The Assassin and the Sorceress Ch. 04

She harrumphed somberly. Despite the wonderfully calm night, something was bothering her. It wasn't having had sex with Morgana again, or even Gwendolyn this time. She had already decided to stop feeling guilty for simply enjoying herself. It wasn't even allowing Morgana to change her body with her magic. That had been a particularly fascinating experience; in fact she might ask Morgana to do that again sometime.

No, the thing that was bothering her was how she had ravaged Gwendolyn so violently like a savage animal. Was that was it felt like to rape somebody? But that was silly! 'You'll never get that cock out of me!' she had said, and 'Don't you dare stop fucking me!' Perhaps it wasn't what she had done that was the sin, but what she had thought. She had allowed herself to wallow in her own hatred and rage, and it had felt amazing! Such power it had given her!

She had decided to stop feeling guilty for simply enjoying herself. Lust and wrath were both deadly sins. So why could she allow herself to enjoy one but not the other?

She supposed she could do the usual thing and pray for some guidance, but that seemed so strange now, considering she had just decided to put behind her what the church had taught her all her life. But was it really so contradictory to indulge in worldly pleasures yet still believe in a just and loving God? Maybe that wasn't so crazy after all.

Her upbringing had been strict, to say the least. Following the rules of the Bible was often compared to walking along a razor's edge. She had seen two ways people had responded to being raised according to the Bible. Most embraced it unquestioningly, though a few bad apples would reach a breaking point and put it all behind them. Her mother was an example of the former: perfectly devout, saying her prayers every night. Gwendolyn was an example of the latter.

But maybe there was a middle ground. She had always regarded her father as one of the most virtuous men she had ever known. Yet he had discreetly spoken against the church on a few occasions, even doubted the truth of a passage of the Bible on one particular occasion. Her mother had been absolutely mortified. Adrielle had sided with her mother at the time, though secretly in her heart she couldn't help but be impressed at her father's bold thinking.

Her mother was devout, while her father was virtuous. Perhaps these weren't always the same thing.

Yes, she would pray. She closed her eyes and opened her soul. She did her best to put her turbulent thoughts into words, and the words came more easily than she had expected. She had little concept of time while the words formed themselves on her lips. It could have been five minutes, or it could have been an hour, but when she finally opened her eyes again, she felt better. More importantly, she thought she had found an answer.

She still believed in God. She believed he was loving, just, and perfect. However, the priests who taught the Bible were men, and therefore imperfect. Even should she learn to read the Bible for herself, every copy of the Bible had been transcribed by an imperfect human.

But when God had created Adrielle, he had created within her an innate sense of right and wrong: her conscience. Given to her by God, her conscience could never lie to her, if only she learned to listen to it. And since she had opened her eyes from her last prayer, for the first time in her life, it had become a louder voice than the teachings of the church.

Making love to Morgana had felt beautiful. The wonderful feelings of love and intimacy it had evoked couldn't be anything but good. It was healing to the soul. But the anger she had felt towards Gwendolyn, even as far from the path of piety as the girl had strayed, served no purpose. Dwelling on such negative emotions as hatred and wrath was a sin because it was harmful. These feelings did not heal. They soured the soul.

Well, she had sinned, and now she had repented. There was no need to dwell on this further.

Then, Adrielle realized another thing. In deciding to bed another woman, Adrielle wasn't casting her faith in the Lord aside. She was fixing it, purifying it. She was removing some possibly flawed notions that had been ingrained in her since childhood, while making sure to hold fast to the teachings she believed to be true. She would follow, just not unquestioningly.

Living in the world, you were exposed to a whole hurricane of outside voices which could quickly drown out that quiet inner voice: religion, politics, war, and all of a person's worldly wants and needs. How many people, Adrielle wondered, had learned to shut out the storm and truly listen to the voice of conscience as she just had?

...

In the following days, Adrielle did her best to blend in with life in Morgana's castle. Most of the other men and women treated her well. Occasionally, she would ask critical questions regarding Morgana's capabilities and her true nature. She was extremely cautious about sounding too interested in these things, so it was a slow process.

There was definitely something different about talking to them. It was hard to even imagine, but her new friends were hundreds of years old! Apparently being immortal changed a person. She told them about recent history, major world-changing events from the past hundred or so years that they might have missed since moving into Morgana's secluded community. Though she told them of wars and the rise and fall of entire kingdoms, they seemed to place no more importance on it than if they had been gossiping about the affairs of someone across town.

There was more to it than that. There was a sheepish quality to them. About the only things that seemed to occupy their thoughts was how they would pass the time that day: their next meal, who they wanted to fuck next, when they would do what few chores they had. For lack of a better description, Morgana's servants had gone completely docile. Their world was a bubble, and they didn't seem to care one bit about what was going on outside of it. For the second time, she found herself wondering if this was what a life of perpetual comfort did to a person.

She found this aspect of them a little boring, though it hard to completely dislike them. Having come from a world where peace had to be fought for, often with blood, it just wasn't what she was used to.

In fact, life within the castle was surprisingly cultured. There was so much more than just fucking and eating themselves silly, as Adrielle soon learned. They practiced skills that took a lifetime to master: painting, poetry, games of skill, and some of them had reached levels of mastery that no mortal could have hoped to achieve. With nothing but time on their hands, why shouldn't they? Adrielle used her time to learn to read. Her new friends were happy to teach her. If she ever escaped back to Lindis, she would be one of the only commoners there with that skill!

She also practiced her fighting skills. As it turned out, Cuthbert was a master swordsman. He'd had over three-hundred years of practice, after all. She never came close to beating him, but of course beating him wasn't the point. This was the closest to real combat as training could possibly be. They could use real bladed weapons and fight all-out, and with no chance of injuring themselves. Once she escaped from Morgana, maybe she could finally show those boys in the training yard a thing or two!

Mainly, she focused on using a buckler and short sword: something lightweight and fit for a woman. He also taught her to use a longsword and shield, a great sword, knife fighting, unarmed combat, and more. She even tried fighting with a pair of longswords, which she found laughably impractical but indescribably fun!

She loved practicing with Cuthbert. She loved watching as he performed his perfect moves. He was broad shouldered and muscular, yet moved with grace unexpected from such a powerful form. He had a round, boyish face; he looked no older than his early twenties. He had short, sandy-colored hair and a gentle smile that drew her eyes.

Several times their sparring ended in impromptu lovemaking. It was fun, extremely fun, though there was no romance that Adrielle felt, certainly not coming from him. It was only a friendship, and not even a deep one at that. She knew fully well that Cuthbert, like almost everyone else here, had no interest in monogamy. Yes, having sex with him was fun, but it was an empty pleasure: the kind that made her feel good while she was going it but as soon as it was done she was back to whatever mood she had been in before.

The only man in the castle she might have felt a romantic attraction towards was Hassan. Hassan was the one she had watched lick up Cuthbert's seed at her first dinner, and nearly made her lose the same. Despite her crude first impression of him, she quickly learned he had an artistic, sensitive side. Hassan was more slender than Cuthbert, though his muscles were incredibly well-defined, almost statuesque. Though Cuthbert showed surprising grace in combat, Hassan exuded it in every single thing he did. His voice was deep, eloquent, and exotic. Adrielle could have lost herself in the sound of it alone.

But the things he spoke of with that voice! Hassan was a poet and a philosopher. He spent considerable time browsing Morgana's library. He loved to quote the works of the ancients: Aristotle, Virgil, Homer, Socrates, and he had composed some impressive works of own in tribute to them. But despite having had centuries to work on them, he never dared to claim his works to be equal to the works of the masters. "Only in tribute," he would say, though Adrielle thought he was being far too humble.

Often, Hassan would explain some tenets of classical philosophy, and then elaborate with his own ideas. His ideas were deep and provocative: insights into the nature of the universe around them, morality, even the human soul. And then, after postulating some new idea of his that might have turned conventional understanding of the world upside-down, he seemed to suddenly realize how silly he must have sounded, and started laughing embarrassingly with a shy grin. Adrielle, who would usually be completely absorbed into his explanation, would start laughing too, and for no reason she could tell. This, of course, only made Hassan laugh all the harder, and so forth.

Adrielle became quite enamored of Hassan. However, just as Adrielle felt little romance towards Cuthbert despite their friendship, Hassan expressed none towards her. He never seemed to be bothered when she made physical contact with him, though he didn't seem excited by it either. Hassan never seemed to have an eye for the women here. She would see him and Cuthbert fucking mostly, though she also saw him with Michael and a few of the other men. He even made glances at Guarin, though he seemed to know and respect that Cateline's husband was off limits.

In fact, the only person in the entire castle who showed romantic interest in Adrielle, not just sexual interest, was Morgana. She felt a pang of jealousy every time she saw Morgana getting intimate with another of her servants, which was usually Gwendolyn. Wretched Gwendolyn!

She envied Guarin and Cateline, though she loved them greatly. Each got to enjoy the other all to themselves. There wasn't one other person in the entire castle who Adrielle could have claimed all for herself. Morgana could conjure almost any trinket a person could desire, yet the thing Adrielle wanted most seemed completely out of her reach as long as she remained here: a true love.

But Morgana was close. In fact, she soon began to suspect that she was one of the few, if not the only person who showed true and unconditional affection towards Morgana. Of course everybody showed her respect, but that wasn't the same thing as affection.

Every other time Morgana laid with one of her servants, it was only for one of two reasons: either Morgana came to them and requested they entertain her, or if they came to her it was almost always because they wanted something only her magic could provide.

Adrielle seemed to be the only exception. Following Morgana's trysts with her servants, she would often spend the time alone. It seemed to be so long-ingrained that she could hardly tell if it was Morgana who dismissed them or them who wished to leave. It was just what they did. It was the routine. But when Adrielle laid with Morgana, they would fall asleep in each other's embrace. On a few occasions, Morgana even stayed the night in Adrielle's chamber, an honor that seemed to be reserved for none of the other servants. This, of course, didn't miss the attention of Gwendolyn, who asked about it one morning after. Whether Gwendolyn was jealous, though, she showed no sign.

There was an expression Adrielle's mother was always fond of saying: "Barbers... bartenders... whores... In truth they're all selling the same service: an ear to hear your woes. The only difference is what they do to pass the time while they pretend to care about your troubles."

Of course, none of that was a good substitute for a real friend who actually cares about your thoughts. That, Adrielle figured, was what made her different. She was perhaps the only person in the entire castle who spent time with her not because she was ordered to or wanted something in return, but because she cared about her. Adrielle hadn't planned it that way, but sometimes shrewdness is simply recognizing when things fall into place in an advantageous way. Little by little, she was gaining the sorceress' ear.

This was good, but it was also dangerous. Frequently, she had to remind herself that she was falling in love with her adversary. And what would happen when she finally forgot, when her love became more important than her mission?

...

Morgana seemed to be confiding in Adrielle in ways she didn't with the other servants, but this still wasn't much.

So it was that one morning, as on several other mornings already, Adrielle was lying back in Morgana's bed while Morgana intimately suckled on her nipples as she so loved to do. Morgana would do that for hours, sometimes after they had had sex, sometimes after they woke up, and Adrielle certainly didn't mind. Sometimes it was sexual, but other times it was just something they did for intimacy. Adrielle, meanwhile, stroked Morgana's hair and stared up at the ceiling. She was savoring the pleasant sensations of Morgana's kisses, but she was also deep in thought. Morgana seemed to trust her enough. Maybe it was time to dare to ask a dangerous question.

"Mistress, where did your powers come from?"

"Hmm?" she responded quietly. Adrielle could feel her tense up. She had stopped suckling.

"Your powers... how is it you are able to do these amazing things?"

It was the second time Adrielle had asked Morgana this. The first time, Morgana clearly hadn't wished to talk about it. This second time, though Adrielle didn't get much more information, she sensed Morgana might have wanted to tell her, but was afraid to.

"I... It's a long story. And I can't really explain it myself." Morgana's head was now resting idly on the right side of Adrielle's chest. She stared at Adrielle's left nipple while she played with it absent-mindedly between two of her fingers. Adrielle was starting to feel a little nervous, so she took a deep breath to help herself stay calm. With the sorceress' ear pressed right up against her chest, she didn't want her heart to change its pace too quickly.

"Were you always able to do that?"

"No, but it started when I was a young woman."

"Did somebody teach you?"

"No. It just came to me." She said that last with a telltale sort of monotone insistence often heard when a child tells a fib. Morgana had just lied to her! Adrielle wouldn't push it just yet, but that was interesting. Very interesting!