Chapter 18B

Thankfully Nick and company arrive two days later in Edinburgh, otherwise the two new lovers might never have eaten. It doesn't bother Maddy of course, but when she suggests food, a pale, unsteady Lionel struggles into clothes and staggers during the walk hand in hand to the nearby pub. Despite near starvation, he still wears a silly grin.

"Look what the cat dragged in," Nick jokes, his comment sending eyes to the entrance.

"What are you doing here?" murmurs Lionel when he approaches the table filled with friends and strangers. Friends include Kevin, to whom he addresses.

"Came for the skin of course," Kevin replies. "Stopped here before sending for you. A long journey left us peckish. You look the worse for wear."

While Kevin helps his protégé to a seat beside him, Maddy and Maggie embrace, missing each other terribly. They take seats across from their men. Despite being in near constant contact with Maddy for two days, Lionel barely recognizes her absence beside him. He's unsettled by Kevin's words.

Before they can argue a pretty waitress takes their orders. "I'm buying," says Nick. He and the ladies including Alice decide on the mutton stew special while Kevin goes for shepherd's pie and Lionel orders haggis, always wanting to try it. Everyone agrees on partaking of the local ale and the waitress brings out a pitcher and stein glasses along with a loaf of fresh bread.

"I thought that we were going to meet with Professor McClure and his students," says Lionel at last. "We would be discussing our findings, the skin amongst them, and perhaps get some new insights into the mystery."

"Yes, yes, I will meet with my old professor before we journey to Trinity."

"Trinity?" replies Lionel with his mouth full of bread.

"Didn't Maddy mention anything about it to you? I thought that was why she came up here early."

Lionel and his new lover look at each other and blush. "I guess the topic never came up," she says. "Something else did," she thinks, "quite often." The thought makes her giggle. Lionel catches the innuendo and blushes deeper. "But before we get into it, perhaps some introductions might be in order?"

"Of course," says Lionel. "My apologies."

"This is Nick, an old friend and his companions Claire and Tillie. Nick, ladies, this is my Lion."

"Lionel Smyth. Pleased to meet you," he nods at them, noticing how close Alice sits with Tillie and how happy she seems and that makes him smile. He has always liked Kevin's cousin despite her gruff, standoffish nature and he's glad the tall and pretty dark haired woman seems to have softened her attitude. His eyes flit back to his friend and new lover. "What have you forgotten to tell me Madeline?"

"Uhm, well, my Lion, it really is nothing bad. In fact quite the opposite. I heard tell there is to be a changing of the guard so to speak at Trinity in regards to their Archeology department. Much has been said by, well, near everybody about yours and Kevin's remarkable discovery. And I knew neither of you had found a sort of base of sorts aside from the Royal Academy which of course is more of a gentleman's club, albeit a most scholarly one, than a real learning center and you had to grapple with the old farts, forgive my French, to find the few willing to support with grants your theory which of course turned out quite right."

"And how was it you knew of this changing of the guards?" asks an amused Lionel.

"Red hair. Pale skin. Freckles. Puggish nose." she points out each item on her. "Trinity is in Dublin, my Lion. Dublin as in Ireland."

"You said you escaped the wave shattered little Isle off the coast, Madeline. Ran away as a teen to the bustle of London."

"You think I made no friends, Irish friends before then or in London. You can't help attracting fellow expatriates looking as I do."

"Irish rogues I presume?" Lionel spits jealously.

They silently stare daggers at each other before Maddy sighs. "We'll discuss this in private. The gist of it is I sent a glowing report on your keen mind and dedicated work as well as your patience with me in mentoring me. Of course I pretended to be a young man named Dylan since the edification of females holds no court and would be considered less education than seduction. Turns out a Professor Malloy took the cause, wishing to interview you and Kevin for the department. Kevin would be offered professorship of course, being knighted and all, but Malloy wants you as instructor and possibly as an assistant professor. Thing is, the professor has taken an interest in this ancient skin we stumbled upon. Seems his interests in ancient studies take on a more anatomical focus. The stature of ancient man and diet effecting such stature and things of that nature. He started studying medicine before he had a bit of an epiphany when he encountered a skeleton of Paleolithic man and decided to combine disciplines. He'll be begging you and Kevin to join Trinity just for the skin."

Lionel shakes his head. "You told him about the skin? You know we want to examine it further before publishing its existence. It could be some sort of sham. As it is it makes no sense: skin without skeleton?"

"But we could tell at least it's from the time from the gold threads in the bejeweled robe," says Kevin. "We figured he must have been a priest."

"Of Osiris probably, and what would an Egyptian high priest be doing during the siege of a Trojan fortress by a Greek army?"

"There were some symbols suggesting Osiris, but others suggested Hades, a similar god for the Greeks."

"I know. But what about his size? He must have towered over the population by at least a foot."

"Determining height without a skeleton?" Kevin shakes his head. "You know I remain skeptical regarding that."

"The skin stretches to the point where it loses elasticity. Just short of that would be his height," Lionel explains, frustration apparent from its frequent repetition.

"Boys," Maggie grins. "Isn't that the point? Let us meet this Malloy fellow, hook him in with your remarkable skin, and the three of you can discuss this to your heart's content while you two become educators at that fine institution."

"How's the haggis?" Nick asks Lionel.

"Strange. Should have had the shepherd's pie," he replies, though he has no problem devouring the Scottish dish, filling his no longer empty stomach.

After impressing his former mentor and the Scottish professor's students on the first day of the school year, Kevin and his old and new friends pack up the various artifacts, less each place he and Lionel visit and tell their stories of the Troy discovery, but still extensive and including the skin of course, and they travel to Dublin.

Through a businessman, a minion of the twins, they rent a manor home going to seed from a dissolute heir losing the family fortune and vacating it for a room in downtown Dublin, bringing the prematurely aging bachelor a stake in more dissolution.

"Oh my," says Alice upon entering the dusty estate. "This will take some work."

"We'll chip in of course," says Maggie, catching the men's eyes, "all of us."

"I'm use to keeping house, but with a house kept up," Alice sighs, a smile edging at a corner of her mouth. "I do like a challenge though."

They tour the main floor. The kitchen pleases Alice. With a cord of wood and an icebox filled with ice and some pots and pans and dishes and settings, utilitarian since the heir sold off the silver and fine china, since Alice has little aristocratic pretensions she finds it quite suitable to their needs. And the spaciousness of it pleases her even more.

Both Kevin and Lionel love the solarium. They bring the boxes of artifacts there. The dark wood round table in the middle seems out of place, but eminently functional. It would be their work room, with the glass walls looking out to the south providing plenty of light upon which to study.

Lionel discovers a large rolled up quilt leaning against a wall. "What's this for?" he asks.

"To cover the artifacts, protecting them from dust and sunshine," says Maddy. Grabbing it, she unrolls it over a space between the table and the entrance, transforming cold stone floor into something much softer. "And in the evening, a place to play." She pulls him to sitting and then lowers him onto his back.

"Maddy! The others!" Lionel complains half-heartedly.

" ... will help inaugurate it," she says, climbing on top of him and kissing him.

A few inches away, Claire pulls Nick down between her spread legs. She smiles at Tillie.

"I'll go fetch Alice," Tillie volunteers.

"And then join us?" Claire replies with pleading eyes.

Looking at Kevin and his distracted eyes gazing out the glass walls, Tillie grins and nods at her student.

"Let's both go," says Maggie. "We can warm her up for her cousin."

And so the angel and the tutor surprise Alice, Tillie by opening her blouse to show her tits and embracing her, and Maggie by sneaking behind and pressing her own naked tits against Alice's back. By the time they head to the solarium, all three ladies have stripped off their blouses.

Britches having been removed from the men on the floor, the revealed penises have been taken into orifices. Maddy engulfs Lionel's cock with her mouth while Claire, naked from hips down, guides Nick's cock into her needy cunt, straddling him. Nick and Claire unbutton each other's torso covering clothes as she begins a slow ride.

"Get naked and sit on Nick's face," Claire orders Tillie. Tillie eagerly obeys. Soon all three are naked and moaning their pleasure into mouths, the ladies' upper ones as well as Tillie's lower one.

Meanwhile, leading Alice into Kevin's arms readily open, his eyes, moving from the writhing bodies on the floor noticed with the first moan and causing a lump to form at the crotch of his britches, to Alice's eager eyes, Maggie leaves them to their loving.

"I've missed your embrace and your sweet mouth," says Alice when her mouth retreats from Kevin's mouth. Her hands busily remove his shirt. His hands remove her skirt. And when she bares his cock with the unbuttoning of his britches, she sighs, "And I've missed this." She kneels and sucks in his glans causing an appreciative groan.

"Me too," Kevin mutters tightly, the pleasure affecting most profoundly his ability to talk. He gazes down into her loving eyes.

Odd woman out, Maggie smiles at her sister's success as Lionel's cum fills Maddy's mouth. They wink at each other while Maddy gulps it down, milking the last of it with careful pulls that keep Lionel's cock from becoming flaccid. As her twin straddles Lionel's face, muted roars and expletives draw Maggie's attention to the threesome sharing orgasms. She catches the tutor's well sated eyes. Removing her skirt to become the last one naked, she pulls Tillie off Nick's mouth and into her arms for a deep kiss.

Claire lets Nick's dying cock out of her saturated cunt and lies beside him, caressing that cock gently while he caresses her breasts and cunt. They watch Tillie and Maggie discovering each other's bodies for the first time.

"What's going on?" asks Tillie between breathtaking kisses. The conversation is muted to keep from being heard by Kevin, though he is very much distracted.

"It seems I have a new assignment," Maggie tells her after another kiss.

"Really? What about Kevin?"

"He has his muse already and his knighthood and his professorship. He no longer needs my presence."

"He has a step up being aristocracy," Tillie agrees. "And Alice already rewrites his words making them publishable and speakable."

"Exactly. Enough talk. Let's make love." She pulls the much taller lady to the floor and lays beside her, their thighs scissoring the other's as they crush clits, kissing and fondling breasts and moaning.

Nick and Claire share a grin. "They look lovely together," says Claire.

"My granddaughter looks enough like you to make that a rather egotistical statement," Nick chuckles.

"She's much more beautiful."

"I disagree," Nick counters, bringing her lips to his. When it ends, Claire's grin responds to a different issue. Nick's cock has hardened from her hand pulls. She kisses her way down to it and takes it into her mouth. Sucking becomes gradually more intense as she succumbs to the Snake elixir semen that mixes with her own mortal, less powerful but tasty secretion.

"Fuck me," she gasps, moving to the side and pressing her head to the quilt and lifting her ass high.

Chuckling, Nick gets to his knees behind that wonderfully pert little ass. Her petite hand reaches back to guide him in. "Yes," she moans as he pushes with one steady thrust as deep as her cunt allows him to go. He leans over her and takes hold of the dangling fleshy fruit of her breasts while she moves her hand used to guide him in to bring fingers to rub her completely erect clit.

Thrusts and rubs and tugs and twists take on a complex mix of rhythms, at times equivalent and at other times counterpointed. The unpredictability thrills both of them. Accompanied by moans and groans surrounding them as three other couples share their love and/or lust, they continue the complex fucking for several minutes. Earlier climaxes for the other men allow them, like Nick, to delay a second cumming while bringing their mates one or two or, in the case of Claire, several orgasms.

Like toppling dominoes, albeit in slow motion, one after the other of the couples reach final climax. Some exclaim their release. Others quietly shiver. In the end, Claire's orgasm is a silent writhing and tightening one as Nick at last spurts his seed beyond her cervix with a roar. They collapse onto their sides and look up to see an audience of sated gentlemen and ladies. Neither feels the least bit embarrassed.

"I wish you could fuck my ass," Claire whispers while smiling at their audience. "It needs filling too."

"Another time, my love," Nick tells her with all seriousness. "Soon enough it will be the only lower orifice to be filled by my seed."

"I wish you didn't worry about my pregnancy. I'm old enough to carry a child."

"Perhaps your body is, but I want you to wait on motherhood. I want you to wait on that burden."

"Will I be a good mother to your minions?"

"The best, my love," says Nick, turning his body to hers and pulling her on top of him and kissing her softly but thoroughly. When it ends, he says, "Be patient."

"Me patient?" she grins wryly. They laugh.

Once dressed, the entourage tours the second floor where disappointment in small bedrooms with even smaller beds becomes amazement and amusement at a king sized suite. An antechamber with an impressive bathroom through a small side door opens through an oversized door to an oversized bedroom fit for a king. The bed, though unadorned by posts, takes a significant chunk out of the large room.

"A bed for orgies?" Alice remarks. "The owner is that ambitious for pleasures of the flesh?"

"No," says Maggie. "My friend sold the small canopied bed for the owner, a rather ornate and ugly think that fetched a pretty penny. He knew of our predilection for sharing amorous nights with others, us twins and Nick as well, and with the three of us he went extra large.

"Like the quilt downstairs?" asks Alice.

"Exactly."

Most of them enjoy the possibilities, Lionel and Maddy the exceptions.

"Which room do you prefer?" asks Maddy.

He takes her hand and guides her to a room several doors away. It is small like the others other than the master bedroom. "We don't need a big bed," he says.

"No we don't," Maddy smirks and brings his lips to hers. "And that rather impressive desk by the window doesn't hurt."

"From what you say, the owner sounds less than studious," says Lionel.

"What's this?" asks Maddy finding a small locked door. "How mysterious."

"And sad," says Maddy's twin framed by the open door leading to the hallway. Maggie holds a ring of skeleton keys in her hand. "None of these are supposed to open it."

"Not a problem," Maddy smiles mischievously, extracting a switchblade from her purse and springing it open.

"This is the brother's room I think," says Maggie watching her sister slide the blade between door and door jamb and unlocking it. Inside the large closet almost the size of the room, they find gowns and nighties.

"Brother?" Maddy inquires.

"Wanted to be the sister" her sister shrugs. "Preferred dressing as a woman. Very sensitive young man. Wrote poetry and plays and essays of a rather romantic sort. Rather excessive I am told and mediocre. The owner wanted to cure him of his cross dressing, brought him whoring with him and found to his astonishment that his brother rather enjoyed the female sex. The whores took a liking to him as well because they had fun dressing him up.

"Unfortunately our rather insensitive owner brought home a saucy wench who craved licentiousness as much as him. He promised her a ménage a trois. He considered her a perfect match, and her dowry made her a winning fiancé. At dinner the brothers flirted with her. I guess the parents had perished recently and the brothers still drowned their sorrows and at the same time celebrated in a way because the wench had not been a welcomed guest or possible bride despite her wealthy family. It was said they had highwaymen in their heritage and still acted brutish and their stealing had taken on a more sophisticated veneer. So this first night with her visiting instead of stealing away to secret rooms or somewhere outdoors the two drunken brothers made a deal with her to team up on her. Well, our owner got her ready with plenty of foreplay before the brother sweeps in wearing a bridal gown. She hid her disgust well, wanting to be sandwiched between men for the first time.

"Only a couple days later, with the brother in a casual country frock as the three played croquet did the cruel wench show her colors. Her brothers rode in on horseback and proceeded to pummel the brother with fists and mallets, concussing the owner with fists as well. They promised to shame his family name if he told and stole away. The family doctor could do nothing to save the poor soul, and the dissolution of the owner began in earnest. He burned all his brother's writings and locked up these outfits and proceeded to burn through his inheritance much slower but with less regard than he burned his dear brother's works, gambling and whoring and drinking relentlessly."

"Such secrets," says Lionel. "How is it you know?"

"My friend has a knack for business," Maggie explains, "for exploiting weaknesses but at the same time making fair exchanges despite his domination at negotiations. He sees through surfaces and brings forth the troubles hidden. In our owner's case he saw a deep sadness which he felt needed to be aired less to gain higher ground than to help the poor wretch. And he succeeded in drinking the man under the table and the liquor loosened his tongue and the man told his story and actually seemed relieved after being promised discretion and not being extorted on the price of rental. I mean relieved of the guilt that built inside him like a cancer that only needed a bit of air to gain at least some remission.

"Anyway, Alice prepares supper. Let us adjourn to the dining room for a feast, than we can christen our beds."

"It may be only with sleep," Lionel yawns.

"It can wait until morning," Maddy grins.

And so it does, for both bedrooms. After which they share showers and ablutions and Lionel and Kevin head out to their interview, Maggie accompanying them.

Her company presumes to be for guiding them to Professor Malloy's office, and both men become perplexed that she joins them in greeting the professor. "I have to confess," she tells the messily dressed and groomed professor even more given to distraction than Kevin. He is handsome despite his lack of grooming in a rugged sort of way, thickly built, looking to be a working man cursed with heavy lifting except his thick hands have a softness to them only a man of books could keep. To Kevin's consternation, she touches the man's bulky arm.

"I have a couple confessions, actually," she continues. "First of all, my sister pretended to be a man when she wrote you of Lionel's mentoring skills. But other than that, she told the absolute truth. And this made up Dylan's sister is actually her sister. Me."

"I can see that," Malloy rumbles quietly, his voice deep and pleasant like the low octave of a baritone opera singer. "Though the daguerreotype did you no justice. You are quite exquisite. But that only brings up the question, 'Why me?'"

"Don't get me wrong. I quite enjoyed being under Sir Kevin's wing during that extraordinary dig. But when my friend told me of possible positions here for my boss and my colleague..."

"Who is this mysterious friend? You never informed me of his name."

"I figured the source might discourage your interest. He is of the janitorial class here at Trinity. And his wife is a cook at the cafeteria."

"Perhaps I know him. I am less interested in the striations of class than most others."

"He told me the same thing. O'Connor's his name. Shamus O'Connor."

"Of course!" Malloy grins widely. "Sometimes it seems when I'm burning a candle at both ends, his charming conversations come at the exact time needed to bleed my mind before it becomes too crammed with thinking. We talk of many things as he sweeps and cleans; everything and anything but archeology. Aside from his brogue being as thick as molasses, his cleverness makes we wonder why he uses a brush as a tool rather than a pen."

"His modesty and humbleness is only matched by his sweet disposition," Maggie answers fondly. "Forgive me for saying this, but it takes a certain amount of arrogance to proselytize for the edification of young minds. He prefers equal footing only available from his simpler station. Not a corpuscle of arrogance in that man. Of course not many of you superior creatures wish to see eye to eye with him."

"Probably not. Mores the pity for my proud and yes arrogant colleagues. How much they miss out. How many times has his gentle and remarkable charm given me fresh perspective on my studies and allowed me discoveries my cluttered mind could not realize? I owe the man much."

"He thinks fondly of you as well. And his wife finds you quite fetching. And with your often brilliant discourses, written with such passion and yet within proper form, I found myself drawn to you despite never meeting you in the flesh so to speak. Thus the communications got a bit heated. I hoped I didn't offend. I'm afraid I'm a bit brash for a lady of our time. But you seemed receptive."

Malloy chuckles deeply and sensuously. "I much enjoyed our discourse and looked forward to our meeting however it might happen. This is most welcome, joining with your mentor and your colleague like this. Speaking of which, shall we begin the interviews?"

"Lionel Smyth sir. I too found your writing most compelling." They shake hands.

"Thank you. So if you'll excuse us," the professor says to Kevin and to Maggie.

"I don't understand," Kevin says shakily as Maggie brings him outside.

"No, I suppose you don't," Maggie sighs. "You must have noticed I am a flighty creature, flirting most outrageously."

"Maybe sometimes. But..."

"Sometimes it's more than flirting. Sometimes it wasn't your bed I warmed."

"I ... I tried not to notice."

"Sometimes it was those rough locals, swarthy skin and blackened nails."

"But you always returned..."

"You needed my companionship. You never needed my love. Lucky because I had little to give to you. Only friendship and sex. You have your love, Kevin. You don't need me to tap your prodigious libido. Alice enjoys it much more than me. And you enjoy Alice more."

"She ... she likes sharing me."

"She likes women and she likes you. Fortunately for you, you are the only penis she will allow inside her. I am quite the opposite, Kevin, unless I find love with a man. Then I'm as monogamous as she is with a man. I like you Kevin, obviously, but I'm not your love. Alice is. And Malloy will hopefully be mine. Perhaps I can steer Malloy into sharing a bed with you and Alice and if Alice feels so inclined, perhaps sharing her with Malloy while I allow you back inside my body. I doubt it, but it could happen. But at least we could get you two men excited by a lusty lesbian scene. That I'm sure she would enjoy. Suck it up Kevin. You need to show off your brilliance. Think of it this way. Though I'm sure you're a shoe in, my blatant seduction of Malloy in front of you takes away the presumption of you fucking your student despite the truth of it."

"There is that," Kevin half smiles. "But I can't help missing your beauty and your body."

"You won't miss my beauty. I will be around. As far as the body goes ... We'll see."

With a giggle she kisses his cheek. He sighs and shrugs and pulls himself together.

"Good man," she says, patting his shoulder.

"Horrid man," Tillie mutters cringing at the subject of her distaste bumping against her side as the carriage travels out of Dublin. Trussed and gagged, he has nothing to say. "How old do you think she was? Younger than me when he raped me."

Minions had been tailing Tillie's rapist, the ignoble Professor Nelson as soon as he arrived at Trinity. Being without his wife gives him freer reign. And the small cottage he stays in, given to him as part of payment for his residency as distinguished visiting professor, brings him privacy. He visited a whorehouse demanding the youngest and most virginal whore the first night. On the second he hired the same woman to visit him dressed as a maid. He can't afford more than a couple more evenings with her. Once school begins his second week there he has many more choices.

As usual he cultivates the prettiest of the fawning students. It's at a sort of sister college catering to females as Trinity deals exclusively with young men. He insists on the extra class, claiming his well honed skills teaching young women, and the girls-only school couldn't be happier. Neither could the wolf.

He finds the victim to be exceptional, both bright and spunky with a lean and tight and tall and athletic body. Raven hair and pretty blue eyes. Perfect. And that Irish brogue makes him even harder. He can barely wait to sink his hard flesh into her tight virgin hole. But wait he must. He has to cultivate her infatuation and not frighten her away. That takes time.

"She looked like me," Tillie notices.

"Were you the first he raped that year?" asks Claire.

"I might have been except for my innate resistance, so he needed more time than I think he wished."

"He must have noticed your interest was purely intellectual," Nick suggests.

"He did chat me up that first day after class and for a couple weeks after until the rape. He encroached on me, but I tended to step back."

Everyone nods.

The wolf approaches the young lady after the first class. He notices her pleasure in their closeness. He wants to be closer and senses she does too. He asks her to accompany him to his office where he gets her to tell him of her life in Dublin. Nothing special, but she tells it charmingly. Asked if she ever had a boyfriend, she blushes and tells him a couple, but neither went much beyond kisses as she found them to be rather juvenile. With remarkable pluck, she looks at him directly and tells him she would prefer a man of the world with skills and intelligence who would respect her mind and not just lust after her body. That makes him harder. He reconsiders the need to take time with her. He asks what she means by skills. That makes her blush again but she manages to answer after a couple seconds telling him maturity lends itself to experience and experience brings understanding of someone other than oneself. He invites her to supper at a tavern near his home on the following evening. Unable to be seen together and lacking an escort has been solved already by the clever wolf. He has acquired the company of an older student, his guide in fact when he arrives on campus, who can't help leering at attractive derrieres. He buys the young man whores on a couple occasions and promises introductions to the young ladies he discards. Why would he suspect the horny young man to be a spy?

"Will she be alright getting home?" asks Tillie.

"Sean will provide her company," says Maggie. "He escorted her there."

"He seems to have become quite enamored with her," Maddy adds.

"In a good way, Tillie," Maggie assures her.

"Despite how he presented himself to Evans, the young man's a perfect gentleman," Maddy explains.

The wolf tries not to snigger when his accomplice wiggles his eyes and wets his lips unbeknownst to the girl upon arrival at the pub. When she turns to the young man to thank him for the escorting, he bows with gentlemanly aplomb and points out where he will be sitting whenever she is ready to head home. Adding that he looks forward to further conversations during that journey causes her to blush and look at him affectionately. He fights back his anger when she turns her attention to the wolf. She had barely noticed his charm when the wolf introduced him to her to calm any concerns about her being escorted that evening. But nearly a mile escorting her to the tavern allows him time to get to know her and for her to get to know him and they both seem to have enjoyed the experience. At the tavern another minion whispers to the escort their choice of food and beverages. He turns his laddie charm on full to distract the buxom waitress hoping the young lady won't notice his addition to the meal on the tray. To be sure the wolf gets the drug, he has watched her serve the beverages, ladies first. The right hand serves first. He sidles up to the waitress when the stew bowls appear, whispering how good it smells and how good she smells and if she could join him with the stew he could enjoy both. While she smiles and regretfully declines he pours the powder into the stew bowl in her left hand. As expected she serves it to the wolf. In about ten minutes the wolf's desire to pee becomes intense.