Taming a Witch

"My Lord!" I said. "You must leave! Come! You are in grave danger!"

It didn't matter how many exclamation points I used: The man just wouldn't budge.

That might have something to do with the woman who had placed herself in front of him, flaunting everything she had. And she had a lot of everything. In truth, she hadn't even had to place herself anywhere. She had merely appeared with her long, brown hair, fuchsia satin dress, generous cleavage, and demure, yet teasing, deep, dark eyes. The man had swerved away from me like I had paint drying all over my face.

"But my Lord," the woman said in a voice that would have won a price at a sultry temptress competition, "you are surely not considering leaving now? The ball is just getting started."

The man moved his graying head and drooping moustache from her to, for a brief instance, me, as if I was distraction of the 'dropping branch' or 'poor beggar' type. "I wasn't..." he said, then turned on that charm that men at sixty still believe will work on women in their early twenties. "Me? Leaving? Haha. Far from it! Not before we have danced at least thrice, Miss...?"

"Passion," she said and stepped even closer. I was surprised there was room for that. "Lady Passion. From the Hollowed Lands." There was nothing soft about her perfume. I could feel the effects myself, like having flower beds in my nostrils. "I am so delighted to meet you. I have often heard that Forgelanders are rude and uncouth, but you seem like a true gentleman."

He was about to become a dead gentleman if he stayed at the ball, so I decided to give this hopeless endeavor another go. You know, to fail again so that I could sleep with a clear conscience tonight, when the inevitable riot raged through the streets.

"Duke Warring," I said, trying to push the so-called Lady Passion out of the way. That was easier said than done. She was a voluptuous woman, and even though I was a big, strong man, almost a head taller than her, I couldn't just ram her with my shoulder or something. "As a Paladin and member of the King's Guard I must advice you to-"

"Thank you very much, young man!" he said. His moustache bristled. Apparently it was time to show who was the alpha male around here, and that it wasn't me. "Your warning is duly noted. Now, please go off and patrol somewhere else and leave the Lady and me to our business. I am sure there is a dark and scary bush somewhere that you could keep an eye on."

Passion, I purposely omitted the 'Lady,' laughed that coquettish laugh women use when they want to make men feel three inches taller than they really are.

No-one had ever used that on me before. Was it because I was scowling all the time? Or had that frown grown a little each time a woman shied away from me? It was like the chicken and egg problem, only I could do without either omelettes and coq au vin.

I could not do without women. I wanted them, I needed them.

But I was picky. Not that I didn't find most women attractive. I did, sure.

My problem was that I wanted things my way, or no way. I wanted women to follow my rules. Wear the clothes I chose for them. Smell of my favorite perfume. Prostrate themselves before me whenever I wanted. The trouble was that women didn't agree with my point of view. Which had caused them to leave me well alone. So far.

I had just about given up on getting laid, but now I was standing so close to this Passion that I could almost sense her fine fuchsia dress against my rough, white surcoat and feel her scent attack my nose like a lioness does a frightened baby antelope. Maybe I should just give up my crazy demands?

Passion pushed Lord Warring backwards towards the dance floor with a single, teasing finger.

"Lord Warring," I said, knowing I would be chewed up for this. "I must insist!"

He flared up. Red face. Moustache all over the place.

Then he pushed me. Hard, and not teasing at all. And he didn't use just one finger.

I almost fell, but managed to limit myself to crashing into a gilded wall and breaking a priceless vase or two with my head.

A black-robed waiter looked at me and sniffed. Passion giggled. Lord Warring challenged me to a fight with his eyes.

I came very close to accepting. Very close. But then I remembered that what would happen to me if Lord Warring got himself killed, was as nothing compared to what would happen to me if I were the one who killed him.

Well, I had been embarrassed and belittled before, so why not in front of all the important guests of this Royal Ball and a beautiful woman like Passion?

So, I just massaged my head and watched them move into the main ballroom where the orchestra played a waltzy kind of tune.

***

Watching Passion dance was like watching, through the neighbors' window, a piece of meat on a spit being turned over the flames. I wanted it, I wanted it bad, but just couldn't get it.

Man, did this woman have hips! She had a body that moved as if everything feminine and feline and succulent was rolled into one, single rhythm as she was led across the dance floor by the luckiest bastard in the world.

There were other women on there, too. They wore elaborate dresses and hair curled and lifted up and pinned like a mix between flower arrangement and a dog show. The men all tried not to look like courtiers puffed up to appear broad-shouldered and muscular. The men all failed.

There had to be hundreds of dancers strewn around the enormous, vaulted hall with its golden walls, painted ceiling and sparkling mirrors. In one end was the orchestra, dressed in black, doing their best to play music meant to be danced gracefully to, and not thrown beer and fought to. Alien, then, to my ears.

And to my few colleagues that kept watch, standing next to some unobtrusive statue or other, looking like white shadows in their Paladin's surcoats. They were here to make sure no-one made a nuisance of themselves during the King's birthday celebration. I was here to make a nuisance of myself by preventing the Duke, who had two daughters that hated each other and who both wanted to inherit him, from getting killed by the agents of one of them.

I guess scrutinizing Passion was just as good as keeping an eye on her dancing partner. Why, she might even be the assassin. Keep a close, close eye on her, Sir Sparky!

Whenever she turned, whenever she glided, whenever she let Lord Warring bend her backwards, her long hair swayed from side to side like a golden brown, silken scarf, expensive and precious, all the way down to her waist. She didn't need to spend hours at the hair dressers before the ball to steal the eye of every man. She only needed to let her brush pass through it a hundred times a day.

I wanted to walk over to her, grab it like a leash, and pull her along with me. I wanted to pull my sword out of its scabbard and kill every man who challenged me. I wanted to drag her into a dark corridor and tear her panties to ribbons. Then, I wanted to push her head down and take her from behind until she cried for mercy. Then cried for more. Then, at last, for mercy again.

That wouldn't go down well with the party goers, and everyone who was anyone in the Kingdom was here. The King and Queen, the Crown Princess, the Dukes and Counts and everyone else had got together for this one night. I knew there was going to be a lot of sex between strangers in the hallways in a few hours, but the idea of a mere Paladin doing a foreign diplomat was preposterous. Still, I could dream.

Dreaming was what I imagined I was doing when I noticed she started throwing looks my way. And not just curious 'why is that rude watchman looking at me' glances either. They told me she knew all too well why I was looking at her. They told me that I might just be in luck tonight. By the Lady, she got to have practiced those smoldering looks in front of a mirror? That was not natural, was it?

I felt myself growing hard. I felt my manhood peeking out through the fly in my underpants. I felt him brushing against the rough fabric of my combat pants.

I grunted. Was my obvious bulge the reason she winked at me? That didn't help! I only hoped I wouldn't have to do any running in this state.

Now she kept her eyes on me whenever she faced my way, and those large eyes were mocking, teasing. Come here, I thought. Come here, and I will teach you a lesson.

She did. She stopped the dance, whispered something in Lord Warring's ear, and walked across the room. The lioness was hunting.

Suddenly I didn't feel so cocky anymore.

***

She came close. Real close. And this time she didn't face some old geezer. This time she faced me. Head on.

I had never known women could grow a pair as big as the ones she shoved at me.

"Hello, brave Sir," she purred. "I don't believe we have been properly introduced. My name is Lady Passion. From the Hollowed Lands."

I had never known such pairs had the power to render a man speechless. I had to fight to maintain my macho warrior's posture, which unfortunately meant legs spread wide apart.

Nah, who was I kidding? I didn't look cool. I looked like the pimply boy being asked to dance by the prettiest girl in the village. I coughed out my name like a hairball.

"I am delighted to meet you, Sir Sparky," she said. I noticed that this bosom of hers was so close to my shirt that we would touch if she took a deep breath. "You are a Paladin? Tell me, dearest Sparky, what are the duties of such a staunch," she almost kissed the word at me with big, succulent lips, "brave, and handsome warrior?"

I took a pause. I licked my lips. I cleared my throat.

"I... Eh..." Not a very good start, this, but I was used to that. "Well, I, you know, guard stuff and all that." Yeah. "People, things. You know."

I managed to wrench my eyes away from hers and looked over her shoulder. The Duke was standing there in the middle of the ball room, looking at me like he wanted to do to exactly the same things to me that I wanted to do to him in order to be Passion's only suitor.

"Really? That sounds very exciting! " She cocked her head. That was enough for me to dismiss him. "Could you tell me," she said and found a button on my shirt, playing with it using only her fingertips, "what you duties are tonight?"

"Oh, you know..." Why was I so warm all of a sudden? "I am making sure the Duke..." I am making sure I betray the trust Lady Marble had placed in me by blabbering? "I am kind of like a bodyguard. Yeah, I am."

"Is that so?" She started to pass the finger up and down my chest. "And how would you like to guard my body?"

Gah. Gah, gah.

I couldn't see the Duke right now, but I wasn't really looking.

She cocked her head again, waiting for an answer, and the movement made loops of her glossy hair fall across her left shoulder. Golden earrings glittered on each side of her face.

She didn't get no reply. I was transfixed.

She giggled. Woman can giggle like a punch to the teeth sometimes. "Do you like my hair, Sir Sparky?"

I nodded. I had always been particularly attached to women's hair. That is, if raw lust can be described as an attachment.

"Oh, thank you, but..." she said and put her finger on her lips. Red nail, red lipstick. Danger, danger. "...I always find it gets a little messed up when loose... I really ought to wear it up, don't you think?" She fluttered her eyelashes at me.

"No!"

"No?"

"No. Please don't." If I had my way, women would not be allowed any kind of hair pins or bands. Brushing, though, would be mandatory.

"Really?" She giggled again, this time making me blush like I was bleeding internally. "Could you just pat it down for me a little?"

I could. Of course, I could also have worried about being spotted by my colleagues or some offended guest. I could have kept an eye on the Duke. I could have asked myself why Passion made us both face the wall, away from the party.

I didn't.

I hadn't really touched a woman's hair before. Once or twice in passing, perhaps. One time when I kissed a girl. That's all.

I was like a man who only had tasted a few drops of yeasty beer before, and now was let into a wine cellar with orders to empty as many bottles as he could.

I fingered it where it looped down by her neck for a few moments, unsure of what to do. It was smooth, it was soft, it was everything I had ever dreamed it would be. Honey and amber played on it as I began to pat, reflections of the myriad of candles and chandeliers in the hall.

I let it run through my hands. I combed it with my fingers. I watched the ends slip from my grasp and fall down her fuchsia satin dress. I wanted to bend down and bury my face in it. I wanted to keep her standing like this forever, for my pleasure only.

It was with a tremendous effort I managed to turn my head and gaze out over the ball room. Didn't see Duke Warring. But I saw another man. A huge, tall, fat man dressed all in red. He stared at us like we were a couple of succulent pieces of finger food.

I got a little worried then.

Then, I got Passion's butt straight into my rock hard manhood.

***

Like most guys I was a frequent masturbator. If you asked me, I would say I did it a few times a week. If you didn't, but read my mind instead, I did it at least once a day.

And one of my favorite fantasies was to take a woman from behind. I had never experienced it, but I imagined it was like the touch of my own hand, only warmer and wetter.

I was wrong.

Even this, having her satin dress rubbing against my rough pants, was far beyond what I could ever do to myself. It was heaven. It was divine. It was her, her skin below the fuchsia, her flesh moving to the beat of her heart, to the rocking of her hips as she pushed and retreated, made circles, massaged.

I noticed myself pulling at her hair in response. Pulled hard, with both fists clenched around a thick ponytail, one under the other, letting them slip off the end and fasten at her neck again, faster and faster as if I was touching myself by proxy.

She was smiling and stretching her neck like a cat being petted. Wasn't I hurting her? Did she enjoy this as much as I did?

Did she like it when I went faster and faster and harder and harder and...

***

"Thank you very much, my hair looks absolutely stunning!" Passion walked away, trailing brown hair which proved her right.

And I, I was left just short of an eruption. I was sweating, I was panting, I was confused.

I was disappointed.

I was angry.

Watching her move into the throng of people dancing, I swore I was going to get revenge. One day I would get hold of Passion, and then she would beg to be allowed to make me come.

Then, when my manhood finally began flagging, frustrated and disappointed, and blaming me for being cheated, I looked around me to see if anyone had noticed. No-one had, as far as I could see, except the fat man in red. He was giving me a triumphant leer.

The Duke! Where was the Duke?

Nowhere.

Passion! She had distracted me, the vile woman! I would find her and spank the truth out of her.

She was gone.

The fat man saluted me with his glass.

***

I ran over to one of my colleagues who had been stationed next to a big flower pot, and who was probably in the best position to have observed Duke Warring.

She was leaning against the wall with her eyes half glazed over. If I had been the Lady Marble, I would have reprimanded her severely. Of course, Lady Marble would only take time to do that after she had chewed me up, fired me, and killed me, all for flirting with a woman obviously involved in the plot to kill the man I was set to protect.

"Duke Warring!" I shouted, waking her like a bucket of water.

"Yiah!" she yelped as her eyes came back into focus.

"Duke Warring, Limely! Did you see where he went?"

"Duke...?"

"Warring!" Limely was one of those graceful women I would ogle as often as I could. Now was an exception.

She yawned. Not a good sign. "King of the moustaches?"

"Yes!"

She looked at the dance floor, looked at me, opened her mouth, paused. "Garden?" she said at last. "With a woman in a black dress?"

"You asking me or telling me?" I wanted to shake her.

"I... guess?"

I guessed that would have to do, turned around on my heel, and started to run.

***

The Garden of the Royal Palace was accessible through a pair of huge, glass double doors at one end of the hall. I burst through them, not knowing if they were opened or closed.

Thankfully, the lack of a trail of broken glass followed me into a field of pungent flowers and trickling fountains and charming gazebos, all lit by the mysterious light from the stars and moons above. Or it would be a field if it wasn't full of green, tall, and thick bushes, closely trimmed to create a maze of the 'found their bones some three months later' type. Night birds chattered, owls hooted, insects that were up and about too late did insecty things. With the right woman this would be awesomely romantic, even sensual, as could be testified by some low moaning coming from a clump of bushes at the near corner of the maze.

I didn't have the right woman. I didn't have anything.

That is, unless I had the sight of a twitching shape under a lemon tree close by.

I had found the Duke Warring, but I had found him too late.