Instead of the cave room Sara had expected, she was greeted by a yawning cavern. The roof stretched fifty feet above her, razor sharp stactites dropping down half that distance by the dozens, their opposites rising up from below. The back wall was just at the edge of vision, a thick green fog suffusing the room overwhelming the potion's ability to peer through the depths. The source of the fog was obvious, as nearly every surface, from the rocky spires to the floors and walls, was covered in a thick yer of shaggy moss. It waved and weaved to the whims of currents she couldn't feel, rippling in dizzying patterns that ran circuits around the cavern, almost like a child running excited ps around the massive room. The entrance was pced solidly in the middle of the wall, which made sense, because ten feet of kelp and seaweed coated everything below, ribbons of green nearly solid in their density. Sara saw shapes darting through the forest, disturbing the vines, and was nearly startled back out of the room when a seal twice her size burst into the open, a wriggling fish cmped in its jaws. It was nearly as shocked by her arrival as she was its, and it backpedaled to dive out of sight.

  "Selly?" Ketch called, swimming forward. "Don't pretend you can't hear me!"

  Evie caught sight of the woman before Ketch did, pointing her out for Sara. A curled form, blending into a cubby carved into one of the massive stactites. Sara thought she was an azarketi, like Ketch, but couldn't really be sure. Her skin was a brownish-green, sporting scales a few inches long across her entire body, whereas Ketch only had scales in a few select pces. Sara mistook her hair for part of the terrain, at first, because it sprouted from her scalp like weeds, wispy pond moss kept in an unkempt cloud. More of the moss sprouted from beneath scales that pried up and off the pink flesh below, as if her entire body was a crushed toe halfway through sloughing off its nail. As she continued to unfurl from her balled position, Sara realized that her limbs were long, far too long, the woman at least twelve feet tall, with all of the height coming from her stretched legs and arms, none from her comparatively diminutive torso. Even with fifty feet between them, Sara had to bite down a sudden urge to back away, a primal kind of fear welling up in her gut.

  Instead of cowering as she wanted to, Sara, self-decred champion of the poker face, simply raised her arm for a friendly wave and cheery shout. "Hey there! Hope we didn't interrupt anything too important."

  Selly pressed her long digits to the stone, a snake coiling for a strike. Sara's grin grew brittle, but she didn't let it fall. Without a word, Selly extended, rocketing towards Sara, and before she could even blink she was surrounded in a gangly embrace, crooked arms and legs bent into Vs that ended on her shoulders and hips.

  Rather elegantly, Sara replied with, "Woahlyshit?!"

  "Hello," Selliana rasped, cheshire grin bearing rows of piranha teeth. She brought her face closer to Sara, tickling her nose with mossy hair, and opened her mouth wide. Sara cringed back, half expecting her head to get bit off, but instead she felt something warm slither across her face, barbed and thin.

  Selliana was licking her.

  "Oh-- Uh, not that I mind, but--" Sara tried to free herself from the grip on her shoulders, but the woman's fingers were steel. "I take it you're Selly?"

  The tongue retreated just before crossing Sara's eyelid, Selliana returning to view. She licked her lips nguidly. "You are the Champion, aren't you? Ketch's memories seemed compelling, but the taste of gods is much more certain."

  The stranglehold on Sara's body loosened slightly, but she still couldn't move. It was like being seized by a daddy longlegs the size of a car, and it took her a moment to scrape her thoughts together before she could reply.

  "Y'know, I've met more than a few people that were convinced I was divine after having a taste of me, but I think you're the first person to do it like that."

  "Ah, amorous Amarat. Of course. I thank you, little Champion, for distracting the body of my Familiar. Always a bother, to tend the needs reflected in she, but not in me."

  Though the images of Ketch getting 'treated' by this woman were a tantalizing distraction, what was left of Sara's analytical mind seized on the word "little". Sara had met hundreds of people that recognized her as a Champion, but not one had called her "little", not even Kings or archmages. Was Selliana that ancient, that powerful, or just commenting on their retive heights? Whatever it was, Sara didn't know; the woman was too alien to read. Sara hadn't felt this out of her depth since Garen had tossed her into a ceiling.

  "It feels weird to get thanks for that, to be honest." Sara shrugged as best she could. "It's been a pretty great deal on my end, after all."

  "So I've seen, through her eyes," Selliana replied, almost wistful. "Maybe I ought find a potion to bring to light other's desires. The throes of ecstasy are such potent things, for luring spirits of the mind."

  Sara'd been wondering why Ketch wasn't saying anything yet, and when no response came from her after that idea, Sara looked about. She found the woman, of all things, clinging like a monkey to Selly's thigh, eyes lidded and staring up in absolute adoration. It was a reverant expression Sara had only seen when Ketch was under the influence of the Gift of Lust, and to see it invoked here was disconcerting.

  "Ketch? Ketch, you good?"

  "She is well," Ketch's body replied, the dry rasp of Selliana's voice emanating from her sck mouth. "It is simply how she prefers to be with me. Minds intertwined, no lines between hers and mine."

  Sara bristled. Or at least tried to. Self-righteous protectiveness was hard to summon up while being pinned in pce by someone twice her height. To see Ketch reduced to nothing but a puppet was disconcerting in the extreme, and she opened her mouth to protest.

  Instead, Evie appeared beside her, speaking in a low tone. "Master, all is well. She told us herself that Selly had Bonded her, and I expined in no uncertain terms what that meant."

  Selliana nodded, releasing one of Sara's shoulders to reach down and fondly pat Ketch's head. "What she and I are makes pale of the bindings between you and your Evie, little Champion. She is Mine, an organ and a limb, and I am hers, beating heart and stained soul." There was a faint twitch in Ketch's empty expression, one of pleasure. "In death and the life after will we remain so, one soul of two minds." Her hand moved lower on Ketch, possessively tightening around her throat in a way very, very familiar to Sara. Ketch had shown her just how to squeeze, after all. It was no surprise when Ketch's hips twisted, pressing her core harder against Selly's thigh. Chuckling, Selly said, "And I assure you, she is ever so well treated. Perhaps not so tenderly as I have seen through her eyes, nor so rough, but treated all the same."

  Ketch was now licking Selliana's scales, slowly running the ft of her tongue up and down her leg. Her legs had twisted to lock around the rger woman's thighs, her lower back unduting in an unconscious grinding motion.

  Sara watched this dispy with a mixture of astonishment and other, less appropriate emotions. She shook her head at Ketch. "Damn, girl, you're really bad at not getting mind controlled, aren't you?"

  Blue eyes fluttered, some sembnce of thought reentering them just so Ketch could turn to pout at Sara. "That's unfair. Your Gift of Lust is hardly mind control. And besides, have you any idea what it's like to be a Familiar?" A shiver ran down her body. "She's in my mind, Sara. What she wants me to think, I think. What she wants me to feel, I feel. She can take from me painful memories and help create wondrous new ones, even twist me into a different person if she so pleased, but I hear all her thoughts, and know she never will." Her eyes began to lid once more. "It is wonderful, wonderful. Truly... wonderful..." She trailed off, lost to insensibility once more.

  "So you see?" Selliana asked, releasing Sara at st. "You have no need for fear of me, Champion Sara. She is very welcome in my embrace."

  Sara reached up to rub at her shoulders where fingers had dug in, taking the time to put words to her thoughts. "Look, 24/7 kink stuff is fine for some people, but you gotta admit the power dynamic on dispy here is risky at best." Sara wasn't sure if those terms were too foreign to be understood, but it was the only way she could parse it. "Like, it's one thing to do full time rolepy, but you literally are Ketch at this point. I've got no way of knowing if she actually said that stuff, or if you just made her mouth move the right way."

  "Then ask her again, when you and she are free of my Mien," Selliana suggested, long fingernails scratching Ketch's head. "Your own pet knows much of those such as we, I note." She pointed to Evie. "Sve," she used the word fondly, "What of familiars and their masters have you seen? Your colr winds its way into your soul in a most unusual way, and such a thing does not come to be by fate or chance. It has been pushed deeper into your web, divine binds guided and pruned. You have begun to emute the Bond?"

  "Woah, what?" Sara asked, whirling on Evie. "You've been doing what? "

  Evie shrugged, feigning indifference. "I have read and studied witchery these st few months, and used it to deepen the colr's hold on me. At first I thought only to understand its effects, perhaps find you a simpler way to break its hold on others, but practitioners only ever seemed interested in binding another to themselves, rather than the reverse."

  "But you did that on us? "

  "On myself only, Master. You seek to break the colrs, to rid the world of them, and I will do everything in my power to see your ambitions through. Of course, it naturally occurred to me that if you were able to do so painlessly, you would naturally break our own bond, and the thought terrified me. The rituals required to Dedicate myself to you were not difficult to achieve, not with such a strong binding tying our souls together already."

  Sara pinched the bridge of her nose, groaning. "So you, knowing that I wanted to get rid of magic svery, did your best to find ways to make it work even better? "

  "You have ever encouraged me to take my own course, Master. That I exercised your permissions in this manner may be surprising, but I don't believe it can be criticized."

  "I mean-- I guess?" Sara sighed. "Just... how well did it work? If you get captured, can some dickhead study what you did to make the other colrs work better?"

  "Perhaps?" Evie sounded uncertain. "All of the texts emphasized the role of the supplicant, rather than the Master. It is why I could perform the rituals without your notice. Even if the effects may be replicated by another manner, I do not believe the methods I employed could be achieved without the willful participation of the ensved."

  "But you're not certain?"

  "I was merely following instructions, Master. I know very little of magery and its workings, and so can't confidently say. It is a problem that would only have become relevant were I defeated and captured, and I am very skilled. I gave it little thought."

  "That's... mindblowingly arrogant."

  "If I may?" Selliana interjected. She didn't wait for a response. "I believe I have found myself intrigued, and the pursuit of my curiosity may yet sate yours. If you wish, I could investigate what your sve's blind toying with her immortal soul has achieved."

  "It was not blind," Evie sniffed, offended. "I am not foolish enough to attempt ritual magecraft without appropriate preparation."

  "Of course, of course," Selly purred, reaching one long limb out to brush the back of her hand against the metal of Evie's colr. "But neither you nor I understand in fullness what you have done. Won't you take the chance to learn more of yourself?"

  Evie flinched away from Selliana's touch, a protective hand itching to go to her colr, but she mastered her instincts, barely allowing the slow stroking. At the question, she only twitched her ears, gncing at Sara. "Well, Master?"

  "It's... I mean, we kinda have to, right? Learning about the colrs is pretty high up on my priority list. What do you already know of them, Selliana?"

  "Little more than the fact that they are a blinding white to my Sight, too suffused with ancient threads to decipher."

  "But did they really come from a god?" Sara asked. "Everyone cims they did, but I never found any actual records on that. I always wondered if people are only assuming they're invincible, because of their supposed origin."

  "I was not there when they were brought to this world, but to deny their divinity is lunacy. None but the gods can create things of such indomitable certainty. They are not magecraft, little Champion. They are an aspect of reality, defined. A point of existence that insist upon themselves, their rules supersede the world they inhabit. You can no more fight the colrs than you might overcome the pull of the world itself."

  "We actually did that, though," Sara said. "Back in my world? We beat gravity, the pull of the world. It turns out that if you get high enough, and fast enough, it doesn't really matter anymore."

  Selliana stopped her slow stroking of Evie's colr, silently absorbing that. "...Well. Perhaps my choice of words was poor, but the nature of the colrs remain. They are divine, and therefore insurmountable. The morality of your Quest is as impeccable as its fulfillment is impossible."

  Though Selliana's words were spoken with lordly gravitas, Sara shrugged. "Eh, I've read enough history to know what to think when someone says something is impossible. We're not dealing with capital-g Gods here, so they're not perfect, and that means there's gonna be some way to destroy what they made. Even if there's not, I could still, like, toss them all in a volcano."

  Selliana smiled sweetly, a grisly thing. "You wish to find all the colrs, little Champion? Scour the world for five-ten-thousand iron bands, kill every st one of their possessors, then break the will of the gods themselves to destroy them?"

  Sara cocked her head to listen, bobbing her head after each listed challenge like she was memorizing a grocery list. When Selliana finished, she nodded."Pretty much sums it up. After all, doing impossible stuff is a Champion's shtick, isn't it? At the very least, I'm gonna have a better chance than anyone else has at succeeding." Sara looked out at the rest of the cavern, as if she could look beyond the walls to the world beyond. "Are there really fifty thousand of those things out there?"

  "According to tale and legend, yes."

  "Well. That's going to take a while, but it's not like there's anything better to do with the time. Now, weren't we supposed to be studying my girlfriend?"

  "Sve, Master," Evie reminded her, leaning in.

  Sara rolled her eyes. "Sve, right. Sorry." She looked to Selliana. "Are you ready to start?"

  "I have no reason to dey. So you do wish to be studied, Sve?"

  Sara paused, feeling confused, and a little bit confused about why she was feeling confused. After a moment, it clicked. It was the first time that someone in this world had heard Sara make a decision for Evie on something, yet persisted in asking for her sve's opinion anyway. Everyone else, even Vesta or Hurlish, took for granted that Evie was on board for whatever Sara wanted to do.

  Even Evie seemed a little bit bewildered, but the moment of confusion was much shorter for her. "Master wishes me to, and so I will."

  "Excellent," Selliana said, swimming away. Ketch was still firmly attached to her thigh like a remora, dampening what might have been an otherworldly eeriness.

  To Evie, Sara whispered, "Well, she seems... interesting."

  "She seems useful, Master," Evie corrected. "Enough that I wonder if Amarat's interference in your meeting with Ketch was intended as an introduction to Selliana, rather than Ketch herself."

  Sara frowned, slowly beginning to follow in Selliana's wake. "Not sure if I like that interpretation. It'd be pretty shitty of Amarat to get innocent bystanders wrapped up in my personal shitshow just so they can introduce me to someone else."

  "By Selliana's account, the completion of your quest will require you to involve nearly everyone in the world with your 'personal shitshow', Master. I fail to see the moral difference."

  "The difference is that I have to, if I want to do what's right. Getting rid of those abominations is worth a whole hell of a lotta colteral. But Amarat's a god. She has enough power to do things the right way."

  "So you often say, Master." Evie cast a supersititous gnce towards the ceiling. "I, for one, would like it to be known that any aid of the gods, no matter how circumspect its delivery, is something I welcome very gratefully."

  Sara snorted, diving down to the small clearing in the seaweed Selliana had nded in. There was something of a boratory there, though it was far from any modern standard of sterility. Gss beakers and vials were corked with bck rubber, fantastical ingredients in various stages of disassembly beside them. Many powders and bowls of solution were kept in sealed gss boxes filled with air, even some pots of living flowers kept carefully out of the way. Skewered bugs and filleted fish were as common as herbs and powders, and many of their parts had been chopped off in piecemeal fashion for some presumed reason or another. The only space that was clear was the rge stone table in the center of the clearing, which Selliana patted invitingly.

  "Come now, come. Let us begin to learn of the iron which binds your souls."

  Evie swam forward, allowing Selliana's long limbs to maneuver her into a ying position. The witch-- a title which Sara was increasingly certain was the only appropriate word for Selliana-- plucked several metallic instruments from hidden pces, ying them beside Evie like a surgeon. This done, Selliana looked to Sara.

  "Well? What are you waiting for, little Champion?"

  "Me? I thought I was just watching."

  "Perhaps at first, if you'd like, but the bond cannot be so crudely studied. We will need to see it at its height, if we wish to be illuminated."

  "Meaning...?"

  "When your Sve Dedicates herself to you, of course. What else?"

  "Uh..." Sara gnced at Evie, who was characteristically unfazed. "You do know what that involves for us, right? Because I'm Amarat's Champion?"

  "Yes, yes, Ketch has seen it, even involved herself with it." Ketch's body shifted, grinding a little bit harder against Selliana's leg. The witch gave her another fond pat. "Rather enthusiastically, as you can see. What is the issue?"

  Sara looked at her surroundings, from the desiccated bullfrogs to the ominous cavern of doom, the water thick with moss and algae, and then to the intended spectator, who loomed over them with flesh that looked to be nearly rotting off the bone.

  "It's just that, uh, we haven't done it underwater," Sara tried. "Not really sure if everything would work right, with human bodies."

  "I assure you, my potions cover all contingencies. Your sve's natural lubrication will--"

  Selliana's head cocked, her body nguage shifting as Ketch's voice emanated from her mouth. "It's not that, Selly. It's the environment."

  Selliana's head twitched back the other way, her natural voice returning. "I hardly see the problem, my precious guppy. I've already expined the potion's effects will compensate."

  Ketch's voice returned. "It's not a physical problem, Selly. It's in the mind. Just trust me on it, okay?"

  Ketch's body straightened on Selliana's thigh, looking up as Selly's voice rasped out of it. "You never had any such problems, guppy. Quite the opposite, if anything."

  "Everyone's different," Ketch replied, this time using her own body. Sara was starting to get a headache trying to follow it. "Take their minds somepce else, if you really want to see them involving themselves." After a moment's hesitation, the ancient witch's body cocked its hips, looking pouty. "And send me with them, too. The taste of your skin can only get me so far."

  "Fine, fine," Selliana sighed, her true body waving Ketch's mannerism away like a buzzing fly. She looked down at Sara. "Do you agree with my familiar, Champion? Should you allow it, I may send your dreaming minds to anywhere of your comfort."

  Sara looked for Evie's opinion and was met with her typical deference. "Sure," Sara decided. "It's dream stuff, right? Not actually invading our minds?"

  "Correct, but in the interest of honesty you value, I must say that it would not be difficult to enter your mind once you are under my thrall."

  "Yeah, well, I wouldn't advise you try. Amarat probably rigged a bomb to go off the moment someone goes poking around in there, to keep certain things secret."

  Selliana's fingers hesitated over her instruments. "Ah. A prescient warning. I will take utmost care." She produced two dark potions, floating one each over to Sara and Evie. The fluid was dark and thick in the vial, but not quite as immediately unappealing as the water breathing potions. "A simple draught to draw you into a deep sleep. When you are ready, drink it and lie upon the stone."

  "Getting some serious fshbacks to my school days," Sara mumbled, hopping up onto the table next to Evie, who was already drinking the potion. Sara downed her own, surprised at how quickly it went down, then id back and did her best to get comfortable. "So, will you be able to see what's going on in on her heads while you do this?"

  "Yes," Selliana replied simply, selecting an instrument that looked like a magnifying gss. She bent low over Evie's colr, holding the device close. "I am guiding the spellwork, after all."

  Sara's head began to spin with anesthetic wooziness as she watched Selliana work. "That's not a problem on my end, but for the record, I'm not gonna take responsibility for whatever weird fantasies my subconscious produces."

  "Yours?" Selliana hummed without looking up. "My dear, we are studying your Sve. It is you who will be subject to her innermost desires."

  "Oh," Sara said quietly, the world beginning to darken at its corners.

  ----------------------------

  Evie

  ----------------------------

  Evie's mind fell into a deadening spiral, a thick numbness in her tongue spreading up through her throat and into her mind, stripping away the yers of reason that would have allowed her to discern reality from fiction. She heard a few metallic clicks, felt a long finger prodding at her throat, and then she was away, far away, thinking about... thinking about...

  What was it, again?

  Oh, yes. The Day of Selection. How could she forget?

  Evie straightened her dress in the parlor's waiting room, smoothing the sheer threads until they clung against her bare stomach. While most of the other sves chose something more chaste, if still revealing, she had assembled her outfit with only one target in mind. Thin strips of opaque cloth barely covered her breasts, one rge red ribbon that tied into a stylized bow between her shoulderbdes. The gossamer material that hung from it was barely present enough to discolor her skin, some foreign silk or another that served only to bridge the gap to her bottoms, a set of that same red cloth that looped around her waist several times before diving between her legs, pressed tightly enough that it hid nothing.

  It was said that the Champion had rather bold tastes, as might be expected of Amarat's Chosen, and Evie had dressed with this in mind. The Madame had seen her outfit and tsked rather pointedly, suggesting several alterations that would better entice a Lord or Lady into a purchase so they might unwrap her body for themselves, but Evie had persisted. The Champion would not be interested in a woman pying coy, her instincts told her. Evie arranged herself in the room according to that idea as she waited, lounging across the velvet furniture in a variety of casual poses that left every bit of her on dispy.

  The problem was, Evie couldn't decide on a pose. The door directly faced both the chaise lounge and the poster bed, but it would be obviously unnatural if the Champion walked into the room with Evie's legs spread wide on the bed. Some decorum would do, at the very least, and she mustn't look like one seeking to cling to the Champion's coattails by overdoing things.

  As Evie was indecisively moving yet again from the bed to the chaise lounge, the doorknob clicked. Evie's ears and tail went rigid with panic as she suddenly dove forward, throwing herself into position as quickly as she could.

  "...told you, this entire thing is ridiculous--" Evie heard the Champion say as the door swung open, still looking over her shoulder to speak to someone behind her. "--and I don't care what the Church has to say about... about..." The words trailed off as the Champion turned to look at Evie for the first time.

  Evie smiled politely, giving a gentlewoman's wave, as if she weren't as close to naked as one could be without baring it all. She'd nded in a proper Lady's sitting position on the edge of the lounge, with one leg thrown over the other and her hands folded primly in her p. Her straight posture pushed her modest chest forward, highlighting what little her clothing hid, and Evie was rewarded immediately when the Champion's eyes darted down from her face, instinct driving her eyes into a lecherous appraisal of Evie's body.

  To her credit, the Champion mastered herself incredibly quickly. Just before her eyes reached beneath Evie's waist she steeled herself, locking into a firm eye contact with Evie, expression all business. Only the rising blush gave away her thoughts, and Evie felt her tail curl with pride.

  "Hello," the Champion said, swallowing. "Sorry for not knocking. I was in the middle of an argument, and most of the others haven't been so..."

  "Honest?" Evie supplied, spreading her hands-- and by consequence, her arms-- wide. The Champion's eyes fshed towards her chest for the briefest moment, almost enough to make Evie doubt it happened. She forged on, eager to pick away at so strong-willed a woman. "For the sves of a brothel, so many of my sisters work very hard to convince the customers they are anything else. I, on the other hand, delight in my profession."

  "I can see that," the Champion said, swallowing again as she looked about herself. She was wearing men's commoner clothing, breeches and a cloth shirt, but if the outfit was to downpy her Champion's beauty, it had failed. Despite no signs of tailoring, Amarat's blessings had her clothes hugging her form like the men's suits of foreign courts, though without the stiff colrs and fine buttons. What would have been frumpy ziness on any other became rugged practicality, a handsome presentation that stirred warmth in Evie's core. She licked her lips and allowed her gaze to wander freely as the Champion spoke on. "Nothing wrong with taking pride in what you do, when you enjoy the work. But if you were really deadset on getting the job with me, I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint."

  "Oh?" Evie intoned, cocking her head and flicking her ears in an inquisitive fashion, a practiced gesture that intentionally drew the eye to Evie's exotic features. "And why ever would one such as you pass up so excellent an opportunity as this? The Madame's products are the finest in the continent, it's said."

  "Yeah, and I'm sure they are, but the fact you're called 'products' is kinda the problem," the Champion said, scanning the room for a chair. There was nowhere to sit aside from the lounge Evie occupied and the bed, and they would be expected to conduct this interview for fifteen minutes or more. "Not really interested in the whole sex-sve thing, afraid to say," the Champion said, electing to remain standing.

  Evie smiled warmly, though the words made her stomach lurch. "While I would be incredibly disappointed to sleep apart from you, I can assure you that my talents extend far beyond sensuality. I will be your attendant in all things, your tutor and your accountant, bodyguard and spy. To achieve what I can alone, you would need a staff of dozens."

  "And that's helpful, and super impressive, but--" Evie stretched once more, pushing her hands over her head so that her tail naturally uncurled, rolling into sight. The Champion stuttered mid-sentence. "B-but... Uh... If doing that means owning someone else, then it's not really worth it."

  Evie finished her nguid stretch. "I can assure you, Champion--"

  "Sara's fine."

  Evie blinked at the uncharacteristic interruption, but took it in stride. "I can assure you, then, that I am everything but unwilling. Need I prove it to you, while the magic doesn't yet bind us?" Evie nodded towards her colr's associated wristband, which sat on a vishly sequined pad on the bed's end table, waiting for the Champion to cim her. "It doesn't control me presently, as you can see. I could have left any time, yet I chose to wait for you. I can say anything I like right now, and I choose this."

  "I mean-- systemic issues can create a lot of unconscious pressures to conform--"

  "Dear," Evie interrupted, as if chiding her. She slipped off the chair, taking slow, overpping steps towards the Champion. "If you won't take me as yours, why not at least spend our time together memorably?" Evie advanced on the Champion, who was chuckling nervously and backing towards the door.

  "Oh. Oh, I mean, I guess there's nothing wrong with that, but..."

  "But?" Evie prompted, closing the gap. She stopped just before the bare skin above her chest would have pressed against the underside of the Champion's breasts. Up close, it was truly striking how tall the woman was. Evie batted her eyes up at her, awaiting a response.

  "But... It's complicated," the Champion breathed, her shoulders raised up and her palms pressed to the wood behind her. It was as if she was terrified of touching Evie.

  "Complicated how?" Evie asked, studying Sara.

  "Champion stuff, I guess. Changes, since I came to this world. Not sure if I want to push my luck."

  "Oh, now that sounds positively delightful," Evie purred, taking her time btantly looking the far taller woman up and down.

  "I'm-- look, can we get some space here?" The Champion asked, breathing quickly. "Amarat's got, uh, certain expectations for her Champion's behavior, I guess, and I haven't been living up to that yet, so--"

  Evie's grin turned vilinous. "Oh, tell me it isn't true. A week in our world, gifted this body by Amarat, and you haven't yet put it to the test?"

  "It's been a really busy week, in my defense," the Champion whined, doing her best to become one with the wooden door behind her. For all her wriggling, though, Evie hadn't seen her reach for the door handle once.

  "So tell me," Evie said, reaching a finger out to trace the outline of the Champion's arm against the wood. "What is your concern? Too strong? You might hurt me? Or is it the... urges?" Though the second guess had been a stab in the dark, the Champion gulped. Evie ughed, retracting her hand. "It is the urges, isn't it? Amarat's Champion worries about controlling herself, is that it?"

  "All the time," the Champion groaned, eyes wrenched shut. "So fuckin' hard, tryna stay focused in meeting after meeting, meanwhile my libido's going through the roof and I'm just getting lectures and books and god it's so boring and I'm so horny and it's the worst--"

  The Champion's jaw clicked shut, as if finally realizing she shouldn't be menting her circumstances to a prostitute.

  Evie only snickered. "I have a few ideas of what might help with that," she said.

  "You don't get it, though," the Champion said, eyes still closed, her body still pinned by Evie's.

  Evie stepped closer, going up on her tiptoes so the breath of her words would dust across the Champion's colrbone. "Don't understand what, pray tell?"

  The Champion stayed silent, taking shaky breaths. Evie studied her for a moment, considering, then silently reached a hand up. Slowly, gently, as if calming a wild animal, she pressed her cupped palm to the Champion's jawline.

  Dark eyes fshed open, a hand appearing around Evie's wrist, around her waist, dragging her in. Evie gasped as she felt her entire body get drawn tight against the rough cloth of the Champion's clothing, fearing for her life for the briefest of moments before the woman buried her face in Evie's hair and took a deep breath through her nose, the rumble of her chest reverberating into Evie's.

  "Oh?" Evie said, pressing harder into the Champion's body. "Has someone found their spine?"

  "Fuckin... fuckin' found something..." the champion muttered, face still buried in Evie's hair. "Dunno what it's gonna do to me, though. You sure you wanna do this?"

  "My dear, what about my actions could have given you any other idea?"

  Even as the words left her lips, Evie felt herself being picked up, strong arms reaching around to the back of her bare thighs, carrying her towards the bed. She ughed aloud at Sara's sudden change in attitude, rewarding the woman by peppering the side of her neck with light kisses. Sara groaned at each touch, a deep, guttural noise that Evie knew well, one that had her own body stirring in response.

  Evie felt herself tilted backward onto the bed, soft sheets embracing her with the welcoming sigh of silk sliding over silk. Sara's body never left hers, the Champion following her all the way down so that her hands wouldn't be interrupted in their roaming, the pads of calloused fingers seeking to trace every line of her body. Evie shifted on the sheets to allow Sara better access, shivering every time her attention roved near somewhere intimate.

  For all the repression Sara had spoken of, she was infuriatingly patient with Evie. The Champion lingered in her exploration of Evie's body, ghosting across her skin with lips and tongue, nipping at Evie's shoulders and neck in just the right way to leave her squirming, thighs rubbing together as her entire body yearned for more. Evie let out little gasps each time Sara drew near her breasts or the crook of her legs, hoping to lure her attention inward, but Amarat's Champion was nothing if not thorough, always darting away to explore new pces. When she felt a hand massaging through her scalp, gently untwisting the bands that tied her hair up, Evie realized with quiet satisfaction and primal frustration that Sara was in no rush to to speed things along. Encouraging in the long run, of course, but blindingly infuriating when Evie already felt her core pulsing with need.

  As Sara traced yet another long line across her colrbone, Evie managed to steady her voice enough to speak. "Are you going to y here and touch me all night, or are you going to feel me, Sara?"

  Such mild teasing was standard fare for Evie, hardly worth mentioning, and so she was rather surprised when Sara responded with a long, drawn-out moan.

  "You taste... so fuckin' good," the Champion murmured, meeting Evie's eyes for a brief moment. With a wobbling head and wandering eyes, the Champion looked nearly drunken, or perhaps drugged, clearly getting some kind of high from just the taste of Evie's body. She realized with some trepidation that if she didn't take things further herself, Sara very well might be satisfied with spending the rest of her life running her tongue up and down Evie's skin, and at the rate things were going, Evie might soon find herself contented by the idea.

  She mastered her trembling limbs just long enough to find the hem of Sara's simple shirt, drawing it upwards. Sara growled as she did so, shifting her arms just long enough for Evie to remove the offending garment, and then they were back together, skin pressed to burning skin.

  "Gods," Evie breathed, wrapping her arms around Sara's back, half in an embrace, half so she could draw her cws out to cut the bindings wrapping Sara's chest. "You're far too patient for me."

  "I don't know if I could count to ten right now," Sara replied breathlessly, pausing to shudder when Evie's cws scraped light lines across her back, severing her breast bindings. "Keepin' track of time's way the hell outta the cards."

  Evie normally would have offered some snarky reply, but she was too distracted by her efforts to rid the world of anything that had the gall to cover the Champion's body. She balled the damnable cloth in a fist and threw it to the side, freeing her hands as quickly as possible so she could return her attention to her prize.

  The Goddess of Passion, Evie saw, was not sparing in her generosity. Sara's body, exquisite even at a distance, was quite literally divine when it was flush with hers. She had a form that would drive sculptors mad in their endeavors to render it in marble, defining beauty in a way that ought not be possible. There was nothing unnatural about her presence, as there might be found in the magical bewitchment of a succubus, just an absolute refinement of the human form that was tailored to enrapture all who gazed upon it. What might have been blemishes on another became delicious contrast on her, grounding enough to assure an onlooker that they weren't hallucinating. Evie doubted there would be any in all the world that found nothing to desire in Sara's body, no matter their tastes. Those that preferred men would fawn over the subtle definition of her muscuture, those that preferred women would lust after her soft hips and generous chest, and even those who had no interest in sex at all would be delighted to view the aesthetic purity of her form, with not a hair nor freckle a sliver out of pce.

  And, Evie realized as Sara pulled back, she was the perfect person to be gifted this perfection. Sensing her enrapture, Sara did not blush, nor preen, but simply sat back and rexed with her hips straddling Evie's, allowing Evie to look as much as she desired.

  And Evie did. She ran her hands up and down Sara's hips, devouring the sight of her breasts, which moved with her heavy breathing, feeling even the heat between the Champion's legs pressing against her thighs. Sara looked down at her with a hungry, lecherous gaze, clearly getting as much out of Evie's body as she did Sara's. For a time there was only the sound of their breath, until Evie's attention finally wandered up and away from Sara's chest, to her colrbone, where a thin line of bruises had begun to darken. The sight of the hickeys she'd left on Sara sent a bolt of lightning racing along her skin, raising goosebumps, and then the quiet moment was over, Evie's throat making a strangled cry as she began to frantically tear at the Champion's pants.

  "Gods, gods, gods," Evie swore, "What are you? How could Amarat let something like you loose into the world, unaccompanied?"

  Sara ughed, refusing to help Evie get her pants off. "Still hoping to get the job, I see."

  "I would kill for it," Evie replied pinly, trying and failing to lift the Champion off of her. "I would give all I had and all I will ever earn for the chance to feel you inside me." Evie groaned, and she realized with a small shock that she well and truly meant it. She gave up on the pants, moving her hands to Sara's breasts, which had gone far too long unattended, and all the while she kept talking. "I would-- I would do anything. Be anything. If it meant I could taste you now, I can think of nothing I wouldn't give." Sara tried to say something, but Evie brushed her fingers over her nipples, causing the words to be cut off in a low moan. "What will it take? What will it take, you have to tell me. Please."

  Sara groaned again, lower, more primal. Her hips began a slow grind against Evie's. Evie took the opportunity to sit up, bringing her mouth to Sara's right breast, nipping at it ever so gently. She was rewarded with a gasp and a hand buried in her hair, pushing her in. Evie nipped again, felt a tighter pull at her scalp, and began to lick and tease, filling her mouth with the taste of Sara's body. Between each attack she pulled back just long enough to breathlessly beg, then dove back in.

  "I'll kneel before you--" Evie licked, Sara twisted-- "I'll fight for you, kill for you--" Evie's teeth grazed against her skin, Sara bucked-- "I'll care for your home, use my body to sate your mate's desires in your absence--" Sara whined, fist balling in Evie's hair-- "I will attend you in all things, supplicate myself before you, accept all you ask of me--" Evie pulled back with a wet pop , looking up at Sara, who she had to steady with her arms, lest Sara's drunken swaying end up with the Champion falling off the bed-- "I will do anything , Sara. If you turned me to the streets as a common whore, ordered me to spread my legs for any passerby, I would do so gdly, so long as it meant I could taste you once more. I would bear children if you asked it of me, Sara." Evie tugged ever so gently at Sara's wrist, bringing her fingertips to rest upon the cool metal of Evie's colr. "I will do anything for you, all so I may call you Master."

  As the words left her lips, Sara changed, some hidden cord of self control finally snapping. Her drunken weaving vanished, lidded eyes narrowing into a predatory gleam. Light began to etch its way across her skin, spiraling in strange purple patterns, magical runes of unknowable nature burning into existence. They appeared across all of her body, effervescent smoke drifting through the air between them. Evie watched the runes travel down Sara's arm, the one Evie had brought to touch her colr, worming their way towards Evie's skin. The moment they reached her hand, Sara let out a final, defeated groan, and then the hand tightened, wrapping around Evie's throat.

  "Prove it."

  Evie's eyes widened, surprise overtaking her for just a moment before she hurriedly nodded. "Yes. Yes, thank you, I will."

  Evie found herself dragged down on top of Sara, who fell back on the bed, their positions reversed, Evie on top. Sara wasted no time finding her mouth, initiating a furious kiss that Evie ecstatically returned. A knee pressed between Evie's legs, causing her to gasp. She felt Sara grin against her lips, using that gasp to shove her tongue into Evie's mouth, and...

  Gods. It was like nothing else. Amarat may not have enhanced Sara's appearance beyond what was natural, but that clearly didn't extend to the taste of her lips. Evie's head swam with the heady taste of golden ichor, Sara's tongue the fvor of every sugary delight she'd ever tasted, and then some. She couldn't put a name to it, only that she needed more of it, no matter what, and she tilted her head and cupped Sara's cheeks in her hands to chase after it, moaning senselessly all the while.

  The knee returned to her core, providing a perch for Evie to rut herself against, the thin silk that still covered her doing nothing for the rough cloth of Sara's clothing, but she was too lost in sensation to care, taste and pressure working in tandem to obliterate sensibility. She lost herself in the moment, tasting Sara, drinking her in, sucking and cwing like it was the st meal she'd ever have, and if it had been, she was fairly well sure she'd have died happy.

  Sara was the one that finally broke the pattern, but only by physically shoving Evie off her, ignoring her pitiable whines at the loss of Sara's lips. The Champion shot her a merciless grin, then continued to lift Evie up and off her, handling her like she was a child. Evie felt her ears ftten pitifully and her tail coil around Sara's thigh in pleading desperation, a betrayal of her emotions that she was powerless to hide.

  "Don't look like that," Sara instructed, depositing her to the side. "This is what you wanted, isn't it?"

  Lost in lust, Evie didn't understand what the Champion meant until she saw her hips shimmying, pants working their way down.

  Evie dove forward like a woman possessed, cwing at the clothing, ripping them down. Sara ughed once more, this time with an arrogant self-superiority that drove Evie wild. She could tell what her body was doing to the poor feline, and she loved it.

  Evie didn't care. She didn't care about anything at all, in fact, save for what was waiting for her beneath the cloth. Pale skin was exposed with every inch, hips turning to thighs, calfs, and finally ankles, and then the clothes were gone, Sara's undergarments with them, naked beneath her.

  Sara pressed her legs together tightly, leaving a small patch of wispy dark hair as the only hint of what Evie so desired, so desperately needed. She bent forward, pcing a hand on either thigh in an attempt to to open them, but Sara resisted, rolling her hips away. Evie looked up at her, confused and pleading. Sara grinned, having assembled a pile of pillows so she could recline while still looking down on Evie.

  "You're not a very patient little kitty, are you?" Sara asked. She moved a hand to her breast, pinching and massaging it as she spoke. "Before you get your reward, why don't you remind me what you'll do for it?"

  "Anything," Evie breathed, without hesitation. "Everything."

  Sara smiled wide. "Good girl," she breathed, opening her legs.

  Evie watched as if in a trance. Never in all her life had her feline senses been so overwhelmed as in that moment, caught in the presence of a woman literally divine. The scent that filled her nose was thick, pressing, awaking a desire in her like nothing ever had before. It was the scent of pure arousal, unrefined desire, a nectar that no force in the world could tear her away from. She leaned in, breathing deep, her mouth falling open. Fluid glistened on Sara's thighs, wet and inviting, and she turned her tongue towards it, pping at the shining skin.

  The taste was divine, exquisite, a reward enough on its own, but hearing Sara gasp above her, squirming on the bed? That was perfection. Evie licked again, drawing closer, and with Sara's impatient whine she found the first thing capable of stopping her from going further within. She kissed and sucked on Sara's thighs, switching sides, soaking in each and every reaction. Her whines were more beautiful than an orchestra, her moans more pleasing than a serenade, and all of it was for Evie, and Evie alone. Sara's breath came faster with each passing moment, until she was panting with both hands wrapped in Evie's hair, shivering arms trying to shove her closer.

  Evie resisted for as long as she could, but she was only mortal, and the scent filling her mind was divine. When she finally did break for Sara's slick, it was suddenly, no time spent enjoying the sights. Almost surprising herself, she dove in with a long, slow lick, spreading the ft of her tongue along Sara's slit slowly, oh so slowly, until she reached its peak and Sara shouted and smmed her legs shut, locking Evie in pce.

  Every promise Evie had made, every solemn vow she'd cimed in the minutes leading up to this, they had all been worth it. She barely needed the hand she shoved between her own legs to find her pleasure, the taste of Sara and the feel of her heat on Evie's tongue nearly enough to send her over the edge then and there.

  She followed Sara's guiding hand in her hair, devoted to earning the approval that would let her between these legs again some day. She bucked against her own hand, her own humming moans providing a buzz that earned a tug of her hair, driving her ever onward, ever onward, lost in the haze of pleasure.

  "Get-- godfuckingdamn-- get something inside me," Sara moans, words pitched pleadingly high.

  Evie obliges her, moving her attention fully to Sara's clit so she can put two fingers inside her, stroking the Champion's walls. Sara cries out, begging for more.

  Evie bumps up the pace, pumping in and out of Sara while tongue flicks and circles, plucking at every string she finds to make more of those musical sounds fall out of the Champion.

  "Oh-- holy shit-- god, Evie, please--"

  Sara's thighs tightened around her head and her moans turned into hiccuping gasps. Evie dives in even harder, pumping furiously with her hand while bobbing her whole head as she pped at Sara's clit.

  Suddenly, as if by instinct, Sara's hands slipped from Evie's hair and nded just behind her ears, knuckles pressing down into their base. White lightning fshed through her mind as the peak she'd been so long denied comes crashing down, tears welling at the corners of her eyes. She had just enough presence of mind to push one st time into Sara, curling her fingers upward, and then she's gone, lost to ecstasy.

  Sara's hips bucked up into Evie's face as she comes with a keening cry, shaking and shuddering as she throws her hips against Evie's face, pulling her as close as they could possibly be. Evie's own cries are muffled in Sara's body, her legs kicking uselessly on the silk sheet as she twists and grinds, the pain of Sara's nails in her skin serving only to drive her pleasure higher, higher, until she's just mindlessly swallowing, drinking in Sara's juices and rutting herself against her own hand.

  Eventually, ter, gods knew how much ter, Evie colpsed into the sheets, Sara following a moment ter. The world is hazy from the tears of pleasure in her eyes, her limbs loose and boneless, but still she managed to force herself up onto her elbows, crawling up and on top of Sara's naked body. The Champion barely noticed, eyes closed and her chest heaving. Evie grabbed her limp wrist.

  With the st of her strength, Evie grabbed Sara's arm and hauled it over to the nightstand, where the wristband that controlled her colr is set on the fine plush pillow.

  "I win," Evie whispered, dropping Sara's arm. It nds on the bracelet with a subtle click, the band turning to mist and coalescing on Sara's wrist. Only then does she let herself colpse, burying her face between pillowy breasts.

  ------------------------

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  Well, that was certainly evocative imagery, Selly's voice said, entering Evie's mind. She still felt as if she was face-down between Sara's breasts, but now she remembers all that led up to this moment.

  I'll say, Sara's disembodied voice replied. The scene began slowly floating away, repced in pieces by a formless void that Evie's consciousness floated through. Y'know, if you wanted to top me for once all you had to do was ask, Evie.

  It was more than that, Master.

  Yes, it was quite fascinating, Selly's voice said, preempting any reply from Sara. The psychological complexities of such a powerful bond being formed between two initially unwilling partners, who ter embraced its binds, is remarkable. While the nature of the colr's enchantments itself proved predictably simplistic, the alterations that have occurred in the intervening period could leave me studying for years.

  I... don't know if I could survive years of encounters like that, Sara said, with an echoing nervous chuckle.

  Though it was undeniably enjoyable, I must reluctantly agree, Master.

  But surely a few more? Selly's voice suggested. My guppy did not get a chance to indulge save as a voyeur, which feels rather unfair. And I would so delight in a longer study.

  A voyeur? Evie inquired. I didn't see her. Can she watch from above, like you?

  She could have, but I instead created a peephole in the wall for her, as well as a rather inventive vibrating saddle for her to be restrained to. A creation offered up by the little Champion's memories, I believe.

  Oh my god, what? You tied her to a sybian? For like an hour? Ketch, are you good?

  Echoing through the void came a low muffled groan, like someone mumbling insensibly into a pillow.

  She is quite well, I assure you. I wouldn't ever allow my guppy to come to true harm. Only enjoyable harm. Now, are you ready to further proceed?

  Though no words were said, a sense of vague assent emanated from Evie and Sara's consciousness.