More Tales of MU

…or, Hot To Trot

Iason showed me where to find food and other common supplies in the tower, and then gave me a tour of the grounds. It was a nice place, its residents notwithstanding. It was quiet and beautiful. It would have been downright tranquil, if it weren’t for the castration and rape threats.

Giant hollowed-out heartwood building aside, though, there wasn’t anything special about it. It might have been exotic to somebody who’d never seen sylvan-style elven architecture. There was more masonry incorporated into the designs than I’d seen back east, but the lines were all the same. That wasn’t all that was the same, either.

Elves are pretty competitive, among themselves. The middlings of Treehome used duels for gambling and deciding who got to fuck whose lover, but historically whole wars had been settled by single combat or athletic competitions. Fewer immortal lives were lost that way. Every elven settlement had an area set aside for physical exercise, and Treehome was no exception. A second loop of wall, like the bigger part of a figure eight, enclosed an area that was completely free of trees.

The stables were in this section. Iason took a lot of time and care showing me around them, pointing out the protection spells and the troughs that dispensed food and water at need. I was unimpressed, to his disappointment. The other animals—the animals, I mean—interested me more than the stables themselves did. The stalls sheltered horses and deer that had been tamed to one degree or another. There were larger stalls with reinforced walls. These were obviously meant for other, more exotic mounts. The same was true of the stalls on the second floor.

Next to the stables, there was also a paddock and small field with a track around it. There was a bathhouse, too. I knew before he opened his mouth that Iason was going to caution me against going in there. From the tone of his voice, I gathered this was jealousy and not protectiveness.

He didn’t expect anything to be done to me in the bathhouse. He worried about what I’d do.

Another part of the exercise area was an archery range. There were shirtless guys competing with each other and with a couple of girls in pants while a small crowd of full elven men watched. Off to the side, a group of half-elves wrestled naked on the grass, fighting for the attention of the crowd. It’s a testament to the importance of archery in elven culture that the wrestlers seemed to be losing the contest. Iason hurried me past. That actually might have been his protectiveness—I got some dirty looks from the grapplers and the archers both when their audience started checking me out.

Treehome was far from deserted, but it was obvious that it was meant to hold many more people than were present, especially when we left the athletic field and headed back towards the trees. Everywhere that we went, we got many sly looks and sideways glances that I noticed. Probably more that I didn’t. I was getting a vibe. A “we’re being watched” vibe. The whole complex would be easily visible from the treetop platforms, even to human eyes. Especially after having seen an exhibition of elven archery, I was a little nervous.

“And that is Treehome,” Iason said after the tour was over. We’d ended up where we started, in the shadow of the great heartwoods, outside his cabin. “My home, for the time being. Would you like to return to my chamber, or go for a ride through the woods?”

“Maybe in a bit,” I said. “I’d like to talk to you a little.”

“You mean, more so than we have already done today?” Iason asked.

“Yeah, actually, I do.”

“Oh,” he said. “Very well.”

“What, you don’t want to talk?” I asked.

“It seems to me as though we’ve already done a great deal of talking today,” he said.

“We’ve done a lot of fucking, too,” I said. “If you’re getting sick of my company, you can point me back towards campus.”

“Oh, I would never say I am sick of you,” Iason said.

“But you aren’t interested in talking with me,” I said.

“Not as interested as I am in other things,” he said. He reached out and felt my lips. “You have a very beautiful mouth, Iamie. Is it so insulting to say that I can imagine better uses for it than idle conversation?”

“A little, yeah,” I said.

“Well, it isn’t meant that way, I can assure you.”

“Assure me, then,” I said.

“What?”

“Go on,” I said. “Let’s hear your assurances.”

“It is a figure of speech, Iamie,” he said.

“Yes, speech,” I said. “Fine. Let’s have some of that.”

“I’m not sure what you expect from me here.”

“Well, if you’re so sure we’re going to wind up together, let’s get to know each other a little,” I said. “Tell me about yourself.”

Iason gave a long, drawn out sigh. Very theatrical-like.

“Did I not tell you enough about my life and my exploits that evening with the pizzas?” he asked. “Do I really need to repeat all of that? I would hope you managed to learn something of me from all that.”

“Yeah, I did,” I said. I gave him half a smile. It was a quarter more than he deserved. What can I say? I felt charitable. “But I kind of like you a little, anyway. Let’s talk about something else, then.”

“Such as what, for instance?”

“Well, we could talk about why you invited me here, but you didn’t actually invite me,” I said. “But still, why bring me here? So you could show off exactly how unpopular you are?”

“Your casual cruelty cuts me to the very core of my being,” Iason said. “One day when your looks have begun to fade, you are going to regret not being a nicer person when you were younger.”

“Oh, will you cut it out with the wounded victim act?” I said. “I just mean, is there anybody here who isn’t going to be out to rape, castrate, or kill me to get back at you?”

“You make it sound as though everybody here were my enemy,” Iason said. “I can assure you that is most certainly not the case. It is primarily Petros and Ursula.”

“And Petros’s boyfriend and Ursula’s band of dress dykes,” I said. “And anybody else who wants to suck up to the family that controls Treehome.”

“Yes, as you say,” Iason said. “Though you should not make the mistake that so many others do and think that these individuals themselves can exert any particular control over the governance of the lodge. The fools lavish attention and favors upon them, never comprehending that the objects of their adulation have no special influence to wield in return except that which their followers give them.”

“But as long as people are buying into it, that influence is pretty damned real,” I said.

“True enough,” Iason said. “But, I have my friends as they have theirs. Melos, for one.”

“Am I going to meet any others?”

“Introducing you to men was not among my priorities,” he said.

“So, we come back to the fact that you wanted to bring me here to screw around, show me off a little, and then stick me in the stable until you were ready to screw around some more,” I said. “That just doesn’t sound like my idea of a good time.”

“I can promise you, once you’re in your other form, you won’t mind it one bit,” he said. “Apart from your natural instinct towards servitude as a mount, there are spells woven into the stalls which keep the animals soothed and contented.”

“And that’s supposed to be a selling point for this plan?”

“Contentment, Iamie,” he said. “Perfect contentment. It’s not a small thing, you know.”

“Call me greedy, but I’m holding out for bigger things,” I said.

“What, exactly, do you propose we do, then?” Iason asked.

I thought about it. I was feeling edgy and nervous. Iason’s warnings, the encounter with Ursula—I was keyed up for danger. Wondering if somebody was sneaking up behind me or looking down the length of an arrow at me wasn’t much fun, though. I needed some excitement, but of a less paranoid nature.

“Well, so far, Professor Bryony’s been keeping us near the path during class… I want to get out and see the real woods.”

“Did you not see them on the way in?”

“Yeah, while flying through them as a big, noisy stag,” I said. “It wasn’t exactly a sightseeing tour.”

“No, but it’s safer traveling by hoof than by foot.”

“You manage it every day,” I countered. “If it’s dangerous for me, it’s dangerous for you.”

“You make an excellent point,” Iason said. “If you stay in Treehome every night, though, I can avoid that foolish and altogether unnecessary risk by riding you to and from the campus.”

“I’ve been in elven woods before, Iason.”

“Back east, you mean?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“You’ve strolled through manicured gardens, then,” he said. “It’s hardly the same thing as setting foot within the forest primeval.”

“That’s all the more reason I want to go have a look around this one,” I said. “If you don’t want to come with me—”

“Iamie, if you try to walk out of this compound without my accompaniment, I will forcibly restrain you,” Iason said. “And no court in the world would find fault with me for doing so.”

“Except for the part where you dragged me here in the first place,” I said. “That makes me your prisoner.”

“No, of course not.”

“Then you’ll have to come with me,” I said. “Because even if I’m going to stay here tonight, I’ve got no intention of hanging around all afternoon avoiding your enemies and being hidden from your friends.”

“Let us compromise,” Iason said.

“I can’t wait to hear this,” I said.

“I will walk you outside the walls, then transform you and we can have a ride through the woods,” he said.

“Fine,” I said. “We’ll walk out and ride back.”

“Walk out, ride, and then come back.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “We walk out into the woods, then you can ride me back the way we came.”

“That would be a very short ride.”

“It will be as long as you want it to be,” I said.

He smiled.

“Now you are being more reasonable,” he said, stepping towards me with a kiss on his lips.

I held up my hand.

“However far you take me in on foot, that’s how far you can ride me back,” I said.

From the way his face changed, he might have just been smacked with an invisible shovel.

“Oh, honestly, Iamie!” he said, turning and stomping away, his cape swishing angrily behind him. “You are as stubborn as a woman!”

“And as likely to have sex with you as one, if you don’t show me something more interesting than your temper,” I said.

“Fine!” he said, wheeling back around. “But if you mean to put yourself into my hands for your safety, then you will listen to me and obey me in all things.”

“Anything reasonable,” I said.

“Be serious, Iamie,” he said. “You will keep your hand near your axe, but not remove it from the belt unless my sword is in my hand. If I reach to turn you, you will not resist. If I tell you to flee, you will make all haste back here. If your path is obstructed or you cannot find the way, you will simply run and trust that I will find you.”

“How dangerous is it, really?” I asked.

“Dangerous enough to make me uncomfortable risking the only one of you I’m likely to encounter in my lifetime,” Iason said. “If I had two or three of you to spare, I would not worry so much.”

“Coming from you, that’s pretty sweet,” I said. I let him take my hand and kiss it.

“In any event, it is not so hazardous in the immediate area, but we may be going a bit further and deeper than I would otherwise be inclined to take you,” Iason said. “I have every intention of getting a decent ride out of you, my very pretty stag.”

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