Make for the building

You descend the tree. Seeing you safe, Brigette lets out a relieved sigh as you hop down the final branch to land in a crouch. You straighten and retrieve the sword of the saint. “There’s a few opportunities,” you say as you strap the weapon back upon your waist. “I saw what looks like a building not too far. It’s on a hill, and even if uninhabited, should provide us with shelter. We can make it there before nightfall, at least.”

“Sounds like a plan,” the green sister says. “Can you make it? Or do you need something to eat?”

You find your eyes drawn down to Brigette’s gravity defying breasts. You lick your lips, watching them drool their thick cream but look up suddenly to their owner’s face. “What about you? Aren’t you hungry?”

Taken aback, Brigette frowns a little at this unexpected thought. “I…Haven’t been, in fact. Maybe a little thirsty but…No. Not hungry.” She raises her hand and turns it over; inspecting the healthy green it has taken on. “Maybe it was one of the changes the demon made in me. But I haven’t felt hungry since we left. Maybe a little at night, but…” She shrugged.

You feel concern take root in you at this information, but Brigette doesn’t seem to have taken on any other changes, and it is thanks to her that you haven’t needed to hunt or find any food on your journey. And, if you are honest, it is a change you can live with. You again look with gratitude at her heavy breasts and smile.

“Nothing to be done about it,” you admit.

That is the last said on the matter and you both resume your journey through the forest. It is easier now that you have a positive direction, and you don’t feel the need to climb a tree constantly to reassure yourself. You move parallel the setting sun, and in time, the forest thins and the ground slopes upward. Soon enough you can see the building you had spotted through the trees. It is a large thing, with a domed marble ceiling and steep walls of colonnaded pillars leaving the building open to the air. As you draw nearer you pass by the ruins of crumbled buildings and statues grown thick with infestations of ivy and moss, showing the faint traces of naked human figures, pieces often missing. A path of stone slabs eventually becomes apparent, and you both follow it as it climbs towards the main building. The ruin never lacks in the decay of its forms, but is more whole as you draw nearer, the encroaching forest more measured, as if it were joining in support of the superstructure. Here and there trees seem to be serving in the place of fallen pillars to hold aloft an arch. Moss forms soft carpets and flowers spring like festive garlands about a ceiling. You climb some steps and pass beneath an arch festooned with vines and enter the main building.

You loosen the sword of the saint in its scabbard and draw it a fraction. Pausing in the threshold you glance about. There are several passages, all open between pillars, but frequently carpets of flowers and vines form something like screens within an arch. A pair of marble statues depicting muscular youths with curly hair flank the entrance, surprisingly whole, but decorated with a crown of lotuses and ivy wrap lovingly across their chiseled figures. This has been clearly cultivated by intelligent hands. The sound of flowing water reaches you from somewhere out of sight.

“Hello!” you call into the temple, foregoing caution. “Is anyone here?”

Only your echoes answer. Cautiously you penetrate deeper into the temple, Brigette close at your side. There is no sound but the light twitter and chirp of birds outside and the pervasive trickle of the water. You push aside the screen of ivy and follow a corridor; the flagstones in many places pushed aside or cracked showing the peeking green and brown of soil and overgrowth. Evening’s red glare glances slyly from between the columns. The passage ends in a second veil of ivy which you quickly push aside, and come upon the source of the water sound.

You at once recognize it as the main building you saw from the tree. A circular space, it was surrounded by columns and at the foot of each, alternating, was the statue of a man or woman, all physically perfect, bent on a knee with hands outstretched in supplication to the center of the room. In the middle there stands a fountain built in a ring of pure white stone. A statue of a woman stands on a raised platform within, she the focus of the stone people’s adoring gaze. Her stomach is distended, gravid with pregnancy, and her breasts sag slightly with maturity. A warm smile is etched on her face, understanding and patient. Four arms extend from her torso, each holding a bowl which overflows with a liquid, but it is not water which spills to pool at her feet, but something red, like blood. You sniff the air and smell the distinct sweetness of grapes and ****.

“Wine?” you blurt out in surprise. You look the statue up and down in confusion. “What is this?”

“A statue of Aellium,” Brigette says in obvious surprise. She looks about with newfound awareness at the statues which were bent in worship. “This must be a temple to her.”

“So close to the abbey?” you say. You step nearer and look curiously at the matronly face of the four armed figure.

“The cult lost much of its influence with the rise of the Burning Rose,” Brigette says as she makes a circuit of the chamber. Her hand passes gently upon the heads of the kneeling statues. “They must have abandoned it and the forest simply…grew up around it. Hiding it.”

“The way you say it, it’s as if the forest were protecting it.” You step nearer the fountain and look into the scarlet waters. Your reflection stares back. It must be the red colour, for you could swear your face looks a little green.

You step back and look about it. “The books say that she may have been a powerful demoness rather than a goddess.”

“Do you believe that?” Brigette asks sulkily.

You flush in shame, recalling your sister’s nickname. “I don’t think so,” you quickly say. “Her cult survives, if small, and though the circle condemns their teachings, they haven’t started a crusade to hunt them down.”

“They do? Why?”

Unbidden, your eyes fall to the pregnant belly of the statue. “Their church teaches to rejoice in fertility. In pleasure, rather than in the chastity of the Burning Rose.”

Brigette runs her fingers through the red wine in the pool. “Well, we have failed that…”

Sadness weighs on you with that reminder. You look down the deep valley of your breasts to your stomach and touch the flat flesh there. You look out through the pillars to the burning orange and red light of the fading day.

“It’s getting late,” you say. “We can spend the night here, and move on in the morning.”

“Yes.” Brigette sits down on the lip of the fountain. She presses a finger against her nipple and spreads the cream oozing forth in slow circles until the heavy globes shine like they are aflame. She turns pleadingly towards you. “Come, Sabine. It will help you sleep.”

You lick you lips hungrily at this display. You settle before her, kneeling between her parted legs. As you lean up, you inhale the heavy perfume of her slit, the earthy aroma melding with the sweetness of the wine behind her, the scent overpowering your sensibilities. You take hold of her breast, and a sudden thought makes you smile. Your tongue laps out lashes Brigette’s breast, licking up the cream she had spread about them. Only once you have cleaned her do you latch onto her nipple and begin to suckle.

Brigette coos and strokes your long fiery mane. “Thank you, Sabine,” she murmurs. “Thank you. Drink of me. Drink deep.”

You spend the waning twilight hours feeding from her once again. You finish as the first stars begin to prick the velvet dark sky with light. Warmed and sated by Brigette’s milk, you both leave the goddess’s tholos to seek out somewhere to rest. A nearby chamber branching from the main corridor serves. Like the rest of the temple it is open, but save a hole where a part of the roof fell in, is in good repair. An altar in the centre of the chamber serve as a make shift bed. Together, you and Brigette curl up atop it, you nestling close as the green woman wraps her arms about you, pressing your head between her breasts. You drift to sleep, safely ensconced in her firm breasts, and feeling her supple fingers toying with the rose in your hair.