The Silver Death At Play Or…

Mildly amused, Marishanna watched from her hammock of silken rope, lined with satin cushions, as two girls, naked but for thigh-high boots, flailed and clawed at each other in the fighting pit that was the centre of attention for every soul - man, woman or whatever - that had chosen to frequent The Wolf-Den on that particular night. It was typical of the entertainment the tavern provided, and exactly the sort of thing the wicked adventuress liked best.

The girls fought on a surface of fine, sandy soil, and kicked up clouds of dust whenever they wrestled each other to the ground, but that was soon to change. The moment the crowd started to loose interest, taps were turned, and water began to pour into the fighting pit, turning the soil to mud. Thereafter, the girls stirred up splashes of slimy ooze whenever they hit the ground, and it did not take long for them to get covered from head to toe in the stuff.

Marishanna smiled slyly. She could imagine what it was like for the girls, slithering around in the mud, feeling it clinging to their bare bodies and oozing down inside their boots…

The adventuress's leather-gloved hand wandered down to that most private of places, hidden where her slender thigh-booted legs joined her small, yet athletic body, but she could not bring herself any pleasure there. She had quite forgotten that she was wearing her new leather body-suit, a legless and sleeveless garment that laced shut up the front.

Denied her pleasure, the warrior-woman looked around for someone else to play with. There was plenty of potential to choose from, but Marishanna was quite demanding in her needs - a whore simply would not suffice, their passion burned out by overuse, and there were whores aplenty at The Wolf-Den every night. The waitresses, though appealing in their deer-skin two-piece swimsuits and glossy thigh-high boots, were not allowed to…interact with the customers, a rule enforced by a number of battle-weary warriors now seeking to earn a living without having to wade through gore and participate in massacres to get it.

All that were left were the other customers, but most of the women in the tavern were accompanied, by friends, lovers or paid bodyguards. The bodyguards did a lot of business here in the independent port of Ilshan-Gyrria, so much so that they had been able to form their own Guild. The idea had some appeal for Marishanna, giving her access to a variety of intriguing females, but the Guild had strict rules against any kind of activity beyond the recognised scope of their profession. A squandered opportunity, thought the warrior-woman, and she slid from her hammock to go hunting.

Marishanna had a particular technique for seeking out her pleasure-prey. Her size worked in her favour here - she stood barely as high as the bottom of most people's rib-cages, even with her wicked golden spiked heels - enabling her to move easily through the throng and brush invitingly against the thighs and behinds of any female she took an interest in. If that approach did not work out, incurring the displeasure of the target, her actions could always be harmlessly dismissed as accidental contact.

If that excuse failed, Marishanna knew she could always deal with any violence. Twice - once elsewhere, and once in Ilshan-Gyrria, her apologies had fallen on deaf ears - and shortly after, those ears, still attached to the offender's head, ended up on the floor, parted from the body by the diminutive adventuress's lethal magical sword, Silver Death.

Despite the sporadic incidences of violence, the technique seemed to work. For every time she was ignored or rejected, Marishanna received varying degrees of interest, ranging from those who liked the feel of the girl's smooth, long hair brushing against their skin to some who would invite her to join them at their table and talk openly about their sexual experiences. On three occasions, the warrior-woman had been offered much more - in particular the opportunity to creep under the table and give her host one kind of secret pleasure or another - but Marishanna would always refuse, even if the idea was genuinely exciting. If there was going to be any intimate contact, it would be on her terms, in a place of her choosing.

I am the hunter, she always told herself. I accept nothing less.

On this particular night, Marishanna enjoyed little success. One woman giggled girlishly as the little warrior-woman's hair brushed against her thigh, and one man dared to reach out and touch her dark, near-ankle-length tresses, receiving bitten fingers as a result. Another man, clearly the worse for ale, suggested that he and his friends should throw Marishanna into the mud-pit as well, so that they could see three girls fighting at once, but a steel-hard glare from the girl, slender, gloved fingers subconsciously coming to rest on the pommel of her sword, prevented him from carrying out the threat. Eventually, she had worked her way right across the tavern and, not a little disappointed, climbed up onto a leather-padded bench to stretch out and relax again before heading back to her ship, the Succubus.

"Her ship" was very much the operative term. She had won the ship, and the loyalty of its crew, from the previous captain in a very short and one-sided duel. Raniv, one of a bat-winged humanoid race known as the Dyals, had seriously underestimated Marishanna's skills and the power of her sword, and he now lay dead and rotting on a lifeless rock in the midst of space.

Surveying the tavern from her new vantage point, her bench being one of a number up on a raised platform overlooking the whole scene, Marishanna spotted a likely target, obscured by taller bodies during her "hunt". One woman was sitting alone, one goblet on the table in front of her, a sheathed sword lying across her lap, her crossed legs causing her long, side-split leather skirt to fall open and reveal deep red thigh-length boots, with flared cuffs like Marishanna's but with proportionately lower and more substantial heels.

A warrior, Marishanna observed with increasing interest. One who relies on speed and skill rather than brute force, by the shape of her. Self-confident, young, very pretty…perfect…

The woman was not expecting guests, and was surprised to see Marishanna approach. That was quite a common reaction in any case, for there appeared to be no race like hers in the strange world Marishanna was now trying to make her own. There was a race of beings not dissimilar to the elves of the warrior-woman's home-world, but Marishanna treated them with caution, if not disdain - the elves of her world had often referred to her kind, the Salvandireen, as "false elves" or at the very worst "stunted verminous goblin-spawned half-breeds".

"Forgive my intrusion, fellow adventurer", said Marishanna, "but I could not help but notice you. I wonder…are you perhaps available to take part in an excursion I have planned? We could use another sword, where we are going."

"And what manner of excursion would that be?", the swordswoman asked. Her voice was particularly refined, suggesting a childhood spent training her voice for giving orders to servants and welcoming the rich and influential to her family home. Stuck-up bitch, thought Marishanna. I'm really going to enjoy this.

Marishanna wove a story tailor-made to grab the woman's attention, involving fine works of art and a nobleman's daughter, all captured by pirates. The gratitude of the noble house resulting from a successful completion of the rescue was heavily emphasised, and the inevitable prestige of having other nobles in her debt was all the bait Marishanna needed to snare her prize.

Marishanna struck with almost supernatural swiftness the moment Almaedora of the House of Two-High-Moons stepped into the apartment the little adventuress had rented for just such an occasion. The noblewoman was disarmed before she could tell that anything was wrong, and by the time she fully realised her situation, silken ropes had already been tightly knotted about her booted ankles and she had been wrestled to the floor.

Hoisting the woman up off the ground by the ropes, threaded through pulleys screwed into the ceiling, Marishanna began to play with her catch, humming softly to herself as she started to cut off the swordwoman's clothing, adding each piece to a growing pile of ruined cloth and leather. Marishanna left Almaedora's boots intact, for she had a genuine love for such footwear, and would make sure they played an important part in the exciting games that were soon to begin.

Hanging upside down in mid-air, her hands bound together and fastened to a heavy ring set into the floor, and a piece of fruit jammed into her mouth to gag her, the writhing noblewoman watched, panic-stricken, as Marishanna unlaced her little leather suit and peeled it off. Naked but for her long soft gloves and gleaming black thigh-high boots, the small woman strutted over, smiling slyly, to have her wild and passionate way with her captive.

The whole thing was perfect. To assault a noblewoman in such a manner was a grievous crime indeed, but Almaedora could never report it, the shame certain to ruin her life of high station and privilege. All Marishanna had to do was tell the authorities that the woman's participation had been paid for in advance, and the threat of the rumours such a revelation - true or fabrication - would spawn would be enough to ensure that no charges were ever brought.

"What would a woman of breeding be doing in a place such as the Wolf-Den in the first place?" was the first thing Marishanna would say in her defence…

The following morning, Marishanna got up with the first of Ilshan-Gyrria's artificial suns, leaving a softly-sobbing Almaedora bound, spreadeagled and face-down, to the bed with just one boot on. The other boot lay crumpled on the floor where an exhausted Marishanna had dropped it, its surface streaked with the sweat - and other juices - of both women…

Bathed and refreshed, Marishanna went to meet her ship at the harbour. "Where to now, milady?", asked Loprinan, the first mate of the Succubus, when she arrived. "It looks as though you've exhausted all possibilities here."

Marishanna had to laugh. She had, after all, done exactly that…

"We've dallied around this region long enough", she replied, strutting up the gangplank and onto the deck with the same wicked swagger she had employed the previous night, whilst closing in on her struggling plaything. "If we're going to make any money worth mentioning, we need to get right into the thick of things. Set course for Freeport…"

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