The Slumbering Mantis Inn, Dragon District, Xing Hong
Fuuka Natsukawa lifted the mug to her lips, finishing the last of her Moon Ale. The alcohol sat warm in her stomach but hadn't touched her clarity. Her Worm Witch metabolism burned through intoxicants the way others burned calories. A useful trait. A necessary one.
She set the mug down and glanced at the twin dragons etched into her Nucleus Watch's face, a holographic bubble visible only to herself floating in the air:
Name: Fuuka Natsukawa
Race: Imperial
PRIMAL Statistics:
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Power: 2
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Resilience: 2
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Intellect: 6
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Magnetism: 7
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Agility: 3
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Libido: 3
Occupation: Worm Witch, Rakshasa Horde
The duel with Marcus Thorne still played behind her eyes. Facing a psion who certainly had years more experience, he'd forced a draw.
Not through skill alone. That Resilience…she'd watched him absorb hits that should have staggered any man then strike at the Creeper she'd sent his way, injuring it. Annoying, but impressive.
Combined with Solar psionics refined enough to channel through his shield, and Covenant combat doctrine that emphasized endurance over flash. The man was built like a fortress that happened to carry a sword.
Her master Moro would want to know about this immediately.
Fuuka picked at the remaining silken tofu on her plate, then pushed her chopsticks aside. Next to her mug of Moon Ale, the matcha in a ceramic cup sat half-finished, but she'd lost interest. Around her, the inn's common room had settled into normality once more. The traveling warrior-bard Jabari, the engineer Xin and his little Diabolisk had all left for home, and most patrons were content to nurse their drinks and swap stories.
She stood, smoothing her kimono. The restroom was in the back, past the bar where Iron Roach the cyborg barkeep was polishing washed utensils. He didn't look up as she passed.
Good.
The door hissed shut behind her, sealing her in the faint smell of the restroom's recycled air. No mirrors. The inn's owner Shazmeen ran a practical establishment, not a vain one.
Fuuka approached the third stall and traced a pattern on the door, her finger following the layered petals of a lotus bloom, starting from the outer edges and spiraling inward to the central jewel, then spreading outward along the sharp, thorn-like projections.
The Rakshasa sigil glowed faintly violet where her finger passed, the lotus seeming to unfold in response to her touch. The door's lock clicked twice, then the entire wall panel slid sideways, revealing a hidden corridor lit by bioluminescent strips.
The passage led upward, stairs carved from Martian bedrock and lined with sound-dampening foam. At the top, another door, this one requiring her palm print and a whispered passphrase in the ancient Devavā?ī.
"Raktabīja kī santān," she murmured. Children of the Blood Seed.
The door opened to reveal Shazmeen's private sanctum.
Nothing like the inn below. Silk tapestries covered the walls. Incense burners released threads of violet smoke that coiled like living things. The floor was covered in thick carpets from Old Earth, fractals within fractals, dimensions the human eye couldn't properly perceive.
Shazmeen Vinh stood at the room's center. The Elder Worm Witch older than a century yet looking to be in her thirties. The one that nobody in Xing Hong ever suspected.
The innkeeper had shed her crimson dress for a black silk robe, so sheer it might have been woven from shadow and starlight, clung to her curves, a lotus sigil above her heart. The fabric revealed the swell of her breasts, the curve of her hips, the long expanse of her legs. Gold chains traced her collarbone, disappearing into the robe's depths. Her dark hair was unbound, falling past her shoulders in waves that caught the lamplight.
But it was Shazmeen's eyes that held Fuuka. No longer the warm brown of the friendly innkeeper. Now they glowed with an inner violet light, pupils vertical slits like a serpent's.
"Sister," Shazmeen said, her voice carrying harmonics that shouldn't exist in a human throat. "The bounty has been posted."
"As the Primarch predicted." Fuuka moved deeper into the room, unbidden. "Fifty thousand for High-Grade Zephyrium. Single hunter only."
"And what do you make of the candidates?" Shazmeen glided forward. The robe shifted, revealing the tattoo that covered her entire back—a massive serpent shifting between purple and black.
"Marcus Thorne. The Covenant Stalwart. He's strong enough." Fuuka began untying her obi, fingers working the complex knots. "That wandering musician, Jabari Adomako. The one with the blessed crossbow. A pleasant enough man."
"And Xin?"
"An engineer with a Diabolisk child. Unremarkable except for his determination." Fuuka let her kimono fall, leaving her midriff and much of her legs bare. Ancient script was tattooed along the silk's edges of her robe. "But the Nordling woman. Sigrun Fjeld."
Shazmeen went very still. "What about her?"
"Tall. Athletic. That particular shade of platinum hair that Valoran nobility would breed for. Blue eyes like winter ice. Carried herself like she was born to command." Fuuka tilted her head. "Do you know her well?"
"I know of her." Shazmeen moved to a low table where a silver basin sat, filled with what looked like mercury but moved: the liquid was thick, seemingly having a mind of its own. "If this Sigrun is who I suspect, the Primarch will want to know immediately."
"Then we should begin." Fuuka approached the basin, her bare feet silent on the carpets. "The Soul Bridge requires two essences. As always."
"As always," Shazmeen agreed, reaching up to unclasp the golden chains. They fell away with a musical chime, and the robe followed, pooling at her feet like spilled night.
Beneath, her body was a canvas. Tattoos covered her from throat to ankle, all interconnected in patterns that shifted when looked at directly. At the center of her sternum, where her heart would be, was tattooed a lotus.
They stood on opposite sides of the basin, the mercury-like substance reflecting their faces in psionic ways, showing them older, younger, past, future, not quite human.
"The Primarch teaches that pleasure and communication are one," Fuuka began the ritual words, her Spirit Lantern flew out from her shed kimono, floating higher, casting violet shadows that writhed.
"That through the joining of flesh, we join across the void," Shazmeen responded, her fingers tracing symbols in the air that left brief afterimages.
"That what the body knows, the Cosmos remembers."
"That what we share in ecstasy, we share in eternity."
Both naked now, they moved at the same time, stepping into the basin. The substance was warm, almost body temperature, and it clung to their legs like something alive. As they sank to their knees, facing each other, the liquid began to glow—first violet, then deeper, a purple so dark it was almost black.
Shazmeen leaned forward, her lips brushing Fuuka's ear. "You trembled when you fought him. The Covenant boy."
"His resilience was...unexpected," Fuuka admitted, her hands finding Shazmeen's waist, feeling the skin beneath the tattoos. "There's something about him. Something the Primarch should evaluate."
"Through us, she will." Shazmeen's mouth found Fuuka's throat, teeth grazing the pulse point. "Open yourself, sister. Let the Bridge form."
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Their lips met, deep and hungry, tongues touching in a familiar way. Fuuka tasted jasmine tea and soy sauce on Shazmeen's mouth, her own lips parting wider to welcome her partner deeper. She'd taken male lovers before. Their roughness had its appeal, but only with women did she feel this synchronicity, this understanding of exactly where to touch, how to move.
Shazmeen's hands cupped Fuuka's breasts, thumbs circling her nipples until they peaked hard. Fuuka gasped into their kiss, her back arching as electricity shot straight to her core. The mercury-like substance around them responded, creeping higher up their thighs, warm and viscous against bare skin.
"I love how responsive you are," Shazmeen murmured against her mouth, fingers trailing down Fuuka's stomach. "In my centuries, no others react as sweetly as you do."
"Because you know me, mistress," Fuuka breathed back, her own hand sliding between Shazmeen's thighs, finding her already slick with arousal. "Every secret place."
They moved in sync, each woman's fingers finding the other's center simultaneously. Fuuka moaned as Shazmeen parted her folds, fingertips circling her clit. The sensation was immediate and overwhelming, her hips bucking forward as she did the same to Shazmeen, feeling the other woman's wetness coat her fingers.
The liquid in the basin began to pulse, responding to their rising arousal. Where it touched their skin, every nerve ending sang. Fuuka could feel her pussy clenching around Shazmeen's fingers as they slipped inside her, two then three, curling to hit that perfect spot that made her see stars.
"Kimochiiiii!" Fuuka gasped, a rare break in her composure. Her own fingers pumped into Shazmeen's heat, feeling the velvet walls grip her tight. "Please don't stop, my teacher…"
Shazmeen's thumb pressed against Fuuka's clit as her fingers worked deeper, and Fuuka matched the rhythm, their bodies moving in tandem. The mercury substance crept higher, coating their breasts, their backs, seeping into every crevice between their legs. It amplified everything…every touch was fire, every kiss was drowning.
Fuuka felt it building, that tightening low in her belly. Shazmeen was close too, she could tell by the way her breathing hitched, the way her inner walls fluttered around Fuuka's fingers.
"Together!" Shazmeen commanded, and increased her pace.
The orgasm hit Fuuka like a lightning strike. Her back arched, a cry tearing from her throat as her pussy clenched and released, fluid gushing over Shazmeen's hand and into the basin. She felt Shazmeen cum at nearly the same moment, her juices mixing with Fuuka's as they squirted into the mercury pool.
But they didn't stop. The ritual demanded more.
Still trembling from her first climax, Fuuka shifted position, spreading Shazmeen's legs wider. She could see her mentor's intimate canal, swollen and glistening, still pulsing with aftershocks.
Bowing down, Fuuka lowered her mouth to taste.
Shazmeen's flavor exploded across her tongue, sour and sweet with hints of ritual incense they'd sometimes burn down here for other Rakshasa rituals. Fuuka licked from entrance to clit, savoring every drop, while Shazmeen's fingers tangled in her hair.
"Yes," Shazmeen hissed, grinding against Fuuka's face. "Make me come again. The Bridge needs more!"
Fuuka sucked Shazmeen's clit between her lips, flicking it with her tongue while sliding three fingers back inside. She could feel another orgasm building in her mentor's body by the way her thighs trembled.
When Shazmeen came the second time, she screamed what might have been Fuuka's name or might have been something in Devavā?ī. More vaginal fluid gushed into the pool, and now the mercury was truly alive, swirling with violet and gold threads.
Panting in satisfaction, Fuuka rose, standing straighter as her mentor bowed.
They switched positions, Shazmeen's mouth now between Fuuka's thighs. The first touch of her tongue made Fuuka sob with pleasure. She was so sensitive from her first orgasm that every lick felt like too much and not enough at the same time.
"I can feel how wet you are," Shazmeen murmured against her pussy. "Still dripping for me."
She worked Fuuka with lips and tongue and fingers, building her up slowly this time, drawing it out until Fuuka was begging, dignity abandoned. "Oh please, Mistress Shazmeen—"
Shazmeen sealed her lips around Fuuka's clit and sucked hard while her fingers found that spot inside. Fuuka's second orgasm was even more intense than the first, her whole body convulsing as she squirted again, adding more of her essence to the ritual pool.
The reaction was immediate.
The liquid erupted upward, forming a column of dark light. Within it, shapes moved. Fuuka felt the familiar hollowing as her Aether Point drained, palpable through the chime of her Nucleus Watch:
[ātma-Setu (Soul Bridge) Initiated]
The column stabilized, solidifying into something like glass, like ice, like condensed void. Within its depths, a face began to form.
Primarch Moro had no fixed appearance. On Shashan, the distant moon of Proxima Centauri where she ruled, she had a physical form. But through the Soul Bridge, she appeared as concept more than flesh.
The face in the column was serene, eyes closed, features that was a cross between Imperial, Djinno, and something older, something that predated human racial distinctions of the Nucleus Age. When the eyes opened, they were the color of deep space between stars.
"Daughters of Rakshasa." The voice bypassed their ears entirely, writing itself directly onto their consciousness. "You reach across the Cosmos with urgency. Report."
Fuuka and Shazmeen's bodies remained intertwined in the basin, the ritual demanding physical contact be maintained throughout the communication. "Primarch Moro," Fuuka began, her voice steady. "The Red Rabbit Warren bounty has been posted. Fifty thousand Atomic Dollars, as you predicted."
"Young Prefect Dilinur seeks champions through economic incentive. How predictably capitalist." There was amusement in that alien voice. "The candidates?"
"Marcus Thorne, a Zorian Covenant Stalwart. His combat prowess impresses. Resilience 8, trained in Solar psionics. He injured my Poison Creeper during our duel."
The face in the column shifted slightly, a movement that suggested interest. "A Covenant dog with teeth. Useful. His genetic sample could benefit our own breeders. Continue."
"Jabari Adomako is here. The musician-warrior from the Inner Sol."
"Ah, the one who unknowingly killed Ta?hā's spawn three years ago. He has his uses. Who else?"
"An engineer named Xin. Travels with a juvenile Diabolisk he treats as a son."
"Touching, though likely irrelevant. Unless?"
"Unless nothing, Primarch. But there's another." Fuuka felt Shazmeen's legs tense against her. "A Nordling woman. Her name is Sigrun Fjeld."
The silence stretched for several heartbeats. When Moro spoke again, her harmonic voice made the walls vibrate. "Describe her exactly."
Shazmeen took over, her words precise. "About six feet tall. Athletic build suggesting military training, though the size of her breasts suggest plastic surgery, perhaps Sol human cybernetics. Platinum blonde hair, natural not dyed. Blue eyes with the crystalline quality of Nordic Commonwealth nobility. Age approximately thirty Solar years."
"Her weapons?"
"A Nordic-type Thermal Axe with custom modifications," Fuuka supplied. "Close combat preference. Fighting style suggests Special Forces training, possibly certified by the Terra Alliance."
The face in the column smiled, an expression that was beautiful and terrible in equal measure. "Queen Regent Maren's Third Daughter. The lost princess Skarn has hunted for thirteen years."
Fuuka and Shazmeen exchanged glances. "Princess?"
"Maren had four Major Daughters before she became what she is now. The eldest joined her in the Fenris Horde willingly. The second rebelled, refusing the transformation. The third...Sigrun…vanished from Europa. Maren blamed the Terra Alliance for hiding her, but if she's been living as a bounty hunter..."
"She's been here for the last decade." Shazmeen finished. "But all Mars settlements have ceased communications with the moons of Jupiter since year '84. Skarn must not know she's here."
"Indeed. This changes the game entirely." The face turned its attention to Fuuka. "You will take the bounty yourself. Monitor all candidates, but focus on Princess Sigrun. Do not kill her. She's far too valuable alive. If possible, turn her to our cause. A princess of the Fjeld bloodline serving Rakshasa would be...immensely amusing."
"And Marcus Thorne?"
"Acquire his genetic material when opportunity allows. Blood, saliva, semen. Whatever you can obtain without killing him. The Covenant zealots produces interesting specimens occasionally. We should cultivate them rather than waste them."
"Your will be done, Primarch," both women said in unison.
The face leaned forward, as if it could somehow emerge from the column. "The Red Rabbit Warren contains more than the High-Grade Zephyrium. Old experiments lurk in its depths. Some mine. Some others'. Be careful what you wake."
The column began to dissolve, the substance in the basin returning to its dormant state. As the connection faded, Moro's last words echoed in their minds: "Remember, daughters, we do not destroy potential. We seduce it, make it ours. That is the Rakshasa way."
The Soul Bridge collapsed, leaving Fuuka and Shazmeen gasping in the now-ordinary basin. The ritual's aftermath left them both hypersensitive, every breath electric, every touch overwhelming. They separated slowly, reluctantly, helping each other stand on shaking legs.
"A Princess of House Fjeld," Shazmeen murmured, reaching for a silk robe. "She'll come eventually, asking questions. They always do when they find out what we are."
"And we'll be ready with answers." Fuuka accepted a towel, drying the strange residue from her skin. It tingled, leaving her flesh feeling new. "Carefully crafted ones that serve our purposes."
"Our great Primarch plays a long game."
"The longest." Fuuka rewrapped herself in the ritual silks, then began donning her kimono over them. "What do you know of Marcus Thorne beyond what we've seen?"
"Covenant intelligence suggests he's from their newer generation of Stalwarts. More flexible in thinking than the old guard, but still devoted to their doctrine." Shazmeen moved to a cabinet, producing a bottle of something amber and viscous. "Here. For the aftermath."
Fuuka accepted the drink gratefully. It burned going down, but settled the otherworldly sensations the ritual always left. "He interests me. That resilience isn't natural."
Shazmeen poured her own glass. "Will you seduce him?"
"Perhaps. The Primarch wants his genetics, after all." Fuuka smiled, an expression that didn't reach her eyes. "And there are worse ways to spend an evening than breaking a Covenant warrior's rigid self-control."
They moved to the window, looking out over Dragon District's neon maze. Somewhere out there, their targets moved through the night, unaware of the web being woven around them.
"The princess will be the real challenge," Shazmeen observed. "If she's survived alone for eleven years, she's either very lucky or very dangerous."
"Why not both?" Fuuka's Spirit Lantern dimmed to its dormant state, returning to her kimono. "I should go. The Warren awaits, and I want to arrive before the others."
"Through the back exit. The main entrances have too many eyes right now."
As Fuuka moved toward the hidden door, Shazmeen called after her. "Be careful in the Warren, sister. The Primarch's warnings are never idle."
"I know." Fuuka paused at the threshold. "Keep watch on the inn. If any of them return, I need to know. Especially Sigrun."
"Of course. May your desires guide your dreams."
"And may our hunger never be sated."
Fuuka descended back through the hidden passage, her mind already calculating approaches. A Covenant warrior, a wandering musician, a desperate engineer, and a hidden princess. Each thread in a puzzle only her great Primarch Moro could see in full.
But Fuuka just needed to weave her own section correctly.
The war was coming to the Seven Realms, whether they knew it or not. And when it arrived, the Rakshasa would be ready.