One Month Ago. The Gilded Cage, a Fem Brothel in the Lower Wards.
The air in the private chamber was a thick, cloying perfume of spilled nectar, cheap incense, and the sweet, desperate sweat of a Fem trying far too hard to please. Thorn let the house boy work, his mouth a hot, wet, and ultimately uninspired vacuum on her thigh, while she gave her full attention to the creature lounging on the silks across from her.
Zephyr. A masterpiece of his caste. His beauty was a weapon, his ambition a clean, cold fire. He had summoned her here, to this den of cheap thrills, a place that reeked of a desperation he himself had long transcended. He watched the house boy's pathetic attempts at seduction with an air of bored detachment.
"He's a rental," Thorn said, her voice a low rumble. "A temporary amusement."
"I can see that," Zephyr replied, his lip curling with a faint, almost imperceptible disgust. He gestured for her to continue.
He had laid out the proposition with a chilling clarity. A contract. To monitor, to harass, and ultimately, to ensure the failure of the exiled Heir, Damask.
"The official story will be bandits," Zephyr had purred, his luminous eyes holding hers. "A tragedy in the blighted wilds. Unfortunate, but not unexpected for a pride so… compromised."
Thorn had felt a flicker of professional respect. This wasn't some brutish power play; it was a surgical strike. She ran a hand through the house boy's hair, guiding his head lower. "Deeper," she commanded.
The real prize, the hook that had sunk deep into her gut, wasn't the promise of coin. It was the target. Damask's pride. And more specifically, the pridemates.
Kestrel Ravenscroft. The stoic, loyal dog. Predictable. A bore to fight, and likely a bore to fuck.
Lyra of the SteelClaw. The hot-headed brawler. A fire that could be easily baited and extinguished.
But then there was the Fem. Petunia. A C-Apt 5 from a prized lineage, gifted to the Heir in a storm of political scandal. The thought sent a jolt of pure, predatory lust through Thorn's core. To cuck a Fem from a pride was the ultimate thrill.
"The Heir's Fem is a political statement," Zephyr said, his voice a silken promise. "His capture would be… a significant blow to the pride's morale."
"But the true prize," Zephyr continued, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "is the reward. Complete the mission, and you will be compensated generously. Perhaps even with a creature of... exquisite beauty and unique talents from my personal collection." A flicker of something knowing and suggestive crossed his face. "One who could make this little Petunia look like a common gutter slut."
The offer hung in the air, thick with possibility. Thorn's internal cockwomb gave a hot, wet pulse. With a grunt of effort, she externalized it. The weapon slid from her cunt with a slick, obscene sound—a thick, glistening pillar of ridged muscle.
Zephyr's perfect brow furrowed with a look of exasperated disgust as he watched her. This was the part he hated about dealing with mercenaries. Their crudeness. Their lack of finesse.
"On your back," Thorn commanded the house boy.
He scrambled to obey. Thorn mounted him, ramming her new cock into his tight, puckered hole with a single, brutal motion. He screamed, a high, thin sound of pure, unadulterated sensation.
Zephyr sighed, a sound of profound disappointment, as if watching a master painter use a house brush. He rose gracefully. "My work here is done. Do try to be discreet, Thorn. We are, after all, professionals." He glided out of the room, leaving her to her brutal, artless pleasure.
Thorn barely noticed him leave. She began to fuck the boy with a hard, punishing rhythm, her mind filled with the image of Petunia's terrified face, of Kestrel's impotent fury, of Damask's ultimate humiliation.
The job wasn't just a contract. It was a hunt. And she was the perfect predator for the task.
Present Day. The Ramparts of the Border Fort.
The wind that whipped across the battlements tasted of dust and decay. Thorn leaned against the rough-hewn stone, her gaze fixed on the shimmering, heat-hazed horizon where the Ashen Grove began its slow, inexorable corruption of the landscape.
She had been here for a week, a coiled serpent of patience in a garrison of bored soldiers. Her hired pride, a motley collection of unbound Bitches and disgraced mercenaries, were already in position, their ambush set. The attack on Damask's scouting party had been a test, a probe to gauge their strength. The report had been… unexpected. A Sow with a dark, thorny power. A First Blade whose loyalty was a tangible, kinetic force. It was more than she had anticipated.
The boredom, however, was a physical ache. The fort was a cesspool of testosterone and unrefined mana, the soldiers too brutish for her tastes. But even in a place like this, there were always opportunities. Later that night, she found one. A young Fem, a courtesan attached to the fort's commander, was scurrying through a deserted corridor, a tray of polished goblets in his hands. He was pretty, in a fragile, terrified sort of way. Perfect.
Thorn stepped from the shadows, her presence a wall of silent, predatory power. The Fem froze, his eyes going wide, the tray clattering to the stone floor. "Well, well," Thorn purred, her voice a low rumble that vibrated in the Fem's bones. "Look what we have here. A little mouse, scurrying in the dark."
She backed him against the wall, her body caging his. She could smell his fear, a sweet, intoxicating nectar that made her own cunt clench with a hot, wet pulse. "Don't worry, little one," she whispered, her lips brushing his ear. "I'm not going to hurt you. I just want to play."
Her hand snaked down, her fingers finding the pathetic, trembling bulge in his thin trousers. She squeezed, and he let out a choked whimper. "You like that, don't you?" she murmured, her voice a filthy promise. "You like it when a Bitch takes what she wants."
With a guttural groan, she externalized her cockwomb. The thick, glistening shaft sprang from her cunt, a weapon of pure, carnal intent. The Fem's eyes widened in a perfect, beautiful O of terror and awe. "On your knees," Thorn commanded.
He obeyed instantly, his body a trembling wreck of submission. She took him right there, in the cold, dusty corridor, his ass pressed against the rough stone, his moans swallowed by the indifferent night. It was a quick, brutal, and utterly satisfying fuck, a reminder of her purpose, of her pleasure.
It didn't matter that Damask's pride was stronger than expected. It only made the prize more valuable.
A slow, cruel smile touched her lips. She could already taste it. The terror in Petunia's eyes as she dragged him from the wreckage of his pride. The satisfying crack of Kestrel's discipline as it shattered against her own superior cunning. The sweet, exquisite pleasure of breaking a new toy, a gift from a grateful client.
She was no longer just a mercenary. She was an artist. And the masterpiece she was about to create would be painted in the blood, sweat, and cum of the Heir's ruined pride.