The Woodward Academy, Year 6

Chapter 8: January

"Morning, David," Vivian said when he sat down at his desk.

"Morning," he replied.

"Problem?" she asked, noting the tone of his voice.

"It's a personal thing, don't worry about it."

"Okay... well, if you want to talk about it..."

"Thanks.  Since I can't really define the problem to myself yet, I can't really talk to anyone else about it, either.  My new girlfriend is acting... odd.  Beyond that, I can't really say anything."

"Have you tried talking to her about it?"

"Yes, but she's not been informative, and I didn't want to get too pushy about it."

"I can understand that.  Well, I'm sure she'll tell you what's on her mind when she's ready.  You didn't, uh, do anything you need to apologize for, did you?"

"Not that I know of," David replied.  "I've thought of that, but looking back on the last week, I can't think of anything at all I've done that should have upset her.  I mean, I've known her for five years.  I would hope by now I would have figured out what does and doesn't upset her."

Vivian grinned.  "True, but she is a woman, and you're merely a man..."

David chuckled at that.  "True enough."

"Good luck with it, anyway."

"Thanks."

David started to fill out some paperwork he'd been putting off.  Joe wasn't around yet, and they'd finished with the list of visitors the day before.  There had only been two wizards on the list.  They were going to work on the histories of those wizards today, but David had to wait for Joe to show up to do so, since he wasn't officially there.

When Joe did finally show up, it was two hours later.

"'Bout time you showed up," David said.  "Here I am on vacation, and I beat you to the office by hours."

Vivian giggled.

Joe scowled at him.  "I was busy doing other things."

"Uh-huh.  Can we get back to work on those visitor records now?"

"Actually, that's what I was working on.  I've got good news, and I've got bad news."

"Okay..."

"The good news is we've figured out which of the two wizards is our killer."  Joe set down a folder.  David opened it.  It showed the image and life history of one Simon Atherton, age 29.  He lived, so the file claimed, in Hartford, Connecticut.  David pulled out an Earth map and looked at it.

"Yeah, makes sense.  He goes right through Springfield on his way home.  So, is someone on their way to grab this fucker?"

"That's the bad news.  Someone already went.  The FBI sent some local police to check him out."

"That could be dangerous.  We don't know how good a wizard this guy is."

"They weren't going to arrest him.  They had some phony story about a missing child they were going to use.  But he wasn't there."

"Probably at work."

"They checked.  He hasn't been to work all week."

"Uh-oh."

"Yeah.  Neighbors said they haven't seen him since Sunday."

"He's on the run."

"Yeah.  The best we can figure, his brother has a friend in the guards, who told him about the visitation records.  Then he must have told his brother."

"Fuck.  All this work, and we basically shot ourselves in the foot."

"Not quite.  It's unlikely he'll be doing any further killing while he's hiding from us."

"We need to keep staking out those locations every weekend until we catch him."

"Agreed."

"Dammit.  This is a hell of a fucking time to not be able to do my job."

"You are doing your job," Joe said.  "And very nice penmanship, too," he said, needling David.

David threw an InkyQuill at Joe, but Joe ducked and it missed.

"Temper, temper," Joe said.  "Get you into trouble every time."

"I don't know... I strangle you, everyone else here gets a promotion."

"But what would Zyla say?" Joe replied.

David grunted, then went back to his paperwork.

"Hey," Olissa said, greeting David at the door with a kiss.  "How was your day?" she asked once they broke lip lock.

"Boring.  Frustrating."

Olissa frowned.  "I hate to make a bad day worse, but we need to talk about something."

"Okay," David said.  He dropped his coat on a chair in the main room, and then turned to face her.  "What's up?"

Olissa paced a couple times before turning to face him.  "David, there's a problem with... us."

David frowned.  "I know that something's been bugging you all week.  I honestly don't know what I did, but I'm sorry..."

Olissa looked up in shock.  "Oh, no, it's nothing you did.  No, I'm not one of those women.  If you do something I don't like, you're going to know it."

David grinned.  "I'd thought so, up until this week."

Olissa smiled briefly, but then the frown returned.  "No, this problem is different, it's..."

She turned to him, finally gathering her resolve.  "David, I don't think we can have a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship."

David felt at once both numb, and as if he'd just been stabbed.

"Don't do this to me, Olissa.  Not you, too.  First Amanda, then Lise, Anne, JoAnne, Lydia... is it really that awful, dating a demighost, that you have to dump me?" he asked her plaintively.  "After five years we try, only to give up after a week?"

Olissa quickly came to him.  "No, David, you don't understand.  I'm not saying we shouldn't be together.  That's not it at all."

She turned from him and walked a couple steps away.  "Do you remember our trip to Mirelia, how I had those visions that bothered me?"

"Of course.  You wouldn't tell me what they were about."

"They were about you and me," she said.  "About the... the position I'm supposed to take in your life."

"So your visions told you not to date me?"

"It's not that simple," she said.  "My visions told me that, while I am supposed to be 'your girl', I'm not supposed to be your girlfriend."

"Those two are the same thing, aren't they?"

"No, they're not, but I'm worried that you won't accept what it is that my visions told me was my true place in your life."

"Well, there's only one way to find that out.  What is it you think our relationship is supposed to be?"

"I'm supposed to be your... odalisque."

"My what?"

Olissa actually giggled and smiled embarrassedly.  "Yeah, I actually had to look that word up.  How about thrall?"

David shook his head, holding his hands up in confusion.

Olissa sighed.  "I was trying to avoid the other word."

"What other word?" David asked, growing slightly irritated.

"Slave," Olissa said quietly.

"Whoa, wait a minute.  You're already my slave."

"I'm your sex slave, David.  That's not the entire role I'm supposed to play in your life.  According to my visions, I am supposed to be entirely, one hundred percent devoted to you, and to belong to you.  Do you remember, after Lise left, I told you that I thought you weren't destined for traditional relationships?"

"Yes," David said, sinking down onto the sofa.  His head was beginning to spin slightly and he felt it best if he wasn't standing up just then.

"I had hints of what I was supposed to be back then.  I didn't understand it fully until the visions, and talking with that priestess in the temple."

"So... I mean, what difference does it make what you call yourself?  Girlfriend, slave... I mean, wouldn't that just make you a girlfriend who was, let's say, highly compliant?"

Olissa smiled.  "No.  Because I'm not supposed to be your girlfriend.  You're supposed to have a girlfriend, David, but it's not supposed to be me.  I'm supposed to be the second woman in your life, not the first."

"That's crazy," David replied.  "First, that you'd accept being a... an 'also ran', and second, that you think someone else is going to accept me having a playmate living with us."

"Someone will.  My vision said so."

"Who is it, then?"

Olissa sat down on the sofa beside him.  "I didn't recognize her.  I wouldn't tell you, even if I had.  That isn't information you should have."

"If you're supposed to be my slave, don't you have to do what I tell you to?"

"Within reason.  I won't do things that will hurt you.  You can punish me for not doing them, but I still won't do them."

"Punish... ow, my head's beginning to hurt.  You actually expect me to punish you?"

"If I make mistakes or displease you, yes."

"Why would you want to take on this role?"

"To help you."

"Help me what?  Be a total pervert?"

Olissa smiled.  "You need no help in that direction.  I can't explain it to you any better than this: my visions indicated that my presence at your side in this manner will help you to help Callamandia.  I did see some other things, but again, I won't tell you about them."

"But... you're willing to give up your own life to serve mine?  Why?"

"Because I love you," she said.  "I love you more than anything I can imagine.  Because I know that you're going to be very important as time goes on, and in this way, I can be just a little important, too.  On my own, I was never going to amount to a whole lot.  I have no real ambitions to do anything, so the likelihood is that I would end up a store clerk or a waitress someplace.  Enjoyable, maybe, but hardly important.

"But helping you is important."

"Why?"

"David, for good or bad, you will be around for the rest of the lifetime of Callamandia.  You can be one of its greatest assets, or one of its worst enemies.  I know you're a good person, but I also know you have a darker side.  I believe that which way you end up going long-term really depends on the people around you.  I'd like to think that I could be a positive force in your life, one of the people who keeps you away from doing evil things."

"And you can't do that as my girlfriend?"

Olissa sighed.  "I have only my visions to go on, David.  What I can tell you is that if it was just me, it wouldn't be as good for you as if there was at least one other.  Since I can't assume some other woman would be willing to be your thrall, and since I am okay with the notion, this is what makes the most sense."

David suddenly got up from the couch.  "I'm having a really hard time with this.  This is a bit too much for me to take in all at once.  Let me make sure that I've understood everything you're telling me.

"First, you do love me and want to be with me."

"Yes," Olissa confirmed strongly.

"But you think that I... need to have more than one woman in my life."

"Yes."

"And you feel that this other woman, whoever she is, should have... uh... 'primacy of place' in the relationships."

"Yes," she confirmed, after working out in her head exactly what he was saying.

"Furthermore, you don't want to be a mistress, you want this to be open for everyone to see."

"Absolutely.  I will not live a lie."

"And finally, instead of mistress or concubine, you want to be... a slave."

"Yes," she said, her voice less sure because she knew he didn't like the term.

"And when you say slave, you mean full-on slave, as in I own you, can do to you whatever the hell I please, you have no rights except what I give you, and you exist to do my bidding."

"Yes," she said more confidently.

"And that would include punishing you, even perhaps physically, for doing things I don't like."

"Yes, of course," she replied.

"That's nuts," David replied.

"Maybe, but I've always been crazy about you," Olissa said with a grin.

David tried to smile at the joke, but was simply too befuddled.

"I can't process this," David said.  "I'm going to need some time.  I'm going to... well, go away for a couple days, to try to think this through.  I would like for you to stay here in the house until I get back.  As soon as I can wrap my brain around this and come to a decision, I'll let you know, okay?"

"Okay," she said, a worried frown crossing her visage.  "Where will you go?"

"Maybe back up to the school.  I can stay in my dorm room."

"But the dorms are closed."

"And I'm the Chief of Security.  I can do as I damned well please as far as that goes."

Olissa smiled at him.  She came and gave him a soft kiss.  He returned the gesture, but it was strained, and she could tell.

"I will wait here, and I promise not to contact you unless there's a problem.  But please try not to take too long, okay?"

"Do what I can," he told her.  "Let me get Jailla and I'll head out."

"David?" she said as he was walking away.

"Yeah?" he asked, turning to face her.

"I love you."

David came back to her and put his arms around her loosely.  "I love you, too.  What will happen if I decide I can't deal with having a slave?"

"We'll go back to the way it was before Christmas.  Well.. as close as we can, anyway.  Like I said, I won't let myself hurt you, David, and me being your girlfriend is... harmful.  Sort of."

Despite himself, David chuckled.  "So you wouldn't leave me."

"No.  I won't leave you unless you make me."

David kissed her strongly, then finally let her go.  She watched him walk out of the room, and held herself together while he got Jailla and some things, and then headed out.  Only when she was sure he was completely gone did she sit down on the sofa and cry.

"So, what do you think?" David finally asked.  He'd explained the situation to Jailla the night before, but Jailla, knowing David, understood that it wasn't yet time to express any opinions.

Jailla looked at him.  "I'm not quite certain what I think.  The truth is that she has been in this role in your life for years."

"Not to this level.  She's talking about me punishing her, and basically treating her like property.  I've never done that to her before."

"No, you haven't.  And while I think punishing her may be something she will expect you to do, I see no reason you need to treat her exactly like property.  You could simply treat her as a subordinate.  You don't treat Tanya or Seth like property, nor any of the members of the DIRT team, yet they are obliged to do what you tell them to.

"Your only alternative is to go back to living the lie you've both been living for five years, pretending you don't want to be with each other."

"I never really pretended that," David said.  "I looked for others because I couldn't be with her."

"And yet regularly had relations with her."

"Whenever I could, really," David admitted.

"So, I repeat, you've been living in this relationship for a long time.  This merely makes it official."

"Maybe," David allowed.  "I just wish... dammit, yes, that's who I need to talk to."

David pulled out his mirror and dialed.  Olissa was soon looking at him hopefully.

"David?  What do you need?"

"I need you to send me Bispy.  I need to talk to him."

"Oh.  Um... okay... I'll have to find out if he can fly that far.  If not, I'll send him on a coach."

David nodded his thanks, and signed off with her.

"Why do you want to speak with Bisperion?" Jailla asked.

"Because he's said some things over the years that I want explained.  I think they relate to this situation, and I need to know what he knows before making up my mind."

Jailla chirped in understanding.

"What is it you seek from me?" Bispy asked.  He and David were walking across the terrace, which was, of course, deserted this time of year.  The snow wasn't too deep, but the open space was what David needed.  He felt too enclosed with his thoughts already.

"Look, I realize that you say what it occurs to you to say when you think people are asking you questions..."

"What else do you do?" Bispy asked calmly.

David trudged on, "... but I need some clear, definite and straight answers to some questions.  I'm sure you're aware of the situation, and in order to resolve it in the best manner for Olissa and myself, I need your input.  I need to know what you know."

"Ask your questions.  I will answer them, or not, as I see fit."

"At last year's gathering before Christmas, when we talked in the kitchen.  Did you talk about our discussion with Olissa?"

"No.  I didn't see the need.  You said nothing she wasn't already aware of."

"How long have you known about this... desire... of hers?"

"Long enough.  Longer than her, in fact."

"You knew she wanted to be my slave before she did?"

"I knew that she needed someone to serve.  As she told you yesterday, she has no ambition other than to be helpful to someone.  Everything she has ever done has been for someone else's benefit.  Part of why her previous relationships have hurt her so badly is that she felt that she hadn't been helpful enough to make them want to keep her."

"So is she doing this just to keep me from sending her away?"

"No.  She is doing this because, deep down in her heart, she desires to do good for the world, but knows that she hasn't the skills or the mindset to do so directly.  She knows that her only hope of making a difference is to help someone else.  Someone who can make a difference directly."

"Hmph."  David walked a short way on, and then he said, "The day we first met, you said that we were 'of a kind'.  What did you mean by that?  It has to have had something to do with Olissa..."

"It did, yes.  Where Olissa is concerned, your highest, most sacred priority is her safety and well-being.  You have pledged yourself to her protection.  As I have done.  We are her protectors.  Unfortunately, we are most often protecting her from herself, but that is still our sworn duty.  Whether or not you act on her request, you know that you will still have that duty."

David was quiet for a long moment, then finally nodded.  "I almost hate to ask this question, but what do you think I should do?"

"I'm younger than you by several years.  Why would you seek my advice?"

"You're a dragon," David replied.

Bisperion snorted.  "A baby dragon's advice is of little use to anyone.  I do not wish to see my wizard hurt.  Your rejection of her will hurt her deeply.  As such, my suggestion is that you take her as your odalisque as she requests.  That opinion is highly biased, of course."

"You've never been this... well, this direct with me before."

"You've never needed me to before."

"Fair enough," David said with a grin.  After a long pause, David said, "Thank you for coming up here and talking with me.  I do have one other question, however.  It's more a procedural question than anything."

"And that would be?"

"Well, you are obliged to your wizard.  If your wizard is then obliged to me, what is the relationship between you and I?"

"I am not to be ordered about," Bisperion said coldly.

"Nor would I dare try.  I am wondering, for instance, if I ordered Olissa to have you do something, would you do it when she asked you to?"

"That would entirely depend on what it was she was asking, as it has always been.  I do not do everything Olissa asks of me.  That is unlikely to change no matter her life circumstance."

David nodded.  "Okay, I was just wanting to be clear on things."

"Of course.  You are very undraconic in that fashion."

David chuckled.  "Yes, well, you know, I am merely a human."

"And a half dead one at that," Bisperion added with a grin in his voice.

"Gee, thanks for the reminder," David said good-naturedly.  Growing serious, he said, "Thank you for your help.  I needed those few things answered to help me make this decision."

"I know.  That is why I chose to answer you."

"Thanks for that.  Do you need a ride home, or can you manage?"

"As I told Olissa, I am twenty years old now.  I can fly just fine."

"Okay, no need to get offended.  I don't see you flying much, so I didn't know how good you were at it."

"People are uncomfortable around flying dragons," Bispy replied.

"People are uncomfortable around breathing dragons," David said.  "And demighosts, and vampires, and werewolves, and damn near everything else in this place.  I would have thought they would have learned by now."

"People are almost as slow to change as dragons are.  The worrisome part of that is that humans do not have quite as long as dragons do to make the transition."

"Hmph.  Anyway, I'll let you get back home."

"Can I give Olissa some indication of your progress?"

"I still haven't made up my mind yet, sorry."

Bispy nodded at him, then leapt into the sky, his wings beating strongly as he rose.  It wasn't long before David couldn't see him anymore, and so he turned and walked back the way he had come, trying to think through the situation.

 It took David a few more days before he returned to his Bolmont home.  He knew that this worried Olissa, but it couldn't be helped.  He had to be sure of things.  She was asking him for a major change in the way he thought about her, and in the way their relationship was structured, and he had to know that it was the right thing to do.

When he returned to the house, he was invisible.  He didn't want Olissa to see him until things were ready.  She was still sleeping in his bed, which he had no problem with, as he'd not told her not to, and both her and Flo had run of his homes.

It was mid-morning when Olissa rose.  He watched her go though her routine, and then she headed downstairs, presumably to make herself some breakfast.  He didn't follow her.

David conjured several objects out of the trunk of his glidecar into the bedroom.  It had been a risk, coming back in the glidecar.  If Olissa went outside, she would see it and wonder where he was, but he didn't expect her to go outside before he was finished with what he was doing.

With all the objects in the room, he started to assemble them into the configuration he wanted.  It didn't take too long, and then he was finished.  He took a case that was about the size of a briefcase into the bathroom and set it on the vanity.

With all of that done, he took the lift downstairs.

As expected, he found Olissa in the kitchen eating her breakfast.

"David!" she cried, happy to see him.  She ran to him and hugged him, kissing him strongly.  Finally, she let him go.  "Did you make a decision?"

"Kind of.  Go ahead and finish your breakfast, and we'll talk about it afterward."

Olissa nodded and returned to her food.  It was not a big meal, and so she was finished quickly.  Without saying anything, David motioned her to follow him.  He took her up to the third floor, and into the master bathroom.

"You're still certain you want to do this?" David asked.

Olissa nodded.

"Take a shower, but don't get dressed afterward.  Make sure your shower is a thorough one."

David leaned against the vanity as she showered.  The two didn't speak.  Both of them felt awkward at the moment, and chit-chat would have been impossible to maintain.  Olissa took extra time, as he had told her to be extensive in her cleaning.  Finally, however, she was finished.

"Should I dry off?" she asked him.

"Yes."  He handed her a towel, and she started to rub herself down with it.

"How do you deal with your hair?" he asked.

"I just brush it and let it air dry," she told him.  He nodded.  No more talking was done while she finished drying herself off.  She hung the towel on the rack, and then turned to face David.

"Now what?" she asked curiously.

David turned to the case he'd set on the vanity and opened it.  He pulled out a pair of blue metal rings.

Handing them to Olissa, he said, "Put these on your arms above your elbows."  She did, and was surprised to find that, once she slipped them on, they wouldn't move.  They didn't touch her skin, instead keeping an even distance all the way around.  David handed her another pair.  "Put them on your wrists."  She did so, seeing the same effect; they hovered around her wrists, completely unmoving.  They did nothing to hamper her ability to move around or use her hands.

There were other items in the case.  David handed her more rings that went above her knees, and around her ankles.  Next, he pulled out a strap.  She realized it was a belt as he stepped behind her and wrapped it around her waist.  Once he brought the ends together, it snugged itself against her, fitting tightly, but not pinching.  Finally, he took the last item out of the case.  This was clearly a collar, and David fastened it around her neck.  Though it had been hinged, it acted just like the other rings.  It floated around her neck, not touching her at all, but she couldn't shift its position in the slightest.

"Come with me," David said.  He opened the door to the bedroom, and she followed him in.  In front of the closet doors was a set of four golden posts.  They were each almost as tall as the room, and flared at their base to keep them stable.  Along their length were red jewels, aimed toward the center of the invisible square that the posts sat at the corners of.

"Stand in the middle," David said, motioning her into the area between the posts.  She stepped in, but didn't feel anything happen.  She noted there was plenty of room between herself and the posts.  She wasn't sure she could reach any of them if she stretched out her arms.

David took a deep breath.  "You have asked to be my slave, but I'm not really sure you understand how unpleasant that could be.  You're asking me to, in essence, not consider your feelings in my day to day activities, or in my life choices.  You're asking me to not worry about whether or not I'm paying enough attention to you.  You're giving me not just the authority, but the right to make you do anything I damned well please, whether you like what it is or not.  You hope I won't abuse you, but if you really mean that you are actually my slave, you can't, and won't, stop me from doing so.  In short, you are asking to take on a whole lot of unpleasantness, and potentially a lot of pain and suffering.  As you have pointed out, I have a dark side.  I can stand here and tell you, honestly, that I cannot conceive of what it would take for me to voluntarily injure you... but we both know that I can, and have, killed people.  There is no telling what I will be twenty or thirty years from now.  You have, barring illness or injury, another hundred years or more to your life.  You are committing to a century of potential misery.

"I'm not sure you're up for that.  I'm not sure anyone is up for that."

"Then... what are we doing here?" Olissa asked unhappily.

"I'm going to give you a chance to prove me wrong.  This," he said, motioning to the posts she was standing between, "is a test.  If you pass the test, I will accept you as a slave.  If you fail the test, we will pretend these conversations never happened."

"Okay.  What do I have to do?"

"Let me explain the test, first," David said.  "This test will take days.  During that time, you will do everything and anything I tell you to do.  You will be subjected to highly unpleasant things, both mentally and physically.  You will face punishment, torment, and even some things that could be called abuse.  I intend to cram into the next few days as much misery for you as I can manage.  I freely admit to you now that I'm trying to get you to change your mind.  Only if you can prove to me that you can handle what is to come will I risk putting you in that position."

"Will I know how close I am to the end of the test?"

"No.  You wouldn't know how close you are to the end of your slavery, either.  You may end the test at any time, merely by telling me to stop.  That would, however, be failing the test."

"Is there any other way for me to fail the test?"

"No."

"Is there anything else I need to know?" she asked.

"You will feel pain.  I will not intentionally injure you.  If I do so accidentally and cannot repair the damage myself, the test will be stopped so I can take you to a healer.  That will not count as a failure on your part, and you will have the choice of whether or not to resume the test when you are well."

"Okay," Olissa said.  She took a deep breath, and then let it out.  "I'm ready to get started."

"You're sure?  Once we start, the only way for you to stop the test is to admit defeat."

"I'm sure."

"One last thing, before I begin."  Olissa looked up to face him.  "Though it may not seem like it over the next few days, I love you dearly."

"I love you, too, David," Olissa said quietly.

"And that is the last time you are allowed to call me by my name until the test is over.  From this point forward, my name is Master.  You will use no other names to refer to me.  Do you understand?"

"Yes, Master," Olissa replied immediately.

David pulled out his wand and tapped one of the posts.  Olissa was suddenly surrounded by a dim energy field.  It was hard to make out, but she could see it.  Her attention was distracted, however, as David made a sweeping upward motion with his hands.  Olissa was suddenly floating a foot off the floor.

David made another motion, and Olissa's limbs were forced to move.  She was quickly maneuvered into a somewhat embarrassing position.  Her legs were bent so that her calves were parallel to the floor.  Her knees were spread as wide as she could go.  Her hands were behind her head, and her chest was pushed forward.  It was as if she were kneeling on the floor, except that the floor was several feet below her.

"This is your position," David told her.  "You will spend most of your test period in this position.  The magical field that is holding you in place will prevent you from cramping, but it will not keep you from growing stiff or sore.  The discomfort is a sign of things to come.  The bondage is a symbol of the slavery you're asking to endure.  You want to be bound to me... first you must be bound by me.  Do you have any questions?"

"No, Master," Olissa replied.

"Good.  I'm going to leave you like this for a little while.  Rest assured, I'll be back to check on you soon."

David left the room, and Olissa looked around.  There was nothing for her to do, nothing she could do.  She couldn't move anything more than to wiggle her fingers and toes.  She was alone with her thoughts, and those began to ask questions like, What is he going to do to me? and Will I be able to endure his test?

Meanwhile, downstairs, David worked on a new potion.

 David had set a timer, so that he would not get so absorbed in his potion that he forgot about Olissa.  He returned to the bedroom to find her, as expected, in the exact same position he'd left her in.

"Comfortable?" he asked.

"No," she replied honestly.

David nodded.  "You are about to become less so."

David turned to a trunk he had set on the bed earlier.  He opened it and withdrew a rod.  He took the rod and inserted one end into a hole in one of the poles that was nearest the bed.  He then twisted the rod, and it extended until it reached the other pole near the bed.  It inserted itself into a hole there.  It now reached across at just below chest height.

David made a motion with his wand, and Olissa was soon standing on the floor.  She was a bit surprised she was able to stand up so readily.

"Lean forward from where you're standing and grab the bar... no, you'd better take a step forward first."

Olissa did as ordered, and she was now bent over, her arms outstretched, holding onto the rod.

"Spread your legs slightly, but not so much as to throw off your balance."

Olissa did so, wondering if he was going to have sex with her now.  She would love that.

Unfortunately for her, that was not what David had in mind.  He leaned against the bedpost and looked at her for a moment.  Finally, he spoke.

"By your own admission, for the last five years, you've been lying to me.  Correct?"

"Yes, Master," Olissa said quietly.

"I have to admit that, while I understand why you felt the need to do so, it rather irks me that you did that.  As my servant, you are never, ever to lie to me again.  Do you understand?"

"Yes, Master."

"What is about to happen is a punishment for the lies you have told me previously.  It is also a warning of what will happen in the future, should you ever lie to me, or omit important information."

David turned to the trunk and withdrew a paddle.  It was wooden, but lined with material to soften its edges.

"During each day of your test, you will be punished for your lies.  The reason for this repetition, and my focus on it, is that I must be able to trust you completely.  I need to feel as though you are an extension of my will.  As such, I cannot have doubts about what you tell me."

David moved into the square, standing behind her.  She turned to look at him.

"Eyes front!" he snapped.

Olissa immediately turned her head back forward and down slightly.  "Sorry, Master."

"It's okay, I didn't tell you beforehand.  Are you ready to take your punishment?"

"Yes, Master."

David rolled the paddle in his hand.  He wasn't comfortable with what he was doing.  He knew that, by the time he was done with this, Olissa was going to be in considerable pain.  He had to reassure himself that this was necessary.  If she could tolerate what he had planned, then he could be fairly assured that she would be able to cope with whatever his life would throw at her.  Better to find out now if she couldn't, while he was in a position to help her recover from it.

Firming up his grip on the paddle, he held it a short distance away from her butt cheek, and swung it.  It made a loud smack as it contacted her cheek, and her body jerked at the pain.

That's one, he said to himself.

He held the paddle at the same distance from her behind, and swung to hit the other cheek.  Her body jerked again.

That's two.

As David continued his paddling, his arm moved further away from her ass, until he was getting the power he wanted.  He dared not use more, for fear of hurting her, but he wanted her bottom to be fiery when he was finished.

By the time he'd reached the tenth stroke, Olissa was crying openly.  He had to shut that out of his mind.  By the fifteenth stroke, she was yelping with each hit of the paddle.  Her cries grew louder as David continued.

Finally, David reached thirty.  He held his hand six inches from her behind, and he could feel the heat coming off it.

David walked over to the trunk and put the paddle back inside of it.

"Stand up straight," he told Olissa.  She did so, but was a bit wobbly on her legs.  She tried to stand at attention, but David could see the wincing on her face.

"You don't need to close your legs if that's uncomfortable," David told her.  "Your physical needs are still important."

"Thank you, Master," she said, and let her legs slide a short way apart.

David twisted the horizontal bar, removing it and putting it back in the trunk.  He then approached Olissa.  He ran his hand along her tear-stained cheek, and then he leaned in and kissed her.

"Learn this lesson well," he told her quietly after he broke the kiss.  "This is one thing you can do to make me really mad at you."

"Yes, Master."

David stepped back and then he made a motion with his hand.  Olissa's body suddenly moved back into her position.  With David as close as he still was, her nipples were nearly brushing his chest.

David took one hand and squeezed her tit, rubbing his thumb over her nipple.

"Don't you worry, there will be some playtime during the next few days.  Of course, I'm not sure if you'll enjoy it as much as I will.  For now, I'll give you some time to recover from your punishment.  I'll be back in a little while."

After leaning down and kissing her nipple, David left the room again.  His potion wasn't finished yet, after all.

When David returned to the room, he saw that Olissa looked decidedly uncomfortable.

"Is there a problem?" he asked seriously.

"I really need to use the bathroom, Master," Olissa told him.

"Ah," David said, motioning with a finger for her to wait a second.  He wiggled his finger, and she moved lower in the field that was holding her.  David then went into the sitting room.  He came back with a bucket.

Placing it beneath her, making sure it lined up with her groin, he stepped back.  "For the duration of this test, that will be your bathroom."

Olissa looked mortified.  "You can't be serious.  Come on, David, at least-"

"What did you call me?" David demanded, interrupting her.

Olissa blanched.  "I'm sorry!  Master!  Please, at least allow me to use the bathroom, Master."

"No.  You haven't earned the right to use the bathroom yet.  And for your little... slip... I am adding an extra day to your test.  I'd advise not making that particular mistake too many times.  We do have to be back to school in a couple weeks.

"The point of this is to remind you that you have nothing that you can hide from me.  As my servant, it is my right to witness and experience every part of your life, your body, your experiences.  As my property, even your waste belongs to me, and you will put it where I tell you to put it."

"Yes, Master," Olissa said, bowing her head in understanding.

David leaned against the bedpost, watching her.  For over a minute, nothing happened.  "I thought you said you had to go to the bathroom."

"I'm embarrassed, Master.  It is making it difficult to relax enough to go."

"Ah.  Well, that's not my problem.  You have another five minutes to use the bucket.  After that, I will remove it, and you will have to wait until I decide to put it back.  If you make a mess on my floor, there will be hell to pay."

"Yes, Master," Olissa acknowledged.  Finally, after another long moment, Olissa was able to urinate.  The sound of it hitting the bottom of the bucket was loud in the room, and David could tell her cheeks were burning in humiliation.

Once she'd finished peeing, David asked, "Are you done?"

"Um... no, Master, I have to..."

"Say it," David demanded.

"I have to shit as well," she finished.

"Good girl," David replied.  Strangely, his praise allowed her to relax enough that she was able to defecate readily.  The plop of her shit hitting the piss in the bottom of the bucket, however, made both of them a little queasy.

"I'm finished, Master," she said.

David nodded, and then went into the bathroom.  He came back with a roll of toilet paper. 

As he was taking some off the roll, Olissa asked, "Master, I can't move my hands.  How will I wipe?"

"You won't," David replied.

Olissa was truly mortified at exactly what that meant.  "Master, you can't... I mean, that's not a task you should have to do..."

"And normally I won't, obviously.  There's a point to be made here.  Even your dirtiest, nastiest, ugliest secrets must be open to me.  Also, you need to understand that, as my servant, your welfare will depend entirely upon me and my whims.  If I chose not to clean you now, you would sit there with a dirty ass until I relented."

"Yes, Master."

"Now, how sore is your ass from earlier?"

"It still hurts quite a bit, Master."

David nodded.  "I will attempt to be as gentle as I can, but obviously, I will have to touch your butt."

David wiped Olissa clean, dropping the toilet paper in the bucket.  Finally he was finished wiping her, and he took the bucket into the bathroom.  He used the shower to add some water to the bucket, then dumped the whole mess into the toilet.  He certainly didn't want it sitting around stinking up the house.

With that done, David returned to the bedroom.

"For my generosity in allowing you to take care of your bodily needs, I think it is high time you took care of one of mine," David informed her.  He twirled his finger, and Olissa suddenly spun in the air until she was staring up at the ceiling.  He made another gesture and her arms moved so they were resting along her sides.  Her head tilted backward as far as it would go, forced by the collar around her neck.

"Open your mouth," David told her.

Olissa complied immediately.  She was staring at the closet door, and the next time she saw David, all she could see of him were bare legs.  She felt the head of his cock slide into her open mouth.

"Suck me," he ordered.

Olissa sealed her mouth around David's cock and she applied light suction.  David provided the movement, which was good, because she couldn't move in the slightest, except her tongue, which she slipped back and forth across his shaft as he fucked her mouth with it.

David rocked his hips back and forth, thrusting deep into Olissa's mouth.  He reached forward and took both of her nipples in his fingers, pinching them strongly.  He felt Olissa scream around his cock in surprise and, no doubt, a bit of pain.

David knew he wasn't going to last long.  He sped up his thrusts, jamming his cock into the back of her mouth, causing her to gag.  In another moment, his cum burst from his cock, filling her mouth.  Olissa struggled to swallow; she didn't want any of his essence to leak out her mouth.

David pulled out as soon as he was coherent enough to do so.  He stepped back and rested against the closet door.  He twirled his hand in a specific gesture which returned Olissa to her position.  He could still see a bit of redness on her ass cheeks, despite it having been a couple hours and her having darker skin.

Unable to help himself, David leaned forward and very lightly ran his hand across her ass.  She gasped in surprise and a bit of discomfort.

David walked back around to face Olissa.  "Did you enjoy that?" he asked.

"Yes, Master," she replied honestly and with enthusiasm.  "Are you going to fuck me now?" she asked.

"No, I'm good," David said nonchalantly.  He then stared her in the eye.  "I will fuck you when I feel the need to fuck you, and not before.  Do you understand?"

"Yes, Master," she replied firmly.

"Good.  I'll let you rest for now.  I need to go finish up what I was doing."

As David put his pants back on and left the room, Olissa slid her tongue around her mouth.  She could still taste his jism, and she reveled in it.  She'd hoped he was going to fuck her, but then again, as sore as her ass was, it might not have been the best of ideas.  The ache between her legs, however, was not caused by her position.

It wasn't very long before David came back to the room.  He had a tray with him.  On it was a bowl of soup and a sandwich.

"It's lunch time," he told her.  "And yes, I will be feeding you.  Again, you are dependent upon me.  I could let you starve for the duration of this test.  As your owner, that would be my right.  Should you not perform well during this test, I will withhold food from you as a punishment.  Do you understand?"

"Yes, Master.  Master... why isn't there any food there for you?"

"Because I've already eaten.  My needs must always come before yours, if you are to be my slave.  Therefore, I made sure I was fed before I even considered making you lunch."

Olissa nodded in understanding.

David started with the sandwich, holding it so that she could bite it.  All she could do was open her mouth and let him position it so she could take a bite; she still couldn't move her head.

With the sandwich finished, David brought the soup over.  He had not put it in a bowl, but rather a wide-mouthed mug, to make it less likely to spill.

"I've not made this terribly hot, just in case we spill some," he told her.  "I don't want to burn you."

"Thank you, Master," Olissa replied.

The feeding took a few minutes, but soon the soup was gone.

"Are you full?" he asked.

"I would honestly like a little more food, Master."

"Well, you're not going to get it," David replied.  "Although I am going to stuff a bit of sausage into you."

Olissa smiled as David got undressed.  His dick was already hard.  Approaching her, he could see the wetness seeping down her leg.  There was actually a stain of it on the floor.

"This turns you on?" David asked.

"You turn me on, Master," she told him.  "Thinking about you having your way with me turns me on a lot."

"Hmm," David replied, then took hold of her.  He moved her with his hands, the rings not resisting him at all.  He didn't change her posture except to spread her legs wider.  He did lower her slightly and tilt her backward, however.  He then moved in and pressed the head of his cock to her opening.

"Oh, god, Master," Olissa said as he slid into her.  "That feels so wonderful."

David grabbed her hips and immediately started to thrust.  He pounded her pussy for long minutes, until finally, with a loud grunt, he blasted his load deep into her.  His hips jerked as he came, thrusting into her strongly for a while, until he finally came down from his high.

Slowly, he pulled out of Olissa and stepped back.  He made the appropriate gesture, and she was soon back in her position, floating upright.

David cleaned himself off in the bathroom, then came back to the bedroom to dress.

"Since I know you're wondering about it, though you're smart enough not to ask, you will have an orgasm when I think you've earned one.  Until then, I will use you to relieve myself as necessary.

"I'll be back later."

As David left, Olissa groaned in frustration.  While she hadn't been right on the edge of orgasm, she knew it hadn't been too far away.  She was hornier now than she could ever remember being.

Oh, god, I hope I earn an orgasm soon...

Olissa did not, in fact, have an orgasm that day, though David had fucked her at least five more times.  She'd had to use the bathroom bucket a few times, as well, which was humiliating, but completely necessary in her current state.

By the time David went to bed, Olissa was thoroughly exhausted.  She had been asleep the last time David had come in, but he'd woken her up to make her suck him off again.  He had then gone to bed himself.  She had struggled back to sleep, as she knew he would be awake again in just four hours.

David did arise four hours later, but he had no intention of waking Olissa.  He knew that she needed her rest to endure this test properly.  He didn't want her surrendering because she was simply too exhausted to cope.  If she was going to give up, he wanted it to be because she understood that she wasn't up to handling the hell she was asking for.

While he waited for it to be late enough to rouse her, he went downstairs and worked on his potion some more.  The potion had nothing to do with the test, but since he had to occupy his non-test time with something, he had decided to make headway on his Level 1 potions mastery application.  He needed only two more potions, so if the one he was making now worked out, he'd only have one left to go.

Finally, when he felt it was late enough, he went to the kitchen and made some breakfast.  He didn't bother with his own, as he just wasn't in the mood.  Olissa, however, would need her strength.  Though he had threatened to withhold food from her, it was the very last thing he would do at this point.

David set the food tray on the night table, and then went into the bathroom to retrieve the infamous bucket.  He put it in position before touching Olissa.

David considered whether to wake her gently or cruelly.  Part of the test experience was whipsawing Olissa back and forth between positive and negative experiences.  Breakfast would be a mostly positive experience, so he decided her wake-up needed to be harsh.

Reaching out, David took Olissa's nipple in his fingers.  He pulled on it, stretching it away from her breast, and then pinched and twisted at the same time.

Olissa's eyes shot open and she cried out in pain.

"Good morning," David said.

"Good morning... Master," Olissa said.  David had heard the very beginnings of his name, but she had been able to catch herself before saying it.  He smiled at her.

"Your bucket is already in place.  Go ahead and take care of things," he told her.  He went over and pulled open the blinds covering the french doors as she took care of business.  He'd kept the blinds closed the day before, but in order for today's tasks to take place, he needed the extra light.

Breakfast went smoothly, and David set the dishes aside.  He turned back to the trunk, which now sat on the floor, and he retrieved the crossbar again.  He put it in place, and then he lowered Olissa to a standing position.

"Assume the position from yesterday," David told her.

Olissa's legs were a little shaky, but she managed to take the required pose, her arms stretched out in front of her, her head up and facing forward, her legs slightly apart.

David retrieved the paddle from the trunk.

"Nervous?" he asked.

"No, Master," she replied.  "Just unhappy."

"Oh?  Upset that your master is punishing you?"

"No, Master.  Unhappy that I made it necessary.  And... to be honest, Master, I'm not exactly looking forward to the experience."

David smiled at that.

"You are to receive the same punishment as yesterday, but there is an additional burden for you.  You are to endure this punishment in silence.  There will be times in your life as my servant where you may be forced by me to do some very unpleasant things, and I won't want to hear your complaints.  For every time you cry out during this punishment, I will add on two extra swats of the paddle, one for each cheek.  Do you understand?"

"Yes, Master," Olissa said, her voice shaking.

"I will give you a moment to compose yourself and prepare for the first strike."

"Thank you, Master," she replied.

After a count of twenty, David said, "And now we begin."

David didn't start off with the short strokes he'd used the day before.  He had learned exactly where his "sweet spot" was, to get the exact amount of force he intended to use.

With the first strike, Olissa jolted, and he could see that she was biting her lip to prevent herself from crying out more in surprise than anything else.  He didn't object to that; he'd only told her she had to be silent, not how she had to pull that off.

David continued to deliver his strokes, alternating between ass cheeks.  On her twenty-first strike, Olissa slipped and let a squeak leave her throat.

"That's two additional strokes," David said calmly.  There was no anger in this for David, no real malice.  He was doing what he felt he had to do in order to prove a point.  He just wasn't sure whether he was proving a point to her, or to himself.  Only time would answer that.

On strokes twenty-six and twenty-eight, Olissa slipped again, and cried out even louder than the first time.  David calmly informed her of her added punishment.

Olissa made no more noises as David continued.  He had reduced the distance of his swats, because he knew that the shorter distance would now hurt the same, since her ass was already so sensitive.  As he delivered stroke number thirty-six, he saw Olissa struggling to hold herself together.

"And we're finished," he told her.

Olissa let out a huge breath, accompanied by a groan of discomfort.  David returned the paddle to its place in the trunk, and then moved around behind Olissa, so that she could not see him.

"You did well," David told her.  "I had expected us to make it all the way to fifty."

"Thank you, Master.  I'm sorry I cried out at all.  I tried to do as you told me to."

"I know."

David quietly slipped off his clothes and stepped up behind Olissa.  He ran his hands ever so gently across her ass, and she flinched, and then groaned at the discomfort.

Bending over, David ran his fingers gently across Olissa's pussy.  Though she was not as wet as she had been after lunch the previous day, there was some moisture there.  The presence of his gentle touch was quickly causing more, and she was soon fully lubricated and ready for anything he might want to do.

David stepped up close, lined his dick up with her opening, and pressed into her.  Olissa moaned deeply, until David's hips came to rest against her ass.  She then gasped and tried to jump.  She couldn't, of course, because of the bondage rings on her body.

David gripped her hips for leverage, and he began to slowly fuck her.  He knew that this would be a mix of pleasure and pain for Olissa, and he didn't want to push the pain too much.  His strokes remained smooth and steady, but gradually began to pick up speed.  Finally he was fucking her at full speed, working hard not to slap into her ass with each stroke.  His cum sprayed from his dick, filling her up with his spunk.  He pulled out of her and then stepped back.

After cleanup and redressing, David returned to face Olissa.

"How badly did that hurt?" he asked.

"It..." she said, then hesitated.

"What?" David demanded.

"I'm not sure which way to answer you, Master.  On the one hand, you told me to always tell you the truth.  On the other hand, you told me not to complain."

"If I ask you a question, the answer to that question, no matter how unhappy or negative, cannot be a complaint.  It is the truthful information that I am then seeking."

"It was very uncomfortable, Master.  It was like someone slapping a sunburn, over and over again."

"Thank you for your honesty.  Sometimes, you might not enjoy sex with me.  It is possible, if my darker nature takes hold, that you will never enjoy sex with me.  Yet you are committing yourself to that possibility."

"Yes, Master," Olissa agreed.

"Why?"

"Because, Master, I don't expect it to happen, and I'm willing to take the chance."

"Hmph.  Stand up.  You may stand as you need to in order to be as comfortable as you can be."

Olissa stood up, her legs apart slightly, as she had been the day before.  David proceeded to remove the crossbar, and then he gestured, moving her back into her position.  This was actually something of a relief to her; with her legs spread as they were, her ass cheeks didn't touch each other, and there was less chance of them rubbing and causing discomfort.

Discomfort was going to come from another quarter, however.  David pulled something out of the trunk, and turned back to Olissa.  He stepped up close to her, the item held in his hand, which was kept low, so she couldn't see it.

Leaning over slightly, David licked and sucked on Olissa's nipples, getting them good and hard.  Once that was done, he took the nipple clamp he'd been hiding in his hand and attached it to her right nipple.  He screwed it down so that it was tight on her nipple, causing her to gasp in pain.

David did the same thing to her other nipple, eliciting another gasp from her.  There was a chain between the clamps, but it was long enough that it was not pulling on the clamps.  Olissa was thankful for that.

"This is another exercise in discomfort and prolonged pain and suffering.  I will be back later to remove the clamps.  Don't be looking forward to that too much.  I'm told it hurts more removing them than it does putting up with them in place."

Olissa grimaced, but said nothing.  David leaned in and gave her a kiss, then he left the room, taking the breakfast dishes with him.

Olissa squirmed as much as she could, trying to find a way to be comfortable, but at this point, there was simply no comfort to be had.  Her ass was on fire from her paddling, her pussy was dripping cum and her juices down her legs, and her nipples were screaming from the clamps.  Tears appeared at the corners of her eyes, but she squeezed her eyes tightly shut, fighting them off.

I have to do this, she told herself.  I have to.

 David came in twice more that morning.  Each time he arrived, he would remove the nipple clamps.  The first time he did that, Olissa sighed at first, but then the pain hit, and she cried out in shock.  David licked her nipples that first time, making them feel very nice by the time he was done.

Each time he came in, he did something with her sexually.  She had blown him the first time, and he had fucked her again the second time.  Still, she had not had an orgasm.  Her sexual frustration level was rising to the point of agony.

David put the nipple clamps back on her each time before he would leave.  She knew her nipples would eventually go numb from the pressure, but it hurt like hell when he first put them on.  And now that she knew what it would feel like when they came off, she dreaded that even more.

David fed her lunch as he had the day before, and he played with her tits, but he didn't fuck her.  He told her there was going to be a special session in the afternoon, and he didn't want to wear her out too early.  She then got to spend the next hour and a half worrying over just exactly what "special session" meant.

The next time David came to the bedroom, he first removed her nipple clamps and then allowed her to use her bucket.  With that done and her privates cleaned up, he stepped up to face her.

"Are you ready for our special session?"

"Yes, Master."

"Was that a lie?" David asked.  He'd heard the quaver in her voice.

"No, Master.  I'm ready to do whatever you tell me to.  I'm just a bit nervous about what it's going to be."

"Fair enough," David said.  He walked over to the bedroom door and opened it.  He motioned with his hand, and Olissa blushed fiercely as six men came into the room.  They all leered at her with grins on their faces.

David closed the door, and then he went and grabbed the chair that was in the room.  He moved it behind Olissa, but didn't yet sit down in it.  He turned to the others in the room.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen.  You've all come to watch our young lady here have a little fun.  Please feel free to pleasure yourselves while you observe.  I have provided you with hand towels, so please don't make a mess all over my floor."

Two of the men, Olissa saw, already had their cocks out and were stroking them.  The others were rubbing their groins through their clothes.  David now moved behind Olissa and pulled her downward so that she was floating at the height he wanted her.

David reached around and began to gently play with Olissa's tits.  She closed her eyes, trying to forget that others were watching her and just enjoy the feel of David's hands.

"No," David said quietly.  "Open your eyes.  I want you to watch them watching you.  See how you turn them on?"

Olissa groaned, but she did as her master said.  She could see that all of them had their hands actually on their cocks now.  As David began to rub his fingers over her nipples, she shivered.  The mix of the wonderful feelings David was giving her, plus the embarrassment of someone else seeing her this way was keeping her off balance.  While she was aroused, she couldn't sink into the sensations.

David eventually slid his hand off her breast and moved it across her stomach and down to her crotch.  His finger slid deep into her pussy, and she moaned at the feel of that, but he was merely getting it lubricated.  He now began to work his finger very slowly over her clit.

Olissa had to struggle to keep her eyes open.  This felt good enough that she just wanted to submerge herself in the pleasure.  She also knew that, at this pace, it would take forever for her to come, if she was ever able to get there.

She heard a loud grunt, and she saw that one of the men before her was obviously coming into his hand towel.  She blushed at that; he'd actually brought himself off watching her get played with.  Two others looked like they were pretty close, as well.

As David continued to toy with her clit and her nipple, one of the guys finally said, "Dammit, man, I can't take this anymore!  Let me fuck her!"

David frowned and said, "I don't know about that..."

Olissa was terrified.  David had not rejected the idea out of hand, which meant that he might be talked into it.  She didn't want anyone other than him now.

"C'mon, man.  I'm clean.  I'll give you a thousand granas."

"That's an awful lot of money.  You sure you're planning on just sex?"

"Won't even come inside her!  Promise!  C'mon, I'm about ready to explode!"

David hesitated for a long moment, during which Olissa was quaking in fear.

Finally, David said, "Sorry.  This one's mine, and I'm not quite ready to share her yet.  Tell you what I will do, though,"

David pulled Olissa backward as he stepped toward the chair.  He whispered into her ear, "How sore is your ass?"

"Not too bad, Master.  It aches, but I'm okay."

David nodded, then turned back to the men.  "I won't let you fuck her.  But I'll let you watch me doing her."

David removed his clothes, and then sat down on the chair.  He pulled Olissa down until she was floating above him.  He shifted so that there was good positioning, and then he pulled her down with one hand as he held his cock upright with the other.  Once she was pressing down against his shaft, he put both hands on her hips and pushed downward, impaling her on his rod.

"Oh, god, yes, Master, fuck me!" Olissa cried out.

One of the men came from that alone.

David used his hands to move Olissa up and down within the bondage field.  She was essentially weightless to him, the field holding her in whatever position he put her in.  He rocked his hips, slamming up into her as he pulled her down into him.

They both saw and heard the guy who had asked to fuck her finally coming very loudly.  David then sped up his own thrusts until he sent himself over the edge, filling up Olissa's pussy with his jism.  He slumped back on the chair while Olissa continued to ripple her pussy muscles on his cock.  She hoped that she could get him hard again, so he'd fuck her to orgasm.

"I know what you're trying to do," he told her quietly.  "It's not going to work.  I told you, you'll have an orgasm when I think you've earned it."

David shoved Olissa off his cock, and she floated upwards and forwards, to roughly the middle of the bondage field.  He rose and went to the bathroom to get a towel of his own.  After he was cleaned and redressed, he noticed that all the men had come.

"Thank you, gentlemen.  That ends our show for the day.  I hope you enjoyed yourselves.  Don't bother spreading word of this show; all other viewings are booked."

David ushered the men out of the room, and was then gone for a while.  Olissa assumed he was showing them to the door.

David finally came back to Olissa, moving her back into her proper spot.

"How do you feel?" he asked.

"Horny as all hell... Master," she replied, almost forgetting his title.

David nodded.  "That cannot be helped.  Do you understand the purpose of this exercise?"

"Not entirely, Master.  I think you want me to understand that you can do with me whatever you like, but I'm not sure that was the whole message."

"I also want you to realize what it's going to be like having other people know about your position.  If you are introduced as a slave, that's going to carry with it certain ideas and prejudices, and you will have to face them."

"Yes, Master, I know."

David went over to the French doors.  "We don't need these open now.  I wanted the extra light so they could see."  As David closed the blinds, he said, "The one who asked to have sex with you.  If I had agreed, would you have done it?"

"Yes, Master... but I would have been very unhappy."

"Why?" he asked, not surprised that she would be unhappy, but wanting her to articulate the exact reason.

"Master, I'm yours, not some random guy's.  I don't ever want to have sex with anyone but you."

"But if I tell you to..."

"Yes, Master, I understand that.  That is why I would have done it.  I simply would not have enjoyed it."

David stepped close to her, and wrapped one arm around her, pulling her to him possessively.  He kissed her strongly, forcing his tongue into her mouth.  She gladly accepted that for as long as he kissed her.

Finally David broke their kiss and moved back.  "As a reward for your... kind words concerning me, I will forego the nipple clamps during this rest period."

"Thank you very much, Master."

David grinned at her.  He then gave her another, brief kiss and left the room.

Olissa groaned.  She had been embarrassed, frightened, and highly aroused by the session, and now she was left without even the ability to pleasure herself.

Goddammit, come back here and fuck me!

David did, in fact, come back and fuck her several more times that day, but never to orgasm.  She fell asleep that night highly frustrated and even a bit angry.  She didn't dare let that show, however.

David left early the next morning, long before Olissa awoke.  He had to retrieve another participant in his little test.

"Good morning, David," Sam said as she climbed into his glidecar and gave him a warm kiss.  "How are you today?"

"I'm fine, Sam.  Are you sure you're comfortable doing this?"

"Does the someone watching know who I am?"

"Yes, you've met them before.  I can't tell you who it is, at least for now.  That would violate a trust.  Does that make a difference?"

"Well... yes and no.  If I don't know who it is, then I won't feel embarrassed when I meet them later.  On the other hand, they'll know, and it could be awkward."

"I'm sure I'll be able to tell you who it is in a few days."

"Okay."

They chatted about various things on their way back to David's house.  He made her breakfast, and they just relaxed, waiting for the time when Olissa would be awake.

Finally, David excused himself from Sam and went upstairs.

"Good morning," David said.  Olissa was already awake, though she looked a bit haggard.  "Did you not sleep well?"

"No, Master.  Unpleasant dreams."

"I'm sorry about that.  Were they due to the test?"

"Yes, Master."

David nodded.  They went through her morning routine, and then David had her stand.

"You'll need to support your own weight fully.  I am going to temporarily shut off the bondage field."

Olissa nodded, and David kept a close eye on her while he turned off the field.  She wobbled slightly, but kept herself upright.

"Are we done, Master?"

"Not hardly.  I merely need to move the poles."

David went and opened the closet door.  He had earlier cleared out a space in the huge closet, and now he moved the four poles so that they encompassed that space.  He brought Olissa into the closet, and then reenacted the field.  With a gesture, she was quickly in position again.

"I will tell you now that, though it isn't happening now, your paddling will happen.  I have postponed it for my own reasons."

"Yes, Master."

"Now, I have moved you into the closet so that you will not be seen.  I am going to have sex with someone in the bedroom, and you are going to have to endure that experience."

"Master, I've already done that."

"Excuse me?"

"When you took Flo and me down to your house in Florida, I often stood outside your bedroom door to listen to you having sex with her.  I needed to know for myself if I could deal with knowing about your other relationships so... directly."

"Interesting," David said.  "Thank you for telling me that.  However, today you will not be just listening.  You will be watching."

"If you leave the closet door open, Master, won't she be able to see me?"

"No.  I am going to cast an illusion over the doorway, so that it will appear to be closed.  You will, however, need to be silent."

"Of course, Master."

"Oh, I don't want to depend on your willpower for that," David said.  He walked out of the closet to the trunk where all his other tools were.  He pulled something out of it and walked back to her.  "Open your mouth," he told her.

Olissa opened her mouth as wide as she could, and David slipped a red rubber ball into it.  He fastened the straps of the gag around her head, and tightened it down until it would not shift.

"Is that painful?" he asked.  She shook her head negatively.

David reached out and quickly pinched her nipple, very hard.  Olissa screamed in pain, but the gag let only the tiniest whisper of noise out.  Just enough to let him know she had actually tried to make noise.

"This is a magical gag.  Its size is mainly for the feel of being gagged.  It absorbs all sound from its wearer.  As you just heard, you can scream your head off with this on, and no one will hear you from two feet away.  If you feel the need to groan, moan, or scream in frustration... go ahead.  Also, you are ordered to watch the entire experience."

David waved his wand and cast a spell.  A small orb appeared above Olissa's head, right in front of her.

"This ball will keep track of your eyes.  It will tell me, afterward, if you closed your eyes or if you looked too far left or right.  Of course you can't turn your head, so I don't have to worry about that.  Do you understand what is expected of you?"

Olissa nodded.

"Just to be clear, you are allowed to blink.  You just can't close your eyes to avoid seeing what's going on."

Olissa nodded again.

"Very good.  Oh.  I will give you breakfast after this session is over.  I didn't want you to worry about going hungry."

David stepped back and then enacted the illusion charm on the closet door.  Olissa couldn't see any change, which made her feel a little nervous, but David seemed satisfied, and he left the room.

"I have to admit, this is a weird mix for me.  It's going to feel weird having an audience... yet also, I feel strangely excited."

David smiled at Sam.  "Sometimes I think there's a closet exhibitionist in all of us."

Sam chuckled.  "Maybe.  Is there some kind of script or pattern you want us to follow?"

"No.  I want you to enjoy yourself.  Do whatever you want.  The only thing is, for visual purposes, we need to lie on the bed sideways, so our observer can actually see what's going on."

Sam nodded.  She slid over on the couch toward him and kissed him hotly.  "Are we going to start soon?" she asked.

"Whenever you like," he confirmed.

"Let's go."

They were in the sitting room, and so it wasn't exactly a long walk to get to the bedroom.  They opened the door and Sam walked over to the bed while David closed the door.

"I thought we had an observer," she said to him after looking around.

"I felt it would be a little weird if she was actually visibly in the room.  She's here, you just can't see or hear her."

"I see," Sam said.

"Now, stop worrying about her, and come here."

David pulled Sam to him and kissed her passionately, his tongue sliding into her mouth.  Sam participated eagerly, and in fact started to remove her own clothes while they kissed.  David let her, rather than try to interfere.  He decided to drop his own pants and briefs, but he couldn't take off his shirt without breaking their kiss, and he wasn't ready to do that yet.

Once Sam was nude, she could feel David's hard cock pressing against her leg.  She reached down and stroked that for a few moments, then broke their kiss.  She knelt before him, and he closed his eyes as her mouth engulfed his cock.  Her lips stayed tight to his shaft as her head bobbed on him.

In the closet, Olissa watched.  She knew she had to, but she doubted that she could look away even without David's orders.  Her own heat was rising fast, and so was her frustration, as she couldn't do a damned thing about her arousal.  She moaned into her gag, but no sound escaped.

Back in the bedroom, David was right on the edge of climax.  Sam reached up and fondled his balls, and that was all it took.  David grunted a warning, then blasted her mouth with a load of cum.  She swallowed all of it, licking his shaft to make sure she got every last drop before letting him go.

David pulled her to her feet, and she realized he'd removed his shirt while she'd been blowing him.  She'd been too focused on her task to notice.  David pushed her down onto the bed, and then scooted her up onto it further.  He knelt between her legs and began to eat her out with enthusiasm.

Sam was quickly squirming beneath him, her hands tangling in his hair to encourage him to keep up what he was doing.  He had no intention of stopping, and when his tongue slipped against her clit, Sam cried out in pleasure.  He continued to assault her clit, and soon she was screaming out his name, her body racked with spasms.

Olissa could almost imagine how good David's tongue would have felt against her own pussy, and she knew that she was probably making a puddle on the floor of the closet.  She could feel it coating her thighs.  She growled in aggravation at her condition.

David was now sliding his dick deep into Sam's pussy.  She groaned at the sensation, and she cried out in joy as he began to thrust into her.  She muttered encouragements to him as he fucked her, pushing her higher and higher toward her climax.  When she came, she screamed out again.

David waited only a short time for Sam to come down enough to continue.  He shifted her so that she was on her side, and he slid his dick into her again, holding her leg up against his chest.  Because she was so intensely aroused already, she came again in less than a minute.

David leaned down and kissed his lover.  He quietly asked her, "You want to finish this off right?"

"Oh, god, yes," Sam moaned.

David pulled out of her, and Sam was quickly up on all fours.  David cast the charm, and then, without much in the way of fanfare, he slid his cock deep into Sam's ass.  The two had done this together frequently enough that she could relax almost instantly, not afraid of him hurting her at all.

David set up a rhythm immediately, stroking in and out of Sam's ass at a fast pace.  He occasionally smacked her ass cheeks, causing her to squeak and shudder.  It wasn't too long before Sam was once more on the verge of a massive climax.

"Oh, god, David, I'm gonna come again!"

"Me, too," he grunted.  He thrust even faster into her, and when her orgasm started, he slammed his hips against her ass and let his own go, his cum blasting into her ass.  Sam screamed and cried, her body shuddering as the orgasm washed over her.  David reached down and wrapped his arms around her, his hands cupping her breasts.  He held her against him as she continued to writhe and quiver.

After a long moment, Sam finally started to settle.  He let his cock slip out of her, and she slowly collapsed to the bed, exhausted.  David slid down onto the bed next to her, just caressing her side.  He stared right at the closet door, where he knew that Olissa had been watching.

Olissa had tears in her eyes.  She wasn't crying from betrayal; she didn't see it as one.  She was crying out of sheer sexual frustration.  She needed to feel David inside of her.  She needed to feel his tongue licking any part of her.  She wanted him pressed against her... but he was there, with that other woman, who was far prettier than her and, at least at the moment, had him.  She didn't begrudge Sam the orgasms she'd just experienced, she just wanted some of her own.

Once Sam awoke from her bliss-induced nap, David ushered her into the bathroom.  He told her he would join her in a minute, but he needed to deal with Olissa first.

David stepped through the illusory closet door, to see the tears in Olissa's eyes.  He carefully removed her gag.

"Was this that upsetting to you?" he asked with concern.

"Master, I need you to fuck me!" Olissa almost screamed.

"I can't right now," David said.  "I'm a bit tired.  In any case, it would be rude of me to be having sex with a mere slave while I have a guest in the house, now wouldn't it?"

Olissa bowed her head.  "Yes, Master, it would."

"I'm glad you understand.  I'll be back after we shower, to give you your breakfast."

"Yes, Master."

 David left Olissa in the closet as he fed her breakfast.  Once he was done with that, he brought several towels into the closet and set them on the floor.  David noticed, but said nothing about, the wet spot beneath Olissa.

When David brought in a tray table and a bowl of water, Olissa couldn't keep quiet.

"What are you doing, Master?"

"Bathing you.  You've been here for two full days now, and you're a bit... well, let's just say you're in need of cleaning."

David took out a sponge and plunged it into the bowl, then wrung it out and started to wipe Olissa's body.  He started with her face and worked his way down, keeping his movements gentle, but more clinical than arousing.  Not that Olissa needed any help in the arousal department at this point.  Had she been able to move, she might very well have tackled David to get at his cock.

David made no mention of sex as he worked, however.  He didn't comment on her wetness, nor the obvious smell of arousal permeating the closet.  He merely performed his task.  Once he was finished, he took the sponge, bowl, and tray out of the closet, back into the bathroom where they had been.

On his way back to the closet, David retrieved the nipple clamps, plus one other item.

As David entered the closet, Olissa asked, "Master, are you not going to move me back out into the main bedroom?"

"You're making assumptions," David told her.  "Never assume you know what your master is up to until he tells you."

"Yes, Master.  I'm sorry."

David applied the nipple clamps to her breasts once again, and Olissa gasped in pain as she was reacquainted with the sensation.  David added something this time, however.  In the middle of the chain running between the clamps, there was a ring.  From that ring, David hung a small weight.  It wasn't too heavy, but it certainly pulled on the chain, thus pulled on Olissa's nipples.

"Oh, god!" Olissa cried out.

David stood, waiting.  "Can you handle it, or is it too much?"  His tone was concerned, but still businesslike.

Olissa took a few deep breaths, finding it hard to do so, as she wanted to keep gasping.  Finally, her body started to settle down.  "I'll... be... okay, Master," she replied.

"Good.  Say 'ah'."

Olissa opened her mouth, and David once again inserted the gag, which he'd set on a closet shelf earlier.  Her voice was wholly cut off now.

"I'll leave you to contemplate your situation for the moment.  I'll be back in a little while to continue your testing."

Olissa nodded in dismayed understanding.

Throughout the day, David and Sam would occasionally come up to his bedroom and have sex.  They didn't do anything particularly special to taunt Olissa, but that was hardly necessary.  Watching her chosen partner being intimate with another woman, while he was barely touching her, was taunt enough.

David kept his physical contact with Olissa to a minimum.  He didn't have sex with her in any way all day, instead focusing on Sam.

Finally, nearing sunset, David drove Sam home.

"I hope your friend enjoyed today," Sam said.  "I know I did.  I hate to admit it, but sometimes I really miss you, the way we used to be... you know, having sex at the drop of a hat..."

"It wasn't hats you were dropping," David replied with a grin.  "I miss you, too.  There's not enough time in my day to visit with everyone I'd like to."

"I know.  You work too hard."  David was about to say something, but she raised her hand to stop him.  "I know, none of my business.  I'm just saying, you're in a unique position.  You can truly take your time to learn and grow at as slow a pace as you choose.  There is no reason to cram every piece of learning into the first few years of your adult life."

"They only let me stay at Woodward for eight years.  I have to make of it what I can."

Sam smiled at him.  "You've done that five times over."

David grinned, then he leaned over and kissed Sam.  She kissed back eagerly, despite having spent her entire day with him.

"I'll see you when you come back to school," Sam told him.  "Good luck with your friend."

"Thanks, Sam.  Take care."

"You'll need to support your weight again," David told Olissa as he lowered her to her feet.

"What's happening now, Master?"

"I'm moving you back out to the bedroom.  Sam has gone home, so that particular exercise has finished.  Do you understand why that exercise was done?"

"I think so, Master.  You wanted me to be aware of just how unpleasant it would be if you paid little attention to me, and more attention to your primary lady."

"Exactly.  And was it pleasant?"

"No," she replied.  Belatedly, she added, "Master."

David smirked, but not where she could see him.  He moved the poles back out to the main room, and had her stand in the middle.  He went to the trunk and removed the crossbar.

As he walked back, he said, "I bet you'd hoped I'd forgotten about this, didn't you?"

"Hoped?  Yes, Master.  Expected, no."

David chuckled.  "Assume your punishment position."

Olissa leaned forward and reached out, grabbing the bar.  David retrieved the paddle from the trunk, and took up his spot behind her.

"Unlike yesterday, you do not need to remain silent.  If you feel the need to holler, go ahead and do so.  However, today's punishment will be slightly longer than yesterday's.  This is to help hammer home the point.  Are you ready for me to begin?"

After a long pause and a couple deep breaths, Olissa said, "Yes, Master."

"Good."  David started right in on his strokes.  He said nothing to her as he counted to himself.  By the time he got to twenty, she was crying out with each hit.  When he reached thirty, she was actively crying.  David stopped at forty, though he'd intended to go all the way to fifty.  Her sobbing was more than he could take, and he didn't want to be the one who broke down in the middle of this test.

Trying to get control of himself, David walked over to the trunk, keeping his gaze carefully averted from her.  He put the paddle away, and then went into the bathroom.  He splashed some water on his face, then grabbed a washcloth, getting it wet and taking it out to her.  He carefully wiped her face, removing the tear stains.

Tossing the cloth on the bed, he had her stand up, and he removed the crossbar.  A wave of his hand and she was immediately back into her position, floating in the air, legs bent, hands behind her head.

"Do you need to use the restroom?" David asked.

Olissa nodded, and so they took care of that necessity.  She was almost inured to the humiliation of it by now, but not quite.

With her physical needs taken care of, David retrieved the nipple clamps and gag from the closet.  He reattached them, including the weight on the clamps.  Olissa squirmed and wriggled, trying to get comfortable again, but it was no use.  David made matters worse by tugging gently on the weight, causing a whole new shard of pain to run through her nipples.

"I'm having guests over this evening.  They shouldn't bother you.  I will make sure you get dinner before they arrive."

Olissa nodded, wondering who was going to visit, and if they were a new part of her test.

David had fed Olissa dinner, and he'd told her that he would probably not see her for a few hours, as he would be entertaining his guests.  He also let her know that he would have to go into town for a little while during the guests' visit, but they weren't supposed to come upstairs, so she shouldn't be bothered by them.

Olissa had her doubts about that.  She figured David had gotten someone else to come and mess with her.  She knew she'd find out soon enough, and right now, all she really wanted was for her nipples to stop hurting, and her pussy to stop itching for a cock.

After a couple hours of hearing nothing at all, she suddenly heard voices in the sitting room.

"David told us not to come up here," one voice said.  Olissa was a bit alarmed when she recognized the voice as that of Jess, Gwen's partner.

She was even more distressed when Gwen's voice said, "Oh, it'll be okay.  He'll never know, and even if he catches us, he'll forgive us."

The door opened at that point, and Jess was saying, "Are you sure about - what the..."

Gwen stepped fully into the room, and her jaw dropped open, staring at Olissa, nude, floating in the air, with a gag in her mouth and clamps on her nipples.

"Holy shit," Gwen said.  "What the hell is going on?  Olissa... did you ask to be like this?" Gwen demanded.

Olissa knew she had to defend her master.  She knew that if she said no, Gwen would run to the Rimohrs.  And truthfully, she'd agreed to the test voluntarily.

Olissa nodded her head affirmatively.

Gwen looked at Jess, who was looking back at Gwen.

Jess said, "I didn't know David was this sick."

Gwen said, "I didn't know she was this sick!"

"I don't think we should be in this room when David gets back," Jess said.

Gwen went one step further.  "I don't think we should be in this house when David gets back!  We need to get the hell away from this shit.  I thought I knew these two, but..."

Gwen's words were cut off because she'd closed the bedroom door behind herself.  Olissa heard them talking as they left the sitting room, but couldn't make out the words.  After that, there was silence.

And her tears.

David returned to Olissa about a half-hour after Gwen and Jess left.  He looked at her with concern.

"You've been crying," he said, removing her gag.

"Master... Gwen and Jess came up here.  They saw me like this."

David nodded.  "What did they do?"

"They asked me if I was here by choice."

"And you said..."

"I nodded yes, Master.  I agreed to this test.  But then they called us sick and ran out."

David nodded.  "That would explain why they weren't here when I got back.  This is a danger to what you're requesting, Olissa.  Many people aren't going to understand this at all.  They're going to assume that I'm holding you hostage in some way.  As much as people are going to look at you as some kind of weirdo for wanting to be a slave, they are also going to leak some of that ill feeling onto me.  Now, I can deal with that problem, since I honestly don't give a shit what most people think.  Gwen's a problem.  I think I can explain this to her, but I'm not sure.  We could lose her as a friend over this.  You need to consider that."

"Yes, Master," she said, new tears flowing from her eyes.

David removed the nipple clamps, causing a whole new bout of pain.

"Thanks to this little development, I'm going to forego any further testing tonight.  We will resume in the morning, unless something else comes up."

"Yes, Master.  Thank you."

David nodded, but he didn't kiss her or touch her.  He left the room, leaving her to her own thoughts and misery.

David left Olissa alone for the remainder of the night, only tending to her needs.  When he came to bed, she was already asleep, and he did not rouse her.

When Olissa awoke the next morning, she could tell by the shadows on the floor that it was already mid-morning.  She wasn't sure exactly what time, but she thought that David ought to have woken her by now.

A noise from outside caught her attention, and she suddenly discovered that she could turn her head.  She worked her neck all the way around, realizing that she was completely free to move her neck.  Testing showed that all of her other limbs were still completely immobile.

A look downward showed her that her bathroom bucket was in place on the floor beneath her.  This was not a good sign.  Was David going to leave her by herself for long enough that she would need the bucket?

Given that it was there, she decided to relieve herself.  This wasn't the wisest move, she realized, as she was now stuck with the smell of it.

A droning noise, similar to that of crickets, caught her attention.  She didn't know what it was, but it varied in pitch and volume, her attention continuing to be brought back to it.  It was a highly annoying noise.

Meanwhile, she felt as though it was getting very hot in the room.  Sweat popped out all over her body as she felt as though she was in a greenhouse.

For a long time, the heat continued.  The noise changed over time, shifting from a droning noise into something of a whine.  It grated on her nerves, which were already frayed from the past three days of tests.  The heat was also shortening her fuse.  When she felt a fly land on her shoulder, she snapped her head over to use her hair to shoo it away.  The fly buzzed around her head for long minutes, and she had to keep flicking her head this way and that to prevent it from landing on her.

The fly eventually took its leave, but by then, she was annoyed and frustrated.  Where was David?  Why wasn't he here to bring her breakfast, to get rid of the bucket waste?  She couldn't do these things for herself, she was depending on him.

That's the point he's driving home, isn't it?  He wants me to understand that I will be one hundred percent dependent on him.  Not that that bothers me.  I've been doing that since I met him, really.

As the day wore on, Olissa began to doubt her assumption of what was going on.

Maybe he's trying to talk to Gwen.  Maybe Gwen went to the Rimohrs anyway.  Maybe he's having to explain all of this to his boss.  Oh, god, what kind of trouble have I gotten David into?

Olissa was now worried, and she wished more than anything that David would come in the door.

The day rolled on, and it was after noon, and David had still not made any appearance.  Olissa'd been forced to use her bucket once more, and the smell was becoming truly nasty in the overheated room.

Olissa shivered as she felt something crawling along the back of her thigh.  She figured it was probably a fly again, but she had no means to shoo it away from her lower half.  The bug, or whatever it was, continued to crawl on her, and her insides shuddered.

When another fly started crawling along her back, she tried her hardest to twist or turn or do anything to make them fly away, but she couldn't move at all.  The thrashing of her head meant nothing to them, and they continued to walk on her.

As she floated there, more and more things began to crawl on her.  She looked down, trying to spot the nasty things that had to be all over her, but she couldn't see anything.

Bugs too small to see?  Well, we have them in Louisiana... Goddamned no-see-ums...

The sensation grew, and Olissa was tensing every muscle in her body, trying to cause a shake, a quiver, any kind of movement of her body.  The bondage rings held her fast, however.  The rippling of her muscles wasn't sufficient to cause the bugs to leave.  It was driving her to distraction.

If David was here, he could at least shoo the damned things away from me!

It never occurred to her that she'd not seen or felt bugs prior to now, and that it was highly unlikely that she was suddenly covered in them.  Her mind was so distraught by the sensation that the only thing that mattered was trying to get rid of the bugs.

Olissa spent her afternoon thrashing her head back and forth while trying to move.  Finally, as the day moved toward sunset, the crawling sensation eased.  The bugs went away, and she heard a buzzing noise, not unlike that of flying insects.  During her torment, she had completely ignored the unpleasant noise in the room, but now that she was freed from that physical problem, the auditory one took up her attention.

What is that? she wondered to herself.  The noise was just familiar enough to her that she knew she recognized it, but not familiar enough for her to identify it.  It, like all the other noises, changed in pitch and volume, making sure she never became used to it.

Am I beginning to hallucinate?  Is that what this is?  Without David to focus on, being just stuck here by myself... am I making all of this up?

While she considered it, she realized that her left leg itched.  This immediately went from a recognition of a sensation to something that consumed her consciousness.  Normally an itch is a minor annoyance, but this is because one can scratch it and make it go away.  When one cannot scratch it, and there is nothing else to draw the attention, that itch devours one's attention until there is nothing left in the world.

The itch grew, as often happens.  First one spot itched, but then another, seemingly unrelated spot began to itch.  Soon there were a dozen spots on her body that needed to be scratched.  This was even worse than the bug-crawling sensation.  She needed desperately to scratch, but she couldn't.

For over an hour, she struggled to move again, trying to get at any one of the itching spots on her body.  The sky outside grew dark, and there was only a single firefly in the room, who was providing dim light.

"More light, please," she asked the firefly, but it ignored her.

"Can I please have more light?" she asked it again.

Once more, it ignored her.

What the fuck?  They never ignore requests.  Maybe it's not even there.  Maybe this is all just a hallucination.

As the darkness fell, so did the temperature in the room.  It was as if the heat had been turned off in the house.  The room quickly fell from overly warm to downright chilly in a matter of minutes.  It didn't stop there, but kept dropping, until Olissa was shivering in an attempt to keep warm.

On the bright side, I'm not itching anymore...

This wasn't much of a bright side, because she was shivering so hard that she'd never notice if she was still itching or not.

Only one bad thing at a time is happening to me.  It's like I'm making this up to punish myself.  Is this about Gwen?  Am I punishing myself for making David have to deal with Gwen after what she saw?  Oh, god, I hope she doesn't hate me...

David, where are you?

More time passed as Olissa shivered and grew more and more concerned.  It was fully dark now, the light in the room dim and somewhat eerie.  She was turning her head constantly now, feeling paranoid about things and wondering whether she was alone or not.  She'd neither seen nor heard anyone, but she felt like she couldn't trust her senses anymore.

What she really wanted was for David, her master, her owner, her protector, to come get her out of this mess.  But she'd not seen him since the previous evening, almost a full day now.  She began to cry softly, struggling to control her emotions.

Olissa's emotional state deteriorated as the evening wore on.  She was cold, hungry, worn out and sick of the smell of her own waste.  She couldn't deal with this.  She needed David.  Finally, she couldn't stand it any longer.

"Master, where are you?" she cried out loud, a sob escaping her throat.

Immediately, David appeared a few feet in front of her, leaning against one of the bedposts.  He quickly came to her and took her head into his hands.  He kissed her softly, but that wasn't sufficient for her.  She did her best to force him to deepen the kiss, and he did, sliding his tongue into her mouth and then wrapping his arms around her.

David broke their kiss and then said something Olissa didn't quite catch.  She didn't have time to worry about it as David pulled her free of the bondage field.  She felt him take up her weight, and she held on to him.  He carried her over to the bed and laid her down on it.

"Don't move," he told her softly.  She nodded.

David went to the bathroom.  She heard water running.  David didn't return until the water had stopped, which seemed to take a very long time.  He returned to the bed and picked her up.

"I didn't realize you were this strong, Master," she told him quietly.

"I'm using a spell," he said.  He carried her into the bathroom, and then over to the tub.  He set her down on the edge of it, and took a deep breath.

"Hold out your arms," he told her.  She did, and David then tapped the rings at her wrists.  They immediately dropped, making contact with her skin for the first time.  He did the same thing with the rings at her elbows, and they dropped, sliding all the way down to join the other rings.  David pulled them off and set them aside.  He then did similar things with the rings on her legs.

David leaned in and kissed Olissa while he unfastened the belt around her waist.  He dropped that on the floor with all the other items, and then he broke their kiss so that he could undo the collar around her neck.

Before moving her into the tub, David got some toilet paper and cleaned Olissa from a day's worth of bathroom activity.  With that taken care of, he shifted her gently into the tub and had her sit back.  She did so, and then watched as he disrobed before sliding into the huge tub with her.

"Your test is over," he told her.

"I failed, didn't I?" she asked.  "I admitted defeat there at the end by calling for you."

"You didn't fail," David told her.  "You never asked me to stop tormenting you.  In the end, all you wanted was for me to come take care of you."

"That's all I've ever really wanted," she admitted.

David grabbed the soap and a sponge, and he lathered it thoroughly.  He then began to wash Olissa.

"Master, you don't have to do that," she told him.

"Your test is over.  You don't have to call me Master anymore," he told her.

"But that's what you are... I hope," she said.  He looked into her eyes, seeing the fear there.

"You passed your test.  I promised I would take you as my... uh, what was that word you used?"

"Odalisque.  Thrall is shorter."

"Yeah, whatever.  We both know you mean slave.  I don't like it, but it's not the word that troubles me, it's the concept.  In any case, I promised I would take care of you."

"Thank you."  She reached over and kissed him strongly.  He continued to lather her chest while they kissed.  Finally, she let go of him, and he continued soaping up her body.

Once David had cleaned her thoroughly, he sat back and pulled her against him, so that her back was against his chest.  He wrapped his arms around her middle, and just held her.

"There are a few things you need to know," David said.

"Okay..."

"The first is, I never left you today.  I was there the entire time."

"So everything I felt was you?"

"Yes.  I was trying to put you through as much torment as I could, while you thought I wouldn't be there to help you.  I wanted to see what your reaction would be.  I expected you to curse me.  Well, not literally curse me, but you know what I mean."

Olissa smiled, but didn't say anything.

"The next, and perhaps more important part, is that the only real person you saw this week, other than me, was Sam."

"What do you mean?"

"The men on the second day of your testing, and Jess and Gwen... they were illusions.  They were never here."

Olissa let out a long sigh of relief.  "So Gwen doesn't think we're sick and perverse."

"Well, she still might, Olissa.  I don't know how she'll react to this."

Olissa frowned, knowing he was right.

"And, as to the guys on the second day, unless something about me changes radically, I would never offer you to another guy, for any amount of money.  You're mine now, and I'm a greedy bastard."

Olissa turned in his arms and they kissed passionately for a long time.  when they broke their kiss, David motioned her back.

"Now that you're clean, I think you need a good massage.  I know you've got to be sore and stiff from four days in that position.  Be honest, what hurts?"

"Almost everything," she admitted.  "Today was especially tense."

"Yeah, I know.  Sorry about that."

"You did what you had to do, Master."

"That... is going to take some getting used to.  Could you build up to calling me that gradually?"

"How do you mean?"

"Well, you already call me that during sex.  Maybe in our playful moments, or perhaps when we're having serious discussions.  I'm just not quite ready to hear you call me Master all the time."

Olissa nodded.  "Would you rather I called you something else altogether?"

"David is right out of the question, huh?" he asked with a grin.

"I'd prefer not to.  It's not appropriate, now that we're official."

"I'll think it over.  In public, I will always want you to call me David."

Olissa frowned.

Seeing that, David relented.  "I might accept 'sir'."

Olissa nodded, smiling slightly.

David shook his head in some exasperation.  "Come on, let's go back to the bedroom.  You can lie on the bed while I give you a massage."

Olissa lay down, and David grabbed some lotion and began to work over Olissa's entire body.  He started at her shoulders and worked his way down.  As this was not intended to be sexual, he didn't avoid, nor focus on, her ass, but treated it like all her other muscles.

David spent a lot of time working on Olissa before he told her to turn over.  She did, and he was treated to his more favorite view of her.  This time, since he was already there, he started at her feet and worked his way up.  He didn't spend any time with her breasts, as they weren't really muscles, and wouldn't be sore.  When he reached her shoulders, however, he spent a lot of time there. 

As he was finishing up, David leaned down and kissed Olissa.  He slid his tongue gently against her lips and she opened her mouth to admit it.  Their tongues began to slide wetly together as David moved over her.  She spread her legs once she realized what he wanted.

David didn't make her wait for it.  He knew from his massage that she was more than ready for this, and so he slid into her right away, his cock penetrating her all the way.  Olissa moaned.

"God, I've missed that for two days now."

David smiled at her, and then started a slow, gentle rhythm.  He knew she would still be sore, so he didn't want to cause her any pain.  He supported himself on one hand, while he allowed his other to fondle her breasts, sliding back and forth to give her pleasure.

Olissa closed her eyes and sighed, just enjoying the feel of him inside her, above her, near her.  Her heat was rising quickly; the massage had aroused her as much as it had relaxed her.  Her master's hands on her body couldn't fail to make her ready for him.

In another minute, Olissa's body started to twitch, announcing her impending orgasm.  She started to groan in anticipation of it.

David, trying to get into his role as her master, leaned down and whispered in her ear, "Come for me.  Come for me now."

In a flash, Olissa's body was over the edge, and she twitched beneath him, crying out in ecstasy.

David, feeling her pussy rippling along his dick, allowed himself to come with her.  He'd been holding back for a while, but now he joined in her pleasure, and the two grunted and moaned together.

It took a while for both of them to come down.  David slipped gently out of her and lay down next to her, laying his hand on her stomach and rubbing softly.

Olissa mewled at his touch.  "Thank you, Master, for the orgasm."

"Believe me, you more than earned that.  If you're up for it, I plan on giving you at least one more tonight.  Though I will understand if you're too worn out."

"For more of you, I'd get off my death bed," she told him with a smile.

David chuckled.  "That would be an interesting way to go," he told her.

Olissa reached down and fondled David's cock, which was still soft.  She knew how to fix that.

Slipping down the bed, Olissa took the head of David's dick into her mouth, slipping her tongue around and over it.  David groaned in pleasure, and Olissa started to take more of him in.  She got over half his length in her mouth, and then started to set up a slow rhythm.  She loved giving David blowjobs, and she wanted him to enjoy this one.  She knew that he wasn't yet comfortable with their new relationship, and she was thanking him, in her way, for acceding to her wishes.

David grew hard quickly, but Olissa didn't stop blowing him for another minute or two.  Finally, however, she let her mouth slip off his hard rod.

"What position do you want me in?" she asked.

David considered, then said, "On all fours."

Olissa nodded with a smile, and she shifted around, kneeling on the bed and then leaning down onto her elbows, which stuck her ass into the air nicely, just waiting for David's attention.

David got up and moved behind her, then slid his cock slowly into her pussy again.  Olissa mewled at the return of his member to her tunnel, and turned her head to the side so she could at least see him a little bit while he made love to her.

Once again, David's rhythm was slow and easy.  There was no reason for them to go fast; they had all the time they needed.

As David slipped in and out of her, he asked, "How's your butt?"

"It's fine now, Master," she told him.  "It was very sore yesterday, though."

David caressed her ass cheeks.  "Please don't make me have to do that again."

"I'll try not to, Master."

"Good."  David sped up the pace just a little bit, pushing Olissa's arousal higher.  He sensed she was beginning to climb toward her peak, and he wanted to help her get there.  His hands roamed over her ass and lower back as he made love to her, his cock gliding in and out as Olissa began to roll her hips, forcing him deeper inside of her pussy.

In just another moment, Olissa cried out, her pussy clamping down on David's cock.  He pushed into her all the way and stopped, letting her enjoy the feel of her climax washing over her.  She shuddered in joy for a long moment, and then finally she relaxed, her body tension easing away.

"Oh, god, I love your dick," she told him.  "Along with the rest of you."

David chuckled.  He reached for a pillow and put it under her midsection.

"Lie down," he told her.

She slid herself down, her legs sliding open wider, since he was between them, and her arms slipping to the side.

"You belong to me now, right?  I can do whatever I want to you."

"You always could, as far as sex was concerned."

David smirked and nodded.  "Lie still.  We're going to do something we've never done together before."

David cast the usual charm, and then he leaned over Olissa again, his dick resting in the crack of her butt cheeks.  He rubbed it there several times, then he shifted his position, his cock pushing in between her cheeks.  As Olissa felt the head of his dick press against her asshole, she mewed in anxious anticipation.

"Have you ever done this before?" David asked softly.

"No, Master.  But I've thought about it from time to time.  It's going to hurt at first, isn't it?" she asked.

"Honestly, that depends on just how relaxed you can make yourself.  I will go slowly, but you need to just accept what's happening."

Olissa nodded, and then took a deep breath and sighed.  As she was sighing, David pressed inward slowly.  Olissa continued to focus on her sigh, and by the time she'd finished, the head of David's cock was inside of her.

"How does that feel?" he asked.

"Very nice," she replied.  "I'm glad I haven't done this before."

"Why?" he asked, confused.

"Because it's at least one thing that I get to give only to you."

David smiled, then leaned forward.  His dick slowly pressed its way deeper into her ass until he was finally buried to the hilt.  He leaned forward and rubbed her back and shoulders.

"Still doing okay?" he asked.

"Mm," she replied with a smile.

"You let me know if this hurts at any time," he told her.  She nodded, then just closed her eyes and waited for the pleasure to start.

She didn't have long to wait.  As soon as David started to move within her, her body began to tingle.  David kept his first moves short and slow, moving as smoothly as he could.  When he was sure she could handle more, he took longer strokes, but kept them just as slow.

Olissa was soon mewling and moaning in bliss, loving the feel of his shaft slipping in and out of her ass.  She hadn't expected to enjoy this much, though if it was something her master liked, she would endure it for his sake.  She was happily surprised to find out that this was a newly discovered pleasure for her.

After David had reached the full length of his strokes, he sped up slightly, until he was moving in her ass at the same speed he'd been sliding into her pussy.  This was still not fast, but that was okay with Olissa.  It felt wonderful, and she knew that another orgasm was on its way.

David continued to run his hands over her body while he plunged his dick into her again and again.  He could feel Olissa beginning to shiver and twitch, her body nearing its apex of pleasure.  He didn't speed up; he was afraid of hurting her, and he absolutely didn't want to ruin this experience for her.  It wasn't necessary in any case; her body would reach its peak without any additional help.

When her orgasm started, Olissa cried out, "Oh, god, Master, I'm coming!"

Olissa's ass clamped down on David so tightly he could barely move.  The feeling was intense, and David couldn't hold back any longer.  He pushed forward until he was completely buried in her ass, and then he erupted, his cock spewing its load deep inside of her.

Olissa and David shivered together for a long moment until David's orgasm passed.  Olissa was still caught in the midst of hers, so David was very careful when pulling out of her.  He let her be while he went to the bathroom to grab a cloth to clean himself off with.  He then returned to the bed, sliding up tightly next to Olissa.

Sensing his presence, Olissa turned and pressed her body firmly against his, squirming to get the pillow out from underneath her.  David wrapped his arms around her and then kissed her.  The kiss expressed a great many things, foremost of which was their love for each other.

When they finally broke their kiss, David said, "I love you, Olissa."

"I love you too, Master," she replied.

The two moved only enough to get under the covers, and soon they were both sound asleep.

David, of course, woke long before Olissa did.  He carefully slipped out of bed, not wanting to wake her up.  He took the time to quietly disassemble the bondage field and pack all of the gear back up into the trunk.  He then stuck the trunk in the closet and closed the closet door.

Done with that task, David went downstairs to do some more work on his potion.  He set a timer; he wanted to make Olissa breakfast, so he'd need to be reminded.  He got much too focused while he was working to remember minor things like the time.

David cut it a little close, as Olissa was just sitting up in bed when he came in with the tray.  She looked at him curiously.

"This is supposed to work the other way around, you know," she told him with a soft smile.

"I know.  But I wanted to treat you nice after spending four days treating you like shit."

He set the tray in front of her and she eagerly began to eat.  She hadn't really considered the fact that she hadn't eaten a thing all the previous day, but now that she smelled and tasted food, her body was screaming for nourishment.

As Olissa ate, David said, "And about treating you like shit... I hope you realize that, at least if I remain as I am now, I would never treat you like that."

"It would be okay if you did," she told him.

"Well, of course you're going to say that.  I'm your master."

She smiled at him.  "True.  But really, it would be.  I'm not saying I liked it, but chances are you wouldn't treat me like that constantly.  What you did was condense your worst treatment down into a solid block of unpleasant days.  If you took what you did and spread it out over a year, it really wouldn't have been so bad.  Well... the thing with showing me off to the guys, I admit, I didn't like.  But I could live with it."

David brushed her hair back out of her face.  "I told you, you're mine.  I don't go showing off what I have to impress people.  I would never actually do that to you.  Well, the current me wouldn't, anyway."

She smiled at him, then took another bite of her food.  When she swallowed, she said, "And I hope you didn't get rid of the bondage field."

"You really like that, don't you?" he said with a grin.

Olissa smiled in embarrassment.  "As I told you, I like the idea of you having your way with me, with me having nothing to say about it.  The only thing you did that I really couldn't handle, Master, was to leave me alone without telling me why."

David moved in closer to her and kissed her softly.  When he broke the kiss, he said, "I'll do my best not to do that in the future."

"Thank you," she said.

David and Olissa spent a quiet, but passionate, weekend with each other.  They didn't leave the house for the entire time.

Unfortunately, on Tuesday, the outside world intruded on their peace.  David was lying in bed with Olissa when his mirror buzzed.  He waited for Olissa to cover up before he picked up his mirror and answered the call.

"Yes?  Oh, hi, Tanya.  What's up?"

"David... I, uh... didn't realize you'd still be in bed.  I can call back..."

"No, no, it's fine.  We're just resting.  What's going on?"

"We've run down the guy we think raped Rose.  You said you wanted to be part of the takedown."

"Yeah.  Where is he?"

"He's coming here to campus.  We sent him a phony letter saying the school wanted to give him an award as an outstanding alumnus.  He called and confirmed with the registrar about twenty minutes ago."

"Okay.  I'll be up there in a half hour."

"Take your time.  He's not supposed to be here until after lunch.  I just wanted to give you plenty of warning."

"Okay, thanks.  Have you called Rose?"

"Not yet.  That's my next call."

"Good.  See you in a little bit."

David fogged off, and then he rolled out of bed.

"Time to go back to work, huh?" Olissa asked him.

"Yeah.  I guess it's time to return to the real world."

"I like your world better," she told him, getting up herself.

David walked over to her and gave her a hug and a kiss.  She snuggled against him tightly as he held her.  Finally he broke their kiss and let her go.

"I've got to get up there.  I should be home tonight.  If not, I'll give you a call."

"Thank you."

"Love you," he told her, looking her in the eye.

"Love you, too, Master," she said, smiling warmly at him.

He gave her another, brief, kiss and headed out the door.

"So how did you find this mutt?" David asked Tanya.

"He got careless.  While Rose's description didn't do us a whole lot of good, this town's not that huge.  There were only a few guys who fit even the minimal description we had.  One of them had travel patterns in and out of Gorumshead that matched up with the time we know he spent with Rose.  He used an alias at the inn that we checked with the Rimohrs, and it was a known one.  We got his real name, and then looked to see if he'd ever been a Woodward student.  Sure enough, he had.  That's why he already had the uniform."

"Good job," David said.

"Thanks."

David and Tanya were both waiting in the registrar's office, waiting for their target to come in.  He arrived at two o'clock, as he had said he would.

"Punctual fucker," David murmured to Tanya.

The man walked up to the registrar counter and said, "I'm here to receive an award of some kind."

David and Tanya stepped behind him.  David said, in a game-show-announcer voice, "Yes, sir.  You have won an all-expenses-paid trip to Barnard Hill.  Yes, for six to ten glorious years of balmy days and chilly nights, you will be wrapped in the all-encompassing discomfort of Callamandia's nastiest scenic location."

Tanya was giggling.  The man looked annoyed.

"Who the hell are you?"

"Woodward Security.  You are being detained."

"On what grounds?"

"Suspicion of rape.  Hold out your hands."

"I will not!  You have no authority!"

"Listen dickhead," David said, his voice going from lighthearted to dark and menacing, "You can hold out your hands, or I can rip them off of your arms.  This is not a request or a negotiation.  Do as you're told and you might not get hurt.  Don't do as you're told, and you'll be spending the next six months in the infirmary."

"You don't scare me, kid."

David hauled off and punched the man as hard as he could.  The man fell, hitting his head on the registrar's counter, causing a gash that spurted blood everywhere.

"Do I scare you now, you motherfucking coward?  If I don't, then you are even dumber than you look.  And you can't be dumber than you look, because you're capable of speech.  Now, unless you would like to live out the rest of your life missing several internal organs, you will fucking well do as you are told," David snarled.  "On your feet!"

The man staggered drunkenly to his feet.  His head was still bleeding freely.

"Now hold out your hands.  I will not ask you again.  If you refuse, you will enter the detention facility while unconscious."

The man held out his hands, and David enacted the handcuff hex.

"Now walk."  As the man started to move, David said to Tanya, "Call maintenance and have them send someone to clean up this mess.  Then call Healer Hall and tell her to come see our misguided friend here."

"You're not taking him to the infirmary?" Tanya asked.

"Hell no.  This bastard can bleed."

"You've got nothing on me," the man said, still woozy.

"Oh, I think we will have within the next twenty minutes," David told him.

"You know, he's right, David.  What we have is all circumstantial evidence."

"You ever wonder why glamours are actually legal?" David asked, seemingly out of the blue.

"Uh... no.  It's a simple piece of magic, why would it be illegal?"

"For precisely the reason that we had trouble here.  It can be used to protect yourself while committing a crime.  But it's not illegal.  Ever wonder why?"

"No."

"It's because Rimohrs can break glamours.  And they can also recreate them."

The man's head snapped around at that statement.

"Oh, didn't you know that, shithead?  Yeah, the Rimohrs can pull up every glamour you've ever done.  When your victim identifies you, you're toast.  If you don't watch yourself, I'll just tie your ass up and let her have at you, rather than calling the Rimohrs on you."

"Uh, David," Tanya said very quietly, "aren't you a Rimohr?"

"Not right now I'm not.  I'm on administrative leave."

"Oh.  For what?"

Raising his voice so their suspect could hear him, he said, "Because I killed a suspect who pissed me off."

David was gratified to see the man shrivel.

Tanya looked at David, unsure if he was kidding or not.  She decided not to ask further right then.

Once they were in the detention house and Healer Hall had patched up the suspect's wounds, David set him down in a chair.  He cast a spell, darkening the entire room, except for himself and the suspect.  He motioned to Tanya, who was in the room, though David could not see her.  She brought Rose into the room.  Neither David nor the suspect could see her, or Tanya.

Tanya said, "We're ready."

David lifted his wand, motioned carefully, and intoned, "Obna ruzhity yego maskirovaya."

Slowly, a new face appeared where the suspect was sitting.  His features changed, now covered by a glamour.  It was not, however, the glamour that Rose had described.

"No," Tanya said aloud.

David nodded, flicked his wand, and said, "Zatyim."

The face changed again.

"No," Tanya said once more.  David flicked to the next face.

"That's the one," Tanya said.

"Escort our guest out," David said to Tanya.  He heard the door close, and then he let go of the darkness spell.  "You've just been identified as a rapist and, if you get a nasty prosecutor, someone who attempted murder."

"How do you figure?" the man asked snidely.

"You left your victim tied up in a room with no way to call for help.  Had she not been expected by someone, she could easily have died before being able to free herself."

"It's not my fault if she's an incompetent bitch."

"Ever tried performing magic when you can't move your hands?" David asked.  "Would you like me to tie you up the same way you tied her up, and see how long it takes you to get free?"

"Thirty minutes, tops.  Those knots weren't that goddamned tight."

"Thank you for admitting to rape," David said.

"I didn't admit to anything!"

"Didn't you?  How would you know how tight the knots were, unless you were the one who tied them?"

The man was just smart enough to not try to answer that question.

"Doesn't matter.  I didn't admit anything in front of anyone who matters," he said.

"Except the recorder in the corner," David said, jerking his thumb at the bookshelf.

The man blanched, then decided, a little too late, that it was time to shut his mouth.

David sat and stared at the man until Joe and Vivian arrived to pick him up.

"What happened to his head?" Joe asked.

"He resisted."

"I just voiced an opinion!" the man objected.

"Rapists don't get to have opinions in my school," David said.

"Really protecting the world for freedom and democracy, huh?"

"This is Callamandia, dickhead.  It's not a democracy, it's a parliamentary monarchy.  As to freedom... no, you don't have the freedom to go around raping helpless young women.  You do have the right to remain silent.  Use it, before you need another visit from Healer Hall."

David handed over the recorder to Joe.  "You'll find a fairly clear admission of guilt on that."

"You never read me my rights!"

"I'm not required to, jack-off.  This is Callamandia, not America.  If you're a citizen and you don't know your rights by now, you need to go back to school.  They were a part of your citizenship exam.  Not to mention, as I am head of security for the school, and not currently a Rimohr, I wouldn't have to read you your rights even if we were in Washington, DC."

"All right, buddy, let's go, before you actually make him angry," Joe said.

"He nearly took my head off!" the man exclaimed.

"See?  He only nearly took it off.  He's not actually pissed off yet.  Count your blessings."

Vivian waited until Joe had taken the suspect out.  "How hard did you hit him?"

"As hard as I could," he replied.  "If I could have hit him harder, I would have.  Rose is a friend of mine."

Vivian nodded.  "Your hearing is tomorrow afternoon, at three.  You'll need to be down in Bolmont for that."

"Right.  I'll be there."

"Good.  Take it easy.  The hearing's just a formality, you know that."

"I hope so."

"Let's bring this hearing to order.  David Stroud, we're here to evaluate your actions leading up to the death of a suspect.  This is the second time in a four-month period that you've been responsible for a death.  Most Rimohrs go their entire careers without killing anyone.  How do you account for that?"

"Sir, my opinion of a great many Rimohrs is not something I'd care to air in front of my superiors.  In any case, I would suggest that I have perhaps been exposed to more dangerous cases than the average Rimohr, due to being an intern who is not able to come to work every day.  My training officer calls me in mainly for the touchy or interesting cases, and that often leads to violence."

"You're suggesting the internship program is to blame for this death?"

"No, sir.  You asked me to explain why I had caused two deaths in four months.  Since I have no concrete answer for why I've been involved in more than the average number of violent offenses, I did the best I could to provide an explanation for a possibility."

The man nodded.

Another of the questioners asked, "Was this death another accident, like the first one?"

"No, sir.  It was my intent, purpose, and goal to make sure that bastard would not survive my attack."

"Yet last year you told us you were merely aiming to wound.  What changed?"

"The circumstances, sir.  Last year's event was an obvious crime, and though some magical battle happened, it still felt like a law enforcement procedure.  We were there to arrest people.

"What happened in Bolmont last month was not law enforcement, it was combat.  It felt like combat, and we weren't arresting people, as much as trying to survive.  When I saw the man attempting to kill my training officer, I did what I would have done in combat: I killed him first.  In my previous duties as captain of the Discipline Response Team for Woodward Academy, I found out what happens when you hesitate to cross that line.  It doesn't end well for your friends."

"You're sure he was trying to kill Agent Garibaldi?"

"The spell he had cast was razpadat.  It's a disintegration hex, which I have been first-hand witness to in the past.  If I had allowed him to finish casting the spell, it would certainly have killed anyone it hit."

"Very good.  Do you have any further questions?" the man asked his two companions.  They both shook their heads negatively.  The man turned back to David.  "This inquiry finds that your actions were wholly within the standards of behavior of the Rimohrs.  You are to be commended for your quick action in saving your training officer.  You are returned to duty effective immediately."

David was a little stunned.  The hearing had been extremely short.  The man saw the look on his face.  "What happened in those streets was a blood bath, Officer.  It's amazing that more people didn't die.  Frankly, I'd rather it was a suspect than an officer.  This hearing was required by our regulations.  None of us actually felt the need for it.  Your actions were clear.  Your motivation was the only thing we were unsure of, and frankly, that didn't matter much in the great scheme of things.  We asked you questions mainly to satisfy our own curiosity.  Good luck, Officer."

"Thank you, sir," David said.  He walked out of the interview room to see Joe and Vivian waiting for him.

"That was fast," Joe said.

David shrugged.  "They said they really didn't see the need for a hearing to begin with."

"And there wasn't one.  Since people other than him died in that fight, he was a murder suspect.  That he wound up dead isn't much concern to anyone but his family."

"He has one?" David asked.

"I didn't bother to find out," Joe admitted.  "Come on, Zyla wants to see you."

"Okay.  Any luck on that serial killer?"

"Not yet.  Maybe you can track the bastard down."

"I'm going to try, that's for sure," David assured him.

David and Olissa were walking through the upstairs of his Bolmont home together.  David did this on occasion, just to make sure that there were no problems in the house.  Since he almost never went to the second floor for anything else, he made a point of checking it regularly.

Olissa was with him because she was always with him now.  She knew that would change once they got back to school, because she would continue her education so long as he did.  It gave her something to do, and the skills she was now focusing on were ones she hoped would be useful to him.  She was becoming a healer, which, though it wouldn't help David much, she figured would be of use to his family, when he had one.  She was working on Herbology because she knew that David could use a herbologist to help with his potions making.  She was working with Coach Hall to improve her MagEc skills, to become a perfect housekeeper and aide to her master.  She had been planning for this day for years, and now that it had arrived, she was as happy as she had ever been.

The two were chatting about various things as they walked, looking into each room to check for deficiencies, and not finding any.  As they entered the "right wing" of the house, as David referred to it, they heard a noise above them.

"What the hell was that?" David asked, looking up.

"I don't know," Olissa said, a trace of fear in her voice.

"There's... not a room above us," David pointed out.  "It would be attic space.  But... I've never seen a door to the attics."

As they talked, they heard the noise again.  It sounded like running feet.

"What do we do?" Olissa asked him.

"First, let's make a really careful look for a door to the attic.  It might be hidden in a closet or something."

The two spent an hour examining every room on the second floor.  There was no door to the attic space above in either wing.

"What now?" Olissa asked.

"Well, there's only one other simple option.  There might be a door hidden in the master bedroom someplace."

"Let's go look."

When they arrived in the bedroom, they realized that the closet took up one entire wall.

"Inside the closet would be a great place to hide a door," David said.  They went in, taking a firefly with them so they could see better.  David examined the wall carefully.  This was made more difficult by the fact that the chosen finish was a tongue-and-groove boarding that would hide the horizontal cracks, with the occasional vertical strip that could hide any vertical cracks.  They looked for a long time, trying to spot it, but had no luck.

"Let's try the other side," Olissa said.  "There's no closet boarding there to hide it."

"No, just a huge bed."

"Well, I wouldn't think it'd be behind the bed," Olissa said.

The two searched the wall of the bedroom for just as long as they did the closet.  There was still no sign of an entrance.

Olissa slumped down onto the bed.  "Well, now what?" she asked.

David's head suddenly came up.  "Now we remember who built this house," David said.  "Come on."

David took Olissa by the hand and then ghosted himself.  Olissa gasped at the unpleasant sensation, but she stuck with David.  He walked directly toward the bedroom wall, not stopping when he got there, but passing right through it.  Olissa followed nervously behind him.

The two were now standing in the attic space.  David faded back to solid form, and then turned around and looked at the wall, confirming that there was not, in fact, a door to enter this area.

"Jacob's a demighost," David explained.  "He didn't need a door.  If he wanted to hide something up here, the best way to do so would be to make it a space only he could get to."

Olissa nodded.  "So what's in here?  What did we hear?"

David cast lux to give them more light to see by.  There were skylights, but it was a cloudy day, so the room wasn't that well-lit.

In the gloom, they saw work tables, several books and various tools and instruments.  At each end of the room sat some kind of archway.

Suddenly, as they stood wondering what was going on, a bright light came out of the archway behind them.  They turned just in time to see five small beings leave the archway and enter the attic.  The beings were mostly human in appearance, though extremely short.  They were slight of build, and their skin had the slightest green tinge to it.  Their hair was curly and black.  The creatures came up short, seeing the two humans, their eyes opening much larger than any human's.  For a long moment, no one moved, but then the creatures just laughed and ran past them, running into the other archway and disappearing.

"It's a travel gate," Olissa said in wonder.

David wasn't so sure.  He went over and looked at one of the books on the table.  It was open to a particular page, and he read the writing there.

"It's not a travel gate," David said.  "It's a portal."

"What's the difference?" Olissa asked.

"A travel gate moves you between worlds, but it's in exactly the same spot in both worlds.  In other words, a travel gate has one end in Dugerra  and another end in Earth, but the two ends overlap physically, you get it?"

"I think so."

"Portals like these take you from one place to another within one world.  In other words, if we were to step through one of these gates, we'd be somewhere else in Dugerra."

"Where?"

"This doesn't say.  I wonder what those creatures were."

"House trolls," Olissa told him.

"There are trolls that live in houses?"

"Well... they used to.  People used to take them as servants."

"You mean as slaves?" David said, raising an eyebrow at her.

Olissa blushed.  "Yes, Master," she replied with a grin.  "Anyway, they are pretty good at domestic chores, which is why they were enslaved.  No one's allowed to enslave them anymore, though some people do hire them to work for them.  They're tireless workers for small tasks like household stuff."

"I think I'll stick with the brownies."

Olissa nodded.  "Some people like to have their servants visible.  Plus, the house trolls don't mind being seen, so if you need a butler or someone to help at a party, then the house trolls are better suited than the brownies."

"Right.  Where do they live?"

"In Shovianox.  What we call Africa."

"So, unless there is another portal in someone's house somewhere, then these portals lead to Africa?  Holy shit."

"We could walk through and find out."

David looked down at the book to check that out.  He flipped the page, and was startled at what he found.

"Let's go through that one," he said, pointing to the one nearest the bedroom.

"Okay."

David took Olissa's hand, and they stepped through the portal.

After a brief and slightly nauseating experience that was impossible to describe, they found themselves in... a darkened attic.

David cast lux again, and then he ghosted himself, sticking his head through the wall to see what was on the other side.  When he pulled himself back, he nodded and then faded to solid form.

"Where are we?"

"In the other attic," David said.  "This portal just leads to the other side of the house."

"What about that portal?" Olissa asked, pointing to the one at the far end of the room.  As she pointed, it lit up, emitting a burst of light as the same five young house trolls - at least, David assumed they were the same five - came barreling through the opening.  They laughed and giggled as they ran past David and Olissa, and disappeared into the other portal.

"We're just going to have to look for ourselves.  They don't seem to be suffering any ill effects from repeated use."

"Nope," Olissa agreed.

David once again took Olissa's hand as they headed for the other portal.  Taking a deep breath, they stepped through it together.

David and Olissa found themselves standing at the bottom of a grassy hill.  The heat was intense; David figured they must be near, or south of, the equator for it to be so warm in January.  He looked up the hill they were standing at the foot of.  Just at the top, he saw another portal.

"I wonder if that's the one that leads to the other side of the house," David said.

"Look.  There's the kids," Olissa said, pointing.  They were up on top of the hill, and they each jumped onto the back of a very odd looking bird with a long neck and very stiff wings.  The birds, feeling the light weight of the children, hopped off the ground and extended their wings fully.  They glided down the hill at a tremendous rate, pulled up at the bottom to bleed off speed, and then settled to the ground.

The kids each hopped off their bird, and they ran as a group, giggling and laughing, right past David and Olissa and disappeared into the portal.

While the kids were gone, the birds all took to the air again.  They flapped slowly up to the top of the hill and landed, each turning to face the hill's drop-off.

"They're actually waiting for the kids," David said.

"They're trained."

"Or pets," David agreed.

Shortly, the kids emerged from the portal at the top of the hill.  They milled around for a few minutes, talking to each other, then they headed back for the birds.

"The portals are a damned ski lift," David said.  "Or an escalator, or what-have-you."

Olissa chuckled, then grew serious.  "Why separate them by so much, though?  Heck, why do they go through your house at all?  Why not just have a portal go from here to the top of the hill?"

"You can't," David told her.  "What little I read suggested the portals can only exist in specific places.  Each end is determined by the magical currents around the planet that coalesce in specific locations."

"Lucky that the house was in the perfect spot for them."

"I highly doubt luck had anything to do with it.  I imagine the house was built where it was, and designed the way it was, specifically for the purpose of harnessing these portals."

"Why?" Olissa asked.

"I have no idea.  Come on, let's go back.  I want to see if there's more information."

They stepped back through the portal they were standing near, and found themselves once again in the "left wing" attic of the house.  David cast lux, and he looked over the worktables in this attic now.  He found one book, sitting on the table by itself.  He opened it, and began to read.  The first two pages caused him to shudder, and he closed the book.  He suddenly realized that it had the seal of the King of Callamandia on it.  There was no security warning visible, but he wondered if he was even allowed to read the book.

Picking it up, he turned to Olissa.  "Come on," he said.  He took her hand and ghosted them, moving back into the bedroom.  He faded back to solid form and looked at Olissa seriously.

"Okay, so... now you're my slave, right?" he said.

Olissa nodded.

"Here's my first order as your Master.  You will never talk to anyone about what you just saw.  You won't mention the portals, the house trolls, the attics... none of it.  Not to Gwen or Flo or even Bispy.  As far as you're concerned, those attics don't exist.  Understood?"

"Yes, Master," Olissa said, confused, because she'd not read the book.

"Also, you aren't to read this book.  I'm not sure it's even legal for me to read it, but I'm going to take that chance.  But you must not read it."

"Yes, Master.  Can you tell me what's going on?"

"I'm not sure yet.  But I'm damned well going to find out."

David spent the rest of his day reading as many of the books from the attics as he could cram in.  They were more like journals or diaries than textbooks, so they were quick reads, but there were quite a few of them.  The more that he read, the more astonished and dismayed he became.

Olissa, seeing his mood, left him alone.  She made his meals, not because he needed to eat but because she knew it comforted him to do something "normal".

That night, David barely slept.  He was tormented by what he'd read.  He knew that he had to get answers to his questions.  He vowed to do it in the morning.

It was that vow that led him to be standing where he was, just outside the space encompassed by Jacob's Haven prison.  David finally stepped inside and looked around.

"David!" Jacob said.  "Good to see you!"

"Hey, Jacob," David said.

"You seem troubled."

"I am troubled.  Just what the hell did you get me into?"

"To what are you referring?"

David held up the book that bore the king's mark.  "I'm talking about this."

"Ah, so you discovered the attic.  May I ask how you managed to find it?"

"Some children decided to use my attic as a lift."

Jacob nodded.

"What the hell is this all about?  What is an OmniPortal?  Why are there four portals in my house?  How did you find those portals, and why did you build them?"

Jacob held up his hands.  "Please, David, slow down.  I will answer your questions as best I can.  Please, sit."

David took a seat on a sofa.

"I won't be able to give you as much detail as you'd like.  The work, you see, was not mine.  It was my wife, Giselle's.  She was a wizard and a researcher, and she discovered the existence of portals.

"The energy field we call magic has what Giselle called 'lines of focus'.  These lines of magic wrap around Dugerra like a web, all twisted up.  In certain places, the lines of the web come together.  At those points, what she called 'nodes', the opportunity exists for a portal to be created.  But a portal's entrance and exit must be fixed, and there must be a direct path along the web from one to the other.

"When she first started working on these portals, she brought her work to the king.  The king commissioned her to discover everything she could about the portals.  Her research showed her some of the best places to build portals.  The easiest for her to get to were the ones that existed where the house now stands.

"Because the work was secret, and because it was potentially dangerous, we built the attics to secure the information.  The only way to get in or out of them, without damaging the house, is to be a ghost.  She depended on me to move her in and out of the attic space."

"No one else knows about this?"

"Whoever has seen the king's records.  I haven't told anyone.  Giselle never talked about it, even with me.  So, unless you've told people..."

"Only the woman who was with me when I discovered them, and I've already sworn her to secrecy."

Jacob nodded.  "There are records in the royal archive.  But they are over a hundred fifty years old now.  I can't imagine too many people have looked that far back."

"Except the scribes.  Particularly Master Elderwok.  He's in charge of studying ancient artifacts.  He would look that far back and much farther."

Jacob nodded.  "So, it's possible that some people do know.  If they know, I imagine they're keeping it to themselves.  If people knew about portals, they'd want them all over the place.  But there are security, safety, and privacy concerns that make it a dangerous concept."

David nodded.  "So, what the hell is an OmniPortal?"

"As I said, for a regular portal, both ends must be fixed.  They each exist at a specific node within the web."

"Right..."

"An OmniPortal has only one fixed end.  The other end can be steered to any node on the web.  From the fixed location of the portal, you would be able to move anywhere in Dugerra in seconds.  The security implications of that were so staggering, the king himself swore us both to secrecy.  It was at that point the work was terminated.  The king couldn't risk having this information known.  You see, the OmniPortal cannot be created.  It exists somewhere of its own choosing.  The king couldn't chance the idea that it might exist within the boundaries of an enemy state."

"Like Vrudena," David said.

"Exactly.  If the weres had the power to move directly into Senesty, can you imagine the devastation?"

David nodded.  "So no one knows where the OmniPortal is?"

"Not to my knowledge.  If the king continued the research without Giselle, we knew nothing of it.  It would have been difficult to continue without her notes, however, which she never did give over to the royal court."

"I've read through most of them," David said.

Jacob nodded.  "If you go looking, David, be very careful.  What you find could be more dangerous to Callamandia than anything else in existence."

"I don't know as I've got the time right now, even if I did have the inclination," David told him.

Jacob nodded.  "That may very well be for the best."

"I don't mind filling in for you, Chief, but do I get overtime pay?" Tanya asked.

David snorted.  "You get as much overtime pay as I got while working as a DIRT captain."

"Well, that sucks," Tanya said with a grin.  "What are you off to do now?"

"I get to spend a week with the Child Safety Board."

"You don't sound too thrilled."

"I'm not.  I've had dealings with the CSB before."

"You don't think protecting children is important?" Tanya asked, surprised.

"I do, but apparently they don't.  From my experience, they're not really worried about the safety of the child, they're worried about the little boxes on their forms."

"They can't all be like that," Tanya objected.

"Maybe not.  I've only met two of them.  But my training officer didn't give me cause to think that it was unusual for them to act that way."

Tanya frowned.  "Maybe you can inspire them to do better."

"If by that you mean smack them upside the head a few times, I'll be glad to."

Tanya chuckled.  "I'll see you next week."

David nodded.  He then turned to the new office manager.  "Sheila, if anyone really needs to talk to me, just mirror me.  But Tanya's in charge while I'm gone, so I can't imagine why anyone's going to need me."

Sheila nodded.  "I'll try to keep things afloat until you get back," she told him with a smile.

David smiled at her.  She was either hitting on him, or trying to be overly positive.  In either case, he wasn't going to worry about it.  "See you next Monday, at the latest."

"Yes, sir."

"Officer Intern David Stroud, meet Agents Mary Boscarelli and Carlos Nieto."

David shook their hands and greeted them.

"This is Agent John Sullivan, your training officer for the week."

David shook the man's hand.

"At least they didn't assign me to Agent Noyes," David said.

"You have a problem with Ed?" Agent Nieto asked.

"Let's just say his middle name ought to start with the letter A."

"Why?" Carlos asked, confused.

"Because his name would then be Ed A. Noyes."

Mary groaned and Sullivan chuckled.  Carlos just shook his head.

"Okay, well... take your cues from Agent Sullivan.  Your job is to assist him.  His job is to make any arrests we need made, and to assist us in interrogations by looking intimidating.  You... don't look intimidating, sorry," Mary told him.

David shrugged.  "I didn't get much choice as to my age when I un-died."

"You're not human?" Carlos asked.

"No, I'm a demighost.  Am I more intimidating now?"

"Yes, but not in a useful way," Mary replied for Carlos, who looked a little pale.  "In any case, we don't actually have anything to do at the moment.  We have paperwork to do, and you... can just sit and eat donuts, I guess."

"Fine with me."

"Don't get too fat now," Mary said sarcastically, looking at Sullivan, who had a healthy gut on him.

"I don't gain weight, Agent Boscarelli.  I can eat the entire box with no ill effects."

She frowned at him.  Her own waistline was threatening to expand, and to have someone admit to not having any trouble with their weight irked her.  "Whatever.  We have work to do."

"Don't mind them," Sullivan said once they'd walked away.  "They think, because they work directly for the government, they're too important for us lowly Rimohrs."

David nodded.  "From what I've seen, their arrogance is even less deserved than ours."

"Ours?"

"Meaning the Rimohrs as a whole, not any specific person."

"Ah," Sullivan said, nodding in understanding.

"So, do I call you John, or Agent Sullivan?"

"Everyone calls me Sully."

"Okay."  After several long moments of awkward silence, David said, "So, where are the donuts?"

Sully laughed, and pointed to the table with the refreshments.

David's first day with the CSB was a total waste.  He and Sully sat around and chatted.  It was like being a fireman in a town with no fires.

Finally, the following day, they had a case to go on.

"Two parents have been accused of neglecting their children.  They were reported by a teacher, who claims the kids are showing up to school in dirty clothes, obviously hungry and unbathed."

Sully asked, "How many kids?"

"Four."

"Where?" David asked.

"Treacle.  Ever been there?"

"Twice," David confirmed.

The carriage ride took a while, but they finally pulled onto the street where their suspects lived.  Once they reached the house, all four exited the carriage.

"Just hang back," Sully told David.  "Let them do the talking.  Our job is to look mean."

"Easy for you to say."

"Hell, you're a demighost.  Just glare at them."

"Oh, you know about that, do you?" David asked with a grin.

"You're not the first I've met."

David nodded, then turned his attention to the CSB agents.

"I can hear movement, but they're not answering the door," Carlos said.

Mary banged on the door hard, "Child Safety Board!  You are required to open the door!"

The rustling inside grew louder, but no one came to the door.

The CSB agents stepped away from the door.  Mary turned to Sully.  "This is your job.  Get us in there."

Sully turned to David.  "You want to do it?"

"We worried about damage to the house?"

"The more damage you do, the more they have to fix.  If the problem is money, that makes the situation worse," Sully told him.

David nodded.  He pulled out his wand, pointed it at the door and chanted, "Avata."  The lock clicked, and David reached forward, opening the door slightly.

The CSB agents pushed forward, but David motioned them back.  "You might want to let us lead.  If they're not going to answer the door for you, they may be violently hostile."

"He's got a point," Sully agreed.

Mary and Carlos backed away.  Sully stepped up toward the door, and David stepped to one side, the palm of his hand flat on the door, ready to push it open.  Sully pulled his wand, and then nodded to David.

David pushed the door open, and Sully rushed in, moving to the right.  David came through the door right behind him, moving left.

They saw before them two kids.  The children were filthy and were confined inside a play pen that would have been too small for just one of them.  There were no adults present.

"Where are your parents?" Mary asked.

The older of the two children, who was maybe eight, shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.  The younger child, who looked to be about six, just stared at them.

"Where are your other two sisters?"

The older one just pointed through a doorway.

Sully and David checked the doorway, which led to a hall.  It was fairly obvious which room the sisters were in, as there was a huge padlock on one door.

Sully blasted away the padlock, and the two Rimohrs entered the room.  They found the two girls huddled on a bed.  The sheets were filthy, and the girls looked scared.

"Don't worry, we're not here to hurt you," David told them.

"Where are your parents?" Carlos asked the girls.

"Daddy's at work," the oldest said.  "Momma's at the store."

David and Sully moved back out into the living room while the CSB agents questioned the girls.

"So now what do we do?" David asked.  "Don't think we want to be mean and intimidating to the children."

Sully smiled grimly.  "We just hang loose and wait."

Their wait wasn't long.  In only a couple minutes a woman came bursting through the front doorway.

"What the hell is this?" she demanded.  "Get out of my house!"

"Rimohrs, ma'am," Sully told her.

"Who gave you permission to break into my house?" the woman demanded.

"We did," Agent Boscarelli told her.  She held up her credentials.  "Child Safety Board.  We have a report about children being neglected.  The condition of this house would suggest something far worse than mere neglect."

"Well, I don't know who's been lying to you, but there's nothing wrong with my kids!"

"Except being dirty, poorly clothed and undernourished," Carlos said.

"That's a lie!  My kids are fed the same food my husband and I eat!"

"And how much of it do they get?" Mary asked coldly.

The woman didn't respond to that.

"Not to mention your children have been illegally imprisoned within the home."

"I had to go to the store.  I didn't want them to get into things."

"And what if there had been a fire?"

"There wasn't."

"But there could have been, which is why doing such things is illegal.  Where is your husband?"

"He's at work."

"Where does he work?"

"He's a metalsmith's assistant, at the forge."

"You might want to contact him and tell him to come home."

"He can't afford to be missing a day of work over your idiocy!"

"Oh, he's going to be missing a lot more than one day," Carlos told her.  "You and your husband are both going to be charged with child neglect and child endangerment.  Agent Sullivan, if you would."

David stepped to one side, so that he could still cover the woman in case she tried to do something stupid, while Sully stepped forward.

"Ma'am, you're under arrest by order of the Child Safety Board.  Please hold out your hands."

"I will not!  This is utterly ridiculous!"

"Ma'am, if you don't hold out your hands, I will have to employ other means to restrain you."

"You do and I'll have your badge!"

Sully sighed.  David said, "Sully?  Mind if I give it a shot?"

Sully motioned him forward.  David stepped right up to the woman, his eyes boring in on her.  She shivered at the look on his face.

"Hold out your hands you worthless piece of human waste.  If you do not do so, the other method of restraining you involves binding you hand and foot and carrying your sorry ass out of this house, in front of your children and your neighbors."

The woman paled at that.

"Oh, yes, your neighbors.  We will make absolutely sure to make enough of a racket that they will all come out of their houses to see you, hogtied and carried out of here.  Or you can be sensible, and we will do this quietly.  Your choice.  I'll be happy to hex you, if that's what you'd prefer."

David's glare was distinctly uncomfortable, though he wasn't using the full weight of his gaze on her.  The woman finally held out her hands, and Sully enacted the handcuff hex on her.

"Smart choice," Sully told her.  "David, you want to escort her out to the carriage?"

"Do I wait with her or come back here?"

"Wait out there.  We'll have to drive over to the forge once someone comes to collect the kids."

David nodded and motioned the woman to walk in front of him.

David's third day at the CSB had them handling minor issues that were cleared up easily, plus an ongoing matter that they were merely checking in on.  Between those cases was traveling, since the CSB office handled a region just as large as the Rimohr office did.

On David's fourth day, however, things got ugly.  They were called to a home in Bolmont, where a father was suspected of beating his young son.  When they arrived in the home, there was a lot of shouting between parents, but no children in sight.

"What the fuck do you want?" the father snarled when the CSB agents stepped into the yard.

They identified themselves and asked, "Where is your son?"

"In the house.  The pussy complained about his arm hurting, so I have to do his goddamned chores.  Now get off my case!"

"Sir, we need to see your son."

"So go see him and leave me the fuck alone!"

The man returned to zapping weeds in the yard.  All four of the officers went into the house, accompanied by the woman, who looked scared.

"He's probably in his room," she said, her voice shaking.

The CSB agents walked down the hall while the Rimohrs stayed in the living room.  The adults were the likely threat, so that's where they would stay, in case of trouble.

The CSB agents brought the boy out to the living room.

"How did this happen?" Mary demanded, motioning to the child's arm.

"He... he fell down," the mother said, clearly lying.

"And broke his arm?  From falling down?  What did he fall off, the roof?"

"He was climbing a tree," she offered.

"And you thought this arm was going to heal itself, so he didn't need to go to a healer," Carlos said.

"I was trying to convince my husband to take him," she said.

"What fucking shit are you blaming on me again, Margret?" the man bellowed from the doorway.

"Why hasn't this child been to a healer?" Mary demanded of the man.

"It just happened!" the man growled in reply.

"It happened before we got here.  He should have been on his way to a healer or infirmary immediately."

"I have to finish the work he was supposed to be doing!  Off playing in a tree, he's supposed to be taking care of the yard!"

"Agent," David said, motioning to Mary.  David had been looking at the child's arm during the discussion.

"What have you got, Officer Stroud?" she asked.

"See these marks?"  David indicated some red marks on the boy's arm, right about the point where it was apparently broken.

"You said he fell out of a tree?" Mary asked the man.

"Yeah, so what?"

"What did you do after he fell?" Mary asked.

"Told him to get back to work!  Then he bitched that his arm hurt, so I told him to go to his goddamned room."

"You didn't help him up?"

"Why would I do that?  He's eight, he can pick his own damned self up."

"He has a broken arm.  You didn't help him up?  There are finger marks on his arm, as if someone was gripping it tightly."

"Okay, so, yeah, I picked him up off the ground."

"By his broken arm?"

"What?" the man asked.

"These finger marks are right on top of the spot where the break is.  You grabbed your son and hauled him off the ground by his broken arm?"

"Of course not.  I grabbed his other arm.  Didn't I, Jeremy?"

The boy nodded mutely.

"Ma'am?" Carlos asked.

"I didn't see," she told them.  "When I came outside, Jeremy was already standing up again."

"Uh-huh."

"Officer Stroud, take the boy out to the carriage.  We'll take him to a healer.  Make sure to get pictures of that bruising, too."

"Right.  Come on, Jeremy."

"'kay," the boy said, almost in a whisper.

"You're not taking my son anywhere," the man said, reaching out to grab David and stop him.  David faded at just the right second, and the man's hand passed right through him.  David then stepped clear of the man and faded back to solid form.  He took out his wand and leveled it right at the man's nose.

"Attempt to interfere with my duties again, and we'll be taking two people to the healer.  Step aside, while you can still walk."  David's wand was crackling with energy, and the man's eyes crossed, staring at the little sparks jumping off the tip.  He moved out of David's way.

David took Jeremy outside, in the sunlight, and got several images of the bruising with his wand.  He then helped Jeremy climb up into the carriage, and told him to wait there.  He then returned to the house.

"Come on," Sully said when David re-entered the home.

"We're not arresting this pile of dogshit?" David asked.

"We don't have enough evidence that he was the one who caused the child's injury.  As such, we cannot take him into custody," Agent Boscarelli told him.  She and Agent Nieto then walked down to the carriage.

Sully just looked at David, understanding his anger, but having done the job too long to share it.  He shrugged in ambivalence.

"Give me a minute," David told Sully quietly.  Sully nodded and walked back down to the carriage.  David turned and faced the husband.

"What do you want?" the man demanded.

David changed his coat.  Instead of a Rimohr symbol, it was now just a blank black coat.

"I want to give you a message, from me to you.  Not me as a Rimohr, or as an agent of the government.  Me as someone who knows what you just did to your son."

"You can't prove shtttt...."

The man's words were cut off as David wrapped his hand around the man's throat and squeezed.  He slammed the man back against a wall and held him there, his eyes boring in on him with the inhuman gaze that caused the man to wonder where the nearest bathroom was.

"If I find out you've hurt your son like this again, I will be back here.  Again, not as a Rimohr, and not as an agent of the government.  As a wizard and a demighost that will show you the real meaning of pain and suffering.  You broke the arm of an innocent eight-year-old boy.  Do anything like that again, and I will break a lot more than one of your bones.  Got it?"

The man, struggling to breathe, nodded his head.

"Good."

David didn't just let go of the man, but pulled him forward and down, causing him to drop to his knees when David let go of him.  David glared at the wife, then turned and walked out of the house, joining the others in the carriage.  He changed his coat back to a Rimohr uniform on the way.

"What did you just do?" Agent Nieto demanded.

"I had something personal to say to the man.  It's not your concern."

"It is if you've jeopardized our case!" Agent Boscarelli replied hotly.

"You just told us you don't have a case," David replied.  "Since you're not going to do anything to protect the child, I reminded the man that the government isn't the only place that punishment can come from."

"That wasn't a good idea, David," Sully said.  "He could file a complaint."

"Probably will," David agreed.

"And you're okay with that?" Mary inquired.

"If it also means he won't hurt his son again, absolutely," David replied.  "Your job is defined by the title of the agency you work for.  Your entire purpose for existing is child safety.  If a few parents have to wet their pants when you show up, that's not something that's going to concern me too much."

Mary stared at him.  "I don't think this is the right place for you to be working, Officer.  I don't think I'm comfortable with you accompanying us on any more cases.  You can return to your normal duties tomorrow."

"As you wish," David replied.  "Mind dropping me off at my house, so I can get my glidecar?  Just take the next left."

When they pulled up in front of Pendergrast Manor, they were all agape.

"You live here?"

"Yes.  I own the place."

"And you work as a Rimohr?"

"What am I supposed to do?  Sit around and play games all day?  Worry about making even more money?  I took a job with the Rimohrs to help people, to keep the bad guys away from the good guys.  All my money really means is that I'm a bit more focused on the point of my job than I am with keeping the bureaucrats happy.  Good day, Agents, Sully."

David walked down his driveway as the carriage pulled off.  He shook his head at the bullshit that took place.  He found Jailla waiting in a tree near his glidecar.

"You're home early."

"Yeah, well... the CSB fired me, so to speak.  I'm going back up to the school.  I'm now back on my normal Rimohr duties... well, I guess I am.  Unless they decide to fire me, too."

"What did you do?" Jailla asked.  David explained it to him.  "I doubt they would fire you for merely threatening the man."

"Wilson will have words for me."

"Almost certainly."

"You wanted to see me, sir?" David asked, entering Wilson's office.  It was Monday morning.  Wilson didn't work weekends, and David figured that was why this had waited so long.

Wilson was about to motion for Garibaldi, but Joe was already walking in the door.  He leaned silently against the filing cabinet.  Even if David hadn't already called him and told him about the incident, he'd heard about it from Sully over the weekend.

"I have here," Wilson said, "a report from the Child Safety Board.  It details an incident in which you threatened a man.  Is this true?"

"Is the report true?  I highly doubt it, since neither of the CSB agents were in the room when the incident took place," David replied.

"I also have a complaint from the man in question," Wilson continued.

"That is probably more accurate," David allowed.

"So you admit to threatening the man?" Wilson demanded.

"I explained the consquences of his actions on a personal level, yes sir.  Again, so long as he doesn't hurt his son again, he has nothing to worry about."

"Who the fuck do you think you are?" Wilson screamed.  "You can't just randomly go around threatening people to get your kicks!"

"The threat was hardly random, Agent Wilson.  Nor do I get off on threatening people," David replied.  "I would rather, however, the man be afraid of me than to have to pick up the child's dead body because the man believed no one would do anything to stop him."

David was calm, and didn't raise his voice in the slightest.  He was also not nervous or afraid.  The latter made Wilson angry.

For the next ten minutes, Wilson yelled, ranted, and threatened.  David had to stifle a yawn.

Finally, Wilson stopped to take a breath, and slumped back down in his chair.  He had been pacing his office for the last five minutes of his tirade.

"Are you done now?" David asked calmly.

"WHAT?" Wilson yelled.

"I asked if you were done."

"Am I boring you, Officer Intern Stroud?"

"Frankly, yes.  Do you actually think this is an effective disciplinary technique?  In order for this to work, I'd have to be afraid of making you angry.  I'm not.  You know that I'm not.  If you wanted to get across some point about the appropriate way to have interacted with the man, then you should schedule a training exercise, but screaming at me is completely ineffectual.  So, if you're going to punish me, punish me.  Otherwise, you are wasting the time of three government employees who really do have better things to do.  Or, at least two of us do."

The insult was not lost on Wilson.  "These two complaints will go permanently into your record.  I will be making a report to the Academy Commission concerning your behavior.  A big black mark will go in your file.  Your chances of ever becoming a Rimohr have just gotten significantly smaller.

"Any questions, Intern?"

"How's the boy?"

"What?" Wilson asked, genuinely confused.

"The little boy?  The one the man you are oh-so-concerned about broke the arm of?  How's he doing?"

"How the hell would I know?"

"Do you care?" David asked seriously.

"Not particularly," Wilson said dismissively.

"That's why I refuse to take you seriously," David said.  He then turned and walked out of the office without waiting to be dismissed.

Wilson stared after him, enraged at being so utterly disrespected by an underling.

"His career is over," Wilson spat.

Joe said nothing, instead choosing to leave the room.  He walked over and saw David sitting at his desk, calmly filling out paperwork.

"He can make it very hard for you to become a Rimohr, you know," Joe told him.

"Don't care," David replied.

"You don't care?" Vivian asked in surprise.

David looked up, pointing his InkyQuill toward Wilson's office.  "If that's what it means to be a Rimohr, if I have to have that attitude to do the job properly, I don't want the job.  I came here with the express intent of protecting innocent people from guilty people who want to do bad things to them.  I'm getting called to the carpet because I merely suggested that I might hurt someone, while that same someone is being let off scot-free for actually hurting someone.  Something is very wrong in Denmark when that is how the system works."

"We can't go around threatening people, whether they're guilty or not," Joe replied.

"Why not?" David asked.

"Because we're not the magistrate.  We don't get to decide on guilt or innocence, and because of that, we also don't get to decide on punishment."

"And if a citizen had made the same threat, what would have happened?"

"Not much."

"Exactly my point.  It's a sad day when the police have less rights than the people they protect."

"So, what, you want us to go around beating up everyone?"

"No, just the bad guys."

"That's not how we operate," Joe told him seriously.

"Yes, I see that.  What I also see is a society which takes us less and less seriously, has no fear of us anymore, and even less respect for our position.  Explain to me which part of that is something we should be striving to continue.  I've read the histories.  A hundred years ago, that man would have been pissing his pants the minute we stepped in his yard.  He wouldn't have dared to do something so utterly stupid as try to put hands on a Rimohr doing his duty.  Had he done so, he probably would not have survived the encounter.  I'm not talking about legends here, Joe, I'm talking about recorded case files and court documents.

"You told me, when I joined up, that no one challenges us.  That's bullshit.  We get challenged at nearly every crime we go to.  The warning that Jacob gave me when I was turned was old and out of date.  Nothing really bad would have happened to me had I resisted you guys when you arrested me.  Oh, you'd have still managed to catch me, but you wouldn't have done anything.

"Frankly, I don't know how long I will stick with this program.  This is why I wanted to be an intern, rather than a cadet.  The cadets aren't learning what the real casework is like.  Hell, I don't even know if Chloe's out of the Academy yet."

"Losing you would be a setback for the division," Joe said.  "Not to mention having wasted half a year of your time."

"I've got plenty to waste," David said.  "Better to waste half a year than seven of them," he said, looking at Vivian.

"You're angry right now.  Don't make decisions while you're angry," Joe counseled.

"I'm angry, yes.  But not because of Wilson.  You think anything he said in there angers me?  He's not even relevant to me anymore.  He's a bureaucrat.  When was the last case he actually worked on?  That theft in my fourth year?"

"That would be it," Joe confirmed.

"And that was for... what, like two hours?  He's not a cop.  He's a pencil pusher."

"All organizations need administrators, David," Joe said.

"Those administrators don't need to be sworn officers," David shot back.  "No agent worth his salt should want to be tethered to a desk.  Do you?"

"Hell no."

"All right, then.  Now, before you talk me into quitting this hell hole, where are we on finding the serial killer?"

"Nowhere.  We've got no idea where he went."

"Can't we just trace him?"

"No.  No trace has been put on him  He's not an unlicensed wizard, he's just a dark one."

"Right, I'd forgotten.  Okay... is there any way we'd know if he had come to Dugerra?"

"Not really, no."

"Did he take his car?"

"Nope."

"Shit.  This guy's good.  He knows we can track him.  He's probably not using credit cards, either.  He probably had a good stash of cash lying around, and he's moving using that.  Or he found a way to get a fake identity, and he'll be using that, instead.  He could steal credit cards, use those one or two times, and dump them.  This could take a very long time."

"Yes, it could."

"Shit."

"I thought being a Rimohr was important to you," Olissa said.  David hadn't related things to her the previous day because he was still too annoyed about the whole thing.  He had calmed down overnight, and so he discussed it with her after breakfast.

"Helping people is important to me.  I thought those were the same thing.  I may have been wrong."

"What did Joe say?"

"He actually hasn't given any advice.  He just encouraged me to stick with it."

"Maybe you should ask him how he deals with it."

"Maybe.  What are you working on today?"

"I have Healing class in an hour.  After that, I need to do some work on my Herbology.  I'm having some real difficulty figuring some of this out."

"Have you talked to Miss J about it?"

"No.  I... well, you and her seem to have some problems now, and I don't want to get in the middle of that."

David snorted.  "My problems with Miss J aren't something you need to worry about."

"But if she doesn't like you..."

"Oh, it's just the other way around.  She likes me a little too much."  David grinned, but seeing the look on Olissa's face, he said, "Don't worry about it.  But there'd be no problem if you went and talked to her."

"Okay."

David kissed her, and headed for his school office.  As he neared his office, he found a group of ten students facing off, four on one side and six on the other.  He unfortunately recognized the four.

One of them saw him coming, and they all started to move away.

"You make me chase you bastards, and I'll put every one if you in the infirmary for two days," David warned.  All of them froze in their tracks.

David arrived between the two groups.  He turned to the first four.

"So what is it you think you're preventing now?"

"These guys are starting a gang, just like The Clan.  We told them we weren't going to let them pull that shit again."

David turned to the six.  "Obviously you're all part of a group.  What are you doing?"

"None of your damned business.  We weren't causing any trouble until these bastards showed up."

"Everything... and I mean everything... that happens on this campus is my business.  Now answer the question."

"Fuck you."

"Roll up your sleeves."

"I don't take orders from you," the guy sneered.

"You do if you want to have all of your teeth," David warned.  "Roll up your sleeves now.  If I have to ask again, it will be after hexing you."  David pulled his wand, and he made sure the crackles that were escaping it were a little brighter than normal.  This was not difficult, as he was getting particularly annoyed.

David saw three Clan tattoos.

"Care to explain these?"

"I don't have to explain shit to you."

"You're right.  You don't, because you almost certainly won't be a student here by the end of the day."

David turned to the first four.  "I told you last semester, we don't need vigilante groups here.  You will report to Dean Lengel's office.  Now."

The four walked off toward the rock lift.

"You six will come with me."

"And if I don't?" the snotty one asked.

"Then you can wait here for Healer Hall to come and repair the damage to your body.  Don't try that 'you can't touch us' bullshit on me, jackass.  You've got about three seconds to start walking before I hurt you, badly, and carry your sorry ass to the dean's office.  Now move."

The six started walking.  When they arrived at Beckett Hall, Tracy was a little nonplussed.

"Ten of them all at once?"

"Group problem."

"It's going to get a bit crowded in the dean's office if she needs to involve the Board..."

David nodded.

"Take them across the hall into the meeting room.  I'll have Dean Lengel join you."

"Thanks, Tracy."

"No problem."

David prodded them all into the room and told them to sit.  The snotty one refused.

"You can't make me sit, asshole."

David waved his wand, and the boy collapsed to the floor.  David grabbed him by the coat and slammed him, very hard, into a chair.

"Yes, I can, you stupid little shit.  Maybe, if you're very lucky, I'll reverse the spell.  In a couple weeks."

"David?  What have we got?"

David took a deep breath as he rose.  He needed to calm down from dealing with the idiot.

"These four are our vigilante friends from last semester.  They were once again stepping into things that they should have simply reported and walked away from."

"I see.  How far did they get?"

"No one was hexing anyone just yet when I showed up."

"Okay.  You four will serve two days of detention this weekend.  Show up no later than nine in the morning on Saturday.  The next time we have to remind you that you aren't school security, it'll be a week.  You four are dismissed."

The vigilantes left quickly, not wanting to be too near to David's wrath just then.

"What's the deal with this one?" Dean Lengel asked.

"He doesn't know how to keep his mouth shut," David replied.

"Ah."

"And the six of them as a group?"

"According to our friends who just left, these six are forming a gang on campus.  Given the markings on three of them, I would suggest they are reestablishing a gang on campus.  Roll up your sleeves," David ordered.  He glowered menacingly at the troublemaker, who glared at him, but rolled up his sleeves.  The three tattoos were obvious.

"Dean Lengel, I will not go through what we went through last year.  I want these three expelled.  Immediately."

"For what violation of the school rules?"

"Being part of a criminal organization isn't a violation of the school rules?  The Clan has committed extortion, property destruction, racketeering, and murder.  And those are just the things we know about.  Removing a tattoo magically is child's play, so if these three were no longer in The Clan, they would have removed these marks.  That makes them currently active members."

"I'll have to ask the Board of Discipline about this, David.  I can't expel them on your request alone."

"As you say, ma'am," David replied stiffly.

Dean Lengel looked at him, then left the room to go convene the Board.

"This is total bullshit, dude.  We weren't doing anything."

"I don't care," David told him bluntly.  "You would have been, and I'll be quite happy to get rid of you before you have the chance."

"You're dead meat, man," the snotty one said.

David snorted.  "I'm a demighost, shit-for-brains.  There is literally nothing you can threaten me with.  What are you going to do, kill me?  Already there, asshole."

"There are worse things than death," the guy suggested.

"None that a candy-ass little shit like you is capable of," David replied dismissively.

"I ain't the only member of The Clan, fucker," the guy said.  "And I ain't the strongest member, either."

"I haven't seen a single Clan member that could stand up, toe to toe, with a remedial fourth-year.  Don't try to frighten me, dickweed.  You haven't got anything to back it up with.  Now shut up until the dean gets back."

It wasn't long before the Board of Discipline arrived in the room, with Dean Lengel following them.  The dean explained the issue to the Board, including David's demand.  The marks on the students' arms were still visible.

"You called it a demand, Madame Dean.  What will happen, Mr. Stroud, if we don't expel these students?"

"I will have each of them followed constantly by a member of security until they are caught in an activity you will expel them for.  I am one-hundred-percent certain that they will eventually commit an actual crime.  I am trying to prevent the other students from being hurt.  I repeatedly tried to do that last year.  Please tell me that you have more sense than last year's Board of Discipline."

"I was a member of last year's Board," one of the members sniffed.

"I'm well aware of that.  I was hoping you'd grown a brain by now."

"And what are these students supposed to do with their lives if we expel them?"

"That is not my problem.  This school is my problem.  The safety of two thousand other students, who are not security risks, is my problem.  By removing these six... or at the very least, these three, you increase the safety of those students in a measurable way.  The Clan is a known criminal enterprise.  Over forty Clan members have been sent to Barnard Hill already.  They still hold with an attitude of superiority, as evidenced by the obstinacy this one has demonstrated toward school security from the moment I started talking with him."

"And you hexed me for it!"

"Damn right, and if you keep it up, I'll hex you again."

"Might I ask, what did you hex him with?"

"He's currently unable to stand up.  He claimed that I couldn't make him sit down in the chair.  I chose to prove him wrong."

"Don't you think that was a bit harsh?"

"My response to that, sir, is a number."

"Excuse me?"

"Seventeen dead students and staff," David replied simply.

That put a very cold chill on the room indeed.

"I will not be party to that sort of thing again.  If I have to take the Clan down by myself, I will, but it is going to be brutal and ugly, and Clan members are going to be hexed with vicious regularity.  It will be safer for them," he said, indicating the Clan members in the room, "if you expel them."

"You're advertising the fact that you plan on doing harm to students."

"Not students.  Criminals.  Get it through your heads:  Clan members are criminals.  There is no legitimate reason for belonging to The Clan.  The Clan has only one purpose: to commit crime.  It's like suggesting there's a non-lethal purpose for being on a firing squad.  Either you're there to kill someone, or help someone kill someone.  In The Clan's case, you are either there to commit a crime, or help cover up a crime."

"We'll need to discuss this."

"I'm sure you will," David replied sarcastically.

As the Board left, Dean Lengel walked over to David.  "You seem more agitated than this one incident should account for.  Is something wrong?"

"Trouble with my other job.  Nothing to worry about."

"You're my friend, David.  I worry."

David smiled at her, but it was weak.  Quietly, he said, "Thanks, Emile."

She put her hand on his arm, then stepped back to her previous spot.

The Board took more than ten minutes before they came back in.

"The Board's decision does not need to be unanimous, and in this case, it wasn't.  The three students with Clan markings are hereby expelled from Woodward Academy.  It is the majority opinion of the board that you have violated school policy.

"As to the other three, without more proof they are involved in gang activity, we can't expel them.  And, as you didn't actually catch them doing anything, we can't punish them.  Those three are free to go."

"If you know what's good for you," David said, "You'll keep going, all the way back to where you came from.  Security will be watching you."

"Also, Mr. Stroud, the board wishes to reprimand you for your actions concerning this student.  Hexing is not permitted."

"Thankfully, the board has no authority to reprimand me," David said coldly.  "So your opinion of my actions is worth less than an Earth penny in a Dugerran shop.  The contract I signed specifically states that the only entity to which I have to answer is the Dean's office.  Now, if she wants me to step down from my post, she can ask, but I will not change the way I deal with The Clan in the slightest because it makes you folks uneasy.  Let me repeat myself: I am not going to have another seventeen dead people on my conscience.  Maybe you can live with it, but I have enough nightmares already, without adding more."

As David was about to leave the room, Dean Lengel stopped him.  "Could you at least give him his legs back?  So he actually can leave the school?"

"If you insist," David replied, waving his hand and muttering, "Zurruken."  With that, he left the room.

"Madame Dean," the board leader said, "I think you need to have a serious discussion with him about his actions."

Dean Lengel waited for the students to leave before responding to the board member's comment.

"I did.  A long one, that involved what he went through after last year's battle, and what he went through when he accidentally killed someone doing his Rimohr job.  I understand he's also had to kill one more person doing that job.  No one here has the same perspective on The Clan as he does.  No one here has the same perspective on death as he does.  I think his perspective on death is probably a great deal clearer than ours, and I'm not going to question his motivation when it comes to preventing more of it.

"I trust Chief Stroud to handle things at an appropriate level.  That level may not be one you're entirely comfortable with, but we tried being 'comfortable' with discipline last year.  You saw what it got us.  I will not second guess someone who has the experience and the training to know what works, and what doesn't.  Remember, Chief Stroud is also a Rimohr.  He has been to their academy, he is training with one of their officers.  He brings to the job more knowledge than any Chief of Security that Woodward has had in its entire existence.  I think, quite frankly, that his judgment on how to handle the situation is probably much better thought out than yours."

"Then why don't we just let him dish out the punishments?" the old member of the board asked snidely.

"Because the Education Ministry won't let him," Dean Lengel said.  "Yes, I asked.  They insist that the disciplinary procedures of the school be handled by faculty and the dean.  Besides, as he himself points out, disciplinary procedures can't be decided by just one type of voice.  He knows that there needs to be a moderating voice to his.  That doesn't mean he's going to agree with you, nor does he expect you to agree with him.  He does, however, expect that you give him the respect due him as Chief of Security.  The fact that you chose to disrespect him so obviously is what made him angry, and rightfully so.  You had no place commenting on his behavior in front of students.  You undermine the authority of his position and make his job harder by doing so, and that affects every student in this school.   Every last one of you should be ashamed of your behavior.  Now, this Board of Discipline is dismissed."

David grumbled to himself about once again being called down to Bolmont.  Joe hadn't said it was about a case, which David took to mean it was more administrative crap.

Joe was waiting for David at the entrance to the division office, and he walked over and got in the glidecar before David could get out.

"What's up?" David asked.

"You heard of Jane Bullock?"

"Name's familiar, for some reason..."

"Member of the King's Council for the Bolmont District."

"Oh, okay, that's where I know it from.  Met her once."

"Really?"

"When Ellen and I applied for the Peg Riding Guild, Bullock was there to oppose us."

"Ah.  So you two don't get along."

David shrugged.  "She withdrew her opposition in the end.  I haven't got anything against her, really.  What's this about?"

"Her daughter's been kidnapped."

"Fuck."

"Yeah."

"How old?"

"Sixteen."

"We know anything?"

"Quite a bit, apparently, but I was waiting for you before going over."

"Right.  Why didn't you tell me this was a case when you called?  I could have met you at her house."

"How would you have found it?"

"Joe, really?  You should know by now that I try to be prepared for shit like that.  I have a map of Bolmont in the storage compartment."

"Oh.  Well, I just think it looks better if we arrive together, anyway."

"Whatever," David said with a bemused chuckle.

The two arrived at the Bullock house rapidly enough, and exited the glidecar.  The two house guards, provided by the government, stepped aside immediately as the Rimohrs approached.

"Officers," Bullock greeted them.  She shook their hands in turn.  "Do I know you?" she asked David.

"Yes, ma'am.  David Stroud.  We met last year in the King's throne room."

"Oh, yes, now I remember.  You're a Rimohr now?  What happened to your guild?"

"The guild still exists.  I can't make a living running that."

"Of course," she said.  "You'll excuse me, I'm a little scattered at the moment.  Whatever you need to know, just ask, otherwise I'm likely to ramble."

"When was your daughter taken?"

"On her way to ad school this morning.  Her carriage was hijacked."

"Any idea who did it?"

"Yes.  They left a message with the carriage driver."  She produced the note, and David looked it over, then handed it to Joe.

"So, what does this Terry Benedict got against you?  All it says in the note is, 'You know what I want.'"

"Terry Benedict is a businessman of the worst sort, the kind you'd expect to find in New York or Chicago, if you know what I mean."

"A crook, in other words."

"Yes."

"Not a very smart one, though.  He signed the damned note."

"No, he's not terribly bright.  He thinks I'm the one responsible for blocking his business from getting started.  He wants to open a major casino here in Bolmont, but has been refused a permit to do so."

"Why?"

"He intends the facility to remain open all night.  That's a violation of the law."

"And he couldn't just... close at two, like the bars?"

"He claims this will cause major revenue shortfalls."

"Okay... so why is he blaming you?"

"He was seeking to have the law changed.  I refused to present his request to the Council.  Because he lives in this district, I have to be the one to present it."

"Why did you refuse to present it?"

"Because it's not a legitimate request.  He's asking to have a law changed to favor a single individual.  That sort of thing isn't allowed.  The king would strike down such a law as soon as he learned of it, and rightly so."

"So he wants you to present this law change to the Council, in return for your daughter's safety."

"No, the law actually has to pass.  I know what you were thinking, that I could just tell them about it, we would publicize a discussion of it, with ultimate rejection... but he made it clear to me that he 'knew' I could get that law changed, and that if I didn't he'd... well, do this, apparently."

"He threatened you?"

"In the way of his kind of businessman, yes.  Not something so direct that you could report it.  Just enough to know he meant to cause you serious trouble."

"Right.  Do we have an address on this joker?" David asked Joe.

"We do, but we already sent Rimohrs out to his house.  There's no one there.  He's cleared out even his two servants.  He's probably got some hiding spot away from here."

"How much time did he say in that note?" David asked.  Joe looked down.

"He didn't."

David asked Councilor Bullock, "Any idea how impatient this bastard is?"

"I don't think he'll wait very long, unfortunately.  Please, get Kristen back.  She's about as political as dry toast, and she won't understand all of this."

"We'll do our best, ma'am."

"Thank you very much."

Once back in the office, Joe said, "So, what do you do?"

David considered.  "Have we researched Benedict's real estate holdings, see if he owns other homes here?"

"Working on it," Tom told him from across the room.

"There's no way to locate a wizard?  None at all?  I mean, this guy has confessed to committing the crime already, I would think his privacy is right out the window..."

"No direct way, no.  A wizard has to be traced in order for us to find them.  He wasn't being traced."

"The way you worded that suggests there is an indirect way..."

"We would be allowed to use divination in this case, but we already tried it, and he's using an impediveur."

"What level was your proraziveur?"

"Prorazi-what?"

David rolled his eyes.  "Vivian, who's our favorite junior magistrate?"  Junior magistrates handled most of the minor administrative tasks for the Callamandian court system.  They required the same qualifications as a magistrate, but didn't have the seniority.

"Holt," she told him.  "She's very Rimohr-friendly."

"Can I get an appointment with her quickly?"

"Just ask Nancy to set it up," Joe told him.  "Her, you will need to tell that you're an intern.  I'll have to go with you."

David nodded.

"Officers, what can I do for you today?" the lovely black woman asked.  She had a British accent, which seemed out of place, but was very charming.

"Magistrate Holt," David said.  "I'm Rimohr Intern David Stroud, this is Agent Joe Garibaldi.  Sorry to take up your time, but I need a Royal Permit."

"Oh?  First, you are an intern?"

"Yes, ma'am.  I've been working with the Rimohrs since last June, but I am not a full officer.  Agent Garibaldi is my training supervisor."

"Refresh my memory, Agent Garibaldi.  The limitations on Officer Stroud's authority?"

"He's not allowed to arrest anyone.  Beyond that, he has full authority so long as he's accompanied by another full Rimohr."

Magistrate Holt nodded.  Turning back to David, she asked, "And what do you need the permit for?"

"I need to do some blockbusting."

"I see.  You are aware that only a licensed proraziveur can get a permit for that?"

"There's that word again.  What the heck is it?" Joe asked.  He had moderated his speech, since he was in front of a magistrate.

"A proraziveur, Agent Garibaldi, is someone who is trained to break through an impediveur's magic.  They're not common because the only way to use the skill legally is to have a Royal Permit from either a magistrate, or certain government officials."

David pulled out his wizarding license and handed it over.

"Level 4?  Impressive," she said.  "When were you tested?"

"Last... February or March, I think it was.  It's been a busy year, sorry."

"Quite all right.  Who are you seeking to view, and why?"

David explained the situation to her as succinctly as he could.

Magistrate Holt frowned at the story, then nodded.  "So you're hoping to locate the girl before something bad happens."

"Assuming something bad has not already happened."

"Right.  Very well, I will issue the permit.  You realize, of course, that the permit will take a day to be officially filed, but you don't need to wait.  I am giving you verbal authorization to proceed, due to the time-sensitive nature of the situation."

"Thank you, Your Honor."

Magistrate Holt smiled at him.  "Good to meet you, Officer Stroud, Agent Garibaldi.  Good luck finding the girl."

As they were heading back to the office, Joe asked, "Why did you get that license?"

"Because my professors made me test for it," David said, without bothering to explain it all.  "In any case, it looks like it might come in handy."

"Yeah."

Once they arrived back at the office, David went into the Quiet Room.  he pulled his crystal ball from his Conjuring Room and then settled into the chair, the orb in front of him on the table.

What David had to do was a little tricky.  Crystallomancy was a future-prediction form of divination, but David really needed to know what was happening right now.  His hydromancy skills were minimal, so he couldn't use that.  He would have to attempt to see a very short distance into the future, like an hour or perhaps even a minute, to see if he could find them.

They had gotten a picture of Kristen Bullock from her mother, and there was a picture of Terry Benedict in his government file, so David focused on the two of them.  He pushed his mind forward, into the crystal ball.  He had to fight his way past strong levels of anti-divination magic.  Though it would take him a while, he could sense that he would be able to break this block.  Why Benedict had not chosen to use a stronger impediveur, David didn't know, but he was glad he hadn't.  He didn't know how else they would have found the girl in time.

Getting past the blocks, David found that he still couldn't see either Benedict or Kristen.  He considered for a moment, then realized what that might mean.  He pushed his mind further outward, reaching past Dugerra, and past Haven.  His mind started to ply the future possibilities of Earth, and it was only then that images started to appear.

Where is she? he asked himself.  He could see that she was safe, though terrified and uncomfortable, since she was tied up and gagged.  No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't identify the location of her prison.  David decided to try something different.

Pulling out of his crystal ball, David put it away, and called forth another item from his Conjuring Room.  He hadn't had call to use these very much, and he didn't know if it would work or not.

David opened the box, and he pulled out the rune cubes from inside.  He needed to divine the past now, and runic interpretation was the only way to do that.  What he was doing now was a skill he'd learned in Advanced Divination Techniques: the ability to create a runic message to be interpreted.  Normally, one would use already-existing runes to discern what had happened around them, but when runes weren't available, it was possible to "do it yourself", in a sense.

David was not especially good with this particular skill.  He decided to find out if anyone else in the office had better abilities.  Asking around, no one did.  Concerned, David returned to the Quiet Room and stared down at the runes.

Might as well try.  I've got nothing to lose.  If I can't figure out where she is, it's all a waste.

David held his hands over the runes, and began a long spell.  He had long ago memorized the spell, as it was always the same for creating runic messages.  His mind focused on what he wanted to know.  The runes on the table floated and then shifted about, spinning and aligning until they were showing the right runes, in the right order.  They settled down, and David let his hands drop.

This was, of course, only half the task.  Now he had to figure out what the runes were telling him.  A few seconds later, he'd slipped into the trance that would let him interpret the message.  It didn't take too long to get what little he could out of it.

David cleaned up and headed back out to the main room.

"He's taken her to Earth."

"Aw, shit," Joe spat.

"Where in Earth?" Vivian asked.

"I don't know, exactly.  No matter how hard I tried, my vision wouldn't give me that.  I was, however, able to get the license plate number of the car he was driving when he took her there."

"It's a start," Vivian said.

"We'll need to communicate with the FBI on this one," David told Joe.

Joe just nodded.  "Let's get going."

Despite Benedict's apparent lack of sophistication in trying to hide from the law, it still took the FBI a full day to find him hiding out in a small town in Ohio.  David and Joe flew there immediately.

When they arrived in Buxton, Ohio, they stopped in at the sheriff's office.  The town was too small to have its own police force.

"Something I can do for you folks?" the sheriff asked brusquely.

"We're Rimohrs.  We're after a kidnapper."

"Oh, yeah.  The FBI called us about that.  Don't worry, we're already setting up to take him down."

"I don't think you understand, Sheriff," David said.  "This is our case."

"Anything happens in my county, it's my case, and I deal with it," the man said sourly.  "I don't need any punk-ass weirdos from out of town to help me."

Joe could tell David was about to go off on the sheriff.  He touched David's shoulder.  When David looked, Joe said, "Cooperation, remember?"

"Uh-huh."  He turned back to the sheriff.  "Sheriff Troy, I don't think you really understand what you're up against.  There's a reason this is our case, and you and your men need to stand down and not get in our way.  A young girl's life is at stake."

"Nobody tells me how to run my county," the sheriff said darkly.  "I think you two had best be moving along."

"I'm afraid we can't do that, Sheriff," David said.  "We have our job to do."

"Gomez, Jackson," the sheriff said, motioning to the Rimohrs.  Both deputies pulled their guns and pointed them at the Rimohrs.  The sheriff said, "I tried to be polite about it, but you two just weren't listening."

David raised his hand in front of Joe.  "No," he told Joe.  "You've got nothing that can protect you from those."

Joe nodded, and mimicked David, who had his hands raised.

Deputy Gomez came over and handcuffed both men, then sat them down heavily in chairs.

"Now, you two are going to sit right there and wait while we take care of business."

David looked over at Joe.  "Are we done 'cooperating' with these yahoos now?"

"Yes, I think we are."

David nodded, then closed his eyes.  In a second, his handcuffs were teleported from around his wrists to sitting on the sheriff's desk.

"What the-" the sheriff started.

As David rose from his seat, Gomez started to draw his weapon.  David used sem and ripped the gun from the man's hand.  David unloaded the weapon and dropped it on the floor.

"You don't seem to understand, Sheriff Troy," David said coldly, "That we outrank you in every conceivable way.  Not only do you not have the authority to arrest us, you don't have the ability.  Any mediocre wizard could completely wipe the floor with your entire department, single-handed.  The federal penitentiary has no cell that could hold one of us.  The man you are going up against could kill every last one of you without breaking a sweat.  Your only advantage is your gun, and you saw how easily I took care of that problem."

Jackson pulled his baton and came at David.  David blasted him with an energy ball that knocked him across the room, tumbling across three desks before he finally wound up on the floor.

"If I were in a bad mood, that would have killed him.  You people are getting me there damned quickly.  Now, strip."

"What?" the sheriff asked.

"Take off your clothes.  All of you."

"Fuck off," one of the other deputies said.

"Fine, we can do it the faster way."  David closed his eyes for a brief fraction of a second, then made a strange gesture with his hand.  Suddenly, every article of clothing on any deputy in the room was lying in a heap in the middle of the floor.

"What was the fucking purpose of that?" Sheriff Troy demanded, trying to cover himself.

"To humiliate the fuck out of you, quite frankly," David replied.  "And to let you know just how woefully outclassed you are.  Now, you're going to march back into the back and lock yourselves into the cells."

"How are we supposed to get out?"

"That's not my problem.  If I'm feeling generous, I'll come back once we've finished our business and let you free.  But we are Rimohrs, we have a job to do, and I'm not going to let you get in the way of it."

"And if I choose not to walk back there?" Troy asked.

"Then you will never walk again for the rest of your worthless little life," David replied coldly.

Troy decided to walk back there.

David closed and locked all of the cells, then returned to free Joe.

"You know we have to let them out when we're done, right?"

"I fully expect them to be released by one of the other deputies by then," David replied.  "Come on, let's go get Kristen."

Finding the house had not been all that difficult.  Encouraging the three officers surrounding it to go away was scarcely more so.

David and Joe knelt behind a shrub and discussed ways to get into the house.

"Might this be a time where we should make use of the fact that I'm a demighost, and just send me in there invisibly?"

"But then you can't testify to what you see inside," Joe replied.

"Do I really need to?  He left a signed note.  Not to mention, Kristen can testify to what she's seen.  If necessary, I can always just become visible for a short time while I'm in there.  I can then testify to what I saw while visible."

"Fair enough.  It's probably the safest move.  I don't think Wilson would approve, but he's not here, and I am.  The girl's safety is your ultimate priority, David."

"I know that.  We can always arrest Benedict later, if necessary.  It's very hard to un-kill someone."

"Right.  Okay, go for it."

David faded to invisibility and walked over to the house.  He slipped right through the door and walked around.  He looked into each room, seeing who was there, and also looking for Kristen.  He moved upstairs.  He found Benedict playing poker with two other men, who looked to be subordinates.  Kristen was nowhere to be found.

David moved up to the attic, and still didn't find her.  Next, he headed down to the basement, and still there was no sign of her.

Hidden room of some kind?  Maybe I need to start sticking my head through walls.

David did just this, walking with his body actually inside of a wall, tilting his head left and right to investigate either side of the wall.  Finally, he found her in a hidden closet in the den.

David pulled himself fully into the room, and faded to solid form.  Kristen saw him, and looked at him with fear.  She hadn't yet registered his uniform.

David pulled off Kristen's gag.

"Who are you?" she asked after coughing a couple times.

"Officer David Stroud, Rimohrs.  Want to get out of here?"

"Hell yes," she said.

"Okay."  David pulled out his wand and dissolved her bonds.  She stood up shakily, rubbing her wrists.

"In order to get you out of here safely, I'm going to have to ghost you.  Your body will be able to pass through walls.  This will be a little uncomfortable for you, but it's better than getting shot."

"Yeah," she agreed.

David gently took her by the arm and faded himself.  Kristen gasped as the transition took place.

"Now what?" she asked.

"Just follow me."

David had plotted a route out of the house that would keep them clear of the other men in the house.  When they got outside, David returned to solid form.  Kristen gasped at the discomfort caused by the second transition, as well.

Sticking against the side of the house, David motioned Joe over.  Joe kept in a crouch and ran across the yard.

"There are only three of them.  They're all upstairs, in one of the bedrooms that's been converted to... I don't know what you'd call it.  A sitting room, I guess.  Table, chairs, just a place to lounge around.  In any case, it's the second door on the right from the top of the stairs."

"Kristen," Joe started, "how many men have you seen?"

"Just the three.  The two that kidnapped me, and the boss-guy."

Joe nodded.  David asked, "Can we afford to leave her here?"

"You know better."

"I thought not.  How do you want to do this?  Call them out?"

"That just invites a battle."

"How about an illusion?" David asked.

"What did you have in mind?"

David told him, and he approved.

David stepped far enough away from the house to see into the second floor windows.  He found the one occupied by the three men, and concentrated.  He formed an illusion inside the room.

"Boss," one of the subordinates said, panicked, "fire!"

"Shit!" Benedict said.  "Let's get the fuck out of here.  Benny, you grab the girl.  Don't risk your neck for the bitch, though.  If you can't get to her, no big deal.  Come on!"

The three men rushed from the room, and dashed down the stairs.  Benedict and the one man headed straight for the front door.  Benny headed for the den.

As the two men came out of the house, Joe, who was peeking around the corner of the house, shouted, "Rimohrs!  Drop to the ground immediately!"

The subordinate turned and tried to yank his wand.  David, who was standing near the trees and as yet unseen, zapped the man with a lightning bolt hex that had him writhing on the ground in less than a second.

Benedict's head snapped from where Joe's voice had come from, to where the hex had come from, and back.  He immediately raised his hands.

"On your knees, Benedict!" Joe shouted.

At that point, Benny emerged from the house.

"Boss, she wasn't - what the fuck?"

"On your knees, punk!" Joe hollered.

Benny turned and fired at Joe, having pulled his wand earlier in preparation for untying the girl.  The blast hit the corner of the house, but Joe was not hurt.

Benny was, however, as David's energy ball slammed into him and sent him flying back into the house.  Benny rolled around on the floor, groaning in pain and agony.  David walked back across the yard to stand over Benedict while Joe brought Kristen out from hiding.

"How the fuck did you get her out?" Benedict demanded.

"That wasn't even that difficult," David told him.  "You're as incompetent a wizard as you are a corrupt businessman, Benedict."

"And you're under arrest," Joe continued, "For kidnapping.  Hands out."

David and Joe wrapped up their work, and put Benedict in the truck.  Joe rode in the back with him while Kristen rode up front with David.

"Thanks, you guys.  I didn't think he was gonna just let me go when they were done with whatever they were doing.  What were they doing?"

"Trying to get your mom to have a law changed."

"And they used me to blackmail her?"

"Basically."

"Assholes."

David smirked.  "That's a good description of most criminals."

Kristen giggled.  "Yeah, I guess.  What was your name again?"

"David Stroud."

"I've heard of you.  My best friend's sister went to school with you."

"Oh?  Who was she?"

"Mitzi Hopper."

David thought hard.  He said, "I know the name, but I never talked with her."

"Maybe not, but she knew all about you.  I guess you're pretty popular at the school."

"Infamous may be more appropriate," David said with a chuckle.

"Oh, bullshit, David," Joe interjected.  "That school loves you."

David snorted.  "Sometimes it does, and sometimes it doesn't.  In any case, yeah, I've been pretty visible."

"That's cool.  I'm gonna go to Woodward in a couple years, if I can get in."

"Good luck."

"Thanks.  And thanks for making sure I had the chance."  She looked back at Benedict.  "Fucking dirtbag."

Benedict said nothing.

 

David stood in the middle of Simon Atherton's living room.  Joe was standing at the front door, watching David work.  Joe had learned, over the years, that David had a real knack for finding the important pieces of evidence.  It was a skill that Joe had worked hard to develop in himself, but David seemed to do it naturally.

"The FBI went through his computer?" David asked, turning it on. 

"Yeah.  They found a plane reservation to Albuquerque, New Mexico, but nothing further has come from that."

"Do they know if he actually took the flight?"

"Yes, his name was on the list of passengers."

"He's not disguising himself.  Either he doesn't know how, or he's not worried about us following him," David said.

"How likely is it that he simply doesn't know how?"

"Pretty likely, actually.  I mean, you can only use cash for so many things.  You can't book a hotel room or an airline flight without showing identification.  Your average person doesn't know how to fake a driver's license.  It's easier to hide in Dugerra."

"Really?  Even with so many more people here?"

"Dugerra doesn't keep track of people quite so closely.  At the Slyther Inn, if you want to, you just pay granas for your room, and you never sign anything.  In Earth, they will demand a credit card, just in case you damage the room, raid the mini-bar, or make long distance phone calls.  There's always a signature and an electronic trail."

"You think maybe he might have gone to Dugerra, then?"

"I wouldn't bet against it.  What's this guy's training level?"

"He's a conjurer."

"Okay, so he's a citizen, he could go there and live.  But that makes no sense.  He went to Albuquerque.  In order to live in Dugerra there, he'd have to immigrate to Mirelia, and that would leave a trail."

"Maybe he's just hiding out, without becoming a resident?"

"But Mirelia's mostly a coastal country.  The interior has almost no settlements... except... shit."

"What?"

"The temples."

"What about them?"

"If he applied to become a novitiate, or whatever they call them, they wouldn't have asked him any questions, and wouldn't have registered it anywhere.  The Temple of the Air is right near where Albuquerque would be."

"You think he's hiding out as a monk?"

"I think acolyte was the term they used.  It's been a few years since I was there."

"You've been to a Mirelian temple?"

"All five of the public ones, actually."

"Damn, you get around."

"I was on vacation with Olissa."

Joe nodded.

"We need to go there and see if we can't find him.  I have a feeling we have to do something about letting the Mirelian government know we're coming, don't we?"

"Have to?  No, but it's polite for us to do so."

"Can we do that today?"

"Today's Saturday.  We'll have to wait until Monday."

"Shit."

"He's not likely to kill anyone while he's hiding," Joe reminded David.

"I know, but there's still a chance.  Besides, I had to put this damned case off for too long as it is, what with the kidnapping, that wasted week with the CSB, and the shit with my hearing.  We should have had this fucker already."

"Everything in its own time," Joe told him.

"Uh-huh.  Let's go back to Dugerra.  Since I can't do any case work, I should probably get started on my school work."

"Good idea."