The Beast Inside Page 23

  Although she was bashful at first, they eventually got along well. The two of them were not allowed clothing or anything else, but each of them was given a thread bare piece of cloth that looked like a piece of burlap and smelled of week old potatoes. This cloth only sufficed to cover SilverFox’s private parts and barely covered Alexandra at all. Their room was void of anything, but the bed.

  It was always dark, musty and cold in the room. Cuddling up to each other was what they had to do to keep warm. Once every hour they would be awakened and questioned for half an hour. They never got much more than a half hour sleep at a time. Kept groggy and starving was how their captors robbed them of any dignity of a lie.

  Telling them everything excluding what could give them an advantage in the war, was extremely difficult at the best of times. SilverFox was sure that he let some things slip through the cracks of his consciousness, but he had no clue to their importance or what he had let slip. He could not take much more of this.

  At least Alexandra was holding up to their questions, as he perceived it. Well, it did seem that she was clueless to the goings on of everything that was close enough to give any kind of interest for the emperor’s questioners. It was certain though that his mental awareness was breaking down. He wondered if any of his men, or his father, sent anyone to get him.

  EPILOGUE

  According to custom Ghak’s future wives could not be in the same tent with him before he married them, but would be in a tent by themselves. The wives would discuss things together and get used to sharing a bed together, since they would share their husband’s bed together. This night would be the last night of their three months of staying together in the same tent without Ghak.

  Tomorrow would be Ghak’s coronation and their wedding to Ghak would be after the coronation. They would be his queens and he their king. Katlin, the Ice Deep Elf, is a warrior princess from the far lands and mountain ranges called the Ice Caps of Peria to the east of Ghak’s jungle, Gunga. To the west of Gunga was the charred volcanic wasteland called the Lava Tundra of Peria, which was where Tasheia, the Burnt Deep Elf, came from.

  Peria was the now lost original homeland of the elves where every elf was once the same. This is where the ancient line of Ice elves came from of which Hfhouelph or Mysterio, as the Ice Deep Elf and Burnt Deep Elf Clans knew him, was half. Mysterio’s father was an Ice Elf and his mother was an Ice Deep Elf and happened to be Katlin’s uncle. Katlin’s mother is Mysterio’s sister.

  Since Katlin’s father was killed in the continuing war against the Gorgos Orcs, it became Mysterio’s duty to walk Katlin down the aisle of the tranquil. Ice Deep Elves, because of the frigidly cold climate that is even colder than the ice tundra where Ice Elves are from that they have had to endure, over time developed a light coat of ice blue hair all over their bodies that might be considered fur by others outside of their clan.

  Most Ice Deep elves were considered either long hair or short hair and rarely there would be some born with a silky sheen of hair so fine and soft that you could not see it, but only feel it. Katlin happened to be of the rare variety and even her mother considered her to be hairless. Although she had less hair than most about her body, she had waist length ice blue hair that billowed out from her head and covered most of her back.

  Another rarity of Katlin was her height and size. Where the general populous of Ice Deep elves were over six feet tall and highly muscular, Katlin was only four feet and six inches in height with a delicate extremely feminine figure that belied her true strength. She was stronger than most elves whether they happened to be male or female and her mental capacity outweighed even those ancient elves that spent many centuries studying nature, humanity and the history of the known world.

  Being one hundred and fifty years old meant that she was considered still a child amongst the elves. Burnt Deep elves by contrast were usually a golden brown in complexion with raven black hair and little or no body hair. Tasheia’s skin was an ebony colour that bordered on being a dark charcoal and her mane of hair was a dark raven black that went to her waist. Tasheia grew up in the monastic lifestyle of her father, Tyshavo.

  Her father at one time was a mercenary for the human assassins run by the emperor’s pet necromancer. He was trained in the lethal arts of assassination and carried out many assassinations over the past one hundred and fifty years that he was in the mercenary band of the emperor. In that time he served three successive emperors and three emperors have succeeded them since that time.

  Over the last one hundred and fifty years he led a monastery in one of the great towers in the heart of the only inactive volcano within the boundaries of the Lava Tundra of Peria called the Robes of Justice. This is where his experience as an assassin came in handy. In the monastery everyone went through extensive training in mercenary tactics and how to defend against an assassination attempt. For this training, many in the Grand Reach were trained here and some even lived out the monastic lifestyle until their king called them to serve in the military.

  A lot of other training could be had here as well, but most of that was only taught to those with Elvin descent or those that proved themselves worthy of Elvin teaching. Tasheia’s entire one hundred and fifty years was spent in the monastery, but was still considered an initiate of the Robes of Justice because she was still a child amongst the elves.

  Elves and humans undertook different levels of training in the monastery. The elves even had their own hierarchy, which differed only in the years they spent in each division. It meant that Tasheia would have to spend more than one hundred and fifty years in the monastery to get to the next level in the hierarchy. She was to advance the same night of her mutual wedding with Ghak.

  During the last fifty years of her monastic training, Katlin trained with her. Tasheia and Katlin were matched in height and strength and knew from birth that they would marry the same man, which was a Ghast Ogre named Ghak. With this monastic training they were taught how the Ghast Ogre customs were played out, how to serve their husband, how to please him and most of all how he was supposed to treat them.

  Being as Ghak is a magus of a long line of magi, they had to learn that as well. They learned that the Ghast Ogres were long lived like the elves and that Ghak was two hundred years older than they making him at three hundred and fifty years old to their one hundred and fifty years. It was also made known to them that his father was king of the Ghast Ogres in the Gunga jungle. It was also know that he was a gigantic seven feet and six inches of pure muscle that weighed more than five hundred pounds to their equal height of four feet and six inches, and weight of one hundred and fifteen pounds.

  They learned much of the Ghast culture and the religion of the magi as well. Ghast believed in the strength of body and the strength of will. Their women or more specifically their wives were to have these traits. No Ghast Ogre would be caught dead with a weak wife, let alone two. In Ghast society everyone had the same duties whether they were male or female. The lower your status was in the society the less severe your duties became. Likewise the higher your status was in the society the greater your responsibilities would be.

  To the Ghast it was an honour to do work, the more work you were assigned the more honour you had. Royalty having the highest honour meant that they had to do the more important duties as well as what everyone else was assigned to do. Ghak’s family was responsible for all work done in the Gunga jungle. Katlin and Tasheia being betrothed to Ghak would have to do as much as Ghak was required to do, which meant they had to learn how to do it.

  Now that Ghak would become king and they his queens, they would have to learn to do even more duties. As arranged marriages go, neither of them knew if they loved him. To them it did not matter because love for him would come as long as they loved each other. They were more than sisters, but less than lovers and knew that they would share the same Ogre and that he was certainly big enough for the both of them.

  Getting a sneak peek of him in the flesh when he was imprisoned b
y the same commander that betrayed many Ice Deep elves and Burnt Deep elves, dissolved all doubts that they might have had had they not seen him that way. His skin was a dark reddish hue that was rippled with muscles that had the glint of metal in a forge. It was like he was sculpted from the finest marble.

  The two of them spent the fifty years of training together in preparation of their marriage to Ghak, but only the last three months together in the same tent. It was done like this because in Ghast Ogre culture it was forbidden for females to mate with other females or males to mate with other males. These three months that they spent together was to be done with the utmost respect and dignity called for by Ghast wives to know each other enough that they would not fight each other over their husband.

  Just as when they finally wed their husband they were not to fight with him. A rule was set long ago that wives were to love their husband equally and thus their husband should love each of them equally showing no favoritism to one or the other. Katlin and Tasheia loved each other deeply and bordered on the love that identical twins showed for each other.

  They felt that they could bathe together as though they were babies fresh from their mothers’ wombs and share a blanket like little innocent school girls that they could still obey all of the rules and still share each others sisterly love. When dawn came and the light of the sun had shown through the tent and basked their conjoined twin bodies with the hot rays of the sun they awoke.

  While they had slept through the night they had both dreamt the same dream of when they had seen Ghak in his imprisonment except in their dream he seduced the both of them and they both lay with him and took turns oiling his muscles and he oiled theirs when they were done. They did not do the mating dance with him that male and female do, but this dream still bothered them and quickly untangled their selves for fear of someone seeing them that way. It occurred to them that someone already had when they saw a large tub of scalding hot water was set inside their tent.

  It was also forbidden for a male to see someone else’ wife or wives without any clothing. Both of them shivered despite the heat of the tub that they both slowly got into. Soon an attendant from both of their clans came in the tent with clothes and jewelry for their wedding to Ghak. Katlin’s attendant dressed her in an ice blue gown laced with pearls, rubies and emeralds. Her hair was woven with red, ivory and royal blue ribbons with a diamond and sapphire tiara set in the curls of her hair.

  The bodice was laced loosely down from her ample bosom to her exposed belly button. Beneath her dress in the front could be seen a shear lace latticework that left little to the imagination. A heart shaped pendant encapsulated in gold with a relief of a snow elk etched in jade could be seen through the lace resting between her breasts. Golden sapphire earrings dangled from her ears, diamond rings encrusted her fingers of each hand and delicate slippers of woven gold encased her feet. Shear silk draped over her immaculate features.

  Tasheia’s attendant dressed her in a pearl white gown adorned with sapphire and diamond gems that nearly bathed her in their light and brilliance. Without the gems encasing the sheerness of her dress it would have appeared that she was wearing the lace that was almost hidden beneath Katlin’s dress. The gown was in two pieces, the top was just enough to cover her round breasts, the bottom barely hid the tops of her buttocks and exposed everything up her back and exposed everything from three inches below her navel up to just below her breasts.

  A bracelet of diamonds encircled her head like a headband with an emerald pendant hanging down her forehead stopping just above her brow and a golden choker encircled her neck with a lone ruby dangling above the hollow of her breasts. Golden emerald earrings twinkled as they dangled from fragile earlobes, ruby and diamond rings danced on every finger and delicate slippers of woven gold adorned her feet. Shear silk draped over her immaculate features.

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  Here is a Sample Chapter of the second book in this series.

  SAMPLE CHAPTER OF: A SONG AND ALE: Book 2 of The Immortals of Scar

  CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN

  Delaigda was on Primordia and did not understand why society did not want anyone to be using his or her own brains. Everyone still did not understand that they were on a planet and content with just a little piece of land. It made perfect sense to use your brains against a creature that was far larger and stronger than one’s self.

  The beasts that they had to contend with were dumb, even though they weighed more than thousands of people. She liked hunting, but society forbade that as well. Women were not allowed to do much in society and this made her feel like leaving. She had a loving family, but they were wrapped up in the politics of the society. Her father was even on the council and disliked the fact that his only daughter of ten children, did not act like a daughter.

  Being his tenth child it did not hurt him much in the eyes of society, but it still hurt. She did not like hurting her father and it hurt her inside when her father winced when anyone came with news about her doing this or doing that. It got to the point where she would get punished no matter what they came to see him about. Most men had at least sixty percent more muscle mass than her, even though she had more than any other woman in the society that she lived in.

  Most men despised her due to this fact, including her father. It was obvious that her physical prowess was not gotten from her mother’s side of the family, but from her father’s side. Even though this was so, she was just as beautiful as her mother. The men in her society liked women who were frail and had to depend upon their man to take care of their needs.

  Delaigda was sad sometimes, actually most times, that she would not marry anyone of importance. Those of any import were entwined deeply into the web of the council and any attempt to move around against the faction who led them would bring exile. Rumours of the waste were always brought to the lush green lands where her society lived. It was always said that stranger beasts lived there than any of those that roamed into the society. The waste was a place where nothing grew and only promised death.

  She took to this the same as she took to the idea that women were useless in a society of men that hulked up to a height of nine feet and sometimes weighed over six hundred pounds. The average woman in her society reached up to a height of five feet and most times weighed less than one hundred and fifty pounds. Delaigda was six feet and four inches tall and weighed one hundred and seventy pounds.

  Delaigda was not chubby like most women, but actually appeared to be slim and well toned with a very feminine figure. It was completely away from the normal chubby look that the men of society preferred. This is what made her choose to venture into the Waste. Never in her entire life had she taken things that were not hers to take, but now it was necessary. If she were to survive the waste, she would have to take the necessary things from others. Delaigda thought about taking weapons, but decided taking something that was so necessary for the society to survive would be terribly wrong.

  Her father’s armour and weapon master taught her the workings of weapon making and armour making in secret for the last fifteen years of her life. Delaigda's weapons and armour needed a few more years of honing, but they would have to do. She could always work on it. So, she took her tools as well as the small anvil that she worked with and put them in a reinforced pack. Wearing the armour and the sword was more practical than carrying them. Also taking a whetstone, she left for the kitchen to see what she could find for provisions.

  Filling a large sack with two loaves of day old bread, a pound of soured cheese seasoned to last at least a week without being kept cold, a skin of fermented goat’s milk and two skins of spiced water. From there she went to the Fletcher’s hut to get her composite bow and her fletching tools. After fastening a quiver of forty arrows onto her back, slinging her bow over her left shoulder and putting her fletching tools in her pack, she headed to the store rooms to find some other equipment that she might need.

  Delaigda was able
to procure fifty feet of rope, a long patchwork cloak, a large wool blanket and a small tent. She always thought that they should domesticate an animal for riding, but they had never listened to her. The society preferred to eat the horse rather than to ride it. Thus, Delaigda had to walk into the Waste and hoped she could find a beast to coax into taking her the rest of the way into the Waste.

  A few miles into the Waste and she spotted such a beast, a horse worthy of a warrior such as herself. It was bigger than any horse that she had ever seen being about twenty-four hands high from the place where she would sit to the ground below it. The horse knew that she was there. In fact it tossed its massive head from side to side in defiance of her presence and then stood on its hind legs letting out a mighty neigh, a war cry of sorts.

  Dust was sent into the air like the clouds in fog when its front hooves fell to the ground digging into the desert sand like a tempest wind that causes a sand storm. It danced around in defiant circles bringing up more and more sand. Her eyes were filled with sand, which meant that she could not see the horse stampeding towards her, but she did hear it. The thunder of galloping hooves in her ears made her afraid for the first time in her life.

  She was so afraid that she could not move and trying only made her limbs feel more like lead each time an attempt to move was made. To her amazement the horse stopped a hands breadth in front of her face. It was so close that she could feel the horse’s warm breath on her face, melting away the fear. The horse nudged her shoulder and she took this as a sign of approval. Removing the steel gauntlet from her right hand, she ran her fingers through the thick black mane of this large horse.

  Delaigda talked soothingly to the horse and decided to name him Thunder. Thunder laughed the way horses do when they feel warmth and love coming from the gentle caressing of those that are more than their masters’ and more like companions. She opened her sack and brought out the large wool blanket. Delaigda placed the blanket on Thunder’s back. After putting her gauntlet back on, she climbed onto Thunder’s back.