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"writing": "[b][u][center]The Bonds of Need\nChapter 1\nFor a-lycotonum\nBy Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]\n \n \n \n \n \n\n\n\n“Katya.” Vitus turned to his teacher. “Watch Neena. Make sure she doesn’t leave, make sure she doesn’t cause trouble. Just…make sure she doesn’t do anything.”\n\n“Why her?” Piers asked.\n\n“Because –”\n\nThe hellhound clenched his jaw, taking a moment to breathe, release, breathe, and release. He knew that if he let loose right now, he was going to be fighting tooth and claw to keep from just burning the other man to cinders. Not what he needed right now. Not what any of them needed right now.\n\n“Because she can.”\n\n“Indeed,” the older woman said, getting to her feet. “And I will ensure that she doesn’t get out of any further bondage.”\n\n“I’d like to see you try, old woman,” the sweaty prisoner said. “I got out of the spells that held me before. I’ll do it –”\n\nIt took nothing more than a wave of Katya’s hand to freeze Neena in place. The other woman didn’t move, though the sweat still ran down her body, and a long string of slime that had been formerly suspended against her thigh came loose. It dangled from her pussy, slowly dripping further, further, further down.\n\nWith a snap of her fingers, Katya released the other woman, and she immediately gasped, bringing her legs together. Her cheeks burned bright red.\n\n“How did you do that?!”\n\n“More experience than you will ever have. Now, come. If you’re good, I won’t humiliate you again.”\n\nThey walked back to the wagon, and the Cinnas made space for them as they stepped inside. Vitus shook his head, resting one furred hand against his forehead.\n\n“You think that you can trust her?” Piers asked.\n\n“…Trust.” He shook his head. “You’re a one to talk about trust.”\n\n“I made a [i]mistake.[/i]”\n\n“And then you lied about it.”\n\n“I…I didn’t think I could trust you.” Piers sat down beside him. “I didn’t think I could trust anyone anymore. Not Katya, not my wife…certainly not you, since you caused this whole thing. What was I supposed to do? Say that I went walking, fell in bed with the enemy, and then confessed something I shouldn’t have? If I said anything, you could have killed me.”\n\n“Killed you? Why would I have done that?”\n\n“You almost did,” the one-armed man said, pointing to his throat. A bruise was already forming, almost like a collar around his neck. “Just now.”\n\n“Because you lied to me. If you’d said something about it before, back in port, then we could have handled it. We could have done something to hide our tracks. We could have done [i]something[/i] to keep them from taking Robin away. Instead, you kept your mouth shut, and now we’re down someone that we all care about. [i]All[/i] of us,” he said before Piers could interrupt. “Just because you hate what she became doesn’t mean you stopped caring about her. She was the first person you asked about when we hopped in the wagon, remember?”\n\n“…You’re right.”\n\nPiers sighed, leaning forward as he pulled his legs against his chest. The missing arm seemed to stand out all the more in that moment, and it took Vitus some effort to not stare at the other man for it.\n\nThe silence of the night lingered around them as Vitus couldn’t bring himself to talk to Piers without ripping him to shreds, and he didn’t know what was going through the other man’s mind. He knew that they were at odds, and he knew that this was the worst time for infighting with the group considering what lay ahead of them, but he knew better than to start something that would make it worse.\n\n“You’re right,” Piers repeated. “I made a mistake. And…and I abandoned her when I shouldn’t have. Robin…was my wife. Still is. And…I did everything wrong.”\n\n“Mm-hmm.”\n\n“But.” Piers turned to him. “Katya knew.”\n\n“…Did she, now?”\n\n“You heard her. She wanted to bring this up.”\n\n“And she didn’t before, because…”\n\n“…We made a deal.”\n\n“I see.”\n\n“It’s not just my fault. It’s…both of ours. If you’re going to be furious with me, then you should at least be angry at her, too. That…that is the only fair way, and the only honest way.”\n\n“…You’re not wrong,” he muttered.\n\n“No. I’m [i]right.[/i]”\n\n“Don’t push it.” He groaned, shaking his head. “I need to sleep. We all need to sleep. Tomorrow is going to be hell.”\n\n“I thought we were already in it.”\n\n“Just the outskirts. It’s going to get worse. Sleep.”\n\n“Alright. But…you…You won’t abandon her?”\n\n“No. I won’t. She’s pack.”\n\n#\n\nSleep came, and with it came the advent of the Demon Lord. He was in her realm from the moment he closed his eyes, and Vitus groaned as he felt the power of her realm pull him deeper, dragging the shaggy fur further from his shoulders, pulling him to lean forward on all fours rather than standing on his hind legs. His hands warped, almost becoming paws with opposable thumbs, and he heard the rustling of the other Hellhounds of the Demon Lord of the Hunt.\n\nShe, tonight, sat on her throne with her legs crossed, one over the other. She wore the thick leathers of a huntress, her teeth like fangs coming down the sides of her face. Her lower body was human, and her upper body was furred like the hounds around her, and between her legs was the puffy sex of a feral canine.\n\nMelchiresa looked down at him, her eyes glowing red, and snarled.\n\n“This is your fault. Give me one reason why I shouldn’t take everything that I gave you away?”\n\n“You have given me [i]nothing.[/i]”\n\n“I allowed you your mind, mortal!”\n\nA clawed hand swept through the air, pulling an invisible leash. Vitus yelped like the hound he had become as he was dragged forward, his paws grinding against the ground as he was pulled before her. Her foot came down on his head, shoving him into the earth.\n\n“I called you out of your prison. I let you keep your mind. I let you keep a portion of your soul so you had [i]something[/i] to call your own. I have given you your head, letting you keep your lead, your choices. And all I asked in return…was for a sacrifice, so you could show me that you understood where you belonged. And who was sending you to hunt. And where is that sacrifice? Where is it? Hmm? Where…is…it?”\n\nThe dream realm shifted and shimmered. All around him, spirits of the dead came and went. Human, elven, dwarven, and more swept by, some marked with teeth around their necks, others raked raw by claws along their chests and sides. All showed the mark of death that could only be delivered by a beast, and he knew, deep down, that Melchiresa had claimed them all at the time of their death, taken them as sacrifices from ones like him that were all around the world.\n\n“Where…is…she?” the Demon Lord asked again, her toes grinding into his cheek as she pushed him down. “She is still [i]alive.[/i] And because of that, you have nothing. What excuse can you offer me?”\n\n“…”\n\n“None. I gave you an order. Very, very simple, as it stands. All you had to do…was kill an enemy. Kill one little mage that was hunting you, trying to bring you back to the very one that you hated more than me. I should have thought it was the easiest thing in the world, to kill someone that you hated. So, before I decide to turn you into a hound that [i]will[/i] listen when the pack calls…tell me why? Tell me why you decided that you knew better than me, and why you think that you deserved to tell [i]me[/i] ‘no.’”\n\nVitus grunted, gritting his teeth as she continued to press down. The firm pressure of her foot against his cheek, heel to toe, toe to heel, put him under more and more pressure. In the real world, his face would have cracked against the dirt ground, but here in the dream world, she exerted her power. A Demon Lord’s might was such that it could do whatever it wanted in its own realm. Even the Archdevils would have to think twice about encroaching on such a place of power as this, and she knew it. She knew she could do whatever she wanted to him.\n\nHe lifted his head against her foot, tilting it until his fangs could touch her sole. He did not bite, but he pressed them there, point to flesh…and growled.\n\nIt did not relieve his suffering, but she did not push down any harder. If anything, she paused in her grinding, though she did not pull her leg back. He growled again as he spoke.\n\n“I [i]think[/i] about what I do. Do you know that? I [i]think.[/i] I am not a dog. I never have been.”\n\n“You could have fooled me. You wear the hide, the pelt, and the power of my pack. Who are you fooling when you say anything else? You owe me everything, Vitus. Everything.”\n\n“That…is not what I found in the manor. That isn’t who I am. That’s not [i]all[/i] that I am.”\n\nA deeper growl echoed from the depths of his throat as he tilted his head further back. Fire, black flames of hell and golden flames of something else, rippled in between his teeth. He didn’t know what it was, but he seized hold of it, clenching his will around that furious flame as much as he possibly could. It did not drive the Demon Lord back, but it gave him confidence, and it was badly needed.\n\n“Everyone wants me for something. Brundir. You. Everyone. [i]Everyone[/i] wants me for their purposes. And maybe, just maybe, I can get a better offer from someone else, Melchiresa. So if you want me to follow your orders, give me a reason. Give me a reason, or I’ll howl it out to everyone. I will scream to the moon and the stars and the gods what you are doing. Maybe you can stop a dog from howling, but can you stop a dragon from burning?”\n\n“…You are not a dragon.”\n\n“Not fully. Not yet. But you wanted me…for that.”\n\nMelchiresa said nothing, and the pressure continued to keep him pinned. He was risking so much right now, and he knew it. Everything that passed his lips was a possible reason to kill him, not one to keep him around. He was banking everything on the fact that she needed an agent in the world, and he was the better choice than Katya at that moment. The pair of them were under her, but he was the one that she kept coming for, the one that she wanted to use, the one that she called her Hunter.\n\nThat had to mean something. It had to.\n\nFinally, her foot lifted from his head. He groaned as he was finally able to sit up. Not just sit like a dog, but sit up. His paws were hands, his forelegs arms once more, and he held them at his sides with a groan.\n\nMelchiresa had turned from female to male, and he chuckled as he crossed and uncrossed his legs. A puffy cunt had become a dog cock in the same moment, and it was large. Large enough to send a shiver through him as the tops and bottoms changed for the Demon Lord, as well, with a human top and a dog bottom half, with paws that were broad and thick, and claws that were as dark as sin and as blunt as hammers. One such dragged across his face, tracing a line along his jaw.\n\n“You are brave. Foolish, but brave.” He chuckled. “And not entirely wrong.”\n\n“…”\n\n“You want some slack on the leash. I’ll grant that…for now. But keep this in mind, Vitus. The longer that you make me wait, the greater a task I’ll ask of you. That first one would have given you great power.”\n\n“And you could give me that power now. Power to get Robin back. To get [i]us[/i] out.”\n\n“Why should I do that, if you have so many allies as you claim to have?”\n\n“…”\n\n“Not so good a threat when it takes away your options, is it?” he asked. “I will be there. Watching. Waiting. And when you decide that you want [i]my[/i] power, then you will have to do what I say. My power, Vitus, comes with all the strings attached to it…but I will let you see those strings. I don’t hide what I want. I don’t hide what I’m asking of you. Just like I didn’t hide what you would need to do to save your little pack-mate.\n\n“And that…oh, that…”\n\nThe Demon Lord stood up, holding out his hand. One of the Hellhounds stepped forward, a leash of flames in its mouth. It bowed its head as the Demon Lord took it from its jaws, swiftly disappearing back into the black fog all around them.\n\n“You abandoned your pack-mate. You ran. You broke one of the great rules that I have set for me and mine.”\n\n“…I did,” Vitus muttered, lowering his head. “And this is my punishment?”\n\n“Oh, yes…”\n\n“…I accept it.”\n\n“Good. Hound or dragon, someone with power knows how to take responsibility…and you have much to take.”\n\nThe Demon Lord walked around him, and Vitus stared straight ahead. Both man and Hellhound were in agreement: they had fucked up, and they needed to be punished. Regardless of how much they argued about other things, on this, they were united. They deserved something for failing this time.\n\nThe lash came down with a crack and a hiss, the magical ends raking across their enhanced skin and fur and ripping both. They hissed and yipped, almost but not quite slumping forward as it felt as if fire burned beneath their skin.\n\nCrack!\n\nAnother blow, harsher than the first, ripped down from their shoulders to their spine, halfway to their tail. The blood that came free burst into flames, adding to the agony of the blow.\n\nAnother.\n\nAnother.\n\nAnother.\n\nEach time it ripped through their skin, and each time, it left fire behind. The heat leaped into an inferno on their back, and just when it could get no worse, it turned from heat to cold. The chill swept through their veins, leaving them gasping, barely able to breathe as everything tightened up across their body. The chill of winter, the hunting wind, swept through them, and as everything drew taut, so did their wounds. The cracked skin broke again, blood running down their back and leaving icy trails behind, trails that froze and curved, cutting at their back again with dagger edges.\n\nThe cold continued to build, and this time, they braced themselves, waiting for the next change. It hit as hard as the cold did, not with heat, nor with chill, but with weakness.\n\n“Ah…ah…”\n\nIt was more than just the exhaustion of blood loss. It was the run, the mad flight from the hounds that left nothing in the blood, where the muscles were willing to die just to have a moment’s rest. They fell forward, no longer seated, barely holding themselves up from falling to all fours. They growled, grunting, shaking their head as the exhaustion tried to take them into true sleep. \n\nThey held out, waited it out, even as their arms and legs and everything screamed at them to give in to the exhaustion.\n\nIt changed, as they knew it would. It changed from the heat, to the cold, to the exhaustion…to the [i]bites.[/i]\n\n“Nnngh…ah…NNGH!”\n\nThe sounds that came from them could have been sexual, at first. It felt like bites along their back, their arms, their tail, their throat. Light, at first, barely there, but growing more and more intense. Each strike was like something learning, something testing them, seeing what it could get away with. The bites came faster, harsher, and –\n\n“Ulk!”\n\nThe first one to break skin was at their neck, and it felt as if their throat had been ripped open. Vitus gasped and the Hellhound within tried to bay, but neither could make a sound. Their throat opened, and a brief gush of red came free before it was sealed again.\n\nAnother bite, then another opened them up. One in the back of the leg, the other in the belly, and still others elsewhere. They hunched their shoulders, enduring it, the pain of loss, the pain of failure, the pain of letting down their pack-mate ripping through them again, and again, and again.\n\nAnd yet, still, they managed to stay upright. They did not know how, but they did.\n\nEventually, the pain came to an end. No more bites, no more tiredness, save for what they had already endured. They gasped for breath, looking at the throne once more.\n\nThis time, it was a human woman looking down at them, too pale for words, a white blot on the darkened landscape. The only signs of her canine side were her golden-red eyes, and little pink dots like nipples along her chest and stomach.\n\n“That is the price for failing the pack, Vitus. And that price will be paid again, if you fail her once more. There are rules that even the Demon Lords care for, and for me, my pack is all. It is [i]everything.[/i] If you abandon those that you protect, then you are nothing but prey, and I will hunt you to the end of the earth to bring you down. The pack is all. Do you understand me?”\n\n“…I…Understand.”\n\n“You best hope you do. This was a taste. I will rend your soul from your body and hunt it for eternity if you turn your back on your pack again. No matter the reason, no mater your justifications, I will see you pay the price for failing them. Now…go. Go, and prepare for whatever you claim you will get from your allies.”\n\nMelchiresa waved her hand, and the dream was gone. The world went dark, and he slipped into oblivion.\n\n#\n\nThe next morning came with annoyance on the behalf of some, eagerness on the part of others. Piers had apparently woken first, sitting at the fire and cooking the last of a breakfast for those that needed it (namely, Vitus). The others had come piecemeal from the wagon, from Shereeza to the Cinnas, as well as Neena and Katya.\n\n[i]A motley pack, to be sure,[/i] Vitus thought, biting off a hiss as he walked over to join them. [i]But my pack, nonetheless.[/i]\n\nHe adjusted his shirt, still expecting to feel the raking pain of the whip from the night before. There were no marks left in fur or flesh, but the memory of the torture remained. He shook his head as he took his portion of the breakfast, a small strip of bacon with some bread and cheese. They’d likely eat on the road going forward.\n\n“So…”\n\nAll eyes were on him the moment he spoke. He looked around, then back down again.\n\n“So. If anyone knows…where will they be taking Robin?” he asked.\n\n“Egorian, the capitol.” Neena shook her head. “Do you know nothing of how the Hellknights operate?”\n\n“First time being here,” Vitus admitted.\n\n“But you could have still read a book. It’s – oh, gods, you didn’t even realize what you were coming to with Cheliax, did you? Did any of you know anything about this place?”\n\n“I did.” Katya shrugged, sipping her morning coffee. “It’s why I recommended it.”\n\n“Of course [i]you[/i] did, you old hag. With how long you’ve been around, I can’t imagine you not knowing anything. More’s the pity that you decide to hoard it all. How the hell did you even manage to keep me tied up like that last night, anyway?”\n\n“Secrets,” Katya said, smiling.\n\n“Hmmph.”\n\n“Egorian. Why?” Vitus said.\n\n“Isn’t it obvious? She’s a prisoner, and a stranger in Cheliax. I guarantee you that you didn’t even properly bind her as a slave, considering that it’s the only way that a were-rat like her would be allowed to wander around any part of the country. They’ll want information, and they’ll think that the best way to get that would be in the capitol, in their headquarters. I imagine that she’s going to be put to the most fiendish torments that they can come up with in order to break her will.”\n\n“Hmm, doubtful,” Katya said. “Robin is not likely to break from something like that.”\n\n“Anyone would. What makes her special?”\n\n“I know her,” Piers said, the one-armed man interrupting with narrowed eyes. “I know my wife. And I know what she trained for. You don’t.”\n\nHe looked back at the fire, and Vitus was surprised that Neena didn’t contradict him. Piers ripped off a stick from the wood pile and tossed it into the campfire.\n\n“She was my wife. She learned how to hunt criminals with me. More, she learned how to take it. Torture. Mind games. Potions. Interrogation tricks. She learned how to dish it out, and she learned how to take it. Each and every technique we heard of in Absalom, she learned, and she tested it on herself. Every. Single. [i]One.[/i] She wanted to know how it felt to have it done to her so she knew exactly what she could do to anyone else. How far to take it. Where to stop. How someone could resist having it done if it happened without their knowledge.\n\n“She knows it. So don’t you [i]dare[/i] tell me that she would break. Because she won’t. Not even now…”\n\nNobody had anything to say about that. Vitus couldn’t help but stare as Piers looked away from everyone, his eyes locked with the fire, and he wondered just what the other man had been thinking of all night long. That was the greatest show of devotion that he had seen the former commander give his wife since they had fled from the city, and it was beyond anything that he had imagined the other man felt for the kidnapped woman.\n\n[i]Maybe there is something for them, yet.\n\nThat woman is ours.\n\n…We can share.\n\nHmm. Us first.[/i]\n\nHe put the Hellhound’s thoughts out of his head, turning back to Neena. The naked prisoner looked back at him as soon as he glanced her way, almost bird-like…or something else. He shook his head.\n\n“You’re Brundir’s agent. Which means, I bet, that you reported to him before exposing yourself to us.”\n\n“That’s right. I’m not stupid.”\n\n“Debatable.”\n\n“You want to find out just how much I know?”\n\n“No, no. But…he knows. That means that either he’s coming here…or he’s left you here with different instructions.”\n\n“…You’re good,” Neena said, a smile breaking across her face. “I’m starting to see why my master wants you back.”\n\n“Which is it?”\n\n“…He’s not coming,” she said, looking away as her smile died. “He…told me that there are things that he has to take care of in Absalom right now, so he can’t come to collect me, and you. However…”\n\n“Yes?”\n\n“He said that…if it means keeping you around…I am allowed to help you. And facilitate a deal between you and him.”\n\nAnother silence fell around the campfire, but this time, all other eyes turned on him. Vitus didn’t blame them; he would have liked to look to someone else for ideas, right then.\n\nHe’d imagined making a deal with Neena for her freedom, getting her somewhere safe or at least away from the devil worshipers so that she could get back to Brundir on her own. He hadn’t thought that she would put him in contact with Brundir himself. The idea of seeing that man again sent a shiver down his spine, and not entirely of fear; there was just enough of the old conditioning left that there was a hint of arousal to it, too.\n\nIt had been the narrowest of narrow escapes getting away from that aasimar. If he was ever in the same room with the man again, he couldn’t see himself getting away again. Brundir would have learned from the last time, would have come up with all kinds of ways to bind Vitus and keep him from sliding out of the room again. There would be no escape a second time, and giving that maniac any kind of hold over him was tantamount to putting a collar over his neck himself.\n\nBut what was the alternative? Melchiresa? He got her to back off once, but if he gave her what she wanted, what the hell was he going to do to stay free?\n\nA favor for a mortal, or a favor for a Demon Lord?\n\n“What kind of deal?” Vitus asked.\n\n“He’d want to help you. He wants you back, and he’ll do a few things, at least, to make sure that you don’t get caught by the people here,” Neena said. “Of course, you might need to promise to come back to him willingly, or at least, to get closer to Absalom afterward, but…well, you can’t get something for nothing, can you?”\n\n“And you can facilitate this deal…how?”\n\n“Simple. I cast a spell to summon his image here, and you two can talk it out.”\n\n“That’s simple, in your mind?”\n\n“I know my magic!”\n\nHe held up his hand, not wanting to get into a fight about it. But the idea was sufficiently interesting to keep his attention.\n\n[i]I can talk with him without being in the same room with him. And he wants me alive, not touched, not leashed to anyone else’s power. That means that he’s still…obsessed, which means that he’s going to intervene to some degree whether I want him to or not. Now that he knows where I am…[/i]\n\nThe only saving grace was that Brundir couldn’t leave Absalom at that moment. If the aasimar could, Vitus had no doubt that the purple-skinned former adventurer would have stepped out of the wagon right alongside the Cinnas and made his presence known. As it stood, the image-summoning would be dangerous enough, but he was pretty sure that there were no triggers in his head for the other man to use.\n\nPretty sure.\n\n“We’ll do that in an hour, then. Everyone else, finish eating and get the wagon ready. Katya?”\n\n“Hmm?”\n\n“I need you to check for something.”\n\n“Ah, I think I know what you mean. Yes, that’s a good idea.”\n\n“Then –”\n\n“Yes, then we’ll have you cast the spell, and I’ll…talk to your master,” Vitus said, shaking his head. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”\n\n#\n\nThe horses stopped, and Robin was tossed to the ground. Even with the were-rat’s fur, she could feel the sunburns through the brown coat, and she groaned as she rolled along the sandy ground. The itching and grinding made her skin ache even more, and she hissed as she was picked up by the ropes that kept her arms bound to her back.\n\n“You should be grateful. If anyone else was in charge, I doubt that you would have been allowed to leave the manor alive. If it had been me –”\n\n“But it wasn’t you, was it?”\n\nThe fully-armored Hellknight holding her up turned, facing the commander of their little squad. Robin looked up, a small smile crossing her face despite herself as she looked at Miss Onoria Salvus.\n\nThe tiefling stood head and shoulders taller than most of the other Hellknights, and it wasn’t her armor that made her look huge. She had been altered, Robin guessed, at least to a reasonable extent. No other tiefling that she’d ever met had that sort of build, and she imagined that there had been a great deal of magical experimentation to make sure that this bitch could be as strong as possible.\n\nThe fact that her claws had ripped a significant amount of flesh off the other woman’s neck was not lost on her, either. Despite the hell-healing that Onoria had gotten during the battle, the scar was still there. Five lines of red, bright and raised against the dark flesh. The were-rat smiled to herself.\n\n“You got me,” Onoria said, stroking a gauntleted finger along her neck. “And I have to admit, I didn’t see that coming.”\n\n“There’s a lot that you won’t see coming.”\n\n“Like your friends following us?”\n\n“Oh, that’s obvious.” Robin shook her head. “Stupid, but very, very obvious.”\n\n“Then what won’t we see coming?”\n\n“Hmmm…I’d say that’s for me to know…and for you to try and find out.”\n\nIt was intentionally chosen to piss the knight off. The one holding her growled, lifting her up as if about to throw her, but Onoria grabbed the armored limb keeping Robin off the ground. The tiefling shook her head, taking the were-rat out of the other Hellknight’s grasp.\n\n“Make camp, everyone. We’re going to get four hours rest, then continue. I’ll take care of the prisoner.”\n\nShe was taken to one corner of the quickly-put-together campsite, and the Hellknight carried her into a tent. Robin expected to be tossed to the ground, but instead, Onoria sat her down, keeping her in a kneeling position and shaking her head as she adjusted the were-rat to a more comfortable position.\n\nThe bindings didn’t come off, though. Robin hadn’t expected that they would, but it would have been a nice benefit.\n\n“My fellow knights are right. Most of them would have killed you for doing something like this,” Onoria said, tracing the lines along the side of her neck. “But I see that as something different. Something more interesting. You clearly have skills. And a great many skills, to stand up for as long as you did against someone like me. And clearly, you were not a slave where you came from. And yet, you consented to be treated like one here, under a beast like that man in the manor.”\n\n“There were reasons.”\n\n“There’s always reasons. That’s the same as saying nothing for as much as it tells me,” the tiefling said. “But what it does tell me is that you’re as interesting as that other man…and perhaps more interesting. And your skills…are worth having. Once you have been corrected, of course.”\n\n“That would take a great deal of correcting. I don’t know if I’m really worth it, but you’re welcome to try.”\n\n“Oh, an invitation? It’s been a very long time since someone has invited me to…exercise my talents.”\n\nRobin smiled. Not broadly, not hugely, but enough to show her teeth. Just enough to show that she knew what she was asking for.\n\nAt the very least, if she was being interrogated, she wasn’t going to have reason to talk to someone being friendly. Unless they knew that trick, of course…but then again, so did she…\n\n \n\n \n\n \n\n\n\n\n[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]\n \nSummary: Vitus and Co are back, and we continue the story with the idea that they need to rescue Robin from the Hellknights.\n \nTags: M/F, Foot Fetish, Femdom, Beating, Masochism, Punishment, Pain, Blood, Series, Magic, Fantasy, Hellhound, Demon, Human, Tiefling, Were-Rat, Dark, ",
"writing_bbcode_parsed": "
The Bonds of Need Chapter 1 For a-lycotonum By Draconicon
“Katya.” Vitus turned to his teacher. “Watch Neena. Make sure she doesn’t leave, make sure she doesn’t cause trouble. Just…make sure she doesn’t do anything.”
“Why her?” Piers asked.
“Because –”
The hellhound clenched his jaw, taking a moment to breathe, release, breathe, and release. He knew that if he let loose right now, he was going to be fighting tooth and claw to keep from just burning the other man to cinders. Not what he needed right now. Not what any of them needed right now.
“Because she can.”
“Indeed,” the older woman said, getting to her feet. “And I will ensure that she doesn’t get out of any further bondage.”
“I’d like to see you try, old woman,” the sweaty prisoner said. “I got out of the spells that held me before. I’ll do it –”
It took nothing more than a wave of Katya’s hand to freeze Neena in place. The other woman didn’t move, though the sweat still ran down her body, and a long string of slime that had been formerly suspended against her thigh came loose. It dangled from her pussy, slowly dripping further, further, further down.
With a snap of her fingers, Katya released the other woman, and she immediately gasped, bringing her legs together. Her cheeks burned bright red.
“How did you do that?!”
“More experience than you will ever have. Now, come. If you’re good, I won’t humiliate you again.”
They walked back to the wagon, and the Cinnas made space for them as they stepped inside. Vitus shook his head, resting one furred hand against his forehead.
“You think that you can trust her?” Piers asked.
“…Trust.” He shook his head. “You’re a one to talk about trust.”
“I made a mistake.”
“And then you lied about it.”
“I…I didn’t think I could trust you.” Piers sat down beside him. “I didn’t think I could trust anyone anymore. Not Katya, not my wife…certainly not you, since you caused this whole thing. What was I supposed to do? Say that I went walking, fell in bed with the enemy, and then confessed something I shouldn’t have? If I said anything, you could have killed me.”
“Killed you? Why would I have done that?”
“You almost did,” the one-armed man said, pointing to his throat. A bruise was already forming, almost like a collar around his neck. “Just now.”
“Because you lied to me. If you’d said something about it before, back in port, then we could have handled it. We could have done something to hide our tracks. We could have done something to keep them from taking Robin away. Instead, you kept your mouth shut, and now we’re down someone that we all care about. All of us,” he said before Piers could interrupt. “Just because you hate what she became doesn’t mean you stopped caring about her. She was the first person you asked about when we hopped in the wagon, remember?”
“…You’re right.”
Piers sighed, leaning forward as he pulled his legs against his chest. The missing arm seemed to stand out all the more in that moment, and it took Vitus some effort to not stare at the other man for it.
The silence of the night lingered around them as Vitus couldn’t bring himself to talk to Piers without ripping him to shreds, and he didn’t know what was going through the other man’s mind. He knew that they were at odds, and he knew that this was the worst time for infighting with the group considering what lay ahead of them, but he knew better than to start something that would make it worse.
“You’re right,” Piers repeated. “I made a mistake. And…and I abandoned her when I shouldn’t have. Robin…was my wife. Still is. And…I did everything wrong.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“But.” Piers turned to him. “Katya knew.”
“…Did she, now?”
“You heard her. She wanted to bring this up.”
“And she didn’t before, because…”
“…We made a deal.”
“I see.”
“It’s not just my fault. It’s…both of ours. If you’re going to be furious with me, then you should at least be angry at her, too. That…that is the only fair way, and the only honest way.”
“…You’re not wrong,” he muttered.
“No. I’m right.”
“Don’t push it.” He groaned, shaking his head. “I need to sleep. We all need to sleep. Tomorrow is going to be hell.”
“I thought we were already in it.”
“Just the outskirts. It’s going to get worse. Sleep.”
“Alright. But…you…You won’t abandon her?”
“No. I won’t. She’s pack.”
#
Sleep came, and with it came the advent of the Demon Lord. He was in her realm from the moment he closed his eyes, and Vitus groaned as he felt the power of her realm pull him deeper, dragging the shaggy fur further from his shoulders, pulling him to lean forward on all fours rather than standing on his hind legs. His hands warped, almost becoming paws with opposable thumbs, and he heard the rustling of the other Hellhounds of the Demon Lord of the Hunt.
She, tonight, sat on her throne with her legs crossed, one over the other. She wore the thick leathers of a huntress, her teeth like fangs coming down the sides of her face. Her lower body was human, and her upper body was furred like the hounds around her, and between her legs was the puffy sex of a feral canine.
Melchiresa looked down at him, her eyes glowing red, and snarled.
“This is your fault. Give me one reason why I shouldn’t take everything that I gave you away?”
“You have given me nothing.”
“I allowed you your mind, mortal!”
A clawed hand swept through the air, pulling an invisible leash. Vitus yelped like the hound he had become as he was dragged forward, his paws grinding against the ground as he was pulled before her. Her foot came down on his head, shoving him into the earth.
“I called you out of your prison. I let you keep your mind. I let you keep a portion of your soul so you had something to call your own. I have given you your head, letting you keep your lead, your choices. And all I asked in return…was for a sacrifice, so you could show me that you understood where you belonged. And who was sending you to hunt. And where is that sacrifice? Where is it? Hmm? Where…is…it?”
The dream realm shifted and shimmered. All around him, spirits of the dead came and went. Human, elven, dwarven, and more swept by, some marked with teeth around their necks, others raked raw by claws along their chests and sides. All showed the mark of death that could only be delivered by a beast, and he knew, deep down, that Melchiresa had claimed them all at the time of their death, taken them as sacrifices from ones like him that were all around the world.
“Where…is…she?” the Demon Lord asked again, her toes grinding into his cheek as she pushed him down. “She is still alive. And because of that, you have nothing. What excuse can you offer me?”
“…”
“None. I gave you an order. Very, very simple, as it stands. All you had to do…was kill an enemy. Kill one little mage that was hunting you, trying to bring you back to the very one that you hated more than me. I should have thought it was the easiest thing in the world, to kill someone that you hated. So, before I decide to turn you into a hound that will listen when the pack calls…tell me why? Tell me why you decided that you knew better than me, and why you think that you deserved to tell me ‘no.’”
Vitus grunted, gritting his teeth as she continued to press down. The firm pressure of her foot against his cheek, heel to toe, toe to heel, put him under more and more pressure. In the real world, his face would have cracked against the dirt ground, but here in the dream world, she exerted her power. A Demon Lord’s might was such that it could do whatever it wanted in its own realm. Even the Archdevils would have to think twice about encroaching on such a place of power as this, and she knew it. She knew she could do whatever she wanted to him.
He lifted his head against her foot, tilting it until his fangs could touch her sole. He did not bite, but he pressed them there, point to flesh…and growled.
It did not relieve his suffering, but she did not push down any harder. If anything, she paused in her grinding, though she did not pull her leg back. He growled again as he spoke.
“I think about what I do. Do you know that? I think. I am not a dog. I never have been.”
“You could have fooled me. You wear the hide, the pelt, and the power of my pack. Who are you fooling when you say anything else? You owe me everything, Vitus. Everything.”
“That…is not what I found in the manor. That isn’t who I am. That’s not all that I am.”
A deeper growl echoed from the depths of his throat as he tilted his head further back. Fire, black flames of hell and golden flames of something else, rippled in between his teeth. He didn’t know what it was, but he seized hold of it, clenching his will around that furious flame as much as he possibly could. It did not drive the Demon Lord back, but it gave him confidence, and it was badly needed.
“Everyone wants me for something. Brundir. You. Everyone. Everyone wants me for their purposes. And maybe, just maybe, I can get a better offer from someone else, Melchiresa. So if you want me to follow your orders, give me a reason. Give me a reason, or I’ll howl it out to everyone. I will scream to the moon and the stars and the gods what you are doing. Maybe you can stop a dog from howling, but can you stop a dragon from burning?”
“…You are not a dragon.”
“Not fully. Not yet. But you wanted me…for that.”
Melchiresa said nothing, and the pressure continued to keep him pinned. He was risking so much right now, and he knew it. Everything that passed his lips was a possible reason to kill him, not one to keep him around. He was banking everything on the fact that she needed an agent in the world, and he was the better choice than Katya at that moment. The pair of them were under her, but he was the one that she kept coming for, the one that she wanted to use, the one that she called her Hunter.
That had to mean something. It had to.
Finally, her foot lifted from his head. He groaned as he was finally able to sit up. Not just sit like a dog, but sit up. His paws were hands, his forelegs arms once more, and he held them at his sides with a groan.
Melchiresa had turned from female to male, and he chuckled as he crossed and uncrossed his legs. A puffy cunt had become a dog cock in the same moment, and it was large. Large enough to send a shiver through him as the tops and bottoms changed for the Demon Lord, as well, with a human top and a dog bottom half, with paws that were broad and thick, and claws that were as dark as sin and as blunt as hammers. One such dragged across his face, tracing a line along his jaw.
“You are brave. Foolish, but brave.” He chuckled. “And not entirely wrong.”
“…”
“You want some slack on the leash. I’ll grant that…for now. But keep this in mind, Vitus. The longer that you make me wait, the greater a task I’ll ask of you. That first one would have given you great power.”
“And you could give me that power now. Power to get Robin back. To get us out.”
“Why should I do that, if you have so many allies as you claim to have?”
“…”
“Not so good a threat when it takes away your options, is it?” he asked. “I will be there. Watching. Waiting. And when you decide that you want my power, then you will have to do what I say. My power, Vitus, comes with all the strings attached to it…but I will let you see those strings. I don’t hide what I want. I don’t hide what I’m asking of you. Just like I didn’t hide what you would need to do to save your little pack-mate.
“And that…oh, that…”
The Demon Lord stood up, holding out his hand. One of the Hellhounds stepped forward, a leash of flames in its mouth. It bowed its head as the Demon Lord took it from its jaws, swiftly disappearing back into the black fog all around them.
“You abandoned your pack-mate. You ran. You broke one of the great rules that I have set for me and mine.”
“…I did,” Vitus muttered, lowering his head. “And this is my punishment?”
“Oh, yes…”
“…I accept it.”
“Good. Hound or dragon, someone with power knows how to take responsibility…and you have much to take.”
The Demon Lord walked around him, and Vitus stared straight ahead. Both man and Hellhound were in agreement: they had fucked up, and they needed to be punished. Regardless of how much they argued about other things, on this, they were united. They deserved something for failing this time.
The lash came down with a crack and a hiss, the magical ends raking across their enhanced skin and fur and ripping both. They hissed and yipped, almost but not quite slumping forward as it felt as if fire burned beneath their skin.
Crack!
Another blow, harsher than the first, ripped down from their shoulders to their spine, halfway to their tail. The blood that came free burst into flames, adding to the agony of the blow.
Another.
Another.
Another.
Each time it ripped through their skin, and each time, it left fire behind. The heat leaped into an inferno on their back, and just when it could get no worse, it turned from heat to cold. The chill swept through their veins, leaving them gasping, barely able to breathe as everything tightened up across their body. The chill of winter, the hunting wind, swept through them, and as everything drew taut, so did their wounds. The cracked skin broke again, blood running down their back and leaving icy trails behind, trails that froze and curved, cutting at their back again with dagger edges.
The cold continued to build, and this time, they braced themselves, waiting for the next change. It hit as hard as the cold did, not with heat, nor with chill, but with weakness.
“Ah…ah…”
It was more than just the exhaustion of blood loss. It was the run, the mad flight from the hounds that left nothing in the blood, where the muscles were willing to die just to have a moment’s rest. They fell forward, no longer seated, barely holding themselves up from falling to all fours. They growled, grunting, shaking their head as the exhaustion tried to take them into true sleep.
They held out, waited it out, even as their arms and legs and everything screamed at them to give in to the exhaustion.
It changed, as they knew it would. It changed from the heat, to the cold, to the exhaustion…to the bites.
“Nnngh…ah…NNGH!”
The sounds that came from them could have been sexual, at first. It felt like bites along their back, their arms, their tail, their throat. Light, at first, barely there, but growing more and more intense. Each strike was like something learning, something testing them, seeing what it could get away with. The bites came faster, harsher, and –
“Ulk!”
The first one to break skin was at their neck, and it felt as if their throat had been ripped open. Vitus gasped and the Hellhound within tried to bay, but neither could make a sound. Their throat opened, and a brief gush of red came free before it was sealed again.
Another bite, then another opened them up. One in the back of the leg, the other in the belly, and still others elsewhere. They hunched their shoulders, enduring it, the pain of loss, the pain of failure, the pain of letting down their pack-mate ripping through them again, and again, and again.
And yet, still, they managed to stay upright. They did not know how, but they did.
Eventually, the pain came to an end. No more bites, no more tiredness, save for what they had already endured. They gasped for breath, looking at the throne once more.
This time, it was a human woman looking down at them, too pale for words, a white blot on the darkened landscape. The only signs of her canine side were her golden-red eyes, and little pink dots like nipples along her chest and stomach.
“That is the price for failing the pack, Vitus. And that price will be paid again, if you fail her once more. There are rules that even the Demon Lords care for, and for me, my pack is all. It is everything. If you abandon those that you protect, then you are nothing but prey, and I will hunt you to the end of the earth to bring you down. The pack is all. Do you understand me?”
“…I…Understand.”
“You best hope you do. This was a taste. I will rend your soul from your body and hunt it for eternity if you turn your back on your pack again. No matter the reason, no mater your justifications, I will see you pay the price for failing them. Now…go. Go, and prepare for whatever you claim you will get from your allies.”
Melchiresa waved her hand, and the dream was gone. The world went dark, and he slipped into oblivion.
#
The next morning came with annoyance on the behalf of some, eagerness on the part of others. Piers had apparently woken first, sitting at the fire and cooking the last of a breakfast for those that needed it (namely, Vitus). The others had come piecemeal from the wagon, from Shereeza to the Cinnas, as well as Neena and Katya.
A motley pack, to be sure, Vitus thought, biting off a hiss as he walked over to join them. But my pack, nonetheless.
He adjusted his shirt, still expecting to feel the raking pain of the whip from the night before. There were no marks left in fur or flesh, but the memory of the torture remained. He shook his head as he took his portion of the breakfast, a small strip of bacon with some bread and cheese. They’d likely eat on the road going forward.
“So…”
All eyes were on him the moment he spoke. He looked around, then back down again.
“So. If anyone knows…where will they be taking Robin?” he asked.
“Egorian, the capitol.” Neena shook her head. “Do you know nothing of how the Hellknights operate?”
“First time being here,” Vitus admitted.
“But you could have still read a book. It’s – oh, gods, you didn’t even realize what you were coming to with Cheliax, did you? Did any of you know anything about this place?”
“I did.” Katya shrugged, sipping her morning coffee. “It’s why I recommended it.”
“Of course you did, you old hag. With how long you’ve been around, I can’t imagine you not knowing anything. More’s the pity that you decide to hoard it all. How the hell did you even manage to keep me tied up like that last night, anyway?”
“Secrets,” Katya said, smiling.
“Hmmph.”
“Egorian. Why?” Vitus said.
“Isn’t it obvious? She’s a prisoner, and a stranger in Cheliax. I guarantee you that you didn’t even properly bind her as a slave, considering that it’s the only way that a were-rat like her would be allowed to wander around any part of the country. They’ll want information, and they’ll think that the best way to get that would be in the capitol, in their headquarters. I imagine that she’s going to be put to the most fiendish torments that they can come up with in order to break her will.”
“Hmm, doubtful,” Katya said. “Robin is not likely to break from something like that.”
“Anyone would. What makes her special?”
“I know her,” Piers said, the one-armed man interrupting with narrowed eyes. “I know my wife. And I know what she trained for. You don’t.”
He looked back at the fire, and Vitus was surprised that Neena didn’t contradict him. Piers ripped off a stick from the wood pile and tossed it into the campfire.
“She was my wife. She learned how to hunt criminals with me. More, she learned how to take it. Torture. Mind games. Potions. Interrogation tricks. She learned how to dish it out, and she learned how to take it. Each and every technique we heard of in Absalom, she learned, and she tested it on herself. Every. Single. One. She wanted to know how it felt to have it done to her so she knew exactly what she could do to anyone else. How far to take it. Where to stop. How someone could resist having it done if it happened without their knowledge.
“She knows it. So don’t you dare tell me that she would break. Because she won’t. Not even now…”
Nobody had anything to say about that. Vitus couldn’t help but stare as Piers looked away from everyone, his eyes locked with the fire, and he wondered just what the other man had been thinking of all night long. That was the greatest show of devotion that he had seen the former commander give his wife since they had fled from the city, and it was beyond anything that he had imagined the other man felt for the kidnapped woman.
Maybe there is something for them, yet.
That woman is ours.
…We can share.
Hmm. Us first.
He put the Hellhound’s thoughts out of his head, turning back to Neena. The naked prisoner looked back at him as soon as he glanced her way, almost bird-like…or something else. He shook his head.
“You’re Brundir’s agent. Which means, I bet, that you reported to him before exposing yourself to us.”
“That’s right. I’m not stupid.”
“Debatable.”
“You want to find out just how much I know?”
“No, no. But…he knows. That means that either he’s coming here…or he’s left you here with different instructions.”
“…You’re good,” Neena said, a smile breaking across her face. “I’m starting to see why my master wants you back.”
“Which is it?”
“…He’s not coming,” she said, looking away as her smile died. “He…told me that there are things that he has to take care of in Absalom right now, so he can’t come to collect me, and you. However…”
“Yes?”
“He said that…if it means keeping you around…I am allowed to help you. And facilitate a deal between you and him.”
Another silence fell around the campfire, but this time, all other eyes turned on him. Vitus didn’t blame them; he would have liked to look to someone else for ideas, right then.
He’d imagined making a deal with Neena for her freedom, getting her somewhere safe or at least away from the devil worshipers so that she could get back to Brundir on her own. He hadn’t thought that she would put him in contact with Brundir himself. The idea of seeing that man again sent a shiver down his spine, and not entirely of fear; there was just enough of the old conditioning left that there was a hint of arousal to it, too.
It had been the narrowest of narrow escapes getting away from that aasimar. If he was ever in the same room with the man again, he couldn’t see himself getting away again. Brundir would have learned from the last time, would have come up with all kinds of ways to bind Vitus and keep him from sliding out of the room again. There would be no escape a second time, and giving that maniac any kind of hold over him was tantamount to putting a collar over his neck himself.
But what was the alternative? Melchiresa? He got her to back off once, but if he gave her what she wanted, what the hell was he going to do to stay free?
A favor for a mortal, or a favor for a Demon Lord?
“What kind of deal?” Vitus asked.
“He’d want to help you. He wants you back, and he’ll do a few things, at least, to make sure that you don’t get caught by the people here,” Neena said. “Of course, you might need to promise to come back to him willingly, or at least, to get closer to Absalom afterward, but…well, you can’t get something for nothing, can you?”
“And you can facilitate this deal…how?”
“Simple. I cast a spell to summon his image here, and you two can talk it out.”
“That’s simple, in your mind?”
“I know my magic!”
He held up his hand, not wanting to get into a fight about it. But the idea was sufficiently interesting to keep his attention.
I can talk with him without being in the same room with him. And he wants me alive, not touched, not leashed to anyone else’s power. That means that he’s still…obsessed, which means that he’s going to intervene to some degree whether I want him to or not. Now that he knows where I am…
The only saving grace was that Brundir couldn’t leave Absalom at that moment. If the aasimar could, Vitus had no doubt that the purple-skinned former adventurer would have stepped out of the wagon right alongside the Cinnas and made his presence known. As it stood, the image-summoning would be dangerous enough, but he was pretty sure that there were no triggers in his head for the other man to use.
Pretty sure.
“We’ll do that in an hour, then. Everyone else, finish eating and get the wagon ready. Katya?”
“Hmm?”
“I need you to check for something.”
“Ah, I think I know what you mean. Yes, that’s a good idea.”
“Then –”
“Yes, then we’ll have you cast the spell, and I’ll…talk to your master,” Vitus said, shaking his head. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”
#
The horses stopped, and Robin was tossed to the ground. Even with the were-rat’s fur, she could feel the sunburns through the brown coat, and she groaned as she rolled along the sandy ground. The itching and grinding made her skin ache even more, and she hissed as she was picked up by the ropes that kept her arms bound to her back.
“You should be grateful. If anyone else was in charge, I doubt that you would have been allowed to leave the manor alive. If it had been me –”
“But it wasn’t you, was it?”
The fully-armored Hellknight holding her up turned, facing the commander of their little squad. Robin looked up, a small smile crossing her face despite herself as she looked at Miss Onoria Salvus.
The tiefling stood head and shoulders taller than most of the other Hellknights, and it wasn’t her armor that made her look huge. She had been altered, Robin guessed, at least to a reasonable extent. No other tiefling that she’d ever met had that sort of build, and she imagined that there had been a great deal of magical experimentation to make sure that this bitch could be as strong as possible.
The fact that her claws had ripped a significant amount of flesh off the other woman’s neck was not lost on her, either. Despite the hell-healing that Onoria had gotten during the battle, the scar was still there. Five lines of red, bright and raised against the dark flesh. The were-rat smiled to herself.
“You got me,” Onoria said, stroking a gauntleted finger along her neck. “And I have to admit, I didn’t see that coming.”
“There’s a lot that you won’t see coming.”
“Like your friends following us?”
“Oh, that’s obvious.” Robin shook her head. “Stupid, but very, very obvious.”
“Then what won’t we see coming?”
“Hmmm…I’d say that’s for me to know…and for you to try and find out.”
It was intentionally chosen to piss the knight off. The one holding her growled, lifting her up as if about to throw her, but Onoria grabbed the armored limb keeping Robin off the ground. The tiefling shook her head, taking the were-rat out of the other Hellknight’s grasp.
“Make camp, everyone. We’re going to get four hours rest, then continue. I’ll take care of the prisoner.”
She was taken to one corner of the quickly-put-together campsite, and the Hellknight carried her into a tent. Robin expected to be tossed to the ground, but instead, Onoria sat her down, keeping her in a kneeling position and shaking her head as she adjusted the were-rat to a more comfortable position.
The bindings didn’t come off, though. Robin hadn’t expected that they would, but it would have been a nice benefit.
“My fellow knights are right. Most of them would have killed you for doing something like this,” Onoria said, tracing the lines along the side of her neck. “But I see that as something different. Something more interesting. You clearly have skills. And a great many skills, to stand up for as long as you did against someone like me. And clearly, you were not a slave where you came from. And yet, you consented to be treated like one here, under a beast like that man in the manor.”
“There were reasons.”
“There’s always reasons. That’s the same as saying nothing for as much as it tells me,” the tiefling said. “But what it does tell me is that you’re as interesting as that other man…and perhaps more interesting. And your skills…are worth having. Once you have been corrected, of course.”
“That would take a great deal of correcting. I don’t know if I’m really worth it, but you’re welcome to try.”
“Oh, an invitation? It’s been a very long time since someone has invited me to…exercise my talents.”
Robin smiled. Not broadly, not hugely, but enough to show her teeth. Just enough to show that she knew what she was asking for.
At the very least, if she was being interrogated, she wasn’t going to have reason to talk to someone being friendly. Unless they knew that trick, of course…but then again, so did she…
The End
Summary: Vitus and Co are back, and we continue the story with the idea that they need to rescue Robin from the Hellknights.