Danica Pt. 10

Goblins engulfed in flame and singed by the wave of heat screamed in pain all around him. He drew his fine new sword and started to cut down stunned goblins nearby. The moment of surprise passed quickly, and he soon fought ready, armed goblins instead of stunned, gaping ones. The detonations moments later surprised him and the goblins, distracting them all for a moment. He felt the shock waves roll over him hard, and saw mushroom plumes of black smoke rising from where the women stood hidden by the flames.

"Bloody hell," Brandon roared as he parried a sword thrust from a goblin that had turned back to him, the immediate threat.

Bear was no less stunned than Brandon. He too had leapt upon the goblins as soon as the fire roared to life. The detonations gave him pause as well. He saw that the dwarves and Venaru were also staring at the plumes of smoke until forced to defend themselves again.

Venaru recovered from the shock of the detonations quickly. He brought his sword back up to its deadly work, cutting down a still gaping goblin, and slicing another as he followed through with the strike.

He batted aside a thrown spear, and then leapt forward with incredible strength and grace, jumping up high when he landed to avoid a kick from the goblin as it drew its own rusty sword. It never finished the motion, but fell gurgling to the ground as Venaru's blade sliced through its throat.

Janelle quickly buckled on her sword belt, slung her quiver over her shoulder, and brought her bow up. Goblins fled and panicked all around. Janelle moved out of the flames where she could see clearly to take the monsters down. Her bow sang and a goblin fell heavily to the earth. A second shot took down another. She cursed as the bowstring cut across her bare breast on the second shot.

Cheron let out a mighty war cry and let fly her mace the moment she stepped from the still thick smoke of the flame burst. The mace blasted into the head of a goblin running toward her, the monster's momentum carrying it forward as the dead goblin fell over on its face and slid. Her mace back in her hands a moment later, Cheron charged toward a pair of goblins.

The sight of a stunningly sexy, nude, widely smiling female charging toward them caused the two goblins to pause and look at each other in confusion. It cost them, because the first went down in a heap as Cheron's thrown mace smashed into its face. The other creature snarled and charged the unarmed woman, only to yelp out in surprise and raise a hasty defense as her mace reappeared in her hand.

Danica rose to her feet quickly. She was unharmed except for the slight pains she had suffered in her fall after the explosion. Cheron and Janelle grabbed their weapons beside her, quickly scrambling toward the battle. They appeared unharmed as well.

Danica moved backwards, grabbing her pouches from within the protective hovering sphere that concealed them. As the flames of her spell died down, Danica could see twisted, blackened goblins everywhere. Others ran screaming, their hair and clothing aflame. The blasted remnants of the alchemists were scattered everywhere, bits of them splattered on her nude body.

Her eyes opened wide when she saw the shaman screaming in rage, protected by a fire shield of its own. Goblin shamans were uncommon, but what Danica saw before her now was something so rare as to be nearly legend. The goblin mage caught sight of her and pointed a finger, casting a spell in its harsh snarling voice.

Griffith and Feros were in the thick of those goblins outside the circle of hellish flames. They both only paused for a heartbeat when the detonations sounded, too surrounded to have time to stand around and gape.

They fought towards each other, covering the ground quickly and leaving the fallen bodies of goblins all along the trail. Many goblins took to their feet, running from the hellish destruction at the edge of the camp and the furious onslaught of ferocious dwarves. The initial roar of flames had decimated most of the larger warrior goblins, and only a handful remained. The dwarves smiled at each other as they closed the distance between them, knowing the lesser goblins would prove nothing more than good sport to them.

Twin flashes of light and a resounding boom of thunder echoed as they reached each other, turning back to back to continue to cut down those goblins that weren't running away as fast as their feet could carry them.

Danica instinctively winced as the twin lightning bolts struck the goblin mage's shield spell. It staggered backwards a step and snarled in rage, whatever spell it had been casting ruined by the distraction.

Celes and Terran had obviously recognized the danger of their opponent and abandoned the premise of being mere shaman in light of it. Danica fell into her own magic, and as soon as the Crushing Fist materialized, she sent it hurtling at the mage. The creature's shield held, but the tremendous force of the Fist's impact sent the goblin rolling backwards into the burning shelter, collapsing it atop him.

A group of nine retreating goblins ran toward where Celes and Terran lie in hiding. When the two wizards recognized the danger of the goblin mage and loosed their lightning, the approaching creatures fell to the earth with cries of alarm, barely ten feet away. The monsters stood up quickly, thinking to charge the spell hurlers and kill them before they could enact another spell.

They hadn't counted on Terran's quick form of spell casting, however.

The goblins charged right into a wall of fire that he erected in front of them. Five of the goblins fell screaming and burning to the earth. Two monsters kept running -- their hair and clothing aflame -- right past the two wizards. One skidded to a halt before reaching the wall, and turned tail to run in the opposite direction. The last, a warrior goblin, charged the two wizards with a snarling scream of rage and pain. The flames had singed all its hair away and its clothing smoked, but it was still coming.

The two wizards dived away as the creature brought its huge sword down where they had crouched only a moment before.

Janelle spun when she heard the lightning bolts. She saw the goblin mage stagger, and then hurtle into the shelter when smashed by Danica's spell. When the wall of fire erupted nearby, Janelle turned and saw the goblin fleeing from the magic, back toward the camp. The monster sprouted an arrow from her bow in its forehead and collapsed to the ground before it could take a dozen steps.

She saw Celes and Terran jump away as the warrior goblin slashed down at them. Janelle took aim and fired at the only target available on the bending goblin.

The goblin growled in pain as it straightened, the long shaft of Janelle's arrow protruding from its ass. It snapped off the shaft and turned to charge toward Celes on its left. It caught a barrage of magic missiles from Terran in its back before it took a single step.

The creature roared in rage again, but kept moving. Celes completed her spell casting just in time, and the creature rebounded off her telekinetic shield to land hard on the stub of the arrow in its ass. It screamed again when it landed, and Celes cried out as well, wincing from the force the goblin's tremendous impact exerted on her shield.

More magic missiles thudded into the creature's back, and it rolled back to its feet to turn and hurl a large rock at Terran. The rock connected and knocked the wind from Terran, ruining his next spell. In rising to do so, the goblin exposed itself. An arrow sprouted from its eye with a sickening thud. The goblin took a couple of stumbling steps, and then collapsed face first on the ground with a great crash.

The goblins went into full flight, abandoning the encampment and the deadly attacks of the companions wearing goblin forms. The companions converged near Celes and Terran, but turned when the burning remnants of the shelter suddenly exploded outward and the goblin mage emerged with a snarl of rage.

The fireball it cast exploded in the midst of the converging group, throwing Celes, Terran, and Griffith to the ground. Feros was stunned as well, but all were otherwise unharmed by the fireball because of their fire shielding.

Danica sent her Crushing Fist hurtling at the goblin mage. The goblin snarled and braced itself, turning all it's will into its shield. The Fist vanished into motes of sparkling magic when it slammed into the creature's strengthened shield.

One of Janelle's arrows bounced harmlessly off the shield, as did a stream of acidic balls Terran hurled. Celes began casting a spell that would reverse the goblin spell and take down its shield. The creature cast a ray of dark force at Celes, but it dissolved harmlessly against a shielding wall Danica brought into being just in time.

Celes completed her spell, and the goblin's shield dissolved. It turned and dived for cover, but not quickly enough. Almost simultaneously, an arrow from Janelle's bow, twin crossbow bolts from Feros and Venaru, and a lightning bolt from Terran slammed into the goblin. It fell to the ground and lay still.

The companions caught their breath and looked over the scene. At least seventy goblins lay dead or dying in the camp. One more fell to Janelle's bow when it didn't quite make the tree line in time. More than half of the dead creatures fell to Danica's initial spell.

The sound of trees breaking reached the companions as they gathered together. Danica's eyes widened and she screamed, "Giant!" The whole group whirled around to where Danica looked.

Somewhere between fifteen and twenty feet tall, the hill giant powered its way through the trees into the clearing. It wielded a club nearly as big as Danica in one hand, and it held a stone twice the size of Bear's head in the other.

Two crossbow bolts and an arrow thudded into the creature's bearskin shirt -- the shafts apparently even failing to irritate the creature. The giant gained the clearing and hurled its stone. Only Venaru's incredible agility saved him from the deadly missile as he dived and rolled away.

"Get outta the clearin' where it can't be tossin' rocks at us," Griffith shouted and turned to make the short dash into the trees.

They all turned and ran as one, Venaru setting another bolt as he popped back to his feet, and Janelle knocking an arrow. The giant roared in delight, dragging another rock from a bag slung across its shoulder.

Janelle and Venaru fired, Janelle's arrow thudding into the creature's neck, and Venaru's bolt taking it in the left eye. The giant howled in pain and hurled its rock, but missed badly from the pain of the arrow in its eye. The group gained the trees and kept running.

Another stone came crashing in after a loud bellow of pain and rage from the giant, but the density of the trees kept the rock from coming close. The group ran on. They hoped the trees would slow the creature down enough for them to get away, and so far, it was working.

One of the goblins that had fled the camp suddenly appeared before them, screamed in fear, and dived back off the trail into the underbrush. One of Janelle's arrows sank into the back of the creature's neck. The companions ran on, the sounds of the pursuing giant falling farther behind them as they went.

The group cursed as one when they rounded a bend in the trail and ran into a group of about twenty wildly running orcs. The creatures snorted and tried to scatter. Arrows, bolts, and spells brought some of the creatures down. The flailing weapons of the group took down three more as they charged through the dispersing creatures.

"They're being chased by ogres! Off the trail!" Janelle screamed, and everyone crashed into the undergrowth.

The companions hurried through the woods, heading at a right angle away from the trail. The three women winced in pain as branches and brambles tore into their nude flesh, but they ran on.

Luckily, the ogres either didn't track them, or continued on after their original prey, the orcs. The companions slowed, activating their invisibility magic when they were some distance from the trail.

Reaching a clearing, everyone collapsed to the ground to try to catch his or her breath. Venaru, the dwarves, and Brandon kept watch while Cheron treated the cuts and scratches the women had picked up. Danica and Janelle wiped the gore from the exploded alchemists from their bodies with a cloth.

Celes pulled clothing for the three women from her bag of holding, as well as Janelle and Cheron's leather armor. They stayed for perhaps an hour cleaning up and resting, listening to the sounds of the monsters at war in the wood. Fortunately, none of the sounds were nearby, and the companions had time to recover.

The group started off again at a steady pace, and broke into wide smiles when they exited the woods. Upon reaching the fortress, the companions could see smoke rising in a dozen places, the clouds too large for normal campfires -- fires set off by battles amongst the creatures. The monsters would be too busy this day fighting the fires to cause any mischief, once they realized the danger.

{*****~~o~~0~~o~~*****}

Zoraster scowled. "Bah, the misdirection about that ridiculous wood still blocks my scrying. There may be more here than I initially considered. Celes and the war wizard are able to scry within the wood, so whoever is in there took great pains to block me rather specifically."

"You should have sent me instead of the red headed wench and the crone," Camilla said, laying her hands over Zoraster's shoulders and pressing her breasts against him as she spoke.

Anger flashed in Camilla's eyes for just a moment as he shrugged her arms off and walked to the mirror, deactivating its magic. "You don't have the cooperative spirit necessary. You would have been repulsed alone. It is obvious from what I can see outside the wood and scrying on Danica that her chosen course seems effective."

"Pure luck. She'll probably be dead in a few days."

Zoraster laughed mockingly. "Somehow, I doubt that. You underestimate my little rose, Camilla. You will be needed in an hour to transport an agent to Egoria. Meet me at the front gate at that time."

The dismissing tone caused Camilla's lip to twitch involuntarily in anger, and she turned to stalk out of the room.

Zoraster rolled his eyes and turned as she left. "You begin to bore me Camilla."

{*****~~o~~0~~o~~*****}

The faint light of the scrying mirror barely illuminated the features of a man with the iron gray hair and beard staring into it. Despite his attentiveness to the scene in the mirror, his expression spoke of an almost arrogant indifference.

He watched Zoraster leave the room, and then directed the mirror to show him others with absent waves of his hand. A wizard in purple robes and a pointed wizard's cap spoke with a red-haired wizardess in revealing black robes. After a few moments of watching, another wave of the man's hand caused the mirror to show a horrible demon of obviously great power slaying a group of elves, toying with them before allowing them to die.

For many hours, the man watched various people and places, his expression never changing or showing evidence of weariness. The mirror then showed Danica, seated near Brandon in the fortress. Now, his expression did change. The faintest evidence of intrigue crept into his features. He watched for a few seconds longer, closing his eyes and concentrating for a moment afterwards.

When he opened his eyes, a small sound of curiosity escaped him. "The only question now is who she will serve and whether she will survive to make the choice."

{*****~~o~~0~~o~~*****}

The companions all rested for a short while, using the time to care for their weapons and equipment. The four women all went to take baths in Danica and Celes' tub in the main building. They convinced the men to do the same after crinkling their noses and pointedly avoiding them for a while.

Cheron spent her time talking to Janelle and Bear, who were near inseparable now. Danica guessed the cleric was trying to worm her way into bed with the two, and from the hints she observed, the Heraklan was succeeding.

It was a holy day in Venaru's land, and he returned to his room in the main house to make his observances. He promised that should anything happen, all they need do was call, and he would come. His god would understand the need.

Celes and Terran returned to their scrying upon waking up from a short nap, hoping to discover the extent of the chaos in the wood. The dwarves left for one of the smithy shops to pound dents out of their armor.

Danica sat talking and laughing with Brandon. He told her a story about a battle with goblins that had nearly ended in disaster for him and his company when a shaman with a bent toward irritation cantrips had joined the fray. The creature had made them itch, burn, and ache with small spells. The cumulative effect so distracting that the warriors barely managed to defeat the creatures. They also discovered, to their great discomfort, that the spells lasted for several days.

Danica caught glances of the heat rapidly growing between Cheron, Janelle, and Bear, and that turned up her own heat as well. She caressed Brandon's leg beneath the table, and he soon followed her example. When the other three got up and left the common room, so did Danica and Brandon.

The couple went to Brandon's room, and Danica could already faintly hear the cries of passion from Janelle's room next door. The sounds only aroused them both that much more, and Brandon stripped Danica below the waist in moments. He did not even bother to remove his own clothes or Danica's top, but slipped his head between her legs to taste her.

Danica moaned and gasped in pleasure as he ate her. "Mmm lick me. Make me come," she moaned. She jerked her top open so she could massage her breasts and pinch her nipples while he tantalized her nether lips with his mouth.

Brandon growled in arousal, sucking and lapping with greater pressure, rolling her bud with his tongue and sucking it hard. Danica came quickly, flooding his mouth with her juices.

Brandon lapped up her nectar as she gasped through the waves of orgasm. "Gods how I love it when you come -- so loud, so sexy, and so sweet," he said while licking his lips.

Danica gasped one last time and said, "I want your cum in my mouth." She sat up and pulled down his trousers. He helped her remove them, and she soon engulfed his engorged member in her mouth.

Brandon squeezed Danica's breasts and pinched her nipples slightly as she sucked his cock. She released him for a moment and asked, "Do you want to fuck my tits and my mouth?"

"Oh yeah -- let me get my cock between those big tits."

Danica lay back and Brandon moved astride her. He lay his cock down between her breasts and squeezed them tightly together. He rocked his hips, stroking his cock between the globes, grunting in pleasure and rolling her nipples with his fingers as he stroked.

Danica leaned her head up, pulling a pillow under her head so she could suck on the purple head of his cock as he fucked her tits. She moaned around his glans as she sucked him, moving out of position every once in a while to look up into his eyes to offer sexy words of encouragement. "Fuck my tits. Come in my mouth. I want it."

Brandon stroked harder, his gasping breaths letting Danica know he was close to climax. He exploded with a deep cry of release, leaning forward to support his weight on his hands as he filled Danica's mouth.

Danica swallowed every drop, moaning blissfully. She grasped her breasts and closed them around his cock again, stroking him with them while she continued to suck on his cockhead.

He pulled away after a few minutes, too sensitive to endure her talented mouth any longer. She pulled out her toy and activated its magic, handing it to Brandon. "Fuck me with my toy. Make me come again while we wait for that gorgeous cock to get hard again."