Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

WOMEN OF THE WILD

THE DRYAD

by

Misty Vixen

CHAPTER I

Seth Baker stared at length of smithed steel that was to be his very first blade. It gleamed mellowly in the dim light of the blacksmith, sunlight struggling to make it in through the soot-stained windows along the front of the shop. He moved the sword slowly around, already liking the grip, the way it felt in his hands, his fingers wrapped around it. He liked the sharpness of the blade, enjoyed the feel of it as he rotated his wrist.

“Well? Will that do for you, son?” the blacksmith, a portly, bald man with a large graying mustache asked. Seth couldn’t remember his name. He supposed it was because he’d been too excited and distracted whenever he’d heard it.

“Yes, sir,” he replied. “It’s perfect.”

“Good to hear! I worked hard on it. That’s good steel you’ve got there. Now, will you be wanting a whet stone for sharpening?” he asked.

“Yes,” Seth replied, picking up the leather scabbard the man had agreed to throw in and carefully sheathing the blade.

“Excellent. Altogether, this will run you seventy five gold.”

Even knowing it was coming, the number still gave him a bad, cold feeling in his gut. Seth didn’t hesitate as he reached for his coin pouch and began the process of counting it out, though. This was a serious investment for a man of just nineteen years. A man who was hardly more than a boy, even in his own mind, who had lived in a painfully small village his entire life. Seventy five coins was typically what one of his parents saw in a month.

It was the most amount of coin he’d ever had on him at one time.

Seth had spent six months getting that together. It probably should have taken half that, but a combination of necessary secrecy on his part and his parents, who had correctly suspected he was going to do something like this and trying to stop or even delay it in whatever fashion they could, had stalled his timeline.

“Okay, seventy five, good to go. That’s a lot of coin,” the blacksmith said as he collected up all the glittering coins.

“It is,” Seth agreed. “Took me a long time to get this.”

“I bet. What is it you’re planning on doing with this, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“I intend to travel,” he replied, then wondered if he should say anything. Talk traveled fast, especially in tiny villages. But it didn’t matter. He was leaving tomorrow anyway, whether his parents agreed to it or not. “I’ll probably need to defend myself.”

“It is dangerous out there. Lots of monsters,” the blacksmith said.

He produced a small, round, black stone and set it down. “That’s a good whet stone. I’d say you should probably give it a going-over once a week. Although it depends on what kind of use it’s getting. And don’t forget to bring a rag. Never put your sword away with anything on it, water or blood,” he said.

“Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind,” Seth replied, accepting the stone, studying it briefly, then pocketing it.

“Good luck, son.”

“Thank you.”

He turned and walked out of the smoky atmosphere of the blacksmith. Stepping back outside was like stepping into another world. The day was yet young, the sun bright and unhindered by what few clouds there were in the clear blue skies. The marketplace around him was fairly clear, as the morning crowd had already dispersed and the lunch crowd wouldn’t be in for another two hours at least. Right now, he could just see a few of those that kept more irregular hours and some traveling merchants moving among the stalls and shops.

A wave of cold fear rolled through him as he began walking down the street, pausing once to tie the scabbard to his belt. He was at least familiar with swords and basic upkeep, given that he’d talked his uncle, who was a city guard, into training him on it over the past two years. His father hadn’t really been able to put an end to that, as even he believed that everyone should have at least some basic self-defense training.

Learning to use his natural magical abilities was a bit harder.

All he’d had so far was one old book on basic magic use he’d managed to get his hands on four years ago. It had been useful, but limited.

Seth tried to make himself relax as he walked on. He planned on having a talk with his parents not long after he got home, a talk he’d been working on in his head for at least two years now. He felt sick to his stomach with worry.

Simply put: he wanted out.

Out of this boring life, out of this tiny village in the middle of nowhere, out of this path that seemed to lead to nothing special, nothing important. Out of the boring life his parents were content to lead, and all of the rest of his family, and friends as well. He didn’t want to prudently work a job, meet a woman and fall painfully in love, only to wind up in a largely loveless marriage with three kids and a house he didn’t really like, working a job he didn’t really care about, twenty years down the road. It sounded like…

Horror, to him.

It wasn’t that he necessarily had anything against those who did that. He knew several people in the village for whom this simple life was genuinely satisfying and fulfilling. And that was fine. But it didn’t work for him, and, more importantly, he wasn’t sure it worked for a lot of other people. His parents included.

They didn’t seem to enjoy their lives so much as to be resigned to them.

Probably his largest hurdle, one that he still struggled with, was his own fear. Because there was a certain safety, a certain comfort, in living that life. You were much less likely to die young and painfully. Then again, you were less likely to live a spectacularly amazing life. So Seth had made a choice.

He was going to become an herbalist, a traveling herbalist. At least, that was going to be his primary trade. As he understood it, there was a need for herbalists. Or, more importantly, there was a need for those herbalists paid to go out into the dangerous parts of the land, (i.e., most of it), and collect the rare plants. Seth had decided that he’d just cut out the middle-man and collect the plants himself. He could make a fair amount of gold from making all sorts of potions. The kinds he knew how to make were, admittedly, basic, but he was confident that he could learn. He even had his very first potion picked out.

Seth slowed to a halt as he neared his home. One of half a dozen on one side of a cobblestone road, nestled among small houses like itself. Staring at his house with its weathered, wooden walls and thatched roof, it struck him as particularly bland and small. It always had, to a certain degree, but just recently these observations had been particularly strong. Almost overpowering. Seth shook off the feelings, all of them: the fear, the doubt, the anxiety. Or he tried to, anyway. Instead, as he strode into his front yard, he tried to focus on the good stuff.

The liberation, the hope, the joy.

He’d spent nineteen years here. Tomorrow he would leave.

And he might not come back.

Seth pushed the front door open, stepping into the main living room, and stopped as he saw both his parents waiting for him.

“What is that?” his father asked.

“A sword,” Seth replied slowly as he closed the door behind him. It became darker, and somehow colder, in the house.

“Why do you have a sword?” his mother asked.

Their tones were flat and that sense of dread returned, more powerful than before. Okay, so it looked like he wasn’t going to be able to put off his talk until later. He probably shouldn’t have done this on a day they both had off, but he’d been unable to wait when he’d gotten the last of his gold from an older woman who’d paid him to straighten up her house. He tried to hold onto those good feelings as he fully faced them.

“I suppose it’s time we talked about it,” he said. “I’m leaving.”

“No you aren’t,” his father said immediately, and he knew, suddenly, the knowledge arriving wholly in his mind, that there wasn’t going to be a happy ending to this. It was a strange sensation, but he knew it in the same way he knew that rain was coming. Could read the bitterness on their faces in the same way he read rain in the way the branches blew specifically when a storm was on rapid approach.

But he had to try, he figured.

“I’m not happy here,” he said, attempting to maintain his calm. “I don’t want to live this life. I don’t want to live in this village. This shouldn’t be a surprise, we’ve spoken about this for years now,” he continued.

“Seth, how many times have I tried to tell you this: your wants are not as important as the needs of this family, of this village. We rely on each other. We trust each other. We work hard so that the village continues.”

“So I should have to sacrifice my happiness, my ability to live a life that I think is worthwhile, for this village?” he asked.

“Others have sacrificed more,” his mother replied.

So there it was, plain as day: he was expected to sacrifice his own happiness for the greater good. Not even really the greater good, more just for the good of a village he didn’t really have a personal stake in.

They both stared at him, disapproval burning in their gaze. In a way, it would almost be comical, if it weren’t happening to him. He was living the cliched story of parental pressure and disapproval, how many times had he read that in the novels he’d managed to get his hands on over the years? How many times had he heard that? But it wasn’t funny, because he was enduring it here and now, and then he knew that he could not wait.

He had to leave today.

Right now, in fact.

Seth turned and began to walk out of the room. “Where are you going?” his father asked, standing up.

“To my room,” he replied. “This conversation...can’t go anywhere good, for either of us. So I’m ending it.”

“Bullshit you’re ending it,” his father snapped, and that cold anger was becoming hot. He could sense it and wanted to be out of there all the faster. Seth didn’t say anything as went into his room and grabbed his traveling pack. He’d already packed it last night in anticipation. Clothes, his two favorite novels, a small emerald he had found three months ago and had somehow forced himself to hold onto, as a source of backup income, a dagger, a bedroll. That was it. That was everything he had that he could bring with him.

His pack secure, Seth turned around. His father was standing in the doorway, barring his path, his mother behind him. How hard were they going to try and stop them? His parents had never been particularly close, either to each other, or to him. He didn’t know the specifics of how they had met or why they had gotten married. Well, the real version, not the generic story they’d told him. Even if it were true, it was obvious that the love had faded a long time ago. Thinking back on it, he wasn’t sure he’d ever remembered either of them being what he would call happy. For the longest time, he thought that was normal, but now it disturbed him.

But he did not want this to end on a completely sour note.

“Mom. Dad,” he said, looking at them as squarely as he could manage. “You’ve raised me. Taught me things. Important things. You provided a safe, stable place for me to live, kept me safe and healthy, and for that I do genuinely thank you. I am deeply appreciative of that. I don’t want you to think otherwise. I also don’t want you to think that I’m doing this because it’s ‘just a phase’, or that I’m doing this on a whim, or because I’m a teenager. I want you to believe, at least, that I believe in what I am doing, that I’ve thought for years about this. You know I have, because we’ve spoken about it. And I think that, as miserable as our home life has become over the past year, that you both, in your own way, love me. And if you do love me, then you have to let me do this. And, barring that, you at least have to know that you can’t stop me.”

Both his mother and his father stared back at him, their expressions nearly unreadable, though he thought that his mother’s features had softened slightly. Finally, his father spoke. “If you do this, you have to know that you’re walking away from your life here. Not just us, but this entire village, your friends, your family. You can’t come back.”

“If that’s the price I have to pay, so be it,” he replied.

His father stood in the doorway for a moment longer, then stepped back, out of the way. There were a great deal of emotions roiling through Seth at that moment: tension, anxiety, terror at actually being forced to confront his parents, the most powerful people in his life, but beneath it all, it was as if something was growing, some overwhelming feeling of...release. It was still mostly overshadowed by the other emotions.

But it was there, he could sense it.

There were a few things that came to mind as the last thing he should say as he left, as this could realistically be the last time he ever saw his parents, but in the end, before he stepped out through the front door, he simply said: “Goodbye.”

And he began walking towards his new life.

CHAPTER II

The first order of business, before all others, was to spend the rest of his coin on some crucial supplies for this upcoming journey.

Namely food and drink.

He also realized, suddenly and with the gravity of someone who has overlooked something painfully obvious for far too long, that he was going to need a bow and a quiver of arrows if he hoped to hunt animals to eat. Seth tried not to groan in frustration as he traced his way back through the tiny village towards the marketplace.

He probably had enough gold for a decent supply of food and drink, but he did not have enough for the bow and arrows too. Shit. He almost laughed as he came back onto the main cobblestone path that cut through the village’s marketplace. Two long years he’d been fantasizing about this, planning it, obsessing over it, and...he’d forgotten something basic and important. He did laugh, a little shakily, as he approached his favorite food shop. He’d taken to eating here at least once or twice a week for the past year, as they sold the greatest, well-seasoned meats and the most vibrantly tasty stews of vegetables, potatoes, and meats.

Most importantly, however, the woman who ran it was also among the very few magically inclined in the village and could preserve the food so that it could last for up to a week just wrapped in simple paper.

“Hello, Seth...are you okay? You look upset,” she said.

“Hi, Missus Smith,” he replied, feeling his composure falter slightly. In a way, Beth Smith had almost served as a surrogate mother. She’d taught him a little bit about magic and she often gave him either discounted or free food and was always kind to him. “I’m...well, you’ve heard me say that I’ve wanted to leave the village, go out on my own, make my own life.”

“I have,” she replied. She stood behind the long wooden counter of her open-faced shop. He’d once asked her about how she kept it secure when she left for the day, and she’d responded cryptically that it had its own defenses.

Seth took a seat at one of the bar stool-like seats. “Well, I’m doing it. Right now.”

“Oh...my,” she said, stopping what she was doing, looking fully at him. “You’re leaving the village now?”

“Yes. Well, technically I need to buy a few things first, but after that, I’m leaving.”

“Where will you go?” she asked.

“The Redwood Forest,” he replied. “I’ve actually figured out what I want to do first. There’s a difficult potion I want to make, and it requires a list of ingredients that are rare, but they are all in the Redwood Forest.”

“And what do you intend to do with this potion?” she asked.

“Well, sell it. I should make some decent coin off of it. But really this is a test. I want to do this as a way to...well, I guess prove to myself that I can actually do it.”

“'It' being a life on the road? Adventuring, I’m guessing?”

“Basically. Although I don’t really plan to go out of my way looking to fight. But I do want to travel the land, see people and places, and be able to earn my own coin, and real coin too,” he explained.

“It is appealing,” Mrs. Smith said. She sighed. “I’d always wanted to do something like that when I was growing up, but then I got married, got pregnant, and just...never left.” She frowned suddenly. “What did your parents have to say? I can’t imagine they’re too keen on the idea,” she asked him.

He sighed. “That’s why I’m not in a great mood. They were...very unhappy. They...well, they essentially disowned me.”

“Good Gods,” she said softly. “That seems a bit harsh. Although...” she hesitated.

“Although what?” he asked.

“I don’t mean to be a bitch but honestly, your parents are kind of assholes. Sorry.”

“It’s fine. I know. Part of the reason I’m doing this. I don’t, well, I don’t want to end up like them, you know?”

“Yes. I can understand that.” She sighed suddenly. “Well Seth, I’d like to give you some supplies, and I would if I could, but coin has been tight lately.”

“I understand,” he replied, and set the rest of his coin down on the counter. It wasn’t very much at all. “How much will ten get me?”

“I’ll see what I can do,” she said, taking the gold and moving back deeper into the small structure. He watched her work, wondering how he was going to afford the bow and arrows. But he already knew the answer to that, he just didn’t like it. He’d have to trade his emerald. And, to be totally honest, he was going to be lucky if they would take the emerald. As he mulled over this, Beth returned with probably more food than was reasonable for just ten gold. But he would take it, because he was on his own now.

Truly on his own.

That sent a small wave of discomfort through him, but he ignored it, looking over the supplies she had brought for him. There was some beef and chicken chopped and wrapped, a small sack of vegetables and one of potatoes, one glass jar of water, one of milk, one of strawberry juice. “Thank you,” he said as he shrugged out of his backpack and began to fill it. “I really appreciate this,” he added quietly.

“You’re welcome, Seth. I want you to be safe out there. So...good luck.”

“Thank you,” he repeated, finishing the job and pulling a carrot out of the sack to eat while he walked, as he was hungry now. “Good luck to you too.”

And then he was off, on the last leg of his journey through his home village.

He moved further down the cobblestone thoroughfare, finding the stall that sold junk, odds, and ends. He had seen a bow there last week, one of questionable quality, and was hoping it was still there. He’d surely be able to get it and some arrows with the emerald. The old man who ran the place was sitting in the stall, reading.

“Hello Mister Thatch,” he said. Seth knew he had to play this carefully. Old Man Thatch was about as conservative as his parents, and there was a good chance he wouldn’t sell him the bow and arrows if he knew the truth.

So far, they had at least a neutral relationship.

“Hello there, Seth,” he said, setting his book aside. “What brings you my way? Looks like you’ve got quite a load there.”

“I’m going hunting today and tomorrow, out in the woods. I need to practice,” he replied. “And my father decided I needed my own bow, which I should procure myself.”

“Ah. And you remembered my bow,” Thatch replied, grinning in a slightly smug way. He was a man who bought and sold everything. He purchased literally any kind of junk and refuse from the merchants and travelers that came through. Not at very good prices, but still better than nothing. When he was younger, Seth had once found an old, rusted dagger and the remnants of a wagon wheel when he was out exploring the woods surrounding the village. He’d managed to sell them both to Thatch for a single gold coin.

“I did,” he agreed. “I was hoping to purchase it, and any arrows you might have.”

“I happen to have a little collection of them,” he replied, standing and retrieving the wooden bow and a quiver of mismatched arrows. There were perhaps a dozen of them. Not really great, but he was in no position to be picky right now. “Now, what do you have for me in return?”

“This,” he said, deciding to try and play up the emerald instead of sheepishly admitting it was all he had on him. He reached into his pocket, fished it out, and set it down. It glinted in the sunshine. He’d made sure to polish it.

“Oh. I see,” Thatch murmured, grabbing it and holding it up, scrutinizing it closely. “Emerald. Small...but in good condition. Yes, I believe this will be sufficient payment.”

“Thank you,” Seth said, taking the bow and the quiver before anything else could happen. There was a chance he was being ripped off, he probably could have traded that emerald somewhere else for more, but this would do. “I appreciate it, Mister Thatch.”

“I’m glad. Let me know if you need anything else. I’ve got a new novel in, if you’re interested, and some glass jars...”

“I’ll let you know, Mister Thatch. Farewell for now.”

Thatch looked a little glum, but that was his tactic: he always tried to tag on something else, to keep you lingering, to buy more.

“Farewell for now, young man,” he said.

Seth walked quickly away after getting the quiver and bow in place. As he moved deeper into the marketplace, he realized he was approaching a fork in the path. It split off to the left, and that led towards the town message board, where anyone could come up and post basic jobs, or, if the local Lord was having problems, like with monsters or bandits, he would offer bounties for traveling adventurers or particularly brave locals.

This was where he’d earned most of his coin and honestly, there wasn’t a whole lot of work. The path ahead, however, led to the town’s west gate, where he would begin his journey to the Redwood Forest. He stood there and thought about it. If he left right now, and kept up a brisk pace, he could probably make his way there by nightfall. Then again...he looked to the left. If he was responsible, he would take a few jobs, earn a bit of extra coin.

But even as he considered these options, the urge to simply leave this village, to walk past the gates and out into the great wilderness beyond, became suddenly overpowering. He felt the unbreakable compulsion to simply leave. And before he knew it, his feet, his body, was making the decision for him.

Seth began walking dead ahead, towards the gate.

…

“Where’re you off to?”

Seth stopped as he came in full view of the pair of men who were on guard duty today. They wore simple leather and chainmail armor over their uniforms, each with a sword on their hip, each leaning against the large wood and stone gate that marked the village’s edge.

“I’m leaving,” he replied.

“Leaving? For how long?” the other guard, a larger, more heavyset man, asked. He vaguely recognized them both, but couldn’t recall their names at all. He supposed that was the relationship he had with most of the people in town.

“I’m not sure,” Seth admitted. He suddenly wondered if they would try to stop him, or if they even had the power to stop him. He didn’t think so, but the way the political system worked was that all the Lords in the land swore their allegiance to the King...and then basically ruled their towns and villages however they wanted, provided it wasn’t exceptionally exploitative or illegal. Or, at least, not overtly so.

But they had to worry: towns were known to revolt, and for the most part, in that regard at least, a similar attitude was had. You had to deal with it.

“Not sure? Where is it you’re going?” the first man asked.

“The Redwood Forest. I intend to make a potion. A rare potion. And all the plants I need are there,” he replied.

“The Redwood Forest? By yourself? That’s a good day’s walk at least. How old are you, son?” the second man asked.

“Nineteen.”

“Huh, you look younger.” They looked at each other for a second, and he tensed, wondering if this was going to be a problem, then they shrugged. “Well, good luck. And be careful, you can run into all sorts of things even on the main road.”

“Thank you, I will,” he replied, walking past and then away from them in much the same manner he’d done with Thatch.

And then, perhaps a minute later, he was truly free.

He was free of his home village.

As he moved along the road, in between thick stands of trees to either side, Seth slowed down, taking it all in, enjoying the atmosphere. As he looked around, studying the trees and foliage and the creatures of the land he caught glimpses of, he realized that everything had an air of beauty previously unseen. He was positive it had to do with his sudden freedom, his liberation from his previous life. This closing of the previous chapter, the dawning of a new one, it filled him with a vast excitement, a tremendous joy.

He was here. Seth Baker was here, in the wilderness, by himself, a pack on his back, a sword on his hip, ready to face the world.

Well, hopefully.

The guard’s words of warning came back to him and he looked around again. He was under no illusions: the land was indeed a dangerous place. But he felt, (or hoped, rather), that he’d trained enough in swordplay, in archery, in magic, that he should be able to handle anything that came for him. And he wasn’t above running or hiding. Seth didn’t think of himself as a fighter by nature. Nor did he really want to become one. But he also knew that fighting was part of the job when it came to traveling the land.

Even merchants had to put up with it sometimes.

But no, he didn’t want to think about that. Not right now. Now, he simply wanted to enjoy the sunshine, the cool breeze, the murmur of the forest around him, and the first steps he was taking into his new life. Looking around, he realized that he was still in familiar territory. He had come this way, hunting with his father or uncle, or sometimes just taking walks on his own. There were cabins around here, he knew, for hunters or the wealthier families in town, to come and stay at. A place of their own out in the wilderness, but not too far from civilization. He also thought he remembered there being an old crumbling stone fort out here.

According to the adventurers he’d talked to, there were a lot of those dotting the landscapes. Not just forts, either, but all sorts of structures. He found that interesting, and also found himself wondering if he could work up the courage to go into one, to plunder its dark depths, because surely there must be something hidden there, in those old structures. Seth’s thoughts kept drifting to and fro as he walked on, and before he knew it, he was past even the farthest point he’d ever been. He paused and looked back.

There was nothing to see but the trees and the road.

Ahead of him, the trees fell away, revealing vast, open, rolling fields.

He resumed his journey.

CHAPTER III

As the day continued and the sun made its slow crawl across the sky, Seth’s mood slowly darkened.

He found doubts creeping in, worming their way into his thoughts, growing fear and uncertainty in his mind. He couldn’t discount the possibility that his parents were right. Not, perhaps, that it was worth sacrificing happiness for the greater good, but that he wouldn’t succeed out here. It was entirely possible that he could die. And if he was wrong about that, what if he was wrong about everything? About his desire to come out here and live and travel among the land. What if he was fooling himself? What if he was wrong?

These thoughts continued to gnaw at him as he walked on.

He tried to be at peace with himself, with the landscape around him, but couldn’t escape his anxiety for more than ten or fifteen minutes at a time. Seth walked for four solid hours, passing only a handful of people on the road as he headed west, and broke for a short lunch, then resumed his journey. To distract himself, he tried to think about all the places in the land he could go after this. He lived in the middle of the southern portion of his land. Most of the land was covered in fields or forests, there really wasn’t much else in terms of variety.

There were a number of small fishing and port settlements along the south coast, and he knew that from there you could take a boat to the Southern Isles, or Tomontica as the natives called it. He didn’t know a great deal about Tomontica, but he’d read enough to know that he wanted to visit someday. The place sounded a bit like a tropical paradise. To the west, where he was presently headed, was the Redwood Forest, which stretched across almost the entire land. Beginning south where sea met land, and continued north until it terminated at the Frosted Mountains, which served as a sharp divide between the upper and lower portions of the continent. He wasn’t all too sure about what was up there, beyond those mountains.

The Redwood Forest served as a boarder between human and elven territory. The elves had colonies in the forest, which extended across that entire area of the land, straight up to the sea at the west. By far the most interesting things lay to the east. Much in the way Redwood Forest took up an entire tract of land, so to was the opposite side of the continent engulfed in woodlands. Only these were far, far more dangerous.

The Emerald Wild.

The Wild was said to be filled with monsters of all types, and curses and strange magical discharges and all manner of wicked men. He’d heard a ton of stories about the Wild. The closest thing anyone had to a theory as to why it was the way it was, was Mount Lumos, which sat to the north, at its head. Mount Lumos was said to glow with a brilliant blue energy, a strange stone that conducted magic like lightning.

Stafford was a settlement of magical delights, called the City of Light, nestled at the base of the mountain. They harvested the magically charged stone, and the odd metals beneath it. It was said that a river that came off of the mountain and cut its way through the Wild was the reason for the strange beasts and odd occurrences plaguing that part of the land.

Seth realized, suddenly, that he’d been thinking about the land and all he knew of it for a long time now. When he looked at the sky, he saw that the sun had moved a bit. He had been walking for close to two hours now, lost in thought. Well, if becoming a wandering herbalist was his passion, then geography and history were his hobbies.

In the distance, he thought he could see a town to the right of the road he was traversing. Some of his worries came back to him then. He supposed that the core of his concerns, in this moment, at least, was his lack of funds.

He was utterly broke.

Not a coin to his name. Before, he’d been so desperate to get away from his village and begin his journey that staying even one more second hadn’t been conceivable. But now that he was actually here, several hours into his journey, Seth found that it was really just the village he wanted to get away from, not civilization itself.

Should he stop?

He probably should. There would more than likely be jobs there in the village, and even now he could see the Redwood Forest, perhaps another half hours’ walk or so. Within seconds, he had made up his mind: he would stop in this small town and find a job. Even having ten or twenty coins would go a long way towards making him feel better. He also really wanted to sit down because by the Gods he’d been walking for what felt like ages. Seth had tried to train himself up, and as a result, he was probably in the best shape of his life...which, sadly, didn’t mean much. He’d never been in great shape to begin with.

He thought he was still a bit scrawny and pale, as he did spent a lot of time indoors or under trees. Well, that was sure to change, he thought, looking at his forearms. They were going to get a lot of sun in the near future. He wondered if he would get in better shape. Honestly, he should start assigning himself a daily regimen, do some exercises in the mornings. Seth kept walking until he arrived at the village which, according to the sign in front of it, was called Green View. Immediately he could tell it wasn’t very large, maybe about the size of his own home settlement. There were probably two hundred or so people here.

He passed the man guarding the gate, a burly guy sitting on a barrel eating an apple, with little more than an exchange of nods. Once he was in, he found himself immediately in the town square, and there was the town message board! As he approached it, he saw that there weren’t all that many scraps of papers pinned to it, which worried him. But, coming to stand before it, Seth’s eyes were immediately drawn to a piece of clean white parchment hung up, the writing on it precise and easily legible. It both excited and terrified him.

The town was having a werewolf problem.

On the one hand, Seth was no fighter. But he knew how to fight...but that didn’t necessarily mean he wanted to go looking for a fight. And he didn’t even know how to fight all that well. On the other hand, this was easily the highest paying job on the board. Although it wasn’t a great deal of money, fifty coins would go a long way towards helping him.

That is, if he was still alive and intact.

“Thinking about going after that werewolf, son?”

He turned around, startled, and saw another guard who’d moved into the town square without his noticing. “Thinking about it,” he replied.

“You look a bit young, but, then again, you look a bit like the adventuring type. I think there’s just one left now. We’ve had others come through. It’s a common problem. Don’t know where the bastards come from, other than the Redwood, but about twice a year a pack of them will show up and we’ll have to kill them or drive them off.” He shrugged. “If you’re really interested, head into that blacksmith down the way. The guy who runs it is offering silver swords to anyone going after them. You’ll have to trade yours in, though.”

“I think I’ll do that. Thank you,” Seth replied.

“Good luck.”

Seth looked at the parchment one more time. Fifty coin for a werewolf pelt. If he could find it and kill it, he at least knew how to skin it. All at once, he realized he intended to do this. He was really going to go after a werewolf.

The most dangerous thing he’d ever killed was a wolf, and that was only once when he’d run into one while one of his few solo hunts. It had been terrifying and really more luck than anything else that he’d managed to get away unscathed.

This time, however, he was sure he’d do a better job, since he actually knew that he was going to be in danger.

Well, that was the idea, anyway.

Seth moved down the pathway, deeper into the marketplace, hunting down the blacksmith that the guard had pointed out. He felt an almost eerie sense of recurrence as he stepped into the smoky interior. Looking around as he approached the front counter, he saw the usual collection of axes and daggers and swords on the shelves for sale. Some shields and armor, too. He walked up and banged on the counter a few times.

“I’m coming, hold your horses,” a voice growled from somewhere through the back door. A moment later a man appeared. Seth had to sit on a sudden urge to grin. He’d only ever been in his own local blacksmith, but the man who stood before him could have been a cousin of the man who ran his smithy. Were all smiths large, burly men with soot-stained faces and big, bushy beards? “What do you want, son?” he asked.

“I’m hunting the werewolf, I’ve heard you were willing to offer some assistance.”

“That I am indeed. Gotta trade for it, though.”

“Fair enough.” Seth laid his sword out on the counter.

The man picked it up, studied it closely. “Hmm. Looks new. Not the best metal or quality, but...it’ll do, I suppose. Okay. Try not to get yourself killed. Or bitten. Don’t want anymore of those awful things running around,” he said, handing over the silver blade.

It was roughly the same shape and size as the sword he’d traded, but it was lighter, and felt even better in his grasp. He wondered, as he studied it, if this was luck or something akin to fate. It seemed strange that he should come into a bounty such as this so soon...then again, there was probably a decent chance that he was walking to his doom. That thought made him falter. He had the sudden urge to return the sword, leave the shop, and the town, and just go...away. Somewhere safe. Somewhere where he wasn’t considering this.

But Seth squashed the urge as mercilessly as he could manage. No. If he was going to do this, he was going to have to be brave.

“Thank you,” he said, and sheathed the sword.

“Good luck to you,” the blacksmith called as he stepped back out into the sunlight. Seth came out into the main thoroughfare between the shops and stalls of the marketplace, looking slowly around, wondering what his next move was.

Well, kill the werewolf, he supposed.

But how could he find it? The post said that it had come out of the Redwood Forest, so that was a good place to start. He turned west and started walking, making his way through town, trying to solve the problem of how to find this thing. By the time he hit the gate on the opposite side of the village, inspiration struck.

Magic, of course.

Seth was no magician or mage, not by any stretch of the imagination, but he thought he had some natural talent in it, and one of the things he’d learned was a basic ‘search’ spell. It was difficult to do and often was unreliable. Really, it was more like rolling dice than it was anything else. But he should probably be able to at least get pointed in the right direction of the werewolf. Search spells worked better when you were looking for something that didn’t really belong in its environment. While wolves were very natural to forests, werewolves weren’t. As he began walking towards the forest, which he could see more clearly now, Seth began to gather magic.

Magic was in the air all around, and some people, most people actually, were attuned to it. They could draw on it, and those who practiced enough and also had more natural talent could actually use it for a variety of things.

Seth continued slowly gathering magic, pulling it from the air to himself, as he pressed on to the Redwood Forest.

Thoughts shot through his head as he pushed on. He felt a strange mix of fear and excitement, and a little dark humor. Hadn’t he just been thinking not but a few hours ago that he was the kind of person to avoid danger and fights? That he wouldn’t go out of his way looking for it? Of course, he knew, in the back of his head, that it might come to this at one point. When you were an adventurer, (and he’d pieced this together mainly from talking to the very few adventurers that came through his small village over the years), you needed gold, because the lifestyle was expensive. And there was certainly a lot of coin to be made…

Doing the dangerous stuff.

Like, stupidly dangerous stuff. Hunting monsters, plundering ancient ruins, tackling a small horde of undead horrors.

And they either paid you big for it, or you got some good loot and could sell it off. The obvious problem was that you could also die, and die pretty horribly, if you screwed up. Even just once. The closer he got to the treeline, the more Seth felt his confidence slipping. As he actually came within reaching distance of it, he stopped and looked down at his right hand, which was now resting on the hilt of the sword.

He looked up again, into the forest, thick and lush with vegetation and plant life. He heard several beasts calling out, birds and insects, too. Was he really going to do this? Seth took a deep breath and let it out.

Yes, he was going to do this, and he was going to do it correctly.

Because this was what the life of an adventurer looked like, even one who’s primary interest lay in herbalism. He was going to have to get used to taking risks, doing dangerous things for gold, and the sooner he got used to that, the better.

With this in mind, Seth activated his searching spell. All around him, the world seemed to gray out slightly. He focused his thoughts on all things werewolf, staring long and hard into the forest, waiting, looking not so much with his eyes but with his mind, fueled by the magic. Finally, faintly, he got something.

There, a little to the right, something unnatural, about the size and shape of what a werewolf might be. It was maybe three hundred feet away. He drew his blade and set off into the woods. He would kill this werewolf, skin it, get the reward, and then...probably stay the night in an inn, because already he was feeling tired, and it was getting to be late in the day. He moved as quietly and steadily as he could, not keeping the spell active as it drained his magic, and he might need it in a moment of desperation.

He knew a bit of frost magic.

A sense of disquiet settled over him as Seth moved deeper into the woods. He dragged his gaze relentlessly across his surroundings, struggling to hear any sign of the werewolf. He shifted through the trees, moving among the foliage and trying not to be too loud. Then again, what difference did it make, it was a freaking werewolf. It had hearing way better than him, and it could smell him to be sure. As he came to a small clearing in the forest, Seth stopped and frowned. Maybe this was actually a really stupid idea.

Maybe he should reconsider this.

A twig snapped to his left. He jerked around right about the time a blur of dark brown fur burst out of the foliage and leaped straight at him, roaring furiously. He screamed in response, a reaction of primal fear to match its primal bellow, and brought up the sword in a pure mindless reflex. The werewolf hit him like a battering ram and the only thing he could think was: Well, shit. This adventure didn’t last very long.

Except that, as he crashed to the ground, he realized that the thing wasn’t mauling him to death. But, by the Gods, it was crushing him! He realized that he’d managed to piece its chest with his sword, and he was barely managing to hold it up this way. Grunting and then shouting with effort, he twisted to the side and rolled the big monster off of him. As the thing slumped to the ground, Seth scrambled away from it, abandoning his blade in the process, suddenly overwhelmed by terror. He had come this fucking close to death.

He stumbled to his feet, staring at the huge beast. It had to be seven feet tall, built of thick musculature, its huge muzzle stuffed with teeth. It reeked of death and blood and wet fur. As he stood there staring at it, another emotion suddenly surged through him: elation. He’d done it. He’d fucking killed it!

He’d come within a hair of getting killed, but had come out on top.

Immediately on the heels of this emotion was a wave of sick fear as he realized that if things had gone just slightly differently he’d be dead. Seth Baker would be straight up fucking dead. He shook his head, trying to get ahold of himself. Gods, he was so damned lucky. The wind blew, rustling the trees and plants all around him, and he took a quick look around. Better get that pelt now, before anything else showed up.

Grabbing his dagger, Seth set to work.

…

He thought he’d done pretty good with the pelt.

Walking back through the city gates, Seth tried to feel some pride, or happiness, or elation of some kind at having triumphed, but honestly, he was just tired now. The sun was heading for the far horizon now, night not all that far away. Right now, the primary thing he wanted to do was collect his bounty and hit up the nearest inn. There, he would eat a good dinner, rent a room, and then go to sleep as fast as possible.

He was dead on his feet.

“Holy crap, you did it.”

Seth stopped and looked around. He was back in the town square now. The guard from before was approaching.

“I did it,” Seth agreed. “Where can I turn this in?”

“Come on, I’ll take you to the captain. He’ll get it sorted out.”

Seth followed the guard down another one of the roads, grateful for someone else to take the lead, even if only for a little bit. Gods, that was another thing he was going to have to consider: taking the lead. He was in charge of his own life now, making all his own decisions. If he fucked up, he had no one to blame but himself.

That was a lot scarier than it sounded, now that he was living it.

They came to a guardhouse, a low building made of somber gray brick, and walked in. The guard led him to a large wooden desk littered with parchment where an older, more heavyset man sat. “Who’s this then?” he asked.

“Adventurer. Killed that werewolf,” the guard said.

Seth held up the pelt helpfully.

“Wow. You did that? Nice. Okay, take it down, put it with the others. I’ll pay you out,” the captain of the guard said.

“Thank you,” Seth replied, handing the pelt off to the guard as the captain began to count out gold from a huge sack of it.

“So where’re you from?” he asked.

“Blooming Falls,” he replied.

“That’s a little ways away. What brings you here?”

“I’m an herbalist. I’m looking to make a potion out of rare plants. The ingredients are in the Redwood Forest.”

“Ah, I see. Well, here you are, fifty gold. You earned it,” the captain said.

Seth thanked him, added the gold to his utterly depleted coin pouch, and then headed back outside. He made his way back to the town square, then took a quick look around, hunting for the nearest inn. He found it just down the left main road, opposite of the way he’d just come. It was a simple two story structure that called itself the Green View Inn. It didn’t look too full of patrons just then, which Seth was grateful for.

He wasn’t in the mood for a crowd.

Walking inside, he checked out the area. There was a bar ahead and to the right, a large fireplace over to the left, and the main area was taken up by a collection of tables and chairs. A handful of men were over in front of the fireplace, eating and drinking and talking. He mostly had the right side of the building to himself.

There was an extremely attractive redheaded woman sitting at the bar.

“Hello son,” the man behind the bar, presumably the owner, said as he approached. “What can I do for you?”

“I’d like a room for the night and a meal,” he replied.

“All right, I can give you a basement room. Altogether that’ll run you fifteen coin.”

“I’ll take it,” he said gratefully. As he counted out the coin, he listened to the man rattle off what food they had on offer. He settled on a mug of blueberry juice, a big bowl of meat-and-potato stew, and a side of lamb. He found himself taking in sidelong glances of the redhead. Now that he was closer, he saw that she was actually an elf. Her long, delicate ears poked up out of her deeply red hair. Her skin was very pale.

She looked at him briefly and smiled, and he quickly looked away, feeling his face flush. Gods, she was the most attractive woman he’d ever seen. Or maybe he was just thinking that in the moment, but she was certainly more alluring and beautiful than any of the women in his village. He thanked the man once their exchange was complete and quickly walked over to a table in the corner. He’d never been great with women.

He found his gaze kept slipping back over to her. The fact that she was wearing some fairly revealing clothing didn’t help. She had on a short skirt that showed off a lot of her pale thighs and from his brief glance at her up at the bar, he’d seen that she was wearing a low-cut shirt. And she was showing off a lot of her pale breasts.

When his dinner came, he was very surprised to see that the person bringing it to him was the redheaded elf.

Did she work here?

“Hello,” she said, setting the meal down in front of him. “Mind if I join you?”

“Um...no,” he replied awkwardly, at a loss for why she’d want to. But there was no way he was going to turn her away.

“What’s your name?” she asked, taking a seat across from him.

“Seth,” he replied.

“I’m Lyra. It’s nice to meet you.”

“You too.” He paused. “Um...do you work here?”

She seemed to consider it, then smiled. “I supposed, technically, I do. For now, anyway. How about you? I haven’t seen you around.”

“I’m from a town a little ways to the east called Blooming Falls. I’m an herbalist. I’m...just starting out at it, really.”

“What are you doing around here?” she asked.

“Well, there’s a potion I’m hoping to make...”

Seth fell easily into a conversation with her, and it wasn’t until about half an hour in that he realized that that was strange. He told her about his village, his hopes, a little bit of his fears, about the werewolf. And she listened to him. She seemed actually interested. And that also struck him as very strange.

Lyra seemed like an adventuress herself. Although she dressed a bit light, she had a dagger on her hip, and a bow and quiver of arrows. There was a calm ease to her, the kind he’d seen in many of the adventurers that had passed through his village.

It wasn’t until darkness was just starting to fall and he’d finished his meal about twenty minutes ago, in between the conversation, that he finally realized what was happening. Lyra reached across the table and laid her hand on the back of his, leaning forward, showing off her impressive cleavage. She fixed him with a sultry stare and smile.

“Would you like me to spend the night with you?” she asked. “Fifteen gold.”

Seth blinked several times, at first extremely confused. And then it all slid suddenly and perfectly into place.

She was a prostitute.

He swallowed. “Oh, um...oh wow,” he murmured in reply. Was he really that bad at picking up the clues? He hadn’t ever been around a prostitute before, so he supposed that he was. Several thoughts ran through his head.

Did he have the money? He did, technically, but he was supposed to spend that on other things. Wasn’t that the whole point of coming here and killing that damned werewolf? Was he okay with sleeping with a prostitute? There were none in his village, none that he knew of anyway, and he knew almost everyone there would be horrified by the idea. Sex...wasn’t really the most healthily viewed thing in Blooming Falls.

He’d only ever had it a few times, and even then in secret.

But by the Gods, Lyra was painfully attractive. And he had a certain affinity for redheads. They were so rare, or at least among humans. He had heard they were more common among the elves. And, oh man, she was an elf.

He’d always thought elves were so, so very beautiful.

Seth realized, right before answering, that right now, he was thinking with his dick, and that he had no hope of doing otherwise, because at that moment, there was nothing else in the world he wanted more than to make it with this insanely attractive elf prostitute.

“Yes,” he said simply.

She smiled and straightened back up. “Great. Gold first, then we can go.”

“Okay then.”

He got the gold out, counted it on the table, passed it to her. He couldn’t help but stare at her breasts now, looking perfect and pale in her low-cut shirt, and already his head was filling with erotic visions of what he was going to do with her.

Sex was a thing he had often thought of, and desperately wanted, but hadn’t really been able to get. He’d only ever made it with one girl in his village. She had had a crush on him, she was a hunter’s daughter, quite beautiful in a rough sort of way, and they’d had a brief, passionate affair. When they had almost been discovered, they’d had to stop, and...they just hadn’t started again. He’d hardly seen her since that time.

“Okay, let’s go handsome,” she said, stranding up.

As he began crossing the room, she took his hand. Her skin was hot and soft. He heard a grunt from the left side of the room and glanced over briefly. A handful of the men from before were still there, and they were looking at him, and they looked a little disgusted. Why? Was it because he was sleeping with a prostitute? An elf? Why hadn’t any of them propositioned her? She was drop dead gorgeous. Well, maybe it was like his village.

Social norms dictated that you disdained prostitutes.

Whatever, he didn’t care right now. At this moment, all he really could think about was Lyra, and her short red hair, Lyra, and her beautiful, flawless pale skin. Lyra, the elf woman that he was paying to have sex with him.

He took the key the owner had given him out of his pocket as he finished moving down the narrow stairwell and into the basement section. His room was last door on the left. He opened it up and pushed it in.

“Thought it’d be bigger,” he murmured as he came in.

There was just a single candle, burning sullenly on a dresser. The room contained just a bed, a dresser, and a washbasin. There honestly wasn’t room for anything else. “That’s how it is in small villages,” Lyra replied.

She shut and locked the door behind them.

“Now...” she said, again fixing him with that alluring stare. Gods, her eyes were so blue and brilliant. “Are you a virgin?”

“I...no,” he replied quickly.

She smiled. “I didn’t mean to offend.”

“You didn’t. I just...I haven’t had much experience, and I’ve never been any good at talking with women. And you’re easily the most attractive woman I’ve ever seen.”

“Well thank you,” she said. “I appreciate that. Really. A lot of human men wouldn’t say that to me, even if they thought it.”

“What? Why not?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” she asked, coming towards him. She pushed at the straps of his backpack and he took the hint, shrugging out of his it and setting it down. “I’m an elf,” she said, taking his shirt off for him.

“So?”

She snorted. “So? Elves and humans traditionally don’t get along too well, what with that war we had a few hundred years back. Hmm, you’re quite sweaty. Well, that’s fine. I’ll wash you. Get your boots off.”

“I...okay,” he replied, crouching. He untied his traveling boots and took them off, then finished getting undressed. A wave of discomfort rolled through him as he began to pull his undershorts down. He hesitated.

“If we’re going to make love,” Lyra said, “I’m going to see your dick.” She put her hand on his shoulder. “Seth, don’t worry. I’m not going to laugh at you or anything.”

“Okay,” he said quietly, and pulled down his undershorts. It was very difficult to do, even with her reassuring words.

Being naked in front of someone else was something he’d actually never done before. Even during his passionate tryst with the hunter’s daughter, he’d never actually fully got out of his clothing before. There hadn’t been time. Lyra walked up to him now that he was completely nude and looked down at his dick.

She sighed with an exasperated smirk on her face. “Gods, you boys and your dicks. You get all worked up over nothing.” He let out a small gasp as he felt her warm, soft hand grip his cock, which was as hard as tempered steel now, throbbing with anticipation. “Relax,” she said, and slowly began to massage it. “You’ll do fine.

He swallowed. “Okay.”

“Now come here. I’ll wash you.”

He followed her across the small room to the washbasin, where she pointed her finger at the water and, after a second, the tip of her finger flashed and the water began to steam. Fire magic, very subdued fire magic. Something he needed to learn. Seth knew that there were all sorts of ways to make your life easier with magic.

Lyra found a washrag and a bar of soap and set to work. She wet the rag and the soap, lathered it up in the rag, then set the soap aside and turned to face him. “What kind of sexual history do you have?” she asked as she began washing him.

The warm rag felt good on his skin and it had a soothing effect on him. “Not much,” he admitted. “I’ve had sex three times...with a girl I knew back in my home village.”

“When was that?”

“Two years.”

“And you haven’t done anything since?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No.”

“Not even gotten some head? Or at least a handjob?”

“Nothing,” he replied.

“Kissing?”

“No.”

“Gods, I’m sorry,” she said. She dunked the rag in the water again and then got down onto her knees, washing his lower half. “That seriously sucks. But I know how it is. I grew up in a village to the north, mostly among humans. I know what it’s like to live in a sexually repressed atmosphere. It’s no fun at all.”

“Why didn’t you live in the Redwood Forest, with the other elves?” he asked, then suddenly wondered if that was a rude question. Well, she was bluntly asking him about his sexual history, so she seemed like a fairly open person.

“That’s...complicated,” she replied. “Suffice to say, my parents did something...in poor taste, and we were, not quite exiled, but it was heavily implied that we were no longer welcome in elf territory. So we moved to a mixed settlement. I left home when I was sixteen.”

“Oh, sorry,” he murmured.

“Don’t be. I’m not. Best decision I ever made.” She had saved his cock for last and now she was moving the rag over it, giving it careful, dedicated attention. When she was finished with it, she did the same for his balls, massaging them slowly, gently. “You like that?” she murmured softly, looking up at him, impossibly beautiful.

“Yeah,” he whispered.

“Good. You’re going to just love everything else.” She stood up and set the rag aside. “Okay, you’re clean. Now...” she fixed him with her beautiful gaze and her sultry smile. “Undress me, Seth. I think you’ll enjoy it.”

“I think I will, too,” he whispered.

Reaching out, he gripped the bottom of her shirt and began to pull it up, over her head. She raised her arms for him. She was tall for an elf, maybe five and a half feet, though still half a foot shorter than he was. The shirt came off and he dropped it on the floor. Now she just had a bra on. It wasn’t like the ones he’d heard about from other, more experienced guys, with hooks in the back. Really, it was just like a smaller shirt.

“Take it off, Seth,” Lyra said softly, encouragingly.

He gripped it and pulled up, freeing her pale breasts. His heart was hammering madly in his chest now, his erection almost painful. They were the most beautiful breasts he had ever seen...and he really hadn’t seen hardly any. They were medium sized, firm, perky. There was a fantastic roundness to them, and they were topped with perfect pink nipples.

He dropped the bra. “Don’t be afraid to touch, Seth,” she said.

He reached out and laid his hands across them. A pulse, almost like a shock of magic, shuddered through him, as he took them into his hands. They felt perfectly sized. He began to squeeze and massage them gently. He wasn’t sure how long he did this, feeling up hot handfuls of her pale, elven breasts, but eventually he wanted more. The urge, the need to see more, to experience more, overrode the fascination he had with her breasts.

Seth got down on his knees and gripped her skirt. He began to pull it down. It was tight, and took a little bit of effort to get over her hips, which were a little broad for her small stature. And Gods, her thighs, they were so beautiful, with just the perfect amount of padding to them. They just barely touched together.

Now Lyra stood before him, clad only in white panties.

“Finish it, Seth, so that we can begin,” she said.

He carefully gripped her panties and pulled them down.

Although he’d had sex three times, he’d never actually seen a vagina before. She’d worn a dress each time, and each time had hiked it up for him only when he was atop her, and she had gripped him, guided him in.

Now he was seeing one.

An elf pussy. Although he’d had them described to him before, he thought that it looked better than they had said it would. Maybe it was Lyra specifically, or because she was an elf. Her vagina was a trim, taut pink line between her thighs, smooth and hairless.

“Do you shave it?” he asked, staring at it.

“In a manner of speaking,” Lyra replied. She raised one hand, and he looked up as there was a sudden heat and light. Flames licked along her palm. “Controlled fire spell, burns all the hairs off in a second flat. Easy as pie.” The flames disappeared.

“That’s amazing,” he murmured.

“Do you like it bald? I know some men don’t, and some men won’t do it unless it is bald.”

“I’m...not sure,” he admitted.

“Well, I supposed it won’t matter. It’ll feel good, all the same. Up,” she said. “Let’s fool around and get this started.”

“Okay,” he said, standing.

Lyra led him over to the bed, and sat him down. She pushed him gently onto his back and then laid down beside him. Each time she touched him, it was like a jolt of excitement shot through his body. And when she laid against him, feeling all her hot, bare skin pressed against his, her softness, it made his breath catch.

When he’d lost his virginity, it had been a nervous, almost frantic affair, and a little frustrating. It hadn’t gone at all like he thought it would. But this, what was happening right now, this was how he had expected it to go, how it felt like it was supposed to go.

Lyra kissed him.

It was the best, most intimate kiss he’d ever had.

They both let out small sounds of pleasure as their lips met. Hers were red and full and wet. She kissed him long and wonderfully, then pulled back slightly, smiling at him. Then she leaned in and kissed him once more, deeper this time, and soon parted his lips with hers. Slowly, she slipped her tongue into his mouth, probing delicately. Her tongue found his own and moved it forward, suddenly eager, desperate.

Reaching back around and down, he grabbed her hot, pale ass, groaning at the feel of it. Their tongues met and twined together, dancing the dance of lust and unity. She tasted good, like something sweet. Squeezing her ass, he pulled her closer against him. Some of his natural awkwardness was falling away, being overridden by primal lust, by the desire, the need to make love to her. She seemed to pick up on this.

Gently, she placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him onto his back. Sitting up, she said, “Relax. We’ve got time.”

“What are you doing?” he asked breathlessly as she began shift.

“Sucking your dick,” she replied. “Have you ever had that done before?”

“No. I, uh, I haven’t.”

“Well, prepare for a lot of pleasure.” He opened his legs for her. Lyra laid down on her stomach in between them, staring up at him with that sultry smile of hers, her breasts looking perfectly framed between her arms.

She took a moment to pull her hair into a ponytail.

Then she reached out and gripped his cock, wrapping her hand around its shaft. Her grip was hot and strong and sure. Leaning in, she let her hot breath whisper out along the head, and Seth felt his whole body shudder in response. Lyra stuck her tongue out and he cried out as it made contact with the head. She began to drag it along his most sensitive area.

Pleasure, raw, impossible pleasure, unlike anything he’d ever felt before, began to well within him, radiating out from his core. She continued slowly dragging her tongue across the head of his dick, licking it all over, filling him with a tremendous sexual gratification. Even the sex he’d had before paled in comparison to this.

Then she took his dick into her mouth, slipping it in and bobbing her head with a practiced ease. The pleasure somehow got more intense. He was breathing heavily now, panting at how fucking good it felt. Seth no longer saw the room around him, no longer fully comprehended that he was in an inn, in the town of Green View, near the Redwood Forest. In this moment, there was only him, and her, and the bed.

And what she was doing to him with her mouth.

He stared at her, his eyes wide, sweating now. Saw her full red lips moving up and down his dick, which she now held only loosely with her thumb and first two fingers, encircling the shaft, moving in tandem with her lips as he head bobbed up and down. Each time her lips reached the head, she slowed, lingering, moving the lips very slowly across his most sensitive skin. Each time she did this, it nearly overwhelmed him, pushing him over the edge into orgasm, which he was holding back with all of his might.

And she was staring at him as she did this. Some of her hair had fallen loose, making her strangely even sexier. And, Gods, she was looking him right in the eye. Her brilliant blue ones locked onto his own.

“Lyra,” he gasped, “I’m going to come. You’re going to make me come.” She didn’t stop. Didn’t react at all. Just kept bobbing her head. He groaned, fighting the orgasm and losing. “Lyra, I’m going to come in your mouth if you don’t stop!” he cried.

Lyra didn’t stop.

She began going faster.

That was it. The battle was lost. Seth cried out as a pulse of absolute, impossible pleasure, like a lightning strike, shot out from his core. His dick twitched in her mouth, jerking hard as it spat out the first thick spray of his seed. And more came after that. Much, much more. His dick was kicking rapidly, spurting as fast as it could, and he was blowing the biggest load of his entire life. Lyra didn’t stop. She continued sucking, and that only made it feel somehow even better. He cried out, groaning and moaning inarticulately, his whole body jerking in time with his cock as he orgasmed directly into this redheaded elf prostitute’s mouth.

The bliss, rapturous and complete, briefly transported him to another plane of existence. Or that’s what it felt like. A plane where there was no sight, no sound, nor smell or taste. There was only touch, only physical sensations, and even then, only pleasure. Only blissful release and intense sexual gratification.

His orgasm seemed to go on and on and on, filling him as he emptied his cock into Lyra. And, through it all, she kept sucking.

At some point, Seth was deposited back into his own body. He opened his eyes, blinking rapidly, and looked down the length of his pale, sweaty body. Lyra still had his cock in her mouth. It had finished orgasming. Still sucking as she went, she slowly began to pull her lips up, cleaning his cock with her mouth as she went. He cried out weakly at this unexpected pleasure. She took his dick out of her mouth and sat up.

She swallowed.

“That was the biggest load I’ve ever swallowed,” she said, and wiped her mouth on the back of her forearm. She stood up. “You’re quite lucky I like the taste of human seed.”

“Uh-huh,” he managed, gasping for breath, feeling intensely dizzy, grateful that he was still lying down in bed. Otherwise, he surely would have collapsed painfully to the floor. He weakly tracked Lyra’s nude, pale body as she crossed the room, crouching and rooting around in his pack. “What’re you doing?” he asked quietly.

“I could use a drink. I imagine you’d be grateful if I washed my mouth out after that, given that I’m sure you’re going to want to kiss me again.”

“Oh...yeah...yeah,” he replied, still trying to anchor himself back to reality.

That had been the most intense orgasm of his life.

“Ah, there we go,” she murmured, coming up out of his pack with a bottle of blueberry juice. She tore the cork out with her teeth, spat it into her free hand, and upended the bottle, draining a quarter of it in one go. She re-corked it, then came up with a bottle of water. This time, when she drank, she gargled and then spat it out into the chamberpot. “Much better,” she said, putting both bottles back into his pack after making sure they were secure. She returned to the bed and laid down beside him, snuggling her hot body up to his.

“I take it that was pleasurable?” she asked.

“Beyond,” he replied immediately.

“Mmm, I figured. Take a moment to get your...stamina back,” she said, grinning.

He simply laid there, thinking about sex. All the other times he’d orgasmed, almost all of them being from jacking off, paled in comparison. He’d gotten a handjob from the hunter’s daughter, and the sex they’d had had been nice, but that had been pro-

“Oh shit,” he said suddenly.

“What? What’s wrong?” she asked.

“I don’t have any kind of protection on me.”

“Oh, phew, I thought it was something serious,” she said. “Don’t worry, I can’t get pregnant, and I’m clean. And, Gods, even if one of us had something, there’s a cure for every sexually transmitted disease under the sun somewhere out there. Don’t worry. When you feel up to it, you are going to get some phenomenal, unprotected pussy.”

“Oh wow,” he whispered.

He’d been genuinely tempted to try and find some way around using protection, because he had the idea that it felt much, much better without it. But his lover hadn’t let him, and she had been right to. Gods, how stupid would it have been if he’d gotten her pregnant? Seth let these thoughts drift away, and as they did, he expected more to come, but none did. Instead, he felt a strange almost floating sensation.

After all the fantasies, after all the hopes and dreams and yearnings for sex with a beautiful woman, with an elf no less, (he had seen an elf twice before, both of them women, adventuresses passing through his small town, and had realized that elves were far more attractive than humans), here he was, actually getting ready to do it. He’d had his dick sucked by a phenomenally skilled prostitute and now he was about to have sex with her.

It didn’t feel real.

It didn’t quite feel like a dream or a mirage, it felt like...he didn’t know what it felt like. Seth made an effort to bring himself back down, bring himself back to his body, to this room, to the absurdly attractive naked woman lying beside him.

“How old are you?” he asked, in an attempt to help ground himself, and then immediately felt embarrassed by the question.

If she was offended, Lyra didn’t act like it. “Thirty nine,” she replied.

“You look younger,” he murmured.

“I do,” she agreed. “I don’t know how much you know about elves, I imagine not a lot, given where you’ve grown up. No offense. But we age about three times slower.”

“Oh. That’s interesting.”

“Are you doing okay?”

“Yeah, I’m just a little, uh...”

“Out of it?” He looked over, she had a knowing smile on her beautiful, pale face. He nodded. “It’s okay, I understand. I’ve seen it before. I’ve taken several young men’s virginity, and also been the first real, exotic sexual experience of even more young men, much like yourself. Women, too. It’ll pass. You’re going to feel guilty. Probably. Don’t give it any real thought, the guilt is false. Just...try to relax, to let yourself enjoy this.”

He nodded slowly. “I think I can do that,” he said softly.

“Good. Because I promise you will love this next part.”

“I’m pretty confident that I will,” he agreed, and laughed, and felt himself come back to the here and now. He felt his thoughts returning, felt anchored again.

Most importantly, and most powerfully, he felt lust.

Reaching over, he laid a hand across one of her breasts. She let him fondle her, playing with her beautiful breasts.

“You can suck on them, if you like,” she said quietly, her voice low and alluring.

He was suddenly filled with the need to do exactly that. Seth shifted, lowering himself and bringing his face in closer to her beautiful pale tits. She had the most perfect pink nipples, what he’d always imagined they’d look like in real life. Opening his mouth, he laid his lips on her breast, around the nipple, and began sucking gently on it.

Lyra let out a short breath. “That’s a good boy,” she whispered, running her hand across the back of his head.

The lust he was feeling only became more powerful, more intense. He groped her other breast as he sucked on this one. There was something intimate and intensely erotic about doing this and it filled him with a jittery kind of excitement. After a bit, he pulled back, then licked across her breast. She gasped, a good sound, and so he did it again, and several more times. Then he looked up at her as the desire to penetrate her, to be inside of her elf vagina, became nigh overwhelming. “Can we, uh, make love now?” he asked nervously.

She smiled serenely at him. “Yes, Seth. We can make love now. How would you like to do it?” she asked.

“With you on your back,” he replied.

“Then get on, and get in,” she said.

They shifted around a bit. She moved to the middle of the bed, lying on her back now, and spread her legs for him. He had a moment, as he shifted atop her, where he thought maybe they should get beneath the blankets, but dismissed it. Beside it not mattering, he was just too fucking horny. He got in between her pale legs, looking down at the bald pink slit of her pussy, seeing his own cock, hard and covered in her saliva.

“Here,” she whispered, and reached down between them.

Lyra gripped his cock gently and guided it to her pussy. He moved his hips forward, working with her, and soon the head of his dick met the hot entrance of her vagina. He could actually feel the heat coming off of her. He looked back up at her face, her painfully beautiful, smooth, pale face, her glittering her eyes and her now messy red hair. He thought she might be impatient or annoyed or, worse, disinterested.

But she was none of these things.

She just looked up at him with a gaze that implied both serenity and encouragement. She was happy to let him move at his own pace, and accepting of him. She must be, he realized, a very good prostitute.

Wanting to wait no longer, Seth pushed forward with his hips, and he cried out almost immediately. “Oh Gods!” he gasped as he slipped inside of her.

“Ooh...that’s it,” she whispered, spreading her legs out a bit further. “That’s the spot.”

Pleasure, hot, perfect pleasure more powerful than anything he had ever felt before, even taking into account that blowjob he’d just received, encompassed his cock and began radiating out from his core. It was hot and perfect, nothing but unfiltered rapturous bliss. He didn’t even think it was possible to feel this good.

“Oh Gods,” he whispered again, pushing his was into her further and completely burying himself inside of her perfect elf pussy. “It’s so good, Lyra,” he said, then cried out as he pulled back and then pushed in again. “Holy fuck, it’s...oh it’s incredible!” he groaned.

“Told you,” she said, then cried out as he pushed into her again.

His hips began to work almost of their own accord, sliding back and forth, taking his cock in and out of her stunning pussy. Hot sexual satisfaction began to fill him, propelling towards another orgasm like a ship caught on a tidal wave. But he didn’t want it to end, he wanted to have sex with her like this for...for hours.

For days.

Seth had suspected that unprotected sex felt better than protected sex, but he had no idea it felt this much better. It was night and day. He felt blinded by the ecstasy, utterly consumed by the impossible bliss of Lyra’s elf pussy. He was moaning almost constantly now, and he’d wrapped his arms around her, holding her to him, feeling her breasts press up against his chest. His face was now inches from hers, and he stared directly into her bright blue eyes, and that made the encounter far, far more intimate.

And she didn’t seem to mind that.

He ducked his head and kissed Lyra deeply, passionately, feeling connected with her on a level he never had before. She wrapped her legs around him and slipped her tongue into his mouth, finding his own, twining and dancing with it. They continued kissing, with her breaking the kiss occasionally as he hit a sensitive spot inside of her, sending a jolt of pleasure through her each time, it seemed. He had no idea how long it had been, but, after what felt like nowhere near enough time, Seth knew that he was going to orgasm again.

And there was nothing he could do about it.

“Are you...I’m gonna...can I...”

“Yes, Seth,” she said, again wearing that knowing smile. “Yes, you can orgasm inside of me. You can fill me with your seed. I want you to.”

“Oh, fuck!” he screamed as the first blast of his orgasm hit him like a hammer striking an anvil. It felt like a lightning strike, like an earthquake, as his dick kicked once, hard, inside of the tight confines of her perfect pink vagina and sent a thick spurt of his seed into her. The pleasure was impossible. It blinded him, deafened him, robbed him of his other senses as his cock began twitching over and over again, his hips jerking forward violently with each fresh spurt of his seed spilled into her. He could hear her moaning as he orgasmed inside of her.

The pleasure.

The sexual gratification that came from orgasming into a woman’s vagina without any kind of protection…

He didn’t think, just then, that there were words for it. All he knew was that his body was being filled with a powerful, potent pink energy, a hot rapturous bliss that was released in waves each time his dick jerked inside of her.

Some uncertain time later, Seth was returned to his body. He felt as though he was floating in a warm, serene sea. He realized that he was lying down on top of Lyra, gasping for breath, his whole body covered in sweat, shaking.

“Um...wow,” he whispered, slowly pushing himself up. He stared down at her. She looked absurdly beautiful, her red hair a mess, her pale face flushed and slicked with sweat. She looked calm and...satisfied?

“That was a nice orgasm,” she said. “You really fucking filled me up.”

“Yeah,” he whispered, then carefully pulled his softening cock out of her. It was incredibly sensitive, almost painfully so. “Wow,” he repeated.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just a bit...lightheaded,” he said. “Um, how about you, are you okay?”

She laughed and smiled. “I’m fine, Seth. But I would like it a lot if you got me a wet rag. I need to clean up your mess.”

“Oh, yeah...I can do that,” he murmured. Collecting himself, uncertain of the thoughts that drifted mellowly through his head, never quite coming into focus, he got up off the bed and stood on uncertain legs. Although the washbasin was hardly three steps away, he felt unsure if he could make it. His legs were wobbly and trembling. He managed to get the rag though. He got it wet, wrung it out, and brought it back to her.

“Thank you,” she said, wiping at herself. “Gods, that was a huge load.”

He sat down heavily on the bed, just trying to get his breath back for the moment. “Did I, uh...how did I do?” he asked. That was the first thought that came clear: his sexual performance. Wow, he realized with a stab of guilt that he hadn’t even done anything for her, hadn’t done any foreplay beyond some kissing and playing with her breasts.

“You did fine,” she said.

“I mean, was I...was it good for you?”

She laughed and tossed the rag away, then rolled to the side, pulling the blanket out from under her and then getting beneath it. A feeling of sluggish sleepiness was washing over him now and he didn’t want to leave this room at all. He simply wanted to sleep. Seth climbed beneath the blankets with her and curled up against her.

“Mmm, good. You’re a cuddler. I love cuddling after sex. Now, was I satisfied? Yes. But I tend to get off on getting others, typically guys, off. I believe you’re asking about your sexual performance, yes?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Well, you did okay, for being an inexperienced nineteen year old small-village guy. Pretty good, actually. Some advice for the future: take it slower, do more foreplay, tongue and finger goes a long way with most women, and...actually, that’s all I can really think of. You were clearly into it, you engaged me during, kissed me, looked into my eyes. That’s a big turn on, for me at least. But you did pretty good. And I’m not just saying that cause you paid me to sleep with you. I actually kind of like you,” she said.

He yawned. “You do?”

“Yeah. You’re cute, you’re sweet. Makes me sad I have to leave tomorrow. Don’t suppose I could talk you into maybe traveling with me for a bit?” she asked.

It was tempting, genuinely tempting, but he sighed. “I’d love to, I honestly would, but...I can’t. Unless you’re heading into the Redwood Forest.”

“No, east I’m afraid, then north. Making my way up to Mist. That’s where I live. I take a good long walk once a year in the springtime.”

“What’s Mist like?” he asked.

“About how everyone describes it. Dangerous, misty, kind of cold. Lots of fights, lots of adventurers, lots of thieves and prostitutes and dockhands.” She shrugged. “It’s a big, east coast port town.”

“Huh,” he murmured, then yawned again.

“Go to sleep, Seth,” she said quietly.

He nodded and she rolled over. He laid against her, putting an arm around her, pulling her closer to him. “Is this okay?” he asked.

“It’s fine,” she replied. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, Lyra,” he said, and was asleep almost immediately.

CHAPTER IV

Seth awoke some time the next morning, opening his eyes and finding the room almost exactly the same as it had been when he’d fallen asleep. Except there was one large change: Lyra was not in bed with him.

“Lyra?” he asked, sitting up, rubbing his eyes. He felt slow and almost dizzy, knowing that he must have slept for a long time. “Lyra?”

He was alone in his room, he could sense it. A small sadness welled up within him, but he pushed against it. He was lucky that she had agreed to go to sleep with him at all. He should have expected her to leave before he woke. Still, he wished they could have had sex again, at least one more time. The experience had been…

Just amazing.

He cleared his throat, yawned, and stretched, trying to come awake. Standing up, he walked slowly, carefully over to the single candle left burning, picked it up and used it to light the other candles in the room. He had things he needed to do, and then he had to get back on the road, head to the forest and get started with this transitional period into his new life. To prove to himself that he could actually make it as an adventurer.

His eyes fell on something, now that the light was better.

A note, slipped in under the door.

He picked it up and read it.

Seth, I’m sorry I had to leave you like that. I’m an early riser and I considered waking you for another round of sex, but you looked so peaceful, and you seemed like you really needed the sleep. But I have to keep going. I want you to know, you were a special one. I’m not sure why, but I feel it. I will remember you. If you’re ever in Mist, please look me up, and I’ll give you a free roll in the hay if you’re still down for it.

-Lyra

There was a heart drawn next to her name. He felt a strange swirl of emotions at that. She’d actually really liked him. Well, he hoped so. It was possible she could’ve been lying...but why? Wouldn’t it be easier to just leave without a note? She’d probably never see him again if she didn’t want to.

In the end, Seth simply folded up the note and placed it in his backpack. He wanted to believe it, so he did. And he wanted to keep it. From there, he began going through the simple procedures of waking up, because his brain wasn’t all that coherent right now. He needed to be sharp and clear for the day ahead.

He moved over to the washbasin, grabbed a rag and a bar of soap, and washed himself down. After last night, he needed it. As he did this, he couldn’t help but think about the sex he’d had with Lyra. A shudder ran through him. He already missed it. He missed her, but he knew she had no interest in any kind of relationship, but godsdamn did he miss that sex. Sleeping with prostitutes was definitely something he was going to be doing more often. After he was clean, he dried off and dressed, then he took a moment to collect his things.

After making sure he’d left nothing behind, Seth moved back upstairs and returned the key to the innkeeper, who tried to talk him into staying another night. But he didn’t have the money, the time, nor the inclination. As he began heading for market, looking for a quick and cheap breakfast, he frowned as he realized that he’d spent about the half the money he’d earned from killing that damned werewolf. And most of it on a prostitute.

It was a bad feeling, briefly, because it made him feel impulsive and stupid. But...well, he had to admit to himself that if he was presented with the opportunity to do it over again, he’d still pay Lyra to have sex with him. After a bit of wandering, he purchased a skewer of cooked rabbit and deer meat for a single gold and began eating it on the way out of town. Ahead of him, the Redwood Forest loomed. Looking into the sky, he saw that it was a few hours past sunrise. He was going to have to make a habit of getting up at sunrise, probably, because he imagined that time was going to become a bit of a precious commodity.

After finishing the skewer, he cleaned it and saved it in his pack, since it could be useful in the future, drank off half a bottle of water, and then began walking in earnest. His thoughts drifted and settled and drifted again as he walked along the path in the warm sunshine, drawing ever closer to the Redwood Forest. As he made his approach, Seth began to focus on his actual job. He needed five things, five plants, all of them fairly rare. He had done as much research as he could...which wasn’t much, given the circumstances.

The first thing he decided he was going after was Lilith’s Blossom. It was a flower with alternating red and blue petals, and was supposed to be, according to the slim entry he’d read on it, ‘rare but not impossible to find among the floors of the Redwood Forest.’ It was not to grow near the coasts or along riverbanks.

And...that was about it.

No further information on other flowers you might find around it, clues or hints, conditions under which it grew. Just nothing. It was the most frustrating one and he honestly wanted to just get it out of the way first because while some of the other ones were difficult, and one was outright dangerous, this one was the least obvious one and required the most blind luck. And maybe he’d get lucky, maybe he’d just find it straightaway.

Seth reached the edge of the forest in another half an hour.

He found himself staring up at the huge red trees. The forest seemed somehow less intimidating today, a bit more inviting. The scents of fresh earth and fragrant flowers and of nature itself, accompanied by the calls of birds and the sounds of wildlife and the buzzing of insects all drifted out to him. He smiled, feeling the warm sunshine on his face, the cool breeze on his skin as it whispered across the landscape.

Seth felt good about his chances as he walked into the forest.

…

Six hours.

Six godsdamned hours.

That was how long he had been wandering, just wandering, through the forest. He had started out by moving along the main road, but that hadn’t kept up for long, as he figured, given this was a rare flower and others were probably seeking it as well, it wouldn’t make much sense for any to be left in the most obvious of areas. So he’d spent the next two and a half hours moving along side paths and smaller trails, walking and studying and hunting. A couple of times he thought he’d seen it, but they had been false alerts.

Eventually, he broke for lunch, sat down on a log, and ate some of the meat he’d bought back in his home village. He finished off the bottle of water and then let it dry in the sunshine, since it, he realized, would be what he would store his harvested ingredients in. (There was another thing he’d forgotten to purchase. He was turning out to be a bad adventurer.) When lunch was over, Seth began hunting off the beaten paths, heading deeper and deeper into the forest. As he did, the doubts which he had, well, not quelled, but evaded earlier were beginning to creep back into his head like worms digging into a corpse.

Could he actually do this?

Determination might not be enough. He’d seen people fail before, people who had every right to succeed. People who had been sidelined by happenstance. And they were either older, smarter, or more successful than he was. Or all three. Did he really think he was going to be able to do this? He was a nineteen year old kid from a small village who had hardly ever left said village in his entire life, wandering out into a world filled with dangerous monsters and people and curses and ten different other ways to die.

And he thought he could handle it.

As the sixth consistent hour of his search was coming to a close and he was creeping up on number seven, Seth was genuinely beginning to consider going back. How could he expect to be a fucking adventurer, to survive in this crazy world on his own, if he couldn’t even find one single flower?!

What had he been thinking!?

Seth slowly came to a halt as he approached yet another clearing. He was sweaty and miserable and angry and afraid. Probably that last one a lot, because he’d been getting some bad vibes for the past ten minutes. He’d initially passed it off as his own frustration and anxiety, but now that he stopped and really thought about it, the feelings seemed subtly separate. What did that mean? He suddenly drew his silver sword as a bolt of fear shot through him. There were cursed lands that gave off feelings like this, and some creatures, too.

Evil creatures, corrupt creatures.

Things that not only could easily kill someone like him, but actively wanted to more often than not. Seth spun in a slow circle, scanning the trees. The sun was still out, there were still several hours left in the day, so he should be able to see fine, and despite how far he’d gone, he at least knew how to find his way back to civilization. He’d always been good at navigation for a reason he could not understand nor explain.

It just came to him.

Maybe he should think about at least heading back to Green View. He could ask around, or maybe get another book, regroup and recollect his thoughts.

Something shifted off to his right and he jerked in that direction, suddenly certain that he was being watched. He looked around, panting with fear now. Gods, what a terrible idea this had been. Whatever it was, it shifted again. Where was it?! He couldn’t see anything. Then he heard a branch snap overhead.

Seth looked up and felt his whole body go cold.

A spider, a giant black and red spider, was high up, among the trees and branches, looking at him with a cluster of awful black eyes that reflected the sunlight. Seth screamed about the same time the spider launched itself at him, moving with an awful quickness. He barely managed to throw himself out of the way, moving more out of instinct than rational thought at this point, and heard the awful sound of its huge body hitting the ground.

The wretched beast issued a high-pitched shriek and began scuttling towards him immediately. Gods, it was fast!

He backed up, trembling in pure terror now, sword in hand. He could kill it. He had a silver sword, and this thing had the feel of corruption of some kind on it, of evil, and evil things responded very poorly to silver. But that meant getting close enough to stab the damned thing and it was moving so fast…

The giant spider stopped suddenly, then leaped straight at him. Seth screamed again and ducked, then screamed even louder as he felt a burning line of pain cut across his back. It had gotten him! Was it poisonous!? It had to be. Seth shot to his feet again, spinning around, sword raised. He had to finish this now or he was going to end up dead, paralyzed and sucked dry by this horrible monster. It had already landed and was on the ground again, scuttling towards him once more. This time, Seth mustered his courage and ran forward.

The pain on his back was probably what was fueling him the most. The spider tried to leap at the last moment, but he didn’t let it, sinking the blade into its horrible inhuman face. It issued another shriek that cut off abruptly and went limp. As it collapsed into a heap, it ripped the sword from his grasp and he stood there, gasping for breath, stock still, staring at the body he’d just made. He’d killed it. He’d actually killed it.

Seth was trembling all over now and he lowered his gaze, closing his eyes, trying to get ahold of himself, to stop freaking out. He took a deep breath, held it, let it out slowly. That had always helped him out in the past. It seemed to help a bit now. He opened his eyes and…

“Are you kidding me!?” he snapped, and then felt laughter begin to rise out of him. It was frustrated, manic, panicky laughter. He didn’t know if he was happy or pissed or afraid because right there, right next to his boot, he saw exactly what he’d been looking for: Lilith’s Blossom. The vibrant red-blue flower was so close to his boot that the edge of two petals were touching it. He had nearly crushed the damned thing!

Seth groaned as the laughter faded away.

His back. He needed to do something about that. It was to the left side. The thing had just barely missed his backpack. Shrugging out of the pack and setting it down, Seth crouched before it, wincing in pain, and quickly searched through it. Fishing out his only healing potion, he tore the cork out with his teeth, spit it back into the pack, and then drank the whole bottle. Immediately, he felt the soft, cooling magic rush through his body and go to work on his back. The pain lessened like a flame doused by cold water and he let out a sigh of relief.

Dropping the empty bottle back into his pack, Seth turned slowly to the flower he’d been so ardently seeking all day. He stared at it in the golden sunshine that was just beginning to turn that unique shade of almost red-gold that signaled the approach of nightfall. He still had time, perhaps two and a half hours, before true night fell. That should be enough to get back to the village. Because damn did he need a reprieve from this crap. He reached out and plucked the flower from the ground, not having to be very careful in its harvest.

Holding it up, he studied it. It was beautiful, at least. And it smelled rather nice. Seth retrieved his empty water bottle and carefully slipped the flower inside of it, then re-corked it and put it back in the backpack. Okay, well, he was one fifth of the way there.

“Hooray,” he said quietly and miserably.

The pain in his back had lessened, but not gone away completely, and he was still feeling really hot. Feverish, actually. The healing potion was going to need more time to work. Seth considered his options for a moment, then pulled his pack back on, wincing as he did, and slowly got to his feet. Dizzy, he was dizzy, not a good sign. Breathing slowly and heavily, he wiped his brow and looked around the clearing. If right now was any indication of how he was going to be feeling, then there was no way he was going to make it back to Green View.

No, he’d need to make camp here tonight. Seth glanced at the giant spider corpse. Okay, maybe not right here, but somewhere nearby. He began moving back in the direction of the town. Maybe he should see how far he could get, maybe walking back there wouldn’t be as bad as he felt it might be right now.

Only it was.

No, actually, it was worse.

He managed a staggering kind of walk for perhaps five minutes before being forced to stop in another small clearing. Carefully, he took his pack off again and set it down. This was going to have to do. He set out his bedroll, then began the long, painful process of getting a fire going. Cooking up some food would probably help him out, and then he’d have a nice, long sleep here, and he’d feel better in the morning.

Cooking the food took longer than he would have liked, but it tasted pretty good by the time he was finished. He also very hot, and ended up stripping down to his undershorts by the end of the meal. He drained the second bottle of water, his eyelids becoming heavy as drowsiness set in. When the meal was over, he glanced up at the sky, seeing that the sun wasn’t even gone yet. And despite that he was tired enough to pass out.

Well, he’d had a long day, he supposed.

Seth killed the fire and took the extra effort to make sure it wouldn’t relight in the night, then he packed up his things, save for his bedroll, and laid down on top of it, using his pack as a pillow. As he stared up at the sky, lying on his back, struggling to keep his eyes open, feeling hot and achy, he thought that maybe he should find a better place to sleep. Someplace that was safer, more out of the way, but where?

It was the last thing he was thinking before he slipped into sleep.

CHAPTER V

Nightmares visited him that night.

Seth only remembered one of them clearly. In it, he was lying on his back, staring up at a cold, iron gray sky. It was raining. He realized that he was lying in a hole. A cut hole, rectangular. For a moment, he had no idea what was going on.

He couldn’t move.

The rain spattered his face, freezing but strangely distant.

And then someone stepped up to the edge of the hole and looked down. It was his mother. And then his father beside her. They stared down at him...except they weren’t really looking at him. His father shook his head slowly.

“I told him,” he muttered. “I told him he shouldn’t do it. Now look what happened.”

“He was a disappointment,” his mother said, sounding colder than he’d ever heard her. “He was a failure.”

Another figure appeared, the local religious man from their village. He couldn’t remember the man’s name. Cold fear began to steal into his heart.

“Would you like to say anything?” he asked softly.

“He’s dead,” his father replied glumly, “what’s there to say?”

No! Seth cried. I’m not dead! I’m still alive!

Except he didn’t say anything. He couldn’t move an inch, not a single muscle.

The priest nodded and motioned off to someone out of sight. “Very well then. It’s a tragedy, when the youth get some stupid idea in their head, go off half-cocked and get themselves killed. But that’s life, I suppose.”

“I suppose,” his father murmured.

“Start filling it in,” the priest said.

And a shovelful of dirt fell down through the air and landed directly on his face. Seth tried to scream, but suddenly more dirt was coming in, much more, filling the hole, and the rain was gone. The light was gone.

Everything was gone.

In the frigid rain’s absence came heat. He was hot, burning up under all that dirt. It almost felt as if he was on fire…

Seth gasped awake, snapping his eyes open, then squinting. For one horrifying second he thought that he truly was in a grave, because the skies were gray and there was someone standing directly over him, staring down at him.

He tried to scream but nothing came out. His throat was horrifically dry. Seth calmed down slightly when he saw that the person standing over him was no one he recognized, but then felt a bolt of fear when he saw that they weren’t human. Nor were they any of the other ‘civilized’ races, as they were sometimes called.

Not elven, nor a cat-eared felis, nor a lizard-skinned beryl.

“You’re sick,” the dryad standing over him said.

“Spider,” he croaked.

She nodded. “I thought so. Why are you here?”

“Looking for something...flowers...last night. Attacked. Too tired, too weak to go back,” he replied, finding it very difficult to speak.

“I can heal you,” she said. “Will you let me?”

“Yes, please,” he whispered.

She nodded and knelt. The pain was a lot worse now, and he was so hot. He felt like had a massive flu, he was almost incapacitated with it. The dryad laid her hand across his chest, and her touch was very cool, very soothing. He felt a sudden coolness begin to flow into his chest, and then outwards, through his entire body. Seth breathed a heavy sigh of relief half a minute later when she stood back up, taking her hand away.

“There,” she said softly. “Why did you not heal yourself?”

“I thought I had,” he replied, feeling a lot better, but also drained and very weak. “I took a healing potion...”

“You town-dwellers rely too much on your potions,” she murmured.

“They can be very useful,” he replied.

“I suppose...” She crouched by him again. “What’s your name?”

“Seth.”

“I’m Rain.”

She didn’t look like what he thought she would. Well, not her specifically, but a dryad. He’d heard that they had leaves for hair, but not this one. She had human hair. Long, flowing, emerald green hair. And there were branches coming out of her head, almost like antlers. He could see flowers, too. Pretty little white flowers growing along the branches. The eyes she stared down at him with were the most brilliant green he had ever seen in his life.

Seth found himself struck by her intense beauty.

“That’s...a pretty name,” he heard himself say.

She smiled at him. “Thank you. You say you were here looking for flowers?”

“Yes,” he replied. “I’m...trying to make a potion. A very rare and difficult potion. All the ingredients I need are in this forest.”

“I see,” she murmured. She looked up suddenly, then around, then back down at him. “Well...would you like some help?”

He blinked. All of this seemed extremely surreal, though he had an idea that he was reacting more mellowly than he would otherwise because he was getting over being poisoned and this kind of felt like a dream.

“Yes,” he replied. “I’d like that.”

“Good! The first order of business, I think, is to get you some water. I can sense a great thirst in you, and hunger. And it will help you get your strength back. Come along, I can take you a nearby spring where the water is clear and clean.”

“Thank you,” he replied.

It took him a moment, but he first managed to sit up, then to stagger to his feet. His legs felt weak and rubbery. He started to put his clothes back on, but then realized he was just going to have to take them off again, as he intended to wash off in the stream, so he rolled up his bed, secured it to his pack, and picked it up.

He got his first good look at Rain and felt an immediate embarrassment. “Oh!” he said, startled by what he saw.

“What? What’s wrong?” she replied, glancing behind her.

“You’re, um...you don’t have any clothes on,” he replied.

She looked down at herself, (that was when it occurred to him that she was about three or four inches taller than he was, and that wasn’t even counting the antler-branches), and smirked. “Well, yeah. Dryads don’t wear clothes,” she replied.

He nodded slowly, trying very hard not to stare at her breasts.

But Gods they were large. They were full and round and beautiful, topped by soft green nipples. Her skin was a pale golden color with brown streaks through it. He realized that it looked exactly like the side of a tree that was common to the Redwood Forest. He found his gaze sliding down, across her trim stomach, to her thick thighs and broad hips.

And...oh Gods, he could see her vagina.

No hair or leaves or anything down there, just a taut, darker line between her thighs. He swallowed and forced his gaze back up.

“Are you going to be okay with that? Is it...unappealing to you?” she asked.

“Oh no, not at all. I mean, yes, I’m going to be okay with it. It’s not unappealing. You’re very, ah, beautiful, um...Rain.”

“Thank you,” she said, smiling at him. It seemed like a genuine smile, the kind you got when you paid someone a real compliment. And he supposed that’s just what he’d done, but the fact that she was completely naked was just throwing him off. She turned around. Oh and her ass...there was a nice heft to it, a pleasant amount of padding and thickness. “Come along,” she said, walking off into the treeline, “to the stream.”

“Okay,” he murmured, following after her.

This was definitely surreal, and not at all what he had expected to wake up to this morning. Seth hurried after her. He knew that there would be dryads in the forest. There were other things, too, other creatures that were not monsters.

He just hadn’t expect to see one.

And, even if he had, he hadn’t expected to feel so damned attracted to her. But she was so beautiful. He shook his head, kept following after her into the trees. He must be loopy if he was thinking that a dryad was beautiful. Well it was obvious that she was beautiful, dryads were said to be, but...he was feeling lust towards hers.

Serious lust.

Seth tried to marshal his thoughts as they walked slowly through the forest. He saw, as they progressed, that every now and then a plant or flower or branch would gently, subtly curve after Rain as she walked by, as thought reaching for her. Being around her was strange. He could feel a kind of raw power coming from her. He knew it must be because she was a dryad, a physical manifestation of the forest and nature itself.

He’d done research on the Gods. He knew they were real, and had done his best to...at least try to be devout. He didn’t blaspheme and he tried to pray every now and then, but really, he hadn’t ever found a God or Goddess to follow. That was usually how it worked. Everyone ended up following one or the other.

He knew that the Goddess of Nature was Vivian, and she had much domain over the land, as so much of it was untamed wildlands. Seth’s head slowly began to clear as they walked on, and by the time they reached the bubbling stream, he felt more awake. And with that awakening came a realization of just exactly how hungry and thirsty he was. As soon as he saw the stream, he dropped his pack, fell to his hands and knees, and plunged his head into the water, drinking deeply. The water was cold and crisp and wonderful.

After drinking more than he probably should have, he sat down heavily on the bank and rubbed at his eyes.

“Feeling better?” Rain asked. She sat down beside him.

“I am.” He looked at the stream again and knew he needed to wash up and bathe. He’d sweated up an absolute storm last night, and that was after a full day of walking through the woods. He glanced back at Rain uncertainly.

“Is something making you uncomfortable?” she asked.

“I just...need to bathe,” he replied.

“This stream will be sufficient for that,” she replied. “As a matter of fact, I wouldn’t mind a dip myself.”

He watched as she walked into the stream, going until she was at the middle and the water was up to her large breasts.

They floated.

“I...okay,” he murmured, and figured that, well, being naked around a dryad obviously wasn’t going to make her uncomfortable at all, so why not? Maybe it was the lingering effects of his near death experience, but he felt a sudden loss of inhibition. He took off his shorts and walked naked into the stream. The water was a little chilled, but not terribly so. He moved down deeper into it, moving to join Rain at its center.

As he washed up and rubbed the rest of the sleep from his eyes, he felt much clearer in the head, far more fully awake now.

And again he was struck by her beauty. Not only her beauty, but an almost raw sexuality to her. It wasn’t that she was being sexual, nor was it simply because she was naked. Perhaps sexuality wasn’t the right word, but there was something about her, something about her simple nature, that was calling to something deep and primal in him, something lust-driven, and deeper even than that perhaps. He didn’t know what it was and wasn’t really comfortable thinking about it for...well, a few reasons really, so he stopped thinking about it.

Or tried to anyway.

“So, Rain,” he said, deciding that if he was going to be traveling with a dryad, (no, it wasn’t his previously loopy state that made his reaction to that seem strangely muted, it must be that he was just really okay, on some deep level, being around a monster woman...not that she really seemed at all like a monster), he should get to know her. “Not that I’m complaining or anything, but...why is it exactly that you’re willing to help me?”

“I’m deeply curious about humans,” she replied. “Well, about many town-dwellers. I’ve never had a chance to speak with one.”

“Really? You seem fairly...I guess normal, for never having spoken to a town-dweller. Or, I mean, I guess my perception of normal. Does that make any sense?”

“I understand,” she replied. “I am magical, so I can intuit certain things.”

“Why are you curious about us?”

“You aren’t curious about me?” she asked.

“Well...I mean, yeah. I’ve always wondered what it would be like to talk to a dryad, or a serpentine, or a harpy. You all seem so...mysterious. No one in my village has ever encountered a mon-well, I mean, one who lives out here, in the forest.”

She smiled. “It’s okay. I know you call us monsters.”

“I don’t think you’re a monster.”

“Thank you, but that’s my point. I’m curious about you for the same reason that you’re curious about me: I don’t really know anything about you. You’re mysterious. I want to get to know you, learn about you,” she said.

“Okay, fair enough,” he replied. They spent a moment more washing off, then, his hunger too powerful to put off any longer, he left the stream. She joined him. He realized that he didn’t have a towel. Sighing, he decided to just build a fire and let that dry him. Gods, had he forgotten a lot. “I have to build a fire,” he said, then hesitated. “Is that...going to be a problem?”

“No, why would it?” she replied.

“I just don’t know what you consider, um, appropriate conduct in your forest. I know that you’re supposed to be a guardian of the trees...”

“I am,” she replied. “But it’s okay. So long as you are careful and respectful of the plant life, there won’t be a problem.”

He felt relieved. Dryads were supposed to be downright lethal when they didn’t like you. “I’m very happy to respect the forest,” he replied.

“Good!” she said brightly.

She actually ended up helping him building the fire, pointing out the best kindling, and helping him gather stones. Soon, they were arranged in a tight circle and the kindling had been placed. He at least knew a very, very basic fire spell. Not enough to hurt someone, well, with like a fireball, but enough to get a fire going. Once it was, he got a few slices of beef out of his pack and set up a flat pan on a metal platform over the fire.

He’d at least remembered that.

“So, uh, Rain. I was curious...” he said, trailing off, unsure of what was considered okay with dryads and what wasn’t.

He felt at a huge social disadvantage here.

“Yes? You can feel free to ask me whatever you like. That’s one of the things I imagine we’ll be doing the most, asking questions,” she said. “I want you to know, I won’t get mad at you. If I don’t want to answer, I’ll just tell you.”

“Okay, that’s good. And I feel the same way. Um...your hair. I didn’t think that dryads had...well, actual hair,” he replied.

“Oh...” She looked briefly uncomfortable and began to run her hands through her long, green hair. “We don’t. It’s very rare. I have more human-like hair because...” she hesitated, then sighed. “Well, I don’t want to get into it.”

“Okay,” he said. “That’s fine. Um...you said you could help me with my, uh, list?”

“Oh, yes, I can do that. Can I see your list?”

“Yeah,” he said, getting it out of his pack. He was glad that he’d sketched out what the flowers were supposed to look like, since, even if she could read his own language, he wasn’t sure if she’d know what his species called the flowers of her forest. She took the parchment from him and studied it as he tended to the beef, flipping it over. He crouched by the fire, first facing it, then eventually turning away from it, letting it dry him.

“So you’ve got this first one?” she asked, pointing.

“Yes. It’s in my pack,” he replied.

“Well, one of them is definitely harder than the rest. Maybe we should get it out of the way,” she suggested.

“Okay...why is it hard?” he asked.

“It’s at the top of a very tall tree. It’s...a bit of a dangerous climb.”

Seth frowned as he considered that. She had a point, he should probably get it out of the way. He briefly considered asking her if she had some way of helping him, but...no. No, he had to do this on his own, if at all possible.

“I suppose you’re right,” he replied. “Can you help me find it?”

“Yes. I can do that.”

“Thank you.” He saw that his beef was nearly done and quickly began dressing. “Do you have questions for me?”

“Lots,” she replied.

“Ask away.”

They sat down at the fire-pit and he put it out with a quick frost spell, then split the beef with her, as she was hungry as well.

“Why do you live inside those...buildings?” she asked.

“I guess it’s because we feel safer in there. We used to live out in the woods, in the land, with no roof over our head. Or, I mean, I suppose we did. But the land is a dangerous place, and I guess we wanted to make progress.”

“Make progress? What do you mean?” she asked.

“Well, living out here in the wilderness, it takes pretty much all our energy to survive and hunt enough food to earn back the energy spent. It’s a zero sum game. But if we live together, in settlements, we can unify, work towards larger goals like exploration and invention and societal advancement. Or...well, that’s the idea, anyway. In practice, we mostly just use the extra time for leisure activities,” he murmured.

“I see,” she said quietly.

They finished their meal and he packed up his camp. “Well, how about we start heading for that flower?” he suggested.

“That sounds fine by me. It’s not too far from here. We’ll have to go farther towards the mountains,” Rain replied.

To the north then. He finished packing his backpack and took a moment to make sure he hadn’t left anything behind, then double-checked that the fire was really out. Once he felt confident about it, he and Rain started walking.

CHAPTER VI

As they walked on, the questions began to grow more personal.

“So...why are you here?” Rain asked after several moments of silence while she had been mulling over his answer to why he, and others, wore clothing.

“Here? Like, doing this?” he asked. She nodded. “Ugh. I guess...a lot of reasons. My primary one is that I wasn’t satisfied with my life. I wanted something more. I wanted adventure. But there’s other reasons. I guess at least part of it was because I never felt...accepted, in my community. I always felt like an outsider looking in, a pariah, an outcast. Some of it was obvious, given that my, hmm, how to explain this, my physical appearance is inadequate.”

“Inadequate?” she asked, but something in her tone suggested she got it.

“Yes. People in my village, and in my society for the most part, tend to expect men to be...larger. More built. More physically capable. Strong. If you aren’t, if you’re built like me, well...people tend not to like you. As for why I am the way I am, I guess it’s because I focused more on knowledge and magical practices. Though, in retrospect, I suppose I should have focused at least a bit more on my body, given the nature of what I’ll be doing out here.”

“I think I understand,” she said. “What did your parents think of this?”

“Oh, they hated it. They told me I was going to fail, they condemned me for leaving. So...that didn’t go to well.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she replied quietly. “Although I do understand a little bit what it’s like to be an...an outcast.”

“You do?” he asked, glancing over at her as they walked on through the trees. They’d been moving apparently at random through the forest, as Rain was leading him, and he was essentially trusting her with that. But she seemed to know where she was going, so he hadn’t said anything or tried to alter the course.

“I do,” she confirmed unhappily. “It’s because of my...I look more human than most dryads do. The hair is just the most obvious thing. So I know about physical appearances and the problems they might cause.”

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. She just nodded silently. The quiet played out and he decided maybe he should start asking some of his own questions. “So, um...I know that you’re a guardian of the forest. But what is it you do? I mean, specifically?” he asked.

“Lots of things,” she replied. “I can defend the forest if I must, from evil or from men or elves who are trying to damage the forest in some way. Though honestly it’s very rarely elves, or even felis or beryl, it’s mostly humans...” she hesitated, looked over at him. “I’m sorry, was that offensive? I didn’t exactly mean for it to be...”

“It’s fine,” he replied. “I figure that you’re right. Elves and felis, and even beryl I imagine, are more in tune with nature and have more respect for the land.”

She nodded sadly. “It’s true. But that’s the most obvious of my jobs. I tend to the forest itself. I heal plants, I guide them in their growth. The trees, mainly. I’m not a flower nymph, although I do have dominion over them. I burn dying trees that have no hope of recovery to make way for the new generation of life. I guide the growth of the trees in certain areas. I ensure that sicknesses do not arise from the forest. And,” she smiled, “I apparently help cute young human men in their endeavors to find rare plants.”

She thought he was cute?

He wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “...I appreciate it,” he responded lamely, because he was terrible at talking to women.

Especially extremely attractive dryads.

“There,” Rain said suddenly. “There it is.”

They came into another, larger clearing, and near its center was a tree. It was a large, very tall tree. He felt fear steal into his soul as he stared up at it. He was dwarfed by it. It was huge. Seth swallowed nervously.

“So that’s it, huh?” he asked.

“Yes, I’m afraid so. I don’t know if you can see it, but the plant you seek is up there. Its a long, slender thing, green and blue. It grows only at the very top.” She hesitated. “I might be able to help you with this...”

He sighed and shook his head. “No, I need to do this on my own. I need to...to prove to myself that I can do this.”

“Okay. I’ll be here, waiting. Please be careful, Seth.”

He couldn’t help but grin at that. “I’ll most certainly try.”

She smiled nervously at him. He shrugged out of his pack, took off his sword, his bow and quiver, everything but the clothes on his back. Seth walked up to the tree and stared up. It had to be a good eighty feet tall. Holy shit. There were a lot of sturdy branches, though. So he thought that he could probably do this…

Provided nothing went wrong.

Seth sighed. He felt good. He’d slept a lot, gotten healed, gotten clean and had a good meal. And he’d been in the company of an astoundingly beautiful dryad. He could do this. Right now, he felt like he could do this.

With a heavy sigh, Seth stepped up to the tree, grabbed the first of the branches, and began to haul his skinny self up. At first, it went pretty well. As he climbed, he settled into a good rhythm, as it quickly became easy to find the next branch. He found his mind wandering. Why was he so attracted to Rain? He supposed that some of it might have to do with the fact that she looked a bit more human...but he didn’t think so. He’d seen drawings of dryads and he’d always, from the first time, thought they were beautiful in a...well, okay, a sexual kind of way. Why was that? It wasn’t normal. It wasn’t normal at all.

It was one thing to be attracted to elves. They were basically just petite humans with pointy ears. There were a lot of guys that liked to pretend like they wouldn’t fuck an elf if they had the chance, but he didn’t believe them.

When they said the same thing about the lizard-like beryl or the cat-like felis...well, he tended to believe more of them. Not because he had anything against them, (he actually thought beryl and felis women were very attractive and pretty), but more because the differences between the races was more obvious, and therefore it was easier to be racist. But those were all town-dwellers, what some would probably called ‘civilized’.

(Well, the humans at least, maybe the elves, he didn’t think many people in his village thought of beryl and felis as civilized, much to his chagrin.)

Dryads, on the other hand?

Gods, no. No one would understand wanting to kiss a dryad, wanting to lay with a dryad...wanting to make love with one.

Although he had secretly had fantasies about them, in his heart, Seth hadn’t thought he’d ever really be interested in doing that. He thought it would be too strange. That she would be too different, too alien, too bizarre.

And yet...here he was.

Attracted to a dryad. Sexually interested in a dryad. It was a stupid thing to think about, he knew, and not just because he was climbing an eighty foot tree. He imagined that Rain had no interested in making love with him. Even if she thought he was cute...dryads were probably just more open, her comment probably didn’t mean that much to her. Something said casually. Seth sighed and pressed on, climbing higher and higher.

He paused and looked around, then felt his heart leap into his throat. Gods, he was high now. He had climbed above most of the other trees, and he could see...for miles now. Despite his terror, he could also feel an intense sense of wonder and awe. To the north, he could see the Frost Mountains, rising into the blue skies like great white teeth. Off to the west and down to the south, he could just barely start to make out the ocean. Back the way he’d come, he could see a few villages. It was a rush, and for a second, he almost lost his grip.

“Are you okay!?” Rain called up to him.

“I’m fine!” he yelled back down. “Just fine!”

He kept climbing then, trying to keep a good pace. He really, really hoped that the plant he was looking for was up here. He had to wonder why it only grew at the top of this damned tree. Well, looking around, he could see other trees of this height around. Maybe a couple of dozen of them. It must be something to do with the type of tree, and maybe with magic, too. Frowning, he told himself that if it was easy, then everyone would do it.

If you wanted to do great things, you tended to have to do dangerous or difficult things.

This certainly qualified as both.

And yet, a few minutes later, he managed to reach the top without a problem. Relief hit him, but especially so when he found the plant he was looking for. Sadly, it was short-lived as, after plucking it from the tree and slipping it into his pocket, he looked down and realized that his journey was only half over. He still had to climb back down. Seth took a deep breath and told himself he could do this, because what other choice did he have, honestly?

He began the long, slow climb down.

“Did you get it?!” Rain called up to him.

“I got it!” he called back. He hoped she didn’t call anything else up to him, he needed to concentrate. Not that he didn’t appreciate the interest. The sheer idea that there was someone else who was actually interested in his well being, in his hopes, in this journey he had decided to take on, was pretty mind-blowing to him.

Halfway down, he ran into a problem.

“Seth! There’s a bird coming at you!” Rain called.

He almost laughed. A bird? Then he heard an almost painfully loud caw and jerked his head around. And there, coming right for him, was one big fucking bird. “Shit!” he screamed. It was reaching for him with huge talons that glinted brilliantly in the sunlight. He almost reached for his sword, but he’d left the damned thing down on the ground. And what difference would it make anyway? He was okay with a sword, but he didn’t think he could execute many maneuvers up here, hanging forty feet high off of a tree.

Instead, in an act of desperation, he shoved his hand towards it, palm out and flat, and released a burst of frost magic. It wasn’t very strong, as he didn’t have a lot of magic stored up in him, and there was only so much he could pull from the air in a very short amount of time, but a frigid blast of air hit the bird and apparently that was enough. It let out a startled squawk and turned away, flapping furiously in the opposite direction. Seth let out a long sigh of relief, then screamed as he lost his footing.

He latched onto the branch he was holding into and scrambled to put his feet back on something solid. He succeeded, but his heart was still thundering in his chest. For a moment, he simply stood there, eyes closed, trying to get his breath back. Finally, he found some courage again and began the slow descent downwards.

Though now he was going a little faster, knowing that big bird could come back. It looked fairly mean and nasty and if it got ahold of him, it could easily tear him off the tree and send him plummeting to his death.

Seth kept going until he was about ten feet off the ground.

And that was when he fell.

His foot went right out from under him as he placed it on what appeared to be a fairly stable branch. It snapped right about the time he heard Rain call out a warning, but it was too late. He lost his grip and fell the rest of the way. As he slammed into the ground feet first, there was an awful crack somewhere inside his right ankle that sent white-hot pain zigzagging up through his leg and into his whole body like lightning.

“FUCK!” he screamed as he collapsed into a heap. Again, reacting almost automatically, he began to draw as much magic from the air as he could, this time focusing it into a healing spell. Rain was at his side, asking him where he was hurt, but he could only focus on the pain. It felt world-ending. It was the worst he’d ever felt in his life and pushed all other thoughts out of his head. He laid his hand against his ankle, crying out as he did so, but began forcing the healing magic in. He felt the pain start to lessen, the heat begin to dissipate as a cooling sensation started to spread out. But he could tell this was going to take a bit.

“Seth, I can help,” Rain said.

“No. I-I got it,” he muttered, pulling harder, trying to draw more magic from the air. Seconds went by, then a few minutes. He could feel it taking a toll on his body, could feel exhaustion beginning to set in. He’d never really worked on his endurance this way. Another thing to fix. Gods was this really turning out to be a trial by fire.

In the end, he healed his broken ankle, but by the time he was finished, he could feel his body beginning to give out. Using your own body as a conduit for magic was a taxing thing, and it was only through lots of training that you got any good at it. Try to do too much, too fast, and there would be consequences.

Consequently, Seth looked over once at Rain, who stared back at him, worry obvious on her exotic features, and passed out.

…

When he woke up, it was noticeably darker.

He shifted and groaned, but felt no pain at least. Rain was at his side in a moment. “You’re awake. Finally. I was really beginning to worry.”

“Sorry,” he replied, or rather, croaked. He was extremely thirsty. “Where’s my, ah, pack?” he asked.

“Here.”

She pulled it up next to him. Seth took a moment to pull his other bottle of water out of it, then drank about half of it in one go. He replaced the cork and set it beside him. As he laid there, gathering his thoughts, several emotions came to him. Guilt and embarrassment were the two most powerful. Embarrassment because he could have let Rain handle the healing and not have passed out, given that she was no doubt far, far better at magic. Guilt because he’d gone and passed out on her, apparently for several hours, and essentially forced her into caring for him.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“Why?” she replied.

He growled. “I was stupid, I passed out, you had to take care of me like a fucking child, haul my stupid ass around...”

“Seth,” she laid a hand on his chest, “it’s fine. I don’t mind. You handled the situation fairly well. Although, I’m going to be honest, I know that you...you’re trying to prove that you can do this on your own, but no one does everything on their own. If you’re going to be out here, doing dangerous things, you really need to learn that it’s okay to let someone else help you. If something like that happens again, please let me heal you.”

That would make him feel bad, useless, incapable of taking care of himself. But it’d feel worse if he passed out again like this. And he knew there was truth to her words. No one did everything by themselves, and it was stupid to assume he should or even could.

“I won’t turn away your help,” he said.

She smiled. “Good. I’m very glad.”

He got to his feet. “Now the next one on the-whoa.” He stumbled as his head went light, his vision graying temporarily. Rain placed her hands on him, steadying him. “Oh wow, maybe...uh, maybe I should take a little break.”

“It’s getting late, Seth. Maybe we should call it a night? I know of a grove nearby with a wonderful hot spring,” Rain replied.

That sounded extremely wonderful. For a moment, he tried to resist the thought, and the temptation. He really should be getting back to work, but...Seth sighed softly. What was his rush? Was there a time limit? One of the reasons he’d been looking forward to living this life was that he would be able to do things at his own pace. And, perhaps most important of all, that he would be able to enjoy himself. When he’d lived back in the village, everything had just been GO all the time. Between him trying to train up and learn in preparation for his journey and all the work his parents piled on him trying to prevent that, he’d never gotten any time to himself.

But now he was his own master.

“That sounds like a great idea. I’d appreciate it,” he said as he grabbed his pack. He found that she’d grabbed his sword, bow, and quiver of arrows for him as well. He got it all back in place and turned to face her. “I’m ready.”

She smiled at him, hesitated, then extended her hand. Unsure of exactly what that might mean, he cautiously reached out and took it. That seemed to be what she wanted, because her smile widened and she squeezed his hand gently. He squeezed back and let her begin leading him through the forest. What did this mean? He wasn’t sure, but he liked it. Seth told himself to calm down. It would make sense that dryads would more...touchy-feely, he supposed. Then again, it might make less sense for them to be that way with humans.

He decided to just go with it for now.

She led him for a few minutes through the woods, and as they walked, he really began to notice the atmosphere. The smells, the vibrant colors, the wonderful mixture of sounds of nature around them, the soft, cool breeze. It called to something in him, filling him with a powerful sense of peace and tranquility, a serene sense of wonder. It was something he’d felt sometimes when out hunting, but he’d never really gotten to enjoy it.

“It’s wonderful here, Rain,” he murmured.

“You like it here?” she asked.

“I love it here,” he answered. “...you sound surprised.”

“I’m not...I mean, okay, I am, a little. I’m sorry. It’s just that...a lot of humans don’t really appreciate the wonder of nature. To be fair, it kind of comes with the territory of being a dryad, since I...well, am nature, I guess.”

“I understand,” he replied.

They broke through the treeline and came into a beautiful grove. He stopped and stared, taking in the lush vegetation, the vibrant flowers that ringed the grove, the hot spring at its center that looked extremely inviting, steam rising off of the crystal clear water.

“This is amazing,” he murmured, taking off his pack. He turned to face her. “Thank you, for bringing me here.”

She beamed at him. “You’re welcome. I haven’t...”

“What?”

“I haven’t brought anyone else here before.”

“Oh. Then thank you again, for sharing this with me.”

“You’re welcome.” She opened her mouth again, then hesitated, suddenly looking nervous. “Would you like to hunt some animals? For dinner? I figured we could make camp here tonight, then tomorrow, we can get the next plant.”

“Okay, that sounds great.”

He grabbed his bow and arrow and they went out and spent a little while hunting. As they did, he noticed that Rain seemed to be tensing up. Her movements were stiff and a little jumpy, and she wasn’t talking. He wondered if it had to do with the fact that they were hunting, but that didn’t seem to bother her. Even after he shot and killed a pair of rabbits, she didn’t seem any further upset by it. They took the rabbits back to camp where he skinned and cleaned them, then they started a fire in a pit and he set up the cooking pan.

“Are you okay?” he asked as they waited for the food to cook.

“I’m just a little anxious,” she replied.

“Why? Is it something I did?”

“Oh no, it isn’t you. I mean, it’s nothing you did. I mean...” she sighed suddenly, frustrated. “Let’s eat dinner, then we can talk about it.”

“...okay.”

He began to feel his own anxiety. He found himself wanting to believe her, that he hadn’t done anything wrong, but still...something was bothering her. Was she going to decide that this wasn’t working out? Leave him to his own devices? One part of him thought maybe he shouldn’t rely on her so much, but another, much larger part of him, wanted her to stay for a number of reasons. He found his eyes continually drawn her beautiful, nude body, her bark-like skin, her curvy hips and trim, fit thighs and stunning breasts.

He looked away, feeling bad. She was helping him, being kind to him, and probably wouldn’t appreciate being stared at like that. If it even registered to her. Would she care? Either way, he should just calm down.

“So...what can I expect to deal with for the rest of the plants?” he asked, tending to the pair of rabbits they were cooking.

She looked at the list again. As she did, he suddenly realized that he hadn’t put away the plant he’d risked his life for. He pulled out the bottle that had the first flower and carefully extracted the second plant from his pocket. It was still intact. He slipped it into the bottle and pushed the cork back in, then replaced it.

“Well, this one only grows deep in caves. I think we should probably do that one next, as it’s the nearest. This one here...you can only see it at night. It’s called the Moon Lily. During the day it looks like several other different types of flower, but during the night, it glows a beautiful white. The final plant only grows along the southern coast. The cave one should be the most difficult, since dangerous things sometimes end up in caves,” she explained.

“So you think we should do that one next?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Okay then, we’ll do it. And thanks again for helping me.”

“You’re welcome.”

Soon, the rabbits finished and they began eating. “So, you like eating cooked meat?” he asked. “I thought you’d be a vegetarian.”

“I mostly subsist on sunlight and water and plants. But I sometimes enjoy meat. It’s rare, though. I try not to indulge as it’s...frowned upon. I think I only like it because of my more human characteristics.” A look of great sadness passed across her face. She sighed. “It’s not easy being different,” she murmured.

“It’s really not,” he agreed and, because it seemed appropriate, he reached out and laid his hand over the back of hers.

“You’re sweet,” she said, taking his hand.

“Well...I try to be. When I get the rare occasions to do so.”

They finished eating and then laid side by side on the soft grassy ground, staring up at the darkening sky. He could see the beginnings of the stars starting to come out. The breeze whispered through the treetops.

“Would you like to bathe now?” Rain asked softly after several minutes.

“I would,” he replied. “I really need it, after everything that’s happened.”

She sat up. “I suppose so. Poisoned and you broke your ankle all inside of one day. You’ve had it a bit rough,” she agreed.

He nodded as he stood up slowly, popping a few joints and groaning at the release of tension. “I’m really going to be happy to see my bedroll tonight,” he said.

“Do you mind...if I join you? In the hot spring?” she asked hesitantly.

“Uh no, not at all,” he replied.

They moved over to the hot spring, and he began to get undressed. He hesitated as he got down to his undershorts, then remembered that he’d been naked in front of her already, and took them off. Together, they moved down into the hot spring. The hot water briefly took away all his other thoughts as he sank gratefully into it. It was the perfect temperature, right at the edge of being too hot. It felt fantastic on his sore, tired body.

“Would you be okay with me rubbing your shoulders?” Rain asked.

“I would,” he replied. “Uh...thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” She moved behind him and placed her hands on his bare shoulders, then began to work her fingers, kneading the skin there. Her own flesh was soft and smooth and very warm. It felt fantastic.

“That’s really great,” he murmured. “How, uh, do you know about shoulder rubs? Or, I mean, is that a thing in dryad culture, too?” he asked.

“It isn’t really. I...I sometimes, uh, follow some humans and elves when they travel through the forest. And I’ve seen them do this. They seem to like it. I thought you would.”

“I really, really do. It feels great,” he replied.

“Good. Just...relax, and I’ll take care of you,” she murmured.

As she kept rubbing his shoulders, he began to get an uncomfortable erection. His stomach was starting to churn, his heart beating harder. Why was he so damned horny all the time? He thought about sex a lot. He understood that that was apparently something that was fairly normal for a teenager to do, given the amount it came up among some of the others his age he talked with. He found himself thinking of Lyra.

That only made the erection worse.

He felt Rain move against him. She’d stopped rubbing his shoulders and now was pressing herself against his back. Oh Gods, he could feel her breasts against his skin. Her beautiful, firm breasts, and her nipples even. He was breathing heavily now, his heart thundering in his chest. She brought her arms around and placed her hands on his chest. He could feel her chin resting on his shoulder. What was she doing?

Was she actually initiating some kind of intimacy?

Gods, please…

Without saying anything, she slid her hands slowly down the length of his torso. She moved carefully, as if afraid of scaring him. He didn’t say anything, didn’t move an inch, wanting desperately to see if this was going where he thought, where he prayed it was going. Her right hand came to rest over his cock.

She wrapped her fingers around it, started to slowly massage it. Then, gripping it with her right hand, she brought her left hand up and placed her palm flat against the head. She slowly began to rub the head against her skin.

“Rain...” he moaned loudly.

She stopped. “Are you...is this okay, Seth?” she whispered in his ear. “Do you want me to stop? I will if you want me to.”

“Don’t stop. Please don’t stop, Rain,” he groaned.

She hesitated a few seconds further, then resumed. Pleasure crackled through him as she rubbed the head of his cock against her palm. He moaned again, louder.

“I’m going to make you orgasm,” she whispered in his ear, and her voice had taken on a husky, sultry note. Her breath was hot in his ear. “I want you to come for me, Seth. I want you climax. I want to make it happen for you.”

“Please,” he whispered. “Please, Rain...”

She stopped rubbing and got a better grip on his cock, then she began to jerk him off. Slowly at first. She wrapped her other arm around his stomach, holding him to her. “Do you like that?” she whispered. “Do you like me touching you there? Do you like the feel of my skin against yours? My breasts against your back?”

“Yes, Rain,” he panted. “Rain, it’s so wonderful. You feel so good...”

“Do you think I’m beautiful, Seth?” She was practically panting now, too.

“Yes, Gods yes! You’re so attractive, Rain. You’re so beautiful.”

She began jerking him off faster and he barely lasted another half minute. His cock was throbbing almost painfully, pulsing with the pleasure she was giving him, filling his body with a tremendous bliss.

And then he was coming.

He cried out her name, his whole body jerking in response. Rapturous ecstasy exploded within him like a hammer striking an anvil. He moaned and yelled his pleasure as he started to orgasm, his cock kicking furiously in her firm grasp, spitting its seed out into the water. She was continuing to milk him, to jack him off, pumping his cock dry.

“That’s a good boy, Seth,” she moaned. “That’s a good boy. Come for me. Please, come for me...”

“Oh, Rain!” he cried, and with one, final burst of release, he was finished. Gasping for breath, he sagged against her. “Oh, Rain. Oh...my Gods, oh that was amazing.”

“Was it really?” she asked, and she sat down on a rock shelf near the edge of the hot spring, her head above water, him in her lap. She was holding him now. “Was it good, Seth? Do you regret it...now that you can think more clearly?”

“What? No, of course not,” he replied. “That was fantastic.” He felt himself floating, not just in water, but in that sea of post-orgasmic bliss. His head began to clear slightly. “And, not that I’m complaining, but...why?”

“Why did I pleasure you?” she asked. He nodded. “Well...isn’t it obvious?”

“No, not really.”

She sighed. “I want to make love with you, Seth. I’m sexually attracted to you. Do you want...I mean, are you interested?”

“In sex? With you?” he asked, feeling extremely stupid right now, like even the most basic thoughts were getting caught and tripped up in his mind.

A small smile slipped onto her face, among the anxiety he was currently seeing. “Yes, Seth. Do you want to have sex with me, right here, right now?” she replied.

“Yes. I do. I really fucking want to.”

“Then do it, Seth.”

He was trembling with nervousness and excitement now. His cock hadn’t even fully softened, it was still mostly erect, ready for round two. He tried to remember what to do, what he had done before, and moved closer to her, both of them still mostly underwater. He was going to have sex with a dryad. Oh Gods, he was really, actually going to do this. He was going to have unprotected…

“Do we need protection?” he asked, his face now inches from hers.

She smiled and shook her head. “No. Dryads can become impregnated by humans and elves, but only if we choose to. You don’t have to worry about anything, Seth. All you have to worry about is feeling good.”

“And, well, making you feel good,” he said.

Her smile widened. “That would be appreciated, but I think, this first encounter will be a pleasure all its own.”

And then she was kissing him, pressing her sweet green lips against his, and wrapping her long arms around him, hugging him, pressing his chest against her slick, hot, firm, bare breasts. All other thoughts were blasted out of his head as his lips met hers, and he hugged her back, doing as he had wanted to do so badly, pressing his lips firmly against her own. She tasted...of honeysuckle. She tasted of crystal clear springwater.

She tasted of perfect, golden spring days, when the land almost seemed aflame with greenery, when everything was in full bloom.

There was an earthy scent to her that he hadn’t noticed before, that was strong now. It intoxicated him. Seth slid his hands down the smooth curve of her back, expecting her skin to be rough, like tree bark, but it was actually very smooth, and soft, and hot, and felt like human skin. His hands kept going down until they settled on the firm swell of her ass. Gods, she had such a hot ass. There was a pleasant thickness to it, and she was in such fantastic shape.

Both of them breathing heavily now as they continued making out, Rain closed her eyes and let out a soft moan as she tilted her head and deepened the kiss. He squeezed her ass, pulling her closer against him, hugging her as tightly against him as he could, as though he couldn’t possibly get close enough to her, and she squeezed him back, like she needed him as utterly as she needed sunshine. Right then, she was his entire world.

Rain parted his lips with her own, and slipped her tongue dexterously into his mouth, probing gently for his own. He moved his tongue forward to meet hers. They touched, and twined tentatively together. Then, as if growing braver, more certain, they began to dance an old dance of lust, twisting together, sharing saliva, and the things he had been tasting, that dryad taste, flooded his mouth, nearly overwhelming him.

It felt like he was kissing nature itself.

His erection was a steel bar now, fitted between her hard, athletic thighs.

But no, not sex, not yet. A thought bubbled to the surface, from the sunken depths of his mind, that there was something he was missing. Something that needed to be done. And then he had it, and he broke the kiss.

“What’s wrong?” Rain gasped, her eyes shooting open.

“Nothing,” he replied, getting his breath back. “Nothing. I...want to pleasure you. Let me pleasure you as you pleasured me, Rain. It’s only fair. And I want to.”

“I...okay. Thank you,” she whispered. “What-how do you want me?”

“Up on the side of the hot spring, sit with your feet in the water,” he replied.

“Won’t that make it harder to...oh. You’re going to do that?” she asked, then smiled broadly. “Really?”

“Really,” he replied.

“Thank you,” she said again, more firmly, and kissed him hard on the mouth, then turned and moved over the edge. She hauled herself up and out, then sat down and spread her legs open for him. As he moved over to her and stared up at her perfect, naked body, he thought that she looked like some kind of sex goddess, some deity devoted to lust and love. He wanted to please her, to pleasure her, to hear her moan and scream in ecstasy.

Seth had never actually eaten a woman out before.

He’d always intended to, and he’d actually found a rather...detailed book on the subject a few years back, and had always intended to put the knowledge to use. But he and his lover had never gotten that far.

Now it was time for a trial by fire.

He stared at her dryad vagina, a narrow, light green slit between her legs above the opening itself. Okay, okay...he could do this. Seth rested his forearms on her thighs and felt her shudder slightly at the skin-on-skin contact. He looked up at her, very close now, his face pretty much in her crotch. She smiled down at him.

“Don’t be nervous,” she said. “I...foreplay isn’t really much of a thing among dryads. So my standards are pretty low. Uh, I mean, not to...I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that to be an insult,” she added nervously.

“It’s fine,” he replied. “That works in my favor. I’ve...never done this before.”

“Oh...well, I guess I’m glad that I’m the first one you can do it with.” She smiled. “You’re giving it to me, your first oral sex. I’m excited.”

“Me too. And nervous.”

He placed his thumbs on either side of her vagina and carefully parted the taut lips there. He revealed a field of pale green-brown glistening flesh and a small almost white nub. Her clitoris, nestled among the field, ready for attention. Take it slow, he remembered that. Take it slow. Seth leaned in and took in a breath, then slowly let it out, let it whispered across the oh so sensitive skin there, and Rain trembled once more.

He stuck his tongue out and touched the tip of it to her clit. He could smell tree sap now, a lot of it, and he thought the smell might be bad or strange, but it wasn’t. If anything, it spurred him on further, intoxicated him further. She moaned, a low, arousing sound, as his tongue touched her clit. Slowly, gently, Seth began to massage it, using only the tip. Rain was breathing heavier now. He kept going, letting it draw out over minutes.

Gradually, he began to increase the pressure which he applied to her clit, and then he started going a little bit faster, licking at the small nub. Rain was moaning much louder now, and she moaned his name several times, and Gods, that sound...hearing a woman, a dryad woman, moan your name in sexual bliss was just…

It was unlike anything he had ever felt before.

It lit him as though he’d been struck by lightning, empowered him, emboldened him. Some of his fears and anxieties began to slip away as he lost himself in the act of pure sexual pleasure. He continued licking her clit, going faster and harder, using more of his tongue, stimulating her, pleasuring her.

Seth had intended to use his finger, to push one into her tight opening, to pleasure her even further, but he didn’t get that far. She let out an almost strangled cry of pleasure. “Back!” she gasped. “Stop! I’m coming! I’m coming!” she cried, and he backed off a little bit, head in between her knees, and he watched her.

Rain was orgasming all right.

It was a beautiful sight.

She had her legs spread out, her head thrown back, and she was supporting herself with the heels of her palms, leaning back. Her beautiful breasts were stuck out, bouncing and jiggling so seductively as she jerked and twitched as the pleasure overtook her. Her thigh muscles were bulging and relaxing, bulging and relaxing, and her hips were jerking forward. He knew that some women sprayed sex juices and some didn’t.

Rain did neither.

As he watched, a thick, greenish substance began to come out of her pussy, and he realized at once what it was. Tree sap. She was orgasming tree sap. He thought the sight might turn him off, but it didn’t, not at all. It was hot, sexy in some strange, alien way. Her orgasm lasted longer than he thought it would, and when she was finished, she let out a long, explosive breath and slipped bonelessly back into the water.

“Oh Seth,” she whispered, gasping for breath. “Seth that was amazing. That was...oh my. That was the best orgasm I’ve ever had.”

“Really?” he asked.

“Yes. Truly. Oh, by Vivian, I feel so much better.” She opened her eyes suddenly and fixed him with her fiery green gaze. “And I’m so fucking horny still. I want you inside of me, Seth. I want your human cock driving furiously into me.”

“I can do that,” he said. “How should we, uh...”

“Come here,” she replied.

He came over to her. There was a natural rock shelf she was sitting on and, looking down through the clear waters, he saw that it was the perfect height to fuck at. She scooted to its edge, so that her vagina was right there, ready and waiting desperately to be fucked. He was rock hard, his cock throbbing in anticipation.

Okay, he was actually going to do this now.

He was going to have unprotected sex with a dryad.

He swallowed and stepped up to her, then reached down, gripping his cock, trying to get it into her. It took a few tries, since they were both nervous and shifting around slightly, but then he got the head of his dick resting against the tight, hot, wet opening of her dryad vagina, and then he pushed, carefully, slowly.

And he was inside of her.

Oh Gods, he was inside of a dryad, with no protection, nothing between them. He felt a groan torn from his throat as he pushed his way into her, and at the same time felt her body shudder in response, heard her gasp and moan. He kept looking down for a moment, watching as his penis disappeared inside of her tight pussy, came back out, disappeared again, going deeper this time. Within just a few, short thrusts, he was able to bury himself completely within her. He looked up at her then, into her eyes.

It felt like his whole body was trembling.

“Rain,” he whispered.

She wrapped her legs around him. “Make love to me, Seth,” she murmured back, holding his eyes with her vivid, brilliant green ones. He leaned in and kissed her hard on the mouth as he began driving into her, and she moaned loudly into the kiss. Seth gave himself entirely to her then, entirely to the sexual encounter.

The last of his worries, his concerns, his anxieties over his shortcomings or any small paranoid thoughts he might be having about going totally bareback with a dryad, with an inhuman woman, with what many would call a monster, slipped away.

He was fucking a monster woman.

Rain seemed as into this as he was, kissing him back fervently, shoving her tongue into his mouth, holding him to her. He slipped a hand up between them and began groping one of her breasts. It felt so good in his grasp, so perfect, and the way it fit into his hand, it was like it belonged there, like they were designed for each other.

She felt different inside.

He thought she might, because of the tree sap, and he’d been a little worried, because tree sap was not the most lubricating of substances. At least not in its natural state. And there was a weird, gelled slickness to her, but there was another quality there, one that felt immensely good. Her vagina almost seemed to suction his cock back in each time he pulled back, and that feeling, that suction, was incredible.

Rain broke the kiss and cried out. “Oh yes! Right there!” she screamed.

Wanting to keep this pleasure going, struck by inspiration, he reached down beneath the waterline and grabbed her leg. She shifted slightly, to try and accommodate him, as he brought her leg up and rested her ankle on his shoulder.

“Oh my-oh fuck yes! That’s the fucking spot, Seth! Oh keep fucking it!” she shrieked.

Holy Gods, he never thought he’d get a reaction like this out of a woman, but he wanted to keep it going, wanted to hear more, wanted so badly to pleasure her, to make her orgasm. He gripped her leg and kept driving into her, feeling the pleasure of her vagina, their skin rubbing together, all of it slowly beginning to overwhelm him.

He was going to come.

Seth fought it, focusing. He wanted to make her come again, at least one more time. From the way she screaming in ecstasy, he was probably close. He moved his other hand down, in between them, fumbling around awkwardly until his thumb finally found her clit. She stopped screaming and gasped, looking him straight in the eyes.

He stared rubbing her clit.

“Oh my-yes! That’s so fucking good!” she cried, reaching up and grabbing him, one hand on his shoulder, the other on the side of his head. “I’m...hrgn...yes!” And then she was coming. That did it. He felt her vagina begin to constrict, felt the muscles inside of her tighten and clench and release and twitch.

And there was a heat to her, a sudden burst of heat, followed immediately by a lot more lubrication.

He had made her orgasm.

“I’m going to come,” he moaned as her own climax tapered off. “Rain, I can’t help it, I’m going to come,” he gasped.

“It’s okay,” she whispered, and brought his head closer to hers, resting their foreheads against each other. “Stare into my eyes and orgasm inside of me,” she said, her voice low and seductive. “Fill me with your human seed. I want it so badly.”

That triggered him almost immediately. There was a familiar clenching and a heat in his balls, and then his dick jerked violently inside the tight confines of her dryad pussy. He cried out, dropping her leg, and she wrapped it immediately around him, both of them now, almost squeezing him with her powerful thighs.

“Yes...” she whispered, both hands on the back of his neck now. “Give it all to me.”

“Oh, Rain!” he cried as his dick started spasming powerfully inside of her, spilling his seed within her, pumping her vagina full of it. He came and came and came. Holy fuck there was so much of it, it felt like it wouldn’t end. He moaned loudly, moaned her name over and over again, utterly lost in the maelstrom of his orgasm. Pleasure burst through him like lightning, pulsing out from his core, filling his body.

He was lost in a world of blissful ecstasy.

Somehow, at some point, his orgasm slowly tapered off and fell away, and Seth was taken away from that world of pure physical pleasure, and returned to his own body. He realized he’d closed his eyes, and opened them.

Rain was looking back at him, smiling lovingly at him.

He was gasping for breath, sweating badly, his whole body trembling from the exertion now. “Oh my Gods,” he whispered, laying against her, getting his breath back. “Oh wow, Rain. That was...the most powerful sex I’ve ever had in my life. It felt so good...”

“It did,” she agreed, whispering in his ear, since he was resting his head on her shoulder now, just trying to stay upright. “It did, Seth. It was incredible.”

He stayed inside of her, leaving his softening cock within her because he didn’t want to pull out yet. He liked being in there, and she seemed to like it, too. For several seconds, maybe as long as half a minute, he was in what felt like a perfect state. Still inside of her, floating in a sea of post-orgasmic bliss, holding her, her holding him.

But eventually, the water became too much for him, the heat. He was becoming lightheaded and knew he needed to get out soon or he’d pass out.

He pulled back slightly, so that his face was in front of hers. “I have to get out. This hot spring is a bit too hot for me,” he said.

“Okay, that’s fine. I’ll get out with you,” she said, smiling sedately at him.

He returned the grin, feeling goofy with hormones right then, high on not just the pleasure, but the connection he’d made with her. Rain had accepted him, had been attracted to him, enough that she had let him inside of her.

That was incredible.

Carefully, he pulled his cock out of her, grunting at the slight burst of pleasure it produced, and took a moment to wash up, dunking his head back underwater and rubbing at his crotch. He could see green on it. Not that he really minded. But he liked to be clean. As soon as he was, he climbed up out of the hot spring with Rain.

They walked in silence over to the fire he’d built and sat down in the grass next to each other. He looked over at her.

“Doesn’t it make you nervous?” he asked suddenly.

“What?” she replied, startled.

“The fire.”

“Oh! No, not really. I can protect myself from fire,” she replied, her smile returning. She reached out and took his hand, and he laced their fingers together, so happy to be touching her. He scooted closer to her, and she leaned against him.

“Should we talk about it?” he asked after a moment. “I mean...that all happened...it was kind of fast, and unexpected.”

“Do you want to talk about it? Do you regret it?” she replied quietly.

“No. Not at all. Not for a second. It was amazing.”

“Then...how about we wait until tomorrow to talk about it?” she said, and he could hear the relief in her voice.

“Okay...do you regret it?”

“Seth, you gave me two screaming orgasms. No. I don’t regret it in the slightest.”

“Okay. I’m glad.”

They sat like that together for several more minutes, and when the fire had dried him, he pulled on his undershorts and they laid down on his bedroll together.

“I’m sorry I don’t have anything more,” he said.

“It’s fine,” she replied, facing him, smiling at him, her face inches from his. “I like it this way. I like the closeness.”

“I do, too. Should I put the fire out?”

“No, it’s safe,” she murmured. “It’s contained, just embers now...it will keep us warm throughout the night,” she said.

“We can keep each other warm,” he replied, and she leaned in and kissed him.

“We can,” she agreed.

And, laying there like that, his head resting on the pillow, staring at her stunningly green eyes that he could definitely tell were glowing with a soft, inner light, magic, probably, he fell asleep almost immediately.

CHAPTER VII

There were dreams that night.

Seth’s whole dreamscape was filled with visions of Rain, of her wonderful, nude body. Her breasts and her hips and her thighs and her lips. Every perfect aspect about her. Sex with her, over and over, and when he opened his eyes the next morning, he felt almost incoherent with lust. He wanted, no, he needed her.

They were still on his bedroll, her lying against him, her back to his chest. He realized that he’d begun groping one of her breasts in his sleep. Seth sat up, breathing heavily, his erection powerful and almost painful between his legs.

“Rain,” he said, placing a hand on her shoulder and pushing her onto her back. “Rain, wake up, please.”

Her eyes opened. “What? What’s going on?” she murmured.

“Can we make love?” he asked, practically begged. “Please, I want it so bad.”

She grinned, no longer a loving smile as with the night before, but a sultry, sexy, lustful grin full of devious intentions.

“Fuck me,” she said.

That was all he needed. He parted her thighs with his hand and pushed her legs open, then laid down in between them and grabbed his cock, taking the few seconds required to get it out of his undershorts and lined up and into her. His whole body was resonating with desire and primal, almost animal need. They both moaned loudly in sexual unity as he penetrated her, sliding easily into her hot, wet perfection. Almost as soon as he was inside of her, he began driving into her furiously, wrapping his arms around her and squeezing her against him.

As she wrapped her legs around him, moaning his name, and reached up, gripping his shoulders, Seth pounded her fucking brains out. What they were doing was different from last night. It was furious and frantic, to be sure, but there had been a mutual attraction, a lust, a first-time twist to the sex then. Now, what they were doing was closer to the mindless rutting of animals, fucking for no other purpose than to satisfy their primal urges.

The sex lasted about a minute, but it was pure pleasure the whole way through.

They both began to orgasm at roughly the same time, both of them grunting and growling as they pressed their hips against each other, and then they were moaning, holding each other tightly, as the orgasms overtook them.

Pleasure washed through him, and for a little while, Seth went away.

When he came back, he felt much more clearheaded, awake, and focused. Both of them lay there, entangled with each other, gasping for breath. Finally, slowly, he pulled out of her and stumbled to his feet. He stretched, popping several of his joints, and looked around the clearing. It was perhaps an hour after sunrise, the air had a pleasant warmth to it, a soft breeze whispering through the trees. He felt...refreshed.

And, he realized very suddenly, that he didn’t feel out of place.

He felt...right. Like this was where he was supposed to be.

Seth had not had that feeling for years now...maybe forever.

“We should bathe, then eat. The next flower may be dangerous,” Rain said as she got up and stood next to him.

He nodded. “Good ideas.”

Seth took a moment to rekindle the fire, then lay out what was left of the beef he had on him. Once it was set cooking, he shed his undershorts and joined Rain in the hot spring. It felt fantastic, enveloping him in a beautiful warmth.

Neither of them spoke as they washed up, then got out and sat by the fire. He noticed that she dried very quickly, and pointed it out.

“Oh, it’s just a side effect of being a dryad,” she replied. “We dry fast. The water more rolls off of our skin, or we absorb it.”

“Neat,” he said.

Seth tended to the beef, flipping it until it was finished cooking, and then, as they began eating their breakfast, he decided to try again.

“So...should we talk about it?” he asked.

“What, specifically, do you want to talk about? What aspect?” she replied curiously.

“Well...why?” he replied.

She snorted. “What?”

“Why did you have sex with me? Why did you pleasure me?”

“Well...because I find you attractive. I mean...do I need a better reason? Oh, am I missing something? Some cultural thing?” she asked, more attentive now.

“No. I mean...well, maybe.” He heaved a sigh. “I don’t know, I’ve never been very good at that stuff. The cultural stuff. But, no, this is about me, and us. I guess, I don’t understand why you’re okay with having sex with me. Both because I’m a human, and because I’m...well, I can’t imagine I’m very attractive.”

“Why not?”

“It was made obvious to me, in my village, that I’m not attractive.”

“If that’s true, then I’m sorry. But we aren’t in your village anymore, Seth. I’m not human. I’m a dryad. The fact of the matter is that...I’ve always wanted to make love with a human. An elf, too. A felis, a beryl, a serpentine...I’ve fantasized about many, many different species. But I’ve never worked up the courage to do so, nor have I found myself in an ideal situation to act on these desires. Until I met you...until last night.

“As for why that is? Why I’m attracted to those outside of my own species? I don’t know. But what about you? I could ask you the same question. Doesn’t the fact that I’m not of your own species, not even a town-dweller but a ‘monster’, scare you?”

“No, not really,” he replied. “And I don’t think you’re a monster.”

“Thank you, I appreciate that,” she said, smiling, placing her hand on the back of his. “And I do know how you feel, actually. I’m...different, from other dryads. I can’t honestly tell if they do find me ugly...or are jealous of my perceived beauty. Dryads are, well, we can be complicated. It’s not very fun to put with.”

“I imagine it wouldn’t be. So, what, they give you trouble because you kind of resemble a human a little bit?” he asked.

“No, it’s...it’s not quite that simple.” She sighed suddenly. “I don’t really want to get into it. I’m sorry if I’m being evasive, it’s just...complicated and I hate it.”

“Okay, I won’t push,” Seth replied.

“Thank you.”

They finished eating, then put out the fire, and packed up the camp. Such as it was. After this, provided it all went well, Seth really needed to make some major purchases. Of course, that would require actual, real coin.

As soon as all of that was dealt with, Rain began leading him away from the clearing. “So...what’s so dangerous about this flower?” he asked.

“Well, it’s not a flower, a mushroom, actually, is what you’re looking for.”

“Oh...yeah, duh. Sorry. You’re...distractingly beautiful.”

She laughed again, louder this time. “Good to know. It only grows deep in some caves, pretty far in there, and there might be something dangerous in there. Caves attract evil things. I’m not sure why. But we tend to avoid them. So...you’re going to have to be on guard. I’ll help protect you, but it’s dangerous for dryads, too.”

He frowned, considering it as they walked through the trees, among the flowers and sunshine, nature all around them. He was afraid to put his own life at risk, obviously, but he didn’t know if he could ask Rain to do that.

“Seth,” she said suddenly, reaching out and taking his hand. “I want to do this for you. I want to help you. Don’t feel like you have to tell me not to risk myself on your behalf. I want to do this. Plus, on a practical level, we dryads, and often the serpentine, do have to go into the caves on our land and clear them out, make sure nothing truly evil is gathering in there. So this is something I really need to do as well. So...don’t worry.”

“Okay,” he replied after a moment. “Thank you,” he added, because it seemed a very appropriate thing to say.

“You’re welcome,” she said, then giggled. “We seem to be saying that a lot to each other, huh?” she asked.

“Yeah. Wonder why that is.”

“Maybe because we’re so used to people being...less than nice to us, that we’re so ready to appreciate some kindness,” Rain murmured.

“That’s sad and true,” he said.

They continued walking for a few moments longer, hand in hand, silent and thoughtful. As he walked on, Seth felt a familiar sense of unreality coming to him again, making him feel oddly distant from what was happening. He didn’t like the feeling, he enjoyed it when he was anchored to the here and now.

But what he was doing was so vastly different, so strange compared to his old life, compared to what he had been doing even a week ago, that sometimes it struck him as an impossibility. He’d gone from growing up in a village for his entire life and being miserable for most of it, to walking through a forest with a beautiful, naked dryad woman named Rain, who he had made love to more than once now, and even orgasmed inside of, hunting plants. He was on his own. Well, on his own with Rain, but he was making his own decisions.

As that thought came into focus, a sense of tremendous liberation, like the sun coming out from behind a particularly dense cloud, beamed into his mind. He laughed, a merry, carefree sound, in a pure reflex response to the feeling.

“What is it?” Rain asked.

“I just...I’m out here, making my own decisions now. I’m really doing this. I’m actually going after my wants, my desires,” he explained.

“It’s...admirable,” Rain said.

“Is it? A lot of people think it’s stupid, selfish, and irresponsible.”

Rain huffed in annoyance. “People,” she muttered. “I understand responsibility, but I also understand happiness. I’m willing to bet that there were more than enough people at that village capable of doing whatever jobs they wanted you to do. They only wanted you to stay because either what you wanted was different, and they don’t like different, or a lot of them had once harbored similar dreams, but had been too timid to act on them, and it reminds them of that, of their failures, and so they try to tear you down.”

“That’s...really depressing.”

“I know. But it is admirable, what you’re doing. You’re taking control of your life, and it’s not as if you’re being selfish or doing anything irresponsible. You’re making a rare healing potion.”

“Well, I am planning on selling it...”

“You don’t deserve to be compensated for your hard work? You’re risking your life out here. You almost died once making this potion.”

“I suppose that’s true...is that it?” he asked, coming to a stop.

“Yes,” Rain said quietly. “That’s it.”

About forty feet ahead of them was a dark, ominous opening into a rise in the land. A hole of dark gray rock descending into the earth. He could tell she was right: this was a place of evil. Or maybe that was just his own apprehension.

“So we have to go in there?” he murmured.

“Yes.”

He sighed softly, staring at it, as if expecting something to emerge from the dark hole in the earth. It remained empty.

“Well...I guess we should just do it and get it over with,” he said.

“That would be a good idea,” she replied.

“Let’s get to it then.”

He felt like he was stalling, so he made himself start walking forward. Rain quickly joined him, and they approached the cave side by side. The pair walked in silence until they came to the entrance. Closer now, he could see more, although not a lot more. The sunshine extended maybe twenty or thirty feet into the sloping rock tunnel. It continued on, tunneling into the earth beyond the light’s reach. He stood still, listened.

He could hear nothing.

“Do you sense anything?” he asked quietly.

She shook her head. “No, no more than usual. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s nothing down there.”

“Great.”

“I can help with light, at least,” she said, and raised her hand. Out of it, a small but bright green sphere appeared, shot forward and stopped about ten feet ahead of them. As she began walking, and he followed after her, he saw that the sphere moved with them, keeping the same consistent distance from them as they moved forward.

“Neat,” he murmured.

“Do you know how to cast a light spell?” she asked.

“Sort of...I never really finished learning it. Kind of stupid, I guess. But I was so busy trying to even make this happen...” he sighed.

“I can teach you,” she said.

“I’d really appreciate that.”

They headed into the cave, moving slowly. Seth drew his sword, glad that it was silver. Silver was supposed to be good against evil and undead things, and those were the things that typically dwelt in underground caves. The tunnel seemed to close in on them as the pair made their way down it. As he pushed deeper into the darkness, Seth was all at once extremely grateful that he had Rain with him, because he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to do this by himself. He was admittedly a little claustrophobic, and the dark made him nervous.

What did that say about him?

If he wasn’t ready to go into a dark, possibly dangerous cave by himself to look for a plant, then why was he at all ready to do the rest of it? Ready to live this life? The obvious answer was that he wasn’t. What did that mean? That he should give up? Tell Rain to let him do it all himself? Why did he keep coming back to this? Why couldn’t he just come to a consistent decision? He felt stupid and childish as he walked deeper.

Seth made himself focus.

Whatever his emotions might be at the moment, that didn’t matter right now, because if he didn’t pay attention right now, he might end up dead. The sloping tunnel finally came to an end, opening up into a larger cavern. Immediately, he could tell that someone, at some point, had been here. There was a poorly build table and two chairs all made of wood, and some scattered items across the uneven cavern ground.

“Who would stay here?” he whispered.

“Thieves, possibly. Some of them are smart enough to know that it’s more difficult for us to track them in places like this. Necromancers, too. The fact that I don’t know about this is a pretty good indicator that these people aren’t supposed to be here...if they’re even still around. All of this looks old,” Rain replied quietly.

He and Rain moved slowly around the cavern, checking out the items. There didn’t seem to be anything of any real value or use to him, so he let it be, though he held out hope of something more useful deeper in. There were three openings snaking away from the central cavern. Each looked about as appealing as the other, so they picked one at random and began to slowly move down it. It was cold down here, he realized.

“How will we know what we’re looking for?” he asked.

“They’re hard to miss. They’re red and they grow on the ground, along the walls and in the corners. We should be able to find them without much trouble,” Rain replied.

He nodded, hoping she was right. They took the tunnel to its end, coming into another cavern, this one closed off. There had definitely been people here. He saw beds, and some tables and shelves along the walls. But it all looked abandoned, like it hadn’t been used in several weeks at least. After a bit of consideration, he began searching.

“What are you doing?” Rain murmured.

“There might be something useful here,” he replied. “I’ve read several books written by or about adventurers, wanderers, explorers. One thing they all hold is that one of the biggest ways they make coin is by searching old, abandoned places. They say it’s amazing, what you can find stashed away in old ruins and long-abandoned camps. Since I doubt anyone was down here for a good reason, and even if they might have been, they aren’t coming back, then I imagine this is all open to be salvaged, and it doesn’t count as stealing.”

“That makes sense,” Rain replied after a bit.

He took ten minutes to hunt over the room, looking for both useful things and any mushrooms. He didn’t find mushrooms, but he did find a handful of books, a small sack of gold hidden away beneath one of the beds, and an iron dagger. Not a great haul, but better than nothing. They headed back to the main cavern and moved down the second tunnel. This time, as they pushed deeper in, he began to get a bad feeling, worse than the general sense of dread he’d been feeling ever since he’d caught sight of this place.

“Be careful,” Rain murmured. She must have felt it too.

When they reached the edge of the cavern, he immediately knew why he was so uncomfortable. Thick strands of white webbing crisscrossed the area. Spiders. Why did it have to be damned spiders? Seth hated spiders. And he had a hard enough time with the little regular ones that made little webs in the corners of basements.

These had to be huge.

“This is not good,” Rain said softly.

“We’ll have to be quick, and quiet,” Seth replied just as quietly.

Rain nodded and they moved slowly into the cavern beyond. It was obvious now what had happened to those inhabiting these caves. Either they had fled from the spiders, or become victims to them. It was likely a combination of both. The pair of them moved as quickly and quietly as they could through the shadowy chamber.

In the face of a more obvious threat, Seth was beginning to feel fear steal into his heart. He wanted out of here, out of this cold, dark, damp cave. Although they searched for ten more minutes, still, there were no mushrooms. They retreated back to the main cavern once more and came to stand at the mouth of the final tunnel.

“We have to go down there,” Seth said.

“I’m afraid so,” Rain replied. She hesitated. “If you want, we can try another cave. There are others in the area that would surely have more mushrooms.”

“No, we should face this now,” he replied.

“If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.”

They set off. He held his silver sword tightly, beginning to sweat now. The walls of dark rock, illuminated by Rain’s light spell, seemed to close in on them as they progressed. Seth forced himself onward, one step at a time, fighting his instinct to just get out of there, to run away, back to the safety of the light and the open air. He began gathering magic to himself, something he realized he should’ve been doing ever since entering the cave. He knew a few basic spells, and his strongest offensive spell was frost.

He really needed to learn more spells.

Gods, there was so much he needed to learn and do, he felt overwhelmed. How to prioritize? Really not the time to think about this.

They came to the final cavern. It was darker than ever, and Rain had to boost her spell. The magical light revealed a cavern covered in webbing. And there were shapes among them, dark shapes that moved occasionally.

“There,” Rain whispered.

Across the room, in a clear space, he saw the mushroom they were looking for. Seth was trembling with fear now. How could he do this?! How?! He could actually see the spiders now. They were huge, awful, dark things. Evil things. But he could see that damned mushroom, and he needed it. If he couldn’t do this...then he couldn’t be an adventurer.

“I’m...I’m going for it,” he whispered.

“Please be careful.”

“Oh believe me, I will.”

He said a small prayer to whatever God or Goddess might be listening, and then he took his first step into the cavern, silver sword firmly in hand. Just maybe a dozen more steps, then he’d grab it, then a dozen steps to get back into the tunnel. That’s all. Two dozen steps. He took another step, then another, then two more. The huge dark shapes remained relatively still. This was easily the scariest, most horrifying thing he’d ever had to up put with. Every nerve ending in his body was screaming at him to just get the fuck out of there.

He made it ten paces, eleven…

Twelve. He was there, beneath more webbing, a lot of it, crouching now. And there was the mushroom. Trying not to move too fast, Seth reached out and grabbed it, plucked it carefully from where it grew near the wall. He waited for some horrible, violent reaction. When nothing happened, he pocketed the mushroom, turned around, and quickly began making his way back across the cavern, towards Rain.

He almost made it.

One of the spiders must have woken up, because the next thing he knew, a loud, piercing shriek cut through the air. Seth screamed in pure surprise and started running. More shrieking filled the air. They could make noise?! Something about that horrified him.

“Run!” Rain screamed.

He was already running, but he pushed himself harder and nearly ran straight into her. She released a spell of some kind, he wasn’t sure what, but it caused several of the spiders to shriek in pain. And then they were running down the tunnel. Seth looked back over his shoulder and saw at least seven or eight of the things scrambling after them, running along the walls, ground, and ceiling. Oh Gods. They were horrifying, sleek black things made for killing. He raised one hand almost without thinking about it, palm out, and expunged all the magic he had gathered into a single, hard burst. The frost spell was actually kind of decent.

It hit them and slowed them down, though he could tell that no lasting damage would be done. But it would buy them time at least. He ran for all he was worth, Rain ahead of him, her legs longer than his, plus she was in better shape, no doubt. They hit the main cavern and didn’t even stop, hooking a right and sprinting down the exit tunnel. Or up it, rather. Seth’s legs burned with the effort as he made the long climb up.

“Keep going! Almost there!” Rain said.

Seth managed a grunt in reply, out of breath already. He could hear the spiders behind them. The daylight ahead was like a beacon, distant and terrible. But it grew steadily closer. And closer. And so did the sounds of the spiders, who had apparently already shaken off the frost spell. Somehow, they reached the top.

Feeling faint and sick to his stomach, Seth staggered away from the opening and nearly collapsed to the ground. Instead, he got ahold of himself and spun around, brandishing his blade. Would they follow into the light? He saw no reason why they wouldn’t.

“What do we do?” he gasped.

“Shh,” Rain replied, and he looked over at her.

She was standing perfectly still just a few feet in front of the tunnel opening. The spiders were getting closer. She raised both of her hands, palms out, and Seth felt a tremendous magic power upon the air.

A brilliant red-orange flash snapped into being right as he saw the dark, shifting tide of spiders come rolling out of the tunnel, and then a wall of flame smashed right into them. The things shrieked and hissed and cried out in pain for a brief second, and then they were flash-roasted into crispy remnants.

“Oh Gods!” he moaned, taking the sight in, lurching away, feeling the wave of heat wash over him. And then the smell of cooked meat, mixed in with their natural poison and awful, alien stench, washed over him and he fell to his hands and knees. His breakfast came up in one violent contraction. He heard Rain approach as he finished throwing up, coughing violently, groaning at the awful, acidic stuff that coated his mouth and throat and went up into his nostrils.

“Oh, Seth...are you okay?” she asked softly, crouching by him, placing a hand gently on his back, rubbing it slowly.

“Fine,” he groaned, spitting a few times, “are we safe?”

“We’re safe,” she confirmed.

“Good, cause I need a minute.”

CHAPTER VIII

For the first two hours, their progress was slow and miserable.

Seth felt like shit, emotionally and physically. Rain was being patient with him, which just made him feel worse. Here she was, a smart, competent dryad, wasting time on his stupid human ass while he waited for his stomach to subside and his head to stop hurting. He allowed her to use some healing magic to deal with the minor wounds he’d incurred dealing with the cave. Finally, as they began to head into the third hour, he was feeling better. Well, a little better at least, and their progress became a bit more steady.

They were heading south.

They’d decided to go after the fourth plant, one which glowed only in the moonlight. It was called a Moon Lily for just such a reason. Rain had explained that it would be on the way to their final destination: the southern coast, which was where the fifth and final plant grew normally. Thoughts continued running through Seth’s head as they walked side-by-side. As the second hour came to a close, Rain took his hand suddenly.

He looked over at her. “Hey,” she said, smiling awkwardly at him.

“Hey,” he replied quietly.

“Are you okay? I mean...I know you’re not, like, okay after all that happened. But you’ve been really quiet.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m still struggling with things. With all that happened. And you saved me again. And I...panicked.”

“Seth, I’ll try to put this into perspective. You...take things as they happen. You walked away from that intact. We both did. Celebrate that, then make sure you try to do better next time. Celebrate the victories, learn from the losses. How you did it matters...but not as much as you think it does. Yes, you should be striving to rely on yourself, but you should also be okay with help. I know this won’t fix all your problems right away, nothing will, it’s a long process, but you need to get on the road to getting your head straight about this.”

They had stopped walking, standing together on a natural path in between the trees, the sounds of the forest surrounding them in a peaceful ambiance. The sunlight had faded somewhat, disappearing behind another gray cloud cover coming in, promising rain.

“I guess you have a point,” he said after a bit.

She smiled sweetly at him and reached up, laying a hand on his cheek. Her skin was soft and warm. “I’m glad you think so.”

He laughed softly. “Good. Now, how about-” She stopped suddenly, looking past him, a look of unhappiness and anger passing across her delicate features. He turned around, afraid of what he might see, and was surprised to see three dryads now standing on the path. He hadn’t heard them at all. Not even a little bit.

They looked more like he’d expected dryads to look like. Their hair was made of leaves, actual leaves, and their features were more alien, stranger, more daunting. They were frowning at the pair of them. The one in the middle was taller than the others by a full head. She stared intently at Seth, and he had to fight the urge to take a step back. Or several. But he managed to hold his ground. She turned her gaze on Rain.

“What do you want?” Rain asked, and wow was she angry.

She was scary when she was angry.

“Rain, we were growing concerned. You’ve been spending a great deal of time with this...” she looked at him again, briefly, then looked back, “...human.”

“I have. There’s no need to be concerned,” Rain replied curtly.

“That aside, we think it would be best if you returned to your-”

“Your concerned is noted and unnecessary. You may leave me.”

“Rain-”

“Leave. Now,” she growled, and around her every single plant suddenly shivered. So did Seth. He felt some kind of awful wave of magic shoot through him, filling him with fear. He forced himself to stay still.

“As you wish, Rain.”

They turned and almost appeared to melt into the surrounding greenery. Seth took a little bit to calm down, and so, apparently, did Rain.

“What...was that about?” he asked.

She jerked her head towards him, then seemed to finally relax. She sighed deeply. “Sorry,” she said softly. “I just...there’s more to me that I suppose you should know.” She looked around again, then resumed walking forward, faster this time.

He hurried to keep up with her.

They walked for several more minutes without speaking. “My mother was a very powerful dryad,” she said finally. “Not the most powerful, but very high up in the hierarchy. She was very well respected, feared by some. She did great things. Repelled a brutal assault by a pair of powerful necromancers. Made peace with the serpentine when tensions rose. Stopped a plant sickness in its tracks after it ravaged the forest for weeks. She was a great woman. And...she fell in love with a human,” she explained.

“That...must have been tough,” Seth replied.

“Oh yes, it was. Dryads have been known to take human and elf lovers. Often elves, since they are more in tune with nature. Beryl and felis too, sometimes. But love? No. It doesn’t work out like that. But my mother was...different. She loved him. Although their lives were different and they spent long months apart, he always came back to her. He built a cabin here. They built it together. He would live in that cabin and she would visit him every day. And, one day, after several years, they came to a decision. They wanted to have a child.”

“You said...earlier...” he said softly, frowning.

She smiled. “Humans can impregnate dryads...if the dryad chooses to allow it. It takes a bit of magic. And so it was done. They mated, and a child was produced.”

“And you were that child,” he murmured.

“Yes. I was that child. This was awhile ago. I loved my father, but he died within a decade of my birth. He was north, in the mountains, and died in a landslide. My mother...was never the same after that. And within two years, she died as well.”

“How?” he asked softly.

“The others have their excuses, their explanations, but I know what really happened. She died of a broken heart, as...dramatic as it sounds, that’s what happened. When she died, however, they wanted me to assume the mantle of her responsibility. I tried. For years I tried. I’m naturally strong and talented, but...I didn’t want it. I wanted a more...natural life. I don’t want power over others, I don’t want to be one of the major guardians of the forest, because...” she laughed suddenly. It was a bitter sound. “Like you, I fear, I have insecurities, I doubt that I can handle it. And, what’s worse is they all judge me.”

“For what?” he asked.

“For my father. For my human blood, my human attributes. I think...in a way, it might be their way of getting back at my mother. They resented her for loving a human, for allowing a human to fill her with his seed in such a way. It hadn’t been done for a very long time. Over a hundred years, at least. But they feared and respected her too much to say it to her face. But not me. They don’t mistreat me outright, but they don’t hide their contempt too well. And they’re especially bitter because they do rely on me, and they think they need me, as much as it pains them.” She sighed heavily. “I avoid them as much as I can.”

“I’m really sorry, Rain,” he said quietly, squeezing her hand. All of his problems suddenly seemed pale and pathetic in light of what she was facing.

“It’s okay. I mean, it sucks, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. Although...I wish I could leave,” she replied.

“Why can’t you? Are you...tied to the forest, somehow?”

“No, I’m not. There’s nothing actually compelling me to stay. The only thing keeping me back...” she laughed again, “...is fear. Like I said. I’m having the same problems you’re having Seth, only in your case you actually walked away from your life. You were brave enough to do what I can’t. That’s...part of the reason I’m so interested in you.”

“Really?”

“Yes. It’s almost like...if you can do it, then why can’t I?”

He was silent for a few seconds. “Rain, you can do it. You’re obviously smart enough, strong enough...and if there’s anything I can do to help, I’ll do it. Please tell me if I can do anything.”

She smiled. “I really appreciate that, Seth.” She stopped and gave him a long, lingering kiss on the lips. “When we get to where we’re going, I’m going to give you a very nice reward. You’ve been so sweet to me.”

“You’ve been pretty damn sweet to me,” he replied.

“I know. Come on, we’re almost there. We can make camp and wait for nightfall, then find your plant,” she said, walking off again.

He walked along with her, their fingers laced, feeling very close to her just then.

…

They made camp in another peaceful grove near a small hot spring.

“There’s a lot of these around here,” Seth said as he finished setting up his bedding. Their bedding. He liked thinking that. It was where they would sleep tonight. Together. They’d already set up a makeshift fire-pit.

“There are,” she agreed, standing at the edge of the clearing, staring into the treeline and the forest that surrounded them.

They’d walked for most of the rest of the day, having arrived in this clearing with maybe an hour, perhaps an hour and a half until full nightfall. As it was, the sun was beginning to make its way towards the horizon.

Rain turned around and faced him. She fixed him with her intense green gaze, and there was something in her eyes, some look of almost animal lust. “I believe that I promised you a very special reward, didn’t I Seth?” she asked.

He felt his heart start to beat harder in his chest as his body became flushed with lust and sexual excitement. “You did,” he agreed.

“Take off all of your clothes, and lie down on the bedding,” she instructed.

“Okay.”

He did as she told him, stripping down naked and lying on his back on the bedding. She slowly walked towards him, swaying her hips, a nude natural goddess of sexuality just then. Watching her approach him, he found himself marveling again over how beautiful she was. There must be some edge, some slight effect of her natural magics that enhanced and heightened her already very intense natural beauty and allure when she was being seductive, because by the Gods did she look just fucking stunning right then.

She came to stand over him, one foot on either side of his hips. “You’ve been a very good man today, Seth. You’ve been very good to me. And I want to reward this behavior. So, you’re going to just lay there and let me take care of you, got it?”

“Uh-huh,” he managed, staring up at her.

She smirked. “Good boy.”

She got down on her stomach, in between his legs, and started sucking his dick. He groaned, staring at her intently. At her beautiful, long, luxurious green hair, her intensely emerald eyes as she stared up at him, her head bobbing, her branches with flowers on them. Her hot, naked body. The pleasure made a slow burn through his body, intense and pulsing with raw sexual ecstasy. Rain was good at sucking dick.

She kept going, bobbing her head smoothly, bringing him close to orgasm and then suddenly stopping. When she pulled his cock from her mouth, he saw that it was coated in a thick film of clear-green material. Tree sap. Her body naturally produced a lot of it. With a grin, without a single word, she stood back up, turned around, and then squatted down. She was showing him her ass. Her nice, shapely, thick, dryad ass.

Rain got down onto her hands and knees, now over his legs, and shifted backwards. Reaching behind her, she gripped his cock and held it firmly. Seth thought that she was going to ride him and that would be really awesome. And she did ride him...just not the way he expected. She lowered her ass towards his dick and, once they were properly lined up, she put his dick inside of herself. Up her ass. Seth moaned as he watched his tree sap slicked cock disappeared into her tight ass. She was lowering and raising herself, slowly pushing him into her inch by inch.

“I think you like that,” she murmured.

“Oh Gods yes, Rain...” he moaned, staring intently at the display. She had such a thick, well-padded ass and he was going up it.

He was fucking a dryad in the ass.

It felt…

It felt unlike anything he’d ever had done with his dick before.

“Have you never done this before?” she asked.

He shook his head, panting now, raw, impossible, sexual rapture burning through his cock, radiating out into his body. “No. Never.”

“Mmm...then this is indeed a very special reward. I told you I’d take care of you. Just lay there and let me ride your cock...”

He did just that, feeling incapable of doing anything else.

Watching his cock disappearing into her fat, dryad ass over and over again as she started to go faster was almost like a religious experience, or what he expected one to be like. The pleasure, the pure sexual gratification and rapturous ecstasy, was out of this world. It was too much. It was overwhelming. He groaned and moaned and twitched in response to her, panting and sweating now. He also knew, in some unquestionable way, that he was now going to be addicted to having anal sex with his future partners. He hoped he could find more that would be willing.

“You can come whenever you want,” Rain said.

He just groaned in response. Seth had been on his way to it, but her mention of it, her permission given to come in her ass, trigger it. He cried out, moving finally and reached out, grabbing her by her broad hips and pulling her down roughly into her lap. She cried out in pleasure as his dick went farther up her ass and it began to twitch and spasm and jerk, held firmly in the tight confines of her ass as it began to spit its seed out.

Seth grunted and groaned as his whole world was eclipsed by the seismic orgasm he began to have. He was letting off, filling her ass with his seed, pumping her full of it as his body became overwhelmed with absolute, fiery bliss. He knew he was being loud, couldn’t control himself, and didn’t care.

In that one, perfect moment as he came up Rain’s ass, he didn’t care about anything.

Some time later, his orgasm began to peter out, and he came back to himself. As soon as he did, he felt the strain the climax had put on his body and collapsed against his bedding, letting go of her, gasping for breath, staring up at a twilit sky. When he finished, laying there, slicked in sweat and naked and feeling like a man in a dream, Rain moved forward and let his softening cock fall out of her. She stood up and stretched, then turned to face him.

She looked immensely satisfied.

“I take it you liked that,” she said, smirking down at him.

“Uh-huh,” he managed weakly.

“Come on, dear, let’s get you cleaned up. Both of us cleaned up.”

He nodded and slowly got to his feet. He staggered over to the hot spring, then paused by its edge, glancing back at the fire-pit. “We really should get some food going while we soak, so we don’t have to wait quite so long.”

“How about you take a soak and I’ll get some meat going?” she suggested.

He wanted to do it himself, it didn’t seem right that she should do it after what she’d done for him, but he felt on the verge of collapse, so he just nodded. “Thank you,” he said.

She smiled and kissed him. “You’re welcome.”

He slipped into the water, found a natural shelf to sit on and did so, letting the steaming hot water massage his sore muscles and sooth his frayed nerves. Today had been stressful. But the world class orgasm and this hot spring were going a long ways towards making it better. He watched as she pulled whatever foodstuffs he had left in his pack out, and set up the pan. She put what meat she could find in it and let it sit, then joined him in the water.

When she did, she laid against him. He held her close.

“That was really nice, what you did,” he said quietly.

“Well, I like you a lot,” she replied. “A lot.”

“I like you a lot, too. I...never really thought I would ever meet a dryad, let alone become intimate with one and like her as much as I like you.”

“I had always hoped I’d meet someone like you. I feel as though Bliss Herself must be smiling down on us.”

“Bliss? Isn’t she the Goddess of...sex?”

Rain smiled. “Among other things. Sex and love and pleasure.”

“She must be,” he agreed.

They sat there in the water together, periodically taking turns getting out of it to flip over the meat so it didn’t burn. For a long stretch of time, neither spoke. They simple sat there together, soaking in a companionable silence, enjoying each other’s comforting presence. Honestly, Seth was feeling a little overwhelmed by emotions. He really did like Rain. A lot. It wasn’t love, he wasn’t entirely sure he could love her, because it couldn’t work out between them. Although her mother and father might have made it work, to a certain degree, he knew that he was going to travel. At some point today, some unknown point in time, Seth seemed to have passed through some mental blockade, because now he was actually looking forward to the next part of their adventure, whatever it might be. He thought it might be the sex, but…

No. It wasn’t. It was deeper than that. He’d faced down death twice now, three times, actually, counting the werewolf, and although by no stretch of the imagination was he looking forward to it or even okay with it...he was no longer stark terrified by the prospect of putting himself in another dangerous situation. It was, in and of itself, a dangerous idea. If he let himself get too puffed up, he’d end up taking a really stupid risk and getting killed. But he thought he could handle it now, and, consequently, he knew he would want to travel the breadth of the land and have a lot more adventures. He couldn’t go back.

He couldn’t settle.

But he did think that Rain was a woman he could be more than friends with, more even than friends with benefits. Someone he could trust, someone he could rely on, someone he could visit every now and then, spend time with, be passionate and happy together. So, for now, he was happy enough to just hold her and be held by her.

Eventually, the food was done and they got out of the water. He dried off and pulled on some undershorts, then sat with her near the fire and ate.

“How long do you think until dark?” he asked.

“Not long,” she replied.

He almost asked her for a more precise estimate, but abruptly realized that she probably didn’t know what an hour was. How did dryads measure time? Did they even bother? Probably, but not in the same way that humans or elves did. So he just looked into the sky and tried to guess for himself. Judging by the quality of the sun, the fact that twilight was well into its approach, he figured maybe another half an hour before it was full dark. But what did it matter? He was with Rain, and they would get it done, and it wasn’t like he had a timeline.

“Have you ever been in love?” Rain asked suddenly after almost ten minutes of silence. They’d since finished their meal and had been just sitting there together.

“I...um...” he hesitated, caught off guard by the question. But she just looked over at him now, waiting for his answer. He thought about it, wondering if he had been. He thought of the hunter’s daughter, of how he felt when they were making love on those rare occasions, thought of looking into her eyes, kissing her lips, hearing her pant and moan softly against him. “No,” he said finally, “but I think that I once thought I was.”

“Who was she?” Rain asked.

“Her name was Amanda. She was the daughter of a hunter in my village, a year older than me. Our relationship was short but passionate. I lost my virginity to her. She was a good woman, and we were a decent match, I think. Okay, honestly, I think she was too good for me. She deemed our relationship too dangerous to continue.”

“Dangerous?” Rain asked, clearly confused. “How so?”

“I...” He sighed, considering how to try and explain it. “In my culture, there is a large emphasis placed on...choosing the correct mate. There is certain criteria for what constitutes a good mate. And I...fail to meet a lot of those criteria.”

“Why? I don’t understand. You’re brave, you’re intelligent, you’re passionate, you’re skilled in magic and alchemy...”

“Well, I think you might be a little biased, because you’ve only seen me out here, in the wilderness. And you don’t see me...from their perspective. In my culture, what you should be looking for in a mate, if you are a woman, is a man who is strong and brave and hard-working, a man who will be a good father and provide for you and get you a home to live in.”

“What if...children aren’t desired?” she asked.

“That’s not really an acceptable thought to have.”

“What? Why?”

“It just...isn’t. Marriage is expected. A lifelong career is expected. Children are expected. And if you don’t want these things, if you aren’t interested in them or reject them, then you are, in turn, rejected by society.”

“Wow. I...suppose we aren’t so different,” she murmured.

“Okay, maybe I’m making it sound more dramatic than it really is. There are cities that aren’t like that. The largest cities are more open. People don’t care as much what you do so long as you aren’t causing problems. And I think that’s why some people find the life of an adventurer, what I’m trying to do, so appealing. Interestingly enough, I think that if you are an adventurer and present yourself as such, people actually come back around the other direction and respect and envy you. Though few of them will admit it.”

“Cultural rules are so...weird. And annoying,” Rain said after a little while.

He nodded gravely. “Yes, they are.”

Within a few minutes, it was full dark.

“Come on,” Rain said, standing. “It’s time.”

He stood up and took her hand. She squeezed it gently and he squeezed happily back as they started walking away from the camp. They walked in silence for several minutes, moving among the trees and plants. Rain seemed to know exactly where she was going, never hesitating, moving at a slow but steady pace.

It felt...good.

Just walking through the Redwood Forest, holding hands with her, it felt just simply good. He could see well enough in the moonlight and starlight to walk by, and the forest looked beautiful and ghostly around them.

“There it is,” Rain said suddenly.

He looked ahead of them and saw a glow, a soft white light, coming from up ahead, through some trees. He and Rain carefully pushed through the foliage and stepped into a small clearing. There was something almost deliberate about it, as if it had been designed somehow. He wondered if she had made it.

And…

“Wow,” he whispered.

The light was coming from a cluster of flowers, Moon Lilies, that occupied the center of the clearing. There had to be twenty or thirty of them, a miniature forest of them. “Oh my Gods,” he whispered softly, “these are beautiful.”

“This is my garden,” Rain replied quietly, taking a few steps forward and crouching in front of the flowers. She raised her hand, placing it over the flowers, and they shifted slightly towards her, as though reaching for her. “The Moon Lily is my favorite flower.” She stood up and turned to face him again, extending her hand.

He took it and stepped closer to her. She wrapped him tightly in a hug. “I’ve never shown anyone else this place, Seth,” she whispered in his ear, her breath hot against him. “I wanted to share this with you. My own personal garden.”

“Thank you, Rain,” he whispered in reply, unsure of what else to say.

“You’re very special to me. I’ve never met anyone like you.”

“I know exactly how you feel,” he replied, and she squeezed him tightly against her. He squeezed her back.

They stayed like that for several more silent moments, and then finally she disengaged herself from him, smiling at him. “I suppose we should harvest one,” she said, turning and crouching down again.

“I really appreciate it. Although if you don’t want to take one from your private garden, I’m sure we could find another...”

“Oh no, it’s fine, Seth. In fact, I’m glad that I can give you one of my personal flowers. It makes me happy,” she replied. She placed her hand on the ground next to the collection of flowers and concentrated. One of them suddenly began to move, rising slowly out of the ground. He watched in amazement as it emerged, roots and all, from the ground and then fell into her waiting hand. She turned, stood, and present the flower to him.

“That was amazing,” he murmured, accepting it and staring at the beautiful glowing white flower. It really was stunning.

“Just showing off,” she said, grinning awkwardly.

Seth took the flower, studying it. “We should get back to camp,” he said finally.

She nodded in agreement. “Let’s go.”

CHAPTER IX

They had been walking for almost two hours now.

Seth felt good. No, that wasn’t true.

He felt great.

After harvesting the Moon Lily and securing it, he and Rain had made wonderful, passionate love in the starlight and then fallen into a deep and satisfied sleep. They’d woken and made love again, then bathed in the hot spring and had breakfast, which came in the form of a pair of rabbits. From there, they’d started walking south, heading for the coast. It was a beautiful day out, the sky clear, the sun shining down on them.

After last night, he was feeling even closer to Rain.

But he thought that she was acting a little strangely, during maybe the last half an hour or so of their walk towards the shoreline. Not bad, but more...mischievous. Almost like she had a secret she was dying to tell him.

He opened his mouth to begin asking her when she Rain stopped suddenly. She stopped so abruptly that he stumbled, as they were still holding hands.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, looking back at her.

She was standing rigid, looking around apprehensively. “Shh,” she replied softly. Seth felt fear settle over him and began looking around as well. Almost immediately, he began gathering magic to him. He was going to have to learn how to do that without actually having to concentrate on it. Although his body did naturally draw in a certain amount of magic from the air naturally, it wasn’t a great deal.

“Something’s coming,” she whispered. “Something bad. Get ready.”

She stepped a little away from him and turned towards the east. He turned with her. He could hear it now. Footsteps, heavy footsteps. They were getting closer. What could it be? Now it was crashing through the underbrush and trees. He heard branches snapping in its wake and heavy breathing.

Real fear took him and he backed up a step.

What was it?!

And that’s when a Minotaur stepped into the clearing with them.

“Oh fuck,” Seth whispered.

Something seemed to move inside of him, some subtle but powerful thing shifted, and then he was reacting. He placed both palms out flat, towards the Minotaur, and released all of the magical energy he possibly could in the form of a frost spell. It was more powerful than he thought it would be, but not powerful enough to do anything but cause the thing to stumble and roar furiously. He grabbed for his bow and notched an arrow, his hands feeling almost like they were moving on their own. At the same time, Rain began gesturing sharply.

Roots burst up out of the ground and began to ensnare the Minotaur’s feet. Seth aimed his arrow and fired. It missed, barely. He growled in frustration and notched a second arrow, letting it fly as soon as he’d lined up the shot. This one connected with the thing’s huge chest, though he imagined it didn’t do a great deal of damage. This thing had to be nine feet tall. He kept up the arrow-firing, trying to hit an eye or something else vital while Rain continued trying to hold it in place. He put six more arrows in it, most in its chest but one in its neck, before it suddenly jerked forward, ripping the roots Rain had been using to hold it down out of the ground.

It tripped and fell forward and Seth cried out as he felt a bright burning line of pain erupt across his chest as one of its claws tore through his clothing. He stumbled backwards and fell on his ass, grunting in pain, feeling blood flowing now. It was crawling towards him, coming at him, feet still tangled, reaching for him with its huge hands. Seth felt terror ripping at him, panic filling his mind like ice water, but inspiration struck. He ripped his sword from its sheath and dove forward before he could really think about what he was doing.

The tip of the sword pierced the thing’s big black eye and punctured its brain.

The Minotaur let out a brief roar and then went limp.

Silence settled over the clearing. Then he began to hear things. His heavy breathing. Rain’s heavy breathing. Birds twitting. The soft sounds of the ocean lapping at the shore somewhere nearby. Slowly, he pulled the blade out.

“That was amazing, Seth,” Rain said finally. She offered him her hand. He took it and let her pull him to his feet.

“Luck,” he mumbled in reply, unable to stop staring at the dead beast.

“Maybe, but it was also amazing. You did good. I think you’re starting to get the hang of this,” Rainy replied.

“Maybe,” he replied, and wiped his sword off on his shirt, then winced, looking down at the cut that sliced across his chest. “Damn,” he muttered.

“Here, hold still,” Rain said, and laid her hand across the cut. He hissed again but held still, and immediately felt a soft warmth moving through his body. When she pulled her bloodied hand away a moment later, the cut was gone. Well, the cut in his chest. The shirt was still sliced open, although he didn’t care about that right now. He was actually feeling pretty elated. He’d killed a fucking Minotaur! He’d actually done that.

“Are you okay?” Rain asked.

“Uh...yeah, I think I actually am. I think I’m okay.” He took a step back from the Minotaur and nearly fell again. “Uh...still a little shaky,” he admitted.

Rain laughed and hugged him suddenly. “That’s understandable, Seth.” She paused. “Do you hear that?” she asked, her breath hot in his ear.

He suddenly felt a powerful lust ripple through him. “What?” he asked.

“The ocean. We’re very close now.” He slipped his hands down her back and cupped her thick, bare ass. “I think I know what we should do when we get there.”

“I do too,” he murmured.

“Have you ever made love in the ocean?” she asked.

“No.”

“I have a surprise for you then,” she said, stepping back.

“Is it sex in the ocean?” he asked, grinning foolishly.

“...technically yes.”

“What do you mean technically?”

She began to chew on her lip. “So, I was waiting to tell you...would you be okay with...having sex with someone else?” she asked.

“Someone else?” he replied, feeling like he was suddenly missing something.

“Let’s get out of this clearing,” she said, taking his hand and leading him away, towards the shoreline.

“Who else?” he asked.

“A friend of mine. She’s my only serious friend, the only one I trust...well, besides you now,” Rain replied.

“And she lives...in the ocean?”

“Yes.”

“...and you want me to have sex with her?”

“With both of us, actually.”

He stopped and turned to face her, making her stop too. “Let me get this straight: you are asking me if I want to engage in a threesome with you and...and who?”

“Her name is Amara. She’s a mermaid. We’ve known each other for a very long time now, since we were both young. We...share desires. To make it with those not of our own species. I’ve made love with her several times, but she’s made love with many land-dwellers in her time.” She snorted. “She was always braver than me. But she told me that if I ever managed to work up the courage to...well, fuck a cute human boy, in her words, and I was willing to share, I should bring him down. And, well, we’ve had sex, and I’m willing to share, and given that you’re into me, I thought maybe you might be into mermaids...she’s very pretty.”

“I’m...okay with this,” he replied after a moment of considering it, because he was okay with fucking a mermaid.

Who wasn’t?

He’d never seen a mermaid, but he’d seen drawings, he’d read an account of someone who fucked a mermaid that was supposedly true, and he’d overheard two adventurers talking about it at one point, and that all had kind of planted and then watered the seed of lust towards the idea of making love with a mermaid.

But getting to enjoy a threesome with a mermaid and a dryad?

“I’ve never been in a threesome,” he said as they started walking again.

“Neither have I,” Rain said.

“Do you think she has?” he asked.

Rain laughed. “Yes, she has. She told me about them. I think she’s had four or five of them,” she replied.

“Wow, how does a mermaid find this many land-dwellers to fuck?”

“She gets around,” Rain replied with a shrug. “So, how about we go find that final plant, and then I can get in touch with Amara, and we can...have some fun?”

“That sounds great,” he replied.

They walked on.

…

They found what they were looking for, some moss that grew on rocks along the shoreline, maybe half an hour later. As soon as he had collected it safely and stored it in the jar with the rest of the plants, he’d taken a moment to stare at it.

“That represents a lot of work,” Rain said quietly.

“Yeah,” he murmured, still staring intently at it, slowly turning the glass jar in his hands.

“You did that.”

“No.” He shook his head. “We did this. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“...are you okay with that?” she asked.

He was silent for a moment, still staring at the jar, at the plants held within, and sighed finally. “I think that I am,” he replied. “I’ve been thinking about what you told me, and I think I finally got it. I mean, I understand it, but now I think I might finally be getting it, you know? People say that everyone needs help and it’s an idea I always kind of resisted. I thought that I wouldn’t be good enough until I never needed any help...but I don’t think that’s possible.”

“It’s not,” Rain said.

“I mean, I think I can get better, a lot better, I have so much to learn and figure out, but I’m...okay with getting help.” He put the jar away carefully in his pack, securing it within his clothing. Gods, he didn’t want it to break now, after all that effort. It probably wouldn’t ruin the plants...probably. But he didn’t want to take that risk. Standing, he turned to face Rain and wrapped her in a hug. “Thank you. Sincerely, thank you. You...really went above and beyond to help a total stranger in something he considered deeply important.”

She hugged him back tightly. “You’re welcome. And thank you, too, Seth. You’ve helped me as well, whether or not you realize it.”

“How have I helped you?” he asked.

“I’ll tell you later. Amara will be here soon. I think you should take your clothes off and we can get into the water and wait for her, and relax,” she replied.

“I...I’m admittedly a little reluctant to leave my pack here after all the stuff we went through over the past few days.” He looked down at it.

“Oh, don’t worry about that. I can protect it. Here, strip and gather up all your stuff, I can show you,” Rain replied.

“Okay.” He did as she asked, taking all of his clothes off, hesitating slightly. A clearing in the forest was one thing, but this was the beach. He could see for quite a ways, although he didn’t see any other people, but there were a lot of places to hide. Well...he hadn’t let fear stop him from climbing a huge fucking tree or going into a crazy dangerous and dark cave. Was he really going to let it stop him from having sex with a dryad and a mermaid? He shucked the last of his clothing and put it in his pack, then stepped back from it.

“Ready,” he said.

Rain gestured sharply at the ground. He’d set down his stuff right before the dirt became sand. Roots shot up out of the ground and formed a cage around his stuff. Thorns, big ones, lined the roots. There was no way anyone was getting in there quickly.

“Whoa,” he said.

“Yep. And I’ll know if anyone gets near it. So come on, let’s go have fun handsome,” she said, taking his hand and leading him across the beach. The ocean looked amazing. He’d never actually been to the ocean. Seth marveled at it as they waded into the water. It seemed to go on...just forever. There were barely any clouds in the sky today and the sun was shining wonderfully. He found the water warm as they walked in.

“This is amazing,” he murmured.

“Isn’t it?” Rain replied happily. “Ah, I love the ocean. I love being in this water. It’s so...just satisfying. You’d swear I was part water nymph. Now...come here.”

They were up to their waists now and as he turned towards her, she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him deeply. He felt a spike of lust hammer into him and immediately began to grow erect. He hugged her back, kissing her firmly on the mouth, tasting her wonderful, natural dryad taste and then slipped his hands down below the water, getting a good grip on the thick, firm swell of her ass. He really wanted to have anal sex with her again.

It had felt beyond amazing.

Rain reached down between them and began to massage his cock. That sent sparks of pleasure into him and only made his yearning more powerful.

Suddenly, Rain stopped kissing him and looked over. He joined her. There was a woman in the water a few feet away, staring intently at them.

“Don’t mind me,” she said.

“Amara, Gods,” Rain muttered. “You could’ve said something.”

“I was kinda hoping you’d start fucking and I could watch. So this is him, huh? He’s really cute,” she said.

“How...did you contact her, exactly?” he asked.

“We’re connected,” Rain replied, “on a somewhat magical level. It’s...kind of hard to explain. I can send her basic messages in the form of certain magical bursts. Provided, of course, she’s close enough to hear them,” Rain explained.

“And lucky for you two, I was. So is this a threesome?” Amara asked.

“Yes, if you’re okay with that,” Rain said.

“Of course I’m okay with it.” The beautiful mermaid turned her stunning blue gaze on Seth. “Have you ever made love with a mermaid?”

“No,” he replied awkwardly. It was hard not to stare at her breasts, which were pale, exposed, and quite large.

“He’s a bit...inexperienced,” Rain said. She grinned suddenly. “Although we’ve been working on that over the past few days.”

“You filthy slut,” Amara said with a sultry, seductive smile. “Okay then, let’s give you some more experience, Seth. Come here.”

He looked briefly at Rain, who nodded, and then began to make his way towards Amara. He studied her as he came closer to her. She was absurdly beautiful in an exotic and almost alien kind of way. She looked kind of human, though he could see gill slits over her collarbones...above her huge tits. She was a redhead. That was probably one of the things that stood out the most to him. Seth had a tendency to fall in love, (or, more truthfully, lust), with redheaded women. He had no idea why, but redheaded women drove him absolutely crazy. Her hair was long and wet, plastered to her head and body.

Her blue eyes seemed to blaze in her head, focusing intently on him.

She was a shapely woman, her breasts a little bit larger than Rain’s were. As he drew even closer, he looked down he saw her tail. The ocean was clear that day and he had a good view of it. It was green-blue, scaly, and beautiful. He could also see her mermaid pussy. Where her waistline was, her tail area bulged in a way that definitely resembled broad hips on a land-dwelling woman. Her vagina was in a little bit of a recessed niche between her ‘hips’. It looked very inviting. She was smiling seductively at him.

“Come here,” she said softly as he drew within arm’s length. She shifted a little closer to him and then kissed him. She tasted like sweet saltwater. She hugged him close to her, pressing her big, wet breasts against his bare chest and he felt a tremendous wave of lust roll through him. He hugged her back, pulling her closer against him. They made out, their kissing immediately passionate. This was unreal. Seth felt like he was dreaming, detached from reality. He was kissing a mermaid, and a dryad was watching.

And she was going to join.

He tried to bring himself back, because he really wanted to enjoy this fully. What did it was when Amara reached between them and gripped his dick.

“Hold still,” she said softly, then kissed him once more and slipped below the water. He watched her in rapt attention, staring intently as she came to hover in the water in front of his cock. She opened her mouth and stuck her tongue out, then began to lick the tip of his penis. He groaned as pleasure began sparking into him.

“Holy fuck,” he whispered.

“She’s good with her tongue, isn’t she?” Rain asked.

“Uh-huh,” he managed. She was behind him now, and she wrapped her arms around him, hugging him to her, and he could feel her big, wonderful tits pressing against his back.

“I’m so glad I could share this with you,” she whispered in his ear. “You’re a good person, Seth. I’ll make sure you get a proper reward.”

Part of him felt like arguing that point. He didn’t feel like a good person, not that he necessarily felt like a bad one, more like a mediocre one, and even if he was, he wasn’t sure if pussy and head was a proper reward.

But the rest of him couldn’t even begin to hold onto this thought because he was too busy enjoying the underwater blowjob he was getting from a fucking redheaded mermaid. Amara took his cock into her mouth now and began to suck, bobbing her head. Her red hair floated around her head in a cloud now. She kept going, her head bobbing rapidly, her lips sliding along his dick, focusing on the head, on stimulating him.

“I’m gonna come...” he moaned.

“She wants you to come,” Rain whispered in his ear. She reached around him suddenly and down, and he groaned again as he felt her cup his balls in her hand and began to gently massage them. “Come in her mouth, Seth. She loves the taste. Come in her mouth and she’ll suck you dry,” Rain pressed.

He couldn’t hold back his orgasm even if he tried at that point.

With a loud moan his dick began to kick violently in her mouth. He thought he heard Amara moan underwater, but he couldn’t be sure. Pleasure erupted throughout his body. Between Amara sucking his dick and Rain massaging his balls, he almost felt like he might pass out. As it was, all he could feel was his orgasm, the pulses of pleasure as he emptied his seed into his mermaid lover’s mouth as she sucked and sucked and sucked.

Rain was right. She sucked him fucking dry.

She sucked every last drop out, then slowly pulled his cock from her mouth and resurfaced. “How was that?” she asked, pulling her hair back out of her face. “Good, huh?”

“Amazing,” he replied. “Just amazing.”

“Good. You’ve got good seed. It tastes really good.”

“She likes the salty taste,” Rain said.

“I guess that makes sense,” he murmured. “And thanks.”

“You gonna be okay?” Amara asked with a smirk.

“Yeah. Just...need a minute.”

“That’s fine. Go sit down on the beach, where the tide comes in. You can watch me pleasure Rain,” she said.

He nodded and walked on unsteady feet back towards the shore, buoyed by the water. He sat down in very shallow water and watched the two women begin to get into it. The display was absurdly erotic. It was probably made more so by the fact that there seemed to be real affection between the two women. They were clearly both very familiar with each other. No hesitation, no anxiety, just impassioned kissing. And the way in which Rain groped Amara’s large breasts made him think that she was just as into big, beautiful tits as he was.

They continued kissing until Amara pulled back. “Lay down next to him, and I will pleasure you with my mouth,” she said, grinning at Rain.

“Okay,” she replied a little breathlessly. She moved closer to Seth and sat down beside him. Reaching out, she took his hand and laced their fingers together. “Enjoying yourself?” she asked, smiling at him.

“Yes. A lot,” he replied, unable to articulate himself further.

“Good.”

“You’re going to enjoy yourself a lot more very soon,” Amara said. “Trust me, mermaid pussy is fucking fantastic.”

“I’m very eager to find out,” he replied.

She smirked. “I know.”

Now she laid out on the sand, just below the waterline, and he had a much clearer view. Her tail was definitely very pretty, glittering wetly in the sun as though its surface was jewel-studded. She settled on the wet sand in between Rain’s thick thighs, then leaned in and gently spread the taut lips of her dryad pussy. Rain inhaled sharply, then let out a long, soft moan as the mermaid leaned in and began to tease her clit with the tip of her tongue.

“Oh, Amara yes...” she whispered, spreading her legs a little wider. “Oh my...oh, I’ve missed this so much.”

“That will teach you to stay away from me for so long,” Amara replied, then began licking her clit faster.

“Oh! I’m sorry! I was-ah yes!-busy!”

“Uh-huh,” Amara said, then slipped a finger into her tight opening, causing her to cry out even louder.

Seth was becoming hard again, his cock slowly stiffening in response to the truly erotic display occurring right next to him. He was breathing more heavily and damn did he want to fuck Amara. He was suddenly intensely curious about what it might feel like to slide his cock into bare mermaid pussy. That’s one thing he loved so much about Rain, and apparently other ‘monster’ women: you didn’t need any kind of protection.

You could have completely unprotected, bareback sex with them.

As he’d been learning over the past several days, there was no feeling quite like that. Especially with a dryad, a nymph of the forest, a woman of the wild.

“Oh, Amara!” Rain shrieked, and then she was orgasming.

Amara was face-deep into her crotch, eating her out and fingering her furiously now, pleasuring her very effectively, and she pulled back to apparently stare at the result of her labor. Rain’s whole body bucked and heaved, her thick thighs bulging as her body clenched and released in response to the orgasm coursing through her. She groaned somewhere deep in her throat, her eyes closed, a look of intense concentration on her face. She was panting and moaning and saying something incoherently as she orgasmed and her green tree sap sex stuff oozed out of her vagina, being washed away by the ocean as it lapped gently at her and the shore around them.

Her orgasm lasted for awhile.

When it was finished, she gasped and fell back against the sand, panting.

“Wow,” she whispered.

“Yep,” Amara replied. She glanced over. “Your man is horny again.”

“Oh...” Rain said, looking over at him, she glanced down at his erect cock. “Well dear,” she spread her legs a bit more, “I’m here. I’m ready.”

“Me too,” Amara said, getting onto the sand on her back besides Rain.

Seth quickly got up and shifted over to them, staring at both women. They both looked insanely attractive and deeply erotic right then. He had two naked women laying on a beach, ready for him to take turns fucking them.

A fucking mermaid and a fucking dryad.

This was actually happening.

Seth didn’t want to think anymore, he just wanted to act. So he laid down on top of Rain and slipped his cock easily into her extremely wet, hot vagina and they both moaned in sexual unity as he penetrated her.

“Oh yes...” she groaned as he started making love to her.

The pleasure made him gasp. It felt so fucking good to be inside of her, to be making love with her, to be sliding his cock smoothly in and out of her fantastic dryad vagina. They were both panting and moaning as he fucked her furiously, and he almost blew his load off inside of a minute because he was so turned on, but he made himself pulled out of her. No way was he missing out on the other woman in this threesome.

She smiled at him as he straddled her, placing a knee on either side of her scaly lower half. He looked down at her, first at her beautiful pale face, her stunning blue eyes and messy, wet red hair. Then lower, to her huge tits and her gill slits. Lower still, to her trim stomach that broadened where the skin slowly became scales.

And then he could see her pussy, a tight little pink slit recessed within her tail.

“Put it in me,” she said.

He obliged her happily, gripping his dick, which was now slicked with Rain’s vaginal tree sap, laid it down into her pussy and pushed his way in.

Mermaid pussy, as he expected, felt amazing.

But it also felt different. Very different from human, elf, or dryad vagina. It was almost like...moss. Moss he sometimes found on rocks very near the shore of a lake near his home village. It was extremely slick and hot inside of her. He remembered being grossed out whenever he touched that moss, but surprisingly, this did not gross him out. Probably because it felt so stunningly good. He groaned loudly as he buried his cock inside of Amara’s mermaid pussy, and she moaned as well. She was seriously tight.

Seth began panting as he started driving into her, resting on his knees and really pounding her pussy. Her wonderful, glorious mermaid pussy.

“How does it feel, Seth?” Rain asked.

“It’s good,” he moaned, “by the Gods, it’s so fucking good.”

“Fuck me,” Amara moaned, grabbing his back. “Keep fucking me.”

Seth groaned in response, laying one hand across one big, pale, perfect breast, groping and squeezing and enjoying it. He looked down briefly in between them. He could see his cock disappearing into her pussy over and over again and the pleasure was overwhelming. He heard a slapping sound and felt water splashing onto his back. Looking briefly back over his shoulder, he saw that her finned tail was slapping violently into the water and sand. And fuck, she was so loud. It was so fucking hot.

He leaned down and kissed her, and she kissed back passionately.

Seth couldn’t possibly hold onto his orgasm any longer. He’d fully intended to but it felt simply too good. He continued driving into her, then cried out.

“Oh fuck, he’s coming,” Amara moaned. “I made your man come. He’s filling up my pussy with his seed...that’s a good boy,” she whispered, holding him. “That’s such a good boy. Come in my pussy. Fill me up,” she groaned.

His hips were jerking forward in time with the pulses of his dick as it spat thick, powerful spurts of his seed. He was pumping her pussy full of it, blowing a huge load inside of her. He was coming in mermaid pussy.

“Oh, Amara! Fuck! Amara it’s so good!” he cried.

She was holding him, staring directly into his eyes, and he couldn’t do anything but stare back into her stunningly beautiful eyes, her intense gaze that was hungry, almost feral with lust. Pleasure erupted inside of him, pure impossible bliss that filled him up in a rapturous ecstasy. He came and came and came inside of her.

Eventually, it subsided, and he was left gasping against her.

But he wasn’t done.

He still felt horny, and he was still hard. He wanted more. Seth kissed Amara hard on the mouth, then pulled out of her. Looking down at her briefly, he caught sight of his clearish-white seed spilling out of her pussy.

There was a lot of it.

“Come here,” he almost growled at Rain, crawling hurriedly over to her and getting back in between her legs.

“Oh wow,” she groaned as he penetrated her again. “Good Gods, you are horny today.”

“I am,” he growled and she cried out as he began driving into her, still as hard as tempered steel. “I’m so fucking horny right now.”

“Go, Seth! Fuck her like the dirty fucking nymph whore she is!” Amara cheered.

Rain tried to say something but her word became a yell of pleasure. “Wrap your legs around me,” he said.

“Okay,” she whispered, and did as he instructed her, wrapping him in her thick thighs. He could feel her legs at his back as he drove into her furiously, pounding the fuck out of her amazing dryad pussy.

“Oh, fuck this feels so good, Seth,” she gasped. “Holy...keep going...oh by Vivian yes!” she shrieked and then she was orgasming.

After two orgasms, he thought it would take longer for him to come a third time, but damn if he didn’t start letting off again as he felt her orgasm. The way it got hotter, it got wetter, slicker, the way her tree sap oozed out of her, the way her muscles clenched violently around his cock, massaging it, sucking it in…

It was all a perfect storm of pleasure that pulled his third, and final, climax out of him.

He didn’t think he had hardly any seed left to give, but the pleasure was there, all the same. Both of them moaned and writhed together, and he kissed Rain deeply and passionately and she kissed him back, wrapping all of her limbs around him, holding him tightly to her as they embraced fiercely, orgasming against each other.

This time, when he was finished, and Rain had released him, he very carefully pulled out of her, his cock extremely sensitive now, and rolled off of her, coming to rest on his back in the surf between the two women.

Amara got up against him, and he put an arm around her. She rested her head on his chest. Rain rolled over and got up against him as well, resting her head on his shoulder, careful of her branch antlers, and the three of them laid together for several moments in happy, sedate, companionable silence.

Seth broke it first. “That was...” he said, trailing off, looking for the words.

“Amazing?” Amara suggested.

“Unreal,” he replied. “Like...it feels like a dream, like a hallucination, maybe.”

“Really?” she asked. “Why?”

“My life...was very plain before this week. I left my home village for the first time really in my entire life less than a week ago, and before then, I had only had a few brief sexual encounters with one woman. They were nice, but...they were nothing compared to what I’ve been doing with Rain. What just happened now.”

“Oh wow, it really must have been an insane experience. Well, I’m glad I could give you such an experience. You’re a bit better at sex than your experience level seems to suggest.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, don’t let that inflate your ego though. I’d still say you are more enthusiastic than skilled...but don’t take that as a shot, either. You made me come.”

“Did I? I couldn’t tell,” he admitted.

“It was during your climax. It’s fine. I think a band of Minotaurs could’ve walked up right then and you would’ve had no idea. You were just lost in your own little world there. That’s the awesome thing about being inexperienced and young and awkward: your orgasms are mind-blowing when you’re fucking someone you’re just so into. And obviously you were into us.”

“Oh yeah, that’s for sure,” he murmured. He felt very sleepy now, and again the sense of unreality, of being in a dream, came back. It was powerful this time. He was laying on a sunny shore in between two women of the wild, one of the forest, one of the ocean, and he had had unprotected sex with and come inside of both of them.

“I’m not sure what to say,” he said finally after silence had fallen again.

“Don’t say anything,” Amara replied quietly. She kissed his neck. “Just lay here with us. Enjoy the sun and the sea and the post-sex feelings.”

He nodded, and laid there, and did exactly that.

…

They sat on that beach for close to three hours, just talking and relaxing.

Eventually, Amara had to go. She said she had things to tend to in the ocean, and she’d kissed them both goodbye, then had gone off into the water. After that, he and Rain had decided it was time to eat. They gathered kindling and rocks and made a fire-pit. Rain killed a pair of rabbits and he skinned and cleaned them, then began cooking the meat. All through this, he noticed that Rain had gotten very quiet after Amara had left.

He was beginning to get a little worried.

It laid a dark cloud over his good cheer. He’d done it! He’d gathered everything he needed for the potion! There was more to do. He had to make the potion, he had to sell it, buy new things, get to a village before all that…

But he was worried about Rain.

“Are you okay?” he asked. They’d been sitting by the fire for several minutes now as he slowly turned the spit-roast.

“What?” she asked, clearly distracted.

“Are you okay, Rain?”

“Oh...yeah. I’m okay. I’ve just been...thinking.”

“What about?”

“Something important. Something I’ve actually been thinking about for years now. But I have a question.”

“Okay...”

“What are you going to do? I mean, in your life now. Will you continue?”

He nodded, slowly at first, then more firmly. “Yes. I’m going to continue this. I already have more ideas of what I want to do, places I want to visit, things I want to do. Why do you ask?” he replied.

“I...I guess I should just come right out with it. We talked earlier about how I wanted to leave. I told you that I was afraid. Of leaving. Of what that might mean. I do actually have another place I can go. A smaller forest that some of my friends left for. It’s several miles from here, closer to the center of the land. A portion of our clan left two years ago after an infestation of undead resulted in the deaths of several of their dryad guardians. I’ve visited three times since then and I really, really like it there. And I’ve thought about leaving for it.”

“What’s keeping you?” he asked.

“I don’t think there’s anything keeping me. My original reason was guilt. I felt like I was abandoning my position here, my responsibilities. But in the time since then, it’s become obvious that the other dryads have been slowly picking up the slack, and they can, and probably will happily, run this area without me. Then there are some friends that I would have to leave here, but honestly...except for Amara, who would understand, I’ve grown distant with everyone else. All that was left really was fear. And being with you over these past several days...I don’t know. Maybe it sounds stupid, but you inspire me. It’s like...if you can walk away from your life and come out here and just do this, just live the life you want to live, why can’t I? I’m capable of it. I could do it. I guess I’ve just finally come to realize that there is no good reason not to do this.”

“I’m glad,” he said. “I mean, I don’t know if I can really take any credit, or if I want to, but I’m glad that the result is that you’ve made this choice,” he replied, feeling at once awkward and happy and kind of inspired himself.

“Seth, you don’t owe me anything. Despite what you might think,” she said, raising her voice a little when he tried to start talking. “I know, you think you owe me something because I saved your life at least once or twice, and I helped you a lot. But I did that of my own free will. I wanted to help you. So, you don’t owe me anything, and I do believe that I’m fully capable of doing this on my own, but...I would be grateful if you would be willing to walk with me to that forest. I can do things alone, but...doing new things alone is scary.”

“I know so much about that fact,” he replied. “And yes, Rain. I will help you. I’ll walk there with you. I’ll spend time with you. Help you get settled in. But I’m not doing this because I think I owe it to you. I’m not doing this because I think I have to. I’m doing it because I want to. If that will make you feel better.”

She laughed. “Yeah, it does.” She paused and glanced at the rabbit. “Well, that looks about done. What do you say we eat, and then we start walking for the border of the Redwood Forest? I know the way there and some fairly untraveled countryside we can use. People get a little freaked out if they see dryad out of our forests.”

“I’m okay with this plan,” he replied. “Don’t you need to say goodbye to anyone?”

“No. I don’t want to say goodbye to any of the dryads here. They will sense that I am gone, and I believe they will know why. If they really have a problem with it, they know where to find me. And Amara...well, as I said earlier, I have ways of communicating with her. And even so, I’m positive I will visit her at least a few times a year. She’ll understand.”

“Okay then. Let’s eat and start walking,” he said.

Rain smiled. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. And thank you. For everything.”

They began to eat.

EPILOGUE

For one of the very few times in his life, Seth felt utterly, completely at ease.

He felt as if everything was going exactly like he wanted it to, and there was nothing looming on the horizon, nothing to make him afraid. Walking through the Tranquil Thicket, he realized, suddenly, that he’d been living in the shadow of fear and anxiety for...forever, it seemed. Even from a very young age, he could recall the constant background tension of his parent’s expectations, and the threat of their anger and disappointment should he fail. And then there had eventually been the hope he’d been granted when he’d actually begun to entertain the idea of doing what he was currently doing. But even then, he lived in fear.

It was worse, actually.

Because he knew that making this decision, that acting on this decision, would inevitably lead to a confrontation between him and his parents, who were the most powerful people in his world. The closer and more real it became, the worse his anxiety. And then, after he’d finally made that decision, finally gotten on with it, there was elation, sure, and perhaps a few hours at most of peace in between leaving his past life and beginning his new life, but still, the shadow had been there. But now...now it was actually gone.

Because he’d done it.

He’d faced down the danger, the death, the destruction.

And sure, there was more of that in his future, because he was committed to the life now. There was no way he was walking away from this. Although, good Gods, he was going to be smarter about it. Rain had saved his ass. And he couldn’t rely on her or anyone else forever. Yes, he would accept help, but he had to rely on himself more if he was going to survive this chaotic new life he had chosen. And he already had a lot of ideas of how he could improve, things he could buy, new spells that he was going to have to learn…

But it didn’t matter just then, as he walked through that peaceful forest towards where Rain was waiting for him. It didn’t matter because he felt capable of dealing with whatever life threw at him. Or, at the very least, he felt capable of learning. He felt like he had actual control over his life. And that...was so freeing.

He let his thoughts wander.

It had been almost four days since he’d gotten that last ingredient, since he’d made love with Amara, since he had chosen to help Rain. They had walked out of the Redwood Forest that day, first moving up along its length until they reached a parallel point with the nearest forest to Redwood, the crossing barely a hundred meters. They’d crossed and made camp for the night. And made love three times. Then they’d crossed that forest, and two more after it, until finally, yesterday, they had arrived in the Tranquil Thicket.

This was where Rain wanted to be.

They had met with her dryad friends yesterday in the afternoon, and they had talked and caught up and rejoiced for most of the rest of the day. Seth had taken the time to set up camp and cook up his potion. When night had fallen, Rain had come back to him, happier than he had ever seen her. She was free, too. Free to live the life she wanted. And they’d made love twice more last night, and once again this morning.

After sex, a soak, and breakfast, he’d walked into the nearest town, a trade village called Vale Valley, and had spent two hours haggling for the best price across three different magic stores. In the end, he’d pulled down five hundred gold.

It was the single most gold he’d ever had in his entire life.

He had a lot of ideas on how to use it, but right now, he just wanted to get back to Rain and relax for the rest of the day. He had his gold, and tomorrow he would go back into town and spend it and buy things that he needed.

But now, he would relax.

…

“Are you okay?” Rain asked.

Seth came out of his thoughts, or was startled out of them really. “What?”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m...” he thought about telling her that he was, but it would be a lie. “No, I’m not. I’m sad,” he replied.

“Why?”

They were laying together on his bedroll, naked, the sweat cooling on their skin. Well, his. He still wasn’t sure if she sweat.

“I’m going to leave soon, and you aren’t going to come with me,” he said softly.

“I know...I’m going to miss you. A lot,” she replied.

“I’ll miss you, too. I’m just...having trouble dealing with it.”

“I am, too. But...” She rolled over and sat up suddenly, looking down at him. Above him like this, her head and branches haloed by the moonlight, she looked like a divine being. “Seth, this is how it has to be. If we’re going to be true to ourselves, if we’re going to live the lives we’ve sacrificed for, the lives we want, then this is the way it has to be. I have to stay here, in this forest, and help protect it, tend to it. You have to continue your own life on the road. But...it doesn’t have to be miserable, Seth. Yes, it will hurt, and yes, we will be lonely and miserable for a little while, but you can visit me. I’ll be here, and I’ll welcome you every time.”

She laid down against him and hugged him.

He hugged her back fiercely.

“I’ll come back and visit,” he said.

“Good.” She sat up again suddenly and then straddled him in one quick movement. “But you aren’t gone yet.”

“No,” he agreed, settling his hands on her hips, “I’m not.”

Rain leaned down and kissed him.

WOMEN OF THE WILD – THE DRYAD. Copyright © by Misty Vixen. All rights reserved.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entire coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.