Authors: Monica Luke
“You will speak it at once,” Aderac demanded.
“King Gegorad on his way back to his kingdom, when he stopped for the night,” Belon said seething, “Met with two men from Celgon, along with men that looked like the Segorans. All stayed a long time in his tent.”
“So much betrayal!” he said shocked and seethed as well, “So, so much.”
“Indeed,” Belon agreed, and added, “Two kingdoms have joined to bring down Worrlgen in some plot. You are in more danger here Aderac. I am sending you and the children back to Ivodgald.”
“Noooo! Belon, honey!” Aderac complained with distressed emotion, and about voice his objection more, stopped because the children were now next to them, so he held his tongue.
“Let us get back with haste,” Belon said, as he turned his horse.
As Laad and Loth looked out, when they saw Osgorad and Adeon riding in with Belon, and the others right behind them, Laad guessed Belon already knew.
“Where are you going?” Loth asked, as Laad hurried down the stairs.
“We both know somehow Belon got them to speak.”
Once they passed the gate, Belon sent the children to the chamber; then after he helped Aderac off his horse, and stood in front of him, Aderac looked at him concerned.
“Belon,” Aderac said, and gave him a stern look.
Already knowing what Aderac was about to say, he interrupted him refusing to listen.
“I will not yield.” Belon had already resolved. “You are the children are returning Ivodgald.”
“Honey, no,” he still objected, “We shall agree to send the children back, but I am staying.”
“Aderac!” Belon raised his voice, speaking more firmly, “You will not go against me!”
Aderac interrupted him, speaking back to him just as firmly.
“I must,” he asserted, but didn’t raise his voice, “I must be with you, and dare it be only when all is good that I am. I shall be with you when they are bad as well. I am the King of Ivodgald, Belon, and I am your love. As both, I command and demand to remain.”
Belon huffed, but knew Aderac’s mind was set.
“Yes, you are both,” Belon said, and sighed while distorting his face now helpless to argue the point more.
After Aderac tenderly and lovingly touched his face, when he turned to walk away, Belon made his expression stern, and followed Aderac to court.
All waiting for them, when Aderac walked inside with Belon as always close behind him, Baric spoke first.
“What do you reason Cousin?”
“I believe,” he answered, as he walked in front of him. “Two kingdoms have joined longing to bring down one, but what they failed to reason is this. Worrlgen is not one. Its might is united with Ivodgald’s might, and we shall wrap that might around the neck of Hemrock and Celgon and choked them to death!”
As he spoke, Baric’s quorum hummed.
“Court scribe!” Aderac yelled.
King Baric’s scribe raced in front of him.
“Yes, King Aderac.”
“Parchment, dyes, and quills.”
Quickly, he brought Aderac what he demanded; then as he wrote. The court so quiet the smallest of needles falling to the floor would have sounded like clanging bells, all waited until he finished.
“Grand Commander Belon,” Aderac called out, and at once Belon walked to him.
Looking only at him as he did it, Aderac took the knife out of Belon’s belt and cut into his finger.
After he put his blood next to his name, he looked into Belon’s eyes, and gave him back his knife, then once Belon took it; he signed the parchment, and did the same.
“It is done,” Aderac said, as he looked up at all those around him, while folding the parchment; then when the scribe poured wax on it and closed it, Aderac sealed it with his king’s ring
Once the wax hardened, Belon took the sealed message, and gave it to one of his men.
“Only, and I mean only in the hands of Gueden!”
“Come let us speak in my private chamber,” King Baric said to Aderac, “Along with our high commanders.”
As Belon was about to follow Aderac, Osgorad stood and yelled at him, demanding he apologize for threatening him if he didn’t reveal what he had found out.
“Forgive me Osgorad,” Belon agreeably said in front of all, then walked close to Osgorad so only he could hear him, “I spoke wrong to you in the glen. I did not mean to threaten you. Should harm come to him by anything withheld from you that could have stopped it? I will not threaten to harm you again, I swear to.”
Osgorad scowled, as he breathed heavily through his nose, then turned and stormed away.
**
Later that night, after going over at length the details of how and who would march where once Ivodgald’s men arrived and some of the tactics they would use, Enek unable to sleep went to the men’s hall to have a drink.
Tall, brawny, and handsome, when he walked inside and sat alone, after he got his drink, almost instantly a woman came and sat beside him.
As she flirted with him, Enek enjoyed it. Long since he had had any release, he decided that night he would have it with her, and as she pressed her body close to his, he took his hand, and ran it up and down her inner thighs.
“Umm, hot are your thighs, I wonder if what is between them hotter.”
“Move your hand more and know for yourself,” she suggested.
As he did, Ovfren walked into the men’s hall to get a quick bite to eat before he went on his watch, and while waited, he looked across the room and noticed Enek running his hand up a woman’s thigh. Not knowing Enek saw him, he jealously frowned, quickly stood, and stomped out without any food.
“Come,” she whispered, as her hands went into his tunic slowly moving it up and down his strong chest before she added in his ear, “Let us go and enjoy the other.”
Enek groaned when he saw how Ovfren had stomped out, and knowing it upset him, for reasons he couldn’t explain, felt he had to speak with him.
“This night I cannot. A sudden matter has come before me,” he said, as patted the woman on her rear, “Perhaps another night.”
The woman looked at him disappointed, but said nothing else as Enek moved her hand off him, stood and walked away.
Unsure where Ovfren went, he walked around looking for him, but unfamiliar with WorrlgenHall, gathered he could be anywhere.
About to give up, just as he walked down another hallway, when he glanced over the balcony, he saw him walking across the courtyard towards the stables.
Quickly, Enek sprinted towards the stables and looked for Ovfren, but when he didn’t see him, softly cursed and began to walk away.
“What do you want?” Ovfren asked. His tone filled with both anger and jealousy.
“I came to see about my horse,” Enek lied, still breathing heavy from running.
Ovfren glared at him, while he walked to his horse.
“Have I somehow angered you?” Enek asked.
“Why would you believe such?” Ovfren asked, trying to feign indifference.
“Ooooh,” Enek sounded off, and crossed his arms, “I believed you were from the scowl on your face in your men’s hall, before you stormed out?”
“No,” Ovfren bluntly lied back.
Both blatantly lying to the other, they stood across from the other in a standoff.
“I must go,” Ovfren finally said, but added a sarcastic comment, “I would not want to hold you from that woman in the men’s hall.”
Enek burst into laughter. “Ah, then I did not anger you. I only made you jealous.”
Angered that his jealously only amused him, Ovfren impetuously rushed towards him to strike him, but when he did, Enek’s reflexes faster, grabbed his fist.
“Let it go!” Ovfren demanded.
Refusing to release it; instead, he took his fist and put it to his chest. The same chest a woman’s sensual hand slowly moved across just minutes ago, yet even Ovfren’s fist now gave him more of a pleasurable sensation than her open hand.
“Open you fist now,” he made his own demand, as he did.
Weakened lustfully by his control of him, as Enek squeezed tighter, Ovfren opened his fist, then when he moved his palm to travel down his tight stomach, Enek inhaled and moaned pleased by the heat of his hand on his flesh.
Slowly, as it traveled lower, for the second time Ovfren’s hand now touched Enek’s manhood, but unlike before, Enek didn’t move Ovfren’s hand to feel his actual flesh or caress him.
“I want to feel you as I did before.” Ovfren moaned, noticing that he didn’t.
“If you do, you will have to move your hand yourself,” Enek’s reply, as he stepped backwards into the shadows.
Eagerly, Ovfren stepped with him; then slowly put his hand down Enek’s pants.
Once again, his hard shaft in his hand, he began caressing it with both soft and hard taunting strokes, breathing heavily.
“Dare you seek release with another?” Ovfren questioned while caressing him, still filled with jealously that he put his hands between a woman’s thighs in the men’s hall, “What of your words that I am always in your head?”
“You are, but I am only a man.” Enek’s moaning answer, as he did, his body now wanting more from him, “And need release just as you do.”
Now even more jealous that she was still an option, Ovfren took his other hand and put it behind Enek’s head pulling his lips to his, and as they feverishly kissed, Enek wrapped his strong arms around him.
“You cannot seek another,” Ovfren lustfully ordered into his mouth wanting to lay sole claim to him, “If you do, I shall burn with jealously.”
“I fear you have put some spell on me,” Enek said in disbelief. His mind going back over his life up until he rode to WorrlgenHall, and how never once had thoughts or desires come to him of any other than women, yet now his mind and body ached with want for Ovfren.
“Then be spellbound.” Ovfren moaned.
Enek inhaled deep to clear his clear his muddled head, and remembered what he told Ovfren just days before.
“Go Ovfren,” he said, as his strong arms pushed Ovfren’s body from against him.
“But,” Ovfren said, looking at him puzzled. Now so weakened and taken with Enek, this time Ovfren would have succumbed to his desire.
“I am not one for this,” Enek again resolved, “To hide in shadows or meet in hidden places to be with you. It is not within me to do so, nor shall it be. I can have any I want, and when I want at my will. I spoke to you of what you must do, and if you cannot, then go.”
Wounded, yet filled with desire such that he couldn’t ride his horse without feeling pain. His shaft completely swollen, Ovfren lashed out with words.
“You are doing it again!” he blared, beside himself with lust and anger at his boastful indifference, “Being haughty, and now vain, just like Belon!
“I am who I am, and only that,” Enek chided him. “Just as Belon is who he is, do not scale us again.”
“And do you now just toss me aside, as one would nothing of worth?”
“I cannot toss what is not within my grasp,” Enek shrewdly answered.
“I am in many ways.”
“You are far from it.” Enek knew, “In all the ways I would want, and need you to be.”