Chapter 29:
"She's fine," Lina repeated, for the second time. Not that her assurances did anything to stop Bill from fussing over the plump girl. It was amusing. Even more amusing was the sight of the nasty cougar on the far side of the room. Princess Noemi had been here, waiting on them, when they got back. Far from rushing to her side, Billy the Human had been far more concerned with looking after Olesia. He'd rushed back and forth, procuring food, and stoking up a fire. He'd made sure the plump girl had pride of place in front of the fireplace.
As Billy quizzed the plush princess on her condition, Finn the Human was having a far less pleasant conversation–one that Noemi was forced to listen to. The sanctioning of members of the Privy Council was something that affected all of the Civilized Kingdoms. The presence of the emeralds in the lair of a pack of bandits had torched off a firestorm. The investigation had begun almost as soon as the Finn-Crew emerged from the mine. Finn had begun asking questions immediately. Who had the authority to sanction the removal of emeralds from the Royal Treasury? Who signed for emeralds to be mined and how were they transferred out of the mines and into the treasury?
The questions had come in a bewildering array. The Captain of the Emerald Guard had done his best to answer. There were literally hundreds of people involved in the various facets of the emerald-trade. Miners dug. Supervisors watched the miners and decided where to dig. Permission to dig was handed down from on high, though. And it was the Emerald Guard who watched the mines and the miners, searching them to make sure none of the precious stones were stolen. And that led to the real answer to the question the King of Ooo was asking. The one common thread in all of that was the Royal Heir.
As Heir, it was Prince Qasim's job to manage the Kingdom's most prized resource. Qasim was the man who gave permission to dig. Qasim was the man who ran the Inspection House. And Qasim was the man who had the power as well as the knowledge to divert emeralds traveling between the mines and the Royal Treasury. "Bring him here," growled the King. "At once, sire," replied the Captain of the Guard. As a shocked and horrified Emerald Princess stared, her own guards rushed off to go arrest her nephew and heir.
The young prince wasn't hard to find. He'd been hiding in his quarters. It was immediately apparent when he and his aide were dragged into the room that he was up to his neck in trouble. His shoes were dirty. Billy could see that from across the room. Noemi's keen eyes saw that his shoes bore the same powdery dirt and sand covering Finn's boots. He'd been in the cave. He'd been down in the cave when they were fighting the bandits! Indeed, the nervous, darting eyes and the fidgeting told Noemi that this man was guilty as sin.
"He has been out of the palace today, sire," said the Captain of the guard. Finn turned to the hapless princeling and rumbled, "explain. Your answers could be the difference between life and death for you." Aysun opened her mouth to protest, but her chaperone grabbed her by the shoulder and pulled her back. Indeed, both Royal Chaperones were soon involved in urgently whispering calming words at their princess. "Take him," Finn growled. The guards grabbed the hapless princeling by both arms. At the same time, two more guards dragged his secretary forward.
The terrified functionary immediately began pleading, offering up, "he sold out because of his habit!" Qasim shouted at the man to shut up, but Finn motioned him to silence with a wag of his finger. A tendril of the Grass-Sword licked out and caressed the prince's lips, telling him that he was on the very edge of death. "Go on," Finn told the functionary. The prince's aide told them about his master's gambling habit. He told of how his master had gotten in hock to the tune of thousands and thousands of gold coins. He'd stolen emeralds from the treasury, disguising the thefts by cooking the books. All of that had culminated with his being snatched up by the bandits who ran the gambling-house in the desert. They'd offered his life–and the return of some of his lost treasure–if he would simply whisper some words in his aunt's ears.
Now, of course, the King of Ooo wanted to know what Aysun's part was in all of this. The big man turned to Aysun, who glanced away. "Ok," said Finn, as he turned back to the prince. "Tell me what you were asked to do," he said. "If I'm satisfied, you continue breathing. If I'm not..." Nobody thought the King of Ooo was joking. Qasim Qassam spilled his guts, telling them of all his bad behavior–from the stolen emeralds and raids on the treasury to the attempt to form an illicit alliance with the Muscle Kingdom.
"Where is, Princess Nieve, by the way," Finn asked? "Sh-she's out in the desert," Qasim stammered. "I-I kept her there. She refused to stay in the caverns, so I kept her in a house in the desert." "I'll have the directions," Finn growled, as he motioned for Billy to come forward. The younger man came striding over, as prince Qasim spilled his guts about where Nieve was and who was with her. "She's in danger," Finn rumbled. He didn't doubt that the Bandit Princess would murder Nieve to cover her tracks. "On it," Billy muttered.
Noemi sighed as he went striding away. So much for the reunion. Momentarily, the young hero was on his way to the door, motioning for his team to follow. Setting down the brunner that he'd been munching on, Tom headed off after him. Leo rose to follow too. Lina would have stayed, but Olesia rose to her feet to go too. She'd been in this almost from the beginning. She wasn't going to stop now.
Turning back to the matter at hand, Finn the King declared, "Prince Qasim has engaged with the enemies of peace to subvert the Peace of Ooo. He has committed theft against his homeland. He has provided funds in support of bandits and murderers, making him a part of their conspiracy. He has pursued an illicit alliance without the consent of the Crown of Ooo. For these crimes, he is sentenced to two-hundred years, dungeon. Take him."
The guards took the young prince by the arms and hauled him away. Many faces there showed relief. Things could have gone much worse. Of course, Finn wasn't done yet. Coolly, he announced, "the Emerald Guard is hereby taken under the command of the Princess General of the Privy Council. From this day forward, they will report to Princess Ingrid. The Emerald Mines will be managed by the Bank of Ooo, and the Royal Auditor will be taking charge of accounting for the emeralds and all the treasures in the Emerald Treasury." Aysun went crazy, then. She rushed Finn, screaming and slapping at him. The guards, who'd been holding the prince's aide, let go and grabbed their princess by the arm. Heedless of the commotion, the King of Ooo declared, "I will see supplicants in the Royal Audience Chamber." Without a further word, Finn turned and strode away, leaving Alexia and Noemi staring after him, as Aysun broke down in tears.
Billy and his crew went straight down to the stables, where the young hero rustled up some camels. Of course that left Olesia in a bit of a bind. Without a word, the plump girl walked into the blacksmith's small workshop, returning minutes later wearing a skin-tight jumpsuit in a sexy black. Smiling at the way Billy stared, the plush princess strode over to Lina's camel, announcing, "let's go..." With a long-suffering sigh, Leo handed Tom the asbestos blanket he'd typically worn in Lina's vehicle before motioning for him to climb up on the camel it appeared they'd be sharing. The five rode out, heading north and east toward the fallen Emerald Prince's love-nest.
They rode for miles across the desert, stopping occasionally to rest the camels. It was a helluva trek to get some ass, and a sweltering Pedersen said so. Which was bothering Billy more than a little. He didn't trust the prince any more than his dad did. It would be easy for Qasim to 'leave a few things out'. What if the Bandit-Princess's goons were guarding Nieve? The Muscle Princess was edging slowly over to the liability side of the ledger. Finn knew about her shenanigans. She was no longer a mole inside the Privy Council. Faced with jail or execution, she might spill her guts of anything she knew. Which meant the Bandit Princess might spill her guts first.
The thought repeated itself like a litany in Billy's mind as the sun grew ever closer to the horizon. There was no reason to spare Nieve. She was a liability. At best, she would have been a hostage, but she lost that defense when the Bandit Princess learned of the defeat in the caverns and Qasim's imprisonment. On their fourth stop to rest the camels, Billy came to a fateful decision.
Striding over to Olesia, he said, "I'm gonna' ask you to do something. If you're afraid, I understand..." His words made no sense to Leo or Tom. Lina knew what he was asking as soon as the words left her mouth. For that matter, so did Olesia. Lina swore at him in Russian, as Olesia said, "alright, but I don't know that there's any fires near there. It might take a while." The tall girl swore at her too. Olesia shushed her. Sitting down, cross-legged on the ground, she closed her eyes once more. It took a while. Billy found himself holding his breath, while Lina muttered curses and paced. Leo got up and went to her side, whispering soothing words at her, as he'd just realized an even greater risk was coming up.
"It's empty," Olesia announced. "There's nobody there. There's... The fire's down to embers. At least it was." Looking up at him, she said, "before I tell you this, I don't think you should do what you're planning." Lina glanced up sharply. "Where," Billy demanded? With a sigh, the plump girl said, "headed east. Further into the desert." With only that, Billy summoned up the power of the Ice-Tiara. Moments later, he was flying, soaring into the evening sky, headed east, as Lina shouted after him. Leo grabbed her and held on. He'd known how this was going to go the minute he'd figured out what Billy was asking Olesia to do. "We need to catch up," said the soldier. "You need to help me figure out how to catch up." Billy was going to need them. He might need them to save his sanity.
Late that evening, a weary Finn Mertens finally walked away from the endless audiences. He was distracted and off his game. Worries about what his wives had almost walked into were eating at him. Emeraude had very nearly walked to her doom, and he wasn't really sure Cherry would have fared all that much better. Oh, she was cocky as anything, and she had her share of thugs and killers to do her bidding, true. At the same time, the Bandit Princess had her claws sunk deep into this place if she had control over the heir to the throne. Fortunately, there were a lot of people who were irritated with the prince, his aunt, and their combined antics. It looked like he would be able to get out of here and get back to his lonely, unhappy quest.
In the right now, what he really wanted, more than anything, was to get to the bed that he'd been promised and find himself in it for a few hours before he got up to do it all again. He halfway feared that was part of the problem with the reawakened Curse. The curse had tried to consume Fionna. She'd gone down slowly, with the curse stealing more and more of her strength until she'd been unconscious. He was a little afraid of that.
Striding into the suite that was his, the King of Ooo moved to the bed and began climbing out of the weapons and gear he'd been wearing since he'd gotten up that morning, shedding the hidden armor plates, shedding Nadia's forcefield gizmo, shedding a half-dozen knives and daggers, and a hidden pistol, until he was down to just his shirt, pants, and shoes. He even took off his belt, with the hidden bubble-generator that had saved his butt against Maja in the Fire-Bleeder's cave. That was when Aysun burst through the door to his suite.
She'd been quiet through much of their joint audience. Honestly, with all the angry nobles wanting to kick her ass, he scarcely blamed her. Finn had done most of the talking, and the business had gone pretty much where he wanted it to go. Hurletta would have auditors here within a few days to take charge of the emerald mines. He would have a listing of all the men who were sanctioned to steal from the mines from Cherry's own hand within the week, and they would move on from there. No muss. No fuss.
"I cannot accept this," Aysun hissed. Finn blinked owlishly as he stared at the tall girl standing there in that all-enveloping robe. It had been a subject of fascination for him in the good old days. They'd laughed and hung out together–when her chaperones weren't in the way–and Finn had laughed when her robe got caught on trees and other things while they were climbing or running around. That was what kids did, though. All innocent and above board, when Aysun was a tweener, and Finn was the jerky little boy she sometimes feuded with.
In later years, teenage Finn had sorta-kinda wondered. What did she wear under that robe? He knew what girls looked like naked, and he'd gotten the talk, so he'd wondered. That wonder had only grown after her big mistake. Oh, nobody would ever admit to anything, but Finn knew that she'd gone all the way. Aysun had gone to Tier-15 with a guy who was only really interested in stealing her blind and moving on down the road.
"Are you listening to me," growled the angry princess?! She strode straight up to him and got in his face. It was only then that he realized she had neither guards nor chaperones. Probably because they wouldn't have gone along with her being an idiot. They knew that he was very capable of doing something drastic. "I'm listening," he replied. Though he really wished she would just fuck off. The decision had already gotten made, and he saw no reason to change it.
"I cannot accept this," she declared. As if he gave a fuck. His unwavering expression unnerved the unhappy princess. It was perilously like he didn't care! He was a man! He shouldn't be giving her so much grief! She was a princess! Not that her complaints seemed to register at all with him. Indeed, the more she complained, the less he seemed to care. And that was driving her to exasperation.
Run down on patience, the Emerald Princess howled, "you can't do this!" It was shrill and loud–everything that Finn hated about her. The King of Ooo glared at her. He very well could. In point of fact, he just had! "You took my heir," she snapped! "You're taking my Kingdom's legacy!" He was doing nothing of the sort, and he told her that. "I'm providing adult supervision, Aysun," the King of Ooo retorted. "If the Emerald Princess can't do the job of policing the emerald mines, then I will do it for her. This is the second time you've come close to handing over millions of coins to someone in a position to wreck the peace! I've been lenient, but I can take this as far as I need to..."
She went physical for the third time since he'd been here. She slapped him straight across the face, surprising him with her strength. And that was the limit. He'd had enough. Snatching the belt from the bed, he grabbed her by the wrist and, as he sat down, hurled her down across his knees. It was time for another lesson. The belt was striking her ass almost before she realized what was happening. He wasn't anything close to gentle. It was just as humiliating and painful as the beating across the neck in the badlands. He'd shocked her! He'd shamed her! Her pride had been cruelly stung by being beaten by a social inferior in front of her guards and chaperones.
And the worst part? A piece of her had gotten off on the humiliation of the spanking.
She'd buried and rationalized the whole thing for years. She'd warred with the conflicting emotions of lust for the one man with the gall to touch her and hatred for his daring to put his dirty hands on a princess. And now he was a despot who had seized power over the world. He'd taken power over her kingdom, and now he was taking power over her body!
Two minutes into the beating, the big man noticed something that shocked him. The pretty princess wasn't screaming anymore. At least not in pain. With every stroke of the belt, Aysun was squealing. And that wasn't all. She was grinding her snatch against his thigh, and even when he stopped paddling her ass, she kept on going. Her pale emerald skin was flushed, and it was obvious to a fool she was getting off. Finn reached down and grabbed the hem of her robe, throwing it up over her ass to reveal sexy silk stockings and skimpy thong panties like Cherry might wear. And those panties were soaking wet.
He was overwhelmed by a mixture of conflicting emotions just then. He was angry. He was still angry. At the same time, well, it had been a fair piece since he'd been with any of his girls, and the nanobots jacking up his hormones was still a thing. He was horny as fuck. The sight of that wriggling ass had his pecker hard. Tossing the belt aside, the big man slapped that ass, hard as he could, making the meaty buns jiggle. Aysun squealed in outrage, but it didn't stop that butt from wriggling around. Finn did it again. And then he did it again. Back and forth he slapped that hard little bottom. She had a nice ass, to say she was getting on in years. Of course, a lot of the princesses were fiends for dieting–fighting off age with all their might.
Tired of the bullshit, Finn grabbed the bitch by the scruff and jerked her face up towards him. Aysun glanced away, her face a study in contrasts. She was humiliated–ashamed of what had just happened to her. At the same time, the color in her cheeks told that she very well knew that he knew she'd been getting off. Standing up, the King of Ooo growled, "suck me." Aysun stared up at him in shock. Finn's face was hard. Swallowing, the nasty princess reached for his fly and unbuttoned his pants. Fishing out his hard pecker, the Emerald Princess goggled at it. It was fucking huge! It was huge, and she'd only ever done this once before. Staring into his eyes, it was clear she was going to get on-the-job training.
She started slowly, teasing his pecker with her thin lips and running her tongue around his tip. He was sweaty, and she was at once disgusted and shockingly turned on. Where the young boy who'd tried so hard to be a gentleman had aroused nothing but contempt, the older man who'd come back as her conqueror had her panties pretty damp.
Elsewhere in the palace, Alexia Galitsis, Princess of the Laurel Kingdom, finally broke free of her annoying neighbor. Noemi had been insistently bending her ear about goings on in the wastes east of their kingdoms. The Purple Princess had spent a bit too long loafing in the Candy Kingdom–taking a turn on her favorite toy. Now her counselors were pissed, and the nobles were threatening revolt if she didn't get her bottom back home to deal with some of the problems. They still had piles of refugees from the wreckage of the Elbow Kingdom to deal with, after all.
Alexia was far from interested at the moment. She was far more interested in the sexy sight that had dropped in on them from abroad. She hadn't gotten pregnant. Sneaky, fucking Lamprey Princess had gotten knobbed first shot up the tube, but Alexia had scored a big fat zero in spite of having permission. She wanted to try again. Finn had committed to trying again, but he'd been in the east, hunting down the troublemakers who wanted to wind things up again.
Now he was here.
The King of Ooo was meat on the table so to speak. She was going to get her baby. This was likely her one real chance, and she was determined to grab the brass ring. She was getting too old to be a mother, and there was a real risk she'd be handing the kingdom over to a distant cousin or something if she wasn't careful. Twenty minutes after Finn had gone–long enough that maybe the palace gossips wouldn't put two-and-two together–Alexia excused herself, weaving a small lie to convince Noemi to let things wait until morning. They'd have plenty of time to talk in the morning after all. Slipping out of the meeting hall, the little princess went hunting for her child's would-be father.
She knew where she'd find Finn. He'd offered to chat–after he'd gotten a little rest. If she got her way, he wouldn't be resting at all. A quick stop in her own quarters, letting her shed her dress and any other encumbrances, and the little woman was on her way, wearing nothing but a mantle, just like she'd worn to seduce him in the Candy Kingdom. Middle of the cycle, she thought. The chances are better than last time. She'd taken just too long to put her plan in motion, and she'd known that going in. The chance had been just too good to pass up though. She'd had Finn to herself with no bitches in the way.
There were odd noises coming from the King's quarters as the little princess approached. She found herself straining her ears to hear or understand what was going on inside. A part of her started to get cold feet, realizing that, after chasing the mysterious Bandit Princess all over Ooo and facing down a demon-summoner in the emerald mines, Finn might very well not want to be bothered. But I need this, she thought. Finn was really her best hope.
The door was cracked a little when she reached it, and she peered inside through the opening to find a shocking sight. Aysun. On her hands and knees on the bed. With Finn screwing her within an inch of her life. The scene was so nasty. His hips slapped into the Emerald Princess's hard little ass, making a nasty clapping sound. He was rough as anything, seeming almost to use Aysun for his own pleasure–nothing like the gentleman who'd had Alexia herself screaming in hunger from all the teasing. Indeed, before Alex's shocked eyes, Finn stopped screwing Aysun and began slapping her ass with the palm of his hand, making the firm flesh jump and jiggle. It was every kind of nasty, and it sent jolts of lust shooting up and down her spine.
Finn was only vaguely aware of the door opening. A glance out of the corner of his eye told him that Alexia was standing there, but he was too involved in banging Aysun to really care. As the Laurel Princess watched–rubbing her snatch the whole time–Finn began to screw her neighbor once more. The Emerald Princess clawed the sheets as she wailed in climax. Burying her face into the mattress, the skinny woman screamed as Finn rammed that huge pecker into her belly.
"Fuck her," moaned Alexia, as she watched Finn shove his thick pipe deep up her mortal enemy's ruined pussy over and over again. He was burying it deep with every stroke he took in Aysun's hot gash. Steamy pussy-cream dribbled out of her every time he withdrew. Rubbing her pussy, Alexia hissed, "fuck her good. Cream her pussy. Ooaoaah, yesss... I want you to fuck your bastard into her..." It would have shocked Finn in the past. In his old life, before all the troubles and before every bitch on Ooo decided to grab for a piece of him, the idea of banging one girl while another one was watching was out of the question. In spite of what other people thought, he, Simone, and Emeraude had never done anything crazy. Now the King of Ooo grabbed Alex by her round little butt and pulled her to him. In short order, he had her grinding her hips against his thigh, while he tongued out her mouth–all while he continued to screw the shit out of Aysun.
Out in the desert, Billy the hero came swooping down out of the darkened sky above a small caravan of heavily armed troops. He'd gone just where Olesia had said, anticipating where he'd find the tracks and rolling up the trail. The journey had been the very definition of 'not-fun' with the Ice-Tiara striving to seduce him the whole way. Tonight's enticements were about naked power. The Entity entreated him to seize his dad's empire and rule a world of ice and bitter cold.
Ironically, it's evil suggestions were every kind of self-defeating tonight. Far from being tempting, thoughts of freezing the world made him think of his stepmom, Emeraude. It made him think of Ragnhild and their kids. He thought of Abeiuwa and their little girl. And he thought of Olesia. When he thought of the plucky young woman and all the others who would suffer, he had little interest in the Tiara's power.
The little caravan was making good time, aided by the handful of trucks they had. This was the place where things got hairy. It would have been nice to have Leo or Olesia for backup against the numbers he saw. So come up with a good plan, he told himself. He needed a plan to get the caravan stopped. He needed those men out of their vehicles. Then he had to take them out. All without getting shot. It's winter, he thought. It was damn near winter. His ice would last longer. With the sun gone from the sky, he had a chance.
Conjuring ice-spines from the ground, the young hero shredded the tires on the lead truck. The disabled truck came screeching to a halt, causing the truck behind to slam into their rear, throwing several of the guards from the bed. Billy's conjured ice insured that the third truck in the line lost it's brakes, causing it to come screeching around the second truck–crushing several of the injured soldiers on the ground. Knowing that with every ounce of energy he stole from the air, the Ice-Tiara got stronger, the young prince transformed that energy, feeding it into the engine of the last truck in the line, causing it to explode. In short order, he had the convoy in chaos.
Alighting among the stunned guards, the young prince gutted the first man he came to, taking his dart-gun. Turning the gun on the guard's friends, he laid into them, dropping seven before they could even respond. Of course by that point, Billy was already moving. He was rushing around to the far side of the convoy where the fourth truck was already maneuvering to cut him off. Just what I need, Billy thought. Hurling the empty rifle away, he conjured up a cone of frost to cover the window, dodging aside as the truck went hurtling past–crushing several more men. The out-of-control truck slammed nose-first into the first truck in the line, setting it on fire.
Billy ran back along the convoy, with the guards rushing about in a panic, searching for him. Hiding in the lee of the burning truck, the young man considered his options. Nieve was here somewhere. Was she in one of the wrecks? Was she hurt? You gotta' end this, he decided. Stepping out, he conjured a sheet of thin ice, causing his pursuers to slip. That let him get in among them, slashing and stabbing with ice-daggers. Behind him, the burning truck erupted in flames. It was going up. Billy went forward along the convoy, finishing off guards as he went, making sure there was nobody still moving. In the middle of the pileup, he found Nieve, kneeling there in a state of abject terror next to the truck with the frozen brakes. Dressed in the typical Muscle Kingdom leotard, she appeared to be mostly unharmed, with her black hair a little wild.
Far from calming her, the sight of Finn the Human's son transformed her terror into abject rage. The curvy cutie leapt to her feet with a growl of anger and rushed him. Billy was startled by the reaction, as she slapped him hard enough to knock the spit from his mouth. "What the fuck," he snapped?! "I just saved your life!" "I was going to meet my fiancé," howled Nieve! "How dare you?! How dare you attack a sitting Royal?!" "You were going to be slaughtered," Billy retorted. "These guys weren't taking you to Qasim, Your Highness. They were taking you to his puppetmaster to be her prisoner." That gave the nasty bitch pause. He could see it in her eyes. This wasn't going where she had hoped.
"Qasim's in prison," Billy told her. "We know all about..." Shouting over him, she cut him off. She was back to anger and violence, shouting about her rights as a Royal. She had a half-dozen lies about what was going on, and she demanded to be taken to her fiancé. Rolling his eyes, Billy told her, "he's in jail. He's going to be locked up for a long, long time. He wasn't here to form some kind of alliance, Nieve, though I have every right to punish you for that too..." The princess cussed him, hurling a stream of abuse.
Somewhere in that flood of invective, Billy began to lose his tenuous hold on his temper. He'd rushed here to save this cunt's life. He'd risked his ass and his sanity both, and he'd risked Olesia's safety to snatch her from the hands of the Bandit Princess. This was the dubious thanks that he got. Halfway through that nasty tirade, she'd called him a liar, and that, more than anything else, pushed him over the line.
Her first warning was a stinging slap to the face that shut her up for just a couple of moments. Then, when she tried to punch him, things escalated fast. One moment, she had her fist cocked. The next, she was on her belly, across his knees, and his hand was flying towards her ass at painful velocity. Angry, Billy paddled that big, hard ass a long ten minutes as Nieve jumped and gyrated and squealed. After months of Abeiuwa's angst and Noemi's antics followed by weeks in a frantic effort to rescue a woman who was clearly involved with her abductors, the big man was plum out of patience. He'd been shocked at what his dad had suggested in Aysun's court. He'd been a little horrified that his dad would even suggest turning the robot-army loose on these folk just to prove a point. Now he was beginning to see.
These women weren't little angels. They weren't naive fools doing things they didn't know they shouldn't be doing. Some of them were awful people who needed to be put in their place. Some of them would have to get removed for the world to have peace again. He'd leave it to his dad to decide which group Nieve fell in. In the right now, he was going to give her that dose of medicine that her daddy should have given her when she was growing up.
Nieve's ass was a cherry-red when Billy shoved her off his lap. She knelt there on her hands and knees for a long five minutes, sniffling and spitting curses at him, but the big man was unmoved. Sobbing, the proud princess jumped up and threw herself at him. Billy stepped aside, grabbed her hair, and pulled her back against him. Softly, he said, "do you know how many ways I could kill you for your attempt to subvert the Peace, Nieve?" She shivered in abject terror as the temperature dropped precipitously around them–in the middle of the desert. It only dawned on her then just how dangerous this man was.
"Gather up a couple of water-bottles," he commanded. Her eyes flicked to the corpses. He wanted her to loot bodies! His expression was implacable. Sobbing, she gingerly pulled a water-flask off a corpse. She almost wretched at the sight of all the blood soaking into the sand. She was horrified to find the flask was empty. Billy howled laughter as she was forced to raid two more bodies. She actually hurled one of the empties at him. Catching it on the fly, he said, "one more, Nieve." She spat curses, but she did as she was told. He made her help as he looted the bodies and the wrecked vehicles for whatever they could lay hands on. Then, with his big right hand wrapped about her left arm in a grip of iron, the young hero dragged the unhappy princess into the night, bound for home.
Back in the Emerald Kingdom, Finn lay himself down, exhausted, between the two princesses, with Alexia laying herself down facing him. It was the second time he'd had angry sex. He'd shocked himself by doing both princesses. He'd been pretty thoroughly fried when Aysun came storming in, but anger had given him energy. In the end, he'd kept his promise to Alex. Now Finn pulled Alex close, slipping his arms around her. Aysun slid up against his back, slipping her arms around his middle. Two more on the pile, he thought. If this kept up, he'd be banging every princess on Ooo–at least the ones his sons weren't busy screwing.
One more thread has ended. Getting close to the finale of this Act.