Chapter 80: 76 – Illusions and Tricks

My head is suddenly bombarded with a whole slew of memories— my years studying at the Witch's Academy in Grathir, my relationship with Mira Dawncrest, the Weeping Expanse, Eudora the Cackling Witch, everything floods back into my mind all at once. I fall back, but land on the firm body of Taurac who helps me back to my feet.

I place a hand on his muscular, fur-coated chest and apologize, "As wonderful as it would be to spend an eternity making love with you, I have a world and friends to save. I can't just stay here."

"Taurac understands. Will fight for mate," Taurac answers, stroking my face.

I'm fortunate that my minotaur lover so easily acquiesced. If things were a little different and the world in less dire straits, I may have taken him as my spouse, bore a whole ranch of calves with him. After all, where will I find better sex than with a gentle bull like him?

However, there is only one person who comes to mind when I think of spending the rest of my life with. I want to see her again. I want to hear her call me darling again.

In order for the two of us to make that happiness a reality, I need to break out of this forged world and defeat Edith. Only then could we clear our names and live in peace.

Something hard pokes at my thighs. I look down to see Taurac's erect cock twitching and brushing up against me. My nipples are poking through the silken gown like mountain peaks, and my thighs are getting wet from my pussy dripping again.

"I suppose it couldn't hurt to go another round first. Right, Taurac?" I ask, disrobing myself a second time for him.

Taurac grunts excitedly and carries me back to the bed.

***

I collect my things and make sure everything I came into the tower with is still in my satchel. They are, and so is my familiar. A few potions down the hatch, and I'm ready to set off to explore the forged world with my strength and stamina returned to me.

It's too much to hope the shadowy figure that delivered our food would show up, now that we're invited by whoever sent me the letter. Taurac and I march down the hallway that seems to stretch on for eternity.

The doors lead into an identical room as the one I woke up in. One thing is for sure, we aren't walking around in circles or being led through an infinity loop. When I disturb something in one room, the next room is spotless. Backtracking, reveals the rooms I left a disturbance in has not been fixed.

More disconcerting than the endless hallway is the paintings. They ooze with magic, as though they were painted with crushed magic crystals mixed into paint.

We've been walking for what feels like hours. My eyes are beginning to blur seeing the same dark mahogany hallway. I'm invited to join whoever the sender is for dinner, I must be long past that time now. 

"If I'm invited, where am I supposed to go?!" I yell down the hall, my echo is the only thing that responds.

Taurac continues to open doors, looking inside, and then closing them gently so as to not break the knob and hinges. He even checks behind the paintings, and gingerly fixes them back on. It's amusing to see the giant demihuman so careful with things, especially since he was aggressively attacking me when we first met.

"Maybe there's some sort of clue in the letter?" I ask myself.

The letter reads the same:

'You may not remember me and may remember even less now. We are already acquainted, from a trade made in calmer times. This is your invitation to join me for dinner, so that we may bargain once again.'

I read it again out loud, hoping that it triggers something.

The first part of the last sentence sticks out to me.

This is your invitation to join me for dinner.

"Is… the letter the key?" I wonder aloud.

Taurac looks at me and shrugs, just as clueless as I am.

I hold the letter up to a door and say, "Excuse me! I have an invitation to—"

The doorknob turns on its own and the door swings open. I smack myself in the face for not realizing it was a riddle sooner.

We step inside what appears to be just a significantly larger version of the hallway. The walls to our left and right aren't so claustrophobic anymore, but the ceiling rises into darkness, and before us is a dinner table which also stretches further into the room until all there is is pitch black.

"Please, take a seat. Any seat!" a whimsical voice tells us.

Taurac and I are hesitant to listen to the disembodied voice. For all I know, this is a trick to get us to drop our guard. The two of us walk down the chamber, following the length of the seemingly endless table.

The voice taunts us as we walk.

"Oh, don't be so modest. You must be tired, yes? There is food on the table for you. All you need to do is take a seat," it says.

Sure enough, the table that previously only had dinnerware is now supplied with food. A whole roasted hog, pineapples, fried slabs of sturgeon with a side of lemons, the list goes on as we walk. Taurac eyes the table ravenously, his stomach growls louder than a dragon.

I give Taurac a mean look. "We don't know if it's poisoned. If you eat that, I'm not giving you anymore sex if we end up getting stuck here."

Taurac moos in disappointment. I chuckle at how easily it was to convince him. I may have said that to reign him in, but chances are I'm likely to give in to lust first.

"You're no fun," the voice sighs, this time more exasperated than playful. "I even have mead. You like mead?"

"Whoever you are, we're not falling for your tricks!" I shout in response.

"Why do you have to be so difficult?" it asks.

The next hour is spent walking down the hall with the voice taunting us with insults, teasing me about my sex life, things it shouldn't have known unless it knew me on a personal level.

Eventually, I have enough.

"Alright, already! I'm taking a damn seat…" I grumble.

Taurac and I take the closest seats adjacent to each other.

 As soon as our butts touch the red pattern cushion of the seat, the whole room blurs like I'm being yanked across the room at lightning speed. I come to a stop, dizzy and about to throw up.

I clutch my head, trying to keep my vision from spinning. "What the—"

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"Welcome!" an excited voice shouts in my ears.

"Whaaat?!" I scoot back several feet in my seat.

To my right, a tall gentleman dressed in red, white, and purple robes, one side of which is striped and the other checkered. He has a monocle over his right eye, and a jester's cap on his head with tiny bells that jingle with every little movement.

"It's been a while, hasn't it, Miss Witch?" the man in a jester suit says.

"The way your letter was written… you speak as if we know each other? I don't recall ever meeting someone like you," I reply, moving my seat back into place.

The man rears back, clutching his heart and makes a pained expression. "I'm terribly hurt. Most terribly. We have met, but my name is easily forgotten for a reason. Perhaps this will jog your memory?" 

He clasps his hands on the surface of the table. As he parts them, six restoration potions appear in the empty space.

Six restoration potions…

A name that started with an M…

"You're Morten Sinau? The traveling merchant?" It's all coming back to me now.

Morten is the man traveling on a wagon pulled by oxen who claims to trade with demihumans. He was the one who sold me the sensitivity wand for six restoration potions. His manner of speech seems off.

"Yes, it's me! Hello, again!" he shouts, bouncing in his seat. Morten definitely does not sound like the same Morten I spoke to. The man I met before was a simple merchant, but this one…. Is like a clown. "I see your confusion. Morten is not my name. I go by many names, for my masks are many."

The one I knew as Morten rises to his full height. His skin is white as snow, or perhaps it is make-up he has on. He stands several feet taller than Taurac, carries a cane tipped with a laughing skull, and wears white satin gloves in which the middle finger is colored black.

There are many gods in Talmora. Some we learn in the Academy as primordial shapers of this planet. Then there are those whose names have been lost to oblivion or forcibly purged from history, never to be spoken of again.

A terrible presence thickens around me. I almost want to laugh at the ridiculousness of the situation I found myself in. I recognize the entity before me, a name whose name was one of those stricken from the books, one that is taboo to speak of to witches and holy knights.

"I am Demos, God of Illusions, Foul Tricks and Worn Masks, Whisperer of Jokes, He Who Laughs & Weeps, The Dancer in the Moonlight, and most of all…" the entity before me extends a hand in my direction as though asking me to finish his name.

I swallow hard and utter his final most notorious title, "Father of Black Magic."

Demos' smile widens and curves like that of an early crescent moon, his teeth shining just as brilliant and blinding.

Movement shifts behind me. Taurac moves forward with the intention to protect me, but I urge him back into his seat.

"It's fine. If Demos wanted to hurt us, he wouldn't have hesitated. Isn't that right?" I ask the god.

Demos shrinks to human size and returns to his seat as well. "Astute. It is why we have taken an interest in you."

We?

"So what are you doing here? Did you get stuck, too?"

He gawks at me disbelief. "Heavens, no. I'm an occupant. Like you, silly. I rather like this place, teeming with magic. Of course, I can leave anytime I want, but why would I? It's been centuries since I had a physical form, I'm finally alive again.

Demos fills his plate with food from the table, gorging himself with roasted pork and wine. He is everything I do not expect of a god— unrefined, boisterous, impish, but it suppose this could only be true for the trickster god. It feels like I'm speaking to a loud-mouth drunk.

Next to me, Taurac watches with drool slipping from his mouth.

"There is no trickery with the food," Demos assures us with a grin that makes it difficult to believe.

Regardless, hunger gets the better of Taurac, and he digs into the feast laid out before us.

I, however, am not hungry. I slide the invitation letter to Demos, hundreds of questions are swirling through my head. Only one sticks out to me.

"Your letter asked about making a bargain. What exactly do you mean?" I lean forward on the table to show my interest, and Demos does the same as though about to reveal a big secret.

"We want the woman you call Edith dead just as much as you. However, we want you to sit on that throne," he answers.

"You want me… to take her place?" I can only imagine what that meant. "You keep saying 'we' but no one else is here except us."

"What are you saying? You're the one who brought her here. Isn't that right, my dear sister Vessyra?" the trickster god turns to a figure across the table.

 A woman who wasn't sitting there before, glares at Demos, looking down at him from her nose. However, the expression softens as she turns to me. Almost affectionately so.

She wears a smooth wedding gown, a mantle embroidered with golden leaves drapes over her shoulders. Pointed ears poke out from a lush of wavy, blonde hair, most of it kept from covering her eyes by a golden tiara.

This, as Demos introduced her, is none other than Vessyra, The Goddess of Love and Lust.

Jamminrabbit

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