Queen Yavara: Chapter 56 free porn video

YAVARA

I was in the midst of a great silence. It was deafening. The world around me seemed to pulse with it, fading in and out like the cadence of waves. Blood ran from my sister’s nose and mouth, and pooled onto the hollow of her throat. Her eyes were bloodshot and dull, staring at the ceiling. She was dead, and I didn’t feel anything. There was no catharsis, nor release, nor even a settling of peace. There was just emptiness. It was then that I realized how much of me was actually her. The sum of my soul that belonged to Leveria Tiadoa was filled with my hatred, self-loathing, insecurities and doubts, and that sum totaled more than any other; even more than Elena. Even more than Alkandi. I hadn’t been healed of all the anguish Leveria had dealt me; it had just been carved from me like a tumor crudely cut out, leaving me lesser than I was. The silence blared in my ears like a warning, and my heartbeats pounded like the ticking of a clock.

“You with me, Alkandi?” I whispered.

Silence answered.

“Did you do that, or did I?”

Again, nothing.

“I guess the real question is, what would Yavara do?”

Only the wind from the open window sounded in the room.

I smiled to myself. “No answer, huh? I guess I get to decide then. Any objection?”

Nothing.

“At least I asked.” I leaned forward, and took Leveria’s dead face in my hand. Her heart still pumped, and there was still something going on in what was left of her brain. She was dead, but there was enough left to be called ‘life.’ I reached behind her, scooped the pink matter off the pillow, and tossed it into the hole in her head. Then, I uttered the incantation.

LEVERIA

I opened my eyes. When had I closed them? There was a void. Blackness. No… not blackness, for blackness was something. This was nothing. A space of emptiness between moments. Death. I had died. I could feel it, a numbness, a discontinuity in the center of my consciousness. A before, and an after, but not an in between. A chasm that I had not crossed, but simply appeared on the other side of. I was so cold. I didn’t even remember what warmth felt like. I didn’t remember anything.

There was a creature beside me. A woman? Yes, a woman. Was she dead? She looked dead. Her skin was a sickly pale, and her eyes were distant, and she was lying still next to me. Orange eyes? That seemed strange to me, but I didn’t understand why. Where was this place? What was it? Everything around me was plush and pink, void of edges and hard surfaces. Cushions. Pillows. I remembered these things. I glanced down, and saw an array of strange objects littering the cushion I rested upon. These were things I could not logically grasp yet, but they engendered a strange feeling within me. The thing that lay between the strange objects was my body, and I could understand that it was mine even if it felt detached. Conceptually, I could reason that there were fingers attached to hands attached to arms attached to shoulders attached to chest. I could then reason further that these attachments carried a common connection to me—whatever I was—and that I, the consciousness that inhabited this… whatever this was… I could control my fingers. I sent a signal down my arm, and extended one finger. Yes, I could do that. It required quite a bit of effort, but I had autonomy over this body. This body that somehow did not feel like mine, but something that I had just entered. Had it been someone else’s before? No… no, I seemed to recall that I… whatever “I” was… I used to use this body. Though it seemed modular to me, I deduced that I could not in fact leave this body, though I obviously had just left it only moments ago, and so… ah, it didn’t matter. For now, I needed to only focus on gaining control of the shell I currently occupied.

I wiggled one finger, then the next, then the next, then the next. The last finger was different than the others, and moved strangely. Ah, it was my thumb. My memory was coming back. I wiggled one toe, then the next, then the next, then the next, then the smallest little one at the end. I did the same with the other foot, then extended my heel forward, and felt a satisfying crack in my ankle. Ankle, heel, foot; these were identifiers I could remember easily, but what were the things attached to my toes? Little white and pink shiny things that seemed to grow from the tips. Blades? Yes, they seemed like blades. A blade as I understood it, was a flat and sharp thing, and that described the things coming out of my fingers and toes, but… hmm… it didn’t seem right. Nails. They were called “nails” for some strange reason. I angled one nail against my opposite foot, and moved it across the flesh. I felt pain, and immediately comprehended it. Pain was easy. Pain and I were very intimate.

A flood of memories came back to me. The pain I had endured, the pain I had caused, the pain I relished and the pain I abhorred. The memories were fractured at first, just simple flashes of recollection without context, but they became more vivid by the second, until whole paintings were being displayed in my mind. I had inflicted and received so much pain. It was like I was trading it my whole life. I loved it, this trading of pain, this giving and receiving. It was a game, and I loved games. Who was I? A gamemaster of pain. But who? There was a memory… a crown being placed upon my head by an older man. Had I caused him pain? Oh yes, I had caused much. Had he caused me pain? Yes. He had caused my first true pain. Father. A memory flashed before my eyes. I was a little girl. I was playing alone in my room. Father came in. He walked funny, staggering every step. He stank of alcohol. I remembered that after that night, he never drank until his last dying days, but that night, the miasma of whisky that came from him was so strong that it filled the room. He looked down at me, and smiled. It wasn’t a fatherly smile. He locked the door behind him. There was nothing after that, but I remembered the pain, and that seedling of pain blossomed in me, becoming something beautiful, something terrible.

But I was always terrible. There was an even earlier memory of pain. Not the first pain I endured, but the first pain I inflicted. I remembered standing over the crib of a babe. It was a girl, and her head was bald except for wisps of blonde. ‘Yavara,’ I had cooed, ‘it’s your big sister. It’s Leveria.’ Leveria—that was my name. And this woman next to me… was she Yavara? The memory came back into focus. I had a twig in my little hand. Baby Yavara was only months old. I smiled impishly, and dangled the twig into Yavara’s crib. Her big blue baby eyes widened in wonder at it, and she attempted to grab it. I pulled it away, and giggled. She giggled too. I extended the twig into the crib once more, and gently poked her nose. I giggled, and she cackled delightedly, squirming in that fat little way babies do. I poked her belly, and we both laughed like it was the funniest thing in the world. I poked her in the eye, and she screamed. She shrieked so terribly that it seemed to split right through my skull, and I laughed. I laughed with more pleasure than I ever had.

From those two memories, I reconstructed the person that I was until all the pieces of my timeline were in place, and the only void space was the moment of nothing between my conversation with Yavara, and this instance right here. I looked at my little sister. Though she was staring blankly at me, the sheets beneath her parted mauve lips moved subtly with her breaths. She was so near to death. It had taken everything to bring me back. With a groan, I flopped one arm to my side, purposefully curled each finger around a pillow, then flopped the arm back so that the pillow was secured before my chest in both hands. With the utmost effort, I rolled to my side, atop my sister, and pressed her face into the pillow. She didn’t struggle. She just lied there while I shifted my weight onto my chest, and suppressed her ability to breathe. After a minute, one of her legs kicked a little. After two minutes, the kicking stopped. After three minutes, it started kicking again. Goddamn, how much longer would it take? After four minutes, her foot went still.

“You still alive, Yavara?” I asked. I pulled the pillow away. She was staring blankly at the ceiling, her orange eyes like glass, no light behind them. I put my finger over her mouth, and felt the faint wind of breath coming from her. “Shit,” I mused, “good lungs, but I guess you’re used to holding your breath though, huh?” I chuckled, and put the pillow back over her face. Why were their splotches on the pillowcase? I wiped my brow, but I wasn’t sweaty at all; I was practically freezing from death’s chill. I put my hand to my cheek, and felt wetness. I’d been weeping? Why? It didn’t make any sense, but even as I thought it, fat tears poured from my eyes, and splashed the pillow beneath me. I knew what grief was. I’d felt it keenly before, and so this pain was familiar to me, and it was the most unwelcome pain. It knotted in my chest, and squeezed like a fist around my heart, pulling everything down deep into the pit of my belly.

“No,” I hissed at Yavara’s glass eyes, “no, not for you! Not for you! Not for you!” But I could not kill the pain, and I could not swallow it. It washed over me, taking me completely, and I could only bury my face into my sister’s breast, and vent the pain with deep sobs.

“I won’t say it!” I bawled, “Goddamn you, I won’t say it!”

But the pain broached no argument. It built and built until the words bubbled unbidden from my mouth, “I’m sorry.”

My tears splashed upon Yavara’s vacant face, wetting her pallid cheeks and blue lips. Her breathing was slowing, each exhale like a numeral in the countdown. It wouldn’t be long now. The pain within me ebbed away, and left a cold solemnity. I knew what I had to do. With what strength I had in me, I crawled up my little sister’s body until my crotch was pressed around her face.

“Sorry about the taste,” I muttered as I shakenly elevated myself upright, “but that’s what you get when you have your entire kingdom run train on me.”

I clicked open Yavara’s mouth with my thumb, pinched her tongue, and brought it out. “If you die, this is going to look really, really bad.” I mused, and lowered my clit to her mouth. I gasped when the wet plush flesh pressed around me, but my pleasure was only momentary. As I settled atop my lifeless sister’s face, I realized I would have to do all the work for the both of us.

“I am not a necrophile.” I said to myself, and began grinding across Yavara’s tongue, “Not yet. Hold on, baby sis; I’m coming for you.”

I thrusted and shimmied, driving my hips forward and back, grunting and groaning with the exertion of it. The stimulus was present, but there was nothing about what I was doing that was even remotely sexy to me. I tried degrading my sister, but it only made me feel guilty. I tried encouraging her, but it felt disingenuous. With each labored motion, her breath that heated my sex became less and less frequent, until half a minute had gone by between soft exhalations.

“Come on!” I hissed, tears of frustration falling from my eyes. “Goddamn it! Make me fucking come, you stupid slut! I know you can do it!”

But there was nothing. My motions weren’t sinuous and sexy, but jerking and rigid, and my mind wasn’t soft with bliss and desire, but sharp with urgency and panic. I dug my fingers into the pillow, and tried moaning like I would in lust, but each sound was an affectation, and I gave up after the third utterance.

I closed my eyes. “Elena,” I whispered, “I really need your help right now.” I took one breath, then another, and let them slowly out through my mouth. I felt the panic wash away, and a peace come over me. An image came to my mind. Elena was in bed with me, all tangled in the sheets. She’d been wonderfully abusive towards me all night long, and as the golden dawn caressed her bronze flesh, an apologetic little smile formed over her plush lips. I giggled, and crawled up her body, enjoying this moment of tender dominance, savoring the way she so willingly submitted after being so controlling. I made a seat of her breasts, and outlined her lips with my thumb, whispering of what dirty things those lips would soon be doing. She got impatient with me, and grabbed two fistfuls of my ass. I yelped in delight as she shoved me forward, and I bit my lips and moaned splendidly when I felt her tongue.

“That’s it.” I whispered in both the memory and the present, “Right… oh god, right there.” The tip of Elena’s tongue upended my engorged clit, and drew it out with a come-hither caress. She played with me coyly, drawing such sweet patterns upon me, never moving past the point of teasing pleasure. It drove me wild. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I balled my fists in her hair, and rode her face for all it was worth, forcing her muzzle to smoosh around my leaking petals. The glint in her eyes was alight with the satisfaction of making me lose my composure, and she rewarded me for my defeat, consuming me sloppily, mouthing around my soft parts and plunging her tongue deep inside.

“Elena!” I cried in both past and present, sounding a tenor that was nearly mournful in its tone. I grasped my breasts, my nipples hard through my fingers, and I bestrode her face, kissing her with my other lips, exclaiming of my pleasure with each breath. The feeling within me built, rising steadily and inevitably, taking me higher and higher. It compelled my back to arch, to present my breasts to the sky as I tilted my head back and exalted. I was hot all around her tongue, sweltering and pulsing, wetting her lips and nose with my nectar. She didn’t show any mercy. She feasted upon me without restraint, driving me further and further into my mania, stripping me of all senses but the sensations she poured deep into me. Ecstasy swelled within me, ballooning from my core, moving like electricity through my nerves until it was firing from the tips of my fingers and toes! I looked down at the woman doing this to me, and stared with disbelieving, wonderous eyes.

“I love you!” I whispered, and I didn’t care that it was the sappiest fucking thing in the world to say when coming. I said it, and she winked back, and pushed me over the edge.

ELENA

“Die, you motherfucker, die, die, DIE, DIE!” Huntiata screamed, stabbing his sword into the open mouth of the wolf. Blood poured from its gouged-out eyes and crushed nostrils, but still it gnashed and snapped, wrathful and ferocious to the very end. It lurched forward and bit a grotesque chunk out of a soldier’s leg, and he went down shrieking. The warg silenced his agony with a crushing forepaw, splattering me. I drove my blade into the warg’s throat, and ripped across. A great gout of crimson flowed onto the stone floor, and the beast went still, blocking the corridor with its body. The red eyes of its brethren peered out from behind it, then disappeared in a flash of shadow down the steps.

Huntiata took in a huge breath, and slouched on his sword. We were in the servant’s wing of the castle, on the third floor. The battle for the castle had started in the atrium, where the entire elven force had barricaded themselves before each entrance of the castle’s four wings; the royal wing, the guest wing, the noble wing, and the servant’s wing. When the wargs came through, all four forces were immediately overwhelmed. I didn’t know how the others were fairing, but we’d been pushed backwards up three flights of stairs, and had lost at least two-thirds of our men along the way. I didn’t know how many of the enemy we’d killed, but it seemed to have been enough for our pursuers to seek out easier prey. But then again, I didn’t know.

“Mom?” I asked, panting heavily.

She shook herself back into awareness, and glanced at me. “Yes, Dear?”

“You OK?”

She blinked, then said, “I’m fine,” very plainly.

“We need to regroup with the others,” Huntiata growled, hobbling over to me. He’d gotten a chunk of his foot bitten off on the way up, but he managed to act like it wasn’t bothering him.

“You want to go back down there?!” a soldier screamed, gesturing to the corridor.

“It’s our only chance!” Huntiata snapped, “If we’re able-bodied, we must fight! If we don’t win, we will die!”

“Just give us a fucking second!” a watchman gasped, clutching his bloody side.

“We don’t have a fucking second!” Huntiata roared, “Every second we waste, ten men die! We need to…” He trailed off, and cocked his head. Everyone else went silent. There was a scraping sound like metal on stone. Suddenly, all the daylight that had shone through the western hallway’s windows went out. I slowly turned around, and looked out the window beside me. Where there had once been a landscape of the Bentius Bay, there was now a pair of red eyes surrounded by black fur.

“Oh, shit.” Huntiata muttered, and all hell broke loose. The wargs smashed through the windows, burst through the surrounding stone, and leapt into the hallways. Men disappeared into the mass of fur, and their shrieks cut through the growls and snarls of the feasting beasts. I snatched Mom by the hand, and sprinted toward the felled warg at the corridor’s entrance. Huntiata ran alongside us, and the surviving five soldiers ran behind, none of them looking back. I squeezed past the dead wolf, and dragged Mom through the space. Huntiata hacked his way through its side, and two soldiers flowed in after him. The other three men tried to get into the space Mom and I had passed through, but they all tried to get into at once. Stuck shoulder-to-shoulder, they jostled in a mania of panic before they were suddenly ripped backwards in a trifecta of screams.

We sprinted down the stairs, stumbling over piles of our own dead, maneuvering past the great corpses of wargs. We got down one flight of stairs, the next one, then we were smashed against the wall in a sudden flux of fur and muscle, and a horrific crunch sounded. Someone shrieked next to me, and I squeezed my Mother’s hand, and yanked it toward me. I half-expected it to be the only part of her that came with, but the rest of my Mom came surging after, and we wriggled through the flailing mass of wolf, and burst out from the other side. Huntiata was with us a moment later, a brand-new slice across his cheek that exposed his teeth, but he didn’t seem to notice. He just hobbled along as fast as he could while the two screaming soldiers bought us precious extra seconds.

The atrium was empty when we sprinted into it. Hundreds of bodies littered the four entrances to the four wings, and very few of them were wargs. The three of us hugged the wall as we circumnavigated the expansive room, our eyes shifting to every dark corner and alcove. It was strange how silent it was. Not twenty minutes ago, this had been a scene of raging battle, and now it was a graveyard. Our footsteps echoed in the stony confines, and our shadows moved across the walls. Our breathing was tight and rapt, but still it could be heard like thunder from our lips. I squeezed Mom’s hand tightly, and she did the same, our grips fused together. Huntiata led the way with his sword on guard, leading his shuffle with his half-foot. We came to the royal wing entrance, and peered down the corridor.

Scores of dead littered the luxuriant carpet, and blood splattered the walls. The stained-glass fixtures had all been shattered, and the cold winter light shone through in beams that contrasted the pervading blackness between them, blinding us to what lay beyond. Huntiata shuffled forward, pinning his back to the wall. We followed after; our weapons held tight against our breasts. We made ourselves small against the wall, hiding our side profiles behind the stone columns that framed each empty window. Huntiata made it to the first window’s edge, and ducked beneath the beam of light. He slipped to the other side, and peered out of the edge of the window. A great black paw suddenly shot out of the window, and seized upon Huntiata’s midsection. His eyes bulged, his mouth opened, and he shrieked. He shrieked with a pitch I didn’t think he was capable of reaching, and it was so shrill that it cut right through my head. The massive paw ripped away, and Huntiata’s entire front was ripped away with it, strings of sinew and intestines stretching from his gored belly like gum. He folded in on himself, all of his abdominal muscle removed, and he gurgled into the carpet.

With tears streaming down my cheeks, I grabbed what was left of my friend, and dashed past the window. The paw smashed through it again, missing me and my mother by a hair. We raced past the second broken window, and the paw slammed a second later, tearing the carpet into ribbons with its great claws. I stopped just short of the third window in time to see the shadow cross its beams of light. I set Huntiata down, grabbed another body, and threw into the pale luminance. The black paw came down again, and I came after it with a fury. My sword arced down, and cut through bone like butter. There was a hellish shriek on the other side, and the sound of claw scraping on stone. The beast’s scream faded as it crashed upon the rock, and then ended when it thudded onto the beach a hundred feet below.

I turned back to Huntiata. The pale light illuminated the side of his face, sparkling off his teeth from the hole in his cheek. He showed me the rest of his bloody teeth with a grim smile. “We had some fun, didn’t we?” he mouthed, barely any sound coming from him.

“Yes.” I whispered, kneeling to his level.

“That’s what it’s all about.” He laughed, not heeding the blood that ran freely from his nose and mouth, “That’s all life is. Just a bit of fun, eh?” The smile faded from his lips, and his eyes went dull.

I took his bald head in my hands, and touched our brows. “I’m sorry, Sherman.” I hissed between my tears.

Mom put her hand on my shoulder, and pulled me back from the corpse. “Elena, we have to keep moving.”

We walked silently down the royal halls. The deeper we got into the castle, the more the bodies piled up. By the time we got to the throne room’s entrance, we could hardly walk without stepping on the dead. Only here, the fallen enemies outnumbered the elves. Great iron bolts were imbedded into the bodies of at least twenty wargs. The wolves had been struck with such force that their flesh had been split by the shock of it, cleaving them all the way through. The iron ballistae bolts stuck from the stone walls like rebar, twisted and deformed by the energy of their impact. We ducked beneath the hazardous debris, and moved carefully through the long claws and fangs of the dead wolves. I expected at any moment that their eyes would open, and they’d rip into my leg with one snap of their jaws, but all laid perfectly dead on the plush red carpet, their blood adding to the color.

We summited the final dead wolf, and the light of the throne room shined onto us. And there, sitting at the very end of the long hall, was King Lucas Ternias. Two ballistae flanked his throne, but the crews who had operated them were all dead. Their bodies were piled up right before the throne, lying atop the corpse of the one wolf who had slipped through the crossfire.

“And so, the mystery is solved!” Ternias laughed when he saw me. “I was wondering why all those posters of you were showing up in the lower wards. I actually thought it was due to your mother—not your mother’s doing, mind you, but because of her. But where are my manners? Welcome, the Ladies Straltaira.” He gestured for us to come in. Mom and I looked at each other, then peeked around the corners. There had been an ambush set up there, but the ambushers were dead, along with two wolves. Carefully, I slid off the belly of the warg, and entered the throne room.

Mom and I walked side-by-side down the red carpet, looking every-which way for a royal mage or an archer. We found them; all of them were dead on the way to the throne. I could see the bloody path the wolf had made through them, and could trace its moves nearly verbatim by the orientation of gore on the walls and floor.

“It occurred to me last night that there would be an attempt on my life today.” Ternias said as we walked toward him, “Lady Jonias, Lord Huntiata and Lord Feractian had all been conspicuously silent, and with all the posters of you popping up, I guessed that someone was likely going to use your mother as a tool to legitimize their claim to the throne.” He laughed as if realizing the punchline to a joke, “Never in a million years did I guess that you’d survived that fall.”

“I didn’t.”

He gave me a bemused smile. “I’m sure. Anyway, I spent all of last night meticulously running through every scenario that would result in my defeat, and I enacted my plan. It was a perfect plan given the resources at my disposal, though it appears I underestimated you, Elena Straltaira—though of course, I didn’t know it was you I was underestimating.” He kicked the dead warg in front of him, and laughed, “I guess all that mumbo-jumbo about peace was just hot air after all! Well played!”

“This wasn’t me!” I snarled.

He laughed harder. “You can drop the act! I’m already very impressed!”

“Lucas!” Mom snapped, “Do you really think I would ever even consider a plan like this?!”

He shrugged. “What can I say, Lydia? I can only see the world through my eyes, and I know very-well what I am capable of.”

A chorus of screams came from the corridor. The familiar snarls followed, then the wails of agony, then silence. I watched the entrance of the throne room, and waited, clutching my sword with white knuckles. There was an explosion of gore, and a single warg burst through the remains of its brethren, and charged right for me. I pushed Mom out of the way, drew my sword, and dove forward. The beast leapt at the same time, and while we moved on our trajectories, I twisted in the air, slid beneath its swiping paw, and jammed my sword into its chest. The blade split cleanly through muscle and fat, opening a bloodless line from sternum to crotch as it passed over me. We fell on opposite sides. I hit the floor with a thud, and the beast hit the floor with a splat. Its insides plopped out of its dissected midsection, and the blood began to pump after it. I groaned, and threw myself upright, anticipating another attack from the entrance. Stepping backwards, I grabbed Mom by the hand, and made my way to the throne.

“Ah, I see.” Ternias muttered when we arrived. His pants were soaked in piss, but otherwise, he seemed quite calm. “So, you knew nothing of this?”

“No!” I growled.

He just stared at the dead warg in the middle of the hall, and chewed on his lip. “Are you going to kill me then?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“For Leveria.” I growled, and leveled my sword under his chin.

He laughed. “Leveria has already enacted her vengeance, Elena. That magnificent cunt played us all even after her death. She truly was the best of us.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

He held up a hand mirror that had been resting on the arm of his throne. “I got a call from Field Marshal Shordian this morning. He informed me that he and the entire army had just returned to South Fort. ‘Why have you disobeyed my orders?’ I’d asked him. Because Cavalry Commander Krakis had already massacred the Alkandran horde three days ago under the delayed orders of the ousted Leveria Tiadoa, and Shordian’s army had turned around to rendezvous at South Fort to begin invasion preparations.”

“WHAT?!” Mom and I exclaimed.

“That was my reaction exactly. I was, understandably, quite horrified that I’d just started another war with the Dark Queen. Even with her horde gone, her citizenry is more than ferocious enough to wage war, and she herself has deific powers we haven’t seen on Tenvalia since the time of the Creators. Then Field Marshal Shordian informed me that the Lowland Fleet is precisely one nautical day away from entering the Alkandran Bay. Alkandra is doomed.” Ternias sighed, the echoes of mirth still in his voice, “And as fate would have it—or as Leveria would have it, I suppose—we are all doomed as well. I really should have married that woman, you know. I should’ve got on one knee when I had the chance, and professed my undying admiration for her. Instead, I destroyed her. I can practically hear her laughing from hell.” He looked up at me with a rueful smile, and inclined his head slightly. “You can kill me now, Elena Straltaira.”

“No.” I whispered.

“No?” He asked, surprised, “Why not?”

“Elena?” Mom asked.

I shook my head, tears running down my cheeks. I pulled my sword away, and sat on the steps of the throne. “Look around us, Mom.” I muttered, dropping my head into my arms, “Look at what I’ve done.”

“You didn’t do this.”

“I did.” I whispered, “Five months ago, Yavara revealed herself to me. I was sitting in a chair in Prestira Rasloraca’s bar, and she was straddled across my lap. I had my knife against her throat. Not even Zander could’ve saved her if I had done what needed to be done, but instead, I fucked her.” I wiped my eyes, “If I had just done what I was supposed to do, what I’d been trained to do, none of this would’ve happened.”

“This wasn’t Yavara. You heard that orc.”

“She didn’t order the attack, but she’s the reason it happened. She didn’t start the war, but she’s the reason it was waged. Leveria tried to tell me so many times why Yavara was such a threat, but I didn’t listen. I didn’t understand, but now I get it.” I gestured around the room, “This is what our forefathers were terrified of. This is why the rangers were created. The power of the Dark Queen isn’t her magic; it’s her ability to unify beasts that hate each other, and point them at something they hate even more. Yavara didn’t get the Ten to follow her until she attacked Castle Thorum. She couldn’t build a nation until she built a horde. She couldn’t be a queen until she won a battle.”

“How many times did you say that Yavara wanted peace?”

I smiled bitterly. “She wanted a peaceful war, if you can understand that contradiction. She thought she could control the uncontrollable. She didn’t give Gorlok the order, but she aimed him right at us.” I looked up at Mom through a film of tears, “Leveria told me so many times that Alkandra and the Highlands could never coexist, that the hatred was too great. I was such a fool, Mom. I didn’t listen to her. Well, I won’t stand in her way this time.” I looked at Ternias, and narrowed my eyes at him, “But I won’t be the one who wears the crown when Alkandra burns.”

“That’s terribly noble of you, Lady Straltaira,” Ternias said, rolling his eyes, “but it doesn’t really matter, because we’re all going to die anyway.”

“No, we’re not.” I growled, and thrusted my thumb at the ballista behind me, “It takes a three-man crew to run one of those, and I was trained at Castle Thorum. Since all the other rangers are dead or gone, I’m the best fucking ballista commander in the Highlands.”

“I would beg to differ,” said a voice I recognized all-too well.

YAVARA

I opened my eyes. The world was black. No, there was a faint orange glow on the horizon. Was I dead? Perhaps. I was in a place of impermanence. I’d been here before.

“What the fuck?” someone gasped next to me. I looked to my left to see Leveria lying naked on the astral floor. She looked this way and that, then her eyes fell upon me. They widened for a moment, then settled back into their usual imperious glare. “Feeling… different, Yavara?”

I was, actually. First off, I was quite sure I was in the last hallucinogenic stages of dying. Secondly, I felt a terribly-familiar… emptiness in me. I didn’t realize what it was until I looked at my hands. They were porcelain, the same color as the rest of me, and the hair that draped from my shoulders was platinum blonde. I knew what the feeling was then. I had felt it only once before, when my dichotomy had separated in the astral plane. I was just me. Though I was not cold, I was shivering. Though I was not in pain, every discomfort was acute. Though I was not in danger, I was terrified. The very idea of standing up seemed daunting, for standing would make me easier to see, and I didn’t want to be seen. I wanted to curl into a ball and find a warm safe place to hide forever. I looked at Leveria, and cowered when she made eye-contact with me. How was it possible to look into another’s eyes like that? It was like staring at the sun! Her gaze seemed to pierce right through me, see everything within, and know every weakness there was. Of course, it was quite easy for her to see my weakness, for there was no strength to be found. She chuckled lowly, and it was if the devil herself were laughing sardonically at my quailing soul.

“Zander promised me a moment like this.” Leveria said softly, “So, this is the real you. Pathetic. Less than pathetic. You can’t even look at me!” She giggled, “I can’t believe it actually happened!”

Nothing has happened yet, came another voice. Leveria’s smile faded. A child-like horror crawled across her face. Alkandi was coming. The orange glow on the horizon grew brighter, silhouetting thirty figures—one more than last time. I recognized Alkandi’s angular features instantly, and beside her, I saw… me. It was like looking at a different person. She had the same profile as I did, but she moved in a way that was so sinuous and confident that it seemed alien. Was that how I moved? She had the same proud jaw and chiseled features as I did, but they were set in an expression of such power and arrogance that she seemed to claim ownership of everything her eyes rested upon. Was this how people had seen me? All of the incarnations walked in tandem with the original Dark Queen, every motion mirrored to perfection, but Yavara—Dark Yavara—seemed to walk with autonomy. Energy radiated from all of them, but shown most brightly from the two figures at the front, and my figure outshined Alkandi’s like the sun does the moon. They all stopped five paces away, and looked down at me. It felt like I’d been flayed and pinned to the floor. I couldn’t curl myself into a small enough ball. Alkandi stepped forward, and my incarnation followed.

Yavara, Alkandi cooed, extending her hand to me, come back to me. Come back to us.

“Objection!” Leveria squeaked, her voice pitched high with terror.

Alkandi and my incarnation ignored my sister, and knelt beside my resting form. I was too terrified to flee, and could only curl deeper into my fetal ball. There’s no need for doubt, Alkandi said gently, rebecome us, and feel no fear.

“W-w-w-why are w-w-w-we n-n-not o-o-ne?” I stuttered.

Don’t concern yourself with it. It doesn’t matter.

“I’d say it fucking does!” Leveria squeaked again.

I turned to my ethereal projection, and immediately quailed under her gaze. “W-w-who a-a-are y-y-you?” I hissed.

She can’t speak, Yavara, Alkandi said, putting her hand on Dark Yavara’s muscled shoulder.

“W-w-w-why n-n-n-not?”

Because she’s no one now. All these women you see are just the shells left behind by those who died. I cannot occupy them, but I shepherd them. This woman needs you right now, but not nearly as much as you need her. Alkandi extended her hand toward me, and I cringed away. She smiled compassionately, and brushed my hair away from my face. I loved Elena Straltaira. I befriended Prestira Rasloraca. I forgave Adrianna. I wept when I felt alone. I laughed when I felt belonging. Didn’t you as well? Every emotion and thought you have had; I have had. There was no you and I. There was only us. She looked at Dark Yavara, This was us. This was you. This was ‘I.’ I have told you, Yavara, that you and I are but two halves of a whole. She gazed reverently upon my dark face, And look at what we become together. A god.

“Excuse me!” Leveria’s shrill voice interrupted, “Alkandi! Hey! Over here!”

Alkandi pointedly ignored my sister, and instead focused her gaze on me. I can see your terror, Yavara. I can smell your self-doubt, your insecurity, your anxiety. Have you ever felt these things so vividly before? No. I gave us our boldness. I gave us our bravery. I was the one who charged into the fray without a second thought. I was the one who never feared another man or woman. You can’t even look me in the eye. She took me by the chin, and guided our gazes together. Her orange eyes glowed in the astral darkness, alighting the highlights of her angular face. You are nothing without me, and I am nothing without you. Rebecome us.

“Hey, bitch!” Leveria shouted, “You can’t keep pretending I’m not here!” She marched toward us, and Alkandi’s thirty incarnations all shifted as one, turning so suddenly that it seemed they blinked into place. They moved between Leveria and I, and took one ferocious step toward her. Leveria squealed, and scampered away. Alkandi herself never broke eye-contact with me.

Yavara, there is no reason to feel doubt now, she whispered.

“Then why am I here?” I asked quietly, not stuttering for the first time.

A mistake, nothing more.

“Whose mistake?”

Alkandi pondered me for an excruciating moment. There are some things that do not need to be known.

“What are kindred spirits?”

Alkandi’s frown turned dangerous. It doesn’t matter. Didn’t I tell you that already?

“Answer the question, bitch!” Leveria yelled, then scuttled away with a screech when the incarnations took another unified step toward her.

Alkandi held out her hand. Come, Yavara.

I looked over at Leveria. Though she was obviously terrified, she was resilient in the face of that terror. How? Terror was overwhelming. It washed over me, pricked every nerve, and poured panic into my mind. If I didn’t take Alkandi’s hand, then there would be no shield for this naked terror. If I didn’t take her hand, then she would be angry with me, and heaven only knew what she would do to me! She was the Dark Queen for god’s sake!

“Yavara!” Leveria yelled, “you rejected her before! You can do it again!”

I looked from Leveria, to Alkandi, to Leveria again. When I next looked at Alkandi, her face was set in rage. She grabbed me by the throat, pulled me up, then slammed me down on my back. Pain shot through me, a concussive bell droned in my head, and I blinked stupidly until Alkandi’s snarling visage was clear above me.

Do not even think of it, you sniveling whore! Alkandi growled, If I have to rape you into submission again, I’ll fucking do it!

“I-I-I-I’m s-s-s-sorry!” I managed to sputter out.

Her face suddenly softened into a loving smile. The transition was so abrupt that I wondered if I’d missed something. Do you remember how good I made you feel? She cooed, I just want you to feel good, Yavara. I don’t want to hurt you. Please don’t make me hurt you.

“I w-w-w-won’t!”

I know you won’t, Alkandi whispered, brushing my disheveled hair from my face. You’re just confused and scared, but I’ll make it all better. I’ve got you, Yavara. You’re safe with me. Let me love you.

Her fingers moved on my body. Sliding up the flat of my tummy, they painted a path of tingles. She watched me with her orange eyes ablaze, their depths wrought with both tender love and avarice. When her hands gently cupped my breasts, I was no longer afraid to meet her gaze. Alkandi would keep me safe. Alkandi would make the fear go away. Alkandi would give me pleasure. Her delicate fingers barely brushed the domed mammary flesh, but the graze had such an effect on me that my nipples were achingly stiff by the time she reached them. She played her fingertips across each of the nodes, brushing them so tenderly, making them bounce subtly across each pad. One of her hands stayed on my chest to draw a tortuous path around the prickled dark flesh of my left areola, and the other snaked up my collar, up my throat, and slid smoothly behind my head. Her wonderful little fingers snaked through the roots of my hair, and her palm widened around the base of my skull until she cradled my head entirely in her hand. Lassitude suffused my trapezius muscles, and with a whimper, I wilted into her hold, becoming limp and wanting, receptive and ready. She leaned down, her black hair falling around my face, tickling my chin and cheeks, curtaining us so that we were the only people in the world. Her orange eyes never broke our gaze as she moved upon me, and touched our lips.

Give in to me. She whispered in my mind as her lips parted mine, and her tongue slithered into my mouth. Her oral appendage was as delicate and tender as her fingers upon my flesh, and she lulled my mouth into a blissful trance of consumption, making my eyelids heavier and heavier with the overbearingness of her lust. I was lost in her oral dance, mindlessly following along, barely aware of her fingers as they moved down from my breast, slid along my belly, tickled my naval, and traced the crease of my pelvis.

Fuck me… I thought, and she smiled around my mouth, and answered. Her fingers danced across my clit, brushed through my petals, parted my slid, and entered me. I whimpered weakly; struck by the visceral way I felt the violation. It was like I was a virgin again. Every touch was alien and sent alarms blaring through my synapses. It was horrifying, and yet, it was so… so good. My nerves were reawakened, my flesh was freshly tainted, and I felt my purity being corrupted with every motion of her hand. Evil things were done inside me, done with malicious intent, done with an abhorrent desire to shock and control me, and I became a slave to them, loving every surface of her invasion. My thighs clamped around her wrist, and I mewled and whined as though in distress. I suppose I was in distress, for the sensations that coursed through me were as terrible as they were delightful, and the trauma I felt was real and vivid. But I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the horror as much as I enjoyed the pleasure.

I know where you really like it. Alkandi chuckled in my mind. Keeping her thumb on my clit, and her index and middle fingers in my slit, she retracted her ring and pinky fingers, and slid them down my taint. She pressed those fingers into the moist flesh of my crack, and as the felicitous tingles pricked into my pelvic floor, my anus instinctively dilated.

How shameful… Alkandi cooed cruelly, her tongue now moving gluttonously in my mouth, Such a prim and proper high-elf girl you are, Yavara. So meek and helpless, but just massaging your taint makes your little asshole wink for me. What kind of woman prefers to be fucked from where she shits? Not a woman at all… just a whore. Just my little slut.

Stop saying these things.

Her lips curled wickedly against mine. You don’t want me to stop, Yavara. You’re so wet, I could drown in you. In fact, I think I will. And with that, she departed my gaping lips, licked her way down my collar, breasts, nipple and belly, then lathered my blonde mound with her spit, and slid beneath my pelvis. Her fingers retreated from my pussy, and before I even had a chance to cry out, her tongue was inside me, and her entire hand was pinched against my asshole.

“Wait!” I squeaked.

Relax, Yavara. We’ve done much worse than this together. Her lips wrapped lovingly around my sweltering entrance, and her nose upended my clit, moving it subtly up and down from beneath with the small motions of her consuming mouth. She placated me so easily, and I became languid and loose upon the astral floor, my arms and legs spread out to receive her. She pressed her fingers slowly forward, and my anus dilated around her gradual pressure. There was a strain, but there was no pain, and the strain became more pleasurable as it became more intense. Soon, I was whining through gritted teeth, tossing my head this way and that in the fevered heat of anticipation. My pelvic floor indented, the flesh became thin and taut as Alkandi pushed, and pushed, and pushed, and broke through.

“Yes!” I screamed, arching my back against the floor. Alkandi’s tongue curled and lathered my vaginal spot as her fist twisted inside me, every knuckle a celebration of pressure that ignited the congested nerves into a frenzy of contractions. I heaved in spasmatic bouts, writhing like a possessed whore, exalting with every breath. I was losing myself in the fog of lust, my mind and identity slowly being stripped away. They were so fragile anyway, these new autonomous concepts. Maybe they didn’t even matter. If Alkandi had been with me since before I was born, then who was I without her, and was that person even me?! It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but the way her fist felt with my tight rectal channel wrapping it like an anal glove, or the way her tongue felt as it slathered my thrumming womanly center until the entire column of my femininity was fluttering with gleeful contractions.

There is a path to victory, Yavara. Alkandi whispered in my mind. Let Alkandra burn to ash; it can be rebuilt as long as you live. The people are all expendable. Even the hybrids.

Even Zander?

Especially Zander, that traitor. Let him die slowly. Let him die knowing what it means to betray me a second time. Alkandi’s fist clenched inside me, and I screamed in delight, my lips quivering. Sacrifice everyone to destroy the Lowland fleet, then fly over the Highland army, and turn Bentius to dust. Leave no one alive. Ravage the countryside, kill all that you see, rain terror from above until the Highlands is broken beyond repair. Ignore their army. Kill all their women and children, then wait. Just… wait. Wait for decades. They will grow old and broken, and they will die. Reemerge when your myth has become legend, and slaughter the rest. Then raise Alkandra once more, take the Highlands as your own, and make the traitorous Lowlanders pay for their crimes. Only when Alkandra is the last kingdom standing on Tenvalia, will you know peace. Then you can truly begin to live.

I can’t!

You will. It was why I chose you, Yavara. Only together can we finally do what must be done.

But… all those people!

You won’t care about them when we reunite. You only pretended to care about them for Elena’s sake anyway. She’s gone, and now there is nothing stopping you, nothing holding you back. You want to run away, but you cannot run away from yourself. I am you, and you are me. Embrace me once more, and forever put an end to doubt.

LEVERIA

Through the row of dark-elf incarnations, I could vaguely see Alkandi’s bronze flesh entwined with Yavara’s ivory. The sounds of wet smacks, the rub of flesh, and hoarse moans reached my ears as if I were right beside them, and not twenty feet back. Sound carried strangely here. Everything was strange here, but some things were the same. My sister was still a hopeless anal slut, and I was still hopelessly unathletic. I tried to run around the wall of incarnations, and they easily shifted in my way. I tried to scamper between their legs, and they sidestepped, blocking me with their shins. I even tried jumping over one of them, and ended up bouncing off her belly like a goddamn dodgeball.

“Fuck you!” I screamed, and aimed a punch at her face. She caught my fist, and then let go, staring right past me like I wasn’t even there. Behind her, my stupid little sister was arching her back in the throes of ecstasy, clamping her thick thighs around Alkandi’s black-haired head. The Dark Queen was stooped into a feline arch as she feasted upon my sister, one of her hands buried into Yavara’s clenching ass, the other working the leaking pink folds of her own unfurling cloven pussy. That pretty little cunt was my birthright, and I would be damned if my weak sister was going to take it from me again!

“Hold on, Yavara!” I called, “Stay strong, I’m coming for you!”

For some fucking reason, Yavara didn’t seem too keen on remerging with Alkandi. It was absolutely baffling to me that anyone wouldn’t want near-infinite power, a legendary mythos, and a sexuality so potent that the orgasms were life-altering transformative experiences, but hey, if that stupid cunt didn’t want it, then I’d certainly take it!

“You’re doing great, Yavara!” I called over the rows of incarnations, “Just hold out a little longer! I’m so proud of you!” I took five purposeful steps back, and got into a sprinter’s pose. I inhaled deeply, and stared down my target. She was a dark-elf of maybe five years of age. Obviously that incarnation didn’t make it very far. I grinned at her, pivoted my feet, and charged with a full head of steam. I lowered my shoulder, and smashed into her. A second later, I was lying flat on my back, gasping for air. The little girl stared down at me, lowered her outstretched fist, and then returned her gaze to the astral horizon.

I blinked at the black sky above, stars ebbing in and out of my vision. Zander Fredeon walked into my sight, and stared down at me with an amused expression. “Did you just try to tackle a little girl?” He asked.

“No, I was trying to trample the cunt.” I groaned. “Fuck, I think I broke a rib.”

“The only thing that can be wounded here is your pride.”

“Just help me up, you old bastard.”

Zander hauled me to my feet, and put a firm grip on my shoulder. “I have questions, Leveria,” he said gravely, “Namely, why are the two of you nearly dead right now in the hybrids’ bed?”

“Siblings fight, OK?” I snapped, and pulled my shoulder away, “And just where the fuck were you, old man? I could’ve really used some help!”

“I trusted you to make it this far on your own.”

“You mean you pussied out.”

“I made a tactical decision not to interfere.”

I sighed with a roll of my eyes, “Whatever, old man. You can’t make any tactical decisions here; I need you right now.”

Zander frowned. “Yes, I see that.”

“Nothing scarier than a crazy ex-girlfriend.”

“Keep in mind that if we succeed, you’ll be my crazy ex-girlfriend.”

“Like I said, nothing scarier.” I planted my hand firmly in his crotch, and gave his goods a squeeze, “I know you’ve got some balls in there, Zander; they were slapping my taint all morning. Now if you ever want to dip these saggy salty nuts in my mouth, you’re going to have to use them.”

He raised his brow at me. “Is that a promise?”

I licked my lips. “Don’t you want to find out?”

He looked from me, to Alkandi, then back to me again. “Why do I always fall for women like you?” He sighed, and stepped toward the incarnations.

ZANDER

Alkandi had Yavara bent over and wailing in ecstasy, her bronze forearm wrapped halfway up with Yavara’s clenching pink anus, her other hand buried to the wrist in Yavara’s stretched slit, the petals all opened by the grotesque reaming of her womanhood. Yavara herself seemed to be trapped in that perfect fulcrum of pain and pleasure, for she clawed at the astral earth as she writhed in ecstasy, her mind barely hanging on. But still, she resisted Alkandi, unyielding even in the face of such wonderfully horrific depravities.

“Fuck me deeper!” Yavara screamed in one breath, and in the other, she cried, “Please stop!”

I think I know which one you really want, Alkandi chuckled dotingly, sardonically, and pushed her invading fists deeper into the high-elf princess. Yavara squealed and arched her back, the curvature of her spine deepening with every inch Alkandi slowly pushed in. When Alkandi stopped, Yavara collapsed with a sob, her cheeks wet with tears, her mouth gaping with a euphoric smile. Alkandi’s forearm muscles rolled as her fingers did their seductive damage within Yavara, and Yavara purred and groaned, her eyes rolled back. Alkandi placed a loving kiss on Yavara’s tailbone, then turned around, and set her orange eyes on me.

Why did you come here, Zander?

“You know why.”

Did you think you could change anything? She cocked her head, Or did you just want an apology?

“An apology?” I laughed, “Fuck you.”

She smiled thinly. I am sorry, for what it’s worth, but after a thousand years of failure, I had to take matters into my own hands.

“By breaking the laws of nature.”

Nothing here is natural. It never was. Nature demands that we live and die and disappear, and I refuse to. I’ve already broken the laws of nature.

“You just found a loophole,” I gestured to Yavara, “but this, Alkandi… this will kill you.”

I’m in control.

“She already rejected you once. Face it, she’s stronger than you. Even at your most powerful, you couldn’t do a fraction of the things she’s done.”

She is powerful, Zander, but she is weak. She needs someone like me to balance her.

“She wouldn’t have been weak if you didn’t rob her of experience. Yavara’s naturally meek, and you’re naturally bold, so who ended up making all the hard decisions? I always thought Yavara was too impulsive, but I didn’t realize until now that her impulsiveness was just her leaning on her first instinct, and that first instinct was you. You nurtured codependence because you needed her to need you. She’s soft because you never let the world make her hard.”

Can’t you see that I’m helping her?

I smiled at Alkandi behind the row of incarnations. “I don’t give a shit about her, Alkandi. It’s you; it’s always been you. For a thousand years, I’ve been loyal to you, and you betrayed me in the end.”

It’s an eye for an eye then.

“You know the score’s not even.”

I blessed you with life!

“You cursed me with it!”

Then hang yourself, you ungrateful, incompetent shit! she snarled.

I laughed coldly. “No, no, no, my love. You don’t get to throw me away like trash. You will give me what I am fucking owed!” I planted my foot into the astral floor, and sent the incarnations flying over the horizon. Only Yavara’s dark projection remained, hovering over the pair of elves fucking on the floor. I took a step toward her, and she launched a kinetic attack that sent me sliding backward fifty feet.

Stay there, Zander. Alkandi said, giving me a warning glare, The next strike will be lethal.

“We can fucking die here?!” Leveria exclaimed.

“This place is of the mind. If the mind is destroyed, the body will die.”

“Why didn’t you fucking tell me that before?!” Leveria squealed, and scampered away from the debauchery.

“Alkandi,” I said, “don’t do this. You know you can’t control her.”

I hid her own magic from her for eighteen years. I am in complete control.

“If you were, then we wouldn’t be here. This merging you made with Yavara is unnatural, and it will split apart time and time again until she finally just kills you. It’s inevitable.”

You know nothing. You never did. You were as useless to me in life as you are in death.

“You’re too old to be this defensive. Maybe I know nothing, but you know I’m right.”

I’m not giving up this chance! Alkandi screamed at me, I could wait a million lifetimes and not find someone like her! Can’t you see that this is all we’ve worked for?! Can’t you see this is our destiny?!

“You are my destiny, Alkandi.” I whispered at her, “You are my all, and I gave you everything. Now I know I meant nothing to you. There were people who loved me in this life, Alkandi, good people, great people, and I could never love them back because the only kind of love I know is unrequitedness. Your love. Your indifference. Fine. You never loved me, but you still owe me!”

I hurled a spell across the black expanse, and struck Yavara’s dark projection in the chest. It glanced off her naked breasts, gave them a nice jiggle, then redirected into the sky. It was my most potent killing spell. She looked down at herself, then she looked up at me. I gulped.

You damn fool.

Dark Yavara took one step forward, clapped her hands together, and created a great sheet of fire that split the earth and sky. Its infernal edge shot toward me, and I barely put up my shield fast enough. It didn’t matter. The fire’s blade cleaved my shield like butter, and separated me from my left leg and arm so cleanly that the limbs still completed the signals my brain sent them a moment ago, clenching and pivoting. I toppled to my right, the smell of fried bacon burning in my nostrils. Dark Yavara took another step forward. I rolled to my side, screamed in pain, snatched my severed leg, and dragged it to its steaming stump. It reattached with a great seizure of cramps as the muscles knitted back together. I barely had time to grab my arm before Dark Yavara stomped her foot in the ground, and sent a wave through the astral earth. I was upended like a ship in rough sea, and send hurtling into the air, then plummeting to the ground. I hit the astral surface with a thud, and felt my hip break with a dry snap.

You have no chance, Zander. This realm is of the mind, and Yavara was second only to Prestira in telepathy. Now she’s second to none. Stay down.

I growled in pain, and rolled to my good side. My left fingers grasped those of my severed right arm, and dragged it toward me. I reattached the limb to the stump, and gasped when the horrendous cramps knotted my stitched muscles. Groaning, I planted one foot into the astral earth, and rose to my knees. Dark Yavara took another step toward me.

Don’t make me do this.

I laughed bitterly. “You don’t care about me. You never did. I won’t weigh on your conscience, because you don’t have one, so just fucking finish it, and save me the trouble.”

Flame erupted in Dark Yavara’s palms. Alkandi looked back at me from between the real Yavara’s legs, and gave me a pitiable look. Do you want to know why I never loved you?

“Because you’re a heartless bitch.”

Because you never even tried to love me. I was there. I was waiting for you, but you let unworthy men take your place one after the other, and when you couldn’t stomach it anymore, you had me murdered. You were just obsessed. You don’t know how to love.

I grinned at