Chapter 101

In the end, only Morghinna wanted me gone.

The other matrons - and Grams - supported the plan for walls, food, and protection. None of them liked the reason those things were necessary, but they were practical enough to recognize the danger.

Once the shouting died down, I laid out my plan.

“I’ll raise the walls myself,” I told them. “You won’t need to gather your people or try to build something impossible with hand tools. I can do it with magic.”

Even so, it would take time. Two or three days total, maybe more depending on how quickly Ashlara, Elise, and Mirri regenerated the Faith I’d be drawing from them.

We would start tomorrow.

I made a conscious decision not to ask Iolite for help. He and his little stone friends had already done more than enough for us, and I still had no idea how to repay them. This was something we could handle ourselves.

That night Tansy and I patrolled Mudcross.

We found three more Bloodchildren and led them away from the village, guiding them back toward the forest around the keep the same way Nim and I had done before.

That brought the total to thirteen.

In the morning, Serah stayed behind with the children. She insisted she could help if needed, but I wasn’t willing to risk it. When Elise destroyed the Faith within the others it caused little more than fatigue or tingling. With Serah it was different. She described it as uncomfortable - like something tugging at her soul.

Not painful, exactly. But close enough that we weren’t going to push it.

We gathered at Reedwatch and began building the first wall.

I started singing. Mana flowed through me and into the ground, stone pushing upward in response. The wall rose in jagged slabs of shale and gneiss, rough and uneven but solid enough to stop anything short of a determined army.

For now, rough was good enough.

I managed nearly three quarters of the village perimeter before my mana finally ran dry. Ashlara stepped in after that.

With the Faith Elise stripped from her, we finished the remaining stretch and shaped a simple gate frame from wood. The goblins would have to install proper hinges and doors themselves. Metalworking still wasn’t something I could manage.

From there we moved quickly.

Twinfurrow and Pinefall were finished using Ashlara’s Faith alone. Snagfield and Mudcross were raised with Mirri’s Faith - and she still had some strength left afterward. We didn’t need to touch Elise’s.

By the time we finished, the sun was setting. It had taken the entire day, but the walls stood.

Apparently my earlier calculations had been way off. A few nights ago we’d built nearly four and a half miles of wall in the dark between two armies. Compared to that, the villages were tiny. Each perimeter barely stretched half a mile.

That night I finally slept. Deep and dreamless, surrounded by my three beautiful women.

* * *

In the morning I woke to a warm, wet pressure wrapped around my cock.

Beneath the blankets, a small shape moved between my legs, a soft head bobbing steadily as someone worked their mouth along my length. Ashlara and Serah still slept on either side of me, their bodies heavy and warm, my arms pinned beneath them.

The motion stopped with a quiet, wet pop. Mirri’s head emerged from the covers, green eyes bright and mischievous. A string of saliva still clung to my shaft.

“I missed you,” she said with a wide grin.

She climbed up my body slowly, rubbing herself along me as she went. Her slit slid against my spit-slick cock, warm and soaked, and I couldn’t tell which of us was wetter.

She kissed me - hard and hungry - before shifting back down. Her folds parted and she sank onto me in one smooth motion.

We both groaned.

Mirri had never been subtle about sex. Slow, tender lovemaking wasn’t her style. She liked it rough, fast, and hard, and she made no attempt to hide it. Even riding me she set a relentless pace, lifting herself high before dropping down with her full weight.

Her moans came quickly. Moans became squeaks. Squeaks became breathless cries. Then silence as her orgasm hit her like a lightning strike.

By then Ashlara and Serah had woken. Their lips brushed my neck and chest, soft kisses and teasing touches as they watched Mirri ride out her pleasure.

I slipped my arms free from beneath them, grabbed Mirri’s hips, and flipped her onto her back.

She gasped.

I drove into her hard, pounding her through the fading tremors of her first orgasm and straight into another. Her small breasts bounced with each thrust as Ashlara and Serah leaned in, lavishing them with eager attention - tongues and fingers teasing her sensitive nipples.

Mirri arched beneath me, crying out as wave after wave tore through her.

Only after dragging her through the second climax did I allow myself to finish, burying myself deep inside her as pleasure ripped through my body.

When we were done I rolled to my side, settling between Serah’s long, elegant legs.

She was already glistening.

I lowered my mouth to her and slowly teased her folds apart with my tongue.

Serah shivered.

Behind me, Ashlara moved between my legs. Her strong hands gripped my hips as her mouth wrapped around me, bringing me back to full hardness with ease.

Serah’s pleasure built slowly, the way she liked it. Her body tensed. Her fingers tightened in my hair. Then she screamed as her orgasm broke, her love juices spilling into my mouth and running down my chin.

I rose onto my knees and pulled Ashlara toward me.

The thick hair between her legs parted beneath my fingers. I leaned down and gave her a long, deliberate lick, tasting the heat of her before positioning myself at her entrance.

She groaned as I pressed forward.

Ashlara was tight and strong, her powerful body slowly opening to take my length. I pushed in gradually, savoring the way her walls stretched around me until I was buried as deep as I could go.

I gave her a moment. Then I grabbed her legs and lifted them, folding her nearly in half. Her knees pressed near her shoulders as I drove into her again.

Hard.

Her groans were deeper than Mirri’s, rough and primal. Each thrust drew another growl from her throat as I hammered into her powerful body.

When she came, she grabbed me and crushed me against her chest with terrifying strength. Her muscles locked around me. I kept thrusting.

Her orgasms were always intense - always long - and this morning was no different. Her body shook as wave after wave of pleasure rolled through her, her velvety walls squeezing me so tightly there was no chance of pulling free.

Eventually the strength of it **** another climax from me. We rode it together until her grip loosened and her breathing slowed.

The moment I slipped free, Serah and Mirri were already there.

Their mouths replaced Ashlara’s warmth, cleaning me and coaxing me back to full hardness once more.

When I was ready, I turned to Serah.

She lay waiting, her pale skin glowing the morning light, her long body graceful and elegant against the bed.

I lowered myself over her and slid back into her still-wet folds.

She sighed. Then moaned softly as I began to move.

Serah liked it differently. Where Mirri wanted ferocity and Ashlara reveled in raw strength, Serah preferred attention - slow, deliberate care. My pace stayed steady, my hips shifting as I adjusted angles to find each sensitive spot within her.

Mirri and Ashlara joined us, each claiming one of Serah’s breasts, their hands and mouths teasing her as I worked inside her.

Her second orgasm came with another sharp cry.

A few minutes later my own approached.

“Outside,” she breathed.

I nodded. I understood. She hadn’t even known I could get her pregnant. And the pregnancy was quite traumatic. I couldn’t blame her for not wanting to repeat that experience.

Besides, thirteen children in the house was already plenty.

I pulled free and finished across her stomach.

Ashlara immediately leaned in to clean me with her tongue while Mirri took care of Serah.

Once we’d all caught our breath, we climbed out of bed and made our way to the bathhouse for a proper cleaning.

* * *

I sang up several more shelters, these ones large enough to comfortably house five or six people. I built them into the hillsides where the slopes were steep, shaping the stone so they blended into the terrain and wouldn’t draw the eye of anyone passing by.

Then I took the ferals hunting again.

This time we ranged farther from the keep, deliberately shifting our routes so we wouldn’t strip the forest bare of game. Even with care, the six of them hunted with brutal efficiency. As a pack they could bring down almost anything that lived in the woods.

They enjoyed it too - though each in their own way.

For Nim, it was the cooperation. He thrived on the quiet communication between them, the unspoken roles each fell into. Clo loved the chase. The faster the prey ran, the wider her grin grew. Vel enjoyed the moment of victory - the final surge when the prey fell and the hunt was won. Thae approached it like a puzzle. She watched, calculated, and adjusted the pack’s approach when the prey was larger or more dangerous. Moss… well, Moss mostly seemed pleased that it ended with something she could sink her teeth into.

When we returned home, I sang a long stone trough into existence in the bailey and filled it with coals to make a makeshift grill.

Then came the butchering.

Without proper grates to keep the meat off the fire, I was **** to spit the cuts and roast them over the coals. There was so much meat that I drafted the other children into helping turn the spits so nothing burned.

Feeding thirteen Bloodchildren was a challenge. Each of them could easily put away five or six pounds of meat in a day.

Still, with six deer laid out before us, we would have enough to keep everyone fed for a while.

Late in the afternoon I stepped to my demesne and carried most of the meat to a glacier high in the mountains. The ice there was cold enough to keep everything frozen solid.

From there I made my rounds to the shelters.

The larger ones I stocked with enough food for four people for a full day. The smaller shelters received five pounds of meat each.

Most of the smaller shelters were already occupied.

When the shelters were empty, stocking them was easy.

When they weren’t, things got… more complicated.

If the Bloodchild inside didn’t attack on sight, I left the meat nearby and moved on. If they did attack, I subdued them, **** them to the ground, and held them there until they understood who was in charge. Once they stopped fighting, I left the food inside and released them.

By the time I finished the rounds, the sun had already dipped toward the horizon.

I returned home, washed up, and sat down to dinner with my family.

* * *

I put Vel and Thae in charge of keeping tabs on the Bloodchildren. Each of them got a journal and instructions to record everything they noticed - how many were lurking nearby, which shelters they were using, and any incidents that caught their attention. Fights between them, attacks on livestock or people, signs of packs forming, strange behavior - anything that might matter.

They were also required to work together. No one was to leave the keep alone.

I trusted all of the ferals to handle the Bloodchildren if it came to that, but I didn’t want to gamble on one of them being surrounded and overwhelmed. Vel and Thae could take the others with them when needed, and I encouraged it. The more the Bloodchildren saw the ferals acting together - confident, organized, in control - the better.

Even with that responsibility, their classes continued. The world was big, complicated, and not always kind. If they were going to survive in it, they needed more than claws and teeth. They studied history, magic, math, science, politics, and culture - how different people thought, what dangers existed, and how to protect themselves from those who might try to take advantage of them.

While they worked on that, I kept busy. Reading, fixing things around the keep, and spending time in the workshop.

Iolite returned again, and I took the chance to pick his brain while I had him. With his help, I managed to locate a vein of iron ore in the hills nearby. Using my magic, I crushed the rock down into manageable chunks and carried it back to the workshop.

From there, I built a simple tube furnace - crude, but functional - and fed the crushed ore into it.

When the heat built high enough, the iron didn’t melt the way I’d expected. Instead, the ore broke down into two parts: slag and iron. The slag ran off in glowing streams, draining away while the iron fused together into a heavy, spongy mass at the bottom of the furnace.

It looked more like a lump of burning stone than metal.

The mass still held pockets of slag, though, and those needed to be driven out. Normally that would require a hammer. Since I didn’t have one yet, I had to rely on magic - pounding the glowing iron again and again until the impurities squeezed free and dripped away.

While the metal was still hot, I split the mass into two pieces.

Then I lit the forge and began the slow process of heating and shaping them.

Cold iron resisted most everything I tried to do with it, stubborn and unyielding. But when it glowed red in the fire, it softened just enough that my magic could push and pull it into shape. Even then, it took several rounds of heating, shaping, reheating, and shaping again.

The first chunk I forged into a crude hammer head. It wasn’t pretty, but it would give me an actual tool to work with next time instead of relying on magic alone.

The second chunk I shaped into a rough block - maybe five inches long, two inches thick, tapering down to about an inch at the base. It would serve as the foundation for an anvil.

It wasn’t much, but it was a start.

After dinner I spent time with the children. We sang songs and played games, though finding something everyone enjoyed was always a challenge.

The ferals preferred activity - running, hunting, moving. They were getting better at sitting still, but it still took effort. Torvek and Elarion liked action as well, though they leaned more toward competition than ****. The others tended to prefer quieter games.

Eventually we landed on storytelling.

Each child took a turn adding to the story, acting out their scene before leaving a problem for the next person to solve. The tale twisted and lurched in unpredictable directions as some children tried to resolve conflicts with diplomacy or clever thinking, while others solved social disputes by punching the problem in the face.

Watching how each of them approached the same challenge was entertaining - and surprisingly revealing.

After that I used my magic to polish a pile of stones into smooth little spheres and showed them how to play a simple marble game. They took turns flicking the stones, trying to knock the others out of a marked circle.

It was competitive enough to keep everyone interested, strategic enough to make them think, and active enough that even the ferals stayed engaged - at least most of the time.