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Author's Note: Comments and feedback are appreciated. - Robert robertx5sf@yahoo.com
This is a work of fiction. All characters portrayed in this story are fictional and not representative of anyone living or dead. (c) 2013
by robertx5sf@yahoo.com, all rights reserved, may not be reproduced in any form without the author's consent, with exception of the license granted to Nifty.org per Nifty's terms of use.
The Squires of Telisan Keep - 19
YORIS
"Stefan, pay attention," said Brother Yoris. Stefan was about fourteen with bright red hair and green eyes that were perpetually sad. The boy's eyes had always made Yoris uncomfortable. He thought that the boy looked at everyone as if he knew their fate, and that they were about to die.
"Sorry, Brother," said the young Acolyte. Stefan had been staring out the window again rather than paying attention. Brother Yoris was giving a lesson to the Acolytes on some of the ways to treat simple injuries that were common among Knights and fighting men. There were four teenage boys currently in training at the small Temple of The Warrior that was part of Telisan Keep. Brother Yoris resumed the lesson and Stefan did a better job of pretending to be paying attention.
Near the end of the lesson, Brother Barton, the gray haired leader of the Temple, entered the room. He motioned for Brother Yoris to continue the lesson, then sat down at the back of the room. When Yoris was done, Brother Barton stood up and said, "Boys, please head over to the stables for riding lessons. Brother Kelt will meet you all there." As the Acolytes filed out of the room, Brother Barton motioned for Yoris to take a seat next to him.
"Brother, Lord Velarik has asked me to have one of our order check on Page Karl. Squire Rynil mentioned that the boy has been having nightmares, and Rynil fears that they might be signs of a demon trying to influence the boy. Since you now have the most direct experience with demons, I would like for you to go test the boy. While you are there, you might wish to see how Sir Luken is recovering," said Brother Barton.
"Brother, I will talk with Page Karl as you request, but please, there are others that are better suited to assisting Sir Luken," said Brother Yoris.
Brother Barton sighed, "I know you have never had a close relationship with Sir Luken, but he is your father. I am sure, at some level, he must care for you, and you for him."
"I know you mean well Brother, but when I was a child Sir Luken made it quite clear to me that he does not consider me his son. Over the years he has never once given me any indication that I enter his thoughts at all. You have been a more of a father to me than he will ever be," said the young Priest.
"All I ask is that you keep your heart open. It is possible that when Sir Luken recovers, he will be able to find room in his heart for you. Often a man, who has had such a close brush with death, will reconsider many choices he has made during his life," said Brother Barton.
"Very well Brother, I will consider your words," said Brother Yoris.
"May The Warrior give you strength," said Brother Barton, blessing the young priest as he left the room.
Brother Yoris knocked on the door to Sir Luken's chambers. The door was opened by the young Page. Karl was dressed in his Page's uniform, light blue hose, a dark green tunic embroidered with Sir Luken's coat of arms and soft leather shoes. "Brother, are you here to check on Sir Luken?" asked Karl.
"No Page, I am here to talk with you, if that is alright," answered Brother Yoris. "May I come in?" he asked.
"I guess so, Sir," said Karl as he stepped back and opened the door.
"Please, Brother is fine, you may even call me Yoris or Yori, but I am not nobility," said Yoris. He entered the main room of Sir Luken's suite. Karl closed the door behind the priest. Yoris crossed the room and sat down in the chair by the fireplace. He looked back at Karl and motioned for him to take a seat on the small sofa that was next to the chair. Karl walked over and sat down on the sofa. He glanced up briefly at Brother Yoris, then looked down and stared at the floor.
"Page Karl, I am here because Lord Velarik has asked our order to come talk with you. The Lord is concerned that the demon, that was responsible for the recent attack, is trying to influence you. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?" asked Brother Yoris.
"Okay," said Karl in a quiet voice. The priest said a quiet prayer, and his eyes glowed for a second. "What was that?" asked Karl.
"Just something that well help me know if you are telling me the truth, or if there is something you are hiding. Now, have you been having nightmares?" asked the priest.
"I guess," answered Karl. "You guess?" questioned Brother Yoris.
"Well, I wake up feeling scared, but I cannot remember having any dreams or nightmares. Rynil will wake me up and tell me that I cried out in my sleep, and it was loud enough to wake him in the other room. But I cannot remember having a nightmare," said Karl.
"Are you angry about Sir Alek's death, do you want revenge?" asked Brother Yoris, studying Karl carefully to see his reaction.
The young boy looked down and started crying. After a couple minutes of crying, he composed himself. "Angry? No, I am sad. I miss him. My life is meaningless without him. Revenge would not bring him back, it would just make things worse for everyone else," answered Karl as he struggled to keep from crying more.
"Karl, I'm sorry for your loss. I can tell that you loved Sir Alek. Time will help heal the wound in your heart, but I will be honest, you will always miss him. There is just one last thing I need to do, then I'll stop being so nosy. I am going to check and make sure there is no evil presence inside you. That will lay to rest any concerns that Lord Velarik might have about a demon trying to influence you," said Brother Yoris.
"Okay," said Karl.
Brother Yoris prayed and cast another spell. He examined Karl's aura; there was no demonic taint. "Well good news Page, I can report to Lord Velarik that you're not being influenced by any demons," said Brother Yoris, hoping it might make the boy feel better. Karl just nodded.
There was an awkward moment of silence as Karl just sat there lost in his sadness. Brother Yoris was ready to leave, but could not just walk away from the boy while he was obviously hurting. Brother Yoris sat and talked with Karl for a few minutes. It was not long before Karl was telling the priest that he no longer wanted to be a Knight. Yoris had trouble understanding, because for Yoris, when he was Karl's age, all he wanted in life was to be a Knight. Yoris had even competed in the Page Games when he was nine, and the Squire Games when he was thirteen. But the message contest had been his downfall. It was after he had failed to win the Squire Games that Brother Barton had found him in tears and offered him a position as an Acolyte in the Temple of The Warrior.
"Page Karl, if as you grow older, you still feel you do not want to be a knight, I want you to keep in mind that there are other ways you can serve the realm, and be of assistance to others. There are many religious orders that would welcome you. You could learn a trade. You will have options open to you to do something you feel suits you. But until you are older, and can make those choices for yourself, you must work hard to learn all that you can from your current circumstances. Sir Alek would not have wanted to see you suffering. He would have wanted you to find something that would bring you comfort and happiness. Try to remember the happiness you brought each other, instead of being trapped in your feelings of loss," said Brother Yoris trying to provide some comfort to the boy. Karl forced a weak smile and nodded, hoping his response would satisfy the priest so that he would leave. The response worked; Brother Yoris rose and said goodbye.
Before leaving the suite, he did stop to check on Sir Luken. The injured Knight appeared to be sleeping peacefully, although Yoris knew he was not sleeping but was in a coma. He had lost some weight, but the healer from the Temple of the Harvest was using magic, in the form of prayers to her Goddess, to keep the man nourished. Sir Luken was no longer in danger of dying from his wounds, but he had still not recovered from the horrible burns that had scarred most of his body and disfigured his face. Yoris again said the prayers to detect any presence of evil or demonic influence. He looked over Sir Luken and saw no sign of demonic presence, which surprised him a little bit, he had expected to detect a lingering trace of demonic energy in the burn marks. Sir Luken started to stir, his legs and arms moved a little, then his eyes opened. He turned his head but wasn't able to focus. "Water," he managed to croak out.
"Page Karl, get some water, Sir Luken is awake," called out Brother Yoris. Karl came running into the room and grabbed the pitcher of water that was resting on a table. He filled a goblet of water and brought it to Sir Luken. He lifted the man's head and slowly poured a small amount of water into the Knight's mouth. Brother Yoris nodded, then turned to leave. "I'll go inform the Priestess that her patient is awake," said Brother Yoris.
AYMIL and WILRIK
Aymil sat staring at the fire. While he was mentally exhausted, there was a part of him that felt energized. He had made a lot of progress with Wilrik. The first several days of exploring the boy's memories had been tough. He had needed to constantly maintain physical contact in order to keep the boy's emotions from overwhelming them both as the boy recalled the first few months of his captivity. After killing the orcs and raping Wilrik for the first time, the demon had teleported Wilrik to what appeared to be some type of fortress built into a mountain.
The demon kept the boy locked in a metal box. There were several small holes in the walls of the box that provided air, but there was no light, as the room the box was in was unlit. There was not enough room in the box to stretch out, and he had to remain curled up or at most he could rise to his knees if he ducked his head. He soon had soiled the box, and had to sit and lie in his own excrement. The demon did not seem to mind that Wilrik was covered in shit and piss, but occasionally the demon would make some gesture with its hand, and the accumulated waste in the box would vanish, but he never bothered to clean Wilrik. He received one meal a day, a piece of some unidentifiable meat, a piece of bread, and a cup of water.
The only time he was let out of the box, was when the demon came to fuck him, which Wilrik figured was twice a day since it happened about twice as often as he was fed. While the creature fucked him, it was always telling Wilrik how this was all Mikel's fault. That Mikel had tricked the orcs into taking Wilrik instead, and that it should be Mikel in the box and not him.
Wilrik came to look forward to the twice daily fucking. It was the only time he got to spend outside the box, and he was able to stretch out his limbs. When the demon fucked him, there was always a mix of pain and pleasure, fear and relief, and ultimately shame when Wilrik experienced an orgasm. Aymil tried explaining to Wilrik that the demon had the power to manipulate his emotions, but Aymil didn't press the point, because he didn't want Wilrik asking too many questions about how Aymil and the demon shared the power to manipulate his emotions.
Wilrik could not remember how long he had been in the box. It ended one day when the demon offered him a choice. It was after he had been fucked; he was lying on the floor, his ass aching, feeling ashamed that he had experienced an orgasm as the monster fucked him. The demon said, "You can either go back into the box and this will be how you spend the rest of your life. Living in the box until I wish to use you for my pleasure, which will be less and less often as I am already starting to grow bored with you, or you can become my servant and obey my every command. Which will it be? Decide now, as I will never offer you this choice again," said the demon.
"Please master, I'll serve you, just don't put me back in the box, I'll do anything you ask," begged Wilrik.
"Very well, follow me," commanded the demon as he started walking away into the darkness. Wilrik tried to stand and walk but found he couldn't; it had been so long since he had last been allowed to stand that his body would not cooperate. So instead he crawled along the ground after the demon. They left the dark room where the box was stored and entered a hallway. There were magical lights illuminating the hallway. The demon walked slowly down the hallway and into another room as Wilrik crawled along behind him. Inside the room was a bathtub and several buckets filled with water. The demon very methodically picked up the buckets and poured them over Wilrik, rising off the worst of the shit. Next, it picked up a sharp straight edged blade and proceeded to use it to first hack off then shave the remaining hair off of Wilrik's head. The demon made of point of showing Wilrik that the demon was invulnerable to the blade before setting it back down. Then it pointed to the tub, "Clean yourself."
Wilrik climbed into the tub. The water was warm, and Wilrik was amazed at how good it felt. He noticed there was a brush and a chunk of soap lying next to the tub. The demon left the room and closed the door behind it. A second later Wilrik heard the sound of a bolt being slide into place locking the door. Wilrik had never before consider a bath something to enjoy, but being able to scrub the layers of filth off of him was a welcome relief. After he was clean and the water had grown cold, Wilrik stepped out of the tub and used it to get his balance. Being back up on his feet felt good.
As he was standing there naked, dripping wet, and wondering what to do next, the door opened and the demon entered. "Come with me," said the demon holding out an arm. Wilrik stumbled over to the demon and it grabbed his shoulders steadying him. They left the room and head back down the hallway. Wilrik was slow and unsteady on his feet but the demon supported him as they walked. At first Wilrik was afraid he was being led back into the room with the box, but the demon continued past it and out a door at the end of the hallway. The door led to a small room that was lit by candles. There was an altar set up opposite the door. The altar was covered in carved reliefs which depicted demonic figures committing all manner of atrocities upon humans. The top of the altar was ringed in candles and inside the ring was a black leather hood.
"Now, you will join with me and host part of my essence, one of my children. Remember this is your choice. Joining me will make you strong, and you will never be at the mercy of anyone else again. You will be able to help me get revenge upon our friends who abandoned and betrayed us," whispered the demon's voice inside Wilrik's mind. "When you are ready, approach the altar and don the hood."
That was as far as Aymil and Marsella had wanted to push Wilrik. They decided it was best to let Wilrik dwell on the events leading up to his putting on the hood, at least for a short time. Besides giving Wilrik a chance to process and understand how much duress he had been under when he accepted the demon's offer, it would allow for more time for Aymil to master his powers. In just the few weeks he had been working with Wilrik, the strength of his mental powers had increased greatly. He no longer needed to maintain physical contact with Wilrik to shield him and completely tame the boy's emotions. Aymil had also mastered shutting down that part of Wilrik's soul that was still warped by the demon. It was Marsella's belief that it would be impossible to ever heal that part of Wilrik, and that the best they could hope for, was that they could give Wilrik the strength to control that part of himself again instead of letting it control him.
Aymil knew he would need his powers to be stronger to deal with what was to come next in Wilrik's memories. Already he had been able to feel parts of it leak through as Wilrik recalled the events before he was possessed. There was an overwhelming sense of regret when Wilrik remembered choosing to serve the demon rather than go back in the box. The worst though was during the bath. Aymil could sense that when Wilrik looked back upon the bath, the boy would later wish that instead of bathing himself, he had used the knife that the demon had left in the room, to kill himself.
After spending a couple nights at the original campsite so that Aymil could get Wilrik to a place where he could be conscious for traveling, they packed up their meager belongings and resumed traveling. They headed northwest, deeper into the Great Forest. Marsella told the boys that they were headed to stay with an old friend of hers, who lived on the northwest edge of the forest.
RYNIL and MIKEL
"That is enough for today. You boys can have the rest of the afternoon to yourselves. I have a meeting with Lord Velarik, Sir Luken, and Brother Barton. Sir Luken is recovered enough to tell us what he remembers of the attack," said Sir Valen. He then left Rynil and Mikel alone in the practice room.
"So you sure you want to do this?" asked Rynil as he gave Mikel a skeptical look.
"Yes," replied Mikel. "There might be times when I'll need to defend myself without using magic," explained Mikel.
"It just seems like magic can do almost anything, why would you not be able to use it. If it is because you are too tired, than I do not see how knowing how to use a sword is going to help," said Rynil. Regardless of his belief that Mikel did not really need any way to defend himself besides magic, he had brought a pair of weighted wooden practice swords with him this afternoon. After their last joint training session, Mikel had begged for Rynil to start training him and Rynil had eventually agreed.
"Well what if I am traveling in disguise, and don't want superstitious townsfolk or bigoted Knights to know I am a Mage? Or what if for some reason, I need to put a know it all pompous Squire with a sword that can block magic in his place?" teased Mikel.
"Hmph, you will never be good enough to do that last one," retorted Rynil as he tossed one of the swords to Mikel, "But I might be able to help you with the first one." Rynil started with the basics, showing him basic grips and stances that he could use. Next he moved on to the footwork. He didn't plan on actually sparring with Mikel for a couple sessions yet as he wanted to make sure Mikel understood the fundamentals before he started worrying about how to actually fight with a sword.
The two boys spent over an hour working on Mikel's footwork before Rynil called a halt to the afternoon's lesson. He suspected that one of the reasons Mikel wanted the lessons was so that they could spend more time together, without the awkwardness that had taken hold when the two boys were alone together with nothing they had to be doing. Rynil wanted to have sex with Mikel but he could tell the apprentice was still afraid that he might lose control of his magic again. Rynil had gotten Mikel to make out with him, and also suck him off a couple times, but Mikel refused to let Rynil reciprocate. Rynil was determined to change that.
"So, now that I am doing you a favor by training you, you need to do a favor for me," said Rynil.
"Sure," said Mikel as he approached Rynil. He stopped in front of the blonde boy and sank to his knees. "I'm happy to take care of this for you. I noticed you getting hard while giving me my lesson," said Mikel as he reached out and stroked the bulge in Rynil's hose.
"Close, but that is not exactly what I had in mind," said Rynil. He reached down and grabbed Mikel's hand and pulled the smaller boy towards the door. He dragged Mikel back to the apprentice's room and shoved him down onto his sleeping pad.
"I know you are afraid you will lose control, but I will make sure nothing bad happens. I am not taking no for an answer this time Mikel. I will keep one hand on my sword the entire time," said Rynil. He still had Galaxth, his magic sword, in the scabbard on his belt from their earlier training. He knelt down on the pad next to Mikel.
"I don't know Rynil, what if your hand slips off or something, if I lose control again, I'll never get to leave the Tower," worried Mikel.
"Trust me, you will be okay," said Rynil as he tugged on Mikel's hose with one hand, "Of course, since I only have one hand free, I might need some help undressing you." Mikel was nervous as he reached down and stripped of his leggings. Despite his anxiety, he was hard at the thought of getting his cock sucked by Rynil. Once his dick was free, Rynil took it in his free hand, and stroked it a couple times, then he leaned down and licked the tip.
Mikel let out a moan as Rynil engulfed the head with his mouth and started swirling his tongue around it. Rynil lightly rubbed Mikel's balls with his hand as he worked his mouth up and down on the boy's cock. After a couple minutes, he spread Mikel's legs and shifted around so that he was sitting between them. He resumed sucking on the head of the boy's dick while using his hand to stroke the shaft. Mikel was getting close to cumming and was so focused on not losing himself in the pleasure he was receiving, that he didn't notice when Rynil's other hand started lightly rubbing the area between his balls and his asshole. Rynil reached down with a finger and started teasing Mikel's asshole with the tip as he picked up the pace on his cock.
Mikel groaned and his legs started shaking as he started to cum, but he was able to remain grounded and not lose control. Rynil stopped sucking and kept the boy's cock in his mouth, collecting the boy's load. He savored it in his mouth for a moment before drinking it down. After Mikel had stopped shaking and his cock started to deflate a little, Rynil gently cleaned it off with his tongue, then he climbed out from between Mikel's legs and used both hands to pull up the boy's hose.
"Wait, you were using both hands when I came," said Mikel as he recalled what Rynil had been doing to him during his orgasm.
"Yes, I did. I told you to trust me and that everything would be okay. Now you know you are in control enough that you do not have to be afraid to share yourself with me. You are never going to be let out of here if you do not have confidence in yourself, and now you have one less thing to worry about," said Rynil smiling down at him.