A Debt To Diana free porn video

1. The Deed. The oppressive pounding of my pulse around my head was loud against her silence. It seemed that I would die for what I had done, yet what I had done was right and my determination more than matched my fear. Apart from those all too few moments with my love I had never felt so alive even when death looked certain to make my untimely acquaintance. Coldly, slowly and with deliberate hushed tones she began the rhetorical inquisition. "I can see it was you that let her go" she started, her hard gaze fixing me rigid where I stood. Her deep green, somehow more luminous, eyes were wide with anger yet she was measured in her analysis "ah, I can see now it was love, love that made you do it. How I could of missed this I don't know." She turned and paced slowly around her eclectic workshop, "love, love, love" she spat out with derision in time with every footstep as the candlelight spread her jerky shadow over the potions, clay tablets and herbs that were the ingredients of her trade. There was no doubt that I feared her, and now more than ever, but I had no regrets. There were plenty of reasons to fear her, I had seen her rip the beating heart out of a warrior and I had seen her claw a wild boar to death, yet I would do it again. If a moment ever defined a life then it seemed to me that when I released my love I had draw my last lot, but I was proud to have sacrificed my life for hers, I was proud to die for love. "Fool!" she screamed at me turning back and rushing to bring her face up to mine, "Yes you are right to fear me, and I will have my vengeance on you, but right now Diana must have her sacrifice and it must be tonight. The changing of the moon will not wait for your fancies." As the anger slowly drained from her face, again I saw that terrible beauty: raven black hair, silky pale soft skin, big green eyes and precisely defined cherry lips. She was arresting in her looks but there was something angular about her features, never quite masculine, but hinting at strength and power. She stood face to face with me, eye to eye, not far from six feet tall, and uncomfortably close. Her eyes flicked venomously left and right as she peered through each of mine down in to my soul. "What do you think will happen now you idiot?" she continued, "Do you think the crops will grow if Diana does not have her sacrifice? Do you think that she will offer her protection in warfare? You stupid naive little worm, you have no idea, no idea, no idea at all what it is to hold a debt to Diana." "You can sacrifice me instead" I offered in compensation, I had accepted my doom when I had released my love but I had not thought of the impact on the tribe, perhaps my sacrifice would help. When I went to work as an assistant to the Druid priestess it was a source of great pride for my late mother. I worked as a dock hand as a child, and I had picked up languages easily from the Egyptian or Phoenician sailors. The tribal elders used to call for me to translate when new travellers came, and I will always remember the beam on my late mother's face when, because of my reputation with words, the priestess called on me to be her assistant. It was only a year that I had served her, but the time has passed slowly. I had served her well, and the work was fascinating, but I had missed my love as I travelled extensively with my mistress and I had to live at her lair. Much had happened in the year, I had been orphaned by the loss of my mother, our tribe had grown rich from foreign trading, I had started a translation of the mystic runes on the clay tablets my mistress had inherited from previous priestesses, I had made hundred of potions, and I had become well known in the region taking payments and tributes from the tribes. All that I had done would not be nothing compared to the shame I had now brought on my tribe, I was a willing sacrifice if my sacrifice could make amends. "You hold no value as a sacrifice, virgin you may be, but I need a maiden not a martyr, what could you possibly have of any value to Diana?" she scowled "You sit in the corner, say and do nothing, I will deal with you in time." I had sat silently for a long time, long enough for evening to turn to night, and I watched her pace her workshop at a frantic pace in troubled thought. All of a sudden she stopped, she was still for several frozen moments, and she span around to face me, a quizzical look brushed across her face and she peered at me through squinted eyes. "Perhaps it's not too late" she announced in a drawn out eerie fashion. The spark returned to her eyes and mischievousness lit up her face. "Strip" she commanded. I was taken aback, confused as I was to the relevance of her demand. "You want to be the sacrifice, so strip" she insisted again. Full of perplexity I took of my woollen shirt. "Hurry up fool" she demanded in a thunderous voice that filled the room. I discarded my kilt, except for my boots I stood naked and embarrassed before her. "Good" she exclaimed "leave your boots on and come with me, and I can feel your embarrassment, that's good too." She grabbed my wrist and pulled me at full pace out of her workshop in to the cool summer night. It was a clear evening lit by a full spectacular moon bright against the stars. "Diana expects, and we will deliver, she will taste your fear like I have done" she cackled as she lead me through the dim night. It seemed as though I was to be sacrificed after all, and although I had tried to prepare myself and harden myself for this eventuality I was terrified nonetheless. I was a young and fit youth, but I could barely match her pace as she rushed to the sacrificial stones, I was only a partially willing sacrifice and she practically dragged me up the hill. As we drew close she slowed to her usual deliberate and commanding pace allowing me to get my breath back. "What is this?" called a woman's voice from the dark. I felt embarrassed in my nakedness again and I shielded my genitals with my hands. In contrast, my mistress stood tall and slender on the hill top with the delicate layers of her black garments flowing gently in the breeze. "Where's the maiden?" demanded the woman. As we came closer to the stones I saw an old hag holding her bent form against a staff. "Diana won't be pleased with this!" complained the woman casting a gnarled finger in my direction. "Trust me" my mistress reassured her "Diana will shine on us tonight." "Take off your boots and get up on the stone" my mistress sharply instructed. A flood of fear filled me again as I wondered if they were they going to cut out my heart or slit my throat or kill me in some other gruesome manner. The moment of my impending death was compelling in its blackness. "I can feel his fear" croaked the hag "but it is not a maiden's fear, it is not rich, a masculine fear is full of ego it has no soul, it's even defiant. I hope you know what you are doing, we must not insult Diana with this sacrifice." "Wait till you feel his fear turn on the stone" replied my mistress in disturbing lilting tones. My mind was racing with the possibilities that lay all too close ahead, but I strengthened my will in the knowledge of having done the right thing. With boots cast aside I climbed on the stone table, my death would be a good death, a sacrifice for love. I kept fortifying myself with the thought that it would be over soon and so I resolved myself to accept my fate. I barely noticed the cold of the stone against my buttocks, I barely noticed the fast shallow breaths I was taking, yet despite all the bracing of myself all I could feel was my trepidation against suffering and death and particularly my fear of what form that might take. "I taste no change in his fear" complained the old woman. "Wait sister for now it is time for the deviation" my mistress calmed her. "Spread your legs!" commanded my mistress. I looked at her, again the incongruity hit me, I could not understand what it was she wanted. "Spread them!" she demanded of me. Everything in me railed against this order, this strange and unnatural demand, but this woman, this priestess, this dominating presence, this objectification of fear and power could not be disobeyed. With shaking limbs I slowly parted my legs. "Yes, I feel it now" whispered the crone. "Chant" demanded my mistress of her. The old woman emitted her incomprehensible monotone incantations, and my mistress reached towards my genitalia. Shaking, sweating and terrified I tried to shuffle backwards on the stone, but my mistress spoke some ancient word and I was transfixed gazing helplessly as she slid an outstretched finger nail across my scrotum. The sack opened revealing the source of my manhood. "Delicious" called out the crone. "Keep chanting" my mistress admonished her. My mind was on fire, I had not expected this. "By all the gods no!" I pleaded. I could see the globes of my virility still attached and I begged my mistress to stop "please, please, not this". She closed her fingers around one of my orbs and it disintegrated in to burning ashes that flew away on the light breeze. I knew now that there was no stopping her, but still I begged full of dread. She cast a viscous look at me and then turned her attention back to my remaining masculinity. She rubbed the other globe around her fingers and it too disintegrated in to bright glowing dust. I was filled with emptiness and horror, but the deed was done and all I could do was weep. Through my tears I kept looking at my abused genitals, in the vain hope that there could be some going back. My mistress took a fine needle and put two stitches in the empty sack, and this little adjustment seemed like a finalising of my sorry fate. My mind was heavy with horror on every implication of this horrendous act. I knew what this made of me, and what I was, and what I must now become, but I was agonised just to think of it. I wanted to push it out of my mind, but it was so dominantly present that it could be displaced. I could not comprehend what had just happened but it was obvious that it had just happened. Gradually the emptiness crept in as sickening realisation pushed out the denial. "Diana is pleased" cried the crone "she is pleased with us." "Now you have paid you debt to Diana" smiled my mistress at me, before adding "eunuch" to emphasise my plight. 2. Time Without Meaning A eunuch has no place in my tribe, he cannot be a warrior, he cannot be a husband, and he cannot take part in affairs of the counsel of elders. A eunuch is seen as less than a full person, and I could envisage no role for me that would not compound my humiliation, so I stayed with my mistress despite what she had done to me. Immediately after my castration I felt the loss of my love. The priestess had chosen her from the village for sacrifice to Diana, but she had not known of the love between us. It had been a gross error on her part and she blamed herself for what happened as much as she blamed me, but it seemed to me that only I had paid the price. Now that my manhood had been annulled a million dreams seeped away with it. Though I had gone to work for the high druid priestess, I had always seen my future as a domestic famer and husband to my only love. I had expected to raise a family and work the land and offer my sacrifices to the gods in an ordinary unremarkable way. My worldly dreams may have seen ordinary, but my perspective on living a life of companionship with my love was the opposite of ordinary. My love and I were always soul mates, but now if I could ever find her again I could never be a husband to her. I had expected to die on that fateful night; I had not expected a living death. When I released my love she had urged me to flee with her, but I knew that my mistress would find out sooner if I was missing and she would catch us both. I had a great deal of time to reflect on the last anguished parting scenes between us. At the time they were deeply poignant, but as the colour drained from my world they became simply the events of a former life. My former life had hopes and dreams, my former life had a rich and sumptuous taste, my former life was full of wondrous new discoveries and possibilities every day, but my former life was lost, it was former. My present life was no life at all it was merely an existence. I had defined myself by love, and I had planned to make the ultimate sacrifice for love. Now that I understood what the ultimate really sacrifice was it seemed to me that my incapacity for love negated my identity. As the days dragged on, day by increasingly blank day, I lost all feeling of love; as the months dragged on, month by increasingly hopeless month, I lost all sense of ambition; and as the years dragged on, year by increasingly empty year, I lost all sense of self. My mistress tried to convince me that our intellectual souls separate us from the beasts and that I was in a unique position to realise this part of my humanity untethered as I was from desire, ambition and pride. There was wisdom in her counsel as my lost loving was a bodily loss not a loss in my soul, but I was blind to this insight I was deeply sore and wounded and I destroyed myself by my grief. I found no consolation in her words, the repetitive humdrum activities and the trivial concerns of daily life had lost all significance to me. Ironically I applied myself to study to distract me through the droning of the years, not because of my mistress's advice, but because it was the only thing that it seemed to me that I could do with excellence, though I took no pride in it. I defaulted to a life of study rather than making an active choice, it simply filled the void of existence. 3. Death of a Majestic Creature (Ten years later) The smouldering remains of the warrior lay only a few yards from me with the stench of burning flesh acrid to my senses. I had been knocked to the ground by the dragon's tail, and now the fierce beast was towering over me. Ten years earlier I looked at apparently certain death with fear, now, with nothing left to loose but the breath in my body, I welcomed its approach. I held no value in my life so I willingly followed my mistress and the great warrior that she had taken as her lover to the dragon's den. The dragon had been a blight on the land, and the King of The West was offering a lordship to whosoever could slay it. We had tried, but like countless others we had discovered the true might of this fearsome creature. In failure lay consolation. My death was to be a blessed relief for me, but the pain was not. Lightning strikes of agony convulsed my body as the dragon sunk a talon in to my side, but as the beast played with its prey my mistress struck. I heard a thunderous bang and saw a steak impaled through the dragon's neck. The weight of unconsciousness was dragging me firmly home to my anticipated oblivion, yet the irritating slap of my mistress stirred transient awakenings in me. "Drink, Drink, Drink" she commanded during my abortive serial arousals. With each sip I gained a little more strength until I could taste the foul sticky substance she was pouring down me. "That's disgusting" I complained. "Disgusting, yes I expect it is. Drink it, it'll give you vigour, or it will kill you I can't say which, but what have you got to loose?" she replied with unusual candour. So I drank and drank this slimy fluid until all my strength returned. "What by all the wonders of queen Mab was that?" I demanded of her. "Well I have never heard a servant of mine talk to me like that before!" she indignantly exclaimed in return. It was true in all the years I had served her I would never have dared to speak to her as if we were equals. "And to think that I have just rescued you from death, its a disgrace to talk to your mistress in such a way. It was dragon's egg and you should be thankful for it." she continued with a somewhat penetrating squint. "Dragon's egg! Have I really just drunk a dragon's egg" I complained at the idea, but it seemed equally obvious that it had just saved my life. This life was something I was happy to leave behind just a few short moments ago, but now I felt unusually pleased to still be around. Finding the strength to get to my feet I looked around to see the dragon lying dead in the field with a wooden steak through its neck and a sword in its skull. There was a gash in my side, but it seemed nowhere near as bad as it ought to be, especially considering the pool of blood that flooded the ground where I had lay. My rejuvenation had left me a little giddy and my behaviour became erratic and childish given the magnitude of what had just passed. "Treasure!" I cried out upon the sudden realisation that dragons were famous for hording gold. "There must be treasure somewhere" I shouted to my mistress, but she was kneeling by the remains of the warrior, so I searched by myself. I didn't have to look far, there was a crack between some nearby rocks and upon closer inspection I could see gold there. As my mistress sat by her lost lover I used a long stick to fish out necklaces, tiaras, crowns and rings from between the rocks. After a while it suddenly dawned on me that I felt good. I had not felt good in a decade and now the smell of the spring air, the warmth of the sun and the cold fresh caress of the grass underfoot were all just beautiful expressions of the world, life, and all the glory of living. The gash in my side had healed up to little more than a big scratch and I was feeling better than I had ever done in a long time. I began to dance, spinning around and leaping back and forwards. I was frolicking like spring lamb. I noticed and enjoyed my new sense of euphoria, but I eventually realised the insensitivity of my inward reflections, and I turned to see the sad form of my mistress over the charred remains of the warrior. My egocentricity was quick to return and I was held fast against the memory of my lost love. I had helped my love flee from my mistress but I knew nothing of where she had gone. Through the long dull years I had tried not to think of her because I could not be a man for her, I needed to let her live without me. Now as the sun shone on its vibrant flux in all the forms of this world, I wanted to share the beauty of what I saw and I wanted to share it with her. My needs though, were not the appropriate concern right now. The woman in front of me took my hope of love away from me, but I could still feel compassion for her when she had lost her lover. I sat down beside her, took her in my arms and, for a few moments at least, she cried on my shoulder, then she pushed me away in the manner of a petulant child, perhaps the comfort of a eunuch servant was beneath her. To the generations that lived under the tyranny of this slain beast she would always been a heroine, but her spectacular success would always be tinged with regret. Initially I assumed that her regret was from the loss of her lover, but I would not always be so sure. 4. Returning and Turning. Our horses had died or fled from the dragon battle so the walk home was a long one. We would normally have avoided the enchanted wood, but cutting through saved a couple of days on foot. The day was still young, but as we penetrated deeper into the wood it became darker and darker. We walked to the sounds of twigs crackling under foot; no words were spoken between us. When she needed to communicate, my mistress's hand and pulled us to a stop and she looked at me with a slight cock of her head to indicate that she was wary of something nearby. "Sisters, you a free to pass through this place" resonated a voice through the tress "We are grateful to be free from the winged serpent." We turned to momentarily see a woman dressed in long robes of green and brown before she stepped into the shadow of a large oak and fade from view. "How can this be her wood?" I asked my mistress. "Did you see the tree sprite too then?" my mistress asked me in return dismissing my enquiry. I had never seen a sprite before, but it made sense that she would be able to assure our safe passage through the wood, I was much relieved as the enchanted wood was the stuff of many legends but nobody seemed to have real knowledge of it because few people travelled through it or returned from it. My mistress, though, did not seem interested in our passage through the wood, she looked straight ahead and spoke flatly and matter of fact "It seems that you have been given sight. It must have been the dragon's egg. There has always been something impenetrable about your fate." "Sight?" I enquired. "It will become clear to you in time" she abruptly curtailed the discussion. We walked on a little whilst I tried to make sense of what she was saying to me. From the many runes that I had worked on I knew that priestesses and sorceresses had access to a greater insight. Often their understanding had been revealed to them by a deity. A God or a Goddess would strip away the ways of seeming and show them the way of truth. Diana had given my mistress her sight. My mistress seemed to be suggesting that I was gaining powers like hers, but Diana had not revealed anything to me. I was confused, but she did seem to be right, the tree sprite does not inhabit the human world of seeming so the fact that I could see her did indicate that something in me had changed. The truth of her words, however, were not merely convincing because of the evidence of the tree sprite, they were convincing because I could see their truth, it seemed that sometimes I could see past the way of seeming. I puzzled over the problem for some time. "Did you notice that she called us sisters?" asked my mistress in that nonchalant style that no longer disguised, from me, that the question was significant. "I did, why?" I answered with some concern "I assumed it was because I was emasculated before I had developed a beard, I sense that you think that there is something more to it?", it was becoming apparent to me that I was developing that sense of reading a person, at which my mistress was so sharply adept, but my mistress remained a difficult person to read and I could feel that she was shrouding her thoughts perhaps in response to this 'sight' that I now apparently had. I sensed that she was sensing that I was trying to read her and she was not prepared to accept such behaviour from a servant. "We will need to stop in the next village for rest and refreshment and we will need to be incognito" she announced avoiding my questioning of her. "Very well" I agreed accepting what I thought was a diversion, these were important considerations nonetheless. This region was of divided loyalty, and as we had just struck a major blow for the King of The West, we did not want to draw attention to ourselves. "You won't be able to enter in the village in those blood stained robes of course" she continued. "I don't see the alternative" I replied, although I did see the alternative that she was alluding to "You think I should take one of your robes out of your pack, and this is because the tree sprite mistook me for a woman." My mistress was insistent "You will be better disguised that way." "This makes no sense" I complained, becoming aware that I was speaking out of turn again "Two, apparent, women do not travel alone unless they are in a certain profession, which is one that you are not keep to adopt and I am not qualified for." My indignancy had drawn the pitch of my voice up to a feminine tone. "Enough" she called in that commanding manner that could freeze a river "You will not speak to me with such vulgar inferences. You will wear the robes and I will assume a masculine form. I will be the one in charge as we step in to this village. This is how it will be and you will not question me on the matter again." The last time she ordered me to strip there were serious consequences and this time, in my nakedness I was reminded of those events by the atrophied nature of my long since proud member, which appeared particularly shrivelled past recognition. "We need not worry about that spoiling the disguise" she casually quipped at the remaining pathetic representation of my former manhood. The cruel streak of humour should have hurt me but I felt no injury. She was rubbing salt in a wound, even if an old wound, it had been a sore wound, but it did not sting me at all. It was not like my mistress to make such a comment without design, and I saw then that she was showing me that somehow the wound was gone. I could not grasp how the wound could be gone if I was not restored. I was starting to see through the fog that clouds our minds from divine design, but I could grasp only small fragments, brief glimpses, blinding flashes of illumination that I was not yet ready to hold on to. Occasionally I saw past the way of seeming to the way of truth, but it was the exception rather than the rule. There was only one other robe that we had carried in our packs, and so this was the one I was to wear. I picked it up with trepidation as I remember negotiating the purchase with a Babylonian trader. It was beautiful garment, unusually bright blue signifying its eastern heritage with golden needlework around the neck and arms, and it had been tailored all in to one piece so that I stepped in to the robes and fastened it with a broach on the right shoulder. My mistress had always admired the garment, but had never worn it, apparently because it was, in her words, "loaded with fate" and it "deserved the right occasion." I wondered if she had anticipated wearing it when she returned to the western king in her triumph over the dragon, I asked her if that was why she brought it in our packs, but much to my amazement she did not know why she had selected it and so I was concerned that its fate was attached to me rather than to my mistress. I was walking in to the claws of fate, but the claws of fate could not be avoided whatever path I took. "I'm too tall, too straight for this illusion to work" I complained to her. "For the sake of all the spirits in the forest, do you not think I can whip up an illusion that will carry the day?" she reprimanded me "You've retained delicate boyish features, but as we near the village I will do whatever is required, and yes before you even say it, I know we will have the appearance of wealth and we would normally ride in on horseback, but it is not unusual for a traveller's horse to be taken sick or to stolen. I will prepare the appropriate cover story." I dared not say any more as inflaming my mistress could have serious consequences, indeed I was worried that I dare not even think any more else I get unspoken considerations thrown back at me. She removed her bangles and fixed the copper and ceramic bangles around my wrists though she hid the silver bangles in our packs with the dragon treasure lest we draw too much attention. She fixed a bronze chain around my neck, with fine ringlets of incredible workmanship. I was starting to melt in to an appreciation of the adornment and I was almost gushing as she applied Red Ochre to exaggerate the colour in my lips and cheeks, and fine soot to line my eyes and lashes. I could not understand how I was feeling. In this mystical wood I could hear the soft trickle of a stream in the distance, delicate shafts of light beamed through the illuminated leaves and I was starting to feel at home with nature. My mistress had dressed me as a woman and I had not felt so good in a decade. I was enjoying the feeling of femininity. My soul was doing cartwheels. My intellectual soul was out of harmony with my animal soul. "What.." I began but my mistress put a finger to my lips. "Only in a feminine voice" she softly but firmly instructed with a slight tilt of the head to emphasise the imperative. "What is..." I restarted my sentence but stopped again at the shock of a woman's voice, my voice. A few deep breaths and gulps later and I continued in my new lilting and expressive but still surprising tones "What is happening to me?" "You have eaten a dragon's egg" she candidly answered "and you have ingested some dragon's soul. Dragons are creatures of wild power unconstrained by order or wisdom. Their form was written at the dawn of time. They are flux and fire. You, in contrast, have dispassionately concentrated on nothing but learning and wisdom for a decade. In my long years serving Diana I have had many assistants; none of them have seen the order and structure of the world like you have. There is a storm inside you, a battle between chaos and order, between change and the absolute, this is your battle. On this most important of points, I will not mislead you, only the Dark Lord has ever tamed a dragon and I have no understanding of what it is to tame a dragon inside of you." "Oh well that's great, so I'm likely to end up like some screaming madman?" I retorted. "Oh I very much doubt that." she replied, it was unclear what she meant, shaded as it was with irony, it offered me no consolation. She took this moment to weave an illusion of masculinity upon herself. Her body stretched in height and in width and in all directions, or so it seemed, until she had adopted the physique of a strongly and stoutly built tall warrior of maybe two score and ten years. A full beard partly grey and partly brown descended down her chest. I found myself staring at her trying to make out what I saw. There was what I was seeing and what I was knowing, both pictures superimposed in my mind. With my eyes I encountered the way of seeming and a powerful warrior of advanced age in chain mail and leather stood before me. With my mind I encountered the way of truth and I could just as clearly see the elegant woman that I knew. "This is driving me insane" I protested and I strode off through the forest. "Not like that" she boomed after me in a richly reverberating deep voice "Walk like a lady!", so I did. To begin with, my small footsteps one in front of the other and the movement of my hips was unnatural, but after only a few hundred yards it became an unconscious part of my stride. I was lost in my turbulent thoughts as we quietly made our way through the remaining tress. I feel excited and feminine, but my mind was struggling with the delicious femininity, it felt very right and very wrong. The sway of my hips and the brush of the delicate robes against my flesh were giving me a rush of girlish happiness, but I felt somehow like I was betraying the right way of things. My musings were broken by a storm of rage that knocked us out of our stride, it whipped the wind out of me, and I stumbled and nearly fell. The rage shook me to my core and I was left feeling small, vulnerable and afraid. "By Diana's light what was that?" I barked. "Did you see him?" my mistress re-enquired. "Yes" I replied timidly. The rage seemed to take an age to subside but eventually I gathered my emotions. After a few moments I interpreted the scene "I saw a man. No I saw a warrior. But he was a warrior without his armour. He seems to have been crowned with fire. His rage was terrible. He screamed pure rage, pure and absolute rage. I think he has chosen to die, but he will slaughter countless soldiers first. What does it mean?" "It is half a world away, but it is the dawn of the age of man" she added cryptically with some concern "The fates are long and stretch past my horizon. We must preserve these lands from the patriarchs for as longs as we can, though I fear they will take them in the end." The moment passed and we walked on in sombre silence, with the wood becoming progressively less dense until finally we emerged in to fields and we could see the smoke of the village in the distance. 5. The Fire Inside It was a long time since I had enjoyed the taste of good earthy food. A few pieces of silver extended to substantial hospitality and I sat back satisfied full of roast boar, turnips and bread. Initially I had thought that the village would offer us little comfort as it seemed nothing more than a collection of timber and straw dwellings, but my mistress had told a good story of how (s)he was taking me on a pilgrimage to the great stones on Salisbury plain. It was a master stoke to use of the sanctity of the pilgrimage. Our apparent high standing, caused mainly by my appearance, made the villagers take us to a great stone hall where we enjoyed their best food and drink. We had been entertained by the village chief and his eldest son. The chief was a fat old man with wild grey hair dressed in animal furs and leathers. He spoke little except to grunt his orders to the serving wenches. His son, however, was an altogether different proposition. A tall slender man with a trimmed black beard that was thin enough to reveal handsome features, he engaged in charming conversation always interested in his guests. These enquiries were quickly deflected as to give away too much information was to risk exposure. My mistress, still disguised as a fearsome warrior, asked the chief about buying horses which was met with a stern response, but she indicated that she was willing to pay a good price and so the chief took her to the stables to negotiate a price for two horses. We had more than ample treasure from the dragon's lair so the cost of two horses would be trivial to us. The cost, however, of leaving me alone with this man was more significant. We continued with idle chatter and I failed to notice my girlish reactions to his charm. Intoxicated by his attention on me I was giggling at his humour and casting sly looks in his direction. There was nothing uncomfortable about the inevitable lull in the conversation, it felt like the most natural thing in the world to fall in to his kiss. The soft gentle touch of his lips on mine elicited warm sparks of excitement within me. I arched towards him and he put a hand behind my delicate waist. Aroused by surges in passion we kissed vigorously and I reached around his broad shoulders to pull him on top of me. Consumed and lost in my lust I emphasised our embrace by wrapping my legs around him. I had fallen completely and was desperate for his plundering of me. With aching vigour we added ever more zeal to our passions. As a chief's son he will have known many maidens, but I doubt if he ever encountered anybody as vigorously eager as I was on that occasion. We were interrupted, however, by the return of my mistress and the chief. "Would you deflower this maiden?" thundered my mistress in her warrior guise. The chief's son recoiled and stepped back in shame. I by contrast, was enraged like a wild beast at the frustration of my crazed lust. My mistress saw the white heat in me and acted immediately to dematerialise herself. It was just as well that she acted quickly because my actions were without thought or consideration. I found myself in touch with the primal construction of existence; I could see and speak the language that the universe was written in. [destruction] I screamed ferally in my mistress's direction. The stone wall opposite disintegrated in to a millions bits of grit that exploded across the village. I came to my senses and saw that my body was still heaving with passion, and my deep breaths were lifting a clearly amply bosomed chest. I could tell from the warm aching tingling between my legs that I was fully woman. The chief and his son were transfixed with horror and puzzlement. I took the opportunity of the moments of confusion to make my escape. I ran through the gaping hole in the wall to find my mistress, in her natural guise, leading two horses up the village track. The villagers were closing in on the hall so my mistress and I leapt on a horse each and made our escape. The villagers were soon hot on our heels chasing on half a dozen horses. [speed] I demanded of our horses speaking the language of being as if it was second nature, which it was rapidly becoming. Vigorous pants emitted from these beasts possessed by speed as their lightning hooves despatched field after field. Our horses easily outpaced the villagers, but I kept riding as if my riding was an escape from myself. Eventually my mistress called us to a stop. "You are riding that horse to its death" she called "The villagers are long gone, you can't run from yourself." "Besides, you need to see yourself" she continued. "Why?" I sharply retorted "What's wrong". "I wouldn't say 'wrong'" she explained with a wry smile curling a side of her mouth "perhaps, just different, maybe not what you were expecting." I looked on myself. I could see that my body was curvaceously feminine and it was already clear to me that I was physically all woman and with a woman's desires as well. The horse looked bigger than I expected, but it was I that was smaller. I reached around my head to pull forward long luscious ringlets of deep red hair. I had become almost numb to the catalogue of changes in me, but with inquisitive fingers I felt my delicate soft facial features. "You are truly beautiful" my mistress reassured me and this time the reassurance meant something. I wanted to be beautiful I wanted to be the beautiful woman that I felt I should be. I was puzzled by how good it felt to be a woman, my idea of myself had just been turned completely upside down, and I was fine with it, I even relished it. I needed to see myself. [rain] I called to the thin clouds above. Droplets slowly formed in to a pool in the mud and I leaned over to gaze on myself. Holding my hair back so that the light might fall on my face I gasped at what I saw. I had a soft pale complexion with some pink colouring in my high round cheeks. I had a delicate button nose and wide green eyes. I was delighted with my reflection and I cocked my head this way and that to continue the appreciation from all angles, my attention, however, was always drawn to my pouting red lips. I had a look of blossoming alluring femininity about me and it was sure to cause trouble, but trouble was a price worth paying for these features. My mistress broke the daydream, "You are the physical embodiment of the vibrant passionate woman that you now are." "Hmm" I replied paying scant attention to her words as I was still narcissistically intoxicated. "You could be a great priestess too" she brought us back to business "You must become my pupil, there is much for you to learn". "Your pupil!" I spat back at her "Do you not remember what you did to me! Do you think that I will take no other purpose in life than to serve Diana? No, I will find my own way thank you very much. You are no longer my mistress." She rose to my comments adopting her natural determined look and tone, "Be careful young woman, you have no idea what it is to hold a debt to Diana, and you need guidance, you were clearly out of control back there." "Yes I was out of control" I replied "But it might have been a different matter if you had prepared me, you deliberately lead me in to that trap. You had seen my new form long ago. You saw it when the sprite saw it, perhaps before. That's why you had me dress that way, that's why you lead the chief out, you knew where it would lead. Do you not realise that I can see past the way of seeming." "Do not underestimate the winds of fate." she retorted with hints of anger, the wind picking up around her and swirling her garments in association with her mood "You will need a patron Goddess. The Gods will know of you and they will covert your service and they will make you choose between them. You will also need a king to work through to influence the acts of men. This is the way. See already your naivety shows. You have left your thoughts unguarded. You expect to find meaning by searching for your long lost love, how ridiculous? And what do you expect to find? Will the years have not shaped a new person? A wife to someone perhaps, or a lover, or a prostitute? What profession do you think she will have adopted when she fled with no money and no protector? Even if you find her, which I doubt, it is obvious that your desires are of a different flavour now. It would be a futile endeavour." I leapt back up on to my horse and turned to her "You weave a good web, but I will not be trapped by it. You are already a great priestess and I have already learned much from you, you will now have the ear of the King of The West and you will be able to do Diana's work through him. I understand why you did what you did to me. I understand that what I am now was always written in my fate, from the moment I was born as a young boy I was fated to become the woman that I now am. I understand why you did what you did, but I do not forgive you. Yes it was your fate to create me, first with the cruellest of cuts and then with the dragon's egg. I know that you could not have done otherwise. But, it was you that did it nevertheless. You uncoloured my world. You stole my love from me. Though you could not have chosen to do otherwise, choose to do as you did, you did. Whether I find my lost love or not, it is my fate to look for her, and that is what I choose to do." She laughed, I had not anticipated that response, but laugh she did, and that laugh signalled the end of our relationship, the game was up. "I bet the chief's son had a big surprise when you blew a hole in the wall" she chortled. "He looked like he was about to shit himself" I laughed back "But the look on your face was a picture too, just before you disappeared." "Yes, that was an 'oh shit' moment if ever there was one" she answered appreciating the irony of it all. In nearly a dozen years we had never shared a joke together. "Then this is the time for us to go our separate ways young sorceress" with that she finished our conversation, and rode away, to the court of the King of The West, I assume. 6. Finding (Five more years Later) I lay in the dark. I was so excited. I had never been so excited. I had fought dragons, I had defeated countless warriors, but I had never been so excited. I could feel she was close and she was coming to find me. I had waited so long to find her, so many years, but these moments were tantalising, delicious and agonising all at once. I lay on the bed in the dark, awaiting her. I had left the shutter open, I knew what she had become, and that this was the way to find her. There was no sound in the town, and she made no sound either, she was indeed as good as they said she would be. Silently she climbed up to the window and pulled herself slowly in to the room, dagger drawn. [alight] I called to the hundreds of candles I had left laying all around the room. As my chamber was drenched with light she rushed at me with the dagger. [restrain] I called and the curtains and the bedcovers twisted themselves around her to hold her back. She fought against their manacling and looked me hard in the face "I will kill you, you bitch, you stole my only love and I will have your blood if it is the last thing I do." It was wonderful to see her again, fifteen years had passed since I released her from my old mistress's capture. It was half a lifetime for us both and we had lost so much. I was overwhelmed with love for her. I looked on her and the sight of those familiar features was a relief to the eyes, I could be drenched by her image. Her brown hair was a little shorter, making a pleasant bob with her shoulders, more practical for an assassin I supposed than that long hair that she used to enjoy sitting on when we were together in our youth, but she had the same deep dark big brown eyes that you could drown in. "Do you not recognise me?" I asked of her softly, expecting more than was reasonable given the changes that had happened to me. "You are that twisted priestess from the western lands, that heartless priestess that would have killed me if he had no let me go" she barked at me with venom. "See me for who I am" I pleaded of her, tears starting to well in my eyes "Don't look at this face, look at how my expressions hold my thoughts, don't listen to my voice, listen to what I say and when and how I say it, listen to what it reveals of me, don't look in to these eyes, look beyond them in to my soul, see me." She shrieked a cry of recognition. [release] I instructed to the furnishings, and she dropped the poison coated dagger that she was brandishing. She spoke softly with gentle concern lifting one hand to cup the side of my face "My beautiful boy, what has she done to you?" I pressed my cheek in to her hand warming to the touch that I had missed for so long. "She could never do this. This is way beyond her powers, or even mine. This could only happen with design from a higher order." I explained, but I wanted to express how I felt "It is so great to see you, I have missed you so much for so long." "By all the Gods, I've missed you too" she spoke the words that I so needed to hear "but you're a woman, how can my love be a woman? All these years I thought you were dead. I stayed faithful to your memory. I stayed faithful to my beautiful boy, to the beautiful man he would have become. I tried not to dream that you were still alive, I secretly ventured in disguise back to the village, and no-one had heard from you. But much as I did not want to delude myself that there might be a hope that you were still alive, I could not give up that hope. No man, however handsome or charming, however powerful, friendly or wise could ever hold a candle to your memory. My days were grey then they became black. I missed you so much. I dreamed of this moment so many times, and so many times I shut it out of my thoughts for to dream of you too much is to make myself ill. But the thoughts kept returning. Different scenarios, different settings, I imagined it in so many ways. So many ways, but never like this. Where is my beautiful boy?" Her words cut deep and cut to the truth, I was all too aware of the shock that my transformation was to her. "I'm here" I replied whilst my eyes leaked "That part of me that makes me me, is here inside. My myselfness is the same distinguishing selfness that loved you and loves you still. To be me is to love you. Our immortal souls were cleaved apart at the dawn of time and we dance these strange mortal dances in these bodies in search of our wholeness. Whatever role I play, whatever shape I adopt I will always dance around you, you are my earth and I am the sun that rotates around you from the dawn of days to their dusk. Man, woman, cat, dog, fish or frog, I will love you. I have searched for you over the length and breadth of this land. I have been to every kingdom, I have ridden many horses to their deaths, and I found nothing. Then I realised that only the Dark Lord could shroud your light from me. So I have come here, brazen and exposed, as the druid priestess from the west. In every leaf on every tree, and in every sunset and every sunrise, and in every breath and every beating of my heart I see majestic beauty all around me. But the beauty means nothing without you, everything I sense is given value through you. I would love nothing more than a complete union of body and soul, but the design of the gods is against me, but if I only get the latter with you then I will still have been blessed beyond measure." We fell in to each other's embrace. We talked all night long, we laughed and cried, we shared secrets and dreams. We became deeply close again. It was enormously fulfilling and enormously frustrating. All the intimacy that we shared begged to be followed by sexual union, but we were women with women's desires. At dawn we fell asleep holding hands. I had been distraught to discover that she had been blighted by the same drab feeling of meaninglessness that I had experienced. I had learned how she became an assassin to survive. At first she had little money and inevitably made the acquaintance of some less desirable characters in her search for labour. The first man she killed had tried to rape her, and she despatched him with his own dagger, and when she killed a man in another fight just a short while later she realised she had an unusual if somewhat morally dubious gift. She took to bounty hunting in order to make some money, and after a while she developed a reputation which took her to the court of the Dark Lord. It was only when I had spent some time in the Dark Lord's domain that I heard rumours of an assassin that harboured a deep grudge over the Druid Priestess in the West. When I heard these words I was overjoyed as the design between the words told me that she was still alive. Our reunion was an immeasurable delight, but it was a reunion in a dangerous land, now we needed to escape from the Dark Lord's kingdom. The Dark Lord would never allow a sorceress come within his own city walls and take one of his best assassins. The game had further to play before this matter was finished. In moments like this I missed the counsel of my old mistress; her sly strategies could have been useful. My old mistress was full of guile whereas my strengths were more straightforward displays of brut sorcery, I needed inspiration. I awoke in the middle of the day and planted a soft kiss on the forehead of my sleeping love. I walked to the window to look over the Dark Lord's city, and I saw a city in flames half a world away. Amongst the chaos and confusion a man was fleeing the city carrying his father on his back. Deep fate beyond my ken was at work, but now I knew the part I must play. I would start several fires tonight and as the city burned we would flee cloaked in the confusion. 7. Agony "Wake up, wake up" an insistent anxious voice whispered close and tight in my ear. Once I was roused, the pain in my sides felt crippling. "I don't know if I can move" I confessed, but as our situation clarified itself in my consciousness it grabbed my full attention. We had been riding to the North West as we fled the Dark Lord's burning city, and that was all, I had blanked out. "The Dark Lord's dragon took you" whispered my love placing a finger to my lips "it picked you clean off the horse, I tracked you here, I think we are in its lair, but its nowhere to be seen. I have ridden nearly half a day and climbed the mountain to get here, have you been out all that time?" "It's playing with its prey" I whispered back "I can't weave an illusion that will fool a dragon." We were indeed on a mountain top. The landscape was made of giant jagged and craggy irregular rocks. It was bleak and lifeless with no surviving vegetation. I caught the occasional glimpse of bones and I concluded that my love was right, we were in its lair. "We need a good vantage point" I whispered to her painfully dragging my aching body to kneeling stance "We need to make sure we see it before it kills us." "If I can see the dragon first..." I continued, but I was stopped mid sentence when I realised that the wind was blowing a cloud in our direction. If we were consumed by the mist of the cloud then we would never see the dragon first. [rain] I commanded to the cloud, and as it came closer to us, and just before it came upon us it lost its thickness and dissipated. I breathed a sigh of relief too soon, the disturbance behind me almost stopped my heart as I realised that I had misdirected my attention. My worst fears were confirmed as I swivelled round to see a fearsome black beast with one claw stood on my love. With all the vigour and fever of the flame capped man I screamed [death] at the beast. It takes a lot of force to kill a dragon but I was not found wanting in the violence with which I administered this change in the fabric of nature. My expression captured all of my fear, all of my loving, all of my tortured wanderings and all of my hopes and dreams. The flesh on the creature withered and crumbled in to dust leaving just dry bones that clattered to the ground. I ran to my love and the entire world weighed on me, I fell to my knees in horror and despair. Just barely alive she looked me in the eye, unable to speak she spluttered blood from her mouth. She was too wonderful to die, she was too precious to die. If I ever starred in to the abyss it could not be worse than watching her drift away from me. No desolation could be worse than this. All the power and skill that I had, all the things that I could do were useless and valueless because I could not heal her. People would sell their souls to have a fraction of my abilities, but they were a curse not a blessing if in all my supposed grandeur I watched her die. "No Diana No" I begged open armed to the heavens "Save her, save her, this beautiful woman, this love, this perfect soul." In my wild frustration and anguish I screamed defiant acts of rage at the mountain, at nature and the world. I whipped up lightning storms, I blocked out the sun, I created wild winds and I smashed giant boulders to pieces, but for all my destructive force I had no ability to save her. I could destroy and I could kill but I could not heal, some things are left in the hands of the Gods. "Please Diana, please save her" I begged again more in hope than expectation as I knew the trivial lives of humans meant little to her, she cared only for power, influence and sacrifice. In my despair I realised that Diana would not answer my prayers because I was not her servant, I could not beg anything of her, but I could trade those things that matter to her. "If you want influence in this world of flux and change, then I will be your vassal. If you want sacrifice then I will bring maidens to the hill top. If you want worshipers then I will bring them to you, but save her, save her please" I pleaded to the heavens. 8. Redemption A piece of divine intervention can be subtle. There was no ray of light from the heavens; there was no booming voice from the clouds, just a sudden drop of illumination in my mind. I felt urged across the mountain top to a pile of bones, and I searched with rapid desperation through the bones. There at the bottom of the pile, jet black and just a little larger than a fist, was a dragon's egg. All the lights in the world were shining; I was lifted from desperation to urgent action, I knew exactly what to do. I scrambled back to my love with the egg in my careful care. The dragon's lair had treasure lying around and I picked up a gold coin and ordered it to warp in to the shape of a spoon. I made a small hole in the top of the egg and slowly spooned small quantities of the fluid in to my love's mouth. She was very weak, her consciousness was fading and her eyes were beginning to roll back in to her sockets. I kept her conscious will shouts, screams and slaps to the face. I raised her to a semi-sitting position, but she was still too weak to swallow. I spooned the foul fluid in her mouth mixing the green yolk with the surrounding white liquid, and I commanded her throat to swallow between her weak shallow breaths to avoid her choking. Slowly, all too agonisingly slowly, she began to regain some strength. Her eyes started to keep focus and she looked at me. Though I was still anxious these tentative signs were lifting my heart. "Drink, please, it will save you" I pleaded. I kept spooning the dragon's egg and she was now swallowing it by herself. "That is disgusting" she said with a look of revulsion. "Yes it really is, it's really disgusting" I replied delighted with her new strength. Her vigor was returning. "It's really disgusting, but it's saving your life, drink it all." I continued with a stern edge, but I was dancing inside. I put the eggshell to her mouth and poured the rest in as she swallowed it with revulsion. "By all Diana's light" she declared pushing the empty shell away "it might be better to die than to drink that stuff!" It was Diana's light indeed that had saved her and I was now fully and deeply in her debt. I had tried to avoid service to a deity and all the compromises that it involves, but now I was well and truly sold. I made the bargain without thinking, but it didn't need thought. I would need to do some terrible things, and the irony of sacrificing maidens was not lost on me, but I had gained the world. "Oh my love" she called, we embraced, we held each other tight. We held each other clammed together in the warm security of our love. Unspoken was the overwhelming relief from horror of what we might have lost. On a mountain top, far from all to see, isolated and alone we were so together, so united. "Treasure, dragon's have treasure!" she suddenly exclaimed, and I nearly fell over with laughter. "What?" she complained. "It's the dragon in you" I replied "You need to get the treasure thing out of your system, go on, and find some treasure." My little spring lamb skipped off in search of gold and jewels. I sat there in contemplation of Diana's design. Most priestesses and sorceresses would never see a dragon's egg in their whole lifetime, but I had seen two. Not only had I seen two, but I had caught them just in that optimum moment after laying where they could rejuvenate life. It would have been a very different matter if I had broken open the egg to find a creature in the advanced stages of development. This was Diana's design, and I wondered, how far back she had woven the threads of fate. Was the first Dragon's egg her design? Was my castration her design? Was my initial calling to the service of my old mistress her design? Had Diana adopted me long ago? Perhaps my old mistress had seen some of my fate for some time, it would explain her occasional acidity towards me. I reflected on the parting exchange between myself and my old mistress and wondered if she knew then that my service was bound to Diana. She would have seen that I was destined to become a far more powerful priestess than her. I wondered if she knew that when she fed me that egg, that she was creating me to Diana's design did she think she was casting away herself? I wondered if that was what she wept over, it was the end of her ascendancy that she had lost, not her warrior lover. At the moment of her great triumph over the dragon, just when she had won the influence of the King of The West, had she been commanded by Diana to step aside? I sat and pondered the intricacy of the web that Diana had entrapped me in, but it was no use trying to fathom the ways of the gods, they are creatures written in to the fabric of the world and we can never see from their perspective. My musings were interrupted by the welcome return of my glowing love. "Look what I've found" she proudly declared displaying her loot. 9. Resolution We could see the horsemen from some distance away. Robbers and vagabonds could be easily dispatched, but we approached with caution in any case. On descending the mountain, we picked up the horse that my love had ridden to the dragon's mountain. I sat behind my love on the horse holding her tight as we rode slowly. We stopped with a hundred yards between us and the riders. I dismounted so that I could see all the angles clearly. They approached at a canter and slowed as they came close. They were four unkempt and dishevelled men all with black beards and dressed in tattered leather and animal skins. "We will have our fun with you bitches" grinned the largest of the four to reveal a few remaining rotten and yellow teeth. The others grinned and shook deep chuckles. The display seemed like a ritual of male bonding rather than anything on our behalf. I rolled my eyes and considered the manner in which I might deal with these irritants, but as I deliberated my love drew a dagger and threw it in to the forehead of the leader, she pulled her sword and ran it through another and as the remaining two fled she chased after them spearing one and decapitating the other. She rounded on the decapitated man's horse, lassoing it and bringing it back to me. "We have another horse" she winked at me. "Wow" I uttered in dumbfound amazement climbing on the horse. "You are amazing" I said meaning it in many different ways. "Did you see the structure of that?" I asked after we had ridden on for a while leaving the corpses for the birds and the dogs. "The what?" she frowned back trotting on beside me. "When I ate a dragon's egg I started to see the underlying structure of the world, the real way of truth rather than the illusion of seeming" I explained "I just wondered if you could see that too and that's why you were able to do what you did. I mean, I know you're a great assassin, but that was something else?" "What are you on about?" she smiled in incredulity "Yeah it was good, and no I don't normally do that, but I didn't SEE anything, I just acted, it just sort of happened. It happened without thinking." "Are you seeing anything differently?" I wondered "I started to see all the beauty and wonder of the world after I ate the dragons egg, I just thought that something similar might happen to you." "No" she shrugged to my disappointment. "I feel pretty good though" she announced swaggering in the saddle "pretty damned good!" "Oh yeah" she continued after a brief pause "and as for all the beauty in the world crap, the beautiful thing around here is you." She had said that I was beautiful before, when we were first reunited, but now she was declaring it with a gruff edge to her voice. Previously it was just verbal furniture, but now it meant something, and it had an effect. I was flushing and adopting feminine poses and shooting side glances at her and playing with the rings in my hair. "Oh by Diana's grace" I shrieked as the answer came to me and I clasped a hand to my mouth and pulled my horse to a stop. "You all right petal?" she asked jumping off her horse to land by the side of mine taking the reins in hand. "Yes" I squeaked "I'm fine, are you?" "Yeah" she replied in a long drawn out quizzical note "never better, shouldn't I be?" "I can see what has happened now" I confessed. "Is this something that I should be concerned about?" she wondered lifting one eyebrow. "Maybe" I replied unsure of how she would take the news "I gained the sense of insight and I gained knowledge and I felt a beautiful communion with the world when I ate the dragon's egg, this hasn't happened to you. I think you might have eaten a different kind of dragon's egg. There was one other very significant change in me and I think that came about because I ate a female dragon's egg, I'm not so sure that you have." "Do you mean that I'm turning in to a man?" asked my love in confusion. "You're full of power and action, you're full of strength and will, and I'm starting to find you a bit sexy" I explained. "Quite a lot sexy actually" I corrected myself. My love starred at me lost for words as the truth sank in, I dismounted my horse and to compound the revelation and I stood in front of her now looking up at her. "You are looking pretty hot" admitted my love mixing concern and anticipation. I laid it all out as best I saw it, "If, or rather when, you do manly things and think manly thoughts you will accelerate the transition, but the transition is inevitable. You won't reverse the transition by doing feminine things. Your fate is set. You might as well leap, it will be easier for you." "I don't know what to think, I don't know how to take this" she said with furrowed brow "I should me more horrified than I am." She was in a state of confusion and the confusion could not do her any good, what was going to happen was going to happen, it might take moments or it might take a day, but happen it would. My own transition had been slow to begin with, but was accelerated and completed by the chief's son of a village far away a long time ago. Once the transition was made I was comfortable with the result so I felt like I needed to lead my love away from her perplexity. "If you kiss me now" I offered "it will be unstoppable." I stepped closer to my love, close enough to feel warm breath on me. I was feeling tingles of excitement and anticipation all over, this was a kiss I wanted more than anything else in the world. My lips were quivering and I looked up to my love, my love that I had loved for so long, my love that I nearly lost and my love that I yearned for. In the normal measurement of time, perhaps only a handful of heartbeats passed, but my heart was racing so it might have been many more, then I was kissed. Soft at first, I melted in to the kiss, welcoming it, absorbing the delight throughout my body. I pushed in to it shifting on to my tiptoes. Then with increasing vigour my love pressed our lips t