“YES . . . OH, YES. That’s just right. Deeper, my lover.”
Nasil felt his body respond to the being riding him. He couldn’t see her, but he could feel hands caressing his skin, and the soft touch of hair on his face. But this act was no better than rape. The chains that bound his wrists and ankles didn’t speak of a lover. He was a tool. Nothing more. And yet, he couldn’t make his body stop reacting to her. His hips betrayed him, impatiently thrusting upward into the warm, pulsing flesh.
His fists clenched and his teeth gritted together as her movements finally had the expected result. A climax overtook him and when flesh pressed to his mouth, he opened, expecting a mouth on his, but finding a breast instead. He suckled as the orgasm rode him and tasted fluid. It leaked out from her nipple and made him immediately dizzy, yet lazily content.
Damn it! She’s drugging me. He managed to hold the fluid in his mouth and not swallow. It made his tongue numb, but as soon as she raised up, he turned his head to the side and let the fluid dribble out.
A small hand patted him on the cheek like a dog as her weight lifted from his hips. “That was quite nice, Nasil. Perhaps I’ll keep you around for a little while longer.”
He couldn’t imagine why. He wasn’t the only male bound upon a thick straw bed. There weren’t only snakes either. Some of the captives were birds. One man in particular—a tall, thickly muscled Navajo—looked as disgusted with the process as Nasil. She’d had them all in the short time he’d been here, sometimes taking more than one at a time. He didn’t even want to know how.
He was abruptly tired and his arms felt like lead. It might be the drug she’d secreted, but he didn’t think so. He felt drained. Could she feed on energy? He looked around and the others seemed equally tired. But they were smiling and their glazed eyes said they probably didn’t care.
There was so little information about Marduc, even though he and Sargon had studied the old texts before deciding on this plan. And speaking of plans—“What now, lovely Marduc? This romp has been wonderful fun, but we should make plans to conquer the other Sazi.”
An image of her was in his mind, but he kept his eyes open, trying to get some hint as to whether the woman he saw in his mind had any bearing on reality. “Why so many questions, my lover?” Her voice was soft and sultry and he felt a slow hand caress his chest and tease a nipple. “Isn’t it enough to lay with me, to know I’m yours to pleasure as you will?”
He raised every mental shield he had until the image of her in his mind faded. While there was something supremely amusing in the thought that this might have been Sargon’s fate, he knew his old master never would have allowed it. He hadn’t been ruled by his body. He’d ruled it. Perhaps it was time to learn that lesson. It might take everything he had to pull off this plan, but he had to see what his chances were to become a true partner to Marduc. Because it was only as a partner that he could betray . . . and destroy her.
“Hardly.” His voice sounded dry and imperious even to his own ears. He grabbed the chain with his good hand and pulled sharply with every ounce of his weight. Thankfully, because the chain was high in silver content, the links weren’t terribly strong. He bore the pain as the silver bubbled his skin. Fortunately, he’d endured far worse at his master’s hands, so he could set aside the pain into a small box that didn’t affect his thoughts. The first chain parted from the ring set in the wall like a hot knife through butter. The other three soon followed. He kept his voice cold and sure. “It was entertaining, to be sure. But I’m here for far more than pleasure, Marduc. You said I would rule by your side. That’s what I intend to do.”
He snapped both arms forward simultaneously. The chains whipped in the air and connected around a blurry object. She screamed and tried to back away. That was it! It wasn’t that she was completely invisible. She was more like the ghost cats. If he looked closely, he could see a shimmering area where her body blended with objects beyond. He yanked the chains and caught her weight when she fell on top of him. He’d expected it, so he rolled, and she was suddenly under him. He smiled coldly and rejoiced in the scent of her confusion. “Don’t underestimate me, my Goddess,” he hissed and then chuckled. “I think we can teach each other much as we conquer the world.” He shifted forms on top of her and wrapped himself around her with blinding speed, until he could feel the heat of her warming his skin. The chains dropped away when the limbs they controlled dissolved into his slender form. “Now,” he said quietly, flicking his tongue to find her lips. He felt his arousal grow, and this time it was his doing. “Let us do as you promised. We shall have each other as only snakes can. And then,” he whispered, so the others couldn’t hear, “you’ll tell me what plans you’ve made to destroy the Sazi in the valley below.”
“You surprise me, Ea-Nasil,” Marduc said. He felt her fangs break the skin of his neck and her sweet venom made his heart beat faster. “I’d thought you like the others. But you show promise. Yessss . . . let us see if you’re snake enough to bed a Goddessss.” She shifted forms and Nasil felt his coils unwind because of the sheer size of her. Feathers tickled and cut his skin as she grew and lengthened. She was easily twenty feet long and he felt the brush of wings move on her back. “If you can hold on and mate me as my kind must, we will plan together.”
He was abruptly airborne, held aloft by a creature he could barely see. He tightened his grip as she flapped skyward, until the rising sun made the shimmering energy of her sparkle and gleam. Below them, at least fifty stories down, was the unforgiving earth, strewn with boulders and cactus. It would be better not to look down. “You want to be taken here?”
“As I must be. I’d thought it would be one of the birds to manage it, but I’m willing to give you a chance.” She flapped once, making them rise on the warming air currents and then drop again a dozen feet. She barrel-rolled while Nasil tightened his grip. “And look down below. There’s a powerful wolf running across the ground. He’ll be a perfect after-sex snack.”
Nasil didn’t recognize the wolf, but she was right that he was powerful. He could taste the magic on the wind, and while he wasn’t interested in eating the wolf, it would be useful to question him before Marduc finished him off.
“And if you can’t hang on to mate, there will be two meals for me.” She laughed, a dark rich sound that made Nasil shudder. Yet, there was something highly erotic at the thought of making love like this—with impending doom hanging over his every move. He felt around with his tail until he found her warm, soft opening. Yes, it could be done with some skillful maneuvering. Holding on with one coil, he drove his fangs into her soft underbelly. She screamed, the sharp sound of metal scraping against concrete. But her scent wasn’t angry, it was aroused. He was bleeding from a thousand tiny cuts from her feathers, but the energy from her so bewitched him that he hardly noticed the pain. He managed to lock inside her, his erection swelling until there was no hope of separation until he completed. He moved with her as she floated, dipping and rolling in the sky. He finally got the rhythm of her motions so that he could thrust when she coiled. With each spin, he found another tooth-hold as one ripped away.
“Nobody hasss made my body react this way in a very long time, Nasssil,” she gasped. Her body began to tremble and squirm under him. He drove his fangs in deeper, knowing the venom would only heighten her pleasure. He hadn’t even hoped to bring her to orgasm, but it certainly didn’t hurt. “Yessss . . . you. You will be the one to share in my plansss. You have courage and power. So much . . . delicious . . . power. I sense intelligence, as well—the weight of your experience presses on my mind. And you are capable of a viciousness that rivals my own. Already I can feel your seed from our earlier mating killing the challengers, forcing their way to my eggs. It burns inside me with power. So near, so close to my eggs now. You will father my army of winged serpents, Nasil. I can sense it. And you will lead them into battle against the mammals. We will be a nesting pair the world has never seen.”
She flexed around him, pulling his thrusting member in deeper and it made him groan. His own nest of snakes, strong enough to make the world bow at his feet? While he knew it was wrong to even consider fertilizing the eggs of a monster, the sensations were delicious. He was so very close to climax.
His heart was pounding so fast it was making him dizzy. So very . . . close. Want . . . need . . . this.
There was no focusing past the hunger of his body for this snake . . . this woman, who he couldn’t even see. And what was there to go back to? Bruce was dead, by his own hand—the only male he’d ever been interested in. Why not rule the world as a god with a goddess at his side?
He thrust one last time and couldn’t breathe as the climax took him. He nearly lost his grip from the sheer force of it. She moaned and tumbled as an orgasm claimed her. A series of wing flaps righted them and then she spun toward the ground, and he knew it was so his fluid would travel deep enough to reach her eggs. The complete abandon and exhilaration of watching the ground race toward him while his body shook and tingled in climax made him forget nearly everything he was and everyone he’d ever known. No union would ever be as good, no feeling so right.
She squirmed in the air for long moments, up and down in the sky while he hung on with every ounce of his strength. Finally, she laughed harshly. “Yes! You have done what nobody else has ever managed! You have fertilized one of my eggs, Nasil. I am finally with child after four lifetimes of failure. With more matings, I know you can fertilize the rest. Then the world will know our wrath!” Her triumphant voice dripped with evil intent.
A part of Nasil knew he should shudder to realize what he’d just done. But he didn’t. Instead, he felt a smile come to his mouth, buried deep in her sharp feathers.. He would do it again willingly. He wanted this, and though he was surprised at the speed of it, he could feel another erection forming, pressing against her belly, even as she laughed and teased him to greater stiffness. He released his fangs and they hissed as one before he took another bite and entered her again. This time his thrusts were hungry, desperate, and she responded in kind.
We’ll mate again and again in the skies until you’re spent, my lover—until every one of my eggs is a living snake.
He demanded no less. With those children to follow him, the world would finally be his. All would tremble . . . or die. At last.
Finally I will step out of that idiot Sargon’s shadow to become the ruler I was always meant to be! All I have to do is continue to seduce Marduc, and then Ea-Nasil will no longer be just the tormentor of Akede, but of all the Earth!
But he couldn’t seem to shake that tiny voice in the back of his mind. When did you start to want this, Nasil? Just who is seducing whom?