Honeymoon Manor Ch. 01

A heavy silence hung over them, broken up only by the salt mephit's dark muttering and unflattering references to marble mephits' gaudy makeup and shallow personalities.

"Aha. Well..." Ricard cleared his throat. "I had thought—you being the lockpicker, after all—that that would clearly be your task, Felix." He sighed, shaking his head sadly. "I do wish I could accompany you! But, alas, it seems that this insidious Manor is deliberately designed to scatter us to the winds, and... after all, this is your area of expertise. It seems only fair you be given the easy task, while I brave the greater share of the peril. It's only fair."

"Okay." Felix snorted. "Sure. So... see you on the other side?"

Ricard sketched a short bow. "Until we meet again."

And Felix raised the waterskin to his lips and drank deeply.

As he drank the beverage—which was cool, refreshing, and just so slightly sweet—he wondered how much was safe to drink. Did this potion make him the size of a mouse, no matter how much he took in? Or did it make him smaller and smaller, depending? If he kept drinking, would he become the size of an ant?

He stopped drinking quickly after that. Felix had never liked ants. Ants crawled all over his picnics and got all over his pastries and candies. Extremely frustrating. Aside from the many more obviously pressing issues of being ant-sized, he didn't want to be small enough that he might be forced to face an ant in a fair fight.

Felix was good at fighting, but he knew quite well his equals. If ants were the size of cats, he often speculated that they would rule the world.

All of these thoughts filled his head at the same time as a mild tingling. Then a buzzy static overtook his vision.

Felix clutched at his eyes, groaning. It didn't hurt. It just felt... emptier. Like he was turning into fog. His stomach heaved unpleasantly, but as soon as this sensation filled him, it was gone, replaced by a pleasant hum throughout his whole body.

It felt warm. Soft. Like sinking into cotton. Felix rubbed his eyes, then opened them. "That's re—whoa."

He stared up at Ricard, blinking. Ricard—a man who was by no means unusually tall—towered over him. Felix blinked. "Ricard! Someone's caused you, and the whole point, to grow quite a lot larger!"

And indeed, everything seemed very much enormous right now. Felix was relieved to find he was not ant-sized—perhaps six-to-eight inches or so.

Ricardo smirked. "Felix, let me tell you, it is a heady feeling to be taller than you for a change."

"Well, only in the sense of technical inches." Felix crossed his arms. "If you think about it in... uh, in a sense of ratios, I am still much taller than you. If you think about it obtusely enough."

Ricard raised an eyebrow. "It's somewhat reassuring to know that your general manner isn't just brought on my the thinness of the air at your standard altitude. Come, Felix." He stooped, allowing Felix to hop into his palm. Felix smiled brightly as his adventuring comrade lifted him swiftly up towards the small door. It was sort of fun being carried. "So, what are we planning? Are you just going to unlock the doors, while I stroll—erm, battle my way through to claim the reward?"

"Well, ideally, it's less of a claiming and more of a retrieving." Felix tapped his lockpicks together as he came level with the door. This lock was really quite simple, now that he was small enough to manage it, and it wouldn't take him long at all to crack. "After all, heh, it's not your treasure. We're splitting it forty-sixty, remember?"

Ricard shrugged, causing Felix to stumble slightly. "As long as you remember that you're the one who that rate."

Felix knelt and got to work. "Well, you did fight that acid-spitting hydra to find the map. I'm not about to insist we get an equal rate! Besides, I hardly ever get sick and the innkeeper gives me a great discount for saving his inn from that pesky locust, so I really only need money to buy more food."

"Candies aren't food, Felix."

"That reminds me." Felix scowled. "I'm out of candy."

"However will you endure?"

"I'm sure I'll get by." Felix giggled in delight as the lock clicked open. He straightened and opened the door, peering inside.

A miniature spiral staircase wound upwards, going straight up that rectangular pipe. Felix cocked his head, then stepped through.

~~~~

The salt mephit watched, eyes slightly narrowed, as the little adventurer made his way into the workings of the Honeymoon Manor locks.

Her eyes glimmered with excitement. Below, her fingers delicately tickled the opalescent skin around her half-exposed pussy. As soon as these two were gone...

Will you 'get by', little one? she thought, licking her lips. And you, favorite of Titania. I wonder... whatever will they do to you?

She couldn't wait to find out.

In the meantime, she planned to dedicate quite a lot of energy to guessing.

~~~~

Felix made his way up the stairs, humming softly to himself in time with his footfalls.

The humming was a bad habit. He kept stopping himself when he caught it, but all too often, he lapsed back into it without thinking. He knew it was a safety hazard. He just forgot sometimes.

There weren't too many stairs, but enough to be bothersome, and it was a welcome relief when he reached a large door. The door had an oddness to it, and it took him a moment to recognize that it was, in fact, keyhole shaped.

"Funny," he murmured.

There was no doorknob; only a thin slot. He hesitated, then reached towards it. Was this some sort of trap? A spinning metal disk, maybe? Or a gas dispenser? Or maybe...

A paper card slipped out of the slot and fluttered right into Felix's hand. He looked down at it, perplexed. It depicted a rather silly-looking fellow, very gangly and tall, dressed in highly colorful garb and wearing a belled conical hat. Ten red diamonds drifted around the fellow, and before Felix's eyes, they seemed to shift and undulate, circling around the prancing fool.

He grimaced. "Well, what a rude notion. That doesn't look anything like me." He stooped and slipped the card through the slot. "Another, please."

The card slid in automatically. Felix heard a brief whirring sound, and then the keyhole-shaped door... fell over. On Felix.

It was made of cardboard.

"Ow," Felix said, knocking the papery portal off of him and stepping into the room. "Funnier and funnier. Well, this is really too mu—uh—hm." He stopped stock-still, looking around in wide-eyed wonder.

A few things immediately stood out to him. Felix had once had the misfortune to enter a mirror maze, and he'd experienced what it was like to stare into a mirror with a mirror at your back. This room was like that. It felt enormous, and yet somehow cramped and intimate. And it was hot. And humid. Felix had also once had the misfortune of falling for the classic "enter into a cave, turns out it's a giant snake whose mouth someone propped open with a stick, run out screaming" trick, so his first instinct was to make sure the floor was solid.

It was, to his relief. Maybe a bit wet, but it was the ordinary dampness of cavern stone.

Another thing he noticed was the strange window that beckoned off in the distance, in the direction of the foyer Felix had left. Felix could see, what felt like infinitely far away thanks to the mirrored effect, a large keyhole. Through it, he briefly caught a glimpse of a pacing Ricard talking to the salt mephit.

"Well, this defies at least a few laws of physics," Felix muttered to himself.

A card settled at his feet. Felix picked it up. Upon it danced an academic-looking woman with wild white hair wearing a lab coat. She, too, wore a jester cap, and seemed to be fretting with a series of equations that clearly didn't add up.

"You don't take scientific theory very seriously, do you?" he asked aloud, turning to the room's native occupant.

In virtually all respects, the occupant resembled an ordinary human woman—albeit an oddly stationary one. She was dressed in a small miniskirt and a slim, form-fitting red top that made her prodigious assets quite plain to see. Her hair was a lovely black, contrasting with the red of her eyes and clothes, and her impossibly lush lips were painted a brilliant sunset crimson.

She had especially long and dainty fingers, Felix noticed. Almost like a doll's hands. Porcelain. Perfect.

She smiled slightly at him, but said nothing. Instead, her right hand twitched, brandishing a single card.

Felix hesitated, then advanced. The card waved in front of him, catching his eye with its bright colors. He couldn't help but be curious.

He took the card. She beamed.

His face went red. The card depicted the young woman in a very explicit position, totally naked, with a tight, drooling sex visibly on display, her lips pursed in a o-shape, and her left hand ornately detailed as it seemed to tickle the air. Her eyes were heavy-lidded in a look of suggestive desire. Three crimson keyhole shapes surrounded her.

Felix blinked.

"Well, that seems a bit much," he said to himself. "But... if I'm not quite confused, should I assume you're the Three of Locks?"

She batted her eyelashes at him.

He frowned. "This would be a lot easier if you could just speak, you know."

She rolled her eyes. Her right hand flicked, and three cards seemed to appear from thin air. Felix took them.

As he did so, her fingers grazed his palm, and he flinched. It was surprisingly ticklish.

The first card depicted him once again, but in a rather unsettling situation: Drowning in what looked like mud, or some sort of amber goop. But he was not even trying to escape in this card. His eyes were filled with a hypnotic swirl. His tongue lolled out, and a disembodied hand was spooning something indistinct onto it.

Another hand dangled a pair of milky-white orbs before his eyes.

Two hands brandished feathers and tickled his ears.

A fifth hand held a rose beneath his nose.

"What a peculiar image," he said, shaking his head ruefully. "It doesn't exactly answer my question, though. I guess the feathers are supposed to be hearing, so what about touch? You're missing a sense, surely."

His eyes flicked to the sitting woman, who smiled coyly and slipped the second card to the front. This card depicted her, but now instead of the visible pussy, hand and lips, three padlocks covered each. Six hands floated around her.

"This is an interesting deck," he remarked. "This is, what, the Six of Senses? Are there noble cards? A king? A knave? A queen?"

She silently giggled as the third card slipped to the front. Two more followed suit. Felix stared at them uncertainly. He was sweating now; it was very hot in here.

Each card depicted him kneeling, open-mouthed, eyes glassy and heavy-lidded, before this fey... creature.

One showed his hand held daintily in hers as she appeared to tickle his palm. He bit his lip, remembering how her fingers had tickled him earlier from just a momentary touch. One showed his fingers immersed in her pussy as juices spilled all over it. It was drawn in startling detail. The third showed him kneeling, gazing up at her, as she leaned down and tenderly kissed him.

In each, she wore a majestic crown. In each, he wore a jester's cap.

"Y-you know," he murmured, straightening, "I don't think I like this deck of yours very much."

She pouted her lush lips up at him.

"So you're the key," he said to himself. "Or... the lock? The three locks. Three of Locks." He started pacing, mind racing. "Hand, pussy, lips. The entrance door was like this, just less... er, sexual. Had to solve all three locks basically at once. It could be a trap, but... but I don't feel like they would go to such trouble for a 'lock' that didn't open. Sort of a, uh, lack of payoff to that joke. And their fairies could probably solve this easily." He bit his lip. "No, this must be the real lock."

He glanced back, eyes narrowed. "But that doesn't mean it's not a trap, right?"

She beamed and slowly shook er head. She waggled her fingers, raising an eyebrow suggestively.

Felix rubbed his palms. He could do this. It was just an ordinary lock, really, except for the strange things about it. And it wasn't as though she could mind control him. This trap was probably designed for someone who could be mind controlled. Hypnotized by her touch. Brainwashed by pleasure that left mental defenses vulnerable. Not an ex-witchhunter.

He slowly advanced on the young lady, who bit her lip with excitement and slowly spread her legs. This caused the skirt to climb up and reveal a tight, shaven, already dripping pussy. She looked up at him with wide, almost needy eyes.

He reached down, settling his fingers between her legs. She did nothing—only smiled and nodded eagerly. He leaned down, his face inches from hers. He could feel her warm breath, but still she did not act.

Finally, carefully remembering the orientation of the cards, he took her left hand, leaned into the kiss, and slipped his finger into her dripping cunt.

How dangerous could it be?

~~~~

It felt like she was devouring him, messily, desperately, and yet with perfect technique. Her lips were soft, wonderful, sensuous and wet. Even before her tongue had entered, nothing about this kiss felt chaste.

His knees felt weak as she instantly took control of the kiss, running her lips over his sensitive skin, and he felt himself spiraling deeper and deeper into her.

Then her tongue slipped between his lips, and she started to spiral into him. He moaned, leaning in closer, feeling the pleasure soaring inside him, the pure passion and power.

She moaned back.

~~~~

Her pussy sucked at his fingers like a mouth, and before he knew it, he had ssliped two nside as he third stroked her clit. Hr juices tingled pleasurably on his skin. His fingers felt so... so sensitive. He mewled, unable to stop himself from rapidly pleasuring her as her pussy suckled at his fingers.

She mewled back.

~~~~

Her fingers danced on his palm, faster than thought. Felix had always been more ticklish than he cared to admit to strangers—as one or two pickpockets had been mortified to discover—but her fingers told him she already knew, and somehow, it was even worse. Her fingers skittered like feathers across his palm, tickled the joints in his fingers, stroked along the lines. His hand shook, and she held it tightly, affording easier access with her incessant ticklish fingers.

He squeaked, overcome by the exquisite torment.

She giggled.

~~~~

Through it all, as Felix half-knelt there, hands and lips lost to sensation, his mind was abuzz with new information.

He could see the locks. Or... could feel the locks. Almost like a temperature difference. He trembled with the effort of visualizing them. There, in her hand, right at the center of the palm. It was a childishly simple set of tumblers.

And her mouth! He needed to stick his tongue in, to kiss her back, to take control. It was so easy. A lock for an apprentice smith, not an experienced safecracker.

There, in her pussy, her clit. If stroked just right, slick and smooth and easy...

Dimly, he realized that what he needed to do was make the Keyhole Maiden come.

Pleasure. Pleasure was his three lockpicks here.

But how could he even hope to wield the lockpicks when she was already tumbling him into fragile ecstasy?

Desperately, he sped up his attentions to her clit. She started to whimper and moan against him, and her attentions on his fingers slowed down a little. His hand trembled, still recovering from the tickle onslaught.

Unfortunately, her kissing did not ease up. If anything, she was kissing more hungrily than ever, desperate to heighten the pleasure he was bringing her.

He was melting into her kiss, but he stroked faster. Had to distract her. Had to occupy her. Had to pleasure her.

Her fingers were still trickling along his palm in slow, smooth lines when his own fingers settled on her palm. He felt her gasp against him.

She started to pant, and he pressed the advantage, stroking her palm in his own spirals. Her hand twitched and trembled. Her hips were weakly bucking against his fingers.

He was trembling, too, desperately working her clit, building her. His tongue started to slip into her mouth, and her squeals took on a sharper and sharper pitch—

And she came. Juices spilled over his fingers, and his fingers were momentarily immersed in strange delights as her pussy rapidly suckled them all the way up to the knuckle. She squealed against him, trembling all over.

And in his pleasure-dazzled state, Felix thought he'd won. He'd picked the lock. It was over, and in his triumph, all he felt was soft, sweet pleasure.

He relaxed, just slightly.

And she struck. She started to devour his face with her luscious lips and questing tongue, wrapping her fingers in his hair and clutching him to her. He felt her purring with delight.

He could only whimper. She was so soft, so... so...

Her hand started to dance on his, again, retaking control. He was melting against her, shaking uncontrollably with barely-contained giggles. Thoser touches made him feel so weak, so... so... He couldn't even think straight!

He felt her laughing against him. His knees quaked.

Came too fast, he thought, his heart pounding. I need to... to edge her, to pick them all at once. Need to—

As soon as he'd thought it, the thought was replaced by delicious, sparkling pleasure as her pussy suckled his fingers up to the base, covering them with that wonderful, tingly, sucking sensation.

His cock, he realized with growing nervousness, was beginning to bulge against his trousers. He was practically cumming from this.

His heart was pounding. The stimulation was driving him wild. He was lost in the kiss, drifting into space.

And the worst part was, it wasn't hypnosis. He was fully in control! And still he was helpless against the way she made him feel.

Her pussy stroked his fingers. Her fingers stroked his palm. And her lips... her kiss seemed to suck all the energy and will out of him, replacing it all with pure, erotic touch. He was left drifting in her arms, drowning in stimulation.

And she was laughing. Not cruelly. Just... laughing. She owned him. He was practically swooning into her arms, sinking into her lap.

She was cumming again, and he limply cursed himself for his weakness. Her orgasms offered no respite. Her pussy just sped up, emptied his mind of any thought of taking advantage, and then she went right back to kissing, her tongue exploring his mouth, her fingers stroking his palm, drawing little spirals that drained all thoughts from him and made him nice and submissive and hungry for more. Needy. Horny. Addicted.

He felt her unbuckling his belt. Felt his pants sinking to the ground, and realized he was now sinking half-naked into her lap. His cock was at full attention, ready for her.

If she touched him, he realized with dread, he would melt completely. He was too sensitive now. Too sensitive to his lover's sensuous affections.

But then something occurred to him:

Judging by the way she grasped and gasped, the Keyhole Maiden was just as sensitive as he was.

Breathing heavily, he struggled once again to take control. His fingers started twitching and grazing over her hand, frantically, desperately. Her fingers seemed to react, flinching back, and he pressed this tiny advantage.

As his cock continued to throb from the stimulation, he moaned. But he thrust his tongue into her. She let out a squeak of surprise, and he leaned in, trying to overpower her with his sheer hunger. He harnessed his lust into energy, kissing her desperately, not even thinking about picking the lock—just trying to pleasure her...