Tales of Midbar: Secret Priest

At lunch time, we ate in a bar in a big tent. As it was a dry, warm day, they had the sides open.

Of course I wanted to go and see the device market and displays.

“Thou canst seeth some really interesting devices any time thou wisheth,” said Dwendra.

“I know some of the people on these things,” I said. “There’s also some use in knowing what’s available now and they might actually have something I want. Also I’ve never been able to examine devices here with a magic detector before.”

“Only magi are allowed to use magic detectors,” said Mum. “There’s a dress sale over there, it always has some bargains and Dwendra could do with some fashion pointers.”

“Clindar helped me chooseth this dress,” said Dwendra.

“He’s clueless,” said Mum.

“I thought female clothing was supposed to please men so my opinion would be highly relevant,” I said.

“You only care about cleavage!” said Mum.

“Like I said, female clothing is supposed to please men and there’s nothing wrong with being in touch with my sexual orientation.”

“I liketh dressing in ways Nuharas findeth offensive,” said Dwendra.

“Anyway,” said Mum, “Why don’t we women look at the dress sale while you guys check out the devices?”

Preldin and Zonlaria decided to come with us guys saying they felt uncomfortable trying on clothing in front of other women.

We hadn’t gone far before Ildias grabbed his stomach and said, “Oh no, I knew some of those locusts I ate last night didn’t look right. I’ll catch up with you later!” Then he ran off.

“I don’t have my crutch!” Zonlaria shouted after him, hanging onto the side of a stall. “Excuse me Clindar, do you mind if I hang onto you?”

I couldn’t really think of a reason not to let her. I was bigger and stronger than Screld and Attan, who was with Preldin, and I thought it would look strange if she was hanging off Dad.

We looked at one lot of device stalls with Zonlaria hanging onto me while holding Cren. Attan and Preldin drifted away from the rest of us. Screld, Dad and myself looked at the devices with magic detectors. This was interesting as I hadn’t used one much. I noticed I was starting to feel sexually aroused with the feel of Zonlaria’s body against me. Although she acted like a nice person, there was something I really didn’t like about her vibes and she was a hipsickah.

“Here’s Brulin’s stall!” said Zonlaria.

“What?” I’d been examining a battery pack which had what I thought was an odd associate on it.

“My friend Brulin, her work’s amazing!”

I put the battery pack back on it’s table and looked to see a black tent with photographs of tattoos hanging on it.

“Come on! I might get a new one. Do you have any tattoos?”

“No. My family don’t do them.”

“Hello Brulin?” said Zonlaria dragging me into the tent.

I was still holding my magic detector and could see this tent had a lot of associates bound to it. I looked at Zonlaria and it was clear she was a chelas, with quiet a lot of associates but not arranged the way they are in a mage or magis.

The tent was divided into several small rooms. We found one with a young bennis nibeyah in it who was dressed in a sexy way, showing her many tattoos. I looked at her with the magic detector, that I was still holding, and saw she was a mage but also had associates connected with her tattoos.

“Hi, Brulin!” said Zonlaria.

“Zonlaria!” said the bennis. “Who’s your friend, I take it he’s a mage?”

Cren seemed very happy to see Brulin.

“Yes,” I said, putting the magic detector away.

“He’s Clindar. I only just met him but Ildias ran off so I needed another crutch. He can help me choose a new tattoo.”

“Well let’s see,” said Brulin.

Zonlaria put Cren on the ground; where he ran around, sniffing everything; while shelay down on a reclining chair and started undoing her harness. “Brulin attaches associates to her tattoos which help with medical problems. In case you haven’t noticed, I suffer from Crunmensia, rather a bad case. Brulin’s tattoos are about the only thing that helps without making it worse.” She undid her sari at the front and was only wearing a bra and pants underneath. I could see much of the left side of her body was covered in a network of reddish brown lines where the skin was sunken. There were a lot of tattoos covering parts of this.

“It was obvious you had a medical problem,” I said “but I didn’t realize what it was.”

I did know the basics of Crunmensia although it was fairly rare. It was a chronic condition that appeared in early childhood and never got better. It’s cause was uncertain but thought to be related to exposure to organic chemicals produced by XT’s (but nobody was sure what type). The symptoms were somewhat variable but always included impaired development or degradation of bones and muscle in some parts of the body. The symptoms generally got worse during childhood but didn’t progress so much once the victim reached adulthood. It was rarely fatal, at least directly. What made this disease particularly notorious was that it was aggravated by surgery, cellular regeneration, immune stimulation as well as injuries and pregnancy, making most types of treatment counterproductive. Victims often died either of a disease which was treatable in a normal person or due to Crunmensia being aggravated by treatment for some other illness.

Brulin started projecting images onto Zonlaria’s body and Zonlaria started asking me how I thought they looked. I really thought women looked better without tattoos so I had trouble formulating answers for this. Also I was feeling extremely randy. Then Brulin projected a picture which went onto Zonlaria’s right breast so Zonlaria undid her bra (it was the type that opened at the front) so I could better see what it would look like. She had small nipples which were only slightly darker than her skin. I realized I really really wanted to have sex, much more than I ever had before but Dwendra had a much better body than Zonlaria. In fact everything about Dwendra was better than Zonlaria, even if you ignored the Crunmensia.

“Sorry,” I said. I hit Zonlaria with a two minute knockout spell.

“That wasn’t necessary,” said Brulin.

“She’ll recover in a couple of minutes. You know I can’t let her see this.”

Then I visioned the dress sale tent, found an empty cubicle and teleported into it.

“How did you get in there?” asked a very hot woman I didn’t recognize as I came out.

She was obviously asking her friends their opinion of a dress.

I followed the anavah vibes.

“Who told you?” asked Vrenloa.

“It’s just a feeling I’ve had,” said Ildias.

I came round the corner to find Ildias surrounded by the three anavot, looking extremely hot, with Mum standing to one side, looking a bit exasperated. I felt bad about finding Egrindreth hot but I was desperate to have sex and I did find Dwendra hotter.

“You’re lying!” said Egrindreth.

“You say he’s lying but you’re OK with Dwendra’s stuff?” asked Mum.

Dwendra looked in my direction, smiled, ran to me, grabbed me and started kissing me very passionately. I couldn’t help myself so I grabbed her left breast and started fondling it.