was.

It must have been a few hours latter that there was a very quick knock at the door and I got up to see who it was. The captain of my guard said, "Young Lazeez says he sees some shadows moving across the hemp field."

"Is he in the balloon?"

"Yes."

There was some copper wire that was in one of the ropes so that we could have a telephone conversation in times like this. "Are the drunks playing their part?"

"Perhaps too much, but yes they are."

I stepped out into the hall and went to a small room and got dressed but this time I put on my heavier armour and clamped the headpiece to the ring. It was an alternate set and I used it because I did not want to wake up the girls. It was also as black as I could get it.

I talked with Lazeez and he said, "They... they are going south east now. I... I think they want to keep the row of trees between them and the house."

"How many are there?"

"There are five horses but three of them have larger shadows on them."

This sounded like a rescue effort for two people but why not the rest? Then I wondered who the two most important were. I wanted to intercept these people but I could not if I still flung out may aura. I started to strengthen my shield but did it clumsily as if I did not really care how it was done. At the same time I slowly started to build up power. This had to be done quick enough so I was not cut off but slow enough so that those that came would not be frightened off.

There was only one unlocked door leading into the house. The supposed drunks were using this to raid the external cellar for wine. All the windows had a decorative steel trellis over the windows that would make it difficult to gain entry.

This trap had been set up just after Park had tried to kill me. I could not hear Lazeez but I could hear the horses and the footsteps. A small amount of grit was on the stone floor just inside the doorway. One person entered the doorway then walked down to a second door but did not go through. That person went back and then I heard two more people enter. This section was used for the pantry and kitchen. There was a lot of equipment here but no people.

The three never got that close together but they were now in the trap. When the last person was four metres inside the doorway a rope pulled the doors shut with a slam and two spring loaded locks made sure each door would not open easily. The three ran back to this door and at the same time my security pulled cords that lead into the room where the three intruders were.

Fulminate of mercury was struck by a firing pin and mace was expelled into the room leading to the kitchen.

There was a lot of running and then some screaming but this seemed to be the woman. She sounded more like she was in rage than in pain.

I had learned my lesson once more so I chose to attack one of the intruders at a time. The first was very strong but so was the mace and its effects. It took much longer to get all three to sleep then the ventilation was turned on to remove the mace.

Six men in environmental suits and using compressed air came into the hallway. They dragged the intruders outside one at a time. The carbon arcs were turned on and I began again to strip each of the people. Once they were bathed, they were taken through another door and put into a room to be separated later. The horses were searched and then they too were lead away.

There was a need for me to make one more round and I checked all of those that would try to kill me. They all had to stay asleep until I wanted to question them but that would be in the morning.

The girls woke up at the usual time and tried to get me to play. I had only two hours sleep but a husband has to make sacrifices.

We had breakfast and then the girls and I went to see the captives. They were shocked to find out that we had three additional guests.

Park was summoned and he gave the names of the three because they were more important than the rest. The woman was Oriental and in her mid twenties. She was also pretty, or at least to me. She had the same kind of tattoos as the rest but also some that looked more recent. They looked more impressive.

The two men were odd. One was thirty at a guess and from a different place in the east because his features were slightly different. I thought of him as Japanese but that race may not have been on the island yet. He was short and stocky. He was also strong. I examined his body and found callouses where a person that was used to unarmed combat would have them. This was also the man that had commanded Park and his now dead partner.

The other man was more Caucasian. He looked similar to the Russians I knew from my time. I figured he was around fifty but he was a very strong and virile looking man at this age. He too had callouses on his hands and I saw both of them as bodyguards instead of mages. I was not going to make a mistake and think of them as anything less than a mage though.

I went back to the woman and saw that her hands too had a build up of thick skin. Her nails intrigued me though. They were long and lacquered but I was thinking of poison. I took her hand and touched her fingers to my tongue one at a time. The pinkie on each hand had the poison on it and I looked to see why the woman was not dead. For the moment I assumed that she had built up an immunity.

This was a ninja trick and I happened to know a lot more. I put my hand on her abdomen and pushed down. This was not conclusive so I interfaced with her body and searched through it. She did have an immunity to the drug and it looked different to the way my own immunity worked. This required a bit of study before my mind went into her colon and vagina. I found a stool in one but something solid in the other.

Patricia and KhAvar watched me. "Patricia hold one of her legs. KhAvar hold the other. She is hiding something from us." They were not sure but did as I asked. My fingers worked in the woman's vagina and I had to use the woman's own muscles to expel the device.

An ivory tube came out but I did not bother opening it. There would be poison and ways of administering it.

A guard was sent out to get a comb and we waited until it came back. I used this on her long black hair and I found some thin wire and some poison pins hidden here too. The thatch over her pubis had only one dangerous weapon.

Lazeez was called and he was very anxious when he saw his next subject. I said, "Lazeez, I want you to draw her tattoos. Draw them large."

"Ah, can I draw her face too?"

I gave a smile and said, "Sure but the woman is a trained killer. She would pretend to be a weak woman and then run her fingernail across your sweating brow and in a moment you would be dead."

"I will have to write a story about her too I guess. By the way, I thought of something. You could make a lot of money selling your magazines. What if I started my own? I could put my drawings in so the readers could see and then I make a story that goes with the picture."

"Lazeez, that would make you fabulously rich but somebody would kill you later when their daughter ran off with a man or was caught in something that the father did not like."

"I would not do that."

"I know that but fathers would just use you because a way of venting their vengeance."

"I don't have to use my own name, do I?"

"Make the stories less erotic and the pictures should have the women not showing everything. The women and the men may like what you write. You can call them romance books."

"Could I really do that?"

"I guess but you have a lot of tasks to do for me first. By the way, I want to thank you for finding these people last night."

"I was only doing my duty."

"Nevertheless, you did a good job. Now draw some pictures."

On a whim, I checked the two men. Both of these had something in their rectums and it was not shit. A chamber pot was brought over and with my control of the body, the packages were expelled. The woman was treated too though but hers was only natural.

Before I left, I said, "Draw the tattoos on the men too. Keep them separate."

I was going to check the old men next but KhAvar said, "Would you check the children next?"

There were guards everywhere in the basement so I knew that Lazeez was safe. When I got to the door with the two guards in front of it I heard a small sound on the other side. There should be nobody able to gain their consciousness.

The two guards had been talking to each other and I wondered what I had done wrong. Patricia and KhAvar were sent away while I went to get my armour and arm some of the guards similarly. We came back fifteen minutes later and entered the room. Everything looked just like I had left it.

Lanterns were brought in and I started checking the older woman. She had trauma from various causes and she did not have a secret stored within her.

The woman of 20 was checked next. She not only had no surprise but she was pregnant. The fetus was only a few weeks old so it might be a surprise to her too.

The young girl looked cute but I had been tricked many times in my youth when we had war games. I was not going to take chances. She did not have any devices in her but she smelt of shit. I turned her over and looked at her anus. She could have farted but she could also have extracted something. The bottom of her feet had been whipped clean but there was still some dirt that should not be there. I looked at the floor and I was able to see one footprint that should matches hers beside the bed.

I said aloud, "You poor child." I turned her back over and put her comfortably as if she was my child.

The boy was next. He too smelt of shit. I turned him over and kept my hand on his back as I used my nose and my other hand to try to find the package that was so recently hidden.

I took this and had one of the guards put his hands on the back of the boy while I went back to the girl's bed. There was a short search but I found as similar package there too.

In a loud voice I said to the guards, "I need some shackles made for the children."

The guard was incredulous and said, "Wa... Yes, my lord."

"They are not asleep. They are very good at controlling their breath. Tell one of the others to bring me some sheets I can use to tie them up in the meantime."

"Yes, my lord."

The girl beneath my hand started to move but I only allowed so much and then pushed her down. I said, "I don't want you moving." The look I got back was not anything I had ever seen on a young girl's face before.

"I... I have to go pee."

"You can go in a few minutes."

"I need to go now."

I just ignored her and used some rags to bind her hands while I stayed away from her nails. I set her on a chamber pot and she did what she said she had to do. In a moment she had to do something more. I cleaned her up and then put her back on the bed. I checked her nails and her pinkies had the poison on them.

The nails were scrubbed and then alcohol used to clean them properly. I went over to the boy and tied him up as well. Both children had longer nails that children of this age would have. Both had the poison.

The comb was used again but the boy had nothing. The girl though had two long thin pins with a tinge of green at the ends.

I took the girl and threw her over my shoulder and told the guard holding the boy to do the same but treat them as if they were poisonous snakes. The guard was better trained than I thought because he did exactly what I wanted.

The girl went into a special room at one end of the house and we waited for the manacles to come. The girl was chained to a ring in the floor and the manacle went around one of her ankles. She had been crying like a baby all the time but I ignored her. When the door was shut it was also barred.

The guard looked at me reproachfully and I said, "Think of her as a poisonous snake. She will cry and pretend that she is sick or hurt. If you open that door without permission, you will never work for me again."

"I will only do as you order, my lord."

We walked further and put the boy down in a similar room then manacled his foot to the floor the same way. He was breathing rapidly so I knew he was awake. "You can stop fooling now. You are no more asleep than I am."

He continued with his act so I left but said the same thing to the other guard.

I checked the two young men and the two old men but they had no hidden packets of death. Each one was helped to fill the chamber pots then I went back to the room with the two women and did the same thing. All of them had been eating the same spice I was happy to know.

Each of my guests were questioned even if they professed to not know anything. Zan, the twenty year-old woman was shown a pantomime of me holding a baby and feeding the child at my breast. I then pointed at her. She violently shook her head no but I smiled and said, "Yes."

I got across the idea of a day then with my fingers I told her how far along she was. She shook her head no but I could see that she was saying this more to herself.

We communicated better in the next few days and part of it was because I indicated that I could terminate the pregnancy. When a week went by and I saw that she was trying harder or faking less I put my hand on her belly and sent a burst of endorphins through her as the fetus was dislodged.

She seemed cooperative and even more so when she found that she had a small loss of blood later.

The next few months were troubling. I had a wide range of ages and genders and I wanted information. I did not feel bad about inflicting pain on the Russian and the Jap but I did not want to do the same thing to the women or the children.

All eleven were given separate places to live and in most cases this was kilometres apart. Each person was exercised, fed, clothed, cleaned and questioned. I was given a lot of static about the children even after I told people how they had put poison up their ass to kill people later.

The men pretended to not know Latin but the one with Japanese features broke down as soon as Park had done. The Russian took a bit longer but he did not know much Latin. I brought a surly old Roman officer over and gave him the job of teaching the Russian how to speak. The Russian's name was Eslan and he had a great incentive to learn because I was the one giving the tests every week.

The young men were nothing more than boys. The older one, Nasim, did know Persian though it was a dialect. I treated him like a boy while I was a grown man and he seemed to come around with little coercion.

The Indian boy's name was Bali and he was actually 14 but nobody knew his dialect. The whole world was filled with major languages but the dialects spoken within a country was like a completely different language.

The two boys were put with the guards and they were trained as if they had joined us but they were always watched.

The two old men were at first a problem until I found an interpreter. The man had been born near Park but spoke a different tongue. The older man was Chinese too but from a different area. None of them could read so that method of communication was out. Most of the Chinese people read and wrote the same characters but they said the words differently.

The old Indian woman eventually gave her name as Abirami. She did not want to cooperate but I put her with the kitchen staff and she seemed to fit right in. Women could communicate well enough even if they did not understand the language.

Zan, the twenty year-old woman was very headstrong just like the one that came that night. I did not want to use pain but I reasoned that ultra kindness may do the same thing.

Park said that the older woman's name was Tai. She was the first one I found with the poison nails. The woman was kept in a hut with her own personal guard. At the moment they were out of sight but not out of range of a whisper. I sat at a small table and tried to appear less threatening. I was fairly sure the woman spoke at least some Latin but she refused to look at me. She had even tried to attack me when she figured she was able to fashion a weapon. She never got very far. She was good but weak.

She usually didn't speak to me at all but tried some times to let me think she was cooperating. At the moment she was sitting on her bed and glaring at me when I started to do what I did to my wives at one time. I spoke kindly to her and at the same time her clit began to make its demands on her.

The woman screamed at me but I just tried to play innocent the way she did. In a few minutes she was pawing at her own clit but I was not allowing her to come. She was trying to fuck her hand when I finally let her have what she sought. Then minutes later I did it again and again.

When I left the hut I told the guards, "The woman is very horny and she will slowly come down in a few hours. This will happen again and again. If anybody but me sets foot in that hut I will expel them from my property. Our Augustus will hear of this too. This is a serious matter and she has to be trained."

Twenty minutes later Zan succumbed the same way. She was even more difficult so I made sure she went through four earth shattering comes before I left.

The children were a difficult problem. They stayed in different wings of my home. The girl had tried to seduce me a few times. Her style was not like that of a girl that was imitating what she had seen. She acted like a woman that had done this many times.

I could at least talk to her and both her speech, diction, knowledge and intelligence said she was much older. I suddenly remembered Fidelis Marius words about a mage migrating into a young body. Everything clicked and I wondered how many of those around me were far older than they seamed.

That night I thought long and hard about the next step. The next day little Oppia got the same treatment as the other two girls. She stared me in the eye all the time as she pawed her small opening and clit. Her orgasms were not as great but she had just as many as the others.

Huang, the boy was next. He too tried to seduce me and talked in his high pitched voice in some Chinese dialect. Giving pain was not ethical because I was not sure yet as to how old the person really was. He did respond to my mental efforts and he began to masturbate as quick as he could. I kept up for four complete times and had to administer a healing because of the abuse he put himself through.

This went on twice a day and for five weeks. Huang came around first and spoke of love to me in Latin. He had to have his orgasms but I could question him in between. He was just as knowledgeable as Oppia but the person inside was not somebody I was happy to meet.

Zan was next. She claimed to want to do anything for me as long as I gave her what she wanted. Her knowledge did not suggest that she was a traveller but just a very hardheaded woman of this time.

Word was all over about me but at no time was I hiding behind doors. Patricia or KhAvar was invited to watch. They saw what I was doing but somehow wanted the pain instead of what I had done.

By the time all four had broke I was angry at everyone. Tutors were found so that some could help those learn Latin that needed it. I had to keep the women from climbing over the table to rape whoever came to teach them. It was only after I rewarded them for their efforts did they really start to learn.

Adults at this time had sex with children but very little was done about it. Usually the adult was ostracised in polite company. I had not touched any of the children and I was looked down on.

Oppia was brought to the house and placed in a large room where men and women questioned her.

She replied once, "I am a mage but something went wrong with an incantation and I was ripped from my body and placed into that of a child that lived a great distance away. It took me months to get back to my home and all I found was my old body rotting on the floor. It was an accident."

This I knew was a lie and I suspected that she had been around long enough to be one of Alexander of Macedonia's contemporaries.

One man asked, "How old are you when you add up all your years?"

"Fifty two. I was in the prime of my life when the accident happened."

Huang was questioned the next day and he answered more truthfully and said that he had migrated four times and was over two hundred years old. He knew what this meant but he knew that I would protect him. I had given my word.

Zan admitted to killing many people. Some were just to perfect her training but others were targets she had been aimed at by her masters.

Tai was much the same but claimed some Hunnish blood. This gave her a hereditary position as leader but it was her ruthlessness that kept her there. This of course meant that she killed many times and felt no remorse for doing so.

The questions and the responses had gone out over the phone lines. Amplifiers in Toronto spoke of the depravity of the four that the crowd was previously so concerned about.

On the next two sermons I made sure the crowds felt bad about the foolishness they had foisted onto me in the last two months.

The questioning continued but this was done in camera. I wanted a report on the Huns, the mages and how the mages were trained. All I had to do was point to a line of questioning and later reward some young women and some very old people living in young bodies.

Tai lay in the large room recovering from her last orgasm and stared at her spectators. I do not think she saw them, just me. I said, "Tell me again why you came here? Do not push the blame on the Huns. I have talked to the rest and so have these men and women. I want to hear not only what you were told but what you surmise."