Eileen Wilks - Mortal Danger

The audience hall was vast, hot, and noisy, an echoing oven of a space hollowed out of the remains of an ancient volcano. Gan scurried across the stony floor as fast as its stubby legs would carry it, watching out for shadows. Sometimes the crevices shifted. What looked like a shadow one day might, on the next, send you plummeting. Or make you look foolish, which was almost as bad.

There was no roof. The walls climbed jaggedly up and up to the exposed sky at the rim of the caldera, black and empty. Gan’s skin crawled at all that overhead emptiness, though it knew Xitil’s pets wouldn’t bother it. Not this time.

Courtiers of every ilk fought or chatted among the carved columns thrusting up from the floor—here a fourteen-foot granite phallus, there a set of gaping onyx jaws big enough to swallow an ox.

Not that half these idiots knew what an ox was, Gan thought with a sniff as it rounded a set of rosy labia formed from quartz. Gan did, though. It might be young, it might be small, but it knew more about the human realm than any of them.

Which was why it had been summoned. A shiver of mingled dread and anticipation fled down Gan’s spine. Drawing the notice of the Most Feared was not safe.

But oh, it was apt to be interesting.

Gan was so busy mentally chortling over the possibilities that it trotted around a grasping stone talon a little too quickly—and dropped flat to the ground, its hearts hammering in terror.

A long snake of a tail, spiked and deadly, whizzed over its head.

Idiot ! Gan screamed at itself silently. Acting like a two-year imp instead of a full demon—daydreaming in the hall! It had almost bumped into one of Xitil’s Claws. You did not want to startle a Claw. Their reflexes were as swift as their wits were slow.

At least Gan had stopped short of real insult. It hadn’t actually touched the Claw.

“What’s this?” The high-pitched voice came from several feet above Gan’s head. This Claw was female, or mostly, Gan decided. “A bug?”

Gan’s field of view consisted of the dusty rock floor, but out of the corner of its eye it saw a scaly foot as long as one of its arms. The claws protruding from the four thick toes were thick and yellow and sharp.

Don’t breathe yet , it told itself. The immediate danger was over, but Xitil’s Claws were as touchy as they were stupid.

“Maybe.” The second voice was raspier, possibly male, and came from the left of the first one. By cutting its eyes as far to the right as possible, Gan could just glimpse another pair of clawed feet. “Or some kind of parasite. Better step on it.”

“Great One,” Gan squeaked, “a thousand pardons. This one deserves to be squashed, yes, squashed flat for intruding upon you, but I beg you to withhold your foot. I am summoned.”

“Summoned?” A clawed foot curled around Gan’s ribs. Idly the Claw rolled Gan over on its back, and Gan stared up into the golden glow of the Claw’s forward pair of eyes. “You think it’s stupid enough to try to lie about that, Hrrol?”

“Looks stupid enough for almost anything. Better step on it.”

“Oh, Great One, I am stupid indeed for having offended, yet not brainless enough to lie about the Most Feared. If I do not speak truth, punish me twice, thrice over—punish me endlessly—but for now, allow me to answer my summons.” You great, dumb doff! If I were stupid, I couldn’t lie, could I? Not even just with words. And if Xitil’s unhappy with me for being late, she’ll be unhappy with you for having delayed me .

“Won’t be much left of it to punish if it’s lying,” the Claw on the left observed. “Better smash it now. Or at least remove that puny excuse for a tail.”

Gan bristled. It was quite proud of its new tail— which maybe wasn’t as long and prehensile as the Claw’s, but was wonderfully strong and had lovely spikes along it.

“No,” the first one said regretfully. “If Xitil has some use for this bug, she might wish it to keep its pathetic little lump of a tail. Later,” she decided. “I will punish it later. What’s your callname, bug?”

“I am called Gan, Great One.” May worms eat you .

“You are a lucky bug, Gan, for I must bow to the whim of the Most Feared, who may prefer you whole. I release you.”

“Thank you, Great One.” Gan scrambled to its feet, bowing as it retreated. “May your claws grow ever longer and sharper, the better to rend your prey.” And may your prey not hurt itself laughing at your stupidity .

Once out of range of the Claws, Gan paid better attention to its surroundings as it hurried to the hottest end of the hall. Here the rocks glowed dull red in their artful tumble around the entrance to the tunnel that led to Xitil’s private chambers. No courtiers lingered at this end of the huge hall. If Xitil wished to see her subjects, she joined them. If she didn’t, who would go to her uninvited?

Gan was invited. With dread and a chest-puffing sense of its own importance—not to mention very hot feet— Gan crossed the threshold.

It immediately felt more comfortable. The ceiling of the rocky tunnel was irregular, but nowhere was it higher than twenty feet. There was only one sharp defensive twist in the tunnel, a mark of Xitil’s confidence. No one had tried to depose her for a long, long time.

The tunnel narrowed at the end; few of her courtiers and none of her nobles could pass into her chambers upright. Gan could, though. It trotted toward the pinkish-purple light at the end of the tunnel, its brow wrinkled. Pink usually meant she was cheerful, or maybe horny. Purple, though…

Gan stepped from the hot, dry tunnel into steamy pink mist, as if the air itself were sweating in the heat Xitil craved and created. The floor here was polished obsidian, slippery and wet. And there facing it, lounging on the mounded pillows on her couch, was Xitil the Most Feared—rockshaper and tyrant, weathermaster and prince of hell. A paroxysm of awe and lust froze Gan in its tracks.

“Gan.” Her voice rumbled through the mist, an audible caress. “Come here.”

Shivering in fear and arousal, it obeyed.

Her immense, undulate form glistened in the directionless light, the flesh as rosy and damp as an aroused vulva. And dense, oh so deliciously dense to Gan’s üther sense, each roll and fold of her packed with lives. Her foremost arms were bent to prop her up, the jewel-tipped claws partially retracted.

Xitil favored breasts lately. She’d grown six of them, and the upper pair were bare. The nipples were hard little nuggets framed by aureoles as red as her eyes—which crinkled with amusement.

“Gan,” she whispered, “you haven’t greeted my guest. Do so.”

It jolted to a stop, eyes widening. Would it be punished? She’d told it to come to her, but… obey, idiot , Gan told itself. It tore its gaze away from Xitil, and its eyes widened as it at last noticed who—or what—stood to the left of Xitil’s couch.

A. human. How odd. They did show up from time to time—many of the courts had private deals with one or more of the species—but why would Xitil want Gan to meet one?

No , it realized a second later. That was no human, whatever form she might be wearing. She’d done something to cloak her energies so Gan read little… but what it read made it shiver again.

The rumors were right. Xitil was entertaining a very strange ally.

Or potential meal? Surely even she wouldn’t dare… but Gan had been told to greet the Most Feared’s guest, not to speculate. It cleared its throat and bowed deeply. “Revered One, forgive me if, in the depths of my ignorance, I address you incorrectly.”