My initial hope, after escaping the feathered-serpent people (Azanaga eventually told me they were called the "Yalewi," if only to get me to stop calling them that) who had attacked us, was to just outrun them. Unfortunately, while the Swordfish could fly faster than the local galleys and longboats could manage, we had only limited knowledge of the local terrain - messy maps pieced together from half-accurate cartography by numerous amateurs. Islands that must have been hallucinations by their absence, landmarks far from where they were marked out, and of course, the great blurry fog of the unknown as one made one's way ever southward. Maps from less civilized people might have gone for "here there be monsters"; ours went for "region unknown."
Occasionally, we'd be surprised by the Yalewi; mostly, we just went up to avoid them, since that was easier and safer than engaging normally. Whatever web spell had forcibly grounded us that first time seemed to be rare, at least, sparing us the constant indignity of getting dragged down.
Still, the Yalewi seemed really damned dedicated to bringing us down, and surprisingly good at figuring out exactly where we were. Unless they were constantly swarming across the oceans like ants and then attacking every airship they saw - which I suppose was possible - it seemed like they were using some kind of divination magic or some more conventional information networks to find us. Maybe some of the talking birds shared intel with them?
I saw the familiar shape on the ship's radar, immediately identifiable as one of the Yalewi boats, headed straight for us, and with the exhaustion of somebody being chased for days, I started to ascend. Holding a greater height burns more power from the mana batteries, and of course there's less mana the further you get from the planet's surface, so we could hardly stay that high up forever... but I was getting tired of this. I set us high up enough that I was sure even the best shot couldn't hit just due to gravity, and then cracked open the airlock.
The loud whoosh of air in my ears was momentarily distracting, but I soon found my target - the ship far below. I just pointed at its mast with my cannon arm and fired. I half-expected to simply miss, given the distance, but the light beam raced right through it, puncturing a good sized hole and setting the thing ablaze. Immediately, the Yalewi set about trying to fix it, even as they howled angrily up at the ship, some of them fruitlessly firing arrows up at us. I watched the scene, deciding if I wanted to sink the ship outright - after all, would the other Yalewi even know if I did that? I'd rather they stopped following me, than that they all died - and decided to take another couple shots, punching fresh holes and starting fresh fires. The Yalewi became even more animated, scurrying across the surface of the ship.
And I noticed a young woman clamber out of one of the holes I'd punched in the ship. I couldn't see her that well, but I could tell she was female, and dark-skinned, and probably human - or else one of the races from up north, not one of the animal-headed folks that seemed surprisingly common around these parts.
Given she was choosing to jump overboard and start swimming, rather than trying to help the Yalewi, I was pretty sure she was a would-be sacrificial victim who I had accidentally saved... and who would probably drown without assistance, given how far it was to the nearest island. I hesitated, then fired off a few more shots at the ship, completely distracting the Yalewi as it started to take on water; nobody else seemed to have the chance to escape, and the ship itself turned as much as it could in its damaged condition, trying to get somewhere safe.
At that point, I went back to the helm, using the ship's radar to find the woman's position, and I lowered the vessel down towards the water, wings shifting from their vertical arrangement to a flat one. After a few seconds, I heard her clamber atop one of the wings, then start banging on the outside of the vessel. "Salama? Ampio aho azafady? Nidina hanampy ahy ianao, eny?"
"Master? There is being somebody banging on the vessel. Also it was being very amazing how you were showing those Yalewi to be fearing us!" Jutaana added.
"I'm pretty sure she's a would-be sacrifice," I said. "But be ready for anything." In response, Akamarina reformed in the main room, and I went to the airlock, opening it one way, then the other.
She was pretty, with chocolate-colored skin and messy dark hair. Her eyes were a surprisingly sharp blue, and she stared at me for a long second, her gaze going to the top of my head for a moment, a frown on her lips. She was also wearing almost nothing - as was common in this region - and had some fairly elaborate tattoos on her arms and her left leg, spiraling up the length of them in geometric designs and patterns.
"Don't do anything violent," I said, though I was pretty sure she couldn't understand me. Especially given the dull look she gave me.
Then she stepped forwards towards me, raising her hand and pointing at my lips. Her finger was just an inch or so away, but the movement seemed simultaneously benign and authoritative, not a threat but a well-intentioned demand, like a doctor's. "Sokafy ny vavanao."
"Wha-" was as far as I got before she stuck two fingers in my mouth. They tasted, as you might expect, like the saltwater they'd just been bathed in, and they ran along my tongue, my teeth, my gums, in a way that felt intimate but was obviously actually aiming to accomplish something. My blade arm had snapped out, just in case it was some sort of attack,
"Oh, yuck," she said, as she pulled her fingers out, looking somewhat disgusted. "What a terrible language. Tastes northern. Almerese?" She toyed with the word for a second.
"You know Almerese?" I was, in fact, surprised.
"Now I do," she said, wiping her spit-soaked fingers off on my shirt. "I assume you didn't actually mean to rescue me?"
I shook my head. "The Yalewi have been hounding me around for a while now," I told her. "I decided to try scaring them off."
"Thanks anyway. Any enemy of theirs is a friend of mine," she said, though the smile she wore didn't quite reach her eyes. "Where are you headed?"
"I was planning to try to find Kitran."
"Master? Is everything being okay, Master?" Jutaana called out from the other side of the airlock.
"I can help with that," the young woman said. "Name's Voasary, by the way," she said.
The external airlock door closed, and there was Jutaana, sword still at her side. Voasary approached her, pointing two fingers at the girl's mouth. "Eh, Master, why is she-mmf!" I was surprised she waited that long, honestly.
"It's fine," I said, as Jutaana raised her sword a few inches, Voasary herself shifting slightly to the side. "Some magic to help learn the language."
Jutaana's leg kicked strangely at the ground, in a way most familiar to me from when we were actually having sex. Eventually, Voasary popped her fingers out, and spoke a few words in Jutaana's native language.
"Ah!?!" Jutaana sounded genuinely excited as she spoke back, but I unfortunately didn't know much more about it beyond them saying 'Ahng' instead of 'Ow!'
Azanaga gave a few quick claps, attracting my attention to her, and reminding me that she and Eshenesra and Pichi were also all in the main room. "Good job." She intercepted Voasary's fingers as the girl approached. "Eshenesra speaks Nyzhraga and I only speak that and Almerese." She jerked her head over towards Eshenesra, who just flushed as Voasary approached.
"Only thing I like rooting around in my mouth is dick," Pichi said, as Voasary started rooting around in Eshenesra's mouth. Voasary gave her a very unimpressed look. "I'm Pichi, by the way."
"Voasary," was the succinct reply. She took quite a bit longer inside of Eshenesra's mouth than she had in mine or Jutaana's, the elf just quietly trembling, glancing over at me for reassurance. Eventually, though, she popped her fingers out of Eshenesra's mouth. "You northerners sure wear a lot," she noted, as she wiped her fingers off on Eshenesra's clothes.
"Right. Now that that's done, do you want us to take you home?" I asked her. "If it isn't too far out of our way, we could."
"My home's gone," Voasary said. "I'm from a small, ah, there's not a word you have for it. Temple village, I think is something like it? Medicine village? Less than a hundred permanent residents. I was the person who would use my magic to help people. The others were minders and fishers and the like."
"You could still be helping people!" Jutaana said.
"I don't want to." Voasary cracked her neck. "I'm from Fiandohana."
"I think I've heard of that one," I said, "but only pretty wild stories."
"They're true in spirit, even if I don't know what you've heard. Rule by the dead. Ghosts of ancestors, cut off from the cycle of reincarnation, enacting a tyranny of their values and traditions into the present. I didn't want to be a... fetish? Totem?" She hummed. "So many missing words in your language, makes it kinda useless." She gestured to her arm. "The tattoos contain spirits which are bound into my body. I was a child and it hurt. Take me with you," she said, focusing her blue eyes on me. "I don't want to go back home, and I can translate for you. If you're headed south, then you won't be able to find people that speak Nyzhraga for much longer."
I thought about it for a long few seconds. We had things set up for a crew of five - not a crew of six. Further, I didn't know how much I could trust her. Pichi, Azanaga, Eshenesra, Jutaana - they were all carrying a slave crest that completely bound them to my will. They couldn't betray me in any way, even if they wanted to. I tried to never give them cause to want to, but you can never know if somebody is nursing some secret grudge and planning to betray you.
On the other hand, if not her, I'd have to find other translators, or multiple translators, and wind up in just the same situation. And unlike those other translators, I had just saved her from being a human sacrifice. "Alright," I said. "You can join us. There's not a spare bed, so you'll have to figure that out," I told her.
"Is that a bed?" She asked, pointing to a sofa in the main room.
"No. It's a sofa."
"Sofa..." She rolled the word on her tongue. "Hm. Sofa. Got it." She sat down on it, wiggled her butt into it, getting ready to lie down.
"Wait, wait, wait," Pichi said, making Voasary pause. "Dry off first," she said.
* * *
Voasary knew a lot about the local region, given that people would come from far and wide to get magical assistance from her. She didn't know exactly where Kitran was, but she knew places which were near it, which in turn helped us get there much more quickly than we would have without her. Whenever there was a need to pick up another language, she'd shove two fingers into somebody's mouth, which seemed to be considered a bit of an honor by the locals who recognized the magic.
Not so much the ones who didn't, of course.
Overall, Voasary had a rough but genial manner. She didn't care much about niceties - or maybe she didn't know them, or was following some other set of niceties I couldn't recognize - but she would be helpful if asked to help with something. She was a voracious reader of what books from the North we had, though she was annoyed by how many of them were about the South. "I already know about the South, why didn't you bring books about the North?" I remember her asking, and not being satisfied with the obvious answer - I already knew about the North.
She mostly treated the food we had like an exotic treat. "mmm, sho good," I remember her saying, at one of Pichi's home cooked meals - and after she ate her first chocolate bar, I was only able to stop her from eating all of them by saying that a) I would kick her off the boat if she ate all the bars, and b) she wouldn't be able to eat bars in the future if she just gorged herself on them.
Her opinion of slavery was - to say the least - poor. Once she worked out that the girls didn't call me Master like you might call somebody Sir, but instead had a slave crest that forced them to obey me, her opinion sharply soured. Jutaana saying I was a great master didn't seem to do much of anything to persuade her. "Only evil countries practice slavery. Even Fiandohana doesn't. The Yalewi do. The Jiraki don't. The Alashkor do." She went on to list like twenty different countries, the vast majority of which I did not recognize, but apparently all the 'good people' countries didn't practice slavery, while all the 'evil people' countries did.
"It's different up North."
"Apparently you are evil up north, then," she said, her gaze sharp.
"I couldn't release them even if I wanted to," was the only thing that actually ended that particular discussion. It required equipment that only existed up North.
Voasary's opinion of me did improve when she saw Pichi, Jutaana, and Azanaga all pretty much beg (in their own ways) for sex - and Eshenesra revealed that I wasn't fucking her at all. The fact that a slave would actually ask for sex with their master was a very foreign concept to her, and she seemed to conclude that 'slavery' must mean something different up North. (I don't think it did, other than us having slave crests - I was just quite lax with them, relative to a lot of others - but I didn't correct her.) Either way, I ordered the girls to avoid mentioning their status as slaves in the future - if slavery was that much of a taboo down South, I didn't want to piss off everybody I met right out the gate.
* * *
Sex with Azanaga was genuinely strange to me. Not that it had changed since I first fucked her - but that it hadn't. She would verbally degrade herself, get me to come, and then consider the sex done and her libido satisfied. I could facefuck her and she would just move on after I came, even though she rarely orgasmed during our sex. (She did sometimes - but that just made it weirder. If she never orgasmed I'd just assume she biologically couldn't, not that she didn't care about them.) She'd explain it as just how demons were, but it was still fucking weird to me. In the end, though, I was fucking her because she wanted me to, so I didn't put much priority on "fixing" her sexual preferences to be more "normal" or whatever.
Still, that day, I'd decided to do her from behind, bending her over my bed and gripping one of her horns as I fucked her, holding her in place as I pounded away. "I'm a Nyzhraga bitch, I was born to get fucked by fat human cocks, the only reason the Nyzhraga Empire existed in the first place was to make it sexier when bitches like me were dominated by human cocks," she explained, her voice a little breathless as I just rammed away. "I deserve to get fucked and put in my place by you, Master. All demon bitches need human cocks to put them in their places as women. Demon men are just a pointless necessity to produce more succubi whores like me."
Her dirty talk was starting to work its magic on me, I have to admit. I was just railing her hard, my cock throbbing inside her, and I let go of her horns to grab her breasts, squeezing one in either hand. "That's right," I grunted out, and I felt her pussy tighten suddenly on my cock. "I only bought you so I could fuck you and put you in your place. You weren't being sold as a civil engineer, why would you think I bought you as one? Demon bitches like you are only good for one thing, and it's what I bought you for." I was just bullshitting - but she actually came, moaning and thrashing on my cock wildly, her pussy going absolutely crazy. She'd come here and there before, but it was the most intense orgasm I'd ever seen from her, and I just bottomed out and came with a long groan as her pussy milked me dry.
Once I was spent, she panted on the bed for several long seconds. "Thanks," she said. "Nnn, fuck." She sighed loudly. "You're getting better at the dirty talk."
"Thanks," I said, in the most insincere way possible to say thanks. I decided to head to the kitchen to grab some water to drink - and I found Jutaana and Voasary rapidly exchanging words in Padauiran. They both fell silent and turned their gaze up to me when I arrived - Jutaana with her puppy love, Voasary with a gaze that asked What are you looking at?
From the way they looked at me, I could tell they were talking about me, but it wasn't like I could have understood it anyway, so I just went to the kitchen and got my drink. By the time I finished and came back, Azanaga had gotten dressed and left my bedroom; Jutaana and Voasary both shut up the second I entered the room, yet again. Voasary stared at me quietly for a long few seconds. "Are you really that good at sex?"
"How good at sex am I supposed to be?"
"Master is being very good at sex!" Jutaana said, and it let me instantly orient how good at sex I was supposed to be. I just took hold of one of her ears, softly massaging it near the base in a way that made her leg kick a little and also shut her up.
"Jutaana is in love with me, so the sex is better for her," I explained.
"Is Azanaga in love with you too?" Voasary glanced in the direction of Azanaga's room. "She certainly seemed... loudly satisfied."
"If she's in love with me, she's terrible at expressing it," I told Voasary. "But I guess I can't put it past her." She did ping pong back and forth between talking about how Nyzhraga was the greatest thing ever, to how it only existed so it'd be hotter for humans to fuck demon sex slaves like her.
She exchanged some quick words with Jutaana in Padauiran - then turned her attention back to me. "I'd like to try sex. According to Jutaana, it's really good, and I have just about no experience, due to being a mpanasitrana. I figure who better to take my first time - pop my cherry? - than the guy who saved me from the Yalewi, if only by accident?" She paused for a moment. "Why does pop my cherry mean that?"
"It refers to the hymen, which often is torn during a girl's first time, producing some amount of blood," I told her, which made her nose crinkle. "Don't worry, it doesn't happen if the guy is gentle getting started."
"Ah, so you are willing to do it," she said, standing up at that point, heading right for the bedroom.
I followed after her, though not before Jutaana spoke up. "Be fucking her really good, Master! Ah! Since she is human she is being possible to get knocked up!" She sounded absolutely torn by the sudden realization. "She is being very nice but still, please be knocking up Jutaana first, okay?!"
"Did you hear Jutaana?" I asked, as I closed the door behind me.
"Ah... yeah," Voasary said, sitting awkwardly on the bed, now. "Why not knock her up? She seems really enthusiastic about the possibility."
"I'd be happy to knock her up, it's just the situation isn't ideal for it," I explained. "I don't suppose you have some magic in those tattoos that can keep you from getting pregnant?" Voasary shook her head, and I bit my lip, thinking about it. "Let's just do a sixty-nine."
"Yeah. I don't know what that is."
"Take off your clothes," I said, even as I did much the same. Obviously it took me much longer, since she wore virtually nothing and was soon naked on the bed. "Now lie on your back. Don't put your head right up near the headboard," I clarified, and she got into the appropriate position - then I clambered atop her, so that I was looking at her pussy, and she was looking at my cock. "It's not technically 'real' sex, but-" I was going to say feels just as nice, but I was interrupted by loud sniffing noises from Voasary, who reached up to clasp the base of my cock, pointing it towards her face as she leaned into it, sniffing ever louder. "Um. Enjoying yourself?"
"It smells... so good," she breathed out, almost exhaling the words. I would have assumed that she was smelling Azanaga's juices, except I'm pretty sure she also just smelled normal. Her nose sniffed louder and louder. "Mmm... fuck," she breathed out. "Does it taste good?" Her tongue danced along my cock, flicking along the side in a completely random spot - but the way she started to just lavish it with hungry licking movements only made my dick throb all the more. "It does, mm, mph, so good, tasty, mm," she hummed and moaned noisily as she just licked at my cock.
It seemed like she understood her part in the position well enough, at least, so I leaned down towards her, kissing at her clit softly, lips teasing the nub. She shivered at that, but didn't stop her licking, desperately sliding her tongue all over my cock, making hungry moans and gasps. You'd have thought my cock was the tastiest thing ever, by the way she wetly moaned after each long lick, sucking noisily on my cock occasionally. Not in the sense of putting it in her mouth, but just attaching her lips to one side and slurping on it, cheeks audibly hollowing.
For my part, I slid two fingers into her waiting sex. She jerked at the touch - my hands do have that metallic coldness, for the most part - but didn't complain, just continuing to lick instead. After a few seconds for my fingers to warm up, I started to finger her more seriously and thoroughly, continuing to kiss at her clit, occasionally pausing to just suckle at the nub.
Her fellatio grew more enthusiastic and sloppy as I worked, and I could feel the spit dripping off my dick from where she'd plastered so much that it was now just cascading down. Her moans started to mix this is tasty and this feels good together, the two feelings both being simultaneously expressed as throaty moans of delight. I just worked to figure out what she liked best in terms of touching, and eventually figured it out. It was harder than usual, due to just how horny and aroused she obviously was from tasting my cock, but once I found the right spots, I managed to get her to come quite quickly, her hips pushing up into my face as she moaned wildly next to my dick, giving up on sucking and licking it for a few long seconds.
When she finished coming, she was left breathless, her tongue making lazier trails across my cock, an almost numb sort of licking, like she was too fuckdrunk to do anything else. Hot breaths spilled out as she recovered, brushing along my cock in the process, but when she got herself together to speak, her words were definitely very pleasant to hear. "Fuck, that felt good. Am I doing a good job on the, uh, blowjob? I got a little distracted with how tasty your cock is." My dick twitched in her hand, and she leaned in to kiss it again. "If I can do something to make it better for you, just say so," she added.
"You've been doing great," I reassured her. "All that stuff was great. But there is one thing you haven't done that's pretty common in blowjobs. Just wrap your lips around the very tip, and start moving your mouth down my length."
She planted her lips in the appropriate location, letting out a muffled noise around my cockhead. "Li'e fihsh?" She managed to get out, around my dick, her tongue flashing about.
"Yes. Now stretch your mouth wide, and just move forward." She obeyed dutifully, her mouth opening and starting to suck my cock into her mouth. She hummed as the (apparently, delicious) flavor hit her tongue again, and she rabidly licked and slurped at my dick, twisting her head on automatic instinct in a way that made the feeling even better. I groaned in pleasure as she moved her way down, momentarily forgetting all about reciprocation. When I hit the back of her throat, she gagged wetly on my cock, spittle flecking out and up - but she didn't stop, surprising me. She just pressed against it, moaning the whole time, clearly very much enjoying the whole experience of gagging on my cock.
As much as Pichi may also have been a fellatio addict, Voasary had a completely different vibe to how she sucked cock. Not just in the lack of skill, but Pichi sucked dick to get a reaction - Voasary was in it for the love of the cock. I had no idea what, in particular, caused the woman to treat my dick like the tastiest, best-smelling thing she'd ever encountered in her life, but there was no doubt in my mind in that moment that that was exactly what she felt like. A tongue that danced along my cock even as she pushed her face against her gag reflex, trying to stretch out to taste as much as she could, intermittently sputtering - then I let go in her mouth, groaning against her clit as I unloaded.
She just swallowed wetly. If anything, her noises about how tasty my cock was got louder, humming and slurping wetly around my dick. She did pull back a bit, but that seemed to be mostly to make more room for my cum - and then she came again, starting to sputter a little in the process, twitching in place around my cock as she accidentally choked on my cum.
When I was finished coming, I pulled out of her mouth, sitting down on the bed and catching my breath. Her face was a bit of a mess - tear stained, and with a little bit of cum having somehow come out of her nose. But she looked absolutely ecstatic as she just swilled my cum in her mouth.
"Fuck, that's incredibly tasty," she said, when she finally swallowed, a couple minutes later. She took a breath through her nose and shuddered. "Smells so~o good, too," she added. She twisted her head over to me. "Can I get another?"
She could.
* * *
The ship proceeded on its course to Kitran, taking directions from various islands. "New docks," I called out, and Voasary poked her head into the cockpit.
"Ah. That's Kitran," she said.
"How can you tell?" I asked.
She pointed out the window. "The giant floating pearl over it," she said. It was partly obscured by a mountain, but after she pointed it out, it was unmistakable. The rainbow colors were bright and eye-catching across the surface of the smooth, round, well-polished giant object. It was one of the distinctive features about Kitran we'd heard about, so it left no ambiguity.
"Ah. Yeah. That's Kitran," I said, starting to lower the Swordfish down towards the docks.
-x-X-x-
The dockworkers definitely had no idea what the hell they were looking at, as the Swordfish descended down. They actually scramble away, people at a great distance pointing at the vessel in something like shock. I was surprised by just how surprised they were. Sure, I was pretty sure I was the first person from the northern hemisphere who had ever come here, and thus this was the first airship they'd seen, but at the same time, what I had seen of the southern hemisphere showed there was plenty of weirdness down here. Races up north all mostly looked the same, save for horns or tails or big ears or being tall or short or the like. Down here, I'd already encountered the feathered-serpent looking Yalewi and the weird dog-people of the Siyaki, not to mention, of course, the talking birds.
In other words, I'd assumed they'd be used to weirdness. But apparently the Swordfish was a bit too weird, even for them. As it set down crisply at the dock, the wings rotating ninety degrees to shift from cutting through air to floating on water, a single dockworker approached the ship.
It was Voasary who got off the ship first, being that she was a local and (I hoped) had already picked up enough local languages. She exchanged some words with the dockworker, who sighed in relief and called out to his fellows.
"You're fine to come out," Voasary called back towards the rest of us. "They're just not used to ships like this."
"I guessed," I said, as I stepped out first. Jutaana was the second out, then Eshenesra, and at last I called back and made Azanaga and Pichi follow. "I really should start learning languages."
"And replace me?" Voasary asked, a flirty smile on her lips.
"You're irreplaceable," I told her, giving her a winning smile - and she seemed to be surprised by that particular statement. Maybe it was a bit too forward? "I need a translator, you have a magical talent with it, and since I saved you from the Yalewi, you would have to be a truly awful person to betray me outright."
She let out a small laugh at that. "Ah, so that's what you meant," she said. "I can't disagree. I do owe you, even if you didn't save me on purpose. Yalewi sacrificial rituals... aren't pretty." The one I had heard about from Voasary herself was that they would break bones so they could force the ribs open and remove the lungs via the hole to place on either side of the corpse, as a visceral sort of "wings." It wasn't clear to her at exactly which point in the process the victim would die, and my anatomical knowledge was insufficient to fill in that particular gap.
She turned back to one of the dockworkers, who had asked her some questions, and she answered them with some brisk words, leading the man to start writing. The words I caught were "leporagi," "pekina," "elf" and "demon" - presumably because there was no local word for any of their races. When he gestured to me, she didn't use any recognizable word; after some back-and-forth, she said, "cyborg," and then a bunch of unrecognizable words.
Afterwards, we were escorted away from the docks, and she explained the situation: he was wondering what race I was. Most humans don't have bits of a dead god attached to their torso, so he was understandably confused.
I wound up paying for some food for us, buying it from street vendors - luckily, we'd picked up a few of various local currencies on the way there, and given this was a port, it wasn't too hard to get things changed. The food on offer were exclusively these thin wooden sticks pierced through with a variety of different fruits. As we wandered, I did start to notice something strange: there wasn't any meat on sale.
I asked Voasary about it, and she relayed my questions to one of the sellers, who - after having the question explained, because he didn't get it at first - seemed more baffled and disgusted than anything else. It wasn't in some moral sense, like I'd half-expected (there were vegetarian subcultures up north who disdained meat eating for moral reasons). More like if I'd asked after why there wasn't poop on sale to eat. It did make it pretty clear that nobody here sold any meat.
"Mm, but meat is being good," Jutaana said, with a little pout. "It is helping build strong muscles which are important for any girl."
"Jutaana, that's only true for leporagi," Azanaga said, her voice a bit chilly as she spoke. Jutaana stared at Azanaga for a long second, turned away, her eyes seeming to scan her brow as she thought about it.
"No!" She said at last. "It was being the Siyaki too! They were being muscular women!" She paused. "But you are also being right, maybe... I am not seeing many girls who are muscular. I was just thinking that Master was picking you flabby girls because you are cheap."
"I'm not flabby," Azanaga grit out.
At that point, we were interrupted by a trio of women, who were wearing fairly reasonable military dress - not full armor, but tunics and chain shirts, with a large flower design on the chest in white-and-gold. Each carried a spear at her side, and all the commoners gave them a wide berth. The leader of the trio barked out a command at us, but obviously, I didn't understand a single word.
"Aha!" Jutaana said. "They are being muscular! I am right!"
"They asked us to follow them to meet the king," Voasary said, strategically choosing to ignore the argument between Azanaga and Jutaana.
"Well, alright, then," I said.
* * *
The king's name was Marfer, and he was clearly quite old. His face was wrinkled, his body thin, as he sat on the throne and peered imperiously down at the group of us.
At his side was a truly, ludicrously beautiful woman with long ears, milky white skin, and shimmering silver hair, her eyes having an almost luminescent blue hue to them, striking as she peered down at us too. She wore what I was pretty sure were a wizard's robes, and I would probably have assumed she was an elf, if she wasn't impossibly pretty - or if I'd never seen an elf before. As it was, it was impossible for me to imagine that she wasn't some strange southerly counterpart to elves, in much the same way that Siyaki very vaguely resembled caninu. If just having long ears made you an elf, then Jutaana was the most elven woman I'd ever met.
Voasary and King Marfer spoke quite briskly, back and forth, exchanging inquiries and answers. I took the moment to quietly look around the room. There were courtiers, most of whom were clearly here to see the strange foreigners. There were also a good dozen more armed women, all of whom were well-armed, wearing similar clothes to the ones who had approached us in the port. They watched us with care, particularly myself, Eshenesra, and Jutaana.
Eventually, Voasary began acting as a translator for the king properly, speaking to me on his behalf. "Why did you come here to Kitran, foreign stranger?"
"I'm an explorer, employed by Almere to learn about the southern hemisphere. I hoped that by coming so far south that no one else had arrived yet, I could find out things of particular value." And, of course, that I could find out things that were interesting. I wanted to be part of the history of discovery, to see what nobody else in the northern hemisphere (thanks, Pichi) had ever seen before.
"What interest do you have in the politics of Kitran?"
"None," I said, honestly confused by the question. "Or, I suppose it would be good to be able to trade with your kingdom, perhaps, but I have no interest in... I don't know what the question is asking, to be honest."
"Matters of royal succession."
"I have no interest in matters of royal succession," I told him. I did feel a creeping concern, though - if there were succession problems, that meant politics that we might get stuck in the middle of.
For a long moment, he stared at us - then gestured to the long-eared woman at his side, who leaned in as he whispered to her. She whispered back. Even if they weren't whispering, I would not have known what she was saying, at all, as I didn't speak the language, at all. He spoke again after a little bit, and Voasary dutifully translated. "Then I offer you a boon, foreign dignitary." I nodded in response, not sure I quite qualified, but also not interested in arguing with him. "Irendar will make for you a potion that will enhance your ability to learn new languages." He gestured towards the elven woman.
"Can I have some for my companions, as well?" I asked, worried the moment the words left my lips that it would be too much. Certainly, once the translation was done, and Irendar crinkled her nose just so, her face still looking beautiful despite it, I definitely regretted it.
"No. Irendar is doing you a great favor, bringing her powerful alchemy to bear for your benefit; do not treat her like some common laborer who you can greedily take more work from."
"My apologies," I said, immediately, bowing my head deeply to the woman. She seemed satisfied with that, her expression returning to its previous cool mien. Her expression was as if everyone in the room were just a variety of mildly interesting animals kept in a zoo; fascinating, but not concerning to her in any way.
* * *
We were allowed to stay in the guest chambers at the castle; some strategic mistranslations on Voasary's part had led to them believing that Jutaana, Pichi, Azanaga, and Eshenesra were all my wives, and we were given a single, large room to share. "It's better than them thinking they're your slaves," she had explained, her voice almost a hiss. "Kitran does not allow men multiple wives, but some of its neighbors do. None south of the equator practice slavery, save the most wicked sorts. Further, there is no risk of scandal if you should be caught fucking them."
That was not the first thing on my mind, when I entered the guest bedroom. It was quite richly adorned, with a very large mattress, a variety of lovely tapestries on the walls, and even some bottled wine and metal cups for us to drink from. The first thing on my mind was the desire to just plop on the bed and pass out. All the social rules of Kitran were foreign to me, just like the rest of the place. My brain was still trying to figure out what my worst faux pas were, trying to figure out how I could make up for them. Maybe offer Irendar some gift? What did I even have that she wanted? Eshenesra was a sorceress, I suppose, so maybe she could share some knowledge?
My arm was laying across my face, blocking out most of the light, my eyes closed in contemplation, when I felt Pichi hit the bed. She just grabbed my waistband and tugged it down. I wasn't erect, what with the stress, but that was hardly enough to stop Pichi. "Since I'm your wife," she declared, with a certain jocular note to her voice, "it's only natural that I would suck your cock when you're stressed."
She leaned down at that point, softly wrapping her warm lips around my flaccid cock. I'm a grower, not a shower, so my cock was maybe the size of a thumb at that point; Pichi seemed to like that particular size a lot, given the way she hummed and noisily slurped on it.
"Eh..." Jutaana said, thinking about what Pichi had just said. "Yes~! Wife, wife," she declared, seeming obviously excited by it, bouncing in place at the idea. "Wife means breeding," she proclaimed, then hurriedly clambered onto the bed, pulling my arm away and fiercely kissing me on the lips, her tongue invading my mouth before I could argue with her. She hummed and panted into my mouth, her kiss seeming exceedingly eager.
My cock, by that point, was fully erect in Pichi's mouth, and she was sucking on the upper half of it, leaving the lower to throb in open air, still slick with her earlier spit. Azanaga huffed at the show from one side, while Eshenesra watched in quiet silence, her cheeks pink as one bent finger trailed across her lips, a phalange finding itself buried past her lips. She definitely had a voyeur streak, and I had no real problem indulging it.
One of my hands found its way to Jutaana's breast, groping it softly, and she hummed into my mouth at the feeling, almost shoving her tit into my palm. My other hand was placed on the back of Pichi's head, gingerly pressing downward in a quiet request, and Pichi responded by doing exactly what was asked of her, slowly but surely descending down my length, her throat bulging with my cock as she moved to deepthroat me. I just groaned at the feeling, while Pichi herself slurped wetly on my length, tongue dashing along the underside, her breasts jiggling softly from her enthusiastic movements and rubbing against my thighs in the process.
I just groaned under the attention, and when Jutaana at last pulled off, I took the chance to suck in some breaths. "I'm still not going to knock you up," I told her, and she bit her lip in the cutest way possible, my cock twitching inside Pichi's throat again. The pekina woman let out a gurgled noise to attract my attention, giving me a sharp look as our eyes met - a silent chastisement for my treatment of Jutaana.
"Ah... my husba~and," Jutaana said, almost singing the word out, "is so mean," she explained. "It is not being normal for a husband to refuse to give his wife baby, right? Right?" She asked Eshenesra and Azanaga.
"Maybe if he's a jerk with a tiny cock," Azanaga said, clearly wanting to tick me off.
"O-oh," Eshenesra said, her cheeks brightening as she made eye contact with Jutaana. "No... no, I don't think it's normal... I mean... ah, maybe, if it would be dangerous?"
"I'm not going to knock you up even if you all gang up on me," I told Jutaana. I gently stroked her cheek for a moment, then slid my hand up to her ear, massaging it near the base, provoking a sharp response from the leporagi, a hot breath escaping her throat as she trembled at the touch. "One day, alright? You're only twenty-four, you've got plenty of fertile years ahead of you, and you'll be with me for all of them."
Jutaana let out a truly sonorous moan at that, clearly loving the idea that she'd be with me for all of them. She pushed against my grip on her ear, and I released it, letting her once more lean down to meet my lips. Her tongue forced its way into my mouth hungrily.
Through all this, of course, Pichi hadn't been doing nothing - but she'd actually shown a bit of self-control, merely softly suckling and licking at my cock. More the gentle, tasting sort of blowjob, than the more intense cocksucking that she could put into it when she was particularly eager for it. Now that Jutaana and I had had a little moment, she clearly wanted the attention back on her cocksucking, and started just pounding her mouth up and down, slurping wetly, twisting her head around and around, her tits jiggling, smacking against my thighs as she moved around. There was an intensity to every motion, and the sounds coming out of her mouth left no doubt she was enjoying herself, soft moans and hums of delight, like she was having the tastiest treat she'd ever been fed at the moment.
For my part, I just groaned from the work, while Jutaana kept making out with me fervently, tongue dancing around the inside of my mouth. She actually took hold of my arms, directing them up towards her breasts, giving them to me to squeeze, and so, naturally, I did so, panting into her mouth as I relished the feeling of her large, full breasts in either hand. She undid her top, leaving her breasts free a moment later, and I could feel her perky nipples pressing into my palms as she made out with me.
At last, she broke off the kiss again, sucking in deep breaths. "Ah... husba~and," she whined, rubbing her thighs against each other. "I am wanting a~all your attention but Pichi is sucking your cock so I will be giving you time, okay? Pichi is being good wife," she said, putting extra-special emphasis on the word, like the scenario was the sexiest roleplay ever, "so she is deserving all her husband's attention as she is sucking his cock."
Pichi let out a soft hum around my dick, giving Jutaana an approving look before peeling off my cock for a moment, sucking in breaths as she stroked me. "Yeah," she said, licking her lips. "You're too eager to get your dick wet in fresh holes, Hob. What's the point of having four wives if you go and do that?"
"Yeah," Azanaga said. "You've got four hot girls who have to suck your cock on command-" Eshenesra went scarlet at that, her blue eyes growing wide, "-and you're still fucking randos like Bakwai and Voasary. I feel all hurt, being cheated on all the time like that, but I guess humans are too dumb to control their dicks."
"You two are enjoying this too much," I said, with a roll of my eyes. "I'll fuck who I want to fuck." I placed my hand on the back of Pichi's head, guiding her downwards. "You're not the boss of me."
"Yes," Jutaana agreed. "Husba~and is being the head of household, he is making decisions about who is getting fucked, which is us, and whoever he is feeling like! He is still paying attention to his wives so it is all being okay!" Pichi slurped my cock into her throat all the way, going completely balls deep and just mashing her nose into it, and I groaned and leaned back again for a moment, back arching, Pichi's tits rubbing and getting squished in between my thighs in a particularly exciting way.
"Mm, fuck," I breathed, leaning up on the bed at last, finally leaving my position on my back. I wasn't moving to get more control on Pichi - though she briefly looked like she was worried about it - and instead reached down for Pichi's tits, just fondling the huge, soft things, playing with them in my hands. "God, you have such crazy big tits, Pichi," I told her, thrusting my hips up into her face, making her let out a faint noise of surprise - but she also didn't try to stop me, neither the jerk of my hips nor the flagrant groping and squeezing of her breasts, tugging on them, squeezing them.
"Guess that's why you 'married' her," Azanaga said. "Just into big fat tits. Guess that explains why you aren't fucking Eshenesra. She's too much of a flatty."
"I- wh- there's no reason, to say things like that, it's just... I haven't asked him or anything! Obviously! You're the one who approached him for sex, I honestly thought you wouldn't," Eshenesra said.
"You should be asking then! Since we are all his wives, we should all be getting fucked!"
"A-ah, no, it's fine," Eshenesra said, ducking her head a bit.
At that point, Pichi did something truly insane and obscene with her mouth, just wetly slurping around my cock as her cheeks hollowed and she swallowed rapidly around my length. The repeated, rhythmic sensation, the way her tongue danced around, the feeling of her big tits in my hands, the way that Azanaga and Jutaana were - on purpose or not - both pressuring Eshenesra into sex with me... it pushed me over the edge, and I groaned as I started to come, tightening my grip on Pichi's tits. She peeled back as best she could, wrapping her lips around the tip, jerking me off with a self-satisfied look on her face as I deposited a thick load of cum on her tongue, and I shuddered and collapsed in the afterglow.
"Breeding sex, husba~and?" Jutaana asked, giving me an eager fluttering of the eyelashes.
"I really have had a long day," I told her.
"Okay..." Her ears actually drooped a little, but I wasn't lying. "I will being satisfied with cuddles then," she declared, hopping onto the bed next to me, sliding around my arm and then wrapping me in a hug. The other girls mostly did not choose such affectionate positions, but there was only one bed, so we wound up lying next to one another. Eshenesra crossed her arms over her chest and tried to stay stock still as she laid next to Azanaga, who slept in a lazy crumpled nude pile. Pichi just curled up on the far end of Jutaana from me, resting her head on a pillow she seemed to have decided was suitably comfy, and promptly fell asleep.
Luckily there were multiple blankets, because we wound up fighting over them, over the course of the night.
* * *
In the morning, we got woken up by a loud rapping at the door. Jutaana awoke first, and her jerk to attention brought me also into consciousness, my eyelashes fluttering open. "Somebody is being at door," Jutaana said to me. "Should I be getting sword?"
"I guess as a safety measure," I told her, stumbling out of the bed, making my way lazily to the door, pulling on my pants as I made the journey. I creaked open the door, finding Irendar standing there.
She was wearing gloves on her hands, which was new from when I'd met her in the throne room. She looked at me with some small note of distaste visible in her gaze - maybe because I was half-naked as I answered the door? - and handed over a bottle about the size of a small salt shaker. She then handed me a letter. "Tye pole't han mana ni eques, mal Voasarime pole sina." Her voice was almost musical as she spoke, stunning me with how pleasant it was to hear.
"Um," I started - but she left without another word.
I think she said Voasary's name, which would make sense. Unfortunately, as Voasary wasn't my 'wife,' but my translator, she wasn't in this bedroom, so I had to get dressed before going out and finding her, handing off the letter.
"It says to drink one thimble's worth per day, and to spend several hours listening to conversations in the language you wish to learn," Voasary said. She hummed as she read it. "It might be possible to use this amount for more than one person? It's not entirely clear on duration, but if you manage to pick up the local language before you drink half the bottle..."
"Right. Where's a thimble, then?" I was most certainly going to head right out to the market and just listen to as many people talking as I possibly could. I considered taking the bottle with me and drinking it there, but I imagined there was the risk of somebody recognizing it and stealing it, or it being broken... so I drank my thimble and headed out.
* * *
One thing I had started to notice about the locals was that they didn't seem to have any fucking horses. I'd expected a lack of personal vehicles like street cars, but even the all-female royal guard (if that was, in fact, what they were) just walked everywhere. Wagons, such as they were, were pulled by people, not animals. It made trips a bit more obnoxious than they otherwise needed to be, but it wasn't like I was going to pay for a palanquin... though I suppose technically my 'wives' could carry me on one.
The experience of listening to conversation in a language I didn't know was quite a surprise. Words didn't flow from one to the other quite right - there was a constant feeling of familiarity, like the meaning of this word or that one was just on the edge of comprehension. I started to recognize the little words and parts of speech - the "the"s and the "a"s and the "-ing"s and the "of"s - and understand their meanings without actually being able to put them into a sentence. It was like hearing "XXX was a XXX XXX to have XXX that," though of course there were words in the middle. Sometimes I could guess at them - that one must have been an adjective by the grammar.
It was honestly bewildering, the way the magic worked, and by the day's end, markets closing up as the sun went down and darkness took over, I was pretty sure I had enough of a vocabulary to manage some shitty, halting conversation. I tried as much with Voasary, since she'd picked up the language more perfectly in her own way, and her conclusion was that I spoke enough to manage something very basic.
Given that, I figured there was probably enough in the bottle Irendar had given me to let one of my 'wives' learn the local language... or to maintain a dose to learn another language myself, if there was occasion.
Either way, I looked forward to the next day. With another dose, my mastery of the language would doubtless be competent enough to manage all manner of conversations, picking up the occasional rarer word where necessary the same way one does in one's native tongue.
My brain was a bit frazzled, though, which disappointed Azanaga supremely as I plopped onto bed. "You're a terrible husband, which I guess is to be expected of a human man," she said, with a long-suffering sigh. I had no idea if her playing the part of 'wife' was just because she thought it was funny or because she was worried about somebody overhearing us speaking Almerese and understanding it. "I'm your wife and you haven't fucked me since we arrived here."
"For fuck's sake, can't you just masturbate?"
"Tch. That's what a rutting dog would say. Isn't orgasm enough? Does there need to be anything more than that? Maybe you can be satisfied with your own right hand-" she actually looked at my right hand and crinkled her nose in disgust. "Actually that's an awful thought and just killed my libido, so good work."
"Me masturbating killed your libido?" I asked as I laid in bed. I was happy she decided to stop being pissy about me fucking her, but the response was still a tad extreme.
"You masturbating with the corpse of my god does, yes," she sneered, looking at me like I was stupid.
Admittedly, it was a pretty good point so I did feel rather stupid. Mostly, though, I felt tired, so I went out like a light once I closed my eyes, Jutaana once more snuggling into me in the night.