Curiosity of the Demon King Pt. 14

Fosi entered the study on Merrili's shoulder and Kaffe, sitting to the side, started to stand before a scowl from Fosi forced her back on her ass. Once she was settled in the big chair, Fosi dismissed Merrili kindly and waited for the maid to leave, for the door to solidly close, set her elbow on the desk and rested her cheek on her hand.

Kaffe said, "I'm sor-"

"Shut the fuck up." So much had happened since the court mage's departure, forcing Fosi to remain in her transformed state for days and days on end, enduring disgrace and abuse, molestation and violence that Avlakoi in his true form as the lord of all demons would never suffer. "Tell me why, apart from my inability to enact it, I shouldn't kill you here and now for what you've done."

"If I may speak," Kaffe said, straightening up in her seat. "I have been engaged in study for your sake, and I do have something I must discuss with you... This may be hard to-"

"I don't care!" Fosi barked. "Pretending you've done anything for my sake, treasonous witch, I should bite your throat out to stop your lies. At the first opportunity, you trapped me in this weak body and you've forced me to become a liar to those who are closest to me, and it is only that being held above my head which saves you from execution at my hand."

"I-"

Fosi slammed her fist on the desk, startling Kaffe. "Since you see fit to pretend loyalty, at least now you'll put your talents to use. I've been waiting for the day Avlakoi could once again walk among us, so that I may visit terror upon mine enemies."

She spoke of the preceding days, the visit of the boar demon king, the ouster of the drunkard liaison for the sacrificial omen of war which replaced him, the nights spent in the company of the boar demons, her kidnapping and subsequent rescue. And she spoke of the future, one which only Avlakoi could manifest by scale and claw. By the end, Fosi had nearly forgotten her anger, filled instead with the satisfaction that she would be able to take revenge for a new friend, cement a new reputation for her so-called "father". The days of laxity were nearly at their end, and those who had trodden on his kinder nature would at last learn that only the strong are permitted to be kind. There was fang in her smile as she explained reticent Kaffe's role in what would come to pass.

"Now." She sighed. "What is it that was so important that you could abandon your position here without so much as a word of permission? Tell me of another environmental survey or anything of its like, and you might not leave this room."

Kaffe was biting her lip, there had been fire in her eyes since the beginning of Fosi's story, but she'd held her tongue, held back her venom. "That bastard Vormise has gone too far!" she snapped through gritted teeth, fangs scraping against one another. "We'll burn down the capital, the forests, stain the ground with blood that won't wash out for ten generations! I'll have his head preserved on a pike for what he's done to you, however many heads you want. No, crucifixion, put on display and carted to the palaces of the other vassal kings until there is nothing but bone held to the planks with rotting ropes and a stench that was once the festering, maggot-ridden bodies of the former boar king's entire family!" There was blood trickling from the site of her clenched fingers on her thighs.

"You understand my feelings at least, it seems," Fosi said. It felt like all of her anger had been shouldered by the other woman, now all that remained was execution. Never mind that the question had been ignored, it could wait. "Have arrangements made for the journey."

-o-

It was uncertainty in Suvir's heart as she rode in the demon king's personal carriage. The journey from her father's kingdom to the small territory claimed by Avlakoi had been cramped and silent but for the grumbling of the assassins pulling her along the rocky ground, had felt far longer than the distance actually was. This time she wasn't weighed down by the knowledge of her impending death, but she did find herself reaching for the calming hand of Lady Fosi, only to find her missing and replaced by... It didn't feel cramped, the carriage was built to the specifications of the demon king after all and it was not made for him bow his head, but he did fill the space on the other side. It had been explained to Suvir that, for safety reasons, the father and daughter couldn't be in one place at the same time, but Suvir would have liked a buffer between herself and this gigantic, implacable man.

The draconic face turned down to regard her, slit pupils growing to give her his majesty's full attention. She didn't know how she was going to last the next week in his presence, or why he'd insisted on her being with him when there were plenty of seats in the other carriages for those who were not marching. At least sir Caelic was right outside if she needed him...

... She did still find it uncomfortable to sit, after being with that man the day before...

"She has told me about you." Avlakoi's voice boomed from within his massive chest as if it were coming from far away, more humble and more humbling than Suvir had expected.

"I'm sorry..."

What she saw on his face couldn't be a smile, a scaly face like his didn't have the flexibility for it. He said, "Everyone seems to be apologizing to me recently. My daughter tells me that you saved her life, no matter the circumstances that led to it being endangered, that is worth giving thanks. As for the rest, your father's crimes belong to him alone. You may relax, please."

"Y-yes sire."

His butt shifted in the seat... did his hips hurt for some reason as well?

"There is no need to worry," he said. "I am far more capable than my daughter, in this way, and I will honor her promises to you and your safety."

"... Right... I don't doubt you, sire."

Avlakoi sighed and looked up to the ceiling. "And don't take what you hear at face value."

"W-what do you mean?"

"I am not the kind to take just any woman who catches my eye. That aside, I would not break something that my daughter values so heavily, and that is what a union between us would mean. You may rest assured, princess."

Despite the fear it had to bore through, laughter bubbled up to her lips and her composure shattered. "Hahaha, you're nothing like I thought! No wonder the other kings don't respect y-" She clapped her hands over her impertinent mouth, she'd been far too prepared to insult this man for days on end.

"We're alone," he rumbled. "Laugh, it's funny. Then, once you've finished laughing, think about the other kings and whether their respect is valuable."

Suvir giggled.

"What is it?"

"You sound just like she does, your daughter. She said nearly the same thing to me just the other day to soothe my nerves. I suppose we know where she gets it from."

The king nodded solemnly. "It is natural that one's progeny would follow in one's own footsteps, but not predestined in the slightest. My father would bite my head off if he heard me speaking like this, if I let him, that is. But then I've long since forgotten a desire for his approval." Was he showing her consideration, even more similar to Fosi? "The only way forward is to surpass our fathers and their fathers, or else wallow in the same mud that our ancestors did, under the weight of their problems. Say, have you ever been in the human lands for any reason?"

"No, sire."

"The sons and daughters of humankind are coddled for years on end, before they even prove they are strong enough to survive, and yet they have beat back our forces on every occasion after a long struggle, further back than written history. I have heard stories of some villages who leave misshapen babes in the woods for the animals, others where food is so scarce that children aren't given names until they're large enough to provide for themselves, but even in these cases, they live lives more comfortable than ours. And then they are stronger than us in the end."

"Pff," Suvir scoffed. "That's only because they have the gods on their side. Once you yourself overcome that barrier and kill their champion, I know the rest of them won't stand a chance. If not, why have we been breeding warriors in the first place?"

"A true believer, are you? It hardly matters, or will matter for many decades. You may not live to see the next iteration of the great war... Shall we speak of something lighter for a change? I hear that you've taken a liking for that wolfman walking beside us." His voice had come down to a conspiratorial whisper, though it seemed hard for him to be quieter than normal speech, what with those lungs.

"Who tol-" Suvir squirmed nervously and it did nothing to alleviate the pounding ache in her hips. "He's nice, I didn't expect that... He's a friend." How this man would react to her true feelings, and for whom, she didn't want to test.

"I'll admit that kindness wasn't a part of the hiring process, but I am glad to see it when I do. It is important that we do not lose focus and throw away something more important along with it by spending ourselves as nothing but warriors and whores... That isn't what I mean."

"I understand, sire." How was he this humble with a girl he'd never met before that day?

"... We've gone back to a heavy subject, haven't we?"

"Yes, sire..."

Silence ruled the space for minutes on end as the massive draconic figure closed his eyes and thought deeply. Suvir felt he might have simply gone to sleep, so sure of his armored scales that it wouldn't matter to him that a near stranger, fresh from enmity with him, was right there. Nobody had searched her when she came to the carriage, Lady Fosi had encouraged her to bring that dagger along, sheathed at the small of her back, and she felt they wouldn't have cared.

There were still poisons that worked on those with prominent dragon blood... Fosi herself had shown her how to pierce a defense like this... They trusted her so quickly...

"Tell me," Avlakoi said, coming back to the conversation from a long way off. "What styles are in fashion right now, that you like?"

"Are you interested in fashion, sire? What you're wearing now is-" Brutalist? Barbaric? Barely clothing? "-just a hide wrap... Maybe something made of cloth?"

"For my daughter. She isn't used to wearing clothes yet..."

Suvir felt herself blush and fought to swallow down the mental image of lady Fosi in the nude, from the tips of he toes, up her creamy thighs and her the firm swell of her... to the tips of those fingers, that clumsy, searching touch of hers... Gulp. "L-lady Fosi would look good in anything, sire." Or nothing at all, especially in nothing at all... Maybe just a ribbon......

"I have seen parts of her wardrobe," Avlakoi said. "I can't appraise any of it by myself. I had no interest in clothing until I was a soldier, and then only because I needed to gird my loins for battle. Some opponents wouldn't balk at aiming to end a man's family line..." He stopped and looked away as if he were embarrassed, Suvir couldn't compare her initial idea of this man to the way he was now.

She lifted her hand and presented her fingers to show off the glossy paint Merrili had applied before their departure, only the pinky nail left its natural black. "I think this type of thing is stylish, sire." A type of adornment which couldn't be torn off by a forceful lover, not nearly as permanent as a tattoo, more subtle than stained patterns.

"Yes, I've seen flashes of color like that more and more recently. I'm told the humans use it as a way of strengthening their nails against splitting, hardly a concern for our kind. But it is pretty."

"If she'd allow it, I would be glad to practice on Fosi's nails, when she comes back..." Overjoyed to hold her hands that long...

Avlakoi bent down into the space between them and brought his head to bear. Suvir felt like a trapped animal, but some feeling in his gaze was too familiar to intimidate her for long. After a time staring into her eyes, he said, "If you have the supplies and the will, you may practice on me."

-o-

The lands of the boar demons, for generations going as far back as the first allies of the first demon lord, as far as mythology and archeology could tell, had been the forested lands of the North. Avlakoi's procession passed through logging operations where broad-shouldered boar men lugged massive double-headed axes on one shoulder and felled trees on the other, soldiers and spies hidden within them by the vassal king. Just at the border, Avlakoi knew that there was an invading force already mustered, hoped they did not see fit to attack.

For their sakes, they should stay hidden.

But just as the wheat had to be taken in, come war or peace, so too did the crop of trees have to be cut down once matured. Already there could be seen among the burly workers their children, too young and scrawny for logging, digging holes and planting new saplings for the next harvest in neat rows. No creature made of nothing but brutish simplicity and violence would live past their first generation, centuries of profit had honed this people into proper stewards of the woods besides. Here and there Avlakoi could make out the features of a lesser clan among the workers, bat ears, a bull's tail, goatish curled horns. He preferred not to think on the matter of how they'd come to have them.

He forcefully imagined that each of those men had a mother back at their village whose race was naught but an academic matter.

More likely, these were the children of raiders.

By his side, Suvir was propped up on her knees upon the seat cushion with a brush and a glass pot of paint, humming to herself, and he saw that this was good. She'd been so tense when he first sat down, and she had seemed an adorable thing even to Fosi, who was much closer to the princess' size. It had hurt to see her cowering in fear from him.

The brush didn't tickle. He couldn't feel it nearly at all through his scales, only the pressure of Suvir's palm where she rested her hand for stability. She'd had the idea that just doing his claws wasn't good enough, when he had these big, nice scales to use as a canvas.

Red, perhaps, hadn't been the best choice. It was darker red than his own scales, but by the unskilled application apparent on his claws, he felt he must look splattered with fresh, wet blood. He laughed under his breath.

If Fosi really had been his daughter, he wished that he would have been able to do this with her. For that, Suvir would make for an acceptable substitute. And this substitute wouldn't be put in nearly as much danger as a real daughter of his blood. But then, he couldn't have been like this with a real daughter no matter what; this was a special treat.

This area was nicer than the brambles surrounding his own castle, both because it needed to be, and it had the opportunity to be. The logging industry needed to foster and suffer the smaller plants and the animals that came to live around and within their crop, it would take decades for any region to see fruit from their labor and would not if not for the life and death of animals for fertilizer, the soil-stabilizing power of smaller roots retaining scarce water.

Avlakoi thought it a decent metaphor of the race. The largest men became so thanks to the contributions of those considered weeds. Then, when it came time to cut down the largest specimens, the weeds and the sprouts were left for another season to rise up.

There at his side, now heartrendingly happy, Suvir was a sapling under the shade of her father's branches, used for his benefit. It was fake, Avlakoi's fatherhood, but he looked upon this girl and felt rage the like of which led to a turning over of nations. A lesser man would be thinking of genocide, salting the earth and razing what still lived as an example to others, but Fosi wouldn't want that for the people of her new friend, and so Avlakoi restrained his impulses. But he could not restrain his blood, sending up fantasied retribution.

In time, the sun set and Avlakoi's errant court settled into camp for the night. A couple dozen men needed only two fires and as many beasts roasting above them. Avlakoi ate sparingly with Suvir sitting daintily on his lap, his painted claws glistening in the firelight and drawing fearful glances. Perhaps a different color would have looked less like he'd just finished disemboweling someone, indeed. One pair of eyes wouldn't leave him from across the fires; it wouldn't be possible to push that man away much longer, and Avlakoi hooked his chin as signal before nudging Suvir off and retiring to his tent.

Peris entered quietly and bowed his head only an inch. "You know why I'm here," he said.

Avlakoi crossed his legs and sat on the ground, allowing the two of them to see eye to eye. It was funny to him, even as Fosi, he hadn't been able to naturally look straight at this man. "I promise only to hear your request and consider it properly before giving you my final answer. I do not expect to be disturbed by this again, should I refuse."

Of course I'll refuse! There's no future in any kind of relationship between Peris and my alter ego... If she were actually my daughter and not me, there wouldn't be anything to consider, I'd have given her over at the first mention of his desire for a wife. He must think I have come to hate him, the way I've been forced to act...

"Sire. I do not know if you have heard the rumors, her and the beast man."

"I am aware that she has lain with Caelic, her knight, yes."

Peris' lip twitched. "Your opinion?"

"Have you ever asked one of the succubi their opinion of our more beastly brothers?"

"I don't see what that has to do with anything."

"Then," Avlakoi said with an angered rumble, "what would you say if I took any demon I pleased at any moment? Even an atavist woman?"

"That would be your right as king." Peris' tone shifted. "It would bring honor to any woman you chose, and I would think nothing less of you no matter what sort of woman it was."

"And a man?" What in Hell's name am I saying?

The question hung in the air between them, as neither man could believe they'd heard that correctly.

Peris closed his eyes and carefully said, "My lord, you of all people in existence may have any pleasure this world can provide to you, free from the restriction of culture, opinion, or morality."

"Don't quote scripture to me. My friend, tell me what you would think of me lying with a man, by choice."

"I-" He took a moment to maintain composure. "As you wish, my lord."

"My friend," Avlakoi said more softly, dismayed, "speak to me from that position once more and you will forever be my servant."

Peris knelt and punched the ground. "What do you want me to say!? I've seen you fuck men before!" Peris whispered harshly, not so quiet that one pressing their ear to the canvas of the tent couldn't hear them. "I hated it too, but sometimes a rout doesn't cut it. I've seen the men you've broken, I've done it myself and retched afterward."

The realities of war against demons, their body or their spirit must be broken...

"No, not that either." Avlakoi uncomfortably shifted in his seat, Fosi's injuries still troubled him, but this body was strong enough to withstand it with mild discomfort. "If I had chosen to lie with a man, taking on the female role. Speak."

"This isn't a good joke."

"Then, do you hate my daughter for lying with another man?"

After all that, Peris wound down, put his elbow on his folded knee and rested his chin on his fist. "So that's where you were going with that. Red, you shouldn't do that to a man, I was about to punch you and hurt my hand. No, of course I don't hate her. I don't have any right to her, when I-" He stopped short.

Say it.

Peris sat quietly for a while, then sighed and bent double, placing his forehead on the ground. "Sire, I must ask that you give me forgiveness for my sins against you and yours."

"You forced yourself on her, once, whilst drunk," Avlakoi said simply, and Peris stared dumbfounded from his supplicant position. "She told me." I'm sorry, my friend, that I must still lie to you.  "I have long since forgiven you, but it was worthwhile to allow you to stew for a time. Her mere existence was revealed to me only that day by Kaffe, I am yet now less than a real father to her, even in the subtle way that a demon may be."

Peris touched his throat. "That bit of jewelry around your neck, it's the same that she wears at all times, only the scale is different."

"A matched set which allows me to switch places with her through some magic. She is now in a safe place, where I have been cultivating power, so well hidden that she would not be found in a hundred years, should I die." Avlakoi leaned forward and placed a massive hand on his friend's shoulder. "I know that you intended to save her, if it happened that I could not fulfill the prophecy and my progeny were to be hunted down for my sins. I thank you, but that isn't needed, and I wouldn't subject the two of you to a loveless marriage for my sake."

"I-"

"And you forget your place, anyway. When I die, if I die, you should be my right hand, fighting the human champions by my side. Were you to marry her, she would still be left alone at that time, in the event of our failure."

With significant effort, the incubus prince of goats pushed Avlakoi's hand off of himself. "When I first made the offer, I wasn't thinking straight. You had left her in the company of men and women alike that weren't so much as even your allies, much less hers. Even before that event, she has been and will be in danger from forces who wish to do you harm... It was by her constant effort that she has gained the trust and friendship of the garrison, the succubi, and the so-called bean counters who you endlessly frustrate by leaving your work unfinished. I've made my opinion about her perfectly clear to the nobility, only Vormise was too stupid and reckless to go against you once you had an opening."

"Then you have no reason to continue. Is it your pride driving on the proposal?"

After a quiet minute, Peris put his hand to his chest and took a deep breath. "I love you, and I love her."

Avlakoi said nothing. Fosi's heart thrummed in his chest.

"Of course, I'm not asking to be taken by you," Peris added quickly. "I love you like a brother, and her like a niece. No, not quite like a niece. If you give her to me as a wife, I vow that I would make her happy, I would protect her with my life... I would protect her to my dying breath either way."

"I love you as well," Avlakoi said quietly.

"Then-"

"But I cannot give her to you."

Peris rose to one knee. "Nothing is impossible to you, my lord."

"I will not."

Defeated, Peris hung his head. And he sighed with a kind of relief as he sank back onto a pillow, then reached for a bottle of wine. He flicked the cork out, destroying it on purpose, it wouldn't be needed again. "Then, if I can somehow get her to love me? What say you then?" He drew heavily from the bottle and passed it over to share in his grief.

Avlakoi let an equal amount pass his lips, then more; his friend had nowhere near his tolerance for the social poison.

"You are wrong," he said as he passed the bottle back.

"Eh?"

"She does love you..." I do love you...  "From before you two met, she's loved you. She knows everything that I've told her about you. If I'd known of her existence from the day she was born, she would have grown up on stories of the fierce knight Peris, the golden curled horns who stood by her father faithfully through hundreds of battles."

"You haven't been around lately." Peris subtly clicked his tongue before upending the bottle again. "I'm sure she's afraid of me."

If I have my way, you will never know why.  "She has her reasons for acting the way she has. That needs to satisfy you for now."

"If that is my lord's instruction."

"It is your brother's request."

Peris nodded and emptied the bottle.

The two emptied bottle after bottle while recounting shared stories, laughing heartily where facts diverged and painted one or the other in the better light. Sobering dawnlight filtered through the tent's flap and roused two pounding heads. Peris had at some point fallen asleep while leaning on Avlakoi's arm, the man's touch was comforting, even in this form...

-o-

The capital city of the boar king was a lavish place, appeared to be. Vormise was a demon's demon; his city was a treasure, a feast for the eyes, with no end to the treasury for whitewash, paint and colorful banners. Coming from a place like this, it was clear why Suvir had reacted so negatively to Avlakoi's castle out in the central badlands. Even the people here, servant and master alike, dressed as nobility in expensive dyes and new fashion.

It was once one looked closer, at all, that the illusion fell apart. Paint chipped wherever it wasn't in direct view of the street, banners fluttered with ragged edges, and clothing that seemed to be the latest fashion was clearly made from the torn and patched remains of last season's. Those who lived here couldn't keep up with their lord's expectation. In Avlakoi's own demesne, he had allowed petition from men wearing nothing but a threadbare rag more than once.

Wearing a threadbare rag, the great demon lord Avlakoi entered the capital city and let all eyes land upon him. Those guards who thought they had hidden beyond his sight around the corners were intelligent enough not to bar his path. He walked alone toward the palace; Suvir should not be forced to see what he intended to do to her father, no matter the strained relationship there between them, and Avlakoi felt confident that Peris and Kaffe could guarantee the safety of her and the rest of the small group taken from the garrison. It wouldn't come to that.

Bringing along the garrison wasn't necessary, this wouldn't be the war that Vormise had been hoping for. Avlakoi intended not to let near that amount of blood flow. This was a conflict between the families of two men; he'd seen from the bottom just how many families could be destroyed by what the nobility would consider a small battle, disregard as the cost of politic. So, Avlakoi held a large bottle in one clawed hand and a small box in the other. It must have been confusing to those reporting on his slow advancement that he didn't come with a sword over his shoulder or an army at his back; how Vormise would respond, that would hardly matter.

Weeks ago, wouldn't he have gone out with just that? Weeks ago, Vormise would know all too well what an aggressive action against his lord would achieve. Fosi wouldn't like for her father to go on a rampage, even for her own sake. She'd had a blessed childhood away from him and his world. He'd existed only in her bedtime stories, knowing how great of a man her father was meant to be, the fulfillment of prophecy. His daughter was blessed to have been apart from her people, how much more blessed would she be if she'd cut off her tail and sawed off her horns, never come to this place?

Avlakoi sighed and continued down the street, the palace rising in his vision over a swell in the ground. There was to be no equilibrium between man and demon, neither ancestors of Heaven nor Hell would allow that. By the refinement of atavism, expansion, devouring hordes and roiling combat, the demon lands were a festering boil upon the surface of the world, purification through infection.

Men and women felt the approach of the demon lord, windows shuttered, doors slammed shut. Such confusion. The appearance of any dragon-kin was cause for concern and rightfully so. A sliver of draconic blood deep within pointed out how flammable this city was, reminded Avlakoi of the taste of roasted pork. His retort: the people here were either starved or fed for martial purpose, stringy meat, gamy meat. The nobility would be fatter. The crackle of rendered fat on an open fire. His fangs emerged unbidden and his mouth watered.

While he daydreamed, he came to the entrance of the palace, and he went in past the guards. These, too, did not dare cross their spears in his path. Marble pillars, his talons left scratches in the floor, and he went to a courtyard garden containing a table far too small for his frame.

He waited. Some servants became wise and brought a seat appropriate for the visiting dignitary's stature. It was, in fact, large enough, a signature of caution.

The boar king arrived soon on their heels, holding back only long enough to avoid looking like he had rushed for the sake of another. He sat without an ounce of weakness showing. Never show weakness, least of all when you are weak.

"How nice of you to come all this way to speak with me in person," Vormise said. Saying: I don't see you as a threat, you're soft.

Avlakoi set the bottle he'd brought on the table with a loud thump. The weight of it threatened to overturn the furniture. He added the box on the other side as if that would balance it. "It has been years since I've visited, I could not pass up the opportunity. The last time, I believe I was working under the snake king's orders, we took down two of your towers and a few hundred troops before negotiations started. Strangely, you never once seemed thinner as the siege continued."

Vormise's lip curled in disgust. "No real king lacks for food."

"Or children, it seems. How many sons was it that you have?"

"Four." Vormise spat.

"Including bastards?"

"Ha! Who counts those? Dozens, hundreds perhaps."

Avlakoi waved for two glasses and popped the cork on his bottle with the tip of a claw. He noticed Vormise's gaze follow the lethal appendage throughout the pour of the blood-red liquid. "And daughters? I'll tell you that my own daughter is very fond of your Suvir. I'm taking her."

"We both know what's happening here," the boar king said quietly. "Yes yes, the prettiest of my daughters, so much like her mother. The only pretty one that sow was able to put out. Human concubines are hard to come by these days, milord, and they are so fragile. Barely one litter and the whore went limp. Better, though, the screams were getting on my nerves. Four litters later, a daughter worth keeping hold of."

What some people would boast about...

Vormise took the first filled glass and quaffed it in a single motion, wine staining his fur. "It's a good year, tart. What? You can't seriously be mad about a little prodding. I've heard legend of high kings who undertook to be attacked throughout their entire reign as a method of practice for war; my forces wouldn't stand up against you and your personal might, and you know it."

"And so you sought to sacrifice your daughter for that."

"What else is a daughter good for? Trade, sale, breed; the sons carry the blood and the daughters carry the seed, as my own father once said. When I heard that a daughter was endowed with your political power, of course I would jab at it."

Avlakoi filled the boar king's glass again and put his hand atop it to keep the volume from vanishing down the man's throat instantly. "Which is the first among your sons, the one who will inherit your kingdom?"

The boar king sat back and considered it as though none of his boys' names were close at hand. "Pate."

"Have him brought here."

"It may take some time."

"I will wait, and so will you, with a dry throat."

A servant scurried off at Vormise's direction and the two kings sat together in silence. The sun went on by degrees overhead over the hours they waited until a heavily-muscled model of a demon strode into the garden with an axe hefted upon his shoulder, naked from the waist up. Pate looked quite like what Vormise would have in his younger years, when a powerful body was still required of him and no amount of food could sate his activity.

Pate came to his father's side and took a knee, notably keeping a hand on the axe handle in the way that he could strike at any moment against the intruder. That such an attack would bounce off seemed not to cross his mind, for this was a matter of honor.

"This," Avlakoi started, opening the box on the table and revealing the powder within, "is an acid which, when it reaches the bloodstream, causes the blood itself to separate into its component parts. In every case that I've seen it ingested, the subject of the test was dead within seconds, and that this would happen with only a few grains." He offered the box toward Pate. "Pinch some from the pile, and add it to the glass of wine on the table. Be sure that you do not touch your fingers to your mouth or your eyes until they have been thoroughly washed, and wash with running water, not a basin. There is no safe dilution."

The muscular prince looked to his father for permission and the boar king looked as though he'd clout his son for daring to even briefly disobey. Two cautious, black-nailed fingers crept over the rim of the box and Pate retrieved a tiny portion of the toxic powder, held it far from his face as he dropped it into the glass.

Immediately, the wine separated, became caustic smelling vinegar. One could only imagine what would happen within the body if one were to consume the same trifling amount, more than Avlakoi had claimed. Would the acids in the stomach become as cheese, nerves fray and muscles tear themselves from the bone like stewed meat? Pate's fingers tightened around the handle of his axe, but attacking the demon lord in all his glory would as certainly death as drinking poison...

Vormise threw out his hand to gasp the axe for himself, set it peacefully on the table. The wood beneath all this weight groaned for relief. "Have you come all this way to make me sacrifice my firstborn son instead?"

"No."

"Then what?"

Avlakoi drank his own glass and poured out another, leaving Vormise to remain thirsty with the poison within his reach. "In the old days, a new prospective demon king, proclaimed by Hell, would first, before anything else, go to the capitals of each clan's king. There, he would obtain veracity by threatening to kill the noble family, and from the records this was normally expected to be pure ceremony, theatre. I did not, as you well know. I was content to secret myself away in preparation for the battle to come, and leave you all to your petty squabbles without me. Now, you mean to throw your army against mine, to die by my hand, but your excuse is no longer in effect."

"And?"

"And I believe we can show your fealty in another way, with only a little blood. Drink."

The boar king's eyes shot to the disgusting, frothy liquid left as a reaction with his wine. It was fortunate for him that his kind had fur to cover the warmth leaving his face.

"You have a successor picked out, do you not? Go on then, make him a murderer, become a true sacrifice so that your blood will remain as the rulers over this land." Avlakoi leaned in, his claws dug into the tabletop. "Drink, and leave this all to your son, or refuse and be the only survivor of what will come. The daughter that you callously threw away to prod uselessly against me shall rule instead, and you will never again see anything more than the walls of my dungeon. Prove the fealty of your bloodline, atone for your sins against me and demonkind through me, and sit in the halls of Hell with the honored ancestors to await the opening of the gates. And know all the while that I am merciful."

Pate said softly, "Father..." He began to rise, but Vormise's hand caught him across the face and he sprawled out on the ground.

To Avlakoi's surprise, the boar king took up the glass and drained it in as swift a motion as he had done with the unspoiled wine before. Minutes passed as father and son considered mortality, then minutes more until Avlakoi likewise spoiled his own drink and threw it back.

"Disgusting, isn't it?" he asked, though this body's tongue could hardly tell how bad it was. "Entirely safe, but disgusting."

Four beady eyes regarded the regality of the demon lord coming to his feet and rolling his neck.

"You've died, in a way. I have to thank you for this lesson in governance: I've neglected my duties by allowing confusion as to who is your ruler. I see now that the nobility must be provided a firm hand." Avlakoi took the axe from the table and brought the blade hard against his shoulder, left the bent steel edge where he'd taken it from and made certain the prince met his gaze. "I have not taken a personal interest in the function of my vassals and their lands, and that shall now stop. You have forgotten, because I felt that a territory produces more for its own benefit than the benefit of a faceless authority or the whole of a race, that these are my lands first and foremost."

"Yes, my lord..." the son said.

"And if you feel otherwise," Avlakoi said, spreading his claws, "you may, in the fashion of our shared ancestors, try to take any inch of it from me. Never again through a proxy, never again against my family. You will send word of an intent to conquer, and we will meet on the field of battle like men. And then you will die an honorable death."

He would not allow them a chance to retort, to plead for mercy or test the limits of his patience. Avlakoi spread his wings and threw the garden into shadow as he summoned a wind to carry him off into the sky and away from the disgusting place, back to the arms of his allies.

-o-

The garrison was allowed to go into the city to restock provisions and spend their earnings on souvenirs. It would have been long enough for any of them since starting work in the demon king's peasant castle that they'd have excess to waste on trinkets and baubles. A few men intended to go in and find the nearest brothel, as one might expect of any man, but Avlakoi was heartened not to hear any plans to go in and simply drag the first attractive woman spotted into an alley.

There was still work to be done in the area, but Avlakoi of all people know how many willing partners could be found in his castle, how much more placid a man would be after the act...

He knew firsthand...

...

On his orders, some pretty things were purchased for Suvir and he presented them to her on the way home. She'd come to the peasant castle with so few of her own things, and it was his intention to give her some which would remind her of her old home. They might be bittersweet memories, but a sense of comfort spread over her over time as she mellowed out beneath a woolen blanket, lying with her head on his thigh.

Fosi likely wouldn't have been able to keep her hands off the princess... Avlakoi gently caressed her cheek with the flat side of a claw, but it wasn't nearly enough; he could hardly feel the spring of her skin under his touch.

So the trip was uneventful, tension lost. The sky was becoming dim when they passed the threshold and Avlakoi carried a sleeping Suvir in his arms to his bedroom, lamented that he had to release the soft weight that had been slumped over his arm. If that was what it would be like to have a daughter of his own, a real one, he was tempted...

"My lord." Kaffe appeared in the doorway and beckoned him to follow her.

And they were alone in the study once again, and his fury began welling up anew.

"You weren't here. I would have easily been able to deal with all of this, but Fosi had to instead, because you weren't here."

"I am sorry." Kaffe looked on from the middle of the room as Avlakoi set himself down in the couch. She wasn't a danger, to him, when he was in this form, even without the magics bestowed on him by his position, he would have been able to rush her before she could utter a spell, and his own skill in the craft was a certain protection itself. But she didn't look at all like she wanted a fight, seemed to have trouble meeting his eyes. "I was doing important work..."

"It had better have been."

Kaffe went to his desk and set down her bags, pulled a parchment roll from one and came to the table beside the couch with it clutched in paled fingers. "Tracing the origins of that artifact, that one... It was recovered from the hoard of another king, long dead, and I was not able to find any indication that it was used while it remained in his possession, not for its intended use."

"Hmm." Avlakoi's hand went to his neck and a talon raked across the metal loop there. It hadn't been mentioned more than the once that the demon king was wearing jewelry these days, a warrior king festooned with gold and jewels wasn't entirely uncommon imagery anyway... And for Fosi... Women wore pretty things and that was that.

"I was, however," Kaffe continued, "able to find it within portraits going back a few hundred years, worn by the head concubine of each generation."

She unfurled the parchment across the table. On it there were numerous copied prints, scaled down mechanically or by her accurate eye, of draconic succubi under the arms of their mate. In each one, the choker lay on the skin in just the way it did when Fosi wore it, too tight to take off without breaking the artifact entirely. That was apparent despite the evolution of artistic license displayed.

Kaffe spoke as Avlakoi perused the gallery and confirmed his suspicions. "I say it was never used for its actual purpose, but it was used frequently enough to be written of in some scattered documents. 'The royal collar' is an item given unto the bearer of their king's first son as a reward and token of her service; once donned, the collar cannot be taken off without the death of the wearer, and it comes free immediately then. One source recalls an incident in which a maidservant took it from storage to try on in secret; they did try to take it off without killing her, I imagine the execution was incipient in any case but, when they managed to remove it, it caused so much damage to the metaphysical substructure of her soul that she died on the spot.

"On every other occasion, it was an honor bestowed only once in a woman's lifetime, and lasted the remainder of such. The earliest document I was able to find placed it in the so-called treasure vault of Hell's delivery."

Avlakoi interrupted, "There is no such place, we would have found it after a few millennia searching. The vault of the first king, brimming with artifacts of unimaginable power forged in the days when the power of creation still washed across the land by the hand of He who fell from divinity. It's a myth."

"I have seen it."

There were no words as Avlakoi looked up from the parchment to his court mage. She was shaking, but her gaze was filled with near-giddy determination.

"I have seen it," Kaffe repeated. "Within a fissure, carved into the interior of a geode of incredible size, there was His castle. The wind itself tried to waylay me, my compass spun out of control, and the scrying spells I attempted did nothing more than give me a headache... If I hadn't known what I was looking for, and I hadn't seen the metaphysical construction of that thing around your neck, I would have thought it was just an area of concentrated miasma and gone around it. It wasn't even a ward, it was something from before warding spells, something greater and more mysterious. It was a working on the next level, a level and at a scale that no mortal mage of the current age could hope to achieve in their life. I barely fought through it, hiking along the ground, until I arrived and at once it felt as though I had passed some test, the air cleared and I could breathe again. It was a creation that magic was developed to emulate, a miracle..."

The fury within Avlakoi vanished in an instant. "You're telling me you found the birthplace of all demonkind..."

Kaffe nodded, but she did not smile. "It was looted out long ago. All that remains there are traps and unlucky skeletons. Whatever treasure hunters did find the place, they were careful not to reveal the source of their newfound wealth. Who knows, if we could see the beginnings of each royal line, we might find grave robbers. But what was not of interest to them, was not taken away." She dug out a second roll and spread it atop the first.

It appeared to depict a small human figure standing on a cliff, extending a number of bright treasures toward a draconic presence which filled the remainder of the sheet. In the tiny figure's hands, a rod of some sort, and a ring...

"In reality," Kaffe said, "the relief pictured here appears on a wall eighty feet long and thirty high, and it is the fourth in a set. You already must know the story on the preceding three, though I do have copies of every one I found."

"Of course. The first king, betrayed by Heaven and thrown down, cast the souls of his allies into the shapes of demonkind, to become the ancestors of each clan. To a one, they were given the forms of fierce beasts, and he became the first dragon."

Kaffe smiled sadly. "That is the version you would have heard from the dragon clan, as much I expected. According to these depictions-" She laid out the copied pages in sequence and ran her finger along with the story while she told it. "-the first king clawed against his descent to Hell and managed to incarnate as a human child. Alone in a world without our kind, he became like a hero among men, a king in all but name as he grew and learned of his true nature, his history. When he was quite aged, he created a number of artifacts, and met a natural dragon.

"Of course, I'm only reading off pictographs, so I can't ascertain his motives, excepting those that have passed on through our histories. Here, you can see him offering a ring to this dragon, and in the next picture..." Kaffe spread it out, and Avlakoi's heart sank. "A queen for a king. Then, in the next few pictures, more of them. This was the diaspora of demonic blood, spread through marriage... The ring you're wearing now, the form that you have been taking, it is a thing as ancient as you now think."

Avlakoi tugged at it, but it would not budge from his scales even far enough for him to see it. "What have you done to me?"

"Nothing." Kaffe put away the pages, their purpose fulfilled, likely to save them from a wayward spark coming her way, and sank onto her knees before Avlakoi. "I knew nothing about it when it was taken in. I knew next to nothing about it until this investigation. If any other of us were its victim, we would never have sought out its origin..."

"You have been changing my form at a whim!" Avlakoi roared. "You have the spine to lie to my face when it is you who have been holding ransom the incantation that would give me control of it!"

She was scratching her cheek nervously now. "... There is no such incantation..."

"Liar!"

After a deep breath, quivering, she said, "The transformation is permanent and complete in a way only His magic can be... This is a working that bears the hallmarks of one who once knew the secrets of creation. My lord, I have known since the first that your condition is irreversible..."

He felt chills, put his face in his hands... Hands!?

Fosi looked up, Kaffe seemed so much closer. Her clothing, Avlakoi's clothing, hung loose off her body until she'd clutched it tight. "But..." a lighter voice said, Fosi's own voice. "You didn't do anything this time..."

"My spell merely lost its effect, I let it lapse," Kaffe said.

"Please, don't tell me-"

"I was not reversing anything done by the first king's enchantment. All I could do was suppress its effects briefly with a constant pressure."

"But you said-"

"I said what I felt I had to, in the moment, to save you. I felt that this wasn't what it was, that I could find a way to break the enchantment if I only had enough time, and I would have my lord back to his perfect original state." Kaffe came to Fosi's side and slipped her hand around the trembling girl's. "I cannot return you to your true form, because this is it... I am so sorry, my lord, that I had to fail you so. I can only promise that I will devote myself to giving that body back to you someday, that I will teach you the spellcraft necessary to give yourself a temporary return as you please. Just, know that it will be brief."

Fosi put a hand to her chest, she was having a hard time drawing breath. "It lasted more than a week, that time... And travelling just now..."

"The spell draws upon the lingering memory of yourself. With each use, I believe it will be able to last more and more briefly."

"Wait!" Fosi threw off Kaffe's hand and barely restrained herself from slapping the mage. "You knew as much as that while you blackmailed me into degrading myself!"

Kaffe looked away guiltily. "Well... my butt really hurt, that day. I figured getting a firsthand education on the realities of living as a succubus would be appropriate. You have to believe that I thought it wouldn't take long to break the enchantment..."

"I remember..." Fosi's thoughts went back to a momentary pleasure taken by Avlakoi, an act of brutality that was the wont of any demon and barely thought of at the time, and her heart sank further. "... Sorry... You were there and I was horny. You've always been able to take it... I know that isn't a good excuse."

To her surprise, Kaffe actually smiled.

"Even living among them, you don't know Avlakoi's reputation with the succubi? The very image of restraint," Kaffe said, sidling toward Fosi's trembling form on the couch, sliding an arm across the girl's shoulders, "the one noble who one can remain in the same room with, safely. You think us girls haven't figured out how to keep from being raped every moment of every day, after millennia of mothers and daughters passing down practice? Or do you think it's that hard to figure when a man's humors are roused? The common refrain from mother to daughter, echoing throughout the ages, 'if you're in the same room as a man, you've already consented'. But you and your efforts haven't gone without notice..."

Fosi only shivered where she sat, clutching her arms to her naked breast.

"It will be alright, I promise you that, my lady..." Kaffe began stroking Fosi's hair, running her palm down Fosi's back. "I know that you can't see the light right now. I understand that you feel betrayed, and it might take a while to become used to your new life. But you should look around yourself again and see just what respect you've already clawed back, the allies you've cultivated, and take heart."

Over the course of hours, Fosi breathed and became calm, practiced the magic with Kaffe that the mage claimed to use to bring the form of Avlakoi back to the forefront. And Avlakoi, having returned for some time and already feeling the weight of the spellcraft's limits, rested against the far wall of his study.

When morning came, he could not tell whether sleep had ever taken him, but he was able to turn his scaly hand in the dawnlight and that was enough for the moment. It felt as though all this time could have been only a bad dream, and he had only just woken up. He might come to his feet and see that nobody knew of any such 'daughter' of his, that Suvir had never come to the castle, that he no longer had to lie to his closest and only friends.

Hmph, maybe not all of it was a bad dream... Still...

It wasn't worthwhile to think like that. His soul was one of the strongest in existence, but he could feel the strands of his spell creaking and snapping at intervals against the artifact encircling his neck. How long would he have this time? A week, as he did once? A day? It was a constant pressure. Had Kaffe been servicing the spell in this way all along, keeping it from snapping back at an inopportune moment, feeling all of this tension?

Anyway, Fosi had the ability to carry on while he was 'gone' anyway... It wouldn't matter much if at all if he'd left her in charge once again...

He stood and put his hand on his desk, a wayward claw tore a deep gouge in some report or another, and the sheets beneath it. Fosi's delicate fingers didn't have any trouble with this scribe's work...

"Va'le," Avlakoi said, releasing the spell that held his body together; Fosi's voice nearly sounded the final syllable.

Something crashed to the floor behind her and she became stark still with fright, grasping her clothes just in time to stand under the intruder's gaze. She didn't dare turn around, shut her eyes tightly while her lip quivered. Just so long as she didn't acknowledge the world around her, she wouldn't have to endure reality...

"That's impossible..." Peris said quietly. "It's you..."