Love

Chapter 14

Rick took her back outside and onto the main deck. He hid a smile. "You saw the tree. You can talk to it if you want."

"Talk to it?" She squinted at him. "You're joking." She knew people talked to their plants but…she trusted him and started thinking that the tree would actually talk back. It probably had something to do with magic. Kate put her hand on the tree and felt the bark. "Hi." She stood there, listening intently, but didn't hear or feel anything. Then she heard a snicker; it was coming from Castle!

She used the same hand to smack his arm. "I'll get you for that." She had fallen for it hook, line, and sinker. Then she listened and watched as Castle began to laugh. That made her growl at him. She needed a plan to get back at him.

"This way." Rick started walking again. Kate saw a lot of open deck except she saw something toward the front. It actually looked a little familiar. They walked right up next to it.

"Castle, is this a ballista?" It was basically a large crossbow that was mounted to the deck. "A little primitive, isn't it?" It wasn't a howitzer or a rocket launcher or even a .50 cal machine gun.

Rick walked over to the side and Kate saw large arrows mounted to the side of the ship. She watched as he pulled one off and handed it to her. She took it and found it had some weight to it. She shrugged; it was just a big arrow with a big arrow head.

He gave her a clue. "Look closely at the arrow head."

Kate moved it so that she could get a closer look at the arrow head. "Is this glass?" That didn't make much sense. Glass would do very little if any damage at all. Then she saw something because it moved. "It's full of a liquid. …What's in it?" She looked at Castle and watched him use his hands fly apart, moving rapidly from close together with his hands clenched to very far apart with his fingers outspread as he silently spoke a word.

"Explosion!" Kate was in awe.

"See the tape on the shaft?" Rick questioned and Kate looked and saw a small amount of green tape wrapped around the shaft. "Green is acid, red is fire." He pointed to all the other arrows mounted to the side of the ship. There were six on each side. Kate looked closer and saw there would be three of each on either side.

She handed it back to him and watched him put it back. She was a little more impressed now. "Are these the standard weapons you use here?"

"For a ship this small, yes. Remember there's no gravity so what you shoot will go perfectly straight until it runs out of energy and finally stops or hits something," he explained.

That had Kate thinking. It also had her looking down at her feet. She was standing on a deck which meant gravity, didn't it? Yet how she had gotten there pointed to no gravity. No up or down, yet there was because she was standing on a deck.

"Things work differently here. You'll get used to it. Back this way down to the lower deck next." Rick walked back to where they'd started.

Kate saw a door under each of the stairs that went up. "What's up there?"

"Another deck with another weapon and access to the bridge." He gestured toward a structure. "That's that round building up there with all the windows."

To Kate it looked like a short tower with a larger round building on top that had openings all around it. She followed Castle through the door and found a set of stairs going down.

Once down the stairs she saw a large open space from the aft of the ship to the bow and from side to side. Except for a few posts and open beams it was wide open. It was also filled with beds on one side and what looked like a kitchen up against the opposite wall and picnic tables in-between.

"Crew quarters, kitchen, and dining area," Rick said.

Kate started counting bunk beds and came up with fourteen beds, three tables, and an ancient-looking though really large range. She moved into the space. The beds each had a mattress, sheets and blankets, and pillows. There were three picnic tables but what piqued her interest was antique cooktop. It looked like it was made of cast iron. "We cook on this thing?" She had no idea how she was going to do that. Then she started looking around. "Where's the wood or coal?" How did they create a fire to get heat?

She bent down to where the oven was and fire box. "It's lit!" She held her hand close and felt the heat. "How?" She saw pots and pans and cooking tools hanging all around it. There were even pots and a single pan already sitting on top. It looked like it had four huge burners and two very small ones in the center. With two ovens on either side and a fire box in the middle.

There was open shelving on either side filled with all kinds of things, including plates and glasses. There was even a shelf above this ancient thing filled with all kinds of bottles and jars in different shapes and sizes, some of which she immediately recognized. They were her spices from home. Castle had really done a lot of work if he had already unpacked all of those boxes.

"How does it work and where's all the food?" Kate walked to the end and then saw a number of her cans of food on open shelving. It wasn't all of it, but it was a start.

Rick was smiling widely as he walked up to the fire box and opened it. "Hi, Little Flame, how're you doing? Come out and say hello to Kate."

Kate had heard him and thought he was talking to himself or something. However, as she watched this tiny something hopped out and stood on top of the stove. The little being was made of fire and had hands, legs, a body, and a head. It was about the size of her hand, if that. "What the heck is that?" She had never seen anything like it.

"This is Little Flame. He's a Fire Elemental from the Elemental Plane of Fire. He's just a baby but he's friendly. Come say hello." Rick was enjoying this immensely.

Kate moved in closer and began to feel his heat. "Hi," she barely squeaked out. "He heats this thing up? …How?" She cursed internally. That had been a stupid question; he obviously heated it up with his body.

"What's an…elemental? Is that right?" she queried.

"The basic elements are earth, wind, fire, and water. I go to his elemental plane and bring back some of his home for him to eat. In exchange he heats up the unit as requested. He was practically dead when I found him. I don't think the Githyanki took very good care of him." Rick might be a demon but what the Githyanki had been doing was pure evil.

"He heats up this thing." Kate still couldn't believe it. This place was really different and her life was really going to change.

"Just tell him what you want heated up and when to stop." Then Rick spoke to the elemental. "Back in you go, Little Flame. I'll get you more food in a couple of days." Kate watched him hop back inside and Castle closed it again.

"This way." Rick walked back toward the stairs. "Oh, and he also heats up the water for showers or anything else. Pipes from the tank below up come up here, he heats those up. They in turn go to the showers or you can use the hot water here," Rick explained as he opened the door located between the doors and stairs that led down from the deck above.

"Down here is all the storage. Dry food storage, frozen food storage, and the water tank." Rick hid his smile as best he could. If Kate loved him she was going to love this.

Kate followed him down and saw a door that looked sealed just to one side with another door across from it. Straight in front of her was a walkway that had crates, barrels, and any number of things strapped to the ship on either side.

"Most of the food you gave me is down here all packed away. This is the freezer." He let Kate open the door.

The second she opened the door she got hit with a wave of cold, really cold. That was when she saw something that had her squealing and jumping back.

"That's Frosty. He keeps the space frozen." Rick grinned at her.

"Another elemental," Kate guessed, getting braver and stepping closer to get a better look.

"He was in a little better shape when I found him. I reached the same deal with him. I go to his plane and bring some back for him to eat and he keeps the room and its contents frozen. Just don't get yourself locked in here." Rick didn't think he knew the difference and would freeze everything and everyone.

"Frosty." Kate watched it bounce all around and everything it touched gained frost on it. She also saw all of the frozen food she had bought in there.

Rick closed the door and turned to open the other door. Kate looked inside and saw a tank about hip high that was filled with water. However, she squinted as she was sure she saw something swimming inside it.

"Let me guess, another elemental?" There was only one left and that was air. Of course she wondered if they had one of those also.

"His name is Little Drop. He's just a baby, too. He provides all the pressure needed to make the water travel through the pipes. I made the same deal with him. These three keep me busy once a month since they each need fed on schedule."

"This is the water supply. Touch it." Rick watched her step into the room and touch it. It instantly started spewing out water in a stream. It wasn't fast and it wasn't heavy, but it didn't stop.

"Let me guess, more magic." She was really going to have to wrap her mind around this. This place had so much of it.

"It will provide water and never stop unless you touch it again, so we need to be careful," he cautioned.

She caught on quickly. "I see! If we leave it running the tank will overflow." If the tank overflowed she didn't want to think how much damage that would cause.

Kate watched him touch it to stop it and then close the door. She started down the walkway that looked to be made of wood and possibly had space below her. She ran her hands over the crates and barrels and saw that each of them were marked. "You did this?" She knew what was in each one just by reading the labels.

Rick nodded. "Some of it. A lot of it was left behind by the Githyanki and whoever attacked them. I added what you gave me.".

Kate saw that what she had given him wasn't even half of what was here. It had her thinking she should have bought a lot more. Maybe they had gotten lucky.

"What's below me in the bilge?" Kate knew enough about ships to use the right word.

"Waste that we'll need to dump it from time to time. It's mostly sealed so you can't smell anything," he replied.

Now Kate knew where the waste from the bathroom, shower and whatever went. "Swell." She was going to give that job to Castle. She didn't want anything to do with it.

She kept walking and reading. "This one says sails."

"I have a spare set for all thirteen sails in case we need them. They're a pain to put in place." Rick had replaced all thirteen of them and had stored another complete set.

"Thirteen." Kate smiled and shook her head. "Our new lucky number, I guess."

He was ready to move on. "Ready to go up top? We have still more to see."

"Yes, please." She had seen enough below deck.

Kate followed Rick back up to the main deck then up one of the two sets of stairs. Up there she found yet another pair of ballista with the same number of large arrows with glass tips. They were mounted between each of the two clerestories that were all glass.

"How big do ships get here?" This ship felt big enough. Granted it was just the two of them, but eighty feet was big.

"This ship had a crew of fourteen. The largest ship I know about can hold hundreds and are several times our size. They don't have our speed, I hope. However, they make up for that in sheer power and number of people. If we tried to attack one we would be destroyed in seconds. I don't want to think what would happen to us." Rick shook his head to clear the thought.

"The captain's cabin is below us. Up there is the bridge." Rick pointed and Kate looked up. It looked a little bigger up close.

Kate followed Rick up a spiral staircase, ending in a large room that had a pedestal in the middle with a large flat top. "What are all these?" She ran her fingers over some of the symbols that were all around it.

"That's Githyanki. This is where you fly the ship. Deploy the sails, one at a time." Rick hovered a finger over those symbols. "Or retract them one at a time." He hovered his fingers over those symbols.

"These direct where you want the ship to go. Touch that symbol there." He indicated one of the two symbols below one of the windows.

She touched it. "WOW!" Kate watched as suddenly the view zoomed out. Then she risked it. She touched it again and watched it zoom even farther out. Then she touched the other symbol and watched it zoom back in. Touching it again had it zoom back in to where it had started.

"Each window?" Kate saw Castle nod. "WOW!" Then she began looking around.

She waved a hand at all the stuff on shelves below the windows. "What's all this?"

"That's the secret of this ship. You take one and place it on the top and it will spread the magic of the item throughout the ship. Each item will affect the ship. You're only limited by your imagination." Rick loved this part. He hadn't actually believed that old man so he tested it.

"I'll show you." He took his ring off. "My ring is magical. It will repair any damage to my body. It will even regrow limbs if one is cut off." Rick placed it on the pedestal then chose a small dagger from a shelf. "Now watch." He used it to cut a small sliver of wood out of the ship.

Kate stared at it as slowly, over time, it repaired it. "NO WAY! It'll do that to whoever wears this ring?" She started to pick it up, then drew her hand away in case the damage to the ship hadn't finished being repaired yet.

She looked at Castle with hope in her eyes. "Have you got another of those?"

"Believe in magic finally?" Rick teased.

"I'm getting there, I'm getting there." He hadn't answered her question, though. "The ring?"

"I only have the one. It cost me a fortune to get it."

Kate's whole demeanor changed. She was suddenly giving off waves of sadness. "In women's lives." He had condemned them to death at the hands of his master.

Rick knew that voice and he hated it. He reached over and hugged her. "That was a different me. It was before I met you. I can't undo what I did. Those women are gone. But we have something from them." They had a Ring of Regeneration.

"Yeah, I suppose." It didn't feel like a fair trade to her. Still there wasn't anything she could do about it. Then a bolt of fear lanced through her.

"What's your master going to say when you stop bringing him women? Will he hunt you down and punish you?" She still might lose him and that terrified her.

"He has to find me first. But yes, if he finds us, he'll make sure we know pain. Pray that he kills us in the first hundred years." Rick didn't think he could ever find them, but he wasn't sure. Magic could do a lot of things.

"FIRST hundred years!?" Kate opened her eyes wide in shock. GOOD GOD!

.x{O}x.=.o[X]o.=.x{O}x.=.o[X]o.=.x{O}x.=.o[X]o.=.x{O}x.

Kate had tried the shower after telling the little guy to heat up the water. That was followed by making love to Castle in their new bed. It felt different, really nice. He was as good as ever if not better. He was hers, all hers.

She was lying on Castle and doodling on his chest. She now had a lot of answers. She knew how his massive cock could fit inside her without ripping her wide open and leaving her bleeding. How she could get a cock that big into her mouth let alone down her throat. It hadn't changed his size or his taste. He was still amazing and the best she had ever had. "Castle… when do we solve my cancer problem?" She didn't want to die.

"We need to create a plan. I need to take you to an upper Plane where I'll leave you. You'll have to go into the city and find a temple. Tell them what you want to buy and pay them, if I have the gold for it. You then read the scrolls and start wearing my ring and that should cure you." It was all he could think of. It had to work or he was going to cut his heart out to prevent the pain of it killing him.

"We can start planning in a bit." Kate reached down and started to play with his cock's head and watched his cock start to enlarge. It was still amazing that his basically normal size cock when soft could get so damn big. "You ready for round four, babe?" she purred.

She squealed when Castle spun them and rolled her beneath him. He grabbed hold of her ankles, pushed her legs toward her head, and place his cock head at her entrance.

"Fuck me, babe. Fill me with that cock of yours." Kate had planned ahead a little. She had managed to get a larger prescription for birth control from her doctor. She knew she would eventually run out. At least right now she had protection.

Kate squeezed her eyes closed as she felt his cock bury itself deep inside her. Then she opened them and looked down. His entire cock was buried deep inside her and she felt completely full. She watched as he pulled almost all the way out as he pulled her legs back down and then rammed it deep inside her as he pushed her legs closer to her head.

"YES! Fuck me, babe, fuck me hard." She was convinced that she loved him. She would love him even more if he saved her from dying a painful death.