3 comments/ 37256 views/ 13 favorites Goddesses of the Under-Keep By: HammerGod * * * Now Elric, I said to myself, you've trekked the width of a continent, seen countless sights of immeasurable complexity and exoticism, fought foes of a monstrous sort, but this very well be the most exotic being you've ever laid eyes upon. The being in question was, of course, a woman. But what a woman. Tall, at least my height, which is an impressive feat in and of itself. Even sitting at a table as she was, I could see the sultry beauty in her movement, the suppleness of her white flesh. Her raven hair cascaded down bare shoulders as clear blue eyes gazed back at me. Her crimson lips, coloured like fresh-spilled blood, were full and inviting, moistened by the tip of her tongue in the most sensual manner. She bore a tattoo on her chest, a delicate marking of a crescent moon. The tattoo sat almost in the hollow of her ample breasts, which themselves were barely contained by a scant bra-like garment made of leather and fur. Her midriff lay bare and a tiny garment of the same material was tied about her hips, a garment which served only to cover her most sensitive of female regions. The full, ivory expanse of her long, exquisitely shaped legs were exposed, unclad, and her delicate feet were protected by simple sandals that bound about her ankles. Her garb was like that of one of the feral women, and though she was lithe in build, she lacked the broad shoulders, raw musculature, and ferocious expression of one of these tribal folk. I was no stranger to women myself, but had, in all honesty, never laid with one. My work as a mercenary afforded me myriad opportunity, but minimal time. Thus, when this vision of lustful temptation smiled in my direction and bid me come sit beside her, I leapt at the chance. Without an active contract, I was whiling away my time and money in this small-town tavern, and this woman appeared to be rather willing to occupy my downtime. "Elric Ravinus." I said politely, situating my muscular frame onto the small wooden chair across from her at the isolated table. "Aeryna," she said simply, "just Aeryna. You didn't come over to talk, did you, fighting man?" At this point I felt her brush one of her sandaled feet against my leg under the table, moving it steadily higher until it rested between my thighs. She pressed lightly with her toes and my heart skipped a beat, my hands tensing up in anticipation. "No, m'lady," I replied, "I assume you have no desire to converse, do you?" "Not in the least," she responded with a wicked smirk, "but my home is not in town." "I'll walk a continent and back if I must." I hastily stated. "Oh you'll do nicely." purred Aeryna. "But the entrance to my home stands in a hollow, under a high hill east of town. Come to me tonight, Elric, and I will assure you a night of minimal rest." Before I could reply, Aeryna rose and walked around the table, her every movement alive with a deliberate sensuality. Closer up, I could smell her sweet aroma, the honey-like fragrance of her flesh, her hair, like some intoxicating supernatural perfume that befuddled my mind with attraction. Aeryna fell upon me, wrapping her porcelain arms around my neck and covering my lips with her's. Her teeth scratched and bit at my lips whilst she pressed her body against me. Then the kiss was broken, and she was gone, walking away at a calm pace, her legs carrying her away with long, visually-gratifying strides. I had to sit still for a moment and calm my heartbeat, wiping faint traces of blood from my lips. The woman kissed hard. My heart pounded like a war-drum and I had half a mind to charge after Aeryna and carry her away in my arms. But there was something ethereal about her, despite her startlingly, almost assertively real presence; I felt that if I chased after her, I would not find her in the streets, only in the location which she had specified. A house under a hill, I assumed built into the terrain itself, east of town. My objective was clear. I paid my fee to the bartender and strode out into the quiet streets. The sun had only just set and the already sparse population of this forest-bordered town was now homeward bound for the night ahead. I had no home here and stayed regularly at an inn across the street from the tavern. But not tonight. I set my self to the east and began walking out of town, watching as the houses diminished in number and grew farther apart until the dirt road became a stone-strewn trail, which led into the thickly wooded area beyond the eastern border of the township. The woods were dark and dense beyond compare, blotting out the dwindling light of the recently-set sun. But even in the encroaching darkness, I discerned the rise of the ground in a northeastward direction. Separating from the path, I began breaking through the brush, crashing through scrub and low-hanging branches, pushing thinner trees aside and crushing tall grass under my boots. The sound of forest creatures drifted to my keen ears, but I felt no concern, for the steel blade at my side could, rather easily, allow me to fell any animal who might fancy me a suitable prey. The trees thinned only slightly as I came to a low hill and began to circle it, seeking a house. As I expected, I found a wooden door in the earthen slope, which yielded to my turning of the knob. Stone steps and thick stone walls greeted me. Who in Hel's name carved this place of stone?! The steps sloped sharply inward into dark depths, though a faint illumination hovered at the end of the dark passage. As I descended down into and below the hill, my means of entry swung closed by its own weight, a dull "thud" echoing down the steps. The illumination grew brighter as I reached the bottom of the stone steps and walked across a tiled floor toward the only door, which stood partially ajar before me. Pushing this heavy oak door inward, I strode into a room illuminated by torches set in brackets near each of its four corners. Other doors exited this room, but all were closed, and the door behind me, heavy as it was, swung to as well. But I was not alarmed, for I was armed and my only possible aggressors would have to come from doors which were clearly visible. I would not be surprised. The room was relatively unadorned, save for a high-backed wooden chair that sat against the wall opposite the door by which I'd entered. The chair had what appeared to be a soft cushion upon it, and on that chair sat a woman, red-haired and pale-skinned, as tall as Aeryna and sharing the other woman's radiant sexuality. But this woman wore only a tightly clinging black robe, cut low enough that I could see a crescent moon tattoo, like Aeryna's, identical in fact in placement and design. Her eyes met mine and the woman smiled invitingly. "You are Aeryna's man, Elric the fighter, yes?" she asked in a stern yet quiet tone. "And you are?" I returned. "Kressa, friend of Aeryna, keeper of her sanctity." she answered. "Keeper of--" "Her sanctity," she repeated, "her well-being. And thus, approver of her... decisions." This last word was pointedly directed at me. I did not quite know where to proceed from this point. Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, Kressa did. "Kiss my feet." she ordered. "I beg your pardon?" I demanded, drawing myself up in an intimidating and indignant manner. "I withhold the right to send you away," she said firmly, her voice taking on a hard edge, "or to admit you into the chambers beyond... and Aeryna." "Chambers?! How vast is this dwelling?" I inquired, curiosity getting the best of me. "Irrelevant!" she insisted. "Now get on your knees and worship my feet, or Aeryna will go wanting tonight." Men are so easily motivated to loathsome self-degradation by lust for a beauteous maiden. Well, I was at least. Pent up as I was, never knowing the glory of carnal relations, I was compelled to act on this Kressa's demands, odd as it all may have been. Thus I walked across the floor and knelt before the robed figure in her chair, lifting the hem of her robe. Kressa's feet were slender and bare, white as snow and baring the sweet scent that emanated from the rest of her shapely body, a scent much like Aeryna's. I took first one of her feet into my hands and began to kiss it, lavishing my lips over the top of her foot, then kissing the instep. She raised her foot further so I could press my lips against her cool, sweet sole. Kressa let out a low hum of contentment. "Between the toes, Elric." she ordered, her firm tone tinged with the heat of arousal. I could not say no, lest the lithe Aeryna go this night well-rested. I raised my lips to Kressa's delicate toes, each nail painted a deep red, and began to suck on them individually, letting my tongue run between them one by one. I repeated the process with her other foot: kissing and licking it, then sucking on and licking between her toes. By the time I was done, Kressa was fidgeting excitedly, her thighs squeezing together in excitement. "Remove all your garments," she demanded, panting exuberantly, "you will now consummate your good intentions for Aeryna, with me, her keeper." "But I came here for--" "Disrobe or depart!" she snarled. What could I do, for want of Aeryna?! I had to obey, and Kressa was, though odd, not an unappealing woman. I stepped away from her and stripped off my garments: boots, pants, lightly armored shirt, and my weapon, organizing them in a pile by Kressa's chair. The woman rose, standing at my height and effortlessly tearing away her robe to reveal a hard body, firm breasts, finely sculpted limbs, and unblemished skin. I stared in awe, even as she took my head in her hands and, with a strength surprising, drew my head against her right breast, burying my face against it. "Drink." she hissed. I was perplexed, but as she'd positioned me such that her right nipple pressed against my lips, I assumed she desired my attentions thereupon. I began to suck, gently at first, then harder as a sweet nectar came forth from her, filling my mouth with its cool essence as I sucked eagerly now, drinking deep as a sensation like the fluttering of a million wings resonated in my every nerve. When Kressa at last pulled me upright, I was dizzy and lightheaded, I staggered yet she held me in her vice-like grasp. "W-what was that?" I asked, in an enthralled tone. "Our essence," Kressa hissed, squeezing my shoulders ever tighter, painfully so, "to make you, not as us, but with our... durability. Our longevity." "What?" "You shall, with regular doses from myself and the others, live forever, and be not unbreakable... but you will reassemble if, rather when, we break you." now she was growling like a beast. "You... you're mad. What is this?!" my voice was filled with an unfamiliar emotion to me: fear. I noticed the changes just as Kressa heaved me off my feet with no effort at all and hurled me like a rag-doll across the room. I struck a wall and fell to the floor, dazed and agonized, but still I watched Kressa as she began to change. She grew taller at first, resembling a giantess of sorts, her head reaching near the room's vaulted ceiling which I'd hitherto not noticed. Tendril's broke off from her in great wisps, wisps that were quite solid and whipped about until her body, save her face and head (now much larger as was the rest of her), was no longer a curvaceous woman, but a gelatinous mass of no discernable shape, tentacles rippling from her "flesh." I struggled to my feet and hastily appraised the situation. Kressa stood between me and my belongings. Rather, she sat or lingered, for this gelatinous being with Kressa's beautiful head had no feet of which to speak. She did not, however, occupy the space between myself and the door by which I entered this room. My muscles sprang like a steel trap, propelling me toward the door with a mighty bound. I ran for it, but barely made it through the door. I could see them there, the stairs, the door, freedom. But I never made it, not even close. The tentacle that snaked around my waist and arms was solid, it felt like flesh, with a solid core like a wire, but one built of steel, though about the thickness of the widest part of a human thumb. It's surface was smooth and in many places moist or slime-flecked, like much of Kressa's newly-revealed body, for perhaps it was there that the slime originated. My arms were pinned to my sides, immobile and ineffective as I was hoisted off the ground and twirled about, wound in the extended tentacle as it drew me ever closer to Kressa. By the time I was face-to-face with her, our noses almost touching, the tentacle wrapped me from my shoulders to my ankles. "What are you?" I demanded, struggling without result in my binding. "A being immortal," she growled, her face now larger than mine like that of a giantess, "like Aeryna and all of our sisters who bare the crescent mark and inhabit the Under-Keep of this land." "Sisters? Land? There are more of you?" I gasped in horror. "Tunnels, catacombs that span the width of the known world!" she proclaimed, her voice booming with malevolent pride. "And many of our kind dwell herein. All of them women, shifters of shape though this be our true form of origin. And you, our male." "Your male? Only I am here? You have no others?" "None that we've not devoured out of boredom." she replied. "But stoic as you are, breaking you for eternity should suit us..." I let out a scream, a scream of unrelenting terror at the cosmic horror that now beset my mind. Eternal damnation amongst these... creatures, Aeryna being one of them. I would know no peace, if I could not escape this doom. But, entirely immobilized as I was, escape was completely out of the realm of possibility. My scream was cut off by Kressa, who pressed her now giant, slavering wet lips over my mouth, smothering my voice as her tongue slid over, around, and in my mouth. She kissed me ferociously, moaning into my mouth, her saliva mixing with, in fact entirely eclipsing my own. I gagged and gasped as the kiss continued, as she began to cover the entirety of my face with these horribly sloppy, slobbering kisses, agonizingly biting my lips and my ears as she kissed me thoroughly. "Such a good boy." she moaned when she was finished with this disgusting onslaught, my face now slimy and dripping wet. "Oh Gods help me!" I screamed in terror and dismay. "No Gods here!" she laughed. "Only Goddesses, more beautiful and powerful than you could possibly imagine. Now, worship us!" The binding tentacle released me for a moment, only to be replaced by two others which seized my wrists and held them tightly above my head, dangling me in the air, still entirely helpless. A tentacle lashed out then, extending to great length, whirling through the air before snapping hard against my back with an agonizing "CRACK!" I cried out again, but the breath was knocked from me when another tentacle followed through with a whipping swing, cracking hard off my shoulders. One after another they whipped down my back, shoulders to heels, then switched to the front of my body and worked their way up before returning their whipping, flesh-bruising attention to my back. Kressa looked at me in sadistic joy as I shuddered and screamed, tears rolling down my face, gasping and pleading for mercy. "No, stop!" I wailed pathetically, my strength forgotten and useless. "Please, Kressa, I beg you. Please! Somebody help me!" "Scream for me, Slave!" she snarled. "Help me!!" The whipping subsided at last, but the respite was temporary and minimal. Kressa pulled me in, pinning me against her heaving, gelatinous bulk, which parted to engulf my manhood and testicles, squeezing them tightly in the warm, soft substance that comprised her being. I groaned in an unwanted pleasure as she contracted that area of her body in pulsing, squeezing motions up and down the length of my shamefully erect penis. But this pseudo-pleasure was not without its misery. A tentacle began to creep down my back, probing at my backside lightly. "Please, Gods no!" I whimpered. "That's Goddess, little Slave Boy!" Kressa corrected. "And Goddess Kressa says... yes..." The thumb-thick tentacle, strewn with its sweet-smelling slime probed slowly in at first, forcing me to emit faint gasps as I felt its penetration. That gasping turned to a low, drawn out moan as twelve inches of tentacle slithered into me, probing and wriggling. My dismay only grew as two, then three, then four more tentacles crept over my flesh and began to push in as well. "It's too hard." I screamed, even as Kressa's bulk worked me to a most unpleasant orgasm. "It's too much." "Nothing is too much for your Goddess." Kressa replied, ecstatic from my misery. But the tentacles slowly retracted, those binding my arms replaced with one around my waist. "But perhaps," Kressa mused, "you were too easily broken. Perhaps you won't amuse us." "What are you going to do?" I pleaded like some weak child. "You won't waste my time," she explained, "or Aeryna's. I'm going to eat you." My scream was short as Kressa's lips sloppily smothered my face. She grew larger now, her lips smothering my head with their wetness, her tongue wrapping around me, drawing me into her mouth. I wept as my body scraped over her teeth, as her tongue moved me to the back of her mouth and I beheld the yawning chasm of her throat. I felt myself, wet and agonized and violated, sliding forward, headfirst. The tongue arched and tipped me forward, down, down, down Kressa's throat, where my screams could not be heard, nor would they ever be... * * * Waking up was my only indication that I'd at all fainted. My arms were above my head, held, it felt like, by bands of iron wrapped in leather and attached to the ceiling. I was naked and felt the air on my skin, felt my bruises and lacerations respectively ache and sting. Though it was dark, it was not pitch dark, and I saw a light approaching me in the distance. As it drew near, I figured it for a torch, and was proven right when its wielder stepped into my range of sight. Aeryna, clad as I'd seen her in the bar, holding a torch which she fixed into a wall bracket. I writhed in my bonds, wanting to strike and harm her, but my arms were held high and my slime-drenched self could do nothing about it. Aeryna approached me and caressed me with her soft hands; a thorough an invasive exploration of my body. Leaning forward, she began to lick the slime from my face whilst I grimaced and cursed her. My cursing was cut short as she painfully jerked my head down to her bosom and forced me to drink more of that intoxicating nectar that would so curse me with immortality. "Kressa held you in her mass until you passed out," she explained, "then she merely forced you out of her body. Our membranes are so usefully permeable." "Aeryna, p-please," I begged, "this is surely not what you want." "You're right," she replied, "I'd have suspended you by your balls, not your wrists. But we'll save that joy for later. Have you noticed the device?" At this moment I became aware of a sensation which had hitherto escaped my notice, due to my more pressing matters. A cool, metal sensation between my thighs, and the familiar throb of arousal. I looked down and beheld the strangest of devices, simple yet in truth, hopelessly intricate. It appeared only as two rings, a smaller one locked around my erect member, a slightly larger one locked around my scrotum. These rings, cast in no steel I'd ever seen before, joined together, and at first appeared smooth until closer inspection revealed almost imperceptible holes along each band. "Keyholes." explained Aeryna, as if detecting my thoughts. "Our shape-shifting allows us to generate tendrils thick or thin as we like, and in this case, thin enough to slip into one of those holes and unlock it. But," added she, "each of us can only unlock one, thus you must satisfy many, though not all, before the device is unlocked and comes away." Goddesses of the Under-Keep "And what exactly is this contraption?" I enquired, my indignation returning with haste. "Each ring serves to stimulate you," she explained, "by our ancient magic they keep you erect, constantly erect and able to be brought to the pinnacle of pleasure, though unable to gain your own release whilst you wear the device. And the larger ring prevents your testicles from retreating when we are less than gentle." "So," I snapped, "you mean I must please enough of your foul kind to earn my freedom of this device?" "And once you've released," she continued, a wicked smile curling her lips, "it reforms by magic and the process begins again. You are thus constantly at our mercy, always erect, lust pumping through you, yet each blissful moment of passion when the device is removed will only start the cycle again. Now, it is time you earn what freedom I may give..." Though I struggled in my restraints, I could not stop Aeryna nor her magic. By that magic, the chains shortened, lifting me well off my feet and dangling me painfully by my wrists. Ripping away her scant garb, Aeryna leapt on me, encircling me with her inhumanly powerful legs and crushing my hips against her's. My helplessly erect manhood ached with pleasure as it was plunged into her without hesitation. The woman screamed in pleasure, rocking her hips against mine, impaling herself down to the base of my shaft, her gyrations forcing our bodies to swing back and forth on my chains. Aeryna did not use her shape-shifting, in this instance, to transform into the true form of her race: that repellent, squamous collection of tentacles and squelching body mass atop which sat the still human head. But her powers were not neglected. I felt her fingernails transform into harsh talons that savagely raked my back and its welts left from Kressa's whipping. I screamed, though futilely and into Aeryna's mouth, for she shared Kressa's fondness for slavering, mouth-smothering kisses. Whilst she kissed me and our bodies thrust together with passionate force, she painfully bit at my lips, drawing blood, which she hungrily lapped away. At the height of our passion, whilst I endlessly lingered at the brink of release, my manhood pulsing furiously with pent up lust inside Aeryna's almost-painfully tight warmth, Aeryna pulled her lips from mine and dug her nails into my back. I screamed, cried out as tears ran down my cheeks. Even as I watched, her smile became a fanged grin, her teeth all taking on razor points. With one hand she jerked back my head and, as she came to orgasm around me, sank her teeth into my collarbone with agonizing force. The resulting scar would survive my body's innumerable reassemblies, a ceaseless reminder, a brand of my subjugation to these underworld goddesses. My pained wailing went on for a while thereafter, even when I was freed from my chains. I sank to my knees, clutching the bleeding bite, even as my manhood continued to throb at the brink of its climax. One of Aeryna's slender fingers extended, growing longer and thinner until, as a needlepoint it entered one of the tiny locks around the device and twisted. A slight click and her tendril retracted, returning her hand to an appearance of normality. Only one out of countless locks opened in this relentless cycle of unmerciful fate. I could have wept like a child, just curled up and cried and bawled to the heavens. But no kind divinity looked to these blasphemous depths, else the creatures would have long ago been purged. "Why are you doing this to me?!" I howled pathetically up at her. "We've watched you," she explained, "crossing this land in a blaze of strength and glory. Breaking your body will be entertaining, but breaking your will shall yield results far more... pleasurable to us. But come, it is time you earn your first release." "But," confusedly protested I, "you said I'd have to please many to earn that freedom." "You catch on quickly." she deviously sneered. I made to rise, but Aeryna had other intentions. A tentacle lashed out from her hand, winding itself tightly around my testicles and squeezing tight. I grunted and fell to my back from the discomfort, which did not slow nor stop Aeryna as she began to walk down one of the many deep and wide subterranean tunnels, dragging me painfully and in a rather undignified manner by my most sensitive region. My screams of agony and protest went unheeded as we crossed one tunnel after another, passing beyond large chambers and finally into a wide, cavernous room, so vast that from its center, its every wall lay in shadow. A ring of torches stood on high poles, casting a broad pool of light at the rooms center, into which I was painfully cast. Aeryna stood over me, and I began to hear a faint whispering sensation, which grew louder and more like a slithering than a whisper. Only did I realize its source when great shadows fell into the circle. The Goddesses had arrived. How many, I knew not, but there they were, many in their natural forms, though a few adopted human guises, but all had eyes set on me. Aeryna began to shift as well, taking on her natural, bulky, slime-coated form. As the others, her head remained in tact, whilst her body became a bulk of tendrils emerging from a soft, sludgy membrane, which exuded that honey-scented slime. Her transformation was seen as a signal by the others, who pressed in around me until I felt crushed beneath the great bodies, lifted from the ground and held suspended in the midst of them. And thus, exposed as I was, the loathsome violation began, despite my feverish struggling and raucous protestations, the latter of which were drowned out by the laughter and pleasure-induced sounds of my captresses. Suspended as I was, all of me was accessible. Slimy tendrils wound eagerly around my every limb, as others explored my body. Two tentacles, their tips thinned to razor-sharp points, from different Goddesses raked up and down my sides and chest, scratching painfully and lacerating my skin. As I gasped, one of the Goddesses in human form, though ascending to a giantess' height, leaned down and smothered my mouth in her's. I gasped with the force and wetness of the gesture, but the gasped turned into a gagging cry as she forced several long tentacles from within her mouth into mine, keeping her lips over mine all the while. I shuddered and struggled as the honey-sweet taste filled my mouth and the long tendrils snaked deep into my throat, sliding up and down, wriggling about. "If you gag and become sick," hissed another creature, her lips next to my ear as she observed my ordeal, "we will tear you apart piece by piece, for a century. Understand?" And she sank her teeth into my earlobe. My eyes rolled back, I prayed for unconsciousness, yet it did not come. Only a greater misery was to follow. I felt the sensation of a tentacle moving down my back to parts below, probing me, and then joined by four others that waited eagerly to enter. "Come sisters," Aeryna cried, "abandon not your current pleasures but add your tentacles to mine, let us all take him in this most glorious way. Let him feel our love." I was granted no respite from my other tortures, but these beings seemed able to call forth as many tentacles as they desired. Five from each of the Goddesses here gathered, five thick, slime-oozing tentacles for each one being moved to join Aeryna's, ready to enter. At her word, they began to push in, squirming, wriggling, slithering in one at a time in a never ending, agony-filled violation that made my hips quake up and down, made me scream into the mouth of the Goddess whose tendrils still snaked down my throat. But by some grim magic, the unconsciousness I sought never came as I was relentlessly penetrated, my flesh stretched beyond its means, bringing fresh new pain to my now-maddeningly immortal form. * * * I was apparently allowed to pass out, after my violation en mass was concluded. This unconsciousness did however invalidate my actions, or so it seemed, for I awoke alone, the device still upon me, its locks all sealed. Nude, unarmed, shamefully and constantly erect as I was, I set off from this spot, lest my captresses descend upon me again, with greater fury. My body had, as they said it would, recovered from their deeds, but the pain was still present and the memories would never be reparable. Thus began my ordeal, and so now it continues. From one of my captresses' lairs in this hellish labyrinth I absconded with this paper and ink by which to write. I now recount my doom's beginning, in hopes that I may somehow convey this work to the surface world to worn others of this fate and perhaps to lead someone to rescue me from this darksome dismay. My first few days, or so I counted them in this land untouched by sun or moon, were a misery unparalleled. Unskilled as I was at evasion, I often blundered into the lairs of my captresses, or into the Goddesses themselves in the faintly illumined tunnels. Though they oft had other business amongst themselves, I was a prize to be snatched up on sight, and held until they could make time to exact their will upon me. And their will is naught but horror and pain. A brutal whipping I'd gladly endure in favor of a night of the affections of these hell-beasts. And immortal as they are, time is of no constraint, I may very well be ravaged and tortured by any of them for days, even weeks on end. Though they have business with each other, I as their only man am a prize and hunted often by my tormentresses. I have thus, in my years of endless captivity, learned well how to scout the tunnels. I plucked, from a low-descending passage, a glowing mushroom, and have found others like it, which I use as light to guide my navigation. More importantly, light which can be covered easily as a torch when I hear footsteps, slithering, or any other sound that suggests one of my predators is near at hand. With my light, I navigate the tunnels in search of subtle niches, caves, anywhere I may conceal myself away for a short time. Never do I stay anywhere too long, for I have learned that lesson well. It is truly a horror to fall asleep in perceived safety and awaken as you are being pulled into the membrane of a hulking demoness, to be squeezed and smothered endlessly for days. Thus, I move often, sleeping when I must and when I can ensure my safety. One day, I hope I will find a way out, a surface-bound tunnel by which I may escape my evil fate, by which I can evade my pursuers and their damned elixir of immortality so rudely forced upon me again and again. I have found, at the moment, a comfortable niche in a wall that links two pathways, giving me a comfortable means of escape in either direction. It is an odd hollow, natural rather than made by the occupants of this labyrinthine den. Thus now I sit, and recount my tale, imbued with a new sense of ambition to spread the word of this hell, and to possibly free myself as well. I hear no sounds around me as I write, though often I stop to listen for the telltale sound of a heavy bulk dragging itself across hard-packed earth. But there is nothing to be heard and I am for the moment safe. Thus, I shall continue and-- * * * Dear reader, whomever may you be, I call myself Aeryna and I shall conclude this little tale, hastily scrawled by my pet, Elric. The poor fool thought he'd been clever, evading us, whilst in truth my beauteous sisters and I only let him run nd Hide so we might better enjoy the chase and concoct new ways of tormenting him. Even now, Kressa has taken him to spend a decade in the lower depths of a vast pit, wherein we cast our sisters who have gone mad from eternity in this Under-Keep. Elric will prove quite the joyous gift for those who have not felt flesh in so long. I doubt their feelings for him will be much reciprocated, but that is little concern of mine. Having known Elric was hiding from us, and concocting this little memoir, you may find yourself wondering why I have left the text to be found, even adding to it my own words. And therein lies the beauty of it all. None can destroy us, none can so much as harm us, for we are insubstantial in essence, made from the stuff of the cosmos itself. We are eternity, my sisters and I, thus we fear no assaults from mere mortals, such as yourself. Read Elric's words, fear the underworld, but know that no fear, nor caution, can keep you from our loving embrace when we so desire you. One day you may slumber and awaken in our lair, or within one of our very bodies if such is our want. My point, dear reader, is that we are a fate inescapable. And as we tire of the Under-Keep, we may draw ourselves up to the surface world, to topple your cities, your petty nations, your goddesses and gods, to replace them with our glorious dominion, our beauteous visages, and our unrelenting love. Know that no deed may slow that day from coming, that we lurk and wait, ever biding our time, until at last comes the day when my sisters and I shall make you, your loved ones, and all of humanity into our subservient followers. Praise us now, speak boldly your worship, and your fate will be swift and only so painful as befits a mortal. Know that time draws nigh, and we are coming...