The Dragon's Bride

By Vincent Darlage

            Marissa was a delicate young maiden from the Lamapachan city of Ortenau.  A dazzling beauty formed in all fashions of loveliness, with long hair that fell loosely around her usually bare shoulders, down her back, and over her breasts.  Although she was not tall, the graceful lines of her slender figure, especially those of her shapely legs, made her seem to be so. Her large eyes danced with lively fancy, and her mind was filled with fanciful romances.  However, to her chagrin, her father had betrothed her to Nuss Dinringer, probably the fattest, ugliest man in the region.  He was known as the most decadent man in the known world, and the thought of such a man touching her and slobbering on her made her shudder with disgust.  Her father, however, thought only of Nuss' wealth.

            Nuss Dinringer was nicknamed "The Dragon" because of his capriciousness and his insane temper.  He was a powerful merchant that dealt largely in antiquities, especially Ingaran antiquities.  Few people were willing to cross him: the Dragon's reach was long, and his wealth far more vast than even the tax-collectors knew.

            Marissa expressed her fears and concerns a week before her wedding to her mother.  Her mother smiled. "Love often comes in strange containers," she said. "Don't worry about what he looks like.  Besides, being married to the Dragon will have its benefits.  You will be wealthy, and won't have to work like I have had to."

            All too soon for Marissa, the wedding day arrived.  The wedding guests laughed and shouted outside of her room as she finished dressing in her wedding finery.  She hated the dress.  It didn't even bare her shoulders, as was her wont.  It was lacy, and volumous.  It was heavy.  She heard some mare of a loud-mouthed woman wondering where she was.  The woman thought virginal shyness delayed Marissa, and did not even consider that Marissa hated her intended even more than she hated her dress.

            Marissa watched out the window.  Nuss Dinringer was already out there, grinning with fat, distended lips, staring with bright pig eyes.  Watching the chins on his fat neck wriggle, she felt disgusted again, and swore that she would never share his bed.

            "Mother, would you leave me for a moment so I can collect myself?" she asked.  Her mother eyed her warily, but assented.  She hugged her daughter and left the room.

            Quickly, Marissa acted.  The home of Nuss Dinringer, where the wedding was being held, was reasonably large, but she knew one of the side windows might afford her egress unseen by the guests outside if she stayed low. 

            Out the window she went, and, bending low, she darted through the private Dinringer garden into the streets of Ortenau.  She dashed through the crowds, dodging herds of pigs and cattle, moving quickly around people, knocking over those that she couldn't dodge around adroitly enough.  She listened for the sounds of guards or others in pursuit, for she knew it would not be long before she was missed.  Her side ached from the run, but she didn't slow.  The gates of Ortenau were in sight.

            Beyond the gates she had no idea where she could go.  She had never really been outside of Ortenau before.  She knew the geography, however, from a map her brother had given her a few years past.  To the north was the foreboding Anhartz Forest, a forest the people were afraid of.  She made for it.  Nothing could be worse than to be the wife of Nuss Dinringer, she was sure, even death by werewolves, goblins, or vampires, which she was sure populated the forest.  She went into the forest.  Before she could orient herself, she became lost.

            Nuss Dinringer was outraged.  He threatened Marissa's father with complete ruin if he did not produce her.  He threatened the magistrate of Ortenau with ruin if his soldiers did not find her.  He threatened to burn down the entire Anhartz Forest if it did not regurgitate her.

            Storming about his garish home, the grossly obese merchant continued to mouth threats as he walked through room after room of grotesqueries, his impressive collection of erotic art.  Lamps fashioned of clay in the shape of squatting fat figures with huge phalluses sent oily flames from holes in the tips of the enlarged members, creating long shadows that leapt across the ceilings.  Obscene statues adorned each room.    Paintings hung in some room, paintings of gross indecent behavior by the various gods, goddesses, and mortals of Ingaran mythology.

            Nuss, in his rage, smashed one of the Ingaran vases that sat on pedestals throughout his home, vases encircled with black and gold satyrs carrying off white nymphs, or persons of all sexes and ages making love in daisy chain fashion.

            Nuss stormed into his bedchamber, kicked his wide, low bed with its silks and fur throws.  He knocked over the long brazier that stood upon a dragon's claws.  A particular statue stood in this room, one representing a nude obese woman, twice as large as even Nuss, clutching three slender youths at once to her lumpy, horrid body, looking as though she might swallow them all in her fatty folds.  As heavy as that marble work weighed, he still was able in his anger to shove it back three paces when he rammed bodily into it.  He twirled around in fruitless frustration.  The painted friezes and murals depicting the acts of lovemaking drew his eye.  All were artfully rendered.  Some were heterosexual, others showed men with men or women with women, others still involved animals, fantastic and mundane.  He roared at the frolicking lovers and punched at their faces, their bodies, their sexual organs.  "I will have my bride!" he swore.

            Marissa wandered about for several days without finding a path.  All around her she heard rustlings and movements that betokened beasts and, she thought, far worse nightmares.  She would continue through the forest heedless of direction until exhaustion would overtake her, and she would fall to the loam and sleep, and cared not if a beast or ghoul devoured her.  She found berries to eat and streams to drink out of, and though it was scant food, she was too terrified to care.

Then she heard people.  People tromping through the woods.  Her name was called.  She took off running.  The sounds of pursuit came to her ears and she heard the sounds of horses crashing behind her.

Suddenly, she was caught off her feet, and a mounted warrior lifted her up and slowed his steed.  "I caught the wench!" he yelled.

            "Teach her a lesson," said another, not pleased to have had to tromp around in these woods for nearly a week.  Five more grim soldiers rode behind him.  Marissa squirmed and thrashed, and finally she twisted and dealt him a buffet with her clenched fist that rocked back his head and brought streams of blood from his nostrils.

            Dropping to the ground, she ran, but the soldiers on their horses were faster, and one used his horse to smash into her, sending her reeling into a creek.  The soldiers closed in a circle.  The one she had hit had a cruel look in his eyes.

            Then came the glint of silver, and the tinkle of metallic wind chimes, and the cruel soldier lost his head.  It flew through the air in a crimson arc and rolled into the underbrush.  The other soldiers cried out in alarm, for in their midst was a warrior decked out in the finest plate armor, armor that seemed to be made of quicksilver, for it seemed to flow around, reflecting the forest around him, making him hard to see except by the flashes of light that would reflect from the rounded surfaces as he moved. 

Watching this warrior was like watching a cat play with a mouse or yarn ball.  He leapt and dodged, and his sword would flash out, inflicting wound after wound.  In short order, he had each soldier dismounted and their horses were running away.  On foot, the skill of the silvered warrior was the better of the combined might of the remaining soldiers.  He moved as a hurricane of strife, casting sprays of red blood in his wake.  One by one, the soldiers fell, uttering ghastly gurgles of death as the crimson blade of the silvered warrior crunched through their armor, smashing their bones, shearing their flesh.

            After the carnage was done, the warrior regarded Marissa.  Although she was at his mercy, Marissa curiously felt no fear.  The warrior reached a gauntleted hand out to her and helped her out of the muddy water.  Her wedding finery was torn from days in the woods, wet and muddy. 

            "What is your name?" she asked.

            "Vouivre Sunathaeraux," he replied.  His voice was deep, magical.  He removed his visored helm.  He was blonde and handsome.  He was possessed of a beauty that she had never seen before; an unearthly beauty was her impression of him.

            "I have been lost in these woods for the past days, probably a week," she said, tears in her eyes.  "Sleeping in the open.  Do you live nearby?"

            He regarded her again, and then nodded.  "Follow me," Vouivre said. "A night under a proper roof would do you some good."

            She followed him as he walked through the wood.  Finally they came upon a beautiful castle situated in a large meadow and surrounded with water. She looked around, afraid she had come to Fairyland or someplace just as sinister.  She saw no people, although the castle seemed well kept.  But why build a castle in the middle of a haunted wood, with no peasants to do the work?  A pathway led to a drawbridge, which had been suspended. He walked confidently toward the castle, saying that it belonged to him.   She had never heard of a castle such as this so close to Ortenau.

            Vouivre stepped on a stone that was mortared into the earth in front of the bridge, and the bridge immediately descended. Then he took out a large key and unlocked the gate. Together they walked though a large courtyard and into the castle.

            He led Marissa into a beautiful room and asked her to make herself comfortable. "You should find clothing here that will fit you.  Have no fear here.  No one will harm you."

            She thanked him, her eyes wide.  The room was more sumptuous than any she had ever seen. It was furnished in old carved oak, with large carved cabinets, and the chairs were cushioned with crimson Drychtnothian velvet.  The walls were covered with tapestry, and surrounded with great gold frames, the figures depicted were in ancient and curious costumes, all generally festive.

            "You must be famished, and would like something hot to eat," Vouivre said.  "I too am hungry.  I shall leave you here and go and prepare a proper evening meal."

            "You?" she asked.

            He laughed.  "Because I have no servants, I have to take care of everything by myself."

            "Why don't you have servants?" she asked.  Surely this man had enough wealth that he would never have to lift a finger without the aid of someone if he wanted.  Was he a miser?

            "I don't believe in people serving me in that manner," he said, then left the room, closing the heavy door behind him. She looked through the room, and found several dresses that were beautiful beyond compare.  The style seemed a bit dated, but they were more gorgeous than any dress she had ever seen a noblewoman of Ortenau wear.  She chose a billowy multi-colored dress, one that left her shoulders bare.  Her long neck she adorned with a smart little lace choker, and she found a jade comb to use to untangle her hair, made unruly by her time spent in the wild. 

            A short time later Vouivre, dressed like a nobleman from the past, returned and led Marissa to another richly furnished room with a beautiful roast, cakes, and many other delicious things. He set the table and invited his guest to help herself. She did not need to be asked a second time.

            Marissa thought Vouivre looked radiant.  He wore a green velvet surcoat trimmed with gold.  A heavy silk sash girdled him and he wore the sides of the surcoat loosely laced.  A white shirt was worn beneath the surcoat, and his long tight breeches displayed firm muscles in his legs that Marissa could not help but to admire.

            After they had eaten, they sat together and talked with one another. Marissa said that she felt sorry for him, because he lived here all alone, observing that time must pass very slowly for him.

            "Oh no," he said. "Time does not pass slowly for me," adding that nonetheless he sometimes did wish for company, but if he did not have any, he could still manage just fine.

            Marissa answered, "If you do not mind, I would like to stay here for a few days to keep you company, and to decide on what I need to do next and where I can go."

            Vouivre bowed and said, "I would be happy for you to remain for as long as you wish."        

            After the meal, Vouivre and Marissa talked in his downstairs library.  She was so pleased with the sparkling way he conversed.  He talked not of politics or crops, but told romantic stories of heroes, and discussed the tomes in his library and of the countries he had visited.  She spoke little, content to listen to the tales he told. His manner was polite and his accent seemed to Marissa as being somewhat unusual.  He didn't sound foreign, but like he was speaking the language differently than she was used to hearing it.

            The night grew long, and Vouivre escorted his young guest to her bedchamber.  He kissed her hand and withdrew for the evening.  She closed the door to her room and hugged herself, happier than she had ever been in her life.  She sat on the canopied bed and looked around the room, which was lit by the oil lamp next to the bed.  It was one of the handsomest rooms she had ever been in.  It was stately, yet comfortable.  The bed was made of elaborately carved walnut-wood, hung with silken drapes.  A somber tapestry hung opposite the bed, representing the princess of one of the stories Vouivre told her tonight, a princess who took her own life when her love had died.  But the gloom of that faded tapestry was redeemed when she examined the rich gold carvings, and the varied colors of the other decorations in the room.

            There were candles at the bedside, and on the bed was a soft silk dressing gown, embroidered with flowers and lined with quilted silk.  She undressed and put on the nightgown, which lay beside the dressing gown.

            In another bedchamber, Vouivre sat down on the bed, ignoring the dust that came from it.  He thought of the pretty creature who was his guest, and he wondered at his love for her that sprung up uninvited.

            Marissa awoke the next morning feeling refreshed and happy.  She smiled.  The room was still here.  It wasn't dream she had.  It was truth.  The sun shone brightly through the tall, thin windows, colored gaily as the light passed through the blue window curtains.  The floor was marble, with bright rugs.  Flowers adorned the lively vases that sat around the room.  She thought back to the night before.  Were those flowers there last night?  She shook her head.  She was so tired she doubted if she noticed half of what was around her.

            She rose and attended to her toilette.  She dressed herself with care.  It was not her habit to be disregardful of appearance.  She found a pretty dress that displayed her shoulders, a style she always preferred.  The long blue gown, a girdle of gold embroidery hung about her hips, cleaved to those hips before gently flaring out, draping even her slippers.  She thought her breasts were beautifully molded by the gown as she hooked a blue choker around her fine neck.  She brushed her hair smooth, and put a blue ribbon in it.  Afterward, she saw to it that all the things on the toilette table were left straight and neat just as she found them. 

            She sat down on the bed and wondered what to do.  Should she just get up and roam around the castle, or wait for her host to send for her?  She wasn't sure what the proper etiquette was in this situation.  She decided to explore her suite of rooms.  That should take some time at least.

            She passed into the sitting room adjacent to the bedchamber.  The door connecting the two room was open.  The door was half of glass, half of polished oak.  Circumscribing the room, she looked at the pictures on the walls.  One depicted a grim man in a cuirass.  Another showed a lady with a pearl necklace and lustrous black hair.  Passing in front of the tall, thin windows, she pushed aside the coral drapes that hung in front of them here to peer outdoors.  She was three stories up, at least.  The early sun shown prettily on the lawn outside.  At first she thought it odd that she saw no motion, no servants, then she recalled what her host had said.  She wondered at the absence and the cause.  She opened the window and breathed in the pleasantly fresh air.

            Marissa paced some more around the sitting room.  A bronze lamp depended from the ceiling, curiously designed.  She found a little nook that seemed comfortable to sit in, and another half-glass door led into a small library of sorts. 

            She found the door unlocked, and she passed over the threshold into the reading room.  A large, stuffed chair, carved of oak with soft padding, dominated the room.  The chair drew the eyes toward it, even away from the shelves of books that lined the walls.  Another curiously designed bronze lamp hung from the ceiling, and three small tables stood about the room, each with a fat candle sitting on it.  A bust of some lady sat on one of the tables next to the candle.

            She twirled around, her hands going to her skirts, lifting them so they swirled outward.  She twirled back into the sitting room and collapsed laughing onto the cushioned divan.

            A short time later, she sat with her host at breakfast in one of the downstairs dining halls.  Bright silver utensils sat on either side of a gorgeous bowl of chopped fruit which, in turn, sat on a lovely oaken table of marvelous aspect and impressive size. Vouivre talked brightly as they ate, telling a story about a trip he had taken in Nyandar, where this table had its genesis.

            His eyes sparkled as he talked, and Marissa could have sworn they changed colors three times during the conversation.  She found every aspect of him to be engaging and interesting.  He likewise found her to be wonderful and spirited.  She laughed like a sprite and her smile sent rays of sunlight into his soul. 

            After breakfast they walked the grounds around his castle.  Still she marveled that his abode was not indicated on any map that she had ever seen.  He would just shrug when she asked about that, then would laugh and change the subject, pointing out a bird or shrub.

            At lunch they picnicked on the lawn; he watched her dance around the grass chasing a butterfly that caught her fancy.  Her legs kicked up her skirts, teasingly showing glimpses of well-turned legs.  Her long hair bounced and floated over and around her bare shoulders.  He dreamed of kissing her, pressing his lips against hers, feeling her warmth with his lips.

            That night they supped in the Grand Hall, drinking wine from golden goblets.  He read to her afterwards in the downstairs library, read to her of daring adventures and loves lost and loves found.

            Three days passed in this manner.  On the third night, just before they parted for the evening, when Vouivre escorted her to her rooms, he asked her, "Would you like to be my wife?  I have loved you since I first saw you in the woods."

            Marissa blushed, and opened her mouth to speak, but Vouivre held up his hand.  "Do not answer yet. There is a condition, a serious condition to this offer that you need to think over before giving your answer," he said.  "You must promise me that every seven days I must be allowed to go out and do whatever I please, and you must not try to follow me or look after me."

            He turned and down the long corridor, leaving her alone to think his offer over.

          The knock at the door was so timid that at first Vouivre thought he had imagined it. But there it was again, a tentative tapping which sounded as if the visitor was apologizing for interrupting him.  He opened the door to his guest.  He realized that she was more than just pretty - she was strikingly beautiful. Her hair was worn loose, draping over her bare shoulders.  Her eyes looked at him candidly through thick lashes while the tip of her tongue came out to moisten her full, ripe lips.

            "So Marissa, what can I do for you?"

            The girl blushed and looked down. "Yes," she said.  "I will be your wife.  I accept your condition."

            Vouivre opened the door to his sitting room and, taking her little hand into his, led her in.  She looked around at the splendor in the room, amazed.  She thought her rooms were ornate and rich, yet they weren't even a candle light to the brilliance of these rooms. 

            He led her to his divan and they sat one it.  He leaned in and, for the first time, their lips pressed together in a kiss.  It started out tender, but quickly became passionate, each one hungry for the other.  A few moments later, she sat forward on the soft divan in his sitting room and began undoing the fastenings of her gown. "I suppose I ought to take this off before it gets all creased," she said, smiling up at him shyly.

            "Yes, let me help you. We wouldn't want to spoil it, would we?"  Vouivre sat down beside her while she allowed him to open the garment the rest of the way and push it off her body. Beneath it she was wearing a lace brassiere whose whiteness was dazzling against her smooth skin. But before Vouivre had time to take in and enjoy the delicacy of the female undergarment, Marissa reached behind her and unclipped the lacy harness and let it fall onto her lap.

            Exposed to him now were the two most enchanting breasts Vouivre thought he had ever seen. The perfectly formed mounds thrust out proudly from her chest, tapering into lovely cones which were in turn surmounted by nipples of the lightest, most delicate pink. Under Vouivre's scrutiny, the young girl felt her nipples begin to tighten and protrude.

            The pinkness of the nipples made them look so vulnerable and tender that Vouivre felt a powerful urge to suck them to give them comfort. But he sensed that the moment was not yet quite right and that he should delay paying homage to them with his lips.  He was afraid of frightening her.

            "Do you like them, Vouivre?" the girl whispered, her wide blue eyes searching his face anxiously.

            "My dearest Marissa, they're absolutely perfect. I can't tell you how beautiful they are."  Vouivre looked across the sitting room into the bed chamber and made to draw her up from the seat. "Shall we go and lie on the bed?" he suggested. "We'll be more comfortable there."

            Marissa smiled timidly and nodded her head, realizing that she had set in motion a train of events which neither she nor this handsome stranger would stop. Before long, she would be a virgin no more. She shivered in anticipation, wondering what the moment of penetration, when it came, would feel like. She hoped it wouldn't hurt too much.

            Vouivre bent to pick her up. Her arms came round his neck and her lips found his in a long, hungry kiss. Carrying her young body easily in his arms, he walked into the bedroom, laid her gently on the bed and then stood looking down at her beauty.  His eyes devoured her nakedness.  Her breasts were soft mounds that accentuated her chest, with nipples of darkest pink, hard with urgent need. Her abdomen was smooth, her hips wonderfully rounded, her waist beautifully shaped.  Her pubic mound was lightly covered with an inverted triangle of black hairs between her thighs.

            Her small hand reached out toward him as he stood next to the bed.  She explored the contours of his genitals through the fabric of his trousers for a titillating moment, then Marissa's eyes met his and she smiled shyly at him as her hand began to tug at the fastenings round his waist. She slowly opened his pants to reveal his naked maleness beneath.  She saw strong, muscular thighs covered in light blond curly hairs as she pushed his pants down over his hips. Powerful buttocks flexed as he shifted his legs,  dropping the garment to the floor and stepping out of them. As he drew off his white shirt, Marissa's eyes were drawn to the firm musculature of his chest which, like his legs, was covered with blonde curly hairs.  Her eyes traveled down his rippled abdomen down to the erect flesh that stood out from the dense forest of blond curly hair at his crotch.

            She stared, wide-eyed, at what she had exposed. The foreskin was partially retracted and the shiny head protruded from it like a young bird peering from its nest.  All women's hands are soft, but hers were the softest Vouivre had ever known, and her touch was the most electrifying; the palm of her hand as it pressed against his sensitive erection brought on the tantalizing feeling that it must burst.  Fortunately, the sensation pleasantly died away without its having burst at all when she drew her hand back.  She sat up and kissed his chest, her hands tracing patterns along his arms.  He watched intently as her lovely head trailed down to his belly, then down to the rising swell of his manhood.  Vouivre caught his breath as Marissa's lips and tongue took firm hold of his penis, and his hands twined into her tumbled blonde hair and she licked and nibbled. 

            He reached down and pulled her head away from his groin, tugging at her bare arms until he had pulled her up to him and buried his lips in hers.  They kissed long and deeply, their tongues finding their way into each other's mouths.

            His fingers explored the dark, damp grotto under Marissa's flat belly, luxuriating in the soft, silky feel of the light blonde hairs that adorned the soft labia. Then he drew his forefinger down between the delicate inner lips to explore the opening to her vagina. Marissa's wetness coated it generously and he used that moisture to lubricate the tiny pink membrane that had popped out of its covering sheath at the front of her vulva.  Her hips moved rhythmically in time to his probing, stroking fingers.

            The young girl's eyes closed and she groaned with pleasure. "Oh, my God! That feels fantastic," she sobbed. "Don't stop." She continued to gasp and moan as his fingers explored her, playing in the delightfully slimy wetness.  He thrust his middle finger deeply into her and felt her wriggle with pleasure, moving under his hand in rhythm as he moved his finger in and out, in and out.  He listened to her little cries of joy as he took his shaft in his other hand and massaged it slowly while continuing to attend to the girl's hard little bud.

            Together they collapsed to the bed, breathing hard in mounting ecstasy, increasing the pace of their manipulations.  Vouivre sucked briefly on each of her nipples.  He didn't want to leave one inch of Marissa's luscious skin unkissed or unlicked.  He made her lie very still as his tongue laved her navel.  As he began to graze below, licking and sucking in the tangle of golden hair, Marissa cried out again and, putting her hands on his head, pushed her pelvis up against his lips and nose. His tongue dove in and out of her wet depths, licking her juices, savoring her nectar.  Her hips moved rhythmically under him, her belly bucking upward toward his mouth.  Her rapid breathing told him that she was nearing orgasm, so he increased his tempo, using his teeth gently on her tiny button of sensitive flesh.  Her gasps became screams and her body arched furiously.

            The hardness between his legs sent fires of desire shooting through him, and there was only one place to quench those fires, one hot oasis of moisture.  She rolled over onto her back and he parted her thighs.  She felt dirty, but it was a sexy feeling as she opened up for him, as he leaned over her, his hard organ poised to enter her.  Marissa looked up at him, kneeling between her open legs with his erection held ready in his hand. It looked so huge to her innocent young eyes that fears about her capacity to receive it asserted themselves. Yet at the same time she felt a deep hunger for it which she knew could be satisfied only by taking it inside her body.  He pushed it, slowly, part way in, then out, then back in partially, then out again.  Her knees parted further and she wrapped her long legs around him.  Her hands went to his buttocks, and with one furious thrust, he was deep inside of her. A small, shrill cry escaped her lips as she felt the full length of the rigid shaft slide past the last bit of resistance and come to rest high up inside of her. Marissa's cobalt blue eyes widened and her perfect white teeth bit her lower lip as she felt his bulk stretching her tight little opening. Tears welled in her eyes but she blinked them away, aided by the soft kisses her lover rained down on her cheeks and mouth.

            For a long moment Vouivre rested motionless inside her, anxious to give her virginal flesh time to accommodate itself to the intrusive organ. Then he slowly began pushing himself in and out of her, slowly at first, then faster.  There were only moans of pleasure as they rocked together, joined into one.  As they found their escalating rhythm, he stared down at where his erect member linked their two bodies. The young girl raised her head so that she, too, could see the conjunction of their sexual parts. The thick tangle of blond pubic hair at the root of Vouivre's organ made a pleasing contrast with the darker curls at the base of her own stomach, with the rigid bar of flesh linking the two bodies together at those patches of hair.

            Then, suddenly, with a squeal of ecstasy, she climaxed. Her beautiful blue eyes widened in surprise and then rolled up under their lids as spasm after spasm of pleasure surged through her genitals.

            Vouivre slid his penis from his bride's encompassing warmth and wetness. Then, rising to his knees between her widely spread thighs, he formed his finger and thumb into a tight ring round its neck. He looked down at the beauty beneath him and smiled. She raised her head from the pillow and watched in wide-eyed wonder as, with a few deft strokes, Vouivre brought himself to a huge climax. The slit at the end of his penis opened and from it spurted powerful jets of a milky fluid which felt warm as it landed first on her naked breasts and then on her belly. Soon, her body was covered with the pearly evidence of her lover's pleasure.

            He lay down on top of her, her naked skin against his; that her body was now made wet and slippery by his semen did not detract at all from his joy from lying with her.

            "Thank you, Marissa," he whispered.  Vouivre's arms surrounded her, drawing her close. His lips brushed light kisses against her eyelids and then against her lips. Soon, exhausted, Marissa slept. Vouivre watched her sleep the entire night, just lying with her, holding her.

            After that night, they considered themselves husband and wife, carrying on like young lovers.  He schooled her in all the ways a man and a woman could pleasure themselves.  They played around with positions, some so impossible to maintain that they collapsed in laughter.  They would lie together, naked, whispering, giggling, loving. 

            One night he rolled her onto her back and he straddled her waist, his erection displayed boldly.  He drew his manhood up her body, finally squeezing her breasts together to make a tight tunnel for it.  Fascinated, Marissa lay back against the pillows, watching his thick member move up and down between her breasts, coming closer and closer to her face.  Her head bent and her tongue came out to flick at the tip as he brought it up to her face, still keeping the shaft between her breasts, working his fingers around her sensitive, hardened nipples. He rolled her onto her back and he straddled her waist, his erection displayed boldly.  He drew his manhood up her body, finally squeezing her breasts together to make a tight tunnel for it.  Fascinated, Marissa lay back against the pillows, watching his thick member move up and down between her breasts, coming closer and closer to her face.  Her head bent and her tongue came out to flick at the tip as he brought it up to her face, still keeping the shaft between her breasts, working his fingers around her sensitive, hardened nipples. 

            Another night, he turned her over on her belly, and kissed his way down her back.  Behind her, he buried his face into her buttocks, licking and sucking at her anus and her perineum.  His hands crawled up her sides and then, when she raised up slightly to give him access, under her to tease her breasts.

            He taught her other things as well, beside the sensual arts.  He taught her to read, and to speak several tongues beside her native one.  He educated her on the arts.  To please her, he even brought in servants. The servants were both a convenience for Vouivre and a threat he sometimes seemed to barely tolerate.  But he never said a bad word about them to his wife, for he knew she relished in being waited on by them.  The addition of servants brought about trouble in that his castle seemed to be besieged by people.  It was no longer a secret.

            Yet through it all, one day and night every week, every seven days, he would vanish without a trace.

            Back in Ortenau, Nuss Dinringer sat toad-like his one of his over-worked armchairs in a marble-faced room and reached into a silver saltcellar, scattering grains of salt over his food with a fat hand.  He leaned back and raised his eyes to the ceiling of his home, where painted nymphs frolicked naked, pursued by lustful shepherds and wanton satyrs, as well as each other.  Around the top of the marble facing on the walls, about two feet below the ceiling, Pan, in relief, played his syrinx while nymphs cavorted with his erect phallus and with each other.  In the corner of the room a well sculpted statue depicted an ancient, frail woman engaged in intercourse with a young boy.  A similar statue, of an ancient, frail man sporting with a young girl, sat in the opposite corner.  His attention wandered from the statues back to his guest. 

            "There are rumors," said Custennin Gorneu, a merchant descended from Odhirran heritage, although neither he nor his parents had ever once set foot in Odhirran.  Master Gorneu ate from a golden plate embossed with mythological creatures.

            "Rumors?" asked Nuss.  "Rumors?  The castle is no rumor.  I don't know how a castle could have gone undetected for so long in that damnable forest, but, in truth, few do travel within it."

            "It is not the castle of which I speak, but of Marissa."

            Nuss scowled and stuffed honeyed larks into his pendulous mouth.  "Tell me how you came by this knowledge."

            "It so happened that one of my servants, an Alisandaran whom I bought five years ago from the Drychtnothian, Lord Euxonius, is brother to one of the women in the kitchen of this Vouivre's castle.  The lady described to me not only matches Marissa's description, but answers to that name."

            "Indeed.  Then perhaps I should pay a visit to this strange castle of Anhartz.  If it is she, then I will have her returned to me.  And if her virginity is gone, then this Lord Vouivre will die."

            Nuss Dinringer arrived at the castle two days later with a full retinue.  He was impressed with the size and style of the castle, but he also became concerned that this Vouivre might be wealthier and more powerful than he.  He smirked.  A rival.  His eyes narrowed and Nuss Dinringer, called the Dragon, began to form a plan for the eventual downfall of this new challenger to his supremacy.  One thing Nuss noticed was the complete absence of soldiers or other armed men.

            Servants outside paused in their industries to watch the process toward the castle.  Nuss crossed the drawbridge on his white Indorian charger.  The gates were opened for him and he processed into the inner courtyard.  Again, he was astounded by the beauty.  He dismounted and approached the double doors to the hall.  A servant opened them and greeted the Dragon.

            "I would like to be announced to the lord of this castle," said Nuss Dinringer, wiping some saliva that had dribbled down his uppermost chin.

            "I am sorry sire, but Lord Vouivre is unavailable," said the butler.

            "Unavailable!  He will not see me?" raged the merchant.

            "Not at all, sire.  He is always absent on the seventh day."

            "Absent?  Where does he go?"

            "I am sure I don't know, sire."

            "May I see the lady of the castle?" said Nuss, irritated.  "Perhaps she knows where he can be found."

            "I assure you she knows not where he goes either."

            "What kind of a husband would not tell his wife where he could be found?" said Nuss Dinringer, "Nothing good can come from such behavior."

            "That is not for me to say, sire."

            "Will you let me in to give my regards to the lady?"

            "Of course, sire."

            Nuss Dinringer and his retinue were allowed into the castle and were led to a vast shadowy Great Hall.  The hall had high, wood-beamed ceilings, and the furnishings of the room were spectacular in design and presentation.  Marissa was sent for to greet her guests.

            Upstairs, Marissa was filled with horror.  She braided her hair and put it up on coils on the back of her head as she contemplated meeting again the monster who was supposed to be her husband.  She determined to meet the Dragon with calm resolve, regardless of his fury.  She left her chambers and walked down the long halls of the castle toward the Great Hall.  The sun streamed warmly through the high narrow windows as she strode bravely onward.  She wished her husband were here. 

            Even though he was expecting to see Marissa, Nuss Dinringer trembled with anger when she finally appeared.  At the same time, his breath was taken away when he saw how beautiful she looked in noble raiment.  The deep sleeves of her shoulder-less green gown were trimmed in gold embroidery, and the long gown whispered as it brushed lightly against the floor.  She walked elegantly toward the other end of the long table Nuss and his guests sat at.  Plates and goblets were already set, and Marissa's servants were pouring the wine and setting out the aromatic food.

            Outraged, Nuss Dinringer stood when Marissa approached the table.  "It is you!" he exclaimed.  Marissa stepped back, wincing.  "You whore!" he continued.  "You belong to me!"

            The servants hurriedly left the room, shocked and surprised at their guest's treatment of his host.

            "I am married now, Lord Dinringer," Marissa said, her voice trembling.

            "Hellfire!" he shouted, banging his fist onto the large table so hard that the silver and plates on the other end jumped.  "I will kill him to have you!"

            "Sire, I must ask you to leave," she said courageously.  "I will not have you speak thusly about my husband."

            "And where is this husband!  Where?" he raged.  "Nowhere!  And where would such a man go, once each week I hear?"

            "I-I don't know.  I am not permitted to know," she said, cringing under the fire of his tirade.

            "Out with other women, I am sure!  You deserve better than that, and you know it!  Hellfire!  Come with me!"

            She shook her head, and after several more minutes of his inflammatory monologue she fled the room, crying.  Nuss Dinringer and his retinue were escorted from the grounds as Marissa flung herself on her canopied bed.

            Marissa immediately resolved to find her husband.

            After a long search, Marissa finally came to the cellar, where she found a strange door.  She found the door locked, but with some industry, she managed to spring the mechanism and open the door.

            The darkness of the hall seemed to absorb her, and to spill out into the cellar she stood in.  She nearly reconsidered her resolve, but at the last walked into the blackness of the revealed corridor.

            Separated from the world above, she descended into depths she had never dreamed of.  The tunnel dripped water, stalagmites tripped her feet, and stalactites hung down like the great teeth of the world. She marveled at the increased humidity.  She felt like she was within a living creature.

            Terror continued to sweep over her as she walked forward into the humid gloom.  She knew not what lay before her, and she tripped often against the obstacles on the floor that she could not perceive until she walked into them.  Her long gown was soon in tatters from the sharp spikes of the stalagmites, and her hair was disheveled from the damp rocks above that dragged at her hair.

            After an interminable period, she came to an opening.  Although the light from the opening did not pierce the darkness of the hallway, she could not fail to walk through it into a light that surprised her.  She backed back into the darkness, then pushed her head through the opening.  The vast chamber before her dwarfed even the Great Hall of the castle somewhere behind and above her, in a life that no longer seemed real.

            She saw massive piles of treasures and valuables.  Coins, gems, jewelry, art all were piled and stacked all throughout the chamber.  Gold statues and vases upon silver bases lay strewn about.  And she saw Vouivre.

            Vouivre, unaware of Marissa's presence, sat nude upon a vast pile of gold coins, sparkling diamonds, bright pearls, bejeweled swords and weapons, ornate vases, decorous busts and statues of grand artistry, paintings in gilt frames, and other treasures.  He breathed softly, still putting off the change he had come to loathe.  He hated being away from his beloved, but he knew he must do this at least once per week.  Without this, he would wither and die.  He lay back finally and, rolling onto his stomach, allowed the change to pass over him.

            Wings sprouted from his muscular back, and a tail sprung forth from him.  His skin became scaled, and his form slowly metamorphosed into something reminiscent of a giant, winged reptile. 

            She recoiled violently when she saw the change that had come over him.  Hissing, his heavy jaws dropped open to bare long, savage teeth, each one serrated, long, and pointed.   It extended out its wings as if stretching, then brought them in, folding them like fans, and they lay flat along his body. 

            She crouched there, panting with fear and confusion, staring up at the reptilian nightmare.  She closed her eyes so she could calm down and finally, by degrees, she managed to gather the courage to look again at her husband.

            She studied the monster.  Green cat's eyes, the center of which held a sharp point of light that light stabbed deep into Marissa’s heart, were set within a reptilian skull armored with small, dark, polished, metallic gold plates.  Scales of the same metallic color feathered the jowls, then swept down the neck and body, becoming larger and thicker as they went.  A pair of horns projected out from the dragon’s forehead.  A thicket of razor sharp spines started between those horns and ran protectively along the entire length of the backbone to the tip of the long tail.

            Starting just behind those long golden horns, then running back perhaps half the length of the long neck, there grew on either side of the spines what appeared to be a thick mane.  It made strange tinkling sounds at any movement; like steel wind chimes.

            To either side of the neck's muscular base bulged the strange double shoulders, from which sprouted both the huge silvery wings and the slender forelegs.  Those armored forelegs were surprisingly humanoid in design and apparent function; and the hands, though armed with long, wickedly curved talons, were still hands.   The wings were enormous.  Each wing was a vast double-layered web of thin, dark-gold skin that stretched between the dragon’s elongated wing bones and attached to the flanks of the reptilian body. A clawed thumb was free of each wing.  Huge bands of pectoral muscle swathed the barrel chest, supporting the wings and arms from the massive, birdlike breastbone.

            Past the ribs, the waist pulled in to lithe dimensions that would do a greyhound credit, then out into the powerful, catlike hind legs.  She had the distinct impression that, despite his size, he was impossibly fast.  Those powerful legs ended in long talons that looked as sharp as Zakharan scimitars from tip to base.   Finally, the body ended in a sinuous, spined tail. 

            The dragon sniffed and smelled Marissa.  Its eyes changed color from green to gold in its surprise as the great head dropped to her level. His serpentine tail lashed in agitation.  The dragon slinked forward, knocking over divans, tall statues and vases, and other treasures.  Marissa felt death clutch at her as the mouth opened slightly, revealing grim rows of tremendous serrated teeth.

            “What are you doing here, woman?” it asked, outraged that its secret had been uncovered.

            "I was curious," she managed to stammer.

            "Unfortunate," it said in a cold tones.  "Your deceit may well end our happiness."

            "My deceit!" she cried.  "My deceit?  You deceived me!  You never told me you were a dragon!  You never told me who you were!"

            "I never said I wasn't a dragon.  You made a vow.  You have broken that vow.  It breaks my heart, but you must leave me forever, or accept the consequences of remaining with me."

            "Consequences?" she asked.

            "Do you not wish to leave?  Surely you do not want a dragon for a husband."

            "Sir!  You are not who I thought you were, but I will not be cast out!  I accept you for whatever you are.  I always have."

            "Indeed you have.  But curiosity has a price.  I must leave you forever, such is the law."

            "Law?  Whose law?  What fetters bind you to this law?"

            The dragon Vouivre growled.  Always this girl lured him, promising him happiness.  Could she be strong enough to live with a real dragon? 

            "What can I do to release you from this limitation?" she pleaded.  Love surged again in the heart of Vouivre.  Never had he met her like.

            "As I said, curiosity has a price.  If you wish to remain with me, you must meet that price.  Is your love strong enough to break the chains of tradition and magic?"

            Marissa nodded, frightened but strangely energized.  The dragon urged her to stand still.  Marissa, trembling with fear, stood straight.  The dragon brought his sword-like claws near to her, and touched her cheek with one. 

            Then the claw slashed downward, and Marissa jumped back.  A savage tear was ripped down her bodice.  Massive claws gripped her from behind, and she was held motionless as the other hand tore off her clothing, shredding them, then pulling the tatters off.

            Marissa stood in all her radiant nudity before the dragon, a form so purely perfect with inimitably graceful, matchless limbs.  The dragon admired once again that bosom with its hills of soft flesh topped with rosy delights.  The dragon followed her form downward, admiring her more than voluptuous area between her legs, clothed with the richest dark bushes of curly hair, sloping rapidly down, like a triangle standing on its point, until its two sides, folding in, formed the deep, soft-looking inside line, which proclaimed the very sensual nature of her sex.  The dragon moved his head in closer, sniffing the scent of his wife.  Deadly teeth showed as its tongue snaked out, dark pink and coming to a single surprisingly fine point, not forked as she had heard. Marissa stepped back in alarm, afraid her husband was going to eat her for breaking her word to him. 

            The dragon made a soft, almost purring noise, eyes half-closed as its warm breath caressed Marissa's bare skin. Not pleasant, but not fetid, nor smelling of rotten meat either. A sweet, moist smell as the very tip of the tongue licked the skin between the soft swells of her ample bosom. Turning, the agile tongue moved up under the well-shaped orb of Marissa's left breast, lifting it gently until it could go up no further and bounced down, the nipple sliding against the coarse pink flesh of the dragons tongue.

             Marissa cried out in surprise when she next felt the dragon's wandering tongue over her belly. Reaching her hands over her head she arched her back as the dragon's tongue found her other nipple, this time almost wrapping around her soft breast before teasing the hard bud. The dark pink tongue slid again over her round, plump breasts.

            The dragon's tongue retreated momentarily, a happy noise coming from deep inside the dragons chest, a pleasant sigh.

            The fine tip of the dragon's long tongue quickly, but gently, touched her thigh. Licking against her abdomen, then up over her breasts again, the dragon Vouivre teased her, and his tongue soon found the inside of her leg. Starting near her exquisitely turned ankle, half wrapping around the nicely toned calf, the tongue wound its way up the smooth surface of her leg, taunting Marissa's inner thigh, drinking the taste of her slender body.

            Flicking upwards gently, Vouivre touched his tongue to the soft folds of flesh nestled beautifully between Marissa's thighs. Rewarded by a pleasant gasp, Vouivre licked up the sensitive flesh again, touching the soft folds delicately with the tip of his tongue. Tasting the sweet fluids moistening Marissa's flower, the dragon pushed its tongue against her, making her quiver as the tip slipped between the smooth, parting lips.

            Marissa moaned and she spread her legs around the thicker part of the dragons long tongue.  She watched the pink member writhe its way deeper into her.

            Relishing the taste of his young bride, Vouivre took her wrists delicately between two sword length claws. Supporting her like this, Vouivre pushed his twitching tongue deeper into her, looking down its snout at the pink tongue buried in tender flesh. It reached out with its other clawed hand, tenderly pushed her right leg farther from her body, and found the sensitive button hidden by the folds of her sex with the sharp tip of its claw.

            Feeling the sharp prick on her clitoris, Marissa struggled to control herself, anxious not the hurt herself on the sharp claws holding her. Biting her lip against the growing tingling, the delicate needle pain of the claw on her clit, not breaking the skin, but manipulating it, teasing it with pin-pricks, making her squeal despite herself. Gasping, she struggled as she felt her feet lift off the ground, pushed up from below with the dragons tongue spreading her wide.

             Lifting the girl, carefully supporting her by her wrists, Vouivre twitched and writhed its agile tongue in and out of her.  The dragon increased its tempo with the increasing sounds of Marissa's cries of pleasure.

            Smiling a nasty dragon smile around its tongue, Vouivre took pride in knowing it hadn't lost its touch. Pleasure warmed the dragon as it drew out Marissa's orgasm expertly, savoring the feel of her around its tongue.

            Marissa had lost count of her orgasms, not that she was one to count them anyway. The terrible eroticism of being so overwhelmingly helpless in the face of a dragon, not to mention what the dragon was doing to her, drove her to heights of ecstasy she had never known before.  Slowly, she begins to come down, the orgasmic high leaving her drained, body almost limp. Marissa begins to feel awareness of the sensation changing; not leaving entirely, but the tongue in her was changing...

            On a couch now, Marissa felt a hand firmly on her ass, and another on her inner thigh, spreading her lovely legs. Looking down she saw a full head of blonde hair between her legs, long fingers with red nails on her sensitive thigh. The face tipped up towards her, eyes grinning gleefully as it licked her.  It was the face of the fairest woman Marissa had ever seen, reminiscent of tales of fairies and nymphs.  Pleasure tingled upwards from her sex, despite her confusion. Marissa gasped as the woman's lips touched her inner thigh.  Then the woman's lips touched a place far more intimate.  As the woman licked her, Marissa was still stunned; the only signs of life which she exhibited were an occasional twinge of her bottom and a gentle up heave of her loins.

            Suddenly Marissa felt afraid and ashamed and pulled away from the woman.  "What is going on?" she demanded.

            "This is the second part of your punishment, Marissa, for not obeying me!" the woman said.

            "You are my husband?" she asked.

            "I am Vouivre," the nymph said in a pretty voice.

            "How can you be a girl?" Marissa asked.

            "I'm not...not in my own form anyway. It is complicated, you might think.  Dragons are neither male nor female exclusively.  We are what our whim makes us.  Several millennia of experiences with the powers of my kind and you would develop many different diversions. Curiosities to explore...sometimes things just happen when you are among mortals.  Sexual acts are a very powerful kind of magic."

            Vouivre sat back so that Marissa could get a good look at its female form.  Vouivre had long red locks of hair that tumbled and played down her shoulders and back.  Her eyes were green cat's-eyes, and she had a small, upturned nose and delicate lips of uncommon character.  Her skin was pale, and her bosom caused Marissa to think of twin hills of living snow surmounted with rosy fire.  The body was lithe and muscular, as befitted a dragon, and, except for the cascading locks on her head and her arching eyebrows, there was no evidence of hair anywhere else upon her body, even on the well-rounded prominence of smooth flesh between her legs.

             Vouivre took Marissa in an embrace, kissing her deeply, thrusting its tongue into her mouth.  Shocked, at first Marissa was frozen, tasting her own familiar juices on the transformed dragon's mouth and tongue. Feeling breasts rubbing against her, feminine hands caressing her buttocks, thighs touching, parting to rub against the smooth juncture between those thighs. Hesitantly, something deep in her stirred at this forbidden act, making love to another woman in a new way, and the heat rose in her loins again. Wrapping her arms around her spouse, Marissa returned the embrace, feeling a dirty, blushing arousal as she touched tongues with her.

            Their bodies crushed together as they explored each other.  Vouivre's touches enveloped Marissa in a voluptuous mantle of new sensations, something like a dream, a dream that sought not fulfillment, but prolongation.  Marissa's hands traced the feminine lines in unfamiliar ways, touching her spouse's perfect breasts, cupping the smooth flesh of its sex, feeling so different this way, but oddly correct; the same. Long, pale fingers found the hot folds of her own sex, their touch hauntingly right, so much the way she touched herself, so strange without feeling this through her own fingers as well. A deep ache set into Marissa, a tremendous desire welled up around this sensation of making love to another woman.

            Flushing with a hidden shame, Marissa let her fingers brush the hard nub of a rosy nipple, then trace down the smooth side of her lover, and allowed herself to be laid out on the couch. Her eyes wantonly devoured the form of the transformed dragon as she pulled Vouivre down for another kiss, relishing the feel of the full lips.  The two women kissed, kissing until they were drunk with kissing, rolling over each other, still kissing.

            "Enough!" Vouivre laughed, smiling wickedly, and pushed Marissa away with one small hand. "I have already shown you my talents; time for you to return the favor!". Turning, Vouivre threw her shapely left leg over Marissa's left shoulder, climbing onto the couch facing Marissa's feet, straddling her head.

            Reaching out with her tongue Marissa touched the beautiful puffy lips before her, rewarded by a happy cooing above. Moist petals part as she licked the length, savoring the taste, the feel of the smooth, hairless flesh. Flicking with her tongue, she teased the clitoris, knowing that if the dragon had really copied human female form, then it was in for a ride.  Marissa's fingers pulled the hairless labia wide, allowing her to stab her tongue deep into the wet inner flesh.

            As she licked and sucked the wet cleft between Vouivre's thighs, she felt her own warm opening invaded by Vouivre's long fingers.  Vouivre rubbed her finger up and down the rosy chink, and Marissa paused in her attentions, enjoying the action Vouivre performed.  Inspired by lust, Marissa seized Vouivre again round her buttocks, pressed her face in between her wide-spread thighs, glued her lips on the soft slit, and eagerly supped up the ambrosial dew distilled from that sweet region with a passion that surprised both.

            The caresses lengthened, their bodies rolled around, positions changed, and the suspense of orgasm was preciously sustained.  Each time one approached orgasm, the other, observing the quickening of the other's motions or sounds, took up the kissing again, and their intercourse became a bath of love-making, moist and hot with passion.  Vouivre's fingers were firm, commanding, like penises; her tongue, far-reaching, knowing so many nooks where it stirred the nerves. 

            Instead of having one sexual core with peripheral erogenous zones, Marissa's body seemed to have an infinity of sexual openings, a sea of equally sensitized flesh, every bit of the skin given the intense sensitivity of the mouth.  The very flesh of Marissa's arm seemed to open and contract with the passage of Vouivre's tongue or fingers.  When the orgasm finally came, it was so vibrant, so intense, that it shook their bodies from head to foot.

            Marissa reflected that dragons had acquired a new sex of sorts by existing beyond man and woman.  This thought haunted her, and she realized her spouse was a mythic figure, enlarged, magnified.  Yet the dragon was not finished with his bride.  With an uncanny roar, and a flash of light and heat, her husband stood before her in all of his blonde masculinity.  Not a trace of girlishness remained, pure male was he.  Her heart smiled within as she looked once again upon his rugged handsomeness, a beauty she once thought of as unearthly, and now she understood the origin of that unearthliness.  And she immediately perceived that, despite the foregoing passion, his desire for her was still urgent.

            Within moments, they were together, husband and wife, male and female, their bodies, merged with passion, gleamed slickly with sweat, slapped against each other with wet sounds.  Love and lust mingled, inextricable from each other; the phenomenon of orgasm or not-orgasm ceased to exist.  There was only one continuous never-ending sensation of a perfect blending of two bodies and two souls into one single fire of existence.

            Afterward, panting, both lay quietly for a while, spent;  Vouivre Sunathaeraux, the dragon, stretched out over Marissa.  His hands played, caressing her soft, sweat slick skin, his lips touching her smooth flesh. After a few minutes, Vouivre drug his tired body around and rested on Marissa's shoulder, tenderly kissing her neck. Vouivre kissed Marissa's ear, then her jaw, pulling her warm body close. "Now sleep," Vouivre whispered. "I don't, not now, but I would like to lie here with you."

            Nuss Dinringer fumed once he returned from the Anhartz Forest.  He raged like a hurricane through his house, knocking aside or destroying the obscene decorations.  Exhausted, Nuss eventually slid like a slug into his favorite chair.  He summoned one of his servants, a red haired Indorian girl, and asked her first to send for Custennin Gorneu, then to retire and meet him in his bedroom after he had finished talking over a certain matter with the merchant.

            "Apparently this Lord Vouivre vanishes each seven-day," said Nuss as Custennin Gorneu entered the room and sat down.  "I would like to know where he goes."

            "I could bribe one of the servants, or get one of mine to join their staff.  Have him followed or something to that effect," said the merchant.

            "Whatever.  But I want to know where he goes, I want him destroyed, and I want Marissa as my wife."

            Hand in hand, still naked, Marissa and Vouivre walked back to through the dark tunnel back to the world above, the world of life and sunshine.  Vouivre explained that this dark corridor was a path through the catecombs beneath the castle, the crypts where former lords and ladies of this castle were laid to rest.  Marissa shivered and increased her pace.

            Once in the cellar, Vouivre closed the door behind them.  Marissa was a little nervous, but also a bit excited, to be standing in the basement without a stitch of clothing on.  She wondered how they would manage the return to their rooms.  No wonder Vouivre never kept servants around.

            Vouivre lifted a damp, moldering tapestry that hung next to the barrels of wine.  Behind it was a door, slightly lifted off the ground so that it was entirely concealed by the old tapestry.  Beyond the door was a stairway that led to another concealed opening in their bedchamber.

            Marissa smiled and embraced her husband.  He picked her up slightly when he enthusiastically returned the embrace.  They didn't see the servant who was in the room cleaning, who, upon hearing the voices in the wall, thinking spirits lurked in the walls, became frightened.  When she perceived the wall moving, she had hid behind one of the thick drapes in the room, thinking bandits lurked in the walls.  When she peered from behind the drapes and saw the nudity of the lord and lady, she resolved to remain hidden.

            Marissa asked, "Why do you disappear every week?  Just to lurk down there?"

            Vouivre laughed.  "If I do not spend a day and night each week with my baubles and treasures, I would wither and die.  It is so with all my kind that I know of."

            She pulled Vouivre down and whispered into his ear, "I enjoyed it down there with you.  May we play again… in all your forms?"

            "Of course, my love," he said, smiling.  "Now let's get dressed and go down for breakfast."

            "Not yet," she said.  "I feel filthy.  I want to bathe.  Care to watch?"

            Hand in hand, they walked out of the bedroom into the bath.  Silently, the servant slid from her hidden location and slipped out of the room.

            Weeks passed and summer passed into autumn.  As a lark, Marissa thought it would be fun to be with Vouivre as a girl for a couple of weeks.  So Vouivre made an announcement that he would be leaving on a brief journey.  Later, in girlish form, Vouivre arrived at his castle as Lady Æsthyr Sunathaeraux, the cousin to Lord Sunathaeraux.  Vouivre was blonde, with long hair that gleamed in the sun like spun gold.  Vouivre wore a beautiful green skirt that seemed to float around her, swishing and twirling with her movements.  A white blouse with short ballooned sleeves did little to hide her charms, and a black sash about her waist completed the outfit.

            Marissa pretended to show Æsthyr around the castle grounds, and made a public show of becoming fast friends.  And that night, Marissa snuck to the rooms assigned to Æsthyr.  Just before their lips met Marissa felt her entire body become covered in goosebumps because of what they were about to do.  Even though she had made love to her husband as a woman before, it had never been a pre-planned thing.

            "Æsthyr, my darling," said Marissa after the tender kiss.

            "Vouivre."

            "Ah, but if I don't use your other name, I might forget, and address you as my lord in public.  Besides, I like you as Æsthyr."  Marissa leaned towards Vouivre and brought her lips to Vouivre's once more.  The kiss felt so sensual and so forbidden as Marissa let her tongue just barely slide into her lover's mouth.  As soon as Marissa felt Vouivre's tongue touch hers she completely melted.

            Vouivre, as Æsthyr, knelt in front of Marissa.  The dragon's fingers were kneading her thighs in a steady rhythm that  was intoxicatingly pleasurable.  It was the smile that got to Marissa  the most.  The entire time, Vouivre just kept looking up at Marissa with this  smile of wicked innocence.  Marissa almost felt guilty for the dirty  thoughts she was having just because of that' smile.

            Vouivre's fingers were moving in tight circles higher and higher up Marissa's skirt.  Warm tingles were radiating from those magic fingers.   Marissa's hands caressed Vouivre's lovely blonde hair. She opened her legs wider as Vouivre's fingers continued their path up her thighs.

            "Please," Marissa gasped as those fingers moved teasingly just outside her sex.  The tenderness that she felt from the soft, feminine touch of Vouivre was more sensual and erotic than anything she had experienced before. 

            Vouivre didn't answer in words.  Her fingers moved inward and began massaging the tender folds of Marissa's sex.  Marissa moaned as contact was made and she shivered as she felt two thumbs rolling her clitoris.  

            Marissa felt like a temple prostitute as she shifted her hips, trying to get Vouivre's fingers inside her.  She couldn't believe how warm she felt.  The gentle touching was so intense, and Vouivre knew right where to tease her.  From the way her fingers pushed her nether lips together to the way fingernails grazed her clit, Vouivre was bringing out a need Marissa couldn't believe existed.

            Marissa begged for more, her head thrown back and her breasts heaving with excitement.  Marissa pulled her skirt up and shifted her hips up, lifting her sex, presenting it to Vouivre.

            Vouivre obliged.  Keeping her knowing smile, Vouivre leaned forward and  took one single long lick of the tender cleft presented to him.  Marissa's thighs twitched and quivered.  Vouivre laughed, and moved closer.  Vouivre's mouth merged with the nether lips between Marissa's legs. 

            Marissa growled in pleasure.  Vouivre's tongue was flickering over Marissa's pleasure center,  drawing it from its hood.  Marissa's thighs danced on the bed as she felt Vouivre's soft, feminine cheeks press against her.  Her hands went again to Vouivre's hair, grabbing the silky soft hair and pulled the sensual  mouth deeper inside her.  Marissa's eyes were rolling in her head as Vouivre sucked her soft folds into her mouth.  Marissa's thighs clenched around Vouivre's head as the dragon whipped her tongue inside Marissa.  So fierce yet so feminine, Vouivre's mouth pleased Marissa to such a degree that Marissa felt like her soul was being sucked down into that lovely  mouth.

            Marissa groaned as she approached orgasm.  Her hands locked down around Vouivre's head and her hips surged forward, her ass lifting from the bed.  Marissa rode the climax as Vouivre sucked strongly between her thighs.

            Marissa moaned incoherently as Vouivre stood before her.  The dragon opened her blouse to reveal smooth skin and small  pert breasts.  Vouivre reached for Marissa's chin and pulled Marissa's mouth to one of those breasts.  Marissa didn't resist at all.  She felt a pink nipple against her lips.  Still flushed from her orgasm, Marissa suckled on the  nipple faithfully as Vouivre removed her skirt to join Marissa's bottomless state.

            The nipple in Marissa's mouth was so soft, and the feminine smell of a woman was so much different when Marissa's nose was pressed against the woman's breast.  Marissa's didn't think at all about her actions.  She just  sucked the nipple with her lips and played with the nipple with her  tongue. 

            "It's my turn," Vouivre said, pulling away from Marissa.  Vouivre sat down on  the opposite side of the bed, completely nude.  She wasn't hairless between her legs like the last time.  A small patch of blonde fuzz, soft and silky in appearance, covered her pubic mound. Vouivre's eyes were almost closed,  waiting for Marissa to do her part.

            Nervous, and a bit apprehensive, Marissa knelt before the woman's open thighs.  A tiny bead of moisture was visible at the opening of  Vouivre's lips.  Marissa felt her mouth water, and she wanted to return the bliss she had received.  Her long hair brushed against Vouivre's thighs as Marissa moved in to lick Vouivre soft cleft.

            Encouraged by Vouivre's moans, Marissa licked deeper, longer and harder.  Hands came down to push gently at her head and Marissa discovered again the little nub nestled at the top of Vouivre's wet slit.  She rolled her tongue over the tiny button,  enjoying the way it made Vouivre's body shudder.

            Vouivre's thighs came together, encasing Marissa's head in a lover's grip.  Her heart beating faster, Marissa surrendered to her passion and licked Vouivre's wonderfully soft vaginal flesh with rapid tongue swipes.  Vouivre's hands pulled her deeper and Marissa was engulfed in warm thighs and damp pubic hair.  Marissa licked harder; delving into the wet folds that welcomed her.

            Vouivre cried out when her orgasm came and Vouivre's thighs tightened further around Marissa's head.  Marissa felt the thighs as they bucked and quivered and Vouivre's moans echoed in the richly appointed guest chamber.  Marissa wished she could change shape.  She wanted to know what it would be like to possess a woman like a man, know what it feels like to be a man making love.

            Marissa slid her fingers into Vouivre wet opening, a single touch, a touch of love...and desire.  Marissa's hand was bathed in Vouivre's juices as she squirmed slightly, completely lost in the moment.   Vouivre slowly spread her legs apart allowing Marissa's fingers to dip into her delicate vagina once more.  Marissa lightly pressed against Vouivre's inner walls with her  finger.  Marissa could tell from Vouivre's whispering and moaning that her hands were doing a good job.

            Marissa watched Vouivre's entire body move as she moaned, her quivering lips, her perfect curves and hips and even her feet which had begun to curl up with ecstasy.   Marissa, not for the first time, felt she was living a dream, only it was real.  She let two of her fingers penetrate Vouivre's warm slit for a final touch just as the excitement grew too great for her to handle.  As Marissa felt her body begin to convulse at last, she held on to her and closed her eyes with her.  The climax was so powerful and yet so calm.  Marissa's fingers were instantly covered in a small gush of her juices in a moment of ecstasy that Marissa never wanted to end.

            The fortnight passed quickly, and Marissa loved every day and night of it.  They played out in the grass, and Marissa even helped dress Vouivre each morning.  They bathed together, and Marissa found she really enjoyed soaping the soft curves of Vouivre's female form just as much as his muscular male body.

            And when the two weeks were concluded, Lady Æsthyr left her cousin's castle, and Lord Vouivre returned to his wife and, that night, made love to her as a man.

            Custennin Gorneu spoke quietly to the servant girl that had hid behind the drapes when Marissa and Vouivre returned from his lair.  The girl was in Ortenau to visit her family.  She told Custennin Gorneu what she saw and heard in exchange for some silver coins to help her family out.  She agreed to intentionally spy if he could see to it that her family would not lack for anything this coming winter.

            And so it was that the girl was hiding in the deep drapes a few nights later while Marissa and Vouivre loved each other.  She watched as Vouivre slid down Marissa's smooth body, caressed her stomach, ran his tongue tantalizingly around her light brown pubic hair, then buried his nose into her crotch.  The girl became aroused as she watched her lord and lady touch and play with each other.  Her hand stole down to her crotch and she rubbed herself through her skirts.  And still she watched.

            Marissa whispered something the servant couldn't hear, but the effect of that whisper caused the spy's blood to run cold.  Vouivre changed.  He became like a dragon, like those found in picture books.  Was Marissa a witch?  Was Vouivre a monster?  The girl had no idea, but she knew she couldn't run yet.  To be caught now might well mean her death.  So she watched.

            Vouivre had control over his size, and this night his dragon form was a mere six feet long from nose to tip of the tail.  His body entwined around Marissa's, and the tip of his tail teased her flesh.  His sharp claws traced careful patterns along her skin, just barely touching her so as to not pierce her skin.  His tongue flicked repeatedly across her pink nipples.  And still the serving girl watched.

            Nuss Dinringer sat contemplating a pair of young dancers gyrating and leaping before him.  He sat nude, stroking his stumpy manhood as he watched the dance.  The dancers themselves thought him crude and grotesque, but they were paid well to let him watch and bring himself to orgasm.  Sweat streaked his obese body, making wet trails that, if anything, enhanced his similarity to a slug.

            He dismissed the dancers after he spent his fluid.  Sleepy, he shifted his position in the overstuffed chair and nearly nodded off.  A loud cough roused him.  His major-domo held out a robe and said, "Custennin Gorneu has arrived and would see you.  Shall I tell him you are indisposed, or shall I ask him to wait?"

            "Tell him to wait," said Nuss, taking the robe.  With difficulty he pushed his bulk out of the chair and stood up.  "I'll meet him in the drawing room."

            "Very good, sire."

            Twenty minutes later, Nuss Dinringer walked into the drawing room.  Custennin Gorneu sat comfortably, smoking a pipe.  Old friends, Custennin didn't stand when Nuss entered the room, as would be the polite custom.  Nuss sat down across from Custennin, breathing hard from the exertion of walking down stairs to get to the drawing room.

            "I wasn't expecting you tonight," said Nuss, yawning.

            "I had news I wasn't expecting," said Custennin Gorneu.

            "About?"

            "Lady Sunathaeraux."

            "Marissa?"

            "Marissa.  It regards her husband more than her, however.  A weakness is discovered, if my sources are to be believed."

            "Speak on.  I am tired and my patience thin."

            "Lord Vouivre is not what he pretends to be.  He is not even human."

            Nuss wrinkled his brow.  "You are mad.  Not human?"

            "Dragon," he said.  For a second Nuss thought his friend was addressing him by his common epithet, then he realized Custennin Gorneu was naming Lord Vouivre.  "By the gods," whispered Nuss, coming to full wakefulness.  "By the gods."

            Custennin Gorneu, not a man given to smiling often, smirked now.  "One of the serving girls witnessed Lady Sunathaeraux making love to her husband, when, at a whispered request from her ladyship, Vouivre apparently transformed to a golden dragon and continued sporting with her."

            "Not a large dragon, is he?" said Nuss, becoming aroused.

            "Apparently of variable size," said Custennin Gorneu.  "The same servant, emboldened by your gold, later used a secret panel she had witnessed on a prior occasion, and saw the same dragon on its hoard, but Vouivre was colossal upon this viewing.  Lady Sunathaeraux was with him still, sleeping curled up against his neck and arm."

            "A dragon," mused Nuss.  "Interesting.  Where does he go each week, then?"

            "To his hoard apparently.  The same servant heard him mention to Lady Sunathaeraux that he would wither and die if he could not be with his treasures at least once per seven-day."

            "And the servant?  Where is she now?"

            "Terrified, she fled after she reported to me.  She would not return to the castle.  But she told me how to reach Vouivre's lair."

            Three days later, Marissa and Vouivre spoke of philosophy in the library.  They discussed the new philosophies of Ghabadal, a philosopher from Alisander.  After night fell, they retired to their bedchambers.  Marissa took off her clothes, then undressed Vouivre.  Taking Vouivre's penis in her small hand, Marissa studied it and, with the other hand, caressed it lightly.  She straddled Vouivre, easing herself onto his erection.  She held it firmly at the base, pushing the head against her pink labia.  Her mat of pubic hair was already wet as she shoved him inside of herself, dropping down with all her weight.  As she moved up and down she slowly drew her right hand up her thigh, feeling her own soft skin, stroking her own firm muscles.  Her hand traveled over her tight abdomen and up to her breasts.  She rolled her nipples between her thumb and forefinger.  Then her hand darted down between her thighs, strumming her clitoris slowly, getting faster as her rocking increased its speed.  Vouivre writhed under her as she rubbed herself as she bobbed up and down on his erection.

            As Vouivre and Marissa sported in their chambers, Nuss Dinringer and Custennin Gorneu found the hidden passage of darkness that led past the catacombs to the hoard-lair of Vouivre Sunathaeraux.  They led the way through that fearsome blackness, followed by their retainers and the few member's of Marissa's staff that agreed to betray their lord and lady.  Upon passing the nighted hall, Nuss and Custennin were stunned to speechlessness for several minutes as they tried to take in all the wealth splayed out before them.  Nuss smiled. 

            Twenty furtive figures stole through the castle in the night.  All was silent as they padded down the halls, their feet cased in soft leather shoes that made no sound neither marble tile nor thick carpet.  Soon they heard the gasps and pants of lovers at play.  The silent group crowded around the door.  The largest of the score approached the door swiftly, slamming his bulk into it according to their pre-ordained plan.  A second bodily ram brought about the sound of hinges tearing out of the wall.  With a crash of wood and the rending of hinges, the door to Vouivre's chambers smashed open on the third bash the and killers dressed in black flooded into the room, and the pair of torches in the room gleamed red on bared daggers, naked sword blades, and at least one keen-edged axe.

            Marissa screamed and the men stopped short.  Marissa was naked, as they expected, but Vouivre was not.  He had managed, from the first impact to the last, to get his armor on, and stood there, ready, sword in hand.  Armed victim or not, the slayers knew their prey, and they pressed the attack.  The first ran in, sword upraised, body low, screaming an unnerving Odhirran battle cry.  Vouivre ducked and parried, and, with a vicious backhand swing as the assailant passed him, crushed the Odhirran's skull. 

            Vouivre was a fast as a Bakaran tiger.  Steel clanged on steel as he fought the remaining rogues.  Whistling cuts nicked bits of metal from Vouivre's armor.  Soon he was bleeding from half a dozen flesh wounds even as he hacked and hewed his attackers in a furious whirlwind of steel.  Marissa watched in terror, unable to scream, unable to move.  The only sounds were the clanging of weapons, the short gasping of hard driven breath, and the shuffling of the fighters' feet on the marble floor.  Black clad killers lay strewn across that floor, either dead, or dying in their own gore as the remainder of their number fought on, keeping Vouivre on the defensive, never letting him really launch an offense.  A keen bladed knife darted in and Vouivre felt it cut into his side.  An icy pain spiked through him, and he clutched instinctively at the weapon that had impaled him.  He jumped back and slashed out with his red blade, catching the assassin's head, biting into flesh and skull.

            Vouivre slipped on the bloody tiles, and a sword broke against his breastplate as he regained his balance.  One hand still clutching the dagger in his side, he continued to fight with terrible sweeping blows that cracked bone and spilt blood.  With a gasping cry he staked all on a desperate onslaught, leaping like an angry tiger into the heart of the fray.  The sudden movement surprised the remaining assassins, and two of them were killed in a matter of a second.  One of the bandits dove at Vouivre's feet to bring him down, but Vouivre jumped out of reach, and the rogue, as he slid in the blood on the floor, watched Vouivre's sword flash downward into his face.

            The axe-wielder, an Indorian brute, swung his axe in a powerful arc, but Vouivre ducked under it and smashed his heavy sword into the Indorian, cleaving into the brute's left side.  Blood poured from Vouivre's side and he felt the burning of poison in his veins.  He parried another blow as he pulled out the venomous dagger.  Vouivre's head spun, and the room reeled around him.  Sweat ran into his eyes and his breath came short, but somehow he managed still to parry or avoid the most dangerous blows of his attackers. Yet his strength was failing, his counter attacks lacked force, and he stumbled and slid more often than not.  Only six of the twenty remained, and they harried him unceasingly, for they sensed the victory.  Like brave vultures, they picked and picked at him, keeping him off balance and weary. 

            Angry, Vouivre roared, and, in a burst of energy, transformed into his true nature, the form of the dragon.  The room was too confining for him to take his full gigantic stature, but his serrated, savage teeth were still deadly, as proved when his snout darted into the chest cavity of a bearded rogue and returned with his blood-spewing heart.  The metallic golden plates that covered his body provided for more protection than the armor he affected in human form. 

            Vouivre impaled another on his horns, and his powerful wings smashed against the others, impeding their attacks in the double-layered web of dark-gold skin.  One of the slayers pushed his sword into the massive barrel chest in a show of incredible strength.  Vouivre reared back, and flipped onto his back, the spines cracking the marble tiles beneath him.  His tail flicked out and smashed the impaler's face into a ghastly ruin.

            Flame poured out of Vouivre's mouth, enveloping an unfortunate villain in a shroud of flickering flames.  Vouivre's talons, keen as the sharpest blade, disemboweled another, plucking out a section of rib cage so that a lung gushed out.

            A sword, powerfully driven, smashed into Vouivre's head, and darkness swam at the outskirts of his vision.  Another human barreled into him, pushing the sword in his chest even deeper into him.  Vouivre screamed in pain and outrage. Again the sword was pushed further into the dragon's chest, and Vouivre crashed to the gruesome floor.  He thrashed around for several minutes as the remaining assassins watched, out of reach of that twitching tail.  Marissa's screams found voice when Vouivre stopped moving, and her terror rang throughout out the darkened halls of the castle.

            Nuss Dinringer watched as work crews emptied the dragon's lair of its treasures.  He listened as one of the black uniformed assassins reported.   Marissa, hauled out of the room kicking and screaming, was tied, nude, to a chair.  Nuss' eyes devoured her nakedness like a savage animal as he listened to various reports.  He had lusted after this girl for so long, and finally could see her in all her natural beauty.   And the ropes only enhanced her beauty in Nuss' eyes.

            Eventually she was freed from the chair, tied up again, and slung into a wagon to be hauled back to the Dinringer estate.  Nuss sat next to her, staring at her, taking in all the curves, enjoying the way she struggled against the ropes.  He didn't know if she were trying to escape or trying to cover up her nakedness.  He spoke to her absent-mindedly, telling her how he intended to ravish her later.  She was gagged, so she couldn't respond coherently.

            Back at his home, he had her taken to his bedchambers.  The guards, not too careful where they put their hands, dumped her onto Nuss Dinringer's wide, low bed with its silks and fur throws. Marissa struggled fruitlessly against the ropes and the soldiers, casting a last look at her naked body, left the room, laughing.  She stared at the decorations of the room.  The long brazier that stood upon a dragon's claws caught her attention, and she held back tears that threatened to appear as she thought of Vouivre.  The statue of the nude obese woman clutching the three slender youths to her gross body frightened her somewhat.  What kind of man had her father essentially sold her to so long ago?  The artful painted friezes and murals depicting the acts of lovemaking drew her attention.  One of these depicted a woman having intimate relations with a dragon.  She nearly began crying, but the door opened and Nuss Dinringer's bulk was silhouetted against the illuminated hallway beyond.

            He strode over to the low bed and untied her gag.  A stream of obscenities shot out of her mouth.  Nuss was pleased.  He liked dirty-talkers.

            "You maggot!" she hissed.  "Why?  Why have you done this to me?"

            "Marriage," said Nuss Dinringer.

            "Marriage?  Why?  Why is it so important to be married to me?"

            "I want you.  I've wanted you since you were little.  You never knew it, but you were watched over by my father's order, and later, by my order.  You were ordained to be my wife long before you were told about it.  My family's money sustained yours in times of famine and want.  But you fled."

            "I have no intention of marrying you, you slug!"

            "My interest in you no longer has anything to do with you being my wife.  You have slept with someone other than me, and that somewhat devalues your life.  But, pretty as you still are, you will become as a slave to me, a servant to my sexual whims.  You will do whatever I tell you."

            "No!  I kill myself first!"

            "Well, you will be guarded against that eventuality," said Nuss.  "And since I doubt you will cooperate this first time, I will have to have you tied to the bed."  He summoned the guards again.

            The two guards walked in and Nuss ordered them to untie her, hold her down, and tie her spread eagled over the bed.  The guards smiled at the duty.  One untied her as the other held her.  She made no effort to resist, and the guard holding her, thinking she had been broken, didn't hold her as tightly as he might have.

            Like a striking cobra, Marissa moved.  Snatching a knife from the guard's belt she leaped, not at one of the guards, but over the bed toward Nuss Dinringer.  Before any could stop her, she had slashed the sharp dagger edge across the great bulk of his belly.  Nuss, his face livid, yelled in frenzied terror, his voice cracked with fear.

            She ran to the door, reaching it just as one of the guards did.  She lashed out with the dagger and he caught her arm.  The other guard had drawn his sword and dashed over the bed toward the girl as Nuss staggered out the way.  Marissa tried to free her arm from the iron grip of the guard, but his other hand locked on her throat, choking her.  Blood trickled over the inexorable fingers that closed like the steel jaws of a trap into her neck, tearing her skin like rotten cloth.  She saw the upraised sword of the other guard shine as it began its inevitable sweep toward her.

            Fast as a frightened cat, she leaped up, double her naked legs up so that her knees were against her choker's chest.  She pushed back with all of her might.  Her head smacked into the door, but she had freed herself from his iron grip.  The sword missed entirely as she dropped to the floor, bruising her hip and elbow.

            Nuss Dinringer continued to howl in outrage, but Marissa didn't waste time listening to him. She jumped upward, thrusting the dagger upward with all of her terror-driven might, ramming it into the arm pit of the sword-wielding guard.  He dropped the sword and fell back.  Marissa pounded the dagger into his left eye, burying the dagger to the hilt in his head.

            The dagger stuck in his skull, so Marissa had to relinquish the weapon as the other guard tried to grab her.   Her elbows smashed into his ribs, and she ducked under his clumsy effort to restrain her.  She grabbed up the fallen sword and slashed it upward inexpertly.  Despite the clumsy attempt, the sword connected with the guard's jaw, felling him.

            She thrust the unwieldy weapon at Nuss, and its metallic length slid into the folds of fat that girdled the merchant.  He gasped and slid to the floor, his hands trying desperately to pull the sword out of his gut.

            Marissa ran into an adjoining chamber and found some clothing.  It didn't fit, but she didn't care.  She tied a belt around her waist to keep the huge pants up, and she threw on a warm cloak.  She pulled on a pair of sandals, and, taking up a jeweled dagger, she left the room.  She ran quietly down the halls of Nuss Dinringer's home, and passed undetected into the streets of Ortenau.

            Marissa ran from the Lamapachan city of Ortenau.  She was no longer a delicate maiden.  She was no longer the frightened bride that first fled headlong into the haunted Anhartz Forest, not caring if she lived or died.  Now she ran toward the forest intending on living.  Although she hadn't told Vouivre, she was pregnant with his child.  She had no idea what a half-human, half-dragon hybrid would be like, but she resolved to see the child born, and raised to return to Ortenau, to tame Anhartz, to find Vouivre's lost hoard, and to rule Anhartz Castle as a seat of power.  Marissa ran, but this time she wasn't running away from fate, but toward it.

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