[b][u][center]Special Positions, Special Perks Part 13 For a-lycotonum By Draconicon[/center][/u][/b] Once they had all calmed down and his knot was small enough to slide out of the were-rat beneath him, Vitus led them all back to his quarters. The fact that they were all naked was not a fact that had slipped his mind, and now that they had all sated themselves to some degree, he didn’t want to be reminded of the various urges that they were all fighting. Robin, the were-rat, might be fighting them the least now, but why not reduce some of the discomfort that they were all going through? He passed out spare robes once they were inside, and while Cazna feigned a lack of concern, he could tell that she was more than willing to get into the robe as fast as possible. Robin was even more eager, almost throwing herself into it as soon as it was in her hands. The pair of females were quick to pull them tight, though again, with some more control on the part of Cazna. Vitus was happy to slide into one as well, though for other reasons than them. The feeling of the robe around him reminded him that he was still human down at the bottom of it all. There might be a great deal of corruption in him now, a great deal of demonic power that was swirling around the three of them, but he was still human. And humans wore clothes. As they got comfortable, Vitus forced himself to remember why they were there. Not merely to socialize or to calm down, but to plan out what to do about…about Master Brundir. Even now, he fought to say something more than that, to call the aasimar by something other than the honorific, but it was burned into his brain and wouldn’t stop. He sighed, rubbing his forehead. “What’s wrong, Alpha?” Robin asked. “Just…trying to figure this out.” “About him?” He nodded, then paused. She’d given him – yes. Vitus pulled her ring out of the little pocket that had held it, and he tossed it over to her. The were-rat caught it with ease, holding it in the palm of her hand. The gold band meant little to him, but she stared hard as she held it, her eyes narrowing, her face tightening. “Are [i]you[/i] okay?” he eventually asked. “I may have made a horrible mistake, but…well, there’s nothing I can do about it now.” She shook her head, tucking the ring into a pocket. “Now…you said that the pair of you were taking the silver…” She grimaced. “I can’t…” “It’s part of the charm spell. Sorry.” “Nnngh. That’s inconvenient.” “I know. But at the time –” “You were doing something illegal. Still…ugh. Fine.” Robin shook her head. “You were taking the silver here, to Brundir?” He nodded. “And the pair of you are trying to plan something to deal with him, yes?” the watchwoman asked, pointing between them. “What is your relationship to Gralon Brundir?” “Slave,” Cazna said, the half-drow, half-harpy rolling her eyes. “Magical advisor,” Vitus said. “Or at least, I assumed that was what I was going to be, but he seems to be changing the terms.” “That’s not terribly surprising. You peel away the veneer of the heroes, and you always find something rotten underneath…” Robin said that as if she had some experience with that, but whatever it was, they didn’t have time to go into it. They had bigger problems. After all, ‘Master’ Brundir had just purchased an insane amount of enchanted silver dust. Even the Arcanamirium was not allowed access to so much of the restricted substance at once, particularly with what it was capable of doing. It was the primary material needed for binding spells, or for the darker, reality-warping spells. He had hoped that he was misunderstanding what the aasimar wanted, but with the way that Cazna had finally opened up, and with the implications Robin had brought up earlier, he could no longer deny reality. He leaned forward, his hands folded over the crotch of his robe. “Let’s start at the beginning. Cazna. What do you know?” His ‘slave’ shrugged, shifting around, probably because there were some tail feathers growing out her back end. He wondered how that would feel, then pushed the idea out of his head. Not something that he needed to think about, particularly when he had a tail that was wagging ever so slightly behind him. “Not enough to do anything about it. My…” She glanced at Robin out of the corner of her eye. “My sponsor has some information, at least about what Brundir wants to accomplish.” “You couldn’t have told me that before?” he grumbled. “Would you have believed a drow? Would you have listened if I told you what he wanted to do without knowing how the hell he was going to do it?” “…Depends on what else you knew, but…probably not.” “That’s what I thought. So, I kept my mouth shut. Why jeopardize…” She cut herself off, and he knew what she was not saying. Why jeopardize the one tool that she had, manipulation, by making him think that she was lying from the start? And she was right, in a way. He would have disbelieved anything that she said about Brundir for a long time, considering that he had gotten his position by keeping her from killing him in the first place. But things had changed. Ignoring the suspicious look that the were-rat flashed the drow, he gestured for her to continue, his head in his hands as he listened carefully. This time, he didn’t want to miss anything. This time, he couldn’t afford to. Cazna sighed, leaning back a bit, crossing one taloned foot over her knee. “I have to admit, I don’t know as much as I want. I don’t know how he plans to do this, or what he’ll do once he gets his goal, but he plans to take over all of Absalom.” Robin started to shake her head, opening her mouth to say the dreaded ‘that’s impossible,’ but Vitus held up his hand. She stopped, and he knew that it was more because he was her alpha than for any other reason. After a moment, he dropped his hand. “It’s not as hard to believe as you might think. There was an…incident…at the Arcanamirium recently that came close to doing the same thing. There are always possibilities for the city to fall, but there’s always something that keeps it from happening,” Vitus said, shaking his head. “I don’t know what you’ve run into before, but trust me. It’s possible.” That said, it wasn’t that likely. There were hundreds of ways for demons to start taking over, but there were very few ways for them to keep doing it, or to hold the city once they had taken the place. There were innumerable gods and temples that would punish that violation of the law, and even those that were not bound by the element of law itself would speak up for something of this magnitude. How would Master Brundir plan to hold anything when he wasn’t even a full-blown deity or demon? How would he expect to keep what he had taken, even with all his power as an adventurer? It was a hard question to answer, but at the same time, he was starting to get suspicions. He remembered the dockmaster and how he had been filled with the energy of a water elemental, something that had made his power over the waves stronger, something that made his job easier, and…and, more importantly, something that was easier to control than the average intelligent biped in the city. Vitus leaned forward over his hands, shaking his head. Cazna noticed, cocking her head to the side. “You’ve got something.” “Maybe, but I need more.” “More what?” “More information. If he’s trying to take over the city, then he’d need connections. Something to fight the law that would try and stop him.” “He…might already have them, unfortunately,” Robin muttered. The were-rat was suddenly the center of attention. She sighed, rubbing her head. “This is all confidential, you understand.” “…We’re talking about stopping one of the most powerful adventurers ever from taking over a city. I think that we all understand that this is something that we don’t want to talk about,” Vitus pointed out. “I suppose. But you know the regulations. I have to say it, even to you, Alpha.” “I get it. Now.” “I’ve been part of numerous…investigations into different improprieties that have been occurring around the city,” Robin explained. “Sometimes, it’s just the disappearance of a prostitute, someone that’s been bought up and sold somewhere, or kidnapped for the pleasures of one of the rich nobles. It’s never good, but it happens often enough that we barely bat an eye at that anymore.” “Then why bring it up?” Cazna asked, looking down at her nails. “Because it led us to a whole brothel that disappeared.” Both of them blinked, and the drow actually showed interest for the first time in the conversation. She stared with her eyes wide, her mouth hanging open. “…How do you up-worlders lose a whole brothel?” “It’s not like we just misplaced it, you know.” “But still…” # Cazna shook her head as she leaned back against her chair, resisting the urge to rub her forehead in annoyance. The fact that there were such clueless people in the upper world made her wonder how they had managed to avoid getting conquered for this long. That said, she knew that they relied on their gods far more than those of the world beneath relied on their demons. There was little point in relying on them for much with the sacrifices that were required, and she supposed if she had someone to worship that would actually give her protection without requiring hourly sacrifices, she might take the deal, as well. But to lose that much just reeked of incompetence to her, and it was one more reminder that the humans were that much less than her people. She glanced at Vitus, watching as the hound stared with such intensity at the were-rat. It was different from the hunger that she’d seen from him in the past, the way that he stared when he was horny and pretending that he wasn’t. This was the look of someone that was desperately trying to solve a puzzle, and yet… Yet, he seemed to be having fun with it, almost like this was what he preferred to do. She didn’t understand him in the slightest, but if one of them was putting the pieces together, she would go along with it. Demons knew that she didn’t know how this was working out. Robin continued. “We tracked the prostitutes to Brundir’s estate, but they were never found. It was as if they never existed, except for the fact that we were able to track them right to his door. He even allowed us to investigate the grounds, searching every room, but we found nothing,” the were-rat said. “What kept the investigation going?” “The reports that the whores were seen at different estates, at various manors and even other temples.” “…How’s that possible?” “I don’t know,” Robin said. “Whenever we’d turn up, we’d find eye-witness reports among the servants, but never any direct evidence. It never felt normal, though, almost like there was always something in the room, something that we couldn’t find that was laughing at our failures.” Cazna could imagine that. The creature that followed Brundir was always there, always threatening, always looming in the black waiting to carry out whatever its master wanted of it. That [i]thing[/i] was what concerned her, because her patron and master had told her to keep an eye out for demons. That…wasn’t a demon. [i]And if the devils are involved…[/i] A shiver ran down her spine. They were far less obvious than the destruction and corruption that the demons were willing to spread through the world. They played a different game, a long game, and they were far more willing to trade favors to get what they wanted. She could just imagine Brundir sending the devil around, watching the investigation, staying one step ahead of everything. With his power, even a basic devil would be invisible to the spells that the investigators carried around. Even a cleric or paladin would struggle to feel the evil aura if it was hidden beneath enough of the aasimar’s power. He’d know exactly what they were doing. But there was more to hear, and Cazna leaned in, more interested than she had expected to be. “The reports have come in throughout the city, and we’ve heard of them being stashed in the most unlikely places. We’ve heard of them being held in the houses of professors at the Arcanamirium, we’ve heard of them being held in the Guild halls, and even in the guest houses of the high priests of Pelor…and other gods, for that matter. “Every time that we investigate, we can’t find the missing prostitutes, but there’s every sign that someone’s been fucked.” She shook her head. “And the fact that we’ve followed them, trailed them from their house to these grounds…” “Meeting with Master Brundir?” Vitus asked. “Probably. Most of them would never come to talk to each other, but if they were given a good enough offer from him, they’d probably do whatever they were asked.” She shook her head. “He’s a very…persuasive man.” [i]You don’t know the half of it.[/i] She shook her head, looking down at her hands, feeling the pressure of the collar around her neck. There was nothing good about the aasimar, and it was good to finally see other people coming around to that point of view. She had been fighting to convince them of it for too long. Vitus tapped his fingers together, and she looked back at him as his claws clicked. The hellhound sorcerer kept tapping, hmming to himself before speaking. “He’s made connections with all the major representatives of the city. That means that he’s connected with everyone that knows the laws, everyone that maintains a level of control over the city proper. Absalom’s elite, basically. Yes?” “Yes. Do you think that he’s blackmailing them?” Robin asked. “Not yet,” Vitus said. “He’s bringing them here for other reasons, but…” Cazna cocked her head to the side, then blinked, remembering the dockmaster. The mark on him, the power of the elemental – “Oh, shit…” she whispered. “What? What is it?” Robin asked. “The dockmaster,” Cazna muttered. “Vitus, you –” “Yeah. They’re coming here, but they’re not leaving alone.” “That’s how they’re keeping it up…” She’d wondered how anyone would be able to keep the power of an elemental bound properly, considering how powerful they were. The answer was, they didn’t have to. If they had someone that was already bound, unable to use the power but able to be tapped for it, obedient, eager to please… [i]Brundir would have the power to bind them that way, set it so that the power leaks out during sex…[/i] And that would mean that the people that he invited back to his manor could use the power without being obvious. There’d be no sudden burst of power, no sudden transformation as the elemental ripped through its magical bonds and took over. But how did that actually get Brundir anywhere? It gave him favors and powers, but that didn’t mean that he’d be able to force the city to bend to him. Why did he need the – “I know how he’s going to do it.” # Robin was at a loss at the back and forth between her alpha and the drow creature that served the hellhound. She didn’t know what was happening between them, what they were talking about when it came to magic, but she knew better than to interrupt. This was how one learned. This was how one solved a mystery, by allowing the experts to talk and picking up the pieces afterward. [i]Dockmaster.[/i] That was another of the officials that she had ordered tailed back to the aasimar’s grounds, though among the lowest ranking of them. She remembered that there’d been some changes down at the dock, some greater efficiency with work, either due to luck or good weather as the ships started to come in more easily and more regularly. The waters had become less treacherous, from what she had gathered. Yet, the dockmaster had become more private, and there were reports – discredited, as far as she’d understood – that the dockmaster had…changed. He had become more leering, more lecherous, and more than one employee had found themselves threatened with being let loose if they didn’t give the dockmaster satisfaction. She had thought that the reports were disproven, but perhaps they had let that one go too quickly. “What are you talking about, you know how he’s going to do it?” Cazna said. “I know what he’s going to do, and I have no idea how it’s going to happen.” “He’s not going to just take over. He’s playing by the rules, and he’s doing it very, very carefully.” The were-rat arched an eyebrow at that. “If he is behind any of this, he’s broken multiple laws,” she pointed out. “There’s nothing here that’s playing by the rules.” “There is, if he bought up all the prostitutes before making them disappear,” Vitus said. “If he bought all their contracts, and then allowed them ‘freedom’ before turning them into specialized servants…” “…Damn. That is a loophole, but it would work, but…what was this about the dockmaster? What does he have to do with this?” “That’s something that we were trying to figure out,” Vitus groaned. “And now, the pieces are all coming together.” “Why? Explain it to me.” “Master Brundir has…a lot of parties. Parties that people come here from all over the city to attend, yes?” Robin nodded. “He isn’t just talking to them. He’s giving them what they can’t get at the rest of the city. Here, he basically writes his own rules. Magically, and otherwise. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure that’s the case, otherwise you would have gotten a warrant or something. Yeah?” “You…aren’t wrong,” she admitted. “He’s applied for special privileges, not dissimilar from ambassadorial exemptions.” “That’s what I was afraid of.” She was amazed at how quickly this was making other pieces fall into place. She had always assumed that Brundir was hiding something, but the way that he had gone about this meant that he had covered his tracks better than any criminal that she had ever chased in the past. Every action was hidden behind a veneer of legality, and anything that was more questionable always took place where the laws of the city did not apply. Hell, she wasn’t even sure if she had jurisdiction on his estate anymore. “Anyway. He’s not just having…parties,” Vitus said, shaking his head with a bit of red in his cheeks. “There’s more going on than just the pleasures that he offers people. There’s power being traded, too.” “Power? Like what? Political, or –” “Magical. Outsider power, to be precise.” Robin narrowed her eyes. Outsiders had always been limited in Absalom, requiring a binding to even be allowed inside of the city. The more powerful the outsider, the more extreme the bindings, and the less that they were allowed to do in the city. Considering what even a mild outsider could do to the average person, it was far too dangerous to do anything else. If he was dealing with outsiders on his estate, then it was right at the edge of what he’d legally be allowed to do. Yet, if there were people going in and out of the estate, coming into contact with them… Vitus must have seen her confusion, because he immediately started explaining. “I realized what he was doing when I saw the dockmaster. He’s been…I guess infected would be the best word. Infected with the power of an elemental, given the ability to use its strength and magic for his own wishes.” “…” “But since he’s not actually hosting the elemental, he’s not breaking the laws of the city. The elemental itself, from what you’re telling me, has been housed inside of the prostitute that he carried away from Brundir’s mansion.” “But we never found any,” Robin said. “You never found any; that doesn’t mean that they’re not hidden from you. A discretion clause, only allowing them to be visible by their ‘owner’ and their preferred client, perhaps.” “…Shit. Shit.” “Yeah, and with them being bound properly, unable to use their powers, only serving as a battery for the one that would use them…” Gralon Brundir had wrapped that up in a neat little package. Whenever they wanted something more extreme, they came to his estate, since they were outside of the rules of the city. He maintained his control over them by giving them a prostitute and power, and that meant that they were inclined to listen when he had something new to try. He was one conniving bastard, she had to admit, but that still didn’t explain the silver. Cazna appeared just as puzzled, so at least it wasn’t just her struggling to keep up. # [i]He’s going to bind them all…[/i] The silver was the key. There was enough of it that, if it was laid down right, along the proper streets, and it was done before anyone could disturb the lines, a proper binding spell could be cast all at once throughout all of Absalom. It wouldn’t work now, of course. Those like the dockmaster had to keep using the power that they’d been given, fucking their outsider-possessed prostitute, taking in more and more of the outsider qualities. The more that they did that, the more broken down their mortal body would get, much like what would happen if someone allowed an outsider possession in a normal way. However, a possession generally ended with the mortal’s body getting ripped to shreds, unable to handle the mutations that occurred on the inside. Under Brundir’s contract, however, he imagined that it would be different. A guided transformation, something that took people on a journey to outsider-hood. Once that was done, they would require being bound by a spell, and that spell would be something that Master Brundir could dictate, since the city had no requirements of what the spell had to say beyond very basic guidelines. An outsider had no rights in the city; one did whatever one had to in order to guarantee safe behavior. “The silver’s going to be part of a ritual. I don’t know when he’s going to cast it – maybe next week, maybe next month – but it will be soon. He’s been having more parties lately, hasn’t he?” Robin nodded. “Then everyone is getting close to losing their mortality.” “Corruption,” Cazna muttered. “Pretty much,” he said with a nod. “And as soon as he casts the binding spell, he’ll have complete legal control over every single person in authority in the city. Every high priest, every guild leader, every powerful mage…everyone. Everyone will have signed it over without a murmur, and he won’t have broken a single law.” It was an impressive scheme, and one that he didn’t blame himself for not seeing before. It was a plan of many layers, and it required knowing too many different things to put it together. The parties and prostitutes, his overall goal, and most of all, how the magic worked, what it could do. Vitus shook his head. They were facing someone that they could not actually charge with anything, no matter how dangerous the plan actually was. At every step, Master Brundir had ensured that everything followed the letter of the law. He’d probably bought up the prostitutes, gone through the rituals to ensure that they were completely his, then bound them tightly with the outsiders so that they were not going to be a danger to society, then filled out the proper contracts… The only point where there might, might be a weak link was in the contracts that he’d have with the various city rulers, and what he was providing them. He looked at Robin, and knew that she’d had the same thought. “The deals he made with the officials. Can you look into that?” he asked. “It’s the only weak link,” she admitted, “but even so…” “It’s the only chance we have. It’s akin to two countries making a deal over something, right? What happens when the laws of two kingdoms disagree?” “…It’s a gray area, but…” “But if we’re working strictly by the books?” “Then…there’s a chance.” Robin smiled, her muzzle pulling up a bit. “I’ll do that first thing in the morning, Alpha.” “Good. We have a chance.” “Now…” The were-rat rubbed the back of her head. “I should probably go. I…I don’t think that this transformation is going to last much longer, and I’d be better off outside of the grounds when the sun rises. If Brundir doesn’t know I’m here already, he’ll know that I paid a visit when he wakes up.” He nodded, gesturing for her to leave. She got to her feet, making her way out the door, and he and Cazna were left alone. The half-drow shook her head, and he sighed. “You don’t trust her.” “No, I don’t.” “She’s as doomed as we are if she gets us caught. I can’t think of any reason not to trust her.” “She’s not…like us.” Not dealing with a demon, she meant, and he sighed. He looked down at his hand-paws, feeling the hunger of the demon dog inside of him starting to rise again. The hellhound had been temporarily sated after rutting the were-rat, but he knew that wasn’t going to last long. It was going to want another round, another person, another rut. And there was no way that he was going to do that to Cazna, even though he knew that she’d obey him, that she’d go along with it. Hell, she might even suggest it, for that matter, but that didn’t mean that it was a good idea. [i]We serve two very different demon lords,[/i] he thought, rubbing the back of his head. [i]I don’t know what hers wants, but I know that it doesn’t want me running free…and I don’t know what Melchiresa wants…[/i] That was the terrifying part. He was affected by her power, but he didn’t know what she’d want of him. How were you supposed to fight against a demon when you didn’t know what they were trying to make you do? # Robin didn’t quite collapse when she transformed back into a human, but she did have to lean on one of the walls of a store as she paused to catch her breath. Feeling the fur poof out of her, falling in clumps to the cobblestones was bad enough. Feeling everything else that had kept her warm beneath the robe suddenly fade, from the thicker curves to the wider hips, to the bits of fat on her chest and through her body, was a bit of a disappointment, too. When it was done, leaving her robed and barefoot at the edge of Absalom, she honestly didn’t know how to feel. Aside from uncomfortable, she supposed, shifting from one bare foot to the other as she grimaced at the feeling of the stones under her feet. This was much easier with rat paws. She looked at the sky, seeing the moon well on the wane. It was almost set, which was why she had transformed back. Now that she had… Well, the events of the night were coming back to her, and not in a good way. [i]Well, I just screwed up the rest of my life, didn’t I?[/i] she thought to herself, looking down at her chest. [i]I’m married, I’m human, I had a decent guard job…and now, I’m a were-rat, I cheated on my husband, and I’ll be lucky if someone doesn’t report me for stealing from the evidence lock-up.[/i] The last part wasn’t so worrying, she supposed. On the list of things likely to happen, that one was down there with actually exposing Brundir for what he was doing. No. She couldn’t let herself just give up hope on that. Now that she knew what the aasimar was doing, she had to find a way to bring him down. Great or small, all were equal before the law, after all. It didn’t matter that he was playing the law to suit his purposes; he was still fucking with everyone in the city, trying to take control in a way that the law was never meant to allow. Robin growled under her breath, startling herself from the dark thoughts with the sound. She had never done that before; apparently, the were-rat stuff was more than just a physical body. [i]Home. I need to get home before Piers gets any more worried.[/i] Taking a step, she paused as she felt something hot, watery, and runny slipping out of her pussy. Her cheeks burned as she realized that not [i]all[/i] of the evidence of her infidelities had leaked out on her chair in the guest house. [i]A quick stop at a well, THEN home.[/i] It was going to be hard enough to try and justify what she’d done tonight without Piers knowing that she’d had sex with another man. If he picked up on that, their usual argument about her hours at work was going to take a much more difficult turn. A turn that she might not be able to actually pull it back from. She clenched her hand around the wedding ring in her pocket, reminding herself of what that meant…but it was hard for her to hold that in her mind when she remembered what her Alpha had asked of her. [i]Fucking hellhound and his fucking fat cock.[/i] [b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]