Chapter 14. Hot and Cold

Chapter 14. Hot and Cold

“Erf,” Anaise whispered harshly, “What is she doing here?”

“Irje?” I asked with faked innocence as my hands kept wandering about, “I think she is a bit tired.”

“She can be tired somewhere else,” She whispered back, smacking my hand away. “Stop it! It’s not the time, yet!”

“What’s wrong, dear?” My other hand gently rubbed the base of her tail, making her squirm in my lap, “You find my touch unwelcome?”

Twin emerald eyes glared at me among the sea of blush.

“She. Might. Notice.” Anaise hissed every word as her ears jumped back and forth between us and Irje lounging nearby. She stopped trying to keep my hands away. Instead, she tried to reposition herself in such a way that her body would better hide my actions.

The actions which didn’t cease. I heard her whimper quietly as my fingers brushed her thigh under the tunic. Too close for her peace of mind yet still not there yet.

A shiver and a wave of goosebumps on her silky skin.

A bitten lip and twitching eyebrows.

“I have heard some complaints recently,” I murmured into her trembling ear, “That I did not pay enough attention to your hair.”

“It is still clean-shaven, there is no... need.” Her whispers stumbled as my fingers trailed upward on her leg, gently brushing across her entrance.

Anaise made barely a peep but I felt her breathing stop as her fingers clamped on my shoulder. She glared at me while desperately chewing on her lip to keep the noises down.

“So smooth indeed, but what is this moisture that I feel?” I murmured to myself as I lifted my hand, hiking up her dress in the process.

Anaise looked cross-eyed at my fingers rubbing together near her face, growing even redder by the second. Dumbstruck by the glistening wetness on my fingertips.

“I think that you desire something... else,” I whispered as I pushed my tunic aside to let my erection free.

With a loud gulp, she sat up ramrod straight as my shaft sprung up and pressed on her core. “Erf,” She hissed, desperately trying to cover her lap with her tunic. “Not now! She will hear us!”

“Hmmm.” I rocked her in my lap, making her grind across my shaft. “What if she does? Just imagine her lying there quietly, listening to every sound that we make. Sneaking glances at your tail whenever you look away.”

I could feel her inner lips swelling with every word I spoke, heat and wetness coming in waves with each shuddering breath she took. Despite her outraged face and eyes full of righteous anger, her body was telling me a completely different tale.

Anaise threw another look at the other couch and turned back to me, her ruby lips slightly parted.

She sucked air in for yet another gasp and a long moan filled the room. Full of lust and desire.

I closed my eyes and sighed, feeling the werfox stiffen in my arms.

Damn it Irje, couldn’t you keep quiet just for a few more minutes? This was your plan yet you couldn't even hold it long enough for me to finish my task.

“You!” Anaise shrieked in outrage, twisting around in my arms, “You were acting all this time! How dare you!”

“Eh, heh, heh,” Irje had the presence of mind to look sheepish, “Sorry.”

“None of that! Out!” Anaise stammered as her shaking finger pointed at the door. “It is my night!”

Called it.

That was her fault, Anaise was getting there but she wasn’t ready yet.

“Aw... but you liked it.” My amazon groused, not rushing to get up.

“I certainly did not!” The werfox proclaimed, shooting me an obvious glare to keep silent.

Yeah, as if I was feeling like dying today.

“I could feel your Flow all the way across the room!” Irje accused, “Do you know how hard it is to stay silent when the toy is shaking like a leaf in the wind?”

“Toy? Flow?” Anaise turned back to face me again, “Did you make a toy for her to spy on me!?”

“I did not,” I gently stroked her head, brushing over her lowered ears. While she looked rather cute while angry I had no intentions of fanning the flames further. “It is hers and was made for her specifically. I made it sensitive enough for her but I did not expect it to be that sensitive.”

My hand slid gently to the cheek and turned her gaze back to Irje, “Nevertheless, she had no reason to interrupt our time together and, for that, you should punish her.”

Irje’s ears twitched.

“But she is your wife,” Anaise murmured back to me, “That is improper.”

“Wrong. Irje is our wife, and she needs to apologize to you properly.” I glanced at our cougar, “Come here.”

The amazon smiled and slid down from the couch. She took her time, slowly crawling on all fours to where we were, enjoying every moment of it. I didn’t need to guess why — she had pestered me long enough to make this happen after all.

“Look at her,” I cooed into the foxy ear, “Still looking so smug. You should put her in place, show her that it is your night after all.”

“Erf?”

My fingers reached at the hem of her tunic, “Show her the beauty of a wermage as you assert your claim. Let her see and bask in her gaze as you do so.”

Her hands twitched but didn’t stop me as I slowly pulled the tunic away, revealing more and more of her thighs to the approaching cougar. Anaise sat still yet it was impossible not to notice how Irje’s steps were faltering with every pant of the werfox. The toy was sensitive to Flow — I made sure to make it vibrate whenever Irje was excited. But there was another excited magical being in the room, and Anaise was either better trained at releasing said magical energies or outright having a stronger effect from her wermage blood.

Suffice to say Irje felt all of that at once.

One final tug and the dress slid off my shaft, revealing just how close I was to sliding in. Anaise squeaked while Irje stumbled to the floor with a hiss and purr. “Look at her. Your pleasure ravages her insides as we speak.”

I reached down and lifted Irje’s chin toward us, “Will you do anything Anaise would ask of you, as your punishment?”

She licked her dry lips, “Yes, I will serve my mistress.”

There was no way that she would just stop eating her out right away.

I also wasn’t done myself.

My hands clamped on her waist as soon as her twitches calmed down somewhat. “Now, about these needs of mine.”

I couldn’t help but smile at her poleaxed look.

I liked that tunic.

XXX

I whistled a simple tune as I walked through my estate. Cornered by our united ministrations, Anaise had to concede defeat and summarily kick us out. I already walked Irje to her own bedroom — tonight was Anaise’s night and that meant I would spend the night either with her or alone.

It didn’t matter that we were all together just minutes ago, nor that she explicitly told me to go away and let her rest in peace. Sadaq rules might be awkward but they were there to maintain the peace and harmony within. That way none of my wives would feel neglected — Yeva knew her night was next. And that solidified the concept of equality among them. Granted, I had a limited amount of say during these times but that was an expected price for having three wives.

Although I might demand a day for myself if Anaise would get as randy as Irje was. Yeva was my only island of respite. Perhaps it was a murk thing — we didn’t have the magical stamina reserves and didn’t need to destroy half of the room just to express our love.

Irje did push her luck tonight.

Luckily for her Anaise accepted my suggestion.

She also didn’t walk away from this unscathed. These toys were definitely wer-only, or Irje-only at the very least. After spending so much time within the wermage ‘aura’ she was visibly limping all the way to her bed.

At least the only new hole, that the dildo made, was through the floor.

Wrena would smack me once again and will be completely in her right to do so.

No wonder murks spoke in hushed whispers about wer sex. The magical counterparts didn’t revel in their strength but it was easily forgotten in the moment of passion.

I glanced down at the ripped piece of cloth that was once my tunic. My body was strong and resilient, a linen tunic was not. A wind blew past me and I shivered. The climate here was similar to a Mediterranean one but nights were still fresh without a tunic on. Even in the first half of the summer.

I guess I will have to get some thread and fix it sooner rather than later.

A bittersweet smile appeared on my lips, I had a modified body that I could enhance further and a skinsuit that was always at my beck and call, I even had the ability to simply get a new tunic now. Yet my first thought was of repair — there was still a part of me that knew the price of simple clothing. An adult’s work could feed a family day after day but a simple tunic would cost months of savings.

I stopped for a second and turned in a completely new direction. Away from my bedroom.

Not that my Navigator self was that much different. Human Collective had a myriad of colonies: shards of a whole that were scattered across a vast area, yet only a tiny fraction of the entire galaxy. And that shattering left its mark.

Colonies adapted differently to the problems they faced. Solar colonies could rely on the vast powerhouse that was Earth, but they always felt the influence of old governments.

The courtyard was quiet, it was late into the night and almost everyone was long asleep.

There was the initial scramble for nearby stars but habitat proliferation stymied that expansion. Once you had sufficient technology your only limitations became heat, energy, and people — not minerals, space, and environmental factors. An O’Neil cylinder needs to be built or grown once. And it could be flown anywhere too, some even moved them from one system to the other. An occasional asteroid would be sufficient for resources as long as the population is maintained and proper facilities are present for maximum recycling.

Hard to justify travelling for years for little or no financial gain — the resources of the Solar system were limited by infrastructure, not scarcity, even after centuries of barely mitigated growth. And for some time these systems remained as nothing else but scientific and tourist destinations.

But then came another challenge - AI. Even early AI had abilities that made it stand out in research, resulting in so-called Patent hegemony. Quite a lot of bleeding-edge technology was nothing more than old methods arranged in a new way to yield better or unique results. While these early AIs were unable to invent new things, they were extremely effective in producing alternative solutions and weeding them out on efficiency. A human lab could spend years chasing a specific concept, but an AI could pick up their prototype and spit out an improved design in a fraction of that time.

The ones who had these AI systems quickly found themselves in possession of many lucrative patents. Too fast for a slumbering bureaucracy to catch up with the insane speed of progress.

My feet carried me past the working areas and kilns, dark and silent.

Facing the increasing technological oppression, a new group of colonists emerged. They ‘headed west’. Just like the filmmakers of yesteryears that ran away from lawsuits of Thomas Edison to eventually form Hollywood. Some had dreams to strike big and return as big players, others sought to live as they saw fit or explore other avenues in technological progress.

Fusion technology, AI, and lack of FTL communication created a ticking time bomb as humanity now had the means and desire to travel far, yet had no ability to stay as one cohesive whole. Humans were a rather forgetful species: spend a century away from the rest of civilization, when even a simple text message took twenty or more years to travel one way, and you will end up with a new culture and ideals.

By the time we learned how to stabilize wormholes, it was too late. Many once young and insignificant colonies had grown into independent nations with their own values. Their own technologies and military powers. Own infrastructure and material independence from the other states. Humanity exploded from a few dominant cultures into many, many more. A nascent stellar empire shattered into the myriad of independent states and unions before it could even fully form.

And that was a great thing in my opinion.

Not only did we spread among the stars but we also ensured that we would not be stuck in some cultural or technological stagnation. Some of us might, there was no doubt about that, but humanity as a whole would prosper.

My ancestors took part in that exodus. They chose to settle around a red dwarf, a dim but very common star type in our galaxy, exactly to avoid early scrutiny and potential demands. The red light of the star and tidally locked planets posed certain challenges that, while not critical to our survival, did push us into developing what was known as the living tech.

Instead of only relying on artificial lighting to create Earth-like conditions, my people chose to experiment and modify the plants on a more aggressive scale, shaping them to fit the new environments instead. Early successes spurred even more arduous research as people tried to find more and more solutions to everyday problems. We still used and welcomed technology, no matter what other colonies had said about us, but living tech became a part of our national identity.

We weren’t that far behind other colonies either. Some things were unfeasible to grow or we wouldn’t have to build fusion reactors. Similarly, we couldn’t compete in extreme-scale construction. But we had our own perks. Even our early living ships could regrow outer layers, treating micrometeoroids as nothing but a mere nuisance. They also were quite flexible, both literally and figuratively. The inherent flexibility of the frame allowed us to field ships with much smaller Kugelblitz drives as they could squeeze through much thinner wormholes. The ships could also grow and regrow into other ship types without spending years in a spacedock.

I glanced around the servant’s housing, seeking the description I’d once heard from Yeva.

And then there was the Organic-AI: the jewel of our craft. Our tree-ships. While others emulated and mimicked neural networks — we grew the real ones. While others built them for a specific purpose, the tree-ships could expand their memory or computing power on demand. They could literally grow smarter if that was necessary. They weren’t human nor even humanlike in their sapience — we had no desire to make slaves or servants, nor replace humans with a new being that was better than us in all regards.

They were designed to be a part of a greater whole rather than an independent sapient being. Especially since just being an AI didn’t mean it was incorruptible, merely that it needed a different approach as it operated on different needs and principles.

Yes, there were successful attempts to bribe AIs with increased energy inputs and computational power.

This is why each Tree-ship had a Navigator. A specifically bred and trained human to complement and guide. A well-designed and constantly evolving AI to assist, nurture, and support. Both of a whole, keeping each other in check.

And keeping others from taking it for themselves.

My hand pushed the door aside as I tried to peer into the darkness, my eyes adjusting without a single thought.

It was possible to ‘transfer’ Lif to someone else, after all, Erf was the perfect example. But said transfer came at a cost of enforced morals and a certain state of mind. Lif was my half now, but she knew her worth — and she expected me to meet her standards.

Which is why I stood here now, in my ripped tunic.

In the darkness, among the cold stones, and leftover soot of burnt debris.

Looking down at the frozen-still body of a lamia. Curled around the remains of a small fire.