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Nametag:rook
CROWN OF THORNS
Xera moved cautiously upon the balls of her small feet in a
manor that would have been the envy of any panther's padded
tread.
Her naked pale skinned body slipped as silent as a ghost
through the garden of strange exotic plants.
The pasty full moon in the clear sky seemed to cast her
nubile young body in a fiery glow of white iridescent witch
fire. Her large gray eyes sparkled as the stars above her and
her lithe long limbs moved with a serpentine stealth as she
weaved her hourglass body through the nodding sleeping
leaves.
Her face was oval in shape with a broad forehead and large
dark scintillating eyes. She had high wide cheekbones and a
small nose and chin. Her naturally red lips were thick and in
a perpetual long pout. She had that cast of all ancient white
races being a mix of Oriental and Caucasian yet split into
separate genetic paths.
Her hair was thick and wavy and long and cascaded about her
face and small shoulders in an ever dancing Aurora Borealis
of shimmering reds. She often wore it braided but it flung
its self freely now about her now like a great crimson mane
that hung down her back where it brushed at her full round
buttocks.
Her neck like her limbs were long and slender and she moved
with grace and precision stripped of all wasted motion.
Her breasts were full and high upon her body and jutted out
firmly from her narrow torso each being larger than her head
and thus of incredible size for such a thin young frame.
Her waist was narrow and her hips high and full. Her body had
a layer of pearly white flesh that made her appear soft and
fragile and thus hid her powerful athletic muscles and deadly
abilities in hardened combat.
She stopped moving through the moon glow and leafy shadow to
look about her before kneeling and identifying the shadowy
figure laying prone on the ground before her. She turned his
head into the shafts of light. Radnor! Dead. So the thief
that had betrayed her had met is end in the witches garden.
Despite his recent betrayal he had been a trusted companion
for several months journey and she felt no great joy at
seeing his corpse now; even though she had planned to kill
him if he ever crossed her path again.
He was wearing a simple harness and loin cloth stained now
with blood. And was armed with only a pair of sheathed
daggers. She took one of the daggers now and the silk coiled
rope tied by thong to his harness.
She moved away from the body into the deep inky well of a
flowering tree and stared hard about her. The body had still
been warm to the touch and blood was still sticky to the upon
her finger tips. What had ever killed the highly skilled
thief had done so not more than minutes before her discovery
of the body. She had heard nothing and his daggers had not
been drawn.
Whatever had killed him had been fast and silent and she
pressed her back against the short tree trunk with its
lowering boughs and peered hard into the bright moon lit
garden spying for hidden death.
The garden of the witch lay within a great high circular
wall. At the center of the garden lay a tower. The tower was
slim and tall and as they had learned from the local town
gossip at the Dying Mare Tavern; it had no means of egress.
No doors, no windows, and it contained great treasure and
certain death.
The wall had no gate either but though of highly polished and
well fitted mortarless stone it could be scaled and climbed
as she and the lightening fast reflexes dead Radnor could
attest. Well, at least she could. One would need a
spiritualist to speak to Radnor now and confirm his ascent.
The young girl held the naked blade before her naked body as
her other supple slim wrist hand clutched at the coiled rope.
She had no intention of leaving the garden until she had a
good look at the lone tower. Radnor had been confident it
could be entered and had deduced from a long study of it from
the nearest hiding place that it must surely have an opening
at its top. If not at its bottom. What good was a tower, even
to a witch rumored to steal young women in the night, if you
couldn't enter and leave it?!
It had been the sort of logic that had gotten the pair of
them in and out of trouble more times than Xera cared to
remember.
Before she could study the tower up close for a means of
entry she first had to reach it. The garden was not so vast
as to hide any large predator or guard. So whatever had
killed Radnor had to be not much bigger than she. Somehow
that was more frightening than the murderer being some large
hulking Golem lumbering about the place.
That something lay lurking in the night shadows of the
nodding plants was more unnerving than the prospect of
something large and readably observed standing sentinel.
She was far more skilled in the weapons of warfare than
Radnor had been; but no one was more lethal with a dagger nor
had she ever met anyone with a more acute awareness around
him than the corpse lying now half in white moon light and
black blind shadow not more than three body lengths from her.
That he had drugged her wine at their no-fire cold camp and
left her naked and weaponless and alone to proceed by himself
into the walled garden had both alarmed and confused her. Now
that he was dead she simply wondered what he had done with
her clothes and weapons and the rest of their gear.
In racing in raged single minded pursuit after the thief she
had obviously stolen past the freshly hidden bounty of their
camp. And having found his means of egress over the outer
wall she had used his slim metal pinons hammered into the
chinks between the well fitted almost seamless stones to
ascend and drop in rapid pursuit.
It must have taken him hours to hammer in all those metal
slim pins and their rings for finger and toe holds. Longer
than he thought it would take or he would have tied her up as
well. For as it was she had scaled the wall and dropped in
the garden in what must have been only moments behind him.
She thought now of those pins and the hammer and in a silent
rush returned to the body and after a few moments search
found the clip ring on the harness with dozens more such slim
ringed pinions and the heavy headed short handled hammer that
he must have been carrying in his hand which now lay in the
small blood pool beside him in the inky dark. She also
realized the harness had a pouch upon it where she knew he
always kept his lock picks. His death having put such common
day to day memories from her mind only to have them come
limping back one after another now.
She snatched up these as well as taking several minutes to
remove his harness. She slipped back to the shadows of the
short squat flowering tree with its branches laden with large
heavy flowers. And here she worked to put the harness upon
her own body.
The harness was nothing more than a series of leather straps
and buckles that was worn on the upper torso that attached to
a slender leather belt at the waist. She had to make
adjustments for her own body's difference in build and
stature but she soon had the tight leather straps snuggled
across her huge naked breasts and around her thin waist. It
did nothing for modesty.
For it left her nipples and thick pubic hair patch exposed
but it let her clip back the ring of pinions and attach the
hammer by its thong and now wear both daggers with her
earlier borrowed one back in its sheath. The coiled rope was
re-attached and thus her hands were left free.
She moved forward now. Crouched. Her fingers lightly brushing
the thick loam of the garden soil as her balled feet tiptoe
pushed her along with a quick rapid rush of short rabbit
bursts from bush to bush; hedge to hedge. Her knees and upper
thighs spanking her huge tits fiercely.
She felt it before she saw it and her continued life she owed
only to it not seeing her.
She stopped up short in full moonlight from the object bush
and its shadow she had been half crawling half sprinting for
and jerked her head and upper body around. There behind it
death angled into view.
It was a serpent. As large as a man. With the squat short
head that told tales of venom and burning blood death.
The wind had changed and it sailed rapidly towards the short
tree she had paused under for so many minutes but now stopped
and raised its self up in obvious confusion.
It's head soon towered above that of horse and it slowly
twisted its triangular head this way and that. The moonlight
turning its large slit pupil eyes into pale dull glowing
lamps of swamp gas fire.
It rolled its heavy coiled body over Radnor's body and the
belly scales caused his still supple flesh of his wide eyed
face to fold and roll at their clinging touch.
She imagined she could hear the scales rasp as they slithered
over his three day unshaven beard.
It had not seen her nor scented her with its flaring nostrils
or darting tongue. She was crouched down upper body awkwardly
twisted back upon herself in full moonlight. Daggers
sheathed. She remained frozen. Daring not to move as the
beast was only a few yards from her helpless form.
Her mind raced. She could make an attempted stealthy dash to
the shadowy bush she had been moving toward when self
preserving instinct had brought her up short. She could
remain where she was stock still until it blundered upon her
or the wind shifted its course again and brought her into its
senses. She could draw her daggers and leap upon it and
attempt to kill it before it could kill her.
There was no chance she could hammer any pinions into the
tower wall and hope to scale it without alerting the serpent
to her presence and having it upon her back.
So even if she managed to make it to the tower unobserved she
could do little but remain hiding there until she was
eventually discovered.
There might be a door in the base of the tower of course or
there might not. She felt the pouch of lock picks attached to
the harness press against her breast and thigh.
Whatever she was going to do she needed to do it fast as she
could feel her leg and back muscles threatening to cramp up
from the unnatural posture she had adopted and froze into at
the snakes bequest.
She pulled both her daggers free. Even in their well oiled
sheaths them made a slight hiss that froze the snakes regal
nodding head in place.
She moved as fast as she could and leapt and the snake
whipped about its head and moved as fast it could. In this
race she could only lose but the spirit of Radnor, perhaps in
atonement for his betray, shifted his body under the great
serpent's bulk and the long sinuous body was yanked downward
a few precious inches from its perch upon his chest and face
even as it pivoted upon its own spine and struck at her.
The poison fangs missed their mark. Her daggers did not. The
head of the great serpent brushed past her face and hair
leaving a wake of old death and decay. But her daggers were
already firmly driven home, one into each eye socket, up to
the hilt.
Recoiling back from each other the girl fell fully upon her
round plump soft pear shaped ass even as the serpent spat and
hissed and wreathed in agony and hatred. She crab-walked
backwards as fast as her palms and feet could carry her and
then rolled to her knees in the direction of the tower and
ran as fast as she could. She tore through brush and beds of
flowers alike until she slapped her palms breathlessly
against the smooth polished sides of the slim tower.
She looked behind her where the death throes of the great
serpent continued and would continue for some time. She had
lost her daggers but had gained back her life.
She turned back to the tower and began to hurriedly search
its surface as the sounds of the loud crashing and thrashing
continued unabated.
She continued around the circuit of the base of the tower
twice and still the serpent was not dead.
Though now it lay in the moonlight glowing bushes with its
coils rolling and winding in steady clenching of muscles but
with little noise like an earthworm escaping the flooded
earth to be caught by the sun upon an exposed rock it seemed
to wither and roil now in a silent contraction of death.
There was no lower door or opening of any kind. She would
have to use the hammer and pinions to scale the tower. But
the tower was even better jointed at its huge stone seams
than the wall had been. Try as she might she could not get
any of the pinions to hammer home in the tight joints of
white rock.
"She is a witch after all. There was magic here," Xera
mumbled to herself and sighed and returned her hammer to her
harness belt and let the three bent and now useless slim
pinions fall to the flowery earth.
She did not relish re-climbing the wall and returning a coin
less pauper back to the near by town. Naked but for a harness
and with only a hammer for a weapon.
She eyed the now still shadows where the serpent lay. She
could retrieve her twin daggers if the beast was truly dead.
In either case she needed to make up her mind for it was
nearing mid-night and she was on a witches doorstep naked and
unarmed.
There was of course a chance if she waited for daylight that
she might find where Radnor had stashed their belongings out
on that wind blasted heath. Of course it might be that the
witch in her tower might notice her dead guard and Radnor's
body and see the naked little girl wandering about the open
rocky tarn and decide to kidnap her as she was rumored to do
to girls from the neighboring villages.
What happened to these captured girls she did not care about
nor wish to experience herself. She had come for rumored
treasure not rumored torture.
If she left she would need to make a hasty retreat of it and
she would not be readily welcome back in any local town as
the wakened wraith of the witch for those that ventured to
near her abode was enough to have any village capture and
kill any enterprising adventurer who was foolish enough to
head in the towers direction.
Xera and Radnor had to make a false start of a days journey
before taking a long detour to sneak back to the witch of the
wastes tower after hearing about it from the local towns
people.
No. No one was going to take pity on her and give her a meal
and lodgings let alone equipment or a job to set her on her
way if they had even the least suspicion she had been
sneaking around the witches tower.
Even the trade of her body for sex which worked so often when
things were indeed at their very worse would save her from
being burned at the stake in the town square of the half
dozen villages that rimmed the witches long bony reach.
The ocean crashed not more than a mile or two away at the
foot of the cliffs that boarded the heath to the west. She
might be able to 'sex' her way safe passage upon a passing
ship. They were more likely to brave the witches wraith in
passing then rooted locals.
There were traders enough hugging that coast and pirates a
plenty. She sighed. Traders had big bellies and little
penises and pirates smelled of fish and tobacco and had
penises just a small.
The young girl looked back up at the tower where now the moon
crowned it in silvery fire.
She would retrieve her daggers at least. She would need to be
careful. Reptiles die slow; taking almost as much time to die
once laid low as it takes to lay them low.
She walked more relaxed now. If all that clamor of the death
throws of that huge serpent had not stirred the witch then
nothing she could do would arise her as well.
She sauntered instead of crawling and hipshaked her naked
body back to were the great snake now lay dead. But the snake
was no where to be seen. Radnor's body lay there but the
snake was gone!
A moment's panic as she instinctively crouched weaponless...
the hammer flew into her fist. It wouldn't do much against a
serpent but it was better than her naked fists!
She looked all around her eyes alternating between wide and
narrowed as she pondered where it had slithered off to. There
was a thick trail of blood from it. Oily and smelling like
fish guts. It would be better to find it rather than waiting
for it to find her.
She warily followed the serpent's blood spore when suddenly
she saw it! Well hidden in the overgrowth of flowers and
shrubs; a sunken stair well. It was dark as pitch down there.
But the angle of the moonlight was such that she could just
make out a short flight of stone steps leading to a stone
door.
Without a second thought she slipped down the stairs and into
the darkness.
The door was well sealed and was of the same white highly
polished marble as was the outer wall and the slim tower.
Not even hammer blows left a crack or mark upon it. She was
about to give up when she remembered her lock picks. But
there was no key hole. No handle. No key hole. Just a stone
door set in a stone wall. Heavily stylized and ornamental in
its carvings but beyond her ability to open.
She was about to leave utterly dejected after yet another
disappointment after such a rush of hope when she noticed the
opening in the side wall behind her. It was a large circular
opening set at the level of the floor in the small square at
the base of the stairs and stone door.
She bent low and felt the oily blood. Of course! The serpent
used this opening when it entered and exited the garden! The
reason she could no doubt see the concealed staircase was
that seriously wounded as it now was it had knocked back the
covering of the stairwell in its pain to flee back to its
bolt hole.
The serpent was quiet large and the circular opening was
large enough for her to enter. It would be a tight squeeze
with her breasts and hips but...
She lowered herself down on to her hands and knees and began
to squeeze into the opening.
The fresh serpents blood made for a primitive lubrication
which aided her in getting her hips through he snug opening
but thankfully the small stone tunnel was both very smooth
and very short in its duration.
It debauched into a small stone room. The room contained a
stone stair case leading up to where it was blocked by a
rusted iron gate that lay across the opening horizontally.
The room its self contained a pool of brackish water and in
that pool lay the serpent now indeed quiet dead.
The water was foul and of unquestionable depth. She watched
the coils of the serpent floating here and there breaking the
scummy surface and decide she did not need her daggers that
badly.
Instead she made her way through the dimness, the only light
being two wall scones shaped as grinning death's heads from
which a feeble yellow sickly light shown out of its eyes and
gapping mouth. Up the stone stairs she went and stopped at
the iron gate that lay across its portal.
Out came the lock picks and in a few minutes of cursing to
make a whore blush she had snapped the rusty lock open and
set about pushing upward with her back until the rusty hinges
gave way until the froze again leaving a space just wide
enough for her to crawl under.
She was now standing on the stone paving floor of a larger
chamber. Round in shape that was no doubt the inside base of
the slim tower.
She thought she was about due for some more cursing when much
to the relief of blushing whores everywhere she found that
the means to the higher floors of the tower were achieved by
manner of a small golden cage that by means of a series of
gears and pulleys and weights could be made to raise and
lower throughout the tower.
This was a new kind of black magic for her for she had never
seen pulleys and gears before.
The cage was up high above her head in a well shaft that rose
up through the central floors of the tower. It took her a
while to figure out how the levers set in the floor made the
device rise and lower and after some experimenting she sent
it down to her.
As it creaked down upon its chains she cast glances about her
at the floor she was currently on. The place was cluttered
with storage crates and barrels and racks overladen with
tombs and scrolls but nothing that spoke of treasure. Worse
everything was covered in cobwebs and inches of dust.
For as pristine as the outer tower and its surface and garden
had been the inside of the tower looked like an unkept ruin!
The ceiling of this lower chamber was not very high and the
echoing clatter of the rattling gold cage as it whooshed to a
stop upon its stone dials was so loud that Xera could only
assume the witch was out for the night doing witchy things
like stealing young women out of their beds and she hoped she
found the fabled treasure of the witch of the wastelands
before she returned with her fresh charges.
Inside the chamber she was delighted to find similar controls
to the floor mounted ones; if a bit smaller and simpler to
use, you had to crank a handle to go up or down, and she
whisked the golden cage with its open front up to the next
floor.
Treasure should be lower not higher, right? She would search
each floor as she ascended. This would not take long as each
floor was a single open room that gradually got smaller and
smaller as the tower rose.
The next floor was again crammed full of stored items. It
would seem the witch of the wild marshlands was something of
a hoarder.
And worse she was an apparent hoarder of useless junk!
In a full blown snit Xera got back on the golden cage and
rose up to the next level.
Again piles and piles of acrania of no viable value to any
pawn shop or merchant worth his salt. Even an occult
collector would find himself hesitating at these books of
half rotted flesh and strange hanging skeletons neither
animal or man and some the size of giants and piles of dried
herbs and hanging bundles of weeds. A dusty clutter of
garbage and refuse.
If Radnor could see this worthless junk now he would be
turning in his grave. If he had a grave, of course.
It would seem the witch of the waste was truly that! A witch
of wastes!
Xera fumed back into the golden cage and cranked it up to the
next level. The jiggling and jarring of the cage made her
need to tinkle and she wondered as she often did how none of
these magical abodes had commodes or how ruins never had a
proper toilet. You always had to find a dark corner and keep
an eye out for spiders. She hated spiders!
The next floor, the third if you did not count the base level
or the snake pit. Finally saw things looking up. Just as
crammed as the previous levels with piles of stuff but now
there was expensive tapestries and rugs and gowns in all
shapes and sizes.
Of course she could not lug back awkward heavy tapestries or
rugs to any nearby town to sell and not end up at the stake
the bonfire for a nights reveals.
And she realized with a sinking dread that the gowns, almost
all of them night gowns, must be the clothes worn by the
stolen girls?!
So the rumor of her stealing young girls seemed to be true
and she began to shudder at the idea of what must have
happened to those young women that would no longer require
them to need their garments any more?!
Being naked she naturally tried on the silk and flimsy
garments but found the girls stolen must not have quiet hit
the same mark of puberty she had as all the shimmering
transparent garments were far too tight in the chest for her
to wear.
She did stop to eye a very large brass telescope and several
large globes of what she took to be representations of the
moon and what perhaps was meant to represent the Earth but
she did not know why anyone would want to put the flat Earth
on a round globe as that seemed to make it really hard to
understand where you were in relation to anywhere else?
Back into the cage.
As she started to crank the lever to ascend she noticed that
the cage was jerking around more than usual and pausing to
peer down the shaft below her she recoiled in shock to see
the still not quiet dead serpent twining its body up the
cages chains. It was using a combination of the chains and
the round wall to slither up the shaft at a rather fast
speed. She could readily see both gleaming dagger hilts in
the things ruined eyes.
Blind or not it could scent her and was insane with rage to
destroy her!
The cage was shaking this way and that as the creature came
shooting up the well shaft hissing with hideous furry to
overtake her!
The golden cage was a cage only three quarters of its
circumference it had an open face to allow entrance and exit
from the cage. It was from leaning out of this entrance that
Xera had been able to peer down the shaft at the rapidly
approaching snake.
She had cranked the cage halfway up toward the next floor and
thus was not yet passing through the rather thick stone
floors circular opening. So being out in the open air as it
were the cage was rocking violently due to the heavy snakes
body climbing up its lower chains.
If only she had seen it earlier she might have been able to
bombard it with some of the useless heavy junk that filled
the rooms but it was far too close now!
She cranked like mad and brought the cage floor half way
through the several feet thick floor of the next level. Then
she pulled her self up and barely squeezed through the gap of
the open face of the elevator and the upper stone surface of
the floor.
She had just managed to pull herself free when with a
thunderous bang the snake slammed into the bottom of the
golden cage!
There was only a few hand spans of open face of the cage
exposed to the lower level where the snake clung to the cages
lower chains.
The creature just might have squeezed its head and body in
that space and then raised up and shot into the upper level
after her but in its blind rage it smashed again and again in
furry at the obstruction keeping it away from her and in this
few minutes the girl quickly began shoving anything and
everything she could lay her hands on into the cage as to
block its ingress.
Still the serpent slammed repeatedly into the bottom of the
cage bending the floor upwards and unwittingly sealing up its
one true chance of reaching her.
Seeing this Xera took a deep breath and turned to study the
floor she now appeared to be stuck on. It was full dead
girls.
Well, not dead. But suspended in large tubes of glass and
filled with a clear bubbling liquid. The girls of all ages
and sizes hung motionless and naked in the jelly clear liquid
in a catatonic slumber.
There were hundreds of them. Tubes and girls and some glass
and copper tubes yet empty. Xera shuddered. A giant snake was
one thing but this was magic of the darkest kind.
From the glass coffins ran long spindly clear coiled flexible
tubes and straight glass tubes that ran up into the floor
above her. All the tubes contained strange colored liquids.
It took her a while to realize the liquids were slowly moving
'up' the tubes from the glass cylinders the girls floated in
and not down into them from the above floor.
Other than the naked girls in their glass and metal liquid
prisons there was nothing else on that floor.
Xera tried to ponder what to do but with the relentless
banging of the serpent against the golden cage that was not
an easy thing to do.
She decided to take direction from the serpent and she
carefully climbed up onto the top of the battered cage and
with some difficulty begin to ascend up the slick somewhat
oily golden chains that ran up from the top of the cage.
She soon found herself pulling herself up past the four foot
slab of stone flooring and jumping out onto what was the last
floor of the tower.
All the other floors had been errily lit by the bronze and
brass skull faces. Each higher floor having more faces upon
the wall and thus more light.
This floor however was illuminated by long slits that cut
through the several feet of the towers outer wall exposing
the interior to the moon light.
The slits were wide enough to pass ones arm through and she
could feel the delicious thrill of the cool winds blowing
both through the cracks and even more so on her wiggling hand
when she slipped her arm through.
She pulled her arm back. That was not wide enough to allow
any kind of admittance even if one could climb its sheer
polished surface.
Was the stair and doorway the only way into the tower? Was
the cage the only way up or down to that door?
When she had crawled through the snakes garden tunnel she had
seen no doorway in the snake pit room. Nor any stone door on
any of the levels. Where ever that stone door lead at the
bottom of those stairs in the garden it was NOT into this
tower!
She began to explore the moonlit tower's top floor. It did
not take long as it was the smallest room of the ever
narrowing slender tower.
Here amongst the deep slatted walls of stone the pale
moonlight shown a large opulent bed and several chests and
drawers. A large round mirror stood next to lavish table and
chair set before a table full of cosmetics and fine
fragrances.
The witch was finely showing her fine tastes. Against the
curved wall opposite the mirror and beauty table sat several
wall mounted bronze spigots set above a table full of several
rich goblets. It took her a while to recognize the tubes
running into the spigots from the floor as being identical to
those running from the naked girls watery vats up through the
floor!
Somehow that witch was siphoning something off from those
girls imprisoned in those bubbling vats and drinking it!
Xera suddenly remembered through out her journey through the
towers floors she had seen no ladder, no kitchen, no food
stores of any kind?!
Is this how the witch kept herself alive?! Living off the
sole essence of young girls?!
The banging below became a long steady screech of shredding
metal and Xera hurried over to the edge of the round hole set
in the center of the stone floor.
Here like in the very bottom floor was set a series of levers
to allow the distant control of the machine. None of the in
between floors had such devices. She leaned upon one of the
metal handles to peer down into the orange and green bluish
glow of the room directly below her and was astonished to see
the blind serpent pushing its head and body through the
rented golden cage and the now smashed debris she had filled
it with. It was slowly disgorging its self from the shattered
cage and inching into the room below. Its freed head making
huge hissing sweeps of the room like a deadly scythe.
It would take it only a few minutes before it realized she
was not on that floor and then only a few seconds more to
fathom she must be on the floor above and climb up the
remaining chains as she had done.
What could she do?
She could use the controls to release the cage! Send it and
the still half contained body of the serpent in it plunging
downward.
She hit the release lever and the chains slackened with a
shattering wind chime sound. The golden cage below dropped a
few feet and the serpent roared in hissing rage but the cage
fell no further and after a few hopeful moments the serpent
began to continue to wiggle its bulk from the cage and
wreckage.
The constant bashing of the snake against the cage had so
battered and warped it out of shape that the cage its self
was stuck in the floors opening.
The snake would find her soon!
Maybe if she pushed some heavy objects down the shaft and
they slammed into the cage and snake? Xera began to look
around her at the room. There were chests and the bed and
everything looked a bit TOO heavy for her to move. But she
raced to the nearest chest wondering briefly if it was full
of the treasure she sought. No time for lock picks she began
to try and push it across the floor. Her bare feet slipped on
the polished marble and for several comic moments she ran in
place as her heels kicked herself in her own ass.
She gave up breathless and sat down upon the large heavy
chest. She wiped her brow with the back of her long slender
wrist even as the chains of the golden cage went taught and
began to vibrate yanking her attention to them.
Then the room filled with an odd purplish light and a heavy
brown mist. Xera shot her gaze from the hole in the center of
the floor to the large oval standing mirror that stood near
it.
The light and smoke were erupting out of the surface of the
mirror. As she watched a gorgeous nearly naked woman stepped
out of the mirror carrying an unconscious girl in her arms.
The woman wore a black hooded open cloak and nothing else.
She was resplendent in evil. Her eyes radiated it and her
cruel beautiful smile taunted all life around her by it. She
was alluring with malice and her body thrummed with power.
Her Asiatic traits were more pronounced than Xera's her
breast much smaller and higher up and her stomach had a small
roundness to it and her hips were a tad thicker and her
thighs were wider giving her that distinctive frog leg look
of shorter women for she was almost a head shorter than Xera
though she was still tall for a woman of her time.
Her eyes were ice blue and they sparkled as they set upon the
still seated naked Xera. Without any hesitation she dropped
the still slumbering girl in her arms who hit the floor like
a sack of potatoes. The prone girl was dressed in a thin
light blue shawl and blouse that hung down to her knees.
The woman in the black hooded cloak came forward to Xera an
evil smirk on her face. Xera could not move. Those eyes.
Those evil powerful eyes.
Suddenly the snakes blind head rose up behind the witch and
slammed its poison fangs so hard into her back that it
staggered her forward so that she almost touched the numb
limbed Xera and then the snake had entwined the shocked witch
and both snake and witch fell backward through the open hole
in the floor. There was a stupendous crash as they hit the
top of the battered golden cage and then cage and all gave
way and the entire group of snake and witch and cage fell and
fell and fell until it was lost from sight and only a dim
roar noted their smashing into the base floor of the tower
far below.
The chests were not full of treasure. They contained various
elixirs and occult whirligigs. After some experimentation she
found some sulfur and brimstone tablets that when held under
the sleeping girl's nose woke even her up from sorceress
slumber coughing and hacking with watery red eyes.
After some lengthy explaining the girl joined Xera in
gingerly climbing down the golden chain to the floor below
with all the girls in their sleeping prisons and helping her
free them and revive them. The brimstones smell of burning
piss was enough to wake even the most lethargic heavy lidded
girl.
After much more explaining the entire group of girls joined
Xera in climbing down the chains to where their sleeping
garments were and now semi-clothed the girl's bravery
returned in leaps and bounds so much so that they had no fear
about climbing down and standing on a cob salad pile of
exploded snake and witch.
It was back in the snake pit room and brooding over the
narrow round tunnel they all had to climb through and the
wall that would have to be pinioned and climbed over after
that; that Xera once again thought about the locked stone
door that was so tantalizingly close next to the serpent hole
on the other side of the tower wall when she noticed the half
submerged lever in the snake pool.
She realized that with the weight of the snake in the pool it
had caused the water to rise and hide the protruding handle.
Now with the snake out of the pool the water had lowered
where the handle tip could just be made out.
The water was rusty as well as scummy and now mixed with
strands and whirls of serpent blood it was far from inviting.
But Xera gritted her teeth and with all the girls behind her
giving out a mass mutual 'gross!' moan as a background to her
own heaving stomach she waded and then swam in the muck to
the lever and set about struggling to pull it.
The lever finally gave with a crunching stone grinding snap
and the water in the pool slowly drained away. In a few
minutes Xera and the girls were standing at the bottom of a
stone cistern. The girls descent made easy by the water's
receding uncovering a stone staircase leading down to the
bottom of the cistern. Here the floor was made almost
entirely out of rusty iron grates. Through which the water no
doubt had drained.
Here was also a metal round door set in the wall a few feet
above the grated floor. It opened with a little of everyone's
help upon rusted hinges revealing a piled high with gold and
jewels in bags and chests of every shape and size.
Here a small stone staircase lead up and back and to a very
familiar stone door.
But in the opposite direction lay another passageway. Here
the bronze heads mounted on the wall gave poor light being so
covered in dirt and roots for the stone work on this
passageway was so old and unused that the earth had pushed
all the blocks and slabs and tiles asunder.
Still embolden even further by the piles of riches they had
just found the entire group followed the dungy winding tunnel
until it eventually lead them to the a cave so cleverly
concealed a dozen feet or more above the high tide mark on
the cliff above the very edge of the local towns ocean
wharfs!
After a few excited trips back to the small treasure room and
back to the cave mouth the girls used Xera's rope to lower
the bags and chests of gold and themselves down to the
jetties below where an entire jubilant town stood wide eye
weeping with joy.
And not one of those young now very rich women were short of
suitors or tales to tell for the rest of their long and happy
lives.
Xera on the other hand was put into jail for the abduction of
minors and the practice of witchcraft and had to escape upon
the chieftain's pride horse disappearing into the map-less
lands beyond the edge of the world.
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