The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

The Stratagem board was silent as ever. Now, to be fair, game boards never really speak. They sit there, they have pieces shoved on top of them, they’re occasionally hurled through the air or thrown upon the floor. For a twenty one inch plank of wood with its little squares of lacquer, it could take a lot of abuse.

This one certainly had. He’d rescued it from a pawnshop, beaten half to death. Paint tarnished, wood chipping, pieces missing. He’d seen to it all. Had new colors applied, rich red and vibrant white, varnished over to be kept serene. Had holes mended, dents fixed, practically rebuilt half of it. Had new little white brothers and little red sisters fashioned for those most lonely.

He loved this board. He polished it regularly, cared for the pieces, kept everything in order, even if it was built in the Damean style. Haughty little shits. Red wasn’t his favorite color, he much preferred the black and white tiled boards. He didn’t much enjoy the clumsy stereotypes of sorcerers mocked out in the pieces. Really, Stratagem was supposed to be played with phalangites, knights, generals, not magi, elementalists, arcanists and their towers. The Damean style was all but propaganda.

At least it was still Stratagem. Same moves, same positions, same gambits to be wrought on learned opponents from all across Ephaos. Everyone who had any intellect had played Stratagem. Everyone ever. It was a game older than words. Kings, emperors, warlords, tyrant mages, everyone knew Stratagem, and each could even be beaten by a lowly peasant. All one needed to know was the rules. Everyone stood a fair chance, everyone was equal on the game board.

Perhaps it was some great irony that he, once a lowly peasant himself, sucked absolute shit at Stratagem. He knew the rules, of course, a babe could learn the rules. He’d studied books, tomes, treatises on the game and its gambits, the strategies one could employ, the arcane descriptions of legendary games denoted only by strings of letters, leaving him to imagine fierce looks, swears tossed, daggers waved and swords drawn in mid-match...

It was all such great drama. It was a brilliant game, it was his favorite game.

And yet no matter how much he studied, no matter how easy the opponents he challenged, he was still utter balls at it.

And perhaps it was this frustration that had driven him to take this Stratagem board which he had nurtured so much, take its pieces which he had coddled since their adoption, and mutilate them all with a woodcarver’s knife.

Every piece had been defaced. Every square and intersection on the board had been marked. Every inch of the sides, even all over the underside. Carved into, graven with lines and circles and angles that would’ve made even a howling madman dizzy.

But his were not the drunken graffiti and scrawlings of madmen. His were the drunken graffiti and scrawlings of a genius.

Which was why thirty two pieces now floated in midair above sixty four glowing squares. It had pained him to draw those runic enchantments, it was true. But just as every painter needed a brush and every sculptor needed a chisel, he, too, needed his tool.

It was just a great fucking disappointment that his tool was still being useless. He sat up in his hammock, nearly hammered his head into the boards of the main deck, then let dangle his legs til feet touched the floor of his cabin. He stood, stretched, took in his personal quarters. Naught but three meters by four meters, and half of that was crammed with crates, barrels, and the other supplies for which there was no other room. Which left him about two meters by two meters to stand, stretch, and flex his naked, lean body in, before throwing on his shipmate’s uniform and having a look out the singular porthole.

… not that there was much to see. It was white. Everywhere. Deep in a mid-morning fog, cold on his face while he stuck his head out to breathe it all into his lungs. A good morning for his work, which did seem quite happy from the look of it. Etched right next to the porthole, a broad and circle-shaped symbol glowed of its own accord, a faint yellow light gleaming through so much mist. Not bright enough to be seen by anyone who didn’t have their face practically shoved into the boat’s hull, but if his work went smoothly, no one would come that close. Or if they did, they wouldn’t care.

The boat was named the O’Hara, at least, that was what had been painted on its side most recently. Captain Beauval had said it was some old family tradition, and he didn’t exactly buy it… but she’d balked enough when he’d insisted on carving the runes all over, so maybe it was true. Didn’t much matter. He put his fingers around the unbroken metal chain that joined every rune circling the small cog, feeling the magic therein, and humming approvingly.

Port side number five would need retouching. Couldn’t be done while at sea, so as he sat at his tiny desk, he scratched out a note on it with his quill. Briefly, he glanced to where the chain terminated, connected by mirrored hooks on the in and outside of the hull. Its links led, lazily, to another iron hook, this one bolted into the side of a lump of metal the size of his head. He knocked twice on the butt of it, felt it buzzing magically somewhere inside his skull, and gave another satisfied hum.

Pyrite. Fool’s gold. The irony was palpable. And he was just about to write out a hilarious limerick to that effect when his door was pounded against, heavily, by a fist he recognized quite ably. “Captain,” he said aloud, fighting past the new sort of pressure welling up within his skull.

“Gonna let me in this damn door, Braber, or am I gonna have to start rippin’ apart my own ship?” she answered, charmingly as usual.

Braber sighed, muttered something between a curse and a spell under his breath, and the heavy bar holding shut his cabin slid loose.

The captain stomped in a breath later, shut and barred the door once more, then rounded on him, as she had each morning and each afternoon on their voyage thus far, though to call it a voyage at all would be more charity than he was willing to dole out. Beauval looked equally incharitable, refastening her tattered blue coat and adjusting her cap. Aside from these aspects, with the brusque angles of her face, she could’ve easily been any one of their crew’s swarthy-looking members, but she carried herself with a dignity befitting her station.

“We’ve been out here four fuckin’ days now, Braber.” Her dignity didn’t exactly carry over to her speech.

“So you remind me,” he said dryly, not bothering to rise from his seat.

“Four fuckin’ days, and you’re still tellin’ me you still haven’t smelled so much as a shit from those fucks from Tanfar we’re out here lookin’ for?”

Braber sighed, put one hand to his face, and gestured to the Stratagem board with the other. Still silent, pieces still floating lazily and undisturbed. “Captain, I am certain you’ve had navigators on your many vessels before. Any one of them could have told you when our quarry was pushing out some ballast, while I can tell you if they’re loosing even a bit of the old breeze.”

“Then why the fuck haven’t you found ’em, eh?”

“Because, captain, there’s nothing to find.” Again, his open palm gestured angrily toward the game board. “I will know when something’s out there, and as soon as I do, you will be the second one to—”

A high-pitched whistling sound drowned out his remaining words. Like a proclamation from a hot kettle, the noise being magically produced by the Stratagem board was loud enough to make Beauval cover her ears with both hands, while Braber’s fingers took on a manic dance, twisting his way through patterns and empowered words until the board was finally silent once more, though the floating pieces looked to be shaking and quivering so much that they might start shouting any second, had they the mouths to do it with.

“What the fuck was that?” the captain swore from behind him while he pulled the game board closer.

“That,” he said, “is something out there.”

The pipe above her head belched out a course change from the helm. “Navigation. Right standard rudder, yaw to one twenty degrees. Acknowledge.”

“Conn, yaw to one twenty, understood,” she called back up through the steel tube that threaded from the stern deck on the aftcastle to the orlop deck, the deepest part of the Poleria where Jehnsavva was stationed. Her hands were planted on either side of the great, mystic basin, filled with water which rippled in complaint as she twisted it about to match the new heading.

“I know, I know,” she whispered to the scrying pool, gritting her teeth as her fingers clenched hard around the great bowl. She was getting more and more used to it, at least: the first course change on a caravel of this size had made her senses, magical and physical, scream so loudly that she’d fallen unconscious.

The moment, full of agony as it was, did soon pass, and she fell back into her seat with a deep, deep sigh. She could rest. The next shift would begin in two hours, and then she could finally—

A movement. Far, far off to port, to the north, tickling at the edge of her mind. Something on the water’s surface. Something she could feel. Something her fingers and her spells jumped into action against.

“What size is it?”

“A moment.”

“What’s its heading?”

“A moment.”

“Do they have a wizard? How many crew?”

“Gods damn you, woman, do you ever—”

Another shrill whistling, self-terminating this time. Out of the rumbling of the Stratagem pieces rose a red tower (what should have been a fortress). It twisted on its axes a few times, and both Braber and Beauval stared transfixed at it.

“What does that mean?” the captain whispered.

“It’s a caravel,” Braber said, waving his hand to plunge the tower back into the rippling waves of the floating red and white pieces. It rose, bobbing like a cork, and found its way slowly to the far left corner. Tilted on its side, it was still slowly swiveling. “Twin-masted. Square sail. She’s quite a heavy one, full to the brim I bet.”

“How’d you figure all that out, then?” she questioned over his shoulder.

“Navigators’ secrets, captain, I wouldn’t want myself out of a job, would I?”

“If that isn’t the boat we’re lookin’ for, I’ll take worse than just your job, Braber.”

“Relax. I’m certain that it is.”

“Hmph.” The captain straightened up, stepped to his side, and leered over the extremely delicate magical instrument. “Where are we on this? It’s a map, isn’t it?”

“It’s as much a map as I am a sailor.” He rolled his eyes, brought his hands up, out, and in again, folding and stretching the pieces to a new arrangement. A little magus (phalangite) bobbed up to the north of the board, while the tower in question still floated and spun its end towards the east. “Each square’s about two hundred yards, so…”

“Eight hundred, or a thousand off the starboard stern.”

“Now you’re getting it. And in a moment we’ll…”

Abruptly, the tower stopped its steady turn. As if caught in the act red-handed, it dove back down, the waves parting to admit it.

“Shit,” Braber said.

“What?”

He was too busy to answer that. One hand to the pyrite, his arcane focus, one hand in the air, one thunderous string of syllables poured from his lips. Outside the window, he could see the yellow glow of his runes flaring through clouds of fog, brightening with each word he spoke, ’til finally with a rush all over himself, the flood diminished.

“Damn it!” Jehnsavva shouted, on her feet now and scanning the basin for anything. A rumble. A ripple. Anything.

“Conn,” she called to the upper decks, “lost the anomaly. Possible vessel, tracing now. Advise keeping current course and speed. Acknowledge.”

“Navigation,” the tinny voice responded, “maintaining current heading, understood.”

She had had them. Whoever they were, she’d been so close to pinpointing them, and then they were just… gone. She knew it was a they, now. Tracking the water being displaced like she was, it’d be impossible for something to just up and vanish from the sea. She knew it was magic to look for, knew it was magic hiding them from her sight. And if there was anything her sorcery made it easier to find, it was more magic.

“They can’t see us, right?”

“Visually or otherwise?” Braber asked.

“Both,” Beauval answered, her fingers tightening around the arms of her coat.

“We’d have to be within a hundred yards for visual confirmation, so, no.”

“That’s good.”

“It is. But it’s more complicated.”

“It’s always more complicated with you fucking wizards.”

Both of them sighed. Braber was first to speak, “If they’re any good, they were looking for us the same way as I was looking for them.” At the captain’s empty stare, he went on, “Surface mapping. If there’s a rock or ship or shoreline jutting out of the water, that’s easy to find. Sticks out like a sore thumb.”

“Like we’re doing right now.”

“Like we were doing right now.” Braber shook his head. “We’re still displacing water, because we can’t not. But with the right enchantments drawn and invoked in the right way…”

Beauval began to nod. “You can make it look like we’re not?”

“Exactly. So you’ll excuse my carving all over your ship, captain, but I just saved our asses.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “You’ll pardon me if I don’t start sucking you off.”

“Much as I’d enjoy that,” Braber said with a chuckle, “you really oughtn’t to. There’s bad news, of course.”

“Of course.”

“Remember how I said that breaks on the surface stick out like a sore thumb?”

“Yeah?”

“Well, magic sticks out like someone screaming their bloody head off.”

She blinked. “Then what the fuck are we gonna do?”

Braber couldn’t keep himself from chuckling. “Tell them to bring down the sails and get us closer. Nice and slow.” He turned to the board, drew himself up tall, and cracked his knuckles. “We’ll play some games with this one.”

Ripples in the basin. The vessel was moving, whatever magic was onboard following with it. Two seconds to focus on it. Two seconds to judge its size, four to judge its heading, three to tell its speed, twenty to communicate everything Jehnsavva knew about the light craft sailing nine hundred and thirteen yards away at twenty three degrees from their position.

Thirty seconds to wait. Ten seconds to feel the humming power of sorcery, coursing through her being, overwhelming her senses, sending the scrying pool into watery chaos. Five seconds to shut her eyes. Two seconds to cover her ears…

One second of silence.

Before she felt the detonation. The eruption of water, the explosion of magic, the complete and erasure of anything and everything in a twenty yard radius of the target. The forcemage called his success through the speaking tube.

Twenty seconds to calm herself. Ten seconds to settle her senses, to right the waters within the great bowl. Five seconds to cast her magic out, searchingly. Two seconds to verify…

Cheering, from the decks above. “They fuckin’ missed us, the godsforsaken bastards!” someone shouted.

“The heavens are on our side!” someone else screeched.

Braber wasn’t a very godly sort. One couldn’t really support a set of individuals when they constantly received credit for every success that one made themselves. The Tanfarites hadn’t missed. The blast was perfectly aimed, perfectly placed to annihilate them. The mark of an excellent forcemage, and an even more frightening navigator.

But they’d been focusing on the wrong target. Obviously, he’d lost them just as they’d been acquired. But the tower that had sunk was now sailing smoothly above the board, course steady, speed steady. Their navigator had masked away the hole they made in the water, just as Braber had, and they’d masked away the blaring alarm of their magic. But a concussive blast of magic conjured from a thousand yards’ distance? Impossible to hide, and impossible to hide the echoes of, ones he still tracked even while they faded.

As for why they’d perfectly blasted the wrong position, well…

Jehnsavva’s breath caught. A set of ripples, cascading out to their north, right where they’d just fired. And then another, to the northeast, at eight hundred yards. And another to the northwest, five hundred and sixty, to the south, seven hundred, southwest, five hundred forty three, northwest, two hundred twenty eight…

“Illusions,” she whispered to herself, as first there were ten ships, then twenty, then thirty, all of them moving or sitting or turning or fleeing or…

Another mark against his favorite game board. There was no piece for the illusionist. The phalangite had become the magus. The fortress the tower, the general the arcanist. The knight the elementalist, the lord the channeler. He could at least claim the enchantress as one of his own brood, but it was a pittance. Where was the crafty master of deception? Where was that dashing, beguiling rogue?

Sitting at the board and playing the game, Braber supposed. Where before only two pieces had risen high, all of them now took up positions in the waters around them. The O’Hara’s little white magus was just one of sixteen identical ghosts, and he threw larger masses out there as well, sloops and great galleons, bigger boats than any he’d actually seen before.

This part of an illusionist’s work was dull. Simply summoning a bunch of magic to one place to make it look like something else was there. To delude his opponent, confound them, make them…

Another explosion sent quakes through the water, rolling the O’Hara on the crest of a wave, forcing him to shift all of his ghosts in just the same pattern. One of the other magi had been sunk. No matter. With a thought and a word, it rose up into the air again, this time on the other side of that red tower.

“You’re making this interesting for me,” Braber snickered to himself, to his invisible adversary. But the real fun was still on its way.

There were too many of them. Too many for Jehnsavva to track at once, too many for her to call into the pipe and up through the decks. She should have been able to tell them apart, to distinguish the magical signatures of the facsimiles from the original, but there was too much noise. Any time she tried to focus on one, another would change course. And any time they did fire on one, another illusion would just appear.

And they were using too much magic, she knew, her and the forcemage up above. They were like a bright torch in the fog. Easy to find. Easy to follow. Easy to sneak upon and…

No. She forced it out of her mind. This was her duty, and her pride at stake. She’d never lost a ship in her life, and she wouldn’t now.

One more order through the tube. One more blast, one more shock to her senses, ten more seconds of reeling before another took its place. That one, she knew, would be fake. Which left thirty more to go…

Banging on the door, before Beauval wrenched it open and flew inside. Fire in her eyes, hunger in her grin. “Distance to ’em?”

“Nearly three hundred yards now,” Braber managed to reply, as beads of sweat drew themselves down his brow.

“And you’ve got a plan, right?”

He turned at this, hand to his chest, appalled, his face twisted in consternation. “Of course I have a plan!”

“Good,” she spat on the floor, rubbed it in with her bootheel, “because there’s no way in Firgin’s icy anus that we’re goin’ to take on a ship o’ that size without a wizard.”

“Take them on?”

The captain stared. “What else are we gonna do! Don’t tell me you’re goin’ soft, Braber, or did you forget that we’re fuckin’ pirates?”

He sighed, rolling his eyes as he turned back to the glowing, sparkling gold metal, pressing his hands to its bare and thrumming surface. “Of course I didn’t. It’s merely that some of us pirates have standards.”

Another blast. This one close enough to send a wave rocking the Poleria to its port side. Jehnsavva breathed deep, waited… and let it go, just as the spell was dissipating. Thirty depressions in her pool, then just as expected, thirty one once more.

Which left twenty still unchecked. Nineteen fakes, one real. The odds were improving, but only slightly. Another deep breath, another pause… and letting it go. She found the next one, off to starboard, opened the pipe and hollered up to topside, “Conn, designate new target. Two hundred ten degrees, six hundred forty five yards, course sixty one degrees, speed of two and six knots, acknowledge.”

She listened to her voice echoing up the tube.

She waited.

She yelled up once more, “Conn, designate new target. Two hundred ten degrees, six hundred forty five yards, course sixty one degrees. Speed of two and six knots. Acknowledge.”

She waited.

And no one answered.

She stood, pressed her face to the pipe, “Conn, acknowledge.”

“Huh?” a voice echoed back down, right into her ear.

“Designate new target, two hundred ten degrees, six hundred forty five—”

“Oh…” the voice cut her off, soft as it was confused. “That’s the… the new target?”

“Yes,” Jehnsavva hissed, “we need to hit it now, before… conn, who am I speaking with?”

“’m Knolson,” the man answered.

“Knolson,” she spoke slowly, “could you please fetch Ruhenna? Our forcemage? So that he and I can talk about the target?”

“Talk about the…” Knolson faltered, then, she could almost see the smile growing as he spoke again, “Ohhhh, you want to talk about the target...”

How had this bumbling idiot made his way to the helm? She was about to tell him off, but then Knolson took the air once more. “Thought you’d want to talk about the fog…”

Jehnsavva’s brow knitted down. “The fog?”

“... uh huh.”

“What… about the fog?”

“Oh,” Knolson sounded surprised, “you haven’t heard?”

“Heard… what, Knolson?”

“Ruhenna said it was… said it had to be magic, ’cause he felt something and he went outside to the bow, and I can’t really see him over there any more... ’cause it’s gotten real hard to hear on account of all that…” he sighed, as if exhausted, “y’know… and the fog it’s so… uh…”

Jehnsavva swallowed. “Knolson, what do you hear?”

“You don’t hear it?”

“What do you hear?” she asked again, feeling the fear creep into her voice.

“... the singing…”

Braber had heard the music at an Elurien opera. Well, it was an opera that looked Elurien enough, with all the painted trees and mostly-naked beautiful women running around. Couldn’t understand a lick of what they were singing about the whole time. Might not’ve even been Elurien, now that he thought about it. He’d never heard an Elurien before, but he thought they should sound more… native. Junglish. You know. Like Eluriens sound.

There was also the fact that he’d attended this opera for the price of a few copper pieces, and at a location several hundred miles south of Elurye itself… whatever. The words didn’t matter, he just liked the tune. Liked it a lot. Enough to commit it to memory, enough to write it down, enough that it sang itself in his head every other week.

The song was all words. All one woman, yowling herself hoarse in a most beautiful way. The words didn’t matter. He’d already replaced them; traded whatever gibberish there’d been for real words. Better words. Stronger words. Words that do more than just stick themselves in a head. Words that burrow themselves in. Words that draw themselves down, down deep. Words that one just can’t help listening to, especially when they’re carried drifting through an endless, ever-thickening mist.

He’d gotten the idea from old myths and older sailors’ tales. Whole ships dashed on the rocks, sunk into the deep, and why? Because they thought they’d heard a pretty lady. Singing a song in a language that didn’t make sense, but sounded sweeter than any ballad from their homes. Singing not just into the air, but singing into them, singing right into themselves. Performances handmade for each sailor alone, and irresistible for it.

They thought they’d seen those pretty ladies on the rocks. Held down with so many chains that they just needed saving. Prettier than anything. Hair so long and shiny it went down to their toes. Eyes so bright, so many colors therein, one could see them even through the thickest fog. And the bodies… well, that always depended on who was telling the stories. Sirens were always as beautiful as could be dreamed by the eyes what saw them.

All of which was perfect for an illusionist like Braber. All of which explained why each member of the O’Hara’s crew was currently walking around, tapping their feet, wearing thick and ridiculous robes and facemasks of white, marked with sigils of enchantment that none of them could stand to even glance at. And why they were all joined by an extremely long chain, threaded through a loop around each hip of each sailor and leading back to the heavy chunk of glowing mineral that he’d strapped to his back.

The earplugs were a blessing, too, since they’d done the job of muting any of the crew’s complaints toward the outfits or the plan. He’d gone over it at least three times with Beauval, who’d told the rest that if any of them couldn’t handle sticking to it, they could all get thrown overboard any time they liked by the captain personally.

Still, hadn’t stopped the grumbling. But Braber could take some grumbling now, considering how much richer they would all be within the hour.

The Tanfarite vessel was looming into view, blooming through the fog like a real ghost. Braber swallowed, shifted on his feet uneasily, much like those surrounding him. They were all standing exposed on the deck of a cog barely half the size of the larger caravel. They would’ve been easy pickings for the many archers that could’ve been firing out of the many turreted windows lining the aftcastle as they drew close…

But there were no arrows. And no archers. Were there no music to worry about, Braber could’ve taken out his earplugs and listened to silence. Deep and sweet, disturbed only by the lapping of waves, the moaning of wood as the two ships came alongside each other. Beauval tossed a net up and over the main deck’s rail, tugged at it, pulled it taut.

Braber gave her a thumbs-up.

She flipped him off, then scrambled up the ropes.

Twenty seconds to wait for the signal, or else they’d all have to—ah, there it was. Captain Beauval’s hand was waving frantically, and with wary glances cast between darkened pairs of eyes, the crew made their way aboard. Braber was last, being the one holding the end of the chain, hauling himself up slowly until he damn near collapsed onto the deck. Breathing hard from the weight on his back and the weight of his spells, he made himself stand and look around.

There were about ten of them on the deck. Easy to tell from the tone of their skin and their lack of ridiculous-looking robes. Tanfarites, men and women, each wearing the same loose clothing and the same tied bandannas.

Well, almost the same. Turning to his right, the man closest to Braber wasn’t wearing pants. They were around his feet, and as the navigator turned his head up, he saw the sailor had his cock out, stroking it slowly while his eyes stared unnaturally wide at Braber’s mask and robe. It wasn’t unexpected, but Braber had never not been surprised to find a man jerking himself in the open without a care in the world.

And though the mist had been thickened by his magic, exceptionally deep and dripping with energy, Braber could still make out the faces on the rest of the Tanfarite crew. The usual gamut was all there: one woman with green eyes looked half asleep, drool dribbling down her chin and onto her chest; one man had the most blissful looking smile; one girl’s lips were fixed together, trembling hard, struggling to contain moans as her body shook from the motion of the hand between her legs; most of them, though, just bore vacant stares. Every face was flushed. Every body nearly still, save for those motions of the urges they couldn’t control, driven by the sight of a dozen chained, gorgeous sirens striding onto their boat.

Braber stomached a note of envy, though it wasn’t as though he hadn’t conjured such illusions for his own pleasure many times before. From the corner of his eye, he saw one of their number walking slowly toward the masturbating brunette, but they were swiftly grabbed at the shoulders by Beauval, kicked in the shin, and shoved toward the companionway, where the whole of their shuffling gang was descending.

That’s where the loot would be, whatever it was. The captain wasn’t the most specific, and Braber wasn’t paid to ask questions. He was paid to find and neutralize threats. Which is why, after making sure his chain had plenty of slack, he made his way to the bow, where a man in a green robe had thrown it half overboard, and now was grunting while both his hands worked with furor.

The navigator looked him over. Short, dark-haired, a cock of some considerable size… but more presently concerning was the device worn around his neck. A golden necklace, set with a green stone that shone strangely in the pale and foggy light. Braber stepped closer, staring into the dark, empty eyes of the mage before him. “Just going to take this,” he muttered, moving behind the man’s back to avoid any unwanted excretions, “don’t think you’ll be needing it, friend.”

If the sorcerer could hear, he didn’t much respond. On the deck like this, where a forcemage would need to be standing, the power of the song was at its apex. Blaring the words of seduction, entrapment, enthrallment into his mind as well as the other nine here joining him. The man didn’t stir as his arcane focus was removed from around his neck. Braber pocketed it quickly, subtly.

The first members of the O’Hara’s crew were coming back up now. Crates in their arms or shared between hands, they hauled them up the companionway, readied to bring them back aboard the O’Hara one by one. It would take some time. Enough for Braber to see to the more pertinent threat.

He ambled down the companionways at a fairly leisurely pace, the mist preceding him where he went. His chain-bound compatriots were like Stratagem pieces themselves, trudging about in their gaudy white outfits and offloading their ill-gotten gains, careful to avoid stepping on the toes of any staring crew… Braber lived for these moments. He was the strategist. He was the leader. He was in charge. The captain was somewhere, but she couldn’t even be heard, what with the music and the earplugs. It was his magic, his spells that were keeping them safe, secure, even sane. With a thought, he mused, he’d’ve been able to make the song swell a bit louder around any one of them, make it a bit more seductive, a touch more enticing, a hint more captivating… twist a few words here and there, get those earplugs out, that sort of thing.

But he was a man of standards, and a man of his word. Which was why he knocked first, politely, on the sealed door at the aft end of the Tanfarite ship’s lowest deck. He was alone down there, but just on the other side of the door… well, there was nowhere else the navigator could be. It was a shame that the orlop deck was below the waterline—barely any fog at all had been able to reach down so far. Though it did mean it was safe for him to shake out an earplug, as he knocked again. “Hello?” he called in, as far from threatening as possible, “I know that you’re in there, so if you could just…”

There was a heavy sound, something being pushed across the floor. Likely to brace the door even further. Braber sighed and shook his head. “Really, we could handle this simply, but no...” With another moment’s thought, spent focused on the magical stone at his back, he channeled a clumsy burst of forcemagic toward the door.

Still, it was effective enough to send it swinging open. And before him stood a woman. She looked a bit short, lean like himself, dark hair swept back behind her head, green eyes wide, rimmed with darkened circles and staring out past her lanky arms, trembling as they held out a long and pointed knife.

And before her stood a woman. She looked tall, thicker than herself, golden hair tumbling so low it swung about her hips, same color as her eyes, endlessly deep and staring out as she took a step inside, the chain around her jingling as…

… as there was white, a wall of it, dark eyes staring out dark slits, a seven-pointed sigil in black that…

… that drew Jehnsavva’s eyes right to the woman’s chest, perfectly round, perfectly soft, perfectly…

… perfectly drawn by the hand of an illusionist, an enchanter, she could feel the magic in the air, in her ears, building up with the same noise that…

.... that sounded so wonderful, so soft and sweet, coming from all around her at once with the wisps of smoke, and she was coming closer still, she…

… she was taking the knife from Jehnsavva’s hands, and she tried to resist, but she heard it clatter to the floor, heard…

… heard the voice, that voice, speaking only to her, “Ah. You’d be my esteemed opponent. Charmed, I’m sure.” She couldn’t make sense of the tongue, it was heavenly, it was beautiful, it was…

… was like a man’s, halting, strange, muffled by the wall of white through which she spoke, distorted by the fog, and it…

… it was like an angel’s, wasn’t it. Yes. It was like an angel’s. And that was why she looked, she stared, she saw golden wings unfolding, like a thousand crystals in different shades, glowing, flickering, drawing her eye every…

… every moment she tried to hold her eyes shut, tried to make out the illusion before it took form, tried to…

… to take it in, because the wings were so very large, so large they didn’t make sense to her, but the angel’s song was telling her it was okay, she could count the crystals like little shards of stained glass, like a mosaic made just for her, like…

… like words of magic in her ears, in the mist, altering her while…

... while the music sang so sweetly, while the colors danced so beautifully, while she counted twenty three little shards and lost her place, while she giggled with the angel and watched the shower of lights flashing everywhere, while…

… while the figure in white looked over her basin, and…

… and told Jehnsavva how ingenious it was, how brilliant she must be, how magnificent of a contender she had been, how she had done so very well, how…

… how the hand that was reaching and the words she couldn’t understand wanted her focus, wanted her pendant, wanted…

… wanted to see it, that was all, wanted to see how delightful it looked in the light of her wings, and Jehnsavva reached behind her neck for the clasp and…

… and could not muster the will to resist loosing it, because…

… because it felt like a weight was lifted from her shoulders, just as…

… just as she let dangle the pendant from her fingers, let it fall into the hand of the angel, let it…

… let it fall away from her senses, let the noise and clamor of the magic fade to nothing, so that…

… so that she was filled with music and song and light and wonder so deep that she could only smile, while she counted her reflections in the crystalline wings, while they danced and fluttered to the song in her ears, while…

… while he shoved the simple emerald focus into his pocket with the forcemage’s matching artifact. Braber cleared his throat, looked the woman over once more, from her leadened feet to her swaying shoulder to her dreamy smile to her unblinking, searching eyes that explored myriad golden mirrors of light that weren’t really there. He assumed it was quite beautiful. And perhaps he would see for himself when he retired in his cabin, that night. But his work here was done. And he should have simply turned and left, though…

… though she looked so eager and excited, blushing cheeks and flushed neck, hands twitching at their sides that would’ve been more than happy to fondle all over his cock and anywhere else on his body, but…

… but he was a professional. One of principle. One of standards. She had been an excellent competitor, a worthy challenger. So worthy that she…

… she was of course worthy of some reward, wasn’t she? A prize for a battle well-fought. She’d probably be dismissed from service, of course, that was just the way of it, so…

… so he could make this voyage not a complete disaster for her. A courtesy. From one navigator to another. Something he’d want for himself, were he in her situation. And so with a deep sigh, and a deeper worry shoved to the back of his mind, he withdrew the pendant from his pocket, shoved it into one of hers, and…

… and in the song, Jehnsavva understood, Jehnsavva knew that she would keep her focus secret, so secret, secret even from herself until she set foot on land, and then she would find it, and remember it, and be free to use it once more. And she could only stare as the angel, nude but for the chain around her waist, walked through and out the door, before…

… before snapping her fingers. The song inundated her ears suddenly, drowning out thought, sending her staggering happily into her seat, keeping her eyes open wide while…

… while another angel, identical, materialized at her left side, and…

… and another, its sister, stood at her right, and…

… and another appeared above her head, and…

… and another knelt between her legs, and…

… and all were unbound, unchained, their wings spreading wide and free, so many colors of gold and yellow and white and amber wrapping around her like a cocoon, showering and dazzling her mind while hands, so many hands touched her body, felt her flesh, slipped within, slid all over, just like…

… just like tongues, so many tongues from so many lovers, delicate and teasing, tasting her skin, meeting her lips above and below, making her moan, making her sing with the music, making her…

… her body quivering and shaking, her legs spread wide, the wings closing in tighter, warmer, hotter, fuller and brighter and…

… and deeper, deeper, always deeper into pleasure and bliss, always deeper into mindless ecstasy, always deeper into…

… into the angels’ embraces, the lovers’ entanglements, the knots of bodies against hers, the cries ringing in her ears, Jehnsavva’s mixing with those of heaven, and heavenly…

… heavenly touches were exploring inside her, her mouth and her core, her wetness all over, being filled with more pleasure, more bliss, more…

… pure, untethered joy, seeping out of and into her from every inch of herself, cradled by magic, held by what she knew must be an illusion, what she knew…

… knew was perfection, even still, as she surrendered to the spells, to the golden glass, to the shining fog, to the…

… to the glow within herself, the warmth and contentment from deep inside, as she lay with the angels, as she lay with the light, as she lay with her fading orgasm, her fading senses, her fading thoughts, her…

Her eyes shut. And she slept.

Braber was still trying to mount his pyrite back into its plinth when he heard a throat cleared behind him. “A good haul, captain?” he asked, knowing the only one who could be behind him without needing to look.

“A good haul,” Beauval replied. “My Keld contacts’re gonna be very pleased with the work we’ve done.”

“Of course,” Braber rolled his eyes, “pointy-eared agents of chaos. What have we stolen, then, swords? Steel?”

Boots thudded up to his side, and a single square of white was placed on his desk. “Paper,” she said with a shrug, “so many embargoes on it that they can’t get it from anybody legal, ’less it’s got a whole lotta Damean bullshit written all o’er it. Tanfarites make the best stuff, sells for the best price.”

“Of course,” the navigator sighed. “Stronger than any sword, but blades are a hell of a lot cheaper.” He fell into his chair, turning to face the captain’s look of suspicion.

“You’re sure they’re not gonna find us out here, right? You took care of the navigator?”

A smile grew on his lips. “Oh, she’s taken care of.”

“I don’t like that smarmy fuckin’ tone o’ yours.”

“Frankly, captain, you don’t even have to like my gorgeous fucking face. You just have to pay me.”

At his cheeky grin, Beauval grunted, and stomped out of his cabin with a wave over her shoulder. “You better be right.”

“I know I’m right,” Braber shouted to her, before shutting and barring the door with a wave of his hand. “And if I’m not…” his eyes strayed to the Stratagem board, silent, pieces all floating in perfect order, “well, we’ll just have a bit more fun.”

Not that he wouldn’t be having such fun himself. He turned his chair around in his tiny little room, stretched his legs, licked his lips, glanced around one more time before…

… before he snapped his fingers, and fell into the embrace of the song drifting through his window, the embrace of the naked, beautiful bodies at his sides, and the blanketing wings of flashing, flickering gold.